Movie Madness Marathon - 2015 edition

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Morthrai
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Movie Madness Marathon - 2015 edition

Post by Morthrai »

Hi all!

In the lead up to Halloween I am going to have another shot at the "one horror or DC-related movie per day" thing that I attempted last year. As I will definitely be watching several of the same movies as last year, I shall refrain from writing capsule reviews of those and concentrate on things that I either have not seen before or have not previously reviewed.

Now to go and pick the first one, as I have not made a list! 8)
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Re: Movie Madness Marathon - 2015 edition

Post by Morthrai »

First up on this year's list, 1977's "The Car" 8)

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Re: Movie Madness Marathon - 2015 edition

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Well, as nobody seems to be looking I decided to try a bad 1980 B-movie I hadn't happened across before. "Without Warning" seemingly exists merely so both Martin Landau and Jack Palance can compete for the low-budget scenery chewing award :D

As it happens though, the flick actually has a reasonable DC quotient. Starting off with the pretty standard trope of kids 'going to the lake to have fun', it turns out that there's this alien who has these VERY DC-ish organic DarkTek throwing things (the word disc is not applicable but they are used like shuriken). Guess what? He's a hunter from another planet, come to get some prey...and not only is this flick cited as inspiration for the original Predator movie, it's the same guy who plays the alien (Kevin Peter Hall).

Not a wonderful movie in and of itself, but very much of its time and it does at least have the Palance and Landau characters who would both make excellent NPCs for a backwoods or Out Law encounter. 8)

I am also still chuckling at David 'CSI Miami' Caruso's awful acting in this flick - "looks like somebody (sunglasses) forgot their line" (Who riff) :twisted:
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Re: Movie Madness Marathon - 2015 edition

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Movie number 3 was one I had not seen in years, and was also pretty much the last in the run of semi-humourous anthology films originally popularised by Amicus in the 1960s. The Monster Club follows the pattern of those previous anthologies, and indeed features several actors who were often seen in those flicks.

In the linking story, renowned horror & thriller author R. Chetwynd-Hayes (John Carradine) saves the vampire Eramus (Vincent Price) from starvation. In return for this generous act, Eramus takes him to the titular Monster Club to help Chetwynd-Hayes gather material for his next book.

It's a fun flick, but it's done with a gentle-but-knowing cheesiness whereas the earlier movies it takes its lead from were (like the old Hammer films) played straight. I like Monster Club but if I were being picky I'd have to say its biggest failing is that it knows it's silly but doesn't let itself be too silly...unlike the Dr Phibes films for example :D
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Re: Movie Madness Marathon - 2015 edition

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Movie #4 - One that used to turn up on the telly when I was younger, 1978's "The Medusa Touch" features Lee Remick as the psychiatrist of novelist John Morlar (Richard Burton), a man convinced that he has destructive psychic powers. The movie starts off with someone bashing Morlar's head in with a statuette, and winds backwards through the story until coming back up to date right towards the end.

Riding the post-Omen wave of shiny big-name movies, this is actually better-written than I remember from years ago. Filmed very much in the florid style of the time, it tells its own story quite neatly. Sadly, it won't be back on the telly anytime soon due to the scene where an airliner crashes into a London skyscraper.
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Re: Movie Madness Marathon - 2015 edition

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Movie #5 - I only saw this particular 1982 flick once before until reviewing it for this series, and in all honesty it's no worse than I remember :D Q the Winged Serpent is (for no real reason) a mash-up of a New York cops & robbers movie with a good old-style monster flick. A strange sequence of seemingly unrelated slayings allied with witness reports of a beastly phenomenon brings seasoned detectives Shepard (David Carradine) and Powell (Richard Roundtree, at a loose end after the Shaft flicks) into conflict with each other, the system, and the lowest-of-the-low-level gangster Jimmy (Michael Moriarty) who knows where the alleged beastie just might be nesting...

It's a big dumb monster flick and never tries to get above its station, but IT'S THE CHRYSLER BUILDING YOU MORONS! HOW CAN YOU NOT RECOGNISE IT? 8)
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Re: Movie Madness Marathon - 2015 edition

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Movie #6 - As stated at the beginning, some of the flicks I am watching this year are the ones that I always return to. There's something about that combination of familiarity, DC leanings, and the strange sort of joy one gets from a movie no matter how good (or bad!) it might be.

Wednesday's movie was one of THE Dark Conspiracy flicks - good old "Split Second". 8)

Just in case you don't know this one, here is the IMDB.com write-up

Check out our old chum Chris Carpenter's review on the DC Movie Database
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Re: Movie Madness Marathon - 2015 edition

Post by Phulish »

Both "The Car" and "Q" are good fodder for DC games, thier age gives a nice retro feel.
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Re: Movie Madness Marathon - 2015 edition

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Morthrai wrote:
Riding the post-Omen wave of shiny big-name movies, this is actually better-written than I remember from years ago. Filmed very much in the florid style of the time, it tells its own story quite neatly. Sadly, it won't be back on the telly anytime soon due to the scene where an airliner crashes into a London skyscraper.
I remember the trailer for this scaring the hell out of me when I went to the pictures as a kid. It certainly made more of an impression than the film I went to see as I've long since forgotten what that was. Watching it for the first time on TV when I was in my late teens it didn't live up to my memories of the trailer but something disturbing about it nonetheless. Even more so now of course.

Would someone with Morlar's abilities be possible under the DC rules?
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Re: Movie Madness Marathon - 2015 edition

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Phulish wrote:Both "The Car" and "Q" are good fodder for DC games, thier age gives a nice retro feel.
One thing about these old movies dating from before first edition came out is that Lester and the others would have seen them, so they had an influence upon the game. The Car hints at demonic forces, but in DC terms we could say it's possessed by an Animator. As for Q, it's a giant beastie terrorising a city and must be stopped - pretty DC-ish :)
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Re: Movie Madness Marathon - 2015 edition

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Linden wrote:Would someone with Morlar's abilities be possible under the DC rules?
I am not sure that a PC with that level of power would be managable. I think that perhaps Morlar is beginning to realise there is more happening than just having strange powers - in DC terms he suspects that he is a fledgling Dark Lord. A pointer to this might be how intense the character is: Morlar is bitter and twisted, haunted by a lifetime of bad memories as well as dealing with the ever-increasing level of his abilities which are only ever destructive. He is also scared and helpless at the same time. Considering the overall ridiculous premise of the movie, Richard Burton manages to put some depth into the Morlar character.

There again, he may be an unwilling channel for Something Else... :twisted:
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Re: Movie Madness Marathon - 2015 edition

Post by Linden »

Some great ideas there Lee, cheers.

I remember my cousin telling me the film was based on a novel by Peter Van Greenaway who was something of a misanthropic, right wing oddball. Reading this article on his work by Christopher Fowler suggests there was rather more to the man than that. I gather The Medusa Touch is part of a series featuring a recurring detective character. Rather fancy reading them. Sounds like an author who's ripe for rediscovery via ebook?
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Re: Movie Madness Marathon - 2015 edition

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Movie #7 - One of several that belong in the category of "Not a Hammer film but may as well have been" :) 1965's "Die, Monster, Die!" is an adaptation of Lovecraft's tale The Colour Out Of Space. Although there are obvious liberties taken with the original story this is a fair enough stab at things. Steve Reinhart travels from the USA to the sleepy country village of Arkham (in the UK), to visit his English sweetheart Susan Whitley. After the villagers refuse to help Reinhart, he walks miles to the Whitley house only to get a frosty reception from Susan's wheelchair-bound father Nahum Whitley (Boris Karloff). Strange goings-on ensue with strange radiations and mutations, as one might expect.

Filmed with a crew including several Hammer names in the same locations used in many Hammer productions, it has that look and style. Also, if you're not really impressed with this one it only lasts a little over 70 minutes ;)
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Re: Movie Madness Marathon - 2015 edition

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I missed a couple of days so I am using the weekend to get up-to-date :)

Movie #8 is another "almost-Hammer" production. Horror Express is a Spanish movie featuring Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing as rival professors who team up to save the world from a deadly prehistoric menace from outer space on the Trans-Siberian Express! Of course, if Professor Saxton (Lee) hadn't dug the thing up out of the frozen mountainous wastes of China then everything would have been fine...

A fun movie that melds elements of English-language horror movies with European ones. Also features none other than Telly Savalas as a Cossack officer for no real reason - shame he doesn't last longer though. The Trans-Siberian Express doesn't look as luxurious as one might expect either!

Best summed up by this single line of dialogue from Dr Wells (Peter Cushing): "Monsters? We're BRITISH!" 8)
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Re: Movie Madness Marathon - 2015 edition

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Movie #9 - For this one, I thought I would continue a little further along the European horror movie trail. Dario Argento's "Tenebrae" tells the tale of an American author who moves to Rome, only to find his book plots seem to be inexorably linked to real-world murders...

I have to say that this one doesn't completely hold my attention, but I admit freely that even though this is regarded as one of Argento's more "coherent plots" it makes less sense, in and of itself, than "Deep Red" or even "Suspiria" did. Possibly one of those times where trying to make sense doesn't work because nobody was expecting it?
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