By now it’s no secret: I love scary movies.  And when I saw the Halloween decorations up at a nearby drug store I couldn’t help but get excited as my favorite time of year is quickly approaching.  Now John and I have some exciting things planned for the month of October, but we’ll let you know about them when the time is right.  In the meantime, I thought I might get my scare on and check out the latest demon-possession extravaganza The Last Exorcism.  So with a big old bucket of popcorn I sat in a very dark theater and dared this movie, “C’mon scare me bitch!”  Sadly, I’m not sure the movie heard me.  For as interesting as parts of this film are, in the end I was hardly scared. 

The film follows an Evangelical minister Cotton Marcus (Patrick Fabian).  Cotton has been preaching since he was 10 years old, and is much more of a showman than a real minister; he uses magic tricks in his sermons and often gets his parish to say amen to the most absurd things.  His father taught Cotton to perform exorcisms and he did his very first one when he was a young boy.  Cotton is making a documentary of his exorcisms to prove a point; not that exorcisms are real, but that they are in fact a hoax.  Cotton admits that nearly every one of his exorcisms was a fake and that he felt his services were more like that of a shrink than a real man of God.  But after reading about a young girl who died during an exorcism Reverend Marcus wants to expose the industry for what it is in order to save lives.  So Cotton takes his small crew with him on a trip to the backwoods of Louisiana, documenting his last exorcism.  Of course, strange things happen and Cotton must deal with his waning faith as he deals with what appears to be something very real. 

Directed by independent filmmaker Daniel Stamm, the movie was shot entirely on a handy cam and is presented as “found footage.”  By now we have all gotten used to the gimmick that is the handy cam movie.  Last year’s hit Paranormal Activity showed us how effective this style can be when you leave it alone and let the audience fill in the blanks.  Other film such as June 09 and The Blair Witch Project have fallen short of the mark as these films tend to reach for things and present the audience with ideas and notions that aren’t quite there.  This movie seems to suffer from this same fate as it struggles with being “found footage” and a Hollywood film. 
(more…)

[NOTE: Ryker's going to take over SHOCKtober! today. -John]

When I was a kid, my Dad would often let me stay up and watch the classic Universal horror movies with him.  They were on after midnight and we would eat popcorn and watch the classics.  Dracula, The Wolfman, Frankenstein, they all scrared the living bejesus out of me.  When I was older, movies like Halloween and Aliens scared me so bad I couldn’t sleep for weeks.  Since then I have come to enjoy the rush that comes from a really good scary movie.  It’s kinda like a really good roller coaster; the good ones stick with you for quite sometime and make you yearn for even scarier ones.   Sadly, most horror films I see aren’t so much scary as they are shocking or disturbing.  Don’t get me wrong, they are fun and all, but my quest for the really scary movies continued. 

That’s partly why I was so excited when I heard about Paranormal Activity, the new handheld camera horror film from Paramount.  All the reports that I had heard about the film was it was scary as all get out, and I am happy to report that these reports (at least for me) are TRUE! 

Paranormal Activity is the story of a young urban couple from San Diego who are having some strange occurances in their home.   Micah hopes to catch whatever is haunting his girlfriend Katie on film.  So he sets up a high-end camera up in their bedroom and lets it capture all night long to his PC.  Much like an episode of Ghost Hunters, we watch as the camera films events as they sleep the night away. 

Of course, things  intensify and Katie calls in a psychic to tell her what he senses.  It’s here we learn that Katie has had this haunting follow her since she was young and the psychic fears that they are not dealing with a poltergeist or mischievous spirit, but something far more dangerous.  He warns them not to get a Ouji board and not to get angry at each other, such activities may make things worse.  Of course neither of them quite follow this advice and the tension builds as what is caught on camera intensifies.  Director Oren Peli is so good at building this tension that the last fifteen minutes of this film was one of the most frightening experiences I have ever had in the movie theater. 

The obvious comparison that people are making right now is this the next Blair Witch Project.  While both use handheld cameras and had great viral marketing campaigns, the similarities stop right there.  Paranormal Activity doesn’t pretend to be some true story of events that happened; everybody knows that it’s a film.  The acting in Blair Witch was spotty at best and we never really felt like what we were watching was real.  Furthermore, the scares were few and far between and what payoffs we did get were, well, lame at best. 
(more…)

Newsflash…This just in…  MEGAN FOX IS HOT!!!  That’s right, Megan Fox is HOT!  And her hotness and all its glory is on full display in her latest film “Jennifer’s Body.”  Thankfully, her hotness alone is not the only reason you should run out and enjoy this film.

The story (Oh wait…there’s a story…did we need one?) centers on two young girls who have been friends since they were kids.  Jennifer Check (Megan Fox) is the hot cheerleader being chased by all the boys, while her nerdy friend Anita “Needy” Lesnicki (Amanda Seyfried) tags along wherever Jennifer goes.  There is a familiar, sexual tension in their friendship, and they even wear matching “Best Friend Forever” lockets around their necks.  Even Anita’s boyfriend Chip (Johnny Simmons) references how unusual it is. 

Jennifer talks Anita into going to a local bar to see some band from the city.  Jennifer flirts with the lead singer while Anita is cautious of his real intentions.  Anita fears that he wants to use Jennifer for his own sexual pleasure, but his real intentions as a worshiper of Satan are far worse.  Disaster strikes the event and Jennifer is whisked away in the band’s van.  Anita fears what may happen, and later that night Jennifer returns home covered in blood and spewing some black ferromagnetic fluid.  Yes something is VERY wrong with Jennifer.

While the school copes with the loss of the students who attended the show, Jennifer seems non-remorse.  In fact she is even more full of herself and on the prowl for guys.  She entices the star running back into the woods behind the field to help him cope with the loss of his friend.  She seduces him, gets naked (Did I say naked…well the really good stuff is still covered but the tease is just about as good, if not better) and…she eats him.  What follows next is a series of random boys disappearing while Anita desperately tries to figure out what happened to her BFF.  And when Anita finally DOES figure out what is going on, will Jennifer allow her friend to exist, or does she become her next meal?

“Jennifer’s Body” was written by Diablo Cody who is best known for her work on the film “Juno.”  Juno’s success is that it didn’t treat the teenagers in the movie as hapless stereotypes, but rather they were real people struggling with the challenges of growing up.  Cody brings a similar vibe to this movie, which on the surface is a teen movie.  It has a teen soundtrack, teen stereotypes, and deals with teen issues.  A running theme throughout the movie is female friendships, their strengths, and awkwardness.  I mean how can women love each other one day and then completely hate them the next?  There is even a scene where Anita and Jennifer “experiment” with these feelings.  That’s right, we get an AWESOME experimenting scene (F YEAH!!!) that, dare I say, is tastefully done. 

Cody tells her story from the perspective of Anita.  She narrates most of the film and I for one kinda dig that style of storytelling; it almost breaks that fourth wall for the audience.  She also adds a great deal of humor to the script, a necessary ingredient to a successful teen horror flick. 

Director Karyn Kusama doesn’t try any weird looking angled shots, or give us anything more than what we really need.  What she does give us is a lot, and I mean A LOT of Megan Fox.  Kusama knows that a large percentage of folks going to see this movie are going simply to gawk at Megan Fox.  So scene after scene we are treated to Ms. Fox as she teases us; showing  just enough to make us want more.  I wondered halfway through if Megan Fox was a good actress; she seems to hold the role quite well but she’s never really stretches herself.  But then again, WHO THE F CARES she’s smoking hot! 

I honestly didn’t expect this movie to be as good as it was.  It was clever, well written, and had a pretty kick ass ending.  I will say that for us horror fans, it wasn’t very scary.  But in the end I didn’t mind, I was simply having too much fun to care.