Rama (Iko Uwais) is a rookie cop with a pregnant wife and he’s sent with a crack police squad to eradicate a ruthless crime lord. This crime lord has spent years taking lives and dealing with dodgy policemen and finally – hopefully – the cops have decided to take him out.

Housed in a thirty storey block of flats, crime lord Tama (Ray Sahetapy) doesn’t appear too concerned when twenty elite cops appear in his stairwells. Why? Because he’s prepared… with guns, knives, machetes and sniper rifles.

Within minutes of the operation our hero finds himself outgunned, outnumbered and out of options. He has to fight his way out, one machete-wielding maniac at a time. And sometimes five.

The Raid is anything but complicated. If you’re after stirring drama then you’re in the wrong place. Violence? Yes. Blood? Yes. Some superbly memorable set pieces? Hell yes. A plot? Kind of…

The Raid is let down by its poor plotting and bizarre character motivations, which appear tacked on and mostly irrelevant, almost to the point of distraction at times. Only focusing on Rama’s background and personality (for about three seconds) it leaves any scenes without Iko Uwais feeling pointless.

Luckily for Raid creator Gareth Evans he’s created such a compellingly insane action film that plot & character don’t particularly matter. It is clear Evans’ focus is 100% on displaying the insanely brilliant Indonesian martial art of Pencak Silat, which Iko Uwais unleashes with frequent voracity. It’s exhausting to watch.

Evans is a welsh-born filmmaker who moved to Indonesia half a decade ago and never came back, documenting and studying Pencak Silat, which then culminated in The Raid. He writes, directs, edits and choreographs, and the result is a monumental achievement.

Huge praise has to go to Iko Uwais, who proves himself to be a versatile and absurdly skilled fighter / actor. Reminiscent of Tony Ja in the Ong Bak ­films, he shoots, stabs, punches, kicks and elbows the living crap out of everything in his way. It’s stunning and hypnotic.

To help explain how utterly insane The Raid is, the cast includes characters named Mad Dog’s Man #3, Carrying Bowo Fighter #15, Hole Drop Attacker #7, Tama’s Victim #5, AK-47 Attacker #4, Tortured Man and Drug Lab Guard #21! There are DOZENS of people that meet a grizzly and brutal demise – legs snap, necks are sliced, heads are riddled with bullets and people are thrown about like ragdolls. It’s absurdly brutal and – rather troubling for my morality – gleefully fun because of it.

For anyone who’s never seen a martial arts film before – or freerunning films like District 13 or The Devil’s Playground – this will blow your mind. Although those who love a slow-burning romantic drama and hate violence, you probably should avoid this… and Gorepress… altogether.

The Raid is a spectacularly violent, brutally exciting experience. For what it lacks in character, plot and subtlety it makes up 10-fold with exhilarating action and endless thrills. Apparently part of a planned triology, I for one cannot wait for the sequel. The Raid is awesome.

Rating: 8 out of 10 stars

The Divide is a taut, disturbing, finely crafted piece of work. Featuring some excellent performances and packed with tension, this only suffers in the inevitably saggy middle, but overall this is 100% worth the watch. The apocalypse is here. Enjoy the show.

Eva (Lauren German) is having a bad day. Not only is she living with her effeminately pointless boyfriend Sam (Iván González), but someone’s dropped some nuclear bombs outside. Inconvenient, huh? Rushing downstairs, she manages to bundle into the basement of her apartment block, along with a smattering of other residents.

We quickly realize the basement is “owned” by the janitor Mickey (Michael Biehn) and luckily for them he’s a post-9/11 paranoid nutcase with lots of stored food and (thankfully) a toilet! Mickey is clearly teetering on the edge of cuckooland, but it’s not Mickey that Eva should be worried about…

As the ‘survivors’ begin to realize exactly how screwed they are, their sanity slowly slips away and factions begin appearing, turning their safe haven into a claustrophobic tomb made of metal and hopelessness.

For a film set almost entirely in one location, it is surprisingly compelling. It does sag horribly mid-way through, delving too slowly into the deteriorating sanity of the survivors, but luckily this 20 minutes of drag is surrounded by 90 minutes of awesome.

Acting wise, The Divide has a lot of talent on display here. Michael Biehn is utterly superb throughout and perhaps it’s telling that the film sags when his character is inactive (and tied to a chair…).

I was also surprised how good Milo Ventimiglia was, considering he’s normally just an annoying twit, and his ability to realistically display his growing insanity is a credit to his quality as an actor. The other supporting roles do very well and Lauren German’s Eva is efficiently elusive throughout.

Director Xavier Gens (Frontiers, Hitman) does an excellent job of crafting the script of first time writers Karl Mueller and Eron Sheean, making it into a disturbingly dark and claustrophobic experience. The start and end are stunning and Gens proves he is a director to watch.

The Divide is jammed with theme and message, mostly revolving around survival instinct and man’s inhumanity to man. Unfortunately this ensures all characters are morally demented in some fashion, from cowards to rapists, and it’s a grim and harrowing watch. The lack of gallows humour and genuinely likeable characters might have some viewers reaching for the remote, but this is ten times more compelling than other apocalyptic depressers like Carriers or Zombie Diaries 2. The Divide takes itself seriously and it’s a thought-provoking and brutal expression of Humanity’s fragile grasp on sanity.

The Divide would be the perfect companion piece of the computer game franchise Fallout, showing what could happen in one of those horrible vaults. It is superbly crafted, beautifully scored and ultimately a great watch. Narcissistic, dark, brutal and thoroughly enjoyable. Watch it.

Rating: 7.5 out of 10 stars

First on the docket is 1988′s Prison. Produced by Charles Band and directed by Renny Harlin, you would be forgiven for thinking this movie may be criminal but take 40 minutes to hear what Sarah and Dangerous Jamie think before shanking it in that yard, you may be surprised.

Alongside our feature review, we also put Empire International’s releases in front of the parole board to see if they are rehabilitated or if they deserve to be put in solitary confinement.

As always, send all conjugal visit requests and prison blueprints to podcast@gorepress.com.

-J&S

As you (should) know, THE RAID is coming to UK cinemas in 10 days and the kind people of Fetch Publicity have sent over a brutal clip from this insane actioner. Punching, kicking, elbows, aggression and a lot of machetes? Bring it on.

Check it out below:

THE RAID CLIP – FOUR ON ONE

For those not in the know, have some SYNOPSIS / BLURB below:

Deep in the heart of one of Jakarta’s most deprived slums stands an impenetrable high-rise apartment block. To most it is 30 floors of Hell to be avoided at all cost but for many of the city’s most dangerous killers and gangsters, including the area’s most notorious crime lord, it is a fortress-like safe house protecting them from the law. Even for the bravest and most experienced police officers it is considered a no-go area.

In a desperate bid to flush these violent criminals and their leader from their haven once and for all, an elite SWAT team is tasked with infiltrating the building and raiding the apartments floor by floor, taking out anyone who stands in their way. Cloaked under the cover of pre-dawn darkness, the SWAT members make their move and enter the block not realizing that this is the easier part of the mission. Once inside, it soon becomes terrifyingly apparent that the real problem at hand is surviving long enough to be able to get out again.

THE RAID will be unleashed across UK cinemas 18th May.

Bring it on.

We take some time to look at British horror through the ages, and present you with our Top 5 British Horror Film list, along with all the usual wrap up show trimmings including news, feedback, upcoming releases, and what we have been watching.

Obviously, the show is rife with digression. But it’s a tasty morsel of a show, scored with Lalo Schifrin‘s suite from The Amityville Horror. Played out by the American Werewolves track Die For Me.

As always, get your feedback over to podcast@gorepress.com, and get involved in the facebook page at facebook.com/gorecast.

-J&S

LAURA LAU is the writer, co-director and producer of Silent House, which is due to land in UK cinemas on Friday 4^th May.

Lau is dangerously close to being as prolific as Terrence Malick, having only made films in 1997, 2003 and 2012 (Grind, Open Water and Silent House, respectively). Working with her husband Chris Kentis on all these features, their latest is a giant leap away from two people stuck in an ocean, surrounded by Jaws’ cousins. Instead it’s Elizabeth Olsen trapped inside a house…

Gorepress’s Scullion had the pleasure of talking to Laura Lau about Silent House – check out his review here.

Lau comes across as a very smart, friendly, professional filmmaker who clearly loves a challenge. Below she talks about ‘Lizzy’ Olsen, the Uruguayan original, small crews, no crew, real fear, abuse, damage and a really big house…

WARNING: this interview contains spoilers for SILENT HOUSE, so watch it first and be enlightened by Laura afterwards. Or eat spoiler.

GOREPRESS: So who decided to make Silent House? Did a studio approach you or is this something you wanted to do since seeing the original?

LAURA LAU: Wild Bunch were fans of Open Water and they approached us to make the film.

GP: There is some stigma attached to remaking foreign films for an English-speaking audience. What was your personal opinion on this before directing Silent House and has this changed because of your experience?

LL: It’s tricky, but we felt with this particular film that there was room for us to do something a little different and push it a little further and basically use the original as a jumping off point. Generally speaking it is difficult doing remakes.

GP: Are you of the opinion that you’re looking to get this to a wider audience? That’s what a lot of filmmakers say about remakes…

LL: Yeah, I don’t think a lot of people saw it in the United States. Did you see the original?

GP: Yeah, only a few weeks back, actually.

LL: Well you’ll see that we made some fundamental changes to what the character does and what her motivation is and we tried to make use of the single take to convey this character’s reality and experience. It was different from the original.

GP: Talking of the “one take” aspect; this is the big selling point, isn’t it? This has been marketed as real horror in real time. Although it’s real horror, it is not actually filmed in real time – in one shot – as suggested. Was there any temptation to actually do this in one take? Or was that impossible?

LL: Well obviously it could be done. You could just turn on a camera and film the entire movie that way, but we believed it would not have been as interesting a film to tell this particular story in that way. Of course you could do it that way but – for us – because of the size of the camera and how long it could shoot for it just wasn’t something we considered.

GP: How long did the shoot take?

LL: We shot the whole film in 15 days – in three weeks.

GP: How did this method of filming affect your rehearsal process and preparation?

LL: Greatly. Because there is no editing, all the decisions that you’d normally make in the cutting room you had to make ahead of time, so right away from the script it had to be tailored exactly to the location because literally every single second is accounted for in the movie and since there would be no covering (we didn’t shoot any coverage) all of the decisions – in terms of pacing, of where the camera is and when we reveal what information – had to be determined ahead of time. So it was all about really being prepared. We didn’t have a whole lot of time to shoot the film so we had to be really really prepared and it was not easy to get any of these long long takes. They were challenging not only performance wise but it was also challenging technically, so we really felt that we pushed it to limit of what we could handle in terms of our resources available to us.

GP: Anything you wish you’d done on hindsight but were unable to achieve because of these limitations?

LL: [laughs] I really can’t think about it that way because so much of what a project is comes from what your resources are, and we got a lot out of what we had, budget wise and time wise. We had a fantastic DP Igor Martinovic and production designer Roshelle Berliner who Chris and I had previous relationships with and so they came onto this low budget film and brought a lot of production value to our project.

GP: You were solely responsible for the script, adapted liberally from Gustavo Hernández’s original. The slow and gradual reveal is very important in a film like this, especially with the revelation at the end. How did you approach the material during the writing process?

LL: When we were first approached we were told this was based on a true story and this true story was about this family in Uruguay and there had been these murders and that it had involved incest. Now the original film actually stayed away from the incest angle, but right away I wanted to know what could have happened in a family system that this kind of thing could occur. So I did a lot of research into the psychological damage that could happen to someone who has been traumatized as a child, and what kind of repressed secrets could suddenly be triggered by going back into this house. To me the whole film is an exploration of this fragmented person, this deeply damaged person, which was also very challenging for Lizzy [Elizabeth Olsen] because she knew that we were carrying a very heavy subject matter at the heart of this story. That was really the motivation for the script and the whole film is about how this character is her experience of reality as a damaged person. Her sense of time is fragmented and her identity is also fragmented, so hopefully the audience go on this journey with her and discover and understand what’s going on as she does. That was the through-line for the film.

GP: This method of filming must’ve meant you had to have the script 100% correct and shoot-ready before beginning, with almost no legroom for changes or last-second amends.

LL: I didn’t have a location before I wrote the first draft of the script, unfortunately. I looked at floor plans of houses in the area and guessed what might be a common layout… but when we actually got to the location it was different. It was on the water and had three storeys! I had originally imagined a two storey house, so I actually went to the house and rewrote the script to really take advantage of that location. Then me and Chris ran the movie from top to bottom over and over again. The script was really short – at 64 pages – and it made everyone really nervous because, as you know, it should be a page a minute and 64 minutes is NOT a feature. As nobody associated with the production had ever made a movie this way none of us knew if it would work, but it felt right to me. I had written 15 scripts and it felt right to me, but I didn’t know either, so we actually had to sign a document that said this would “time out” to feature length… but we didn’t know until three days into shooting.

GP: There’s not a huge amount of dialogue in the script and a lot of action, which Elizabeth Olsen has to deal with for the entire length of the film. How was she to work with?

LL: She was really tremendous. She understood that this was a really complex character and she understood that technically it was going to be very challenging because she never knew which take would be the one that would work, there were so many elements that could go wrong. For example the lighting – the whole house was pre-lit from above. There was a dimmer board operator who would ride the lights and it would take a while to get that right. Then there was the focus puller, there was the camera movement, there was props. There were lots of different elements that could go wrong at any take and if something did go wrong we’d have to start over again. For Lizzy the level of concentration and to keep herself at this very emotional state was very very challenging for her. It was very gruelling for Lizzy.

GP: Having experienced Sarah’s journey – real fear in real time – it’s hard to imagine anyone else squeezing into those spaces with Elizabeth Olsen. How many crew members were involved in making Silent House?

LL: We had a cameramen and a boom. Surprisingly the boom operator was like a magic ghost. We thought we’d have to do everything with wireless microphones but he was so amazing he was able to stay out of the shot. He very rarely – very rarely – blew a take. Generally speaking we would also have some of the AD department hiding in places in order to create certain queues and have doors open and shut, but generally speaking it was just the DP and the boom operator and the rest of us were just behind monitors INCLUDING the focus puller, who was pulling focus off a monitor. He was just tremendous. The 5G cameras are very sensitive to focus.

GP: The film is very claustrophobic in places. How much “acting” did Elizabeth Olsen have to do, considering the enclosed and dark nature of the piece?

LL: Lizzy really took to heart what the subject matter was. She was having nightmares throughout the filming and we actually used some of her nightmare material in the film. I think she was really holding onto the horror – the film is really about the horror that this child felt when she was hiding under the bed or under the table; she’s damaged and has a discontinuous sense of time. Things that happened in the past are feeling like they’re happening now, and so the idea for all of us was to convey the terror that they feel when they’re undergoing this kind of abuse.

GP: This is a vastly different film from Open Water, which was entirely out in the open, whereas Silent House in almost entirely inside a cramped house. How difficult was that to adapt to?

LL: It’s a difficult genre to make anyway and it’s definitely some risky material to deal with. It was also a huge risk to make a film entirely in one shot. It’s a different way to make a movie, it’s a different way to experience a movie and it a different way to tell a story, which is what excited us, in the same way Open Water excited us – it was a challenge. How do you tell a story with two actors bobbing in the water, alone, with nothing? How do you maintain and tell a story under the circumstances? In Silent House it was the same kind of question for us – how do you tell this story with this approach. We had this new technology in 2003, digital was just starting to become more popular and we asked what had we NOT seen? What type of film would benefit from this approach? We shot this film ourselves – Chris and I – we had no crew at all. You asked before about the crew on Silent House - which was small – but compared to Open Water we had a huge crew of about fifty people.  So we felt budget wise and resource wise it was luxurious compared to Open Water! But creatively speaking it’s always about story and character and how the approach would best be mined with this particular story.

GP: Trends in horror change frequently – from the influx of zombie films to a huge swathe of found footage horrors – and you must have seen the genre change a lot between Open Water and Silent House. As filmmakers close to the genre, how do you see the horror film industry evolving in the future?

LL: I can’t really answer that. I think there’s all types of movies for all types of audiences, like the tropes that are tried and true, and I think we’ll keep seeing those. With the tremendous amount of material that is being made it’s becoming harder and harder to find something different. On the other hand, that’s the challenge, how to find a way to make it interesting for ourselves – Chris and I – and this is true of the two projects we’re working on now, we’re trying to find a way to keep us interested in seeing things we’ve not seen before. I think it becomes more and more difficult with the sheer amount of production that goes on though.

GP: What are you up to next? Is it something equally as challenging at this?

LL: We’re working on a couple of thrillers, both based on true events, which isn’t something we intended. I suppose we’re just interested by what moves us and true stories already have that truth to them. So both of the new projects are inspired by true events and again you’ll see we’re trying to do something different with them.

GP: Finally, what is your favourite horror film of all time?

LL: I really have to say The Shining.

GP: An excellent choice.

LL: It’s brilliant and it’s innovative and it changed horror films.

GP: Thanks for talking to Gorepress, Laura. Good luck with those thrillers.

LL: Thanks Gorepress.

It wasn’t just the twiggy fella I didn’t want to keep waiting. As well as double billing the cult, British horror classic and it’s follow up, The Wicker Tree, those crazy Charlies had also managed to rope in the director of both, Robin Hardy, for a Q and A sesh. The cinema was rammed and the audience was chattering excitedly. Paul McEvoy, one of the founders of FrightFest, took to the stage and introduced Mr. Hardy to rapturous applause as well as a “woo!” from the back.

In a brief introduction to the bee-less and peerless 1973 original, Robin told us about the first time he introduced The Wicker Man in America. The film had been billed to the transatlantic audience as “the Citizen Kane of horror”, but not wanting them then, or us tonight, to take it too seriously he reassured them “that it was alright to laugh”. Then, as it was Christopher Lee’s birthday (I just checked it actually wasn’t. It’s not until the 27^th of May), Rob left us with Lee’s own description of the film: “it’s comic, it’s erotic, it’s romantic and it’s horrific enough to melt the bowels of a bronze statue.”

I’m not going to waste to much time telling you how good The Wicker Man is. Everyone knows it’s fucking awesome. The late, great Ewar Woowar plays Sergeant Howie, a scowling, perma-shocked, straight-laced, party-pooper copper. Sent to the remote Scottish island of Summerisle to investigate the disappearance of a young girl, Howie finds himself up to his balls in a community of singing, dancing, shagging heathens. Tempted by the brazen and bra-less Britt Ekland and played like a 3DS by the Island’s increasingly crazy haired Lord (Christopher Lee), the poor guy never stands a chance.

The Wicker Man is considered a classic for a reason. That reason being that it’s a sinister, silly, scary and surreal masterpiece with a jaw dropping and barnstorming ending. We all enjoyed it very much and look, here comes the director to answer all our questions.

We began on the subject of Christopher Lee. Robin told us that he “was always part of the plan. I wish he could be here tonight”. After a doff of the cap to the sadly deceased Woodward, Hardy told us different he thought his two stars were. “Two extraordinary actors. Christopher is a film star. He is, to me, a screen presence. When he’s on the screen it’s very difficult to look at anyone else. Edward, on the other hand, is a consummate actor. Marvellous actor. The two of them together are a fascinating duo.”

Apparently the genesis of The Wicker Man, owes it’s, well, genesis, to pranks. Robin told us that he and the film’s writer, Anthony Shaffer, had an ever escalating “habit of playing enormously over complicated practical jokes on one another. Sometimes they were virtually fatal, but the more extreme they were, the more we enjoyed them. He wrote Sleuth, which is a marvellous, games playing play. It has two people in it and in it two people play elaborate and almost fatal practical jokes on each other. It was an enormous success. While that was happening, we thought that we would like to do the flip side of the Hammer horror films. What actually is behind witchcraft and all that. The pagan religion. We produced a film which is an elaborate game. That moment on the cliffs, when Christopher says “we’ve led you every pace of the way here”, that is his triumph. His game has worked. In this film, we have seen all the clues, all the way through the film – which we put out rather like a child’s treasure hunt. Clues in plain sight. That for us was the pleasure of making this film.”

As revered as The Wicker Man is now for being so distinctive, at the time it’s being different wasn’t quite so positive. “While the film was very unique, it was actually a disaster when it came to distribution. The distributor’s said “it’s all very fine and we enjoyed it, but how do you sell it? Is it a comedy? Is it a horror?” In the beginning we couldn’t get anybody to distribute it, so I did it myself in the United States.”

This was bound to come up. What did Robin think of the Nicolas Cage remake of The Wicker Man?

“I think the remake had wall to wall elevator music. No songs. Nothing which was relevant to paganism. I don’t know what it had, apart from a plot. The plot wasn’t even that extraordinary. Wearing the bear suit, falling downhill…” He tails off with a grin that may have a touch of grimace about it.

The Wicker Man is over thirty years old, but still rewatched and also rediscovered by many generations. Why does he think that is? “There’s a lot to chew. There’s a lot to think about and pull to pieces. There’s quite a lot of meat in the sandwich. I think that’s the reason for it enduring. It’s now A-Level for Media Studies! It’s rather like being Jane Austen for English Lit!”

One element of the film which is particularly memorable is Britt Ekland, the landlord’s sexy strumpet daughter, who spends a scene singing and writhing, while pounding on the wall dividing her room and Sergeant Howie’s in an attempt to seduce him. Does Robbo have any fond memories of that time? “I particularly like the idea of having someone in the next room, who is conjuring up for you a marvellous image, romantic or erotic, take your choice. I think that it’s something that Britt did very, very well and… I certainly enjoyed directing it!”

Over the years, there have been rumours about the authenticity of Miss. Ekland’s posterior in that fabled sequence, so, once and for all, is it Britt’s bum? Or a bum double? “When we rehearsed the scene, I showed Britt through the camera exactly what we would be seeing. She said “you can’t shoot that with me. I’ve got an arse like a ski slope!” A little unfair, but anyway, I and the First Assistant Director went down to Glasgow and trawled all the strip clubs to try and find an appropriate bottom.”

The version shown that evening had some restored footage included, but is this the definitive Director’s Cut of the film? “It’s one of the Director’s Cuts! It was mostly putting it back together again after it had been butchered by the… The main bit is the first night, with Christopher Lee, in the garden, with the snails. I had to reconstruct that. Roger Corman had a print and we reconstructed it from that print.”

Finally, having recently made the follow up, The Wicker Tree, does Hardy have any plans to make a third Wicker film? Maybe in 3D? “Certainly not in 3D, but it will happen. I think, I believe. If we find the money, we’ll make the film. I’m hoping to make it in the Shetland Islands, it will be the Gods, these Gods who’ve taken these terrible sacrifices from mankind, it will be their comeuppance. It is ver loosely musically based on the last act of The Ring Cycle.”

What a fantastic chap Robin Hardy is. Well-spoken and completely open, sitting in the same auditorium as him to watch The Wicker Man and then getting to hear him talk all about it was an absolute pleasure. An absolute pleasure that I wish had ended as he left the stage. Unfortunately I stayed to watch The Wicker Tree. I don’t want to spend much time on it as I don’t want this to end on a sour note, or to spend any more time than necessary on an absolutely terrible film.

Texan, born again Christians Beth and Steve decide to go to Scotland as missionaries. Having little luck doorstepping the city folk, they accept an offer from the clearly-going-to-kill-them-in-a-sacrificial-manner Sir Lachlan Morrison and his wife, to come to their country estate and have a pop at winning over the country bumpkins. There’s been an accident at Sir Lachlan’s nuclear power plant, which has poisoned the water table and left the local villagers infertile, so they want to get Steve to knock one of them up and Beth to be their May Queen… I’m sure that’ll work out just fine.

The film is a mess. A terribly acted mess. There is a Christopher Lee cameo, but his four line performance has obviously been shot on green screen elsewhere and then awfully inserted into a pointless and poor flashback sequence. It’s over long, it goes nowhere, every character is ridiculous and Brittania Nicol and Henry Garrett (Beth and Steve) give terrible performances that would be hilarious if they weren’t inflicted upon you for ninety six minutes that feel like ninety six fucking hours.

The Wicker Tree is a baggy, badly acted embarrassment. It’s out on DVD on the 30^th of April.

Thanks to The Prince Charles Cinema for having me along and putting on “the most Pagan double bill of all time”. Seeing The Wicker Man on the big screen was a big treat and Robin Hardy was a thoroughly charming gent.

But what’s it about? Silent House focuses on Sarah (Elizabeth Olsen), who – alongside her Dad and Uncle – are renovating their old country / lakeside house. Unfortunately rats have chewed through the electrical cables and the windows are all boarded up due to bored teenagers lobbing rock through them (you know, for kicks), so it’s also very very dark inside their old home. Candles and portable lamps dark. Like the beginning of 28 Weeks Later dark.

After finding mold deep inside the walls of their old home, Uncle Peter (Eric Sheffer Stevens) buggers off to town leaving Sarah and doting Daddy John (Adam Trese) in the creaking, sprawling house-of-a-thousand-doors. But are they alone? Nope.

Soon Sarah finds herself locked inside the massive house, her dad missing, with an unseen enemy haunting, harassing and standing-in-the-background-looking-at-her a lot. But how can she escape the Silent House?

Okay, the set up isn’t vastly original, but then that’s what Silent House suffers incredibly from here. Remade from the Uruguayan original of the same name, Silent House was created from a lack of originality. For those who’ve seen only a few horror films, you’re going to have a blast. Horror aficionados will play “notice the cliché” and “hello plagiarism” throughout.

Luckily Silent House is scary either way. That’s the overwhelmingly positive thing I can say about it. It is an effective, scary horror film. Due to its one-shot approach, it plays out very similarly to a found footage film, except the actors can’t see the camera. Using this to its greatest effect, directors Chris Kentis and Laura Lau (co-creators of 2003’s Open Water) ensure the angles are perfect to deliver the jump scares and build an immense amount of tension. A lot of the praise should be heaped on Nathan Larson for his original score and music, which is deep and resounding and always foreboding. Great work from Larson.

Due to the way it is filmed, some people may be irritated by the “shaky cam” filming technique that my dad hates so much. The opening five minutes might make some feel sea sick and it instantly gave me a headache (which thankfully passed) so this filming technique won’t be for everyone.

So what about this “one shot” selling point? Is it convincing? Unfortunately no. Not at all. Apparently filmed in 10 minute chunks (rather than one long one), these transitions are sometimes startlingly obvious, and the film suffers from major continuity errors that ruin any chance of even pretending it’s authentic. A pet peeve of mine is the magically-teleporting bloodstains on white clothing, and Silent House is plagued with it, as Elizabeth Olsen’s chest is splattered with infrequently moving bloodstains, that grow, reduce, get fresher and change shape throughout.

Talking of Elizabeth Olsen’s chest, there seem to be an unnecessary amount of Olsen cleavage on display in Silent House, with some lingering shots down her top that’ll make some audience members uncomfortable, especially considering the context and themes of Silent House. Perhaps deliberate, maybe accidental, but definitely a little too gratuitous for something with such a disturbing undertone.

Luckily Olsen isn’t out-acted by her cleavage and is excellent throughout, projecting a very believable amount of terror into her performance. A great actress, it’s just a shame her character’s actions weren’t more… likeable. She drops keys, falls over, runs upstairs, almost has a Blair Witch snot-attack and repeatedly hides under furniture (to the point the audience chuckled when she scrabbled under something for the third time).

Then there’s the ending. SPOILER ALERT! I thoroughly enjoyed the switch from killer-in-the-house flick into a creepy supernatural horror, which was flagged effectively and produced some excellent moments. Unfortunately the “reveal” is something we’ve seen a dozen times before: from Fight Club and A Tale of Two Sisters (and the American remake Uninvited) to Identity and Switchblade Romance, you literally will not be shocked by this reveal. It’s just a little disappointing the house wasn’t actually haunted by ghosts of children, mean men and one weird mud-covered bald bloke. Again, for those who rarely watch horror this might be revelatory, but for most of us it will be a little shrug-worthy and clichéd.

Overall Silent House is a scary-as-hell horror film ideally suited for infrequent fans of horror. Elizabeth Olsen is excellent and the score is utterly superb, but if you’re a horror lover then this might be a little too familiar to gain the intended impact. Is it just one big gimmick to secure audiences though? No, but does it greatly benefit from this revelatory method of filmmaking? Not really.

Rating: 5 out of 10 stars

Starting with a quick retrospective of lead Viggo Mortensen, listen closely as we clumsily dissect the themes and subtext of this slice of Americana-through-a-British-lens, with all the usual off-topic diversions soundtracked by Nick Bicat’s hauntingly beautiful score.

As always, get your feedback in to podcast@gorepress.com. And don’t forget to like the facebook page over at facebook.com/gorecast.

-J&S

Grave Encounters is not only the name of the film, it’s also the name of the fake reality show, fronted by our fearless host Lance Preston (Sean Rogerson) and staffed by a rag-tag crew including goth camera-woman Sasha (Ashleigh Gryzko) and ‘medium’ Houston Gray (Mackenzie Gray, playing the Derek Acorah role in all but name). The gang are tasked with staying the night in a long abandoned psychiatric hospital where rumours of paranormal activity (see what I did there?) abound and it’s not long before they find what they were looking for. After being shown around the place and given a brief history of the abuse the patients received at the hands of an evil doctor, before taking their revenge and killing him (can you say Dr. Vannacutt?), our crew sets up their equipment and waits for nightfall. Once the cameras start rolling, the ghosts come out to play.

Found footage horror movies are a very mixed bag. Arguably starting with Cannibal Holocaust in 1980 and going strong all the way through to 2012 with some peaks and troughs in between, some are great and hugely inventive, but others are riding the trend in a rather lazy manner, being churned out simply to make money. Grave Encounters falls somewhere in the middle, occasionally hitting on some memorable, extremely well put together scenes but suffering from the fact that, for the most part, it’s all been done before. For every [REC] there is a Zombie Diaries, for every Troll Hunter there is a Devil Inside and for every Paranormal Activity there’s a Paranormal Activity 3, just waiting to scare you witless in the most derivative fashion possible.

Instantly we are aware that the cast and crew of Grave Encounters will meet an untimely end as the film starts with a Producer explaining that what we are about to see is the sixth and final episode of the show. You could argue that this robs the film of some of its tension but the apprehension here doesn’t come from whether its characters will die, rather how and when they will die, and it certainly does get tense in places.

Without wanting to ruin any of the surprises there are several scenes that had me jumping in my seat and making indecipherable noises at the TV. Because found footage movies are all filmed in the first person, that affords them a certain immediacy that is absent in other films, turning the audience into a character and placing them right into the action. This works particularly well in Grave Encounters and it’s easy to lose yourself in the events on screen and imagine you’re sharing the protagonists nightmare. Not only does Grave Encounters excel in making you feel like an extra character, it also does really well at making the abandoned hospital, in effect, an extra character too. It almost feels like the building is alive at times and it’s disorienting never being sure whether what’s happening is real or whether the long night and ghostly activity is playing tricks on our characters minds.

As far as the pacing goes, Grave Encounters suffers a little from a slightly saggy middle area but mostly, the action skips along as it should, with one criticism being that perhaps there could have been about five or ten minutes shaved from the running time and it would not have affected the story at all.

Grave Encounters covers familiar territory but it does it in a much more self aware and restrained way than most of its peers, never blowing its wad too soon in an effort to shock. It’s a wonderfully old fashioned ghost story told through very modern means and contains enough effective scares to please almost any horror fan. It’s not a perfect film by any means; some of the acting can veer towards hackneyed at times and it’s not quite fresh enough to deserve a remarkably wide audience but it’s an entertaining enough way to spend 90 minutes if you’re not already tired of the gamut of similar movies. Give it a shot.

Rating: 6 out of 10 stars

To celebrate the forthcoming release of terrifying new horror Silent House starring Elizabeth Olsen which is released on May 4^th, we have five pairs of tickets to a pre-release screening of the film in London to give away!

The screening will be taking place on Monday 30^th April starting at 6.45pm start at a central London location.

Not enticed enough by the words “win tickets”? Fine, then check out a synopsis below:

In Silent House, Sarah, along with her uncle and father, prepare their long-time family summer home, recently violated by squatters, for sale. But broken windows and cracks in the plaster are the least of their problems when they discover they are not alone and there’s more than just mold concealed behind the walls. Over the course of 88 harrowing minutes, their idyllic isolated retreat is transformed into a site of horror as the family’s past returns to taunt then terrorize them, exposing a hidden and distorted history. Silent House, a re-imagining of the Uruguayan film La Casa Muda, is told in real time in one continuous take, just as Sarah sees – and experiences – it.

To win a pair of tickets, just answer the question below:

Who plays Sarah in Silent House?

1.) Carey Mulligan

2.) Elizabeth Olsen

3.) Dakota Fanning

Send us your ANSWER, your FULL NAME and your PHONE NUMBER using the contact form below. We will need accurate details to contact you should you win.

Silent House is released in cinemas on May 4^th 2012. For more information please visit:

http://www.facebook.com/SilentHouseUK

Luckily most horror fans love zombie films and they especially love GOOD zombie films. Unfortunately it’s difficult to cut the skanky rotten crap from the awesomely undead, but one thing that instantly improves any zombie film (by 34% according to scientists) is Nazis. From Zombie Lake (1981) to Dead Snow (2009) those pesky Nazis keep coming back to life to rip, rape, eat and shoot the living into an early grave.

WAR OF THE DEAD is the latest Nazi zombie horror to land on English shores, but this time (and unlike many other Swastika-splattered undead flicks) this is actually set DURING World War 2. This is actually a Nazi war film.. with zombies. Awesome.

And you want something unique about it? This is the most expensive film ever shot on location in Lithuania. Unbelievable, right? It’s a little bit of history mixed with brutal violence and undead fascist scumbags. What more could you want? A synopsis? Okay then!

At the beginning of World War II in 1939, in a secret bunker near the border of Russia and Finland, the Nazis began “Anti-Death” experiments on captured Russian soldiers. Two years later the project was abandoned with all records destroyed on the orders of Adolf Hitler and the test subjects buried in mass graves nearby.

Soon after those events, an elite squad of US soldiers is teamed up with a Finnish task force and sent on a mission to seek out and destroy the bunker along with any inhabitants remaining there.

Following an ambush en route to their target, during which the Allies lose a considerable number of men, to their shock and horror they later find themselves face-to-face with the same enemy soldiers they had eliminated in the earlier skirmish.

The big problem this time around is the enemy is more fearless than before and much harder to kill. After all, they’re already dead…

WAR OF THE DEAD is out on DVD on May 28^th from all good (and some crap) retailers, complete with trailer and making of feature.

Gorepress review to follow next month.

Movie Mogul Ltd, the film company behind horror thriller Panic Button, have announced that their new feature film MONSTER PROECT has gone into development. Movie Mogul MD John Shackleton will write, direct and co-produce.

Check out the teaser poster artwork below:

Described as a “cross-genre” film, MONSTER PROJECT follows six teenagers who undergo a harrowing transformation into monsters, imbued with various abilities and ailments, and are forced to go on the run, fighting for their survival.

So “Teenage Mutant Hooded Monsters”? Crazy premise and ripe for metaphor, this could be a dark, interesting character piece… or a crazy death-filled comedy romp. Maybe both?

Commenting on the film, Shackleton explains: “Lurking beneath a hugely fantastical movie premise, anchored in reality, is a universal story surrounding a group of alienated teenagers. I’m hoping that this film will have a little something for everyone.”

Movie Mogul’s first feature, Panic Button, received its world premiere at last year’s FrightFest and was released on DVD in November 2011 by Showbox Media Group.

Watch this space for more info. Not literally this space. Watch Gorepress in general. This news piece is done. You can go now.

Bye.

Lance Preston and the crew of “Grave Encounters”, a ghost-hunting reality television show, are shooting an episode inside the abandoned Collingwood Psychiatric Hospital, where unexplained phenomena has been reported for years.

All in the name of good television, they voluntarily lock themselves inside the building for the night and begin a paranormal investigation, capturing everything on camera.

They quickly realize that the building is more than just haunted – it is alive – and it has no intention of ever letting them leave. They find themselves lost in a labyrinth maze of endless hallways and corridors, terrorized by the ghosts of the former patients.

They soon begin to question their own sanity, slipping deeper and deeper into the depths of madness, ultimately discovering the truth behind the hospital’s dark past…and taping what turns out to be their final episode.

To celebrate the release on April 23rd, we’re giving you the chance to win a copy on DVD!

To be in with a chance of winning, just answer the following question…

Which duo direct GRAVE ENCOUNTERS?

a) The Vicious Brothers

b) The Righteous Brothers

c) The Ford Brothers

Answer using the contact form below, only one entry per person will be counted. Competition closes on 30/04/2012. Good luck!

GRAVE ENCOUNTERS is on DVD and Blu-ray on April 23^rd 2012

The Avengers is awesome. Absolutely freakin’ awesome. Fancy some adjectives? Go on then! It’s sharp, smart, funny, moving, hilarious, tense, scary, brutal, fast-paced, insane, furious, awe-inspiring, sexy (naked Hulk! Tasty!), crazy and very very likeable. I want to see it again, right now. But I can’t. Stupid release dates.

So why is Gorepress reviewing it, and how the hell did Scullion see it already? Luck, basically. I entered a competition and won a pair of tickets to the first ever fan screening for it… like a lucky lucky bastard. So why is Gorepress reviewing it? Erm… there’s some blood in it. Badly-applied blood, but still some blood…

Right, so The Avengers is awesome. Yeah, okay, but what’s it about? Do you know who The Avengers are? No? Then you’ve got homework to do – go and watch Iron Man, Thor, Captain America and probably best avoid any Hulk movies because gamma radiation can apparently change Eric Bana into Edward Norton and then into Mark Ruffalo. But who next? (My vote goes to Vinnie Jones. “Don’t you know who I am? I’m the Hulk, bitch”. Could be epic).

So what’s the plot? Well, Thor’s evil brother Loki (played by the excellent Tom Hiddleston) has teamed up with a dentally-challenged alien race and plans on invading Earth. In exchange for the “tesseract” – a monumentally powerful energy source – Loki would receive an army to lay waste to Humans and make them his slaves. Told you he was evil.

But Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson on top form) of secret government agency S.H.I.E.L.D. has other plans. He reassembles The Avengers, a group of mismatched weirdoes, freaks, assassins and billionaire playboy philanthropists, and orders them to take on Loki and save the world. But is it that easy? Of course not!

The Avengers packs a heavy punch in the direction of other blockbusters. Whereas Transformers and Battleship make a complicated mess out of something mind-bendingly simple (they’re children’s toys!!) The Avengers takes a LOT of problem property and creates a smooth, exciting thrill-ride that twists, turns and explodes its way onto the screen. The Pirates of the Caribbean franchise should be ashamed. This is how you create a multi-character blockbuster.

This excellence is down to the disciplined and very smart Joss Whedon. The action in The Avengers is superb. Whedon crafts perfect action sequences that ensure every single penny is exploded across the screen. It looks awesome, sounds awesome and – consequentially – is a little bit awesome.

Yet it’s not just the explodey bits that rock. His dialogue is sharp and brilliantly wielded, creating moments of heartfelt pain and moments of absolute hilarity. The cinema was crying with laughter at one point. The Avengers is so much FUN.

But it’s not all about Joss. The general level of expertise on display here is amazing (apart from whoever did the blood effects make-up – you suck) with some of the finest CGI, creature work and set designs I’ve seen for a long time. And the acting? Exceptional. Everyone pulls their weight and delivers unique and excellent characters – from Jeremy Renner’s uber-cool Hawkeye to the unfortunate jet pilot who pisses off Hulk – this is a superb ensemble piece. It’s not Oscar-worthy brilliant, but exceptional by superhero movie standards (and yes, even better than Elektra). Oh, and Edward Norton, if you’re reading this – you’re an idiot. Same level idiot as Terrence Howard. You know why.

Talking of Hulk, my favourite thing about The Avengers is the big green ragebomb himself. Surprised? I was. I’ve never been a fan of Mister Banner’s story, and always struggle to see the value or possibilities in a plot involving a mild-mannered scientist becoming a giant uncontrollable git. Yeah, it’s Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, but that’s why there’s never been a Jekyll and Hyde sequel. One story, one possibility, little legroom for character development.

Joss Whedon – alongside the always underrated Mark Ruffalo – creates a really, truly interesting character out of Bruce Banner / The Hulk. He also brings something all other Hulk movies (and a lot of the comics) fail to truly depict; the raw and terrifying nature of the beast. Hats off to Scarlett Johansson for helping us achieve this, as we genuinely become afraid of the moment Hulk appears. The build up is carefully developed and – when it does arrive – it’s bloody terrifying.

But enough about Hulk. Is there anything wrong with The Avengers? 9 out of 10 certainly doesn’t suggest perfection. Although close to perfect, only minor quibbles prevent this from being 10 out of 10 genius; Black Widow’s superhero abilities seem ridiculous considering she’s just a human (grabbing a moving vehicle at 80 miles an hour, for example, without ripping her arm clean off) and the alien threat – Loki’s puppet-strings, basically – are never sufficiently explained, in physiology and psychology. This doesn’t necessarily ruin the film, but it does niggle the brain a bit and doesn’t leave you 100% satisfied. 98.93% but not 100…

Overall The Avengers is a must see. If you’re new to the entire superhero genre, I think watching Marvel’s recent canon of filmic delights is worth a punt otherwise you’ll miss out on a few concepts, storylines and characters (like who Agent Coulson is, for example. Or what the hell an Asgard is. That sort of thing).

The blockbuster of the year has arrived and it’s only April. Ignore Dollhouse. Forget Edward Norton. Pick a positive adjective and slap it on the poster. The Avengers is absolutely superb.

Rating: 9 out of 10 stars

Cassadaga is a random string of events, jumbled together and called a horror movie. It’s clear writers Bruce Wood and Scott Poiley had a decent idea about a serial killer who turns his victims into horrific flesh marionettes, but their execution of this story is incredibly poor.

Let’s begin at the beginning. The prologue shows our serial killer as a young “Buffalo Bill”, prancing about in a dress and playing with creepy dolls (in this case, creepy marionettes). The first line of dialogue has his overacting mum screaming “What’ve I told you about dressing like a girl?” at him. His reaction? He cuts off his penis.

Cut to present day and we meet our protagonist Lily, who is played with gusto throughout by Kelen Coleman. Yes, her name is Kelen.

Immediately Wood and Poiley prove themselves to be first timers in the world of feature film scripting. They were clearly desperate to have a likeable and brave protagonist, so they went for a twenty-something deaf orphan teacher who has adopted her younger sister and saved ALL her money so they can both skip continents and move to Paris, literally so her sister could get the education she deserves… whilst big perfect sis would wait tables (as a deaf English-speaking waitress in France, obviously) and spend every evening polishing her halo. A character needs a flaw to be truly sympathetic, but Lily is instantly ridiculous in how perfect she is, and we kind of hate her because of this.

That said… her sister is killed pretty much immediately and Lily gets over it pretty damn quickly, easily gaining a grant / placement / job (it’s not clear what) at an isolated exclusive university in a mansion teaching kids to paint (or something). She meets a loving EMT gentleman going through a bitter divorce and gets her fuck on right away. It’s all working out… until she randomly pays five hundred dollars (about £3.20) to see a psychic that might be able to get her in contact with little dead sis.

Little sis is there – of course – but so is something else! A horrible ghost monster woman who will do anything to mind-fuck Lily into solving the mystery of her death. At least that’s what we VERY SLOWLY discover over the film…
Unfortunately the plot is mostly absent for the first 45 minutes. A series of confused events just irritate rather than intrigue, with the cock-snip opening, a sequence involving a coffin, a weird house, a wank-happy weirdo, an insane séance, some ghosts, a random kidnapping by a voice-throwing serial killer and many other moments of inconsistent weirdness. Without a consistent tone, the film suffers greatly from a lack of direction and becomes quickly dull.

After 45 minutes we’re finally given our FIRST look at our psychotic puppeteer and his headquarters (rented out by Clichéd Serial Killer Lairs Ltd), which is a dirty cellar filled with masks, puppets and – naturally – a sedated woman being slowly made into a giant puppet. Does this have anything to do with our protagonist? Nope. Her story? Nope. The majority of the previous 45 minutes of excruciating confusion? Nope. It’s like the start of a new film…

Having ignored the advice of the psychic experts, Lily refuses guidance and leaves. Afterwards she hallucinates some terrifying shit, collapses in public and pukes up a lungful of bloodied maggots, but still doesn’t consider accepting that “guidance” the experts offered… until she almost dies in a psycho-ghost-in-a-car vehicular accident. Then – returning to the séance house – the psychic woman finally gives us the plot. One hour in. Lily and EMT boy are told to go all Columbo and try and solve the disappearance of a local girl, hopefully freeing her smegged-off spirit and stopping Lily from experiencing random ghost attacks.

By 1 hour 10 minutes it’s excruciatingly dull and angeringly plotless. Lily has random noise attacks which force her to lock herself inside a shed (smart move Batman) and is dumped by her nothingy boyfriend because – basically – she’s acting like a dangerously crazy person.

1 hour 25 minutes in and the press finally dub our serial killer Geppetto. Why? Because this is when the first murder victim is found! So this is a horror film about a serial killer who first appears at 45 minutes and the rest of the world hears about him 20 minutes from the film’s end! This is an endurance task not worth partaking in.

And the absolute fucking randomness doesn’t end there. A policeman suggests Lily sleep in the car why he investigates a lead!! Yeah, why not? Such is the endlessly random nature of the film, our protagonist and antagonist actually only first meet nearly 90 minutes in! Imagine if Laurie Strode and Michael Myers didn’t interact until the last ten minutes of Halloween?

Anyway, the final fifteen minutes then proceeds to be a laughable mess. At one point our hero is too busy flippin’ the bird and screaming “fuck you!” at the killer to look at the road ahead, resulting in a horrible car crash. Random, dull and idiotic – these three words sum up Cassadga perfectly.

I feel a little sorry for director Anthony DiBlasi, because he does a reasonable job of deciphering and filming Poiley and Wood’s awful script. DiBlasi is a decent director, having helmed the underrated 2009 horror flick Dread. Given the right material, DiBlasi could be one to watch. Just not because of Cassadaga.

Now there are some genuinely effective moments amongst the randomness – a “creepy tentacle on the floor” nightmare moment adds to the weird but in a good way (yet even this is promptly followed by J-horror cliché) and the entire puppet-woman is inventive, disturbing and brilliantly designed. Yet this isn’t enough to dig it out from the hellish confusion splattered onto the screen.

What’s more – and this is AGAIN the fault of the scriptwriters – the carefully set up moments and character traits never pay off. Lily being deaf is inconsequential, we never understand how the killer can magically throw his voice (male and female versions!), the dead sister storyline was redundant (need an excuse to do a séance? Her mum died years ago. There, I’ve snipped 40 minutes off your film), the EMT boyfriend storyline is ditched and never referred to again and her mum being a resident of Cassadaga years ago never seems to matter. It’s all so random and poorly thought out that it’s literally just made me rant like a crazy old man on a bus. And I hate ranting in public.

Cassadaga is almost unwatchable. It’s not disgusting, it’s not badly acted, it’s not badly directed – it’s just an absolute mess. And at 100 minutes it is far far too long to bother enduring. Much like this review. Avoid.

Rating: 2 out of 10 stars

Unfortunately this dull start is immediately followed by a dialogueless characters-getting-picked-up montage that features a genuinely angering bad song that warbles something about the word “break”. This annoying soundtrack continues into the next scene too, with more crap songs and a worthy, archaic score… and by six minutes in we’re weary and bored. Not a great start.

So what’s the plot of Break? Four twenty-something ladies are going on a holiday together, seemingly for a laugh, but Sarah (Lili Schackert) is reluctant to go because she’s just split up with her cheating boyfriend. Apparently they’ve been planning this trip for four months, so the others force her to go. Their plan? Travel into the “Canadian” wilderness and camp somewhere they’ve been before. They planned this for four months? I’d hate to see them organize a wedding…

So Sarah and her three friends go for a camping trip in Canada / somewhere in Germany and encounter a pair of hillbilly psychos (one massively retarded, one intelligent and obviously resilient to bullets). What happens next?! You’ll never guess!

Stalking, violence, rape and death ensue, and Sarah must muster all her new-found hatred for men and stab, shoot, beat and scream “fuck you” a lot at these rapey backwards psychopaths. Sound familiar?

Now originality has never been a strong point in horror, but Break should win the annual plagiarism awards for the constant and liberal stealing of ideas from a gazillion other horror films. There are moments from Wrong Turn, The Descent, Deliverance, Pig Hunt, I Spit on Your Grave, War Games, Paintball, A Lonely Place to Die and every other backwoods horror flick I’ve ever seen. Yet – unlike these – Break never shows a spark of originality. Break is a shameful rehash of a hundred other films.

Yet it doesn’t end with just the setup and violence – the character and dialogue feel overly familiar too. And did I mention the music? At one point it sounds like the soundtrack for Brokeback Mountain. And it’s so fucking intrusive.

To survive Break without smashing up your television, you need write a list of backwoods horror film (and general horror film) clichés and down a shot of vodka / gin / bleach every time one of them turns up; with hillbillies, bear traps, bow ‘n’ arrows, skinnydipping, no mobile phone reception, a surprise pregnancy reveal (spoiler! Oops, too late) and a “photo of the group before everyone dies” moment – you’re guaranteed to be utterly pissed before anyone even remotely encounters any peril. Add rape, murder, idiotic decisions, cannibalism, a virtually unstoppable killer, cars not starting, protagonists leaving weapons lying around for the “dead” killer to use… and your liver will explode after 90 minutes.

Perhaps the problem is in production. Despite everyone speaking in English and – although it’s desperately perpetuating the idea this film is set in America (oh look, an American flag!) – it is clearly made in a foreign country, showing a desperation to appeal to a broader audience and cut a slice of $$$ from the subtitle-hating American marketplace. It feels false and shameless and ultimately unlikeable because of this.

Break is German made. It feels German, it looks German, it sounds German. Every character has an odd accent, slipping from America to German to – I dunno – some insane hybrid from scene to scene. It gets laughably terrible when our strongly-acted “Americans” encounter a German tourist whose accent is less thick than theirs! It’s awkward and confusing. And did I mention the music? My God is it annoying.

So what’s good about Break? It’s reasonably well directed by Matthias Olof Eich – in places exceptionally so – and the gore / violence / special effects are very well done. Unfortunately Eich’s dialogue is horribly on-the-nose and lacks all subtlety, either due to translation issues or incompetence. Maybe both. Break is as subtle as a hillbilly fucking a chicken, there is no subtext or twists or shock reveals in this film.

Break is an overwhelming generic addition to the ‘hillbilly killers in the woods hunting girls’ sub-genre of horror. Poorly written, unforgivably lacking in originality and hugely predictable, I cannot recommend Break to anyone who’s seen a horror film before.

Rating: 3 out of 10 stars

What’s good? The acting, the plot, the dialogue and the finale, which is bat-shit mentally insane. Most fans of Joss Whedon will not be surprised to hear this, as he’s on producing and co-writing duty here, leaving the direction and co-scripting to Drew Goddard, writer of Cloverfield and a frequent collaborator on Whedon’s projects. The script and direction is sharply done and mostly pitch-perfect, packed with the expected Whedon witticisms and those incidental characters who are inexplicably given excellent one-liners. It’s a three-dimensional world (although not in 3D, thankfully) and oddly believable… although with some exceptions (more on that later).

There are cameos abound for Whedonites (or whatever Whedon fans are called), with actors plucked from Angel, Dollhouse, Buffy and even The Avengers (okay, Chris Hemsworth isn’t exactly a cameo here…).

But what’s it about?! I’m not saying. I can tell you it shoves the genre places it’s rarely gone before. Slapped with a 15 certificate in the UK, it also pushes these boundaries to the maximum, covering the screen in blood and gore. There is very little swearing and nudity on display here, but lots and lots of violence. And gleeful it is too. And funny. Unless you don’t like clowns. What?! I’m not saying anything.

There are, however, some major problems with The Cabin in the Woods. Unusually for Whedon, some of the main characters lack depth and aren’t fully realized. Chris Hemsworth’s Curt is especially lacking, becoming a jock-like jerk after being – apparently – a book nerd, kind-hearted fella. We’re not greatly convinced of this beforehand, so this change isn’t brilliantly flagged. This may be a deliberate decision from Whedon and Goddard, but it does leave you wanting. Oddly the other characters – NOT our main five – seem more well-rounded than our protagonists. Deliberate? Who knows. It just feels a little awkward.

And then there’s the finale. What a finale. It will split audiences to pieces – some will love it, some will fucking HATE it. I’m somewhere closer to the love it side, although there’s a moment during the finale where a big red button will cause many to mouth “really”? in utter bafflement. “Deus ex machina” fans will be very happy, though…

So that’s it. That’s all you’re getting. No major spoilers here on Gorepress. Apart from this; you’ll never look at taxidermy and unicorns the same way, ever again. “Say what?!” Yeah, it’s that sort of film.

Overall The Cabin in the Woods is a hugely entertaining, blood-soaked thrill-ride that will surprise, shock, amuse and delight. The ending may infuriate some people and the hype might kill off potential fans as it’ll never meet their expectations (no matter what they are). It’s not perfect, but it is immensely fun and utterly insane.

Don’t watch the trailer or seek out spoilers. Don’t ask me what the plot is. Just watch The Cabin in the Woods. It is bloody good fun.

Rating: 8 out of 10 stars

Despite the marketing artwork shamelessly plagiarizing Tarantino’s two-film killathon, Kill Keith is nothing like Kill Bill. For a start, Keith never wears a yellow jumpsuit, holds a sword or even comes close to having any kind of arch nemesis. It is also ridiculous, stupid, inane, unfortunately childish and bloody confusing at times. Luckily it’s also reasonably well crafted, surprising, enjoyably bizarre and actually a helluva lot of fun. Only worth watching with some like-minded mates and a bellyful of alcohol, Kill Keith is still worth a watch.

Keith Chegwin is a television presenter and occasional actor. He’s been around for a LONG time, from Cheggers Plays Pop to The Big Breakfast. He painted himself as a racist anti-Semite in Ricky Gervais’s comedy TV series Extras and even starred in Polanski’s 1971 version of Macbeth (as Fleance, not Macbeth). Outside of the UK he’s a non-entity, so this film will not travel well across the pond, but within the UK – in some circles – he’s seen as a British institution. Like Fish ‘n’ Chips, the Queen and skinheads beating up foreigners.

As the title suggests, Kill Keith is about someone out to murder Keith Chegwin. Yet Keith isn’t the only one in danger. A mad murderer is out to eliminate all the fairly-annoying breakfast television celebrities, all of whom have one thing in common: they’re all in line to become the next co-host of The Crack of Dawn, breakfast television’s most coveted job. The killer’s methods are random, but always involve cereals or milk…

At the heart of Kill Keith lies a romantic comedy focusing on Danny (Marc Pickering), a studio runner who people constantly berate for being a bit shit. Currently in charge of ‘coffee and arsewipes’, this spindly idiot has two dreams: to become a famous breakfast television host and to sexually involve himself with Dawn (Susannah Fielding), the face of The Crack of Dawn. Can he achieve these things? Or will the whole “serial killer” murdering anyone related to the show thing get in his way?

Kill Keith bizarrely (deliberately? Not sure) emulates the cheesy idiocy of weekday morning television shows whilst openly ribbing them, with ridiculously easy quiz questions to awful live-on-the-street segments like “Cheggers knocks you up”. Much like the never-changing format of a breakfast TV program Kill Keith is archaic in it’s sense of humour, with references to the original Batman series and one seriously outdated reference to the crapness of Skodas…

It features some really, genuinely bizarre waking fantasies from our protagonist Danny, from random war scenes down studio corridors to 1920′s black ‘n’ white crime noir in a car. Does it work? Sometimes. Mostly it feels childishly awkward, like a student’s showreel, with these flares added to prove artistic merit and inject “comedy” into an otherwise mostly paper-thin idea. Occasionally it feels like it’s desperately attempting to emulate Edgar Wright during his Spaced years, but it consistently misses the mark. Despite this, director (and co-writer) Andy Thompson does prove to be an excellent director in segments, but as a whole he doesn’t quite manage to knit the entire piece together well enough.

Because of this, Kill Keith turns out to be tonally confused – one second it’s incredibly self-knowing, the next it’s batshit mental, another it’s pathetically childish and another it’s brutal and bloody. As a comedy / horror it focuses almost entirely on the comedy element (and romance) and barely even considers the horror, with the violent elements being shoddily slapped together and more confusing than genuinely effective.

The trailer below is a perfect example of Kill Keith’s general tonality – I ask you to work out the plot, genre or protagonist from this:

The trailer speaks volumes and the poster and title are utterly misleading too, having nothing to do with Tarantino’s two-film opus! Throughout the film random decisions are made for no reason whatsoever. Aging DJ Tony Blackburn is played by a younger actor and then the actual Tony Blackburn – without rhyme or reason – is picked to be his lookalike! I can only presume this is done because Blackburn cannot act in any way, shape or form. Truly a crazy decision.

Kill Keith is packed with needless subplots involving the show’s manager (or whatever the creepy bloke is – job description is a little hazy here), a cleaner / undercover paparazzi and the ever-confusing Tony Blackburn situation. It feels like a short story packed out and procrastinated into a feature film, with very little substance and a whole helluva lot of random. Yet – somehow – it is oddly endearing and certainly original.

Quite possibly the most insane thing about Kill Keith is how good Keith Chegwin is – he’s excellent throughout, from his usual cheeky chappy schtick to his more psychotic moments of surprise violence. Chegwin is excellent throughout. So much so I’ve said it twice. Excellent throughout. Three times, dammit.

In fact, the acting in Kill Keith is generally pitch perfect (whatever pitch they were aiming at – still unsure myself). Pickering, David Easter and Dominic Burns are especially good, delivering a sense of the elevated absurd that the film requires. The quality performances really lift this above the Godawful mess it could’ve been.

Overall Kill Keith is absolutely unique: batshit mental, funny, bizarre, confused, puerile, smart, crazy and contradictory all at once. Do not watch it sober or alone, because it’ll probably just cripple your brain. Worth a watch? Definitely. I guarantee you’ve never seen anything like it. Kill Keith is an enjoyable mess.

Next up – Kill Lenny.

Please.

Rating: 6.5 out of 10 stars

SILENT HOUSE is a “re-imagining” of the Uruguayan film La Casa Muda (released as Silent House in the UK) and stars Elizabeth Olsen, the non-crap sister of Mary-Kate and Ashley and star of cult hit Martha Marcy May Marlene.

In Silent House, Sarah (Olsen), along with her uncle and father, prepare their long-time family summer home, recently violated by squatters, for sale. But broken windows and cracks in the plaster are the least of their problems when they discover they are not alone and there’s more than just mold concealed behind the walls.

Over the course of 85 harrowing minutes, their idyllic isolated retreat is transformed into a site of horror as the family’s past returns to taunt then terrorize them, exposing a hidden and distorted history.

Much like the original, Silent House is told in real time in one continuous take, just as Sarah sees – and experiences – the horror of this not-so-silent house. Looks ace.

Check out the trailer below:

Silent House is released in cinemas on 4th May 2012.

Will Jamie and Sarah give it the respect it deserves? Who is that third voice in the background? Why it’s Rosie, of course. Rosie joins us to talk XTRO and mock Sarah.

We also take a look at some of the best British horror flicks from the decade that Jamie was born in (We covered Sarah’s decade last week…) from Inseminoid to American Werewolf in London.

Don’t forget: We want your feedback. Best British horror lists, recommendations, corrections, etc. If it pertains to horror born of this great nation known as Great Britain, then we want it. Send it over to podcast@gorepress.com. Don’t forget to like the facebook page: facebook.com/gorecast.

We’ll catch you again next week,

J&S

So what is THE RAID?

Sometimes I like to write a little synopsis, but The Raid is so viscerally insane I believe the trailer does a fine job of explaining precisely what it is:

THE RAID TRAILER

Not enough? Okay, some plot stuff below:

Deep in the heart of one of Jakarta’s most deprived slums stands an impenetrable high-rise apartment block. To most it is 30 floors of Hell to be avoided at all cost but for many of the city’s most dangerous killers and gangsters, including the area’s most notorious crime lord, it is a fortress-like safe house protecting them from the law. Even for the bravest and most experienced police officers it is considered a no-go area.

In a desperate bid to flush these violent criminals and their leader from their haven once and for all, an elite SWAT team is tasked with infiltrating the building and raiding the apartments floor by floor, taking out anyone who stands in their way. Cloaked under the cover of pre-dawn darkness, the SWAT members make their move and enter the block not realizing that this is the easier part of the mission. Once inside, it soon becomes terrifyingly apparent that the real problem at hand is surviving long enough to be able to get out again.

Personally I love a film set in a high-rise tower block (District 13, Attack the Block) and this looks like an exceptional addition to this sub sub-genre of film.

Now this is one movie where the buzz is more than justified and is due to open across UK cinemas 18th May from Momentum Pictures. Expect a review closer to the time, but to keep up-to-date on all things THE RAID, check out these useful links below:

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/TheRaidUK

Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/TheRaidUk

Fanhub: http://www.totalfanhub.com/the-raid/

It doesn’t involve zombies. It doesn’t involve vampires. It hasn’t got a serial killer in it and nobody gets eaten by a monster in a cave, but The Raid is still worth your attention. As long as you love awesome, vicious action, you’ll love this…

More updates to follow.

On this week’s episode we dive head first into Homegrown Horror throughout the ages starting with our 70s pick, Frightmare.

We also take a quick glance at British horror from the 70s, along with briefly discussing AIDs, Olivia Newton John, Supernatural, cannibalism, and sweet classic suits.

As always, feedback to podcast@gorepress.com and like us at facebook.com/gorecast.

-J&S

Episode Guide

• 1×01 : Todd The Metal God
• 1×02 : How To Make A Humunculous
• 1×03 : Rock ‘N Roll Zombies Know Best
• 1×04 : Gay Day
• 1×05 : Monster Fat
• 1×06 : Invasion Of The Stupid Snatchers
• 1×07 : Terrible Twin Turf Tussle
• 1×08 : Cockfight
• 1×09 : Big Bad Baby
• 1×10 : The Ghost Of Chet Sukowski
• 1×11 : The Phantom Of Crowley High
• 1×12 : Checkmate
• 1×13 : A Farewell To Curtis’ Arm

I’m confident that, as a 29 year old female, I’m not what the makers had in mind as a target demographic for this Canadian horror-comedy but despite that, Todd & The Book Of Pure Evil managed to win me over anyway. It’s irreverent, fun, puerile and a throwback to the kind of shows that shaped my formative years.

Todd Smith is a High School stoner, content to pal around with his one-armed buddy Curtis, occasionally playing in his band Barbarian Apocalypse. They wear metal t-shirts, double denim and have bad hair, but that’s the least of their troubles. One day, out of nowhere, Todd is mysteriously lead to, what he later comes to find out, is The Book Of Pure Evil; a Necronomicon-inspired creation that allows anyone who comes across it to unleash their deepest desires, with disastrous, and often fatal consequences.

With the help of Science nerd Hannah and Jenny, on whom Todd has a huge crush, the foursome embark on a ridiculously silly mission to locate the book before their guidance counsellor Atticus (who may or may not have everyone’s best intentions at heart) does and before the student body diminishes even further.

Good horror TV shows have been slim pickings of late so amidst a sea of promising but ultimately disappointing shows like American Horror Story and the dire Oren Peli creation The River, Todd and The Book Of Pure Evil is a breath of fresh air. Never for a moment does it take itself seriously and that alone is wonderfully refreshing. It’s Buffy at its peak, minus all the pesky issue-of-the-week stuff, with a healthy dose of 80’s Sam Raimi sensibilities, a dash of 90’s influence and a smattering of Jack Brooks : Monster Slayer. It’s also one of the few instances of alternative culture being presented on screen that didn’t make me bum-puckeringly embarrassed on behalf of the makers. Sure, it’s exaggerated but it’s essentially a live action cartoon and not since Metalocalypse has there been a show that will almost certainly appeal to the sort of people it’s portraying, rather than lampooning them in such a way that it alienates much of the potential core audience.

I’ll be honest and say that Todd & The Book Of Pure Evil did not appeal to me immediately. It seemed laboured and overly forumlaic but, damn it, I’d spent my hard earned money on the box set and it was easy enough to watch so I persevered. Around halfway through the season it struck me that at some point, I had started to like this show. By the finale, I didn’t just like it, I loved it. The cast of losers had become lovable and the once laboured dialogue had become genius in its simplicity and quotability. The cast really comes into its own as the season progresses and is helped by a typically cynical performance from Jason Mewes as the uncharacteristically wise janitor.

Todd & The Book Of Pure Evil will not, and I feel that I can say this with certainty, appeal to everyone. Its audience is likely a niche one and there are probably a few folks who, unlike me, won’t sit through the awkwardness and allow it time to get its hooks in but if you do, prepare for a treat. It has an addictive quality; the more I watch, the more I want to watch. Maybe it’s the metal loving 90’s teen in me enjoying a little nostalgia or maybe it’s just that it smacks of those Saturday/Sunday morning shows we all watched throughout our youth, except with added vulgarity, profanity and buckets of blood, slime and a plethora of bodily excretions.

Like its protagonist, Todd & The Book Of Pure Evil is young, dumb and full of…well, you know the rest. It’s about as far from highbrow as you can get, but it never pretends to be anything more than it is and it’s this self-knowing aspect that really helps to propel it along. Given the seriousness of the horror genre lately and the scourge of overdone ‘found footage’ projects, this is a welcome addition. Give it a chance and let it win you over.

Rating: 7.5 out of 10 stars

I don’t remember anything that we actually say during the commentary, but I’m sure it’s amusing, informative, and handsome.

As always, feedback to podcast@gorepress.com.

Normal service to resume next week.

J&S