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Pipe Wrench (2009)
One of the best horror shorts I've ever seen...
From Blood and Guts Productions comes this short film about a the vicious acts committed by a psychotic, backwoods religious fanatic.
We start out the picture by watching this old man burying a body with a shovel near a corn field. All the while he's rambling religious quotes to himself. A couple out on the road at night run into some car trouble. Soon enough they meet up the old man who happens to run a garage and auto service station. Going back to his garage where they think they'll finally get help with their car and be back on the road, this unsuspecting couple becomes privy to the horrible secrets this old man is keeping locked up in a tool shed. They are led into this room where both are brutally and gruesomely tortured and the old man makes good use of his pipe wrench, the implement of the film's title.
For a short, roughly 15-minute movie, Pipe Wrench is a very entertaining and brutal story with a few cringe-inducing gore scenes. The old dude gives the best performance in the film while the lead heroine is moderately convincing for the most part as is her male counterpart as the geek boyfriend.
Pipe Wrench is overall one of the best horror shorts I've ever seen with good performances and effects and a very satisfying ending.
Blood and Guts Productions' DVD release of Pipe Wrench contains a preview for Deadly Detour, an upcoming micro budget gorefest from the folks at Maniac Films, a preview for an upcoming gorefest from Blood and Guts Productions, a Pipe Wrench trailer, and an entertaining behind-the-scenes featurette on the making of Pipe Wrench. It's clear director Brad Case, producer Shane Michaels and their crew had a blast making this film and it's very evident throughout the featurette.
Bled White (2009)
Pulp Fiction meets Zombieland
I have to admit; Bled White caught my eye with its DVD cover a zombie screaming directly at me, and blood spelling out the title. Well, when I put the movie and began to watch it, I thought it was an average movie, until it hit me and I realized that this was one hell of a zombie flick. The film tells a few stories rather than just one linear story: 1) the story of two hit men who kill humans to feed to a zombie 2) the story of a wife and husband who hire two men to kill humans to feed to their dead zombie son 3) the story of a young couple who try to make it through the end of the world. They are both very stimulating stories and each one really made me feel for the characters.
Right off the bat I noticed something about this film and that something is what really made me love this movie. Each story is like a serial and I can see (I don't know if this is true) that this film pays a lot of tribute to Pulp Fiction in the sense that each story cuts off and picks up with another one. Each story is intertwined and it's non linear, there is even this sense of pulpness and grittiness to the film that mirrors Quentin Tarantino flicks. There is great violence; there is stylization and great character development. That brings me to my next point
Bled White really makes me care for its characters. Character development is very key when it comes to zombie flicks because it helps show the emotion and the struggle when surviving a zombie apocalypse. The hit men are characters that you love but hate at the same time because they are cruel and brutal, and one of them is looking for his wife and you can tell that he really has a heart but won't show it. It's a brilliant character arc. The father from the second story is very quiet but contemplative, he understands what his son is and he knows that him and his wife will eventually die but there is still some delusion left in him. It's sad and I really felt for him out of all the rest. The director did a great job capturing the emotion that drives his characters.
The other thing that it does, quite nicely too, is show us just how bleak the future after the zombie apocalypse is. The film is beautifully shot and it uses a wide array of filters and color correction to give us this threatening and cold world that the characters are in. There are scenes where it looks like the whole thing is in black and white but its not, it's just washed out to show us how dead and cold things are. When its morning the sky is red and orange that maybe hints on the fact that there may have been an explosion or some kind of chemical that caused the atomic sky. The whole film is just wonderfully colorized.
If you are a zombie fan I would not pass this movie up. The movie is like Pulp Fiction meets Zombieland meets Dawn of the Dead meets Benny Hill. It's a fun time and I guarantee that it's worth checking into. This is probably one of the few movies that I have see that has running zombies in it and doesn't make me look away in disgust. So, if you have a chance to see it, give it a try
it's one hell of a movie.
Blitzkrieg: Escape from Stalag 69 (2008)
Blitzkrieg: Escape from Stalag 69 entertains
Like a bloody Thanksgiving turkey stuffed to the crack with outrageous nastiness, Blitzkrieg: Escape from Stalag 69 entertains. While some might find its two hour running time too dense, this combination of Boys from Brazil meets Troma film, is filled with bloody mayhem, clinical savagery, exploding breasts and (yes, ladies and gents!) cocks in peril! Guard that genitalia, son! A group of prisoners of war- including Russian, United Kingdom and (somehow) very modern day Bronx stereotypes – decide to break out of the heinous Stalag 69, but not before a deranged doctor, a sadistic warden and an Asian military torture guru all have their way with them.
Director/co-writer Keith J. Crocker employs every stereotype in the prison film book from woman on woman shower scenes to naked whippings to jokingly delivered homosexual undercurrents. Nicely, Crocker exploits the Nazi Terror sub genre (a popular horror offshoot that even has a box set to its name) without poking a thumb in the still fresh acid burn of reality – there is not a recognizably Jewish character in sight.
Filled with exploitive but amazingly strong female roles (a scene where a very naked Natasha mows down a group of soldiers in the woods is an incredible sequence), Stalag 69 is filled with slightly buffoonish portrayals that actually enhance the atmosphere of the film – although Tatyana Kott (Natasha), Gordana Jenell (Frieda) and Stephanie Van Vlack as a sexy, twisted experimenter all give fairly accomplished and persuasive performances.
Not for those with short attention spans or with a 'blonde' sense of humor, Blitzkrieg: Escape from Stalag 69 eventually delivers in its over-the-top craziness.
The Devil Within (2010)
Bloody, Brutal, and Powerful
Now, when I first heard about The Devil Within I was thrilled and when I read the synopsis I was even more but after I got done watching it I thought
it wasn't bad. It wasn't great, but it wasn't bad. There is lots of room for improvement but there were some good things about it. The main story centers on a group of 'high schoolers' who are throwing a super 18 party, well, drama between the group heightens and on top of that
there is a killer loose.
What I really enjoyed about this movie was the overall theme of this story
near the beginning of the film there is a long lecture of the 7 deadly sins and how greed leads to all sins, which is an interesting theory and it's also brilliant to see how these analogies play into the film because every character in this film is guilty of these sins. When the end twist arrives, it plays out real nice.
The beginning played out well and it really sets up the tone of what this movie could have been and even in the end sequences, this movie gets heightened really fast and it turns into a horror/slasher flick that I actually enjoyed. There was blood, there were brutal killing scenes and I really enjoyed the twist.
With that being said
there were some things that I did not like. First off, I was mislead into thinking this would be a supernatural thriller with the principal killing for rituals, then most of the movie turned out to be a teen drama and it wasn't horror until the very end, so to me this movie wasn't sure of what it was. I was kind of disappointed because I really wanted this to be a slasher or a supernatural movie.
The characters were unlikeable with the exception of three; two being a couple of idiots and one being a teen struggling against her alternate lifestyle and the others are unlikeable
even the ones that I liked turned out to be cheating and bad and I get it's realism but I wasn't please.
In essence, this movie was okay, it wasn't the best and it sort of let me down but I think this movie had a powerful message and I understand why the movie is called The Devil Within but I really wish this movie had executed properly. There were some powerful scenes but there is room for improvement. This movie was excellent but from a general movie standpoint it's okay.
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