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Best thing: There were so many points in this film where I was made to really squirm in my seat. My favourite example.is where the camera shows a point of view shot of someone as they reach down to pick something up. It's wonderfully effective.
Worst thing: All Saw films essentially have two plots going on at once: The 'game' Jigsaw's victims are forced to play on one hand and the detectives and medical staff investigating, on the other. By the second half, everyone involved in the investigation starts acting really suspicious. My biggest issue being, if you think someone who works in the morgue might be connected to the killer.... you should have someone ELSE do the autopsy in order to demonstrate an alternative suspect's guilt. Seriously, follow proper police procedure guys!
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A good friend of mine loves the Saw movies and encouraged me to watch every single last one of them.
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Annoyingly enough, the first one struck me as an inferior imitation of the movie “Seven” (serial killer sets up intricate deaths to shame the victims) and then I felt that even in the sequels where the Jigsaw 'game' section was good, the movies were still spoilt by the focus on the parallel detective storyline.
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And Costas Mandeloy made for the most disappointing protégé for Jigsaw imaginable. Whenever he was in a room of people discussing who might be responsible for the latest deaths, he'd look ridiculously guilty. It's like they still wouldn't notice a murderer if they saw Hannibal Lecter covered in blood and making his trademark 'nice chianti' hissing noise. Mandeloy always acted evil and suspicious no matter what context he was in and it was always bizarre when none of the police staff seemed to notice.
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I was reassured by the promise that this new movie would bypass or simplify the convoluted and increasingly disappointing plotting of the previous films. But the bigger reason to be hopeful was the choice of director.
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None of the sequels have been directed by anyone known for much outside of that series. (I suppose there will be fans of “Repo! The Genetic Opera” out there and anyone seen “Jessabelle” with Sarah Snook? That’s about the extent of it.) Even in the case of the first film, James Wan's film career has been quite inconsistent to say the least. But the Spierig Brothers have three pretty great films in their filmography already. Undead, a sporadically funny but wholly entertaining horror comedy featuring both zombies and aliens. Daybreakers, a remarkably effective thriller about a world of vampires where human blood is a depleting resource. Finally, Predestination, a Robert A. Heinlein adaptation featuring a unique take on time travel.
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In my view, the Spierig Brothers have delivered. We have a straightforward set of traps where tension is built up effectively. Admittedly, the detective section is still the weaker element, but it's still done pretty effectively. However, the 'game' is where the film really delivers. The game area is pretty well-lit without compromising the sense of being trapped.
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This film series hasn't featured enough of the Jigsaw doll on a unicycle, so this film milks the arrival of the doll for all it's worth showing close ups of its little fake legs pushing the pedals to move it slowly along.
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The requirements of the traps regularly had me squirming but they don't really go over-blown. We are told that all the best games are simple and I think they were right to take that approach.
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I'm pleased to see that this is a Saw movie that can act as a stand alone film without requiring you to already know the prior continuity. If I were to suggest a set of the best Saw films I'd suggest Saw, Saw II, Saw VI and Jigsaw. But during Saw VI the indictment of American healthcare insurance is regularly interrupted by the convoluted side-plot involving thd detectives. Frankly, Jigsaw is the only Saw movie I'd actually recommend and the original Saw is good enough (mainly because of Danny Glover) to make it worth watching for context.
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I'm tempted to give this film an A simply because of how much more satisfying I found it than the rest of the series, but I think that's going a bit overboard. This doesn't make a massive leap but I think the main audience would feel slighted if this completely abandoned the formula. It needed to be recognisably a Saw film. Nevertheless, I found Jigsaw to be a very satisfying horror film and worth a watch even if you haven't been following the Saw franchise.
B+
Review of Resident Evil: The Final Chapter (2016)
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Best thing: The return of Iain Glen was pretty great to see, but only because Wesker had been an absolutely awful villain for the last two films. The way he's used doesn't really feel consistent with prior films, but hey, whatever excuse you need to bring him back...
Worst thing: I heard there were issues with the way the film was cut, but I wasn't convinced that it could be that bad... It really is that bad. I can barely tell what is happening in half the action sequences and often the camera doesn't focus on any action long enough for me to enjoy it.
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Discussing a movie series, particularly when focusing on the concluding chapter of that series, I think I'm going to have to presume you have seen at least the previous sequel already.
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To recap the last film (Resident Evil: Retribution), Wesker reveals that he has turned on Umbrella (and that's why he's working with a special agent: the iconic game character Ada Wong). They help Alice escape from the facility where the Red Queen and take her to The White House. Wesker, who has some kind of super speed power, rushes over to Alice and injects her. He tells her that he has given her back her superpowers. We even see footage of her bloodstream, watching the creatures previously injected to repress her powers dying off, confirming that Wesker is telling the truth. Wesker finally tells them they will need to fight to save humanity.
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So in the beginning of this film the White House has blown up, Wesker is back in control in an Umbrella facility and the Red Queen informs us that Wesker betrayed her and only pretended to give her back her powers.
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So naturally I don't believe this for a moment. I saw that the injection works. I remember that the Red Queen wants everyone dead and I remember that Wesker rescued Alice from the Red Queen so that they could defeat the Red Queen together.
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So naturally my thoughts were that Wesker must be trying to fool Umbrella into thinking he is not about to betray them and blowing up the White House and seemingly leaving Milla Jovovich for dead was a ruse to allow him to convince Umbrella he is still on their side.
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When Red Queen talks to Alice, she tells Alice that they need to release an anti-virus that will destroy everything infected with the T-virus. Now let's not forget that besides monsters and zombies the main people we know to be infected with the virus are Alice and Wesker. Since my first instinct is to mistrust the Red Queen (since she was the clear villain in the previous film) I figure that Wesker and Alice are probably still working together against her.
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As you've probably guessed, I was over thinking things. When the big reveals are made at the end, my neat little explanation for why the beginning of this film does not seem to tie sensibly with the previous entry in the series turned out to be completely mistaken.
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It's nice that we finally get an explanation of the Umbrella Company master plan that makes sense but, apart from that, this is amongst the dumbest movies in this franchise and the reason for the massive retcons is unclear.
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What's more annoying than anything else is that I would happily enjoy this as a fun ridiculous non-sensical bombastic finale to this ridiculous action movie franchise... if only I could see the action sequences properly! The action sequences are quick cut to pieces and that just made it impossible for me to enjoy.
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Someone will probably reboot this series. Considering that my clear favourite of the series was directed by Robert Mulcahy, it's not hard to imagine that taking this out of Paul WS Anderson's hands will only make Resident Evil better. But frankly this finale is not a high point for a movie series that generally required lowered expectations at the best of times anyway.
D-
Review of Another Man's Poison (1951)
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Best thing: The on screen chemistry between Bette Davis and Gary Merrill (we're not talking about romantic chemistry by the way) is excellent. Their interactions are the best parts of the film.
Worst thing: A major part of the film relies on us buying into Bette Davis stealing the fiancé away from her young secretary. The problem is that, while Bette Davis might not be that much past her prime here, she's not an easy sell as a knockout by this stage, particularly since her outfits are always quite conservative.
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After being blown away by The Nanny, I was keen to check out another horror film with Bette Davis.
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Frankly it ends up being a pretty average thriller by the end. I enjoyed it for the most part, but the ending wasn't really terribly smart. In a film which relies on building up tension, that's a bigger issue for this film.
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Bette Davis is great and so are several of her co-stars, particularly ACTOR'S NAME and for the first half I was pretty gripped as the mystery unfolded. But in the second half, there isn't much of a mystery left.
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It's fine, but personally I was a bit let down.
C+
Review of The Burning (1981)
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Best thing: Most slashers go for one death at a time, but there's one scene in The Burning that really goes for an out and out massacre. We don't see the killer but we certainly see the carnage. Very well handled.
Worst thing: There is no logic to the killer's attacks. He's upset with some boys who burnt him in a prank, yet nearly all his victims are women! Quite often in revenge slashers there's a sense that the victims who get picked off first are often the ones who (in the killer's eyes at least) deserve it. Not so much here....
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The Burning shares the low budget and the rough edges that characterise a typical 80s slasher movie.
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While certainly inspired by Friday 13th I don't think it would be fair to call it a rip off since, if anything, Friday the 13th part 2 stole some ideas from The Burning. Let's not forget that Friday the 13th did not feature someone taking revenge for what was done to him as a child. And perhaps more importantly the style seems to be closer to Friday the 13th part 2 than it is to the original Friday the 13th film. There's even a bit of a rebellious female character who turns out to be in a relationship with the guy in charge of the camp. That's quite a specific similarity.
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It's also cool to see that this is the slasher from which Final Girls took its in-movie backstory. (Final Girls is a fun horror-comedy/spoof that lampoons slasher movies.) I suppose the title should have made it obvious, but somehow I wasn't expecting that.
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The Burning has all the trashiness of a typical 80s slasher. I'd say it wasn't a more refined slasher like Black Christmas and certainly not like Hooper's Texas Chain Saw Massacre (or Psycho). Recognising that this is a trashy slasher film with the limited depth and limited acting quality that comes with that, this still remains one of the better slasher movies and I had a real blast.
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Satisfying kills, runs at a good pace and features character interactions between the potential victims that I found properly engaging. In spite of having already seen a number of eighties slashers now like April Fool's Day, Silent Night Deadly Night, Christmas Evil, Pieces, Maniac, Nightmares In A Damaged Brain, Driller Killer and all the Friday 13th films, I felt this was surprisingly successful in ramping up tension. If you want a good typical slasher, The Burning is a pretty great choice, even if it doesn't break the mould.
B+
Review of Ed Wood (1995)
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Best thing: Martin Landau as Bella Lugosi, performing his lines about how he will create a race of atomic supermen like a true thespian.
Worst thing: While Depp is doing the kind of over the top performance that audiences seem to be annoyed by these days, it generally works pretty well here. The performance I'm more concerned about is from Bill Murray. Why does Murray come across as so flat here?
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I've never got along with Tim Burton movies. He kept releasing films with fantastic premises and great visuals that nevertheless consistently disappointed me.
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Edward Scissorhands left me cold and the sappy ending was cheesy as hell ("I was that little girl!"). Beetlejuice mostly left me scratching my head. Even Batman had its slow moments. (And "Nightmare Before Christmas" isn't a Burton film, it's a Henry Selick film.)
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So when I was told that Ed Wood was the best Tim Burton movie I still wasn't convinced that I would enjoy it. I was so wrong. This is the only Tim Burton that I absolutely love. It's such a wonderful depiction of the friendship between Ed Wood and Bela Lugosi.
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Funny, moving, well performed and generally just an utter delight. Even if you are a Burton denier like me, you should still give this a go.