Halloween Movie Roundup!

Happy Halloween everyone! As you probably know, this is the holiday when the barriers between the living and the dead are the most permeable, and supernatural creatures wander the earth. They’ll probably want to watch movies, so you’re gonna want to have some decent horror movies onhand. I mean, if you were a ghoul come over to this side of the veil, would you want to watch The Ugly Truth? I thought not. So here is a quick roundup of great scary movies to watch on Halloween. Many of these are movies that even scared me—and I have a protective layer of cynicism towards most horror films that keeps me insulated from their effects. Okay, so let’s get to it: Gunmonkey’s Best Movies for Halloween!

REPOST: Again with the crocodiles: “Rogue”

Well, color me surprised and not a little contrite. Here I was going into Rogue with my critical scalpels sharpened, ready to properly eviscerate it, and to find—surprise, surprise—that’s actually an effective little thriller. In my defense, I did sit through Primeval, and the experience left me predisposed to treating giant crocodile movies in more of less the same manner as the villagers treated Frankenstein’s monster. Yet, this movie exceeded my expectations.

REPOST: God is in a Really Bad Mood: “The Reaping”

Sorry I didn’t get around to reviewing some new horror films, but I had some work and family issues come up. So here’s my review of “The Reaping,” first uploaded on August 12 of 2007. You probably weren’t reading this blog back then anyway, so it’s new to you.

By the time The Reaping slouched to its inglorious climax—beginning as it did like a hybrid of The Exorcist and Star Trek 5: The Really, Really Bad One and then moving on to feature Divine Retribution—I couldn’t help but think that more movies should end with The Almighty smiting the evildoers. Seriously, how can a movie end better than that? I mean, yeah, the cavalry coming over the hill is rousing, and Han Solo deciding to join the rebellion and saving Luke’s bacon just in time to help him destroy the Death Star is a crowd-pleaser, but what truly beats The Big Guy taking center stage and dispatching the baddies? What better way is there to establish who is Good and who is Evil than to have Maker of Heaven and Earth weigh in on the matter?

Gunmonkey Exclusive: “Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans”

Holy crap! I’m going to be reviewing a film before many of the major media outlets! How did I fall ass-backwards into this? I’m now amongst the media elite! When do I get to suck Rose McGowan’s toes (as all professional movie critics do, I understand). Well, until that call, let’s take a look at Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans, a film which proves that if you put someone batshit crazy behind the camera, he can actually make Nicolas Cage look…well, normal is probably the wrong word. Bordering on normal. In the same neighborhood as normal. On the same continent, anyway.

2009 Summer Movie Roundup!

Hey, sorry this summer film roundup is so late. Part of the reason is because some of these films didn’t get a release in Thailand until recently. Mostly, though, the reason is that whenever I ponder for extended periods of time the cinematic offerings Hollywood horked up this summer, I’m overcome by the need to drink myself into senselessness. Then I wake up in my own sick, and possibly with unexplained facial injures, and, well, you can see where this would delay the creative process. Oh yeah, the summer of 2009 blew. Especially when compared to the sprightly and mostly fun summer of 2008 (hey, Crystal Skull haters, would you rather watch that again or Transformers 2 again? Yeah, I thought so). Okay, so before the DTs set in, let’s get started.

The Bangkok International Film Festival Concludes: Fiveplay…”Phobia 2″

So, the last installment in our roundup of the Bangkok International Film Festival, comes from the host country of Thailand. No, it’s not Sawasdee Bangkok! the country’s official entry (fer chrissakes, that movie is 247 minutes long–I couldn’t watch Freema Agyeman bathe for 247 minutes…well, maybe…probably not…possibly…), no, instead we’re going to look at a scary little installment called Phobia 2 (or Haa Phrang in Thai—Five Crossroads). Phobia 2 is a series of five horror vignettes, directed by some of Thailand’s most successful commercial directors. As a general rule, I’m not a huge fan of vignettes—movies or TV shows—since by design they can’t delve too deeply into the worlds they present. In this case, as a horror-injection system, they work pretty well. It kept the girlfriend huddling against me in fright, and what more can you really ask of a horror film?

Dispatch from the Bangkok International Film Festival: Zombie Nazis!!!! “Dead Snow”

Zombie Nazis! Nazis who are now zombies! This is a genius combination! Like rum and coke or sorority chicks and tequila. This is brilliant! I mean, I’ve never been a huge zombie fan, but zombie Nazis…well, that’s a whole ‘nother kettle of fish. Just imagine them advancing upon you in a shambling, undead goosestep, all in neat columns. I bet they’d even keep real meticulous records of precisely whose brain they ate and when and where and how it tasted. The whole “feasting on human flesh” thing even makes sense with Nazi zombies (not terribly culinarily adventurous, my people). Anyway, with this irresistible centerpiece (the Nazi zombies), imagine my enthusiasm for the Norwegian BIFF entry Dead Snow.

Dispatch from the Bangkok International Film Festival: “My Dear Enemy”

Hold on to something, because the next BIFF offering is a whipsaw 180-degree turn from Antichrist. We move from a movie that builds from a series of shocking acts to a horrific, over-the-top climax to a movie which trundles along with all the speed and power of a Prius. The South Korean film My Dear Enemy is pretty much everything Antichrist is not. It isn’t lurid, overheated, violent, or even possessed of much momentum. What it does have is an emotional center that drives the narrative and two sharply and realistically-drawn characters it follows for its runtime. It also has such a palpable feel of realism that there truly is not a false note in its entirety.

Dispatch from the Bangkok International Film Festival: “Antichrist”

Okay, so first up here in my BIFF reviews is Lars von Trier’s Antichrist, a film which left audiences bitterly divided when it premiered at the Cannes Film Festival earlier this year. It’s almost inevitable that LVT is going to evoke strong reactions, since he’s a professional bomb-thrower, and, hey, let’s face it: when you have a fox turn to the camera and solemnly intone “Chaos reins,” there’s a good chance you’re going to lose a big chunk of your audience. And when one of your characters performs a self-clitorectomy with a pair of scissors, you’re probably going to lose the rest.

Round up: Movies of the Bangkok International Film Festival!

Greetings from Bangkok! Krung Thep. The City of the Angels. The Big Weird. And its Thai name Krung Thep Mahanakhon Amon Rattanakosin Mahinthara Ayuthaya Mahadilok Phop Noppharat Ratchathani Burirom Udomratchaniwet Mahasathan Amon Piman Awatan Sathit Sakkathattiya Witsanukam Prasit (The city of angels, the great city, the residence of the Emerald Buddha, the impregnable city (of Ayutthaya) of God Indra, the grand capital of the world endowed with nine precious gems, the happy city, abounding in an enormous Royal Palace that resembles the heavenly abode where reigns the reincarnated god, a city given by Indra and built by Vishnukarn.) Yeah, we’ll just use Bangkok.

The, er, BIFF is a grand affair, hosting films from all over the world. It was kicked off by a black tie gala premiere of Werner Herzog’s The Bad Lieutenant: Port of New Orleans. Unfortunately, my invite got lost in the mail or something, so I missed that one. But it’s been chock-a-block with movies for the better part of a week. I’ve tries to see as many as possible, however I have a job and a girlfriend, and I’d really like to hold on to both of them, so I couldn’t actually spend 18 hours of each day in the theaters of Siam Paragon and Central World. Still, I managed to catch a few that I’m gonna share with you all.

First up: Antichrist (Denmark)

Second up: My Dear Enemy (S. Korea)

Third: Dead Snow (Norway)

Last: Phobia 2 (Thailand)