5 Lesser Known Presidential Monster Hunters

 

Oh sure you know the Abraham Lincoln legend.The Vampire Hunter president. 44 presidents and he gets all the fame for staking vamps and preventing an apocalypse. But let's not forget these other lesser known legendary presidents who battled the supernatural from the Oval Office.

5.)  John Adams/Johny Quincy Adams: Leprechaun Hunters

Father and son took on the menace of killer leprechauns who looked to bankrupt America.

4.) Benjamin Harrison: Troll Hunter

Post civil war president Harrison took a rag tag group of former Union and Confederates soldiers and battled trolls in Colorado

3.) Chester A. Arthur: Sea Monster Hunter

Arthur made new steel war ships in order to battle the ongoing threat of sea monsters threatening the east coast of the US....and he did it victoriously.

2.) Harry S. Truman: Nazi Zombie Hunter

After WWII, Truman had to battle the new threat. Nazi zombies. Defeating a zombie SS army by zombie Hitler, Truman made sure the Nazis were gone for good.

1.) John F. Kennedy: Succubi Killer

Kennedy had to battle the evil but beautiful succubi in all it's forms, seducing them as they seduced him. If it were not for Kennedy, the queen of the succubi, Marilyn would have destroyed us all.

Are you now educated by these other presidential American heroes? Good. See Lincoln wasn't the only one.

The Cabin in the Woods (Review)

The Cabin in the Woods

The Cabin in the Woods (2012)

Directed by Drew Goddard
Written by Drew Goddard and Joss Whedon

The Cabin in the Woods was suppose to come out on February 5th 2010. It didn't. The poster and trailer were released December of last year. We had to wait 2+ years for this to come out. As a hoarder and fanboy of all that is Whedon, I was getting annoyed and was losing any hope that this movie was ever going to be released. They delayed it to 3D it. Joss and Drew cried foul. Would we ever see this???

And yes we all would. But as April 13th approached, I knew Cabin would be my must see movie of the year. I was having Whedon withdrawal and even though he was giving us Avengers, it was mainstream Joss. With CITW, we were getting vintage Joss. Teamed with Drew Goddard (a Buffy/Angel alum writer/director) we were going to get the answer to that age old question...

"What would happen if Joss Whedon (and Drew Goddard) wrote a horror movie?"

And beyond my wildest expectations, The Cabin in the Woods is the best horror movie of 2012. To go even further, it probably is the best horror comedy of the last 10 years. My fellow jaded viewers, CITW is better than Scream (sorry Wes) and all its bastard children. Tucker and Dale vs Evil hinted towards a meta aware horror comedy but CITW goes lights years beyond that.

Simply and concisely summarized, Cabin is a meta self aware revolutionary horror comedy that takes those structured horror cliches, be it the stereotypical characters, the irrational choices, the set direction and the mythos and goes all man behind the curtain on it. Joss and Drew go all Wizard of Oz-ing on the horror genre and it's so brilliant, so awesome and so fucking clever you will leave the theater in a state of pure happy happy joy joy bliss and understand why #CabinintheWoodsisEPIC was trending on Twitter.

It's a horror reference machine, sending you cameos, trends and cliches a mile a minute and it asks you to get it. Do you get it? Do you understand the parody of what you're seeing? You don't? Then go ask somebody. Go watch the Universal classics, the slasher franchises, the Kubrick masterpiece. Then you'll understand why Cabin is going to spawn it's own genre and some bastard children of it's own.

Boring Plot-O-Matic

Five friends go for a break at a remote cabin in the woods, where they get more than they bargained for. Together, they must discover the truth behind the cabin in the woods.

Awesome Review-O-Matic

Of course, the movie is about 5 friends who go to a cabin in the woods. But in the opening scene (in classic Whedon fashion) the twist which is SUPPOSE to be in the middle of the film is the one that starts you off. Any way of plot points and spoilers will ruin the movie for you so I will now not mention much of it (like CTK @ Planet of Terror did in his review). What I will do is answer my standard Q&A when I review a slasher film (because I'm jack full of spaz tuna) and also go in a bonus round, let's cyberchat in the comments. Go, go gadget Q&A!

1.) Does the movie have..... a mysterious, insanely strong, ridiculed as a child, deformed, inbred redneck slasher?

Check...and it has so much more that I'm getting giddy and a horror boner talking about it.

2.) Gratuitous, over the top, super fleshy nudity?

Check. Rated R motherfucker. They're real and they're spectacular.

3.) Stereotypical teenage caricatures with a few old people who die gruesome and horrific over the top deaths?

Check. A blonde bimbo slut, a stoner "fool", the dumb jock, the smart guy and your standard prepackaged final "virgin" girl. Oh how you will howl with laughter at Fran Kranz's performance as Marty, the stoner. He spews Whedon-logue as good as Xander Harris.

4.) No Plot?

It's really a trick question as of course there is a plot and it's fuckin awesome. When you drank a can of New Coke, you know it's just a version of the original formula. Oh how I love the original formula. Classic Coke with a twist of sassy.

5.) Kills by our slasher that make you go "Fuck yeah!"

Check. You will yell out in delight and make a mess in your pants. You will see a lot of fanboy O faces.

6.) Gore, lots of it. Like serious decapitation, dismemberment, impalement, hatchet frenzy steroid rages and blood shooting out at various penetration wounds, limbs a flailing and mindless splatter and mayhem?

Check. There are LOL scenes of WTF by the various "things". The blood and splatter are top notch. Lots of everything I said above with a point that may impale your brain. Hint hint.

7.) Geeky leader who takes charge of the hapless group as they try to escape who befriends the hot girl who knows about the "legend" (there's always a legend no one believes)

Wow. Joss get out of my head. This describes our stoner Marty to a tee. Though the legend is more of the "Here is what the fuck is going on" to his friends and the audience. Marty is using is sight beyond sight. That's the real power of weed.

8.) Funny yet ill timed dialogue but also various quips and one liners that are funny only the first time around (yet somehow funny again when you buy the DVD and only when you're stoned)

Check. The Whedonesque dialogue complete with Buffy speak is as always fuckin brilliant. Sure, "teenagers" are spewing dialogue written by 30 and 40 somethings but it has always worked when done by the Whedon players. The jokes are spot on timely and hilariously LOL. The play on words and reverse logic make it all the more fun. It's dialogue and conversation that is probably written in a conventional way and then Whedon-ized to make it funny. Remember, Joss actually talks like this.

9.) Gratuitous cameos of horror legends (a famous man of the box, classic Universal monsters, Kubrick tweens) that make you flash a metal sign and do the Beavis and Butthead pseudo head nodding.

Check. SPOILER ALERT!!! This link here will give you all the info you need.

9a.) Final girl goes all final girly?

Check. But it's the final girl we see at the end playing "Le Director" that you'll be cheering for.

10.) Wildly ambiguous ending that can be used to warrant a sequel?

Actually...well.....ummm....no?

************************************************************

The Cabin in the Woods will be remembered as a game changer in the world of horror. It's a horror movie within the making of a horror movie. The Whedon elements are pure mythological magic, where he introduces something new to an audience that has long forgotten or chosen to forget why we all love the horror genre.

Goddard and Whedon break down into the slasher formula and ask the questions we've all asked before, during and after the movie. We've always questioned character motivations, absurd coincidences, elaborate backstory and heroic save the day moments but never has it been put in a movie so brilliantly and with such style and and LOL zingers.

A new generation of millennials has now been introduced us to the topsy turvy world of Hellmouth 101.

Nude-ipedia

A spectacular pair of mangoes

Gore-ipedia

Mucho slaughter via slasher weaponry
Mucho victim fodder via various slasher methodology

WTF moment

SPOILER ALERT!!! (scroll over to see)
----> (I'll never see unicorns the same again)

The Jaded Viewer's Final Prognosis

The Cabin in the Woods is clearly the film to beat as best horror movie of 2012. So many Buffy/Angel/Dollhouse alum I was oozing Whedonesque Fanboy-isms like a motherfucker. Everybody go see this movie. NOW. Drop what you're doing and see it now. Why are you still reading this?

Rating:


Check out the trailer.

The Summer of Massacre (Review)

The Summer of Massacre

The Summer of Massacre (2011)

Directed by Joe Castro

Well that sucked.

Back in the day, I would search out for the most fucked up, goriest, splattered fill horror movies out in the underground. I soon stumbled upon German splatter like Ittenbach's Burning Moon or Schnaas Violent Shit trilogy. I would get excited when I'd get my hands on this type of movie because I'd see unrated gore and splatter in all it's 8th generation dubbed glory.

Those movies did it old school. Old school tubes, animal intestines and red faux blood to create those effects. Sure they were balloons filled with red dye and such but it looked awesome. Well those days are long gone unfortunately.

Today we get shit like The Summer of Massacre. A movie whose sole premise is that it holds the Guinness Book of World Records for the Highest Body Count in a slasher film at 155. To get this record it fills 1 hour and 37 minutes with HORRIBLY BAD CGI KILLS. And I don't mean these were Romero like CGI, I mean this is MS Paint bad CGI. It's the equivalent of super transposed 16 bit Genesis graphics on top of the movie. Atari had better graphics than this film.

It's technically an anthology with self contained stories about a mad killer on the loose, some grotesque handicapped kid, killer father back from the dead to torment his son, camp kids killed by mutant firemen and serial killers with a nuke. It's not as cool as it sounds. Bad acting, bad makeup effects, bad stories and utterly fuckin shitty CGI kills. Sliced necks, ankles, necks, etc. Bullet would deaths. A whole level of stupid gross shit. I could list shit but honestly I don't even remember. This is pretty much the worst horror movie I've seen in the last 10 years. And trust me, I've seen a lot of bad ones.

I just can't stand movies who use CGI in their horror these days. I'm an old school guy with a throwback to the grind mentality. I'm pretty sure it's necessary at times but I like seeing the vicious realism of trauma. It's what I grew up watching and I appreciate the effort by the filmmakers when they go this route.

The Summer of Massacre is a crappy induced diarrhea mess of a film. I'd rather have my eyes gouged by hot pokers than see this film again. I'd rather be eaten alive by cannibals and shown by beating heart than see this film again. I'd rather have all my arms and legs chopped off and placed in a wooden box buried alive than see this film again.

The scary part is all those scenes are going to probably be in the sequel in really fuckin bad CGI.

Sonnuva-fuck.

Rating:
0 spinkicks

Check out the trailer below.

El monstro del mar! (Review)

El monstro del mar!

El monstro del mar! (2012)

Directed by Stuart Simpson

Did you ever want to see the Suicide Girls take on a sea monster?

Well Australia has got you covered. Because in Stuart Simpson's El monstro del mar (translated to Monster of the Sea) you'll just see that. And that's pretty much it.

Monstro goes into the way back time machine to give us a throwback to B-movie monsterpalooza where a quiet seaside town goes under attack by 3 hot Aussie vixen pussycat kill kill killers as they battle a tentacle rape octupi.

The movie starts off as From Dusk til Dawn style as our 3 tatted up, goth femme fatales lay a Venus fly trap for some man fodder. They party hard, booze it up and sniff those lines. They meet a young girl (another Aussie hottie) and her grandfather but secrets lay deep in this beach town. Soon locals are slaughtered and much blood is lost.

The CGI monster is slightly above your SyFy original movie but the buckets of blood and gore is unrelenting. Kudos to Simpson and his team for going all out. But hell the tentacles are pure laughable as are the death scenes. It's definitely intentionally "bad", with ridiculous carnage of serpent arms vs man.

But do I buy into the "it's so bad, it's good" formula? Well too a point I do. I'm all for seeing our 3 whores from hell Beretta, Blondie and the hottest of all Snowball go swimming and acting badass but without a real story or any interesting scenes of fun, it also becomes outright boring. It's fairly predictable and generic as they come.

If you want to see Aussie Suicide girls battle sea monsters, this will be your favorite movie. I liked the eye candy and the fairly cheesy monster mash gore. But clearly it's the same as watching a Skinemax action movie. Pick your poison.

Rating:
1/2

Check out the trailer.

Bxx: Haunted - The Revolution of Web Horror?

You know what I forgot to do? I was suppose report back on what I thought of Kill Cam, an interactive horror story that I checked out over a few weeks. It was interesting to say the least. The live web cam turned into a webcam orgy of bored Australian nerds. The story did have a twist but was kind of predictable. To say the least it tried to hard but it did have it's moments. It also didn't go viral like I thought it would within the horror universe.

But you know what Kill Cam was missing?

Star power. A creative genius that had the imagination, funds and scope to make interactive horror on the web a real reality. That's when I stumbled upon Daniel Knauf's Bxx Haunted. Knauf is the creative mastermind behind HBO's Carnivale, Spartacus and Supernatural. So what's Bxx: Haunted? Well it's a non linear interactive movie which after watching the video below, I'm kind of intrigued.

Like a Choose Your Own Adventure tale, you get to choose which characters you want to follow, investigate rooms and check in on cams throughout an house. The story goes that a group of paranormal investigators become trapped in a house that's gone a little Poltergeisty. The Box Narrative is an interesting new way of storytelling and dammit, I'm pretty psyched. 6 characters in one house for 48 hours and we can take any path we want to reveal the narrative.

We're the filmmaker so to speak.

I'm all for new ways to watch horror and this is definitely the most creative gimmick I've seen in a while.

Sign up now as the first 5,000 people get an invitation and then it closes!

Full access will be available online 11:26 PM PST Friday 2/24 by invite only. Check out the teaser with Knauf and the trailers below. Also follow on Twitter.

The Box-Narrative from Daniel Knauf on Vimeo.

Bxx:HAUNTED Teaser #1 from Daniel Knauf on Vimeo.

Bxx: HAUNTED Teaser #2 from Daniel Knauf on Vimeo.

What do you think of this? Do you think this will work as a format to tell a story? Share your thoughts!

The Shortround: Familiar (Review)

The Shortround returns with another Fatal Pictures short film by producer Zach Green and director Richard Powell. I previously reviewed their short Worm which was dastardly disturbing. In Familiar, we get what made Worm mesmerizing and also a bucket of splatter.

Here be the plot.

Through a series of tragic events a middle aged man grows to suspect the negative impulses plaguing his mind may not be his own.

the jaded viewer says: In Familiar, we follow John Dodd, twin brother to Geoffrey Dodd who we saw in Worm. He has a American Beauty like life, with a wife and daughter living the suburban dream (or nightmare). Like his brother, we get to hear his inner most thoughts and he's longing for escape from his mid life hell. Dinners are eaten, sleep is dreadful and all John wants is to escape after his daughter goes on to college.

But John believes his wife is the cartoon ball and chain and is plotting to keep him locked to this living hell. Soon a big development has him taking drastic measures to ensure his escape but that nagging voice in his head is more than what it seems. As Familiar concludes into some self inflicted open surgery, John must battle the inner demon living inside of him.

Familiar is the type of short that packs an emotional punch in it's 20 minute run time then most Hollywood dramas. The lack of dialogue other than an inner monologue by Robert Nolan is paced to a point where it slowly grows over time. It clearly is American Beauty meets Cronenberg madness. Powell works the inner monologue with methodical timing and inserts conversational emotions with each scene between the characters.

I would say it lacks in the fact that an eerie conclusion is used as an ending where possibly a reunion between John and his wife might have been more fitting. Clearly the WTF-ness of it all makes it 10 times more terrifying. Nolan's performance is top notch and shows he can drive a short with just his face.

Green and Powell are a hell of an exciting duo in indie film and there is no doubt a feature is on it's way. If Familiar is the type of work we can look forward to, I can't wait.

The Vitals

• Official Site
• Facebook Page

Check out the teaser trailer.

Kill List (Review)

Kill List

Kill List (2012)

Directed by Ben Wheatley

On the surface, Kill List looks to be your standard five and dime crime thriller. Underworld goons doing their trade eliminating threats for $$. But as I thought about the film after watching it, you start seeing the layers underneath Kill List that enable you to see a movie that has more than meets the eye.

Kill List is a film that slowly burns you into a look into the life of a retired hit man and scopes out a world where his past, his present and his future all collide into an orgy of madness. It's an interesting journey seeing a drama, gore soaked slaughter and a Wicker Man-ish horror flick all blended into one. Sure there is a twist at the end and numerous unanswered questions which make you go WTF but it stills hit you harder than a hail of bullets.

What you'll get from Kill List is a character study of a soldier turned assassin who elects to try to live as a normal but it seems PTSD and pure conditioning to kill are not as easy to shut down when you get home. There is pure hell to pay for the sins of your past and it seems mysterious forces want have molded our hit man's world into their own.

Kill List is a solid flick that may seem like Pulp Fiction without the glitz and glamour. And for that it gets high marks for showing me a touch of all the genres I love from the UK.

Boring Plot-O-Matic

Eight months after a disastrous job in Kiev left him physically and mentally scarred, ex-soldier turned contract killer, Jay, is pressured by his partner, Gal, into taking a new assignment. As they descend into the dark and disturbing world of the contract, Jay begins to unravel once again - his fear and paranoia sending him deep into the heart of darkness.

Awesome Review-O-Matic

I'm going to break this down via Earth layers. Seems easier that way as far as I'm concerned.

The Crust

Kill List starts off as we see Jay and his Swedish wife Shel arguing about money. It seems Jay is a retired ex soldier with tours of Iraq who came back and went all crime underworld . We meet his friend and partner Gal and during a dinner party they talk about their lives, a past botched job and the life they now lead.

Clearly Wheatley uses this first Act to make us care for Jay and Gal and their alpha male shenanigans. Jay and Shel have a son and we see his fatherly side as well as Mr. Husband. Both Jay (Neil Maskell) and Shel (MyAnna Buring) have an uneasy relationship and you can see the scars Jay has been dealing with bubbling up. He's angry and all his instincts have have been dulled by being in this normal life.

Both Maskell and Buring give off good chemistry as a husband and wife who know they have had issues as they both transition to normals (Shel knows Jay is a hit man which is unique). Michael Smiley as Gal is still struggling to go normal but it seems as we move on the the list, we'll see who still has the instincts to do the job.

The Mantle

As both Jay and Gal fulfill their assignments, Jay slowly descents into what he was in the past. Before they embark on the kill, they stake out their victims finding in their now grey moral world reasons to take them out. The kills involving a Priest (highlighted in big white text), a Librarian are dastardly brutal. They slowly start out as professionals but it seems as Jay's scars get reopened (allegor-ized by a inflicted slice on his hand) he's going towards the deep end.

It begs the question can a soldier or even a hit man just turn off "their switch" when they retire? Is it just that easy to do? Kill List says no and I agree. Jay who seemed to be a brutal killer back in the day is as vicious when he gets a taste for it again. Each of the victims on "the list" are moral embodiments to stop him from going back to his killing ways. A priest representing morality, a librarian representing logic and a government official representing the law. Jay ignores all of this and slaughters them all.

The Core

The final scenes with the final kill go into weird Wicker Man territory. Everybody seems to have been played and characters who looked idle appear to be more sinister. A action sequence through a tunnel is mesmerzingly claustrophobic and vicious. These last scenes are very peculiar whipping in survival horror with bizarre rituals. It' s possibly fitting Jay confronts organized chaos as his final test. Having been now conditioned into a cold blooded killer/soldier, his instincts kick in and he becomes the embodiment of a savage.

Could we have gotten a better explanation of the "game" being played? Final answers on why characters actions became oddly weird? Sure but Whealtey seems to want us to fill in the holes which is fine with me.

Kill List gets a barely 3 spinkicks from me for taking me on a long journey of how easily a man can be stripped of his normal suit and launched into a naked and vicious savage. That's what you should take away from Kill List.

Nude-ipedia

Nada

Gore-ipedia

Hammer to the head trauma
Gunshots to the head
Torture trauma
Sliced bowel trauma

WTF moment

The twist ending

The Jaded Viewer's Final Prognosis

Kill List is available on VOD and on Amazon Instant Video. It comes out in theaters on February 3rd.

Rating:


Check out the trailer.

The Cabin in the Woods (Trailer)

Look at that release date from the poster. Hahahaha. It was suppose to come out 2 years ago! It's not surprising as The Cabin in the Woods was filmed in 2009. Director Drew Goddard with co-writer Joss Whedon had me salivating at this movie but it totally disappeared when MGM went bye bye.

Here be the plot:

“A group of five friends going on a quiet cabin retreat scratch the surface of something so massive and horrific that they can only begin to fathom what might possibly be going on just as time quickly runs out.”

Starring Chris Hemsworth (pre-Thor) and Whedon favorites Amy Acker (Fred!) and Fran Kranz (Topher!) I have to say I'm kinda psyched for this. Kranz looks to play final guy and can recite Whedon lines in his sleep.

And WTF is the weird invisible forcefield and unseen tech angle in all this??? Whedon is my Master now and if he wrote this, it can't disappoint. No fuckin way. Check out the trailer and share your thoughts.