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Reviews
The Meateater (1979)
The word "awful" would be degraded if put next to this movie
Not one of the five pictures on the box of this movie are actual shots from the movie; they all seem to be photographs taken on set by a guy with a far better aesthetic sense than the cameramen. That should set the stage.
First off, the title is fallacious. The "villain" eats a rat in the beginning, and nothing else for the rest of the movie. Most of the meat-eating is done by the protagonists, including some disgusting closeups of hotdogs and campy endorsements for them scripted in for no apparent reason, the singing of the Oscar Meyer wiener song for no apparent reason, a big closeup of some roast beef for no apparent...okay, you get the idea. In fact, most of this movie happens for no apparent reason. The thought that the director even wanted to get out of bed after the first day of filming this abomination bewilders me.
The father of the family shows no facial emotion during the duration of the film. His children make you *want* them to die, they're so obnoxious and irritating (not to mention just as flat as the rest of the characters, if not more so), and his wife...don't even get me started.
The cops are so pathetic that it made me laugh hysterically; the police chief has some of the worst lines out of anyone, and the one other cop they show looks like a misplaced 30s gangster about to hop into his getaway car.
Gore? No. Despite the bloody fork on the cover (it's beyond me to guess how that wormed its way on there), there is so little gore that I'm surprised this got an R rating. Not that I'm one to complain about an un-gory movie, but such a movie would need something like plot, acting, scripting, etc. to hold my attention and stand a chance at keeping me entertained. Instead, my only entertainment came from ripping this movie apart and laughing hysterically at each new display of ineptitude.
Did I mention that the movie theater plays nature films to be family-oriented, yet draws a large teenage crowd on the weekends? That this film has the ugliest kid I've ever seen toting a skateboard around inside the theater, even though he was dropped off by his parents and they're picking him up at the end of the movie?
I was amazed by one thing, though. I felt *sure* that if anyone else had heard of this movie, it would be in the IMDB bottom 100. I can't believe that it's not in the bottom ten, much less the bottom 100.
Batoru gâru: Tokyo crisis wars (1991)
you could do worse
a so-so zombie movie from japan. if you like zombie movies, i guess this one's not bad. it never really excels, even within the genre, but...it's not bad. well, put it this way: some of the zombies had some cool makeup and there was some cool atmosphere. those two things are the true essentials of a zombie movie - alone, they don't make it good, but their absence will always make it bad. unfortunately, the plot just kind of goes into a downward spiral after the first 30 seconds, and some of the later stupid things include: 1) a maniacal military guy hellbent on controlling the world (to save japan's reputation?), and 2) half-mutant, half-zombie "monsters" which were spawned by simply injecting humans with the zombie virus and mixing it with other virii. this enables them to grow things like Wolverine-esque metal claws. no, i don't understand it either, but this IS from the same people who brought us the wonderfully-yet-bewilderingly bizarre gift of anime. oh, and the fight scenes...ugh. no, i won't go into them. but if you like zombies, you won't do too badly picking up this corny-but-entertaining flick from asia.
The Laughing Dead (1989)
arrghh...
i haven't felt so much pain just by gritting my teeth and sitting through a movie in a long, loooong time. i've seen worse movies - movies that were less inspired and movies that were more wholly inept - but only a handful, if that, were even nearly as painful. i think what really ruined this for me is that it had some vaguely good/okay concepts, but they were so horribly fleshed out that i just kept yelling at my vcr. the dialog was horrible, the acting was pretty damned bad, and the general premise was fairly weak (though if anything else had existed to keep this movie afloat, maybe it would have been salvageable).
there's nothing i hate more than when characters in horror movies catch on too quickly, and these people were freaking savants in that regard, especially toward the end. oh, wait, there's one thing i hated more than that - the characters themselves! i've rarely seen a more unlikable bunch. i hated them all. even worse, the only two good actors (well actor and actress) in the film had the two most annoying characters out of all.
the dialog hurts, it's so bad and so contrived (did i mention poorly delivered?). the only good points are 1) it ended before 90 minutes were up, and 2) the zombies, which appeared for about ten minutes at the end to play basketball, at least had good makeup. i don't think i can really give unmitigated credit to this movie for anything else.
Brivido giallo: Una notte nel cimitero (1987)
A painful disappointment
this is one of those typical movies in which a bunch of teens, driving around in their hippie van which they call a jeep, drive (quite logically) into a stream, astonishingly get stuck when they're driving against the current in 3-4 foot deep water, and go camp out in the nearby ruins of an old castle. the acting is pretty awful, and mixed with the actual dialog and plot, i just wanted every one of these adolescent abominations to die (it being a horror movie, after all). i won't put in any spoilers, but...let's just say i was disappointed to the fullest degree on that note. in fact, i'll add that i was disappointed by the zombies, or vampire-zombies, or whatever, as they didn't attack ANYTHING. one of them fondled another one's breast and got slapped for it, and one popped out of the shadows and just kind of gave up pursuit, but that was it. i was hoping for something of the gorier, more eurohorror-ish kind a la Zombie or The Beyond. instead, i got Mystery Science Theater 3000 material... but without the robots.