Creepy Ass ‘Children’

“Hey you kids! Get off my lawn, and stay the hell out of my gardening tools!”

A couple nights back, Lady Pain and I settled down with Tom Shankland’s 2008 English infant apocalypse The Children (not to be confused with the 1980s flick of the same name), and got ourselves a creepy, effective little nailbiter for our troubles.

There’ve been plenty of “bad seed” and devil-baby movies in the past, but this one’s not what you’re used to. A handful of ostensibly normal wee ones begin to use the skills they often employ to manipulate adults in daily life to deadly effect, tormenting their parents in a way far more distressing than anything you’re likely to see in a typical slasher.

It’s not that the methods of dispatch are particularly upsetting, but the assured way that they play on adults’ feelings for them is what makes this one so effective. The commentary on “enlightened” parenting (we don’t hit children here), though a tad heavy handed, is also a perfect example of the way the New Horror uses violence and arresting imagery to address larger real world issues. The camera work and its use of nature shots in the dead of winter are particularly effective here.

Sure, Shankland explains the children’s violent streaks away with some mysterious illness that’s infecting the tykes, but this is the only cop out of the movie, and probably instrumental in keeping this production safe from the censor’s ax. It no doubt also helped dampen the protest against the scenes where the adults start fighting back against their deadly offspring. The long buildup to the final showdown may limit The Children’s rewatchability, but this one’s definitely worth your time.

Icelandic Saga of the Bloody Kind

Usually the  most intriguing horror movie titles find themselves attached to the most micro-budgeted of flicks, which makes this little beauty all the more interesting. Ladies and gentlemen, slip into your rain slickers, grab your trail mix, and push off for the Reykjavik Whale Watching Massacre.

Judging by the trailer, what we have here is Dead Calm meets your typical redneck-family-gone-bad movie, with unavoidable comparisons to that other recent boatin’-fiasco flick, Donkeypunch.

Go on, throw a few bucks its way. It’s going to take more than Sigur Ros to tug Iceland out of bankruptcy.

Nope, Still No ‘Eye 3′…

I do enjoy when Google analytics shows that one of the search terms that lands people on this site is a verbatim quote from the copy on the Eye 3 Netflix sleeve. Keep searching, guys and gals. One day, one of us will solve this mystery, or die trying. For a brief explanation of said Eye 3 mystery…

‘Sorum’ Star Dies at 35

'Sorum' star Jin-young Jang died this week from stomach cancer. She was 35.

Everyone hates to see talent cut down, especially in the prime of life. But when you’re a horror fan, there’s an extra little twinge you get when a horror actor/director/etc. dies, as if noticing their passing makes you more morbid somehow. Or maybe that’s just my own sad hang-up.

This week saw the passing of Korean actress Jin-young Jang from stomach cancer at 35. In her short life, she starred opposite one of Korea’s biggest stars, Kang-ho Song (Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance, Thirst), in The Foul King.

Yet to fans of Korean horror flicks, or in this case, dark Korean dramas, she will always be Sun-yeong from 2001’s Sorum. Her role as an abused wife who, like the handful of other residents of a condemned building, is hiding a dark past, won her the Best Actress Award at the Blue Dragon Film Awards.

As someone who has only recently discovered the delights of Korean cinema, I find this particularly sad news. Can we please keep our tragedies on screen for the foreseeable future?

For more on Sorum:

www.koreanfilm.org/kfilm01.html#sorum

www.kfccinema.com/reviews/drama/sorum/sorum.html

www.mandiapple.com/snowblood/sorum.htm

And check out the trailer here. (Sorry, no subs, but you’ll get the gist.)

Yoga: Scares the Heck Outta Me

Always be leery of the leotard, especially in 'Yoga.'

I haven’t seen Yoga, the new horror flick coming out of South Korea (can we just say Korea from now on….what was the last flick you saw out of North Korea?), and I probably won’t. But I do so enjoy the fact that someone made a sinister bit of cinema about this health/lifestyle obsession.

Check out the trailer here — dig the subtle nod to Oldboy — and prepare yourself: It’s only a matter of time before somebody takes a stab at Pilates.

Refreshing Peek Behind the Scenes

'Tarot' is the jumping off point for a sneak peek at the Cinema Evaluation Board in the Philippines.

We don’t hear much about horror flicks from the Philippines here in the U.S., and I’m not sure if I’m likely to rush out and track down Tarot any time soon. That said, I found this little slice-of-life piece about the folks who screen movies there for tax rebate eligibility kind of funny:

“Since the time I sat in the board, the policy had always been to keep the title of the movie secret to those reviewing the film — that is until we get to the screening room. Why? Because if we find out that we are going to sit through what is obviously a crappy film, everyone will be calling in sick and we’ll never get to have a quorum. Administrative head Wilma Isleta and her assistant Rose Hicaro therefore had long been instructed not to tell any member what we are watching for the day.”

First Look at Natali’s ‘Splice’ at Frightfest

A preview of Vincenzo Natali's forthcoming movie 'Splice' will screen at this month's Frightfest film festival in the UK.

For we die-hard fans of Cube director Vincenzo Natali (and yes, I am working on a history of the Cube series, thank you for asking), the coming of his latest work, Splice, is the equivalent of a much-loved band finally coming to your town. While the film itself may not see the light of day until next year, word now comes from the director himself that a 5-minute preview of Splice will be screening at the UK’s Frightfest film festival in just a few days (Aug. 27-31).

Why should we be excited about Splice?

Since his feature film debut with Cube in 1997, Natali has demonstrated a passion for using stunning visuals (and in the case of Cube, a fair amount of blood) to explore complex ideas, and Splice appears to be no exception.

Adrien Brody and Sarah Polley star as two scientists who create a new form of life, which quickly gets out of hand. In the wrong hands, we could be looking at just another monster-on-the-loose flick. But Natali has yet to make a path-of-least-resistance movie to cash a paycheck. Look for some interesting images to underscore some thought-provoking ideas in Splice.

You can check out a detailed history of Natali’s work in The New Horror Handbook.

Grotesque: Take 2 – The Trailer

After seeing the trailer for Grotesque, I think I’ll stand by what I said in the last posting if it’s all the same to you.

Warning: Trailer contains a lot of unimaginative eviserations, and therefore may be unsuitable for those not yet desensitized. There might also be a boob under all that blood, but it’s OK. It belongs to Tsugumi Nagasawa, who was in Tokyo Gore Police, High School Girl Rika: Zombie Hunter, and Cream Lemon 7, so she’s pretty much used to being exploited by now.

Brits ban ho-hum-sounding flick

Japanese torture flick 'Grotesque' reportedly banned by British censors.

[This news courtesy of Japanese Horror's Twitter.]

The UK’s MovieMuser.com reports that a new Japanese movie called Grotesque (Gurotesuku) has been banned by the British Board Of Film Classification for violence. Here’s the MovieMuser’s summary of the film:

“A girl, Aki (Tsugumi Nagasawa), and her new boyfriend, Kazuo (Hiroaki Kawatsure), are mugged, knocked unconscious and kidnapped by an unknown assailant. They wake up to find themselves bound and gagged in a torture chamber-style basement at the mercy of a man armed with a mind-boggling array of kitchen implements and power tools whose only pleasure is gained from the suffering of others. So begins a slow and sustained assault during which the couple is gradually hacked, mutilated and degraded to the point where death becomes a more desirable option to living. Or is it? When one captive is offered the chance to die in order to save the life of the other, the question of how far one would go for a loved one is answered in the most unpleasant of ways.”

My first reaction to reading this plot synopsis was “sounds pretty…boring.” I don’t think I’m alone.

‘Let the Right One In’: Bloody Brilliant

The Morning After

Still racing to finish The New Horror Handbook, but I had to weigh in on Let the Right One In now that I’ve finally had the opportunity to see it.  Good heavens, where to begin.

Yes, it’s been hyped to death; yes, it’s been all but hailed as the Second Coming of horror films. And I’m afraid that, cynic though I am, I absolutely adored this movie.

People occasionally ask me what I mean by “the new horror,” what this blasted book is all about. Now I finally have one solid movie to refer them to.

Granted that adoration didn’t exactly come to me during the screening itself, though I liked it well enough at the time. No, it was more of a slow burn kind of thing — one of those flicks where you keep ruminating on it on the drive home, at breakfast the next morning, and for the next week thereafter.

There are several horror movies where you identify with the characters, or at least like them well enough that you don’t want to see them hurt by the movie’s Big Bad, but if they do get hurt, meh. This is the first movie I’ve ever seen where I actually grew to love the characters, including what by rights should’ve been the Big Bad — the vampire Eli. And it has one of those endings that makes you want to jump out of your seat and howl “Yes!” Sober!!

Product of Sweden that it is, there is the strong compulsion to say that this is the movie Bergman would’ve made had he gotten around to dabbling with the undead. The truth is that’s not very wide of the mark. The much-talked-about cinematography doesn’t exactly live up to the hype — how could it? Yet it does what it’s supposed to do — it manages to make the Stockholm suburb look as drab and depressing as it does the main characters Oskar and Eli radiant.

One can already feel those who are working on the US remake distilling the easiest to understand bits and siphoning off the subtle complexities for the slop bucket. Best to see the original any way you can — the DVD is rumored to be coming out sometime in March — before the Diabolical Power of the Remake compels you to renounce the original. And make no mistake, it is original. Hurry before the next cinematic regurgitations come sluicing down the pipeline.