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emotionlhavd

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*** This review may contain spoilers ***

I saw "The Red Hours" at the last Sitges Film Festival before the screening of "Eden lake" and when this short but very intense film finished I have the same sensation as much of the audience there. I was shocked. Not because of the violence, the sex or something like that. I was shocked by the super speedy trip to death that "Red hours" is. In just only ten but very brave minutes. This is a great virtue for the people that loved the film and the main problem for people who didn't catch it. The film only last for ten minutes but it feels like 3. Director John Fallon doesn't need to put 100 shots to get that sensation but a very subtle plot and direction where content and form work together to serve the film.

The film starts when our main character, Mark, (played by Deke Richards, a regular actor on Fallon's pictures who offers a very different performance from his other works, playing here a regular guy involved in an extraordinary situation. Great work BTW), a young man that seems to have problems with his girlfriend (Natasha) enters the bathroom of a rave party and takes a pill after spitting his own image on the mirror (a very strong image of self contempt). From that moment on it seems like the rejection of the self image is like a rejection of reality and things got complicated for a part of the audience and fascinating for a great deal of them. The film turns to black and white and the guy awakes in a house where two crazy lesbians (one of them Natasha) try to kill them. What the f***?! You must be saying, wait, I'll explain it just in a moment. So we are in horror realm and what follows is a great slasher / action sequence. After that we're back to reality; Mark awakes in the bathroom of the disco and goes to talk to Natasha and kills her with an extreme long kiss.

If you're asking yourself what the movie is about that's when things get interesting. I think that this surrealist piece is about the impossibility of a normal relationship between men and women on modern society. It is also about the fear of man to be castrated (literally or metaphorically) by women. That's the reason of the two lesbians. And that's the reason why we have a few shots of the girlfriend kissing with another girl in the reality segment. All the hallucination is about the fear of this guy that hates himself because he is losing his manhood because he has given it to the only person he loves. That's why he kills her at the end. He hates himself because she is not with him anymore. Some people can thing that this is a misogynist fantasy but I think that is a romantic tale.

Before the movie started, writer / director John Fallon told the audience that the screen was a rough cut. Good move because there are some shots that can be polished and the color correction can be improved also. Anyway, I was very surprised by the direction because I knew the work of Fallon as a writer and I thought that it would more dialog oriented. Big mistake, the film is almost without dialog. At the beginning Fallon even put subtitles during a few dialogs because we are in a disco and we are not supposed to hear what they're saying. I was very pleased to see this kind of Tony Scott technique here. He also goes with some kind of weird Buñuel / Lynch shots at the end of a cemetery when the guy is returning to reality and when he is killing the girl I think. It also can be saying that the whole movie is a "death trip", well, as matter of fact it is. I say "can be" because "Red hours" is very surrealist and that brings me back to the main theme of the movie that can also be applied to the critics (the audience seems to love it). They want horror films to be gore and bad and they want auteur films to be boring. From the moment a horror film is also an auteur film they don't understand it so they kill it. Just like men and women.

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

I saw this movie at its European premiere at Sitges Film Festival. First though I had before the movie started, since I knew that it was a vampire film, was: "I hope that this movie is not a remake of the excellent "Thirst"". My second thought was: "I'm sure that it won't be as bloody as they promised". Lucky me, I was wrong with my two assumptions. The amazing prologue makes it clears that the only link with "Thirst" is that they both are great vampire films and that by the end of the movie I will be covered with blood. With "The thirst" I found a movie that played with my expectations as much as the filmmakers wanted and surprised me scene after scene. First we have this excellent and gory prologue, after that we are introduced to a couple of lovers that has real problems, the story change of pace (not rhythm) while explaining who they are and their previous problems with drugs. After that, a death in the family, and after that, enters Jeremy Sisto, and oh man, the movie doesn't give you any rest until the end. Without explaining the reasons, I'll only say that the couple becomes vampires and they join an eccentric family of bloodsuckers. Yeah, I know you're thinking about "Near dark", but wait until they go to hunt together for the first time (the way the put their victims together is also great, you'll see). In "The thirst", the newcomer is not guilty for killing humans; on the contrary he enjoys it and embraces his new power. And that massacre, you won't believe what you are seeing in the screen, it has all the blood that they promised and more! After that, the movie continues playing with your expectations in my favorite scene of the film

(spoilers!)

Darius (Sisto's character) wants to talk with Max because he thinks that Max is becoming too independent from the family, he starts to become more and more threatening until Max, the newcomer replies him and even scared him in a change of papers unexpected in this kind of movie. In fact I immediately said to a friend near to me: "Man, this is f***** great, it's a vampire version of Sergio Sollima's "Faccia a Faccia"".

(end of spoilers!)

I don't want to reveal more things about the movie but expect a few more surprises that the ones I mentioned. What it is not a surprise is that Jeremy Sisto owns the movie every time he appears on the screen, I don't know if he could be a start in the silent era but with that voice of his I'm sure that he will be a star of our times. The rest of the cast is excellent also, all of them great supporting actors with a large experience in horror movies. I also want to point your attention to the excellent Neil Jackson, when you first see him it reminds to you like a poor man's version of Paul Bettany but wait until the movie ends he is as good if not better than Bettany. I also want to emphasize the strongest point of that film: Jeremy Kastan's direction. From that spectacular prologue (illuminated almost completely in red) to the moving and fluid narrative (It's possible that 70-90 % of the film is shoot with steadicam), the fast editing and the overcharged primary colors (I love that) in the tradition of the Italian horror school. The only thing that I regret are some of the attacks shot at 15 frames per second or something like that, I don't like it very much, but it's only my opinion. By the way the cinematography by Raymond Stella is really great, if I'm not wrong he was the Panaglide operator of the legendary continuous take that opens "John Carpenter's Halloween". I hope that you could see this movie on a Friday the 13th or during Halloween because it's the perfect movie to see with a girl by your side or with your friends and beers.

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

"Deaden" is a difficult movie to talk about. I don't have any doubts of my feelings about the picture but it can be an uncomfortable experience to watch for those who don't know about what Viel and Fallon are talking. I was lucky enough to saw this film at its European premiere in Sitges Film Festival. I remark that I saw this film at Sitges because 5 years ago I saw there Kim Ki Duk's "Address unknown". After that screening I called a friend and told him that the Korean master had made a manifest about human cruelty, after seeing "Deaden" I thought that Christian Viel (the director) and John Fallon (the screenwriter, actor and producer) have made a manifest about human rage. The story line is classic, a vengeance movie about the payback that an ex cover policeman, that becomes a drug dealer because of his job, takes against the punks that rape his wife (with a baseball bat in full detail!) and murder his ¡unborn son! (In extreme full detail!). Yeah, I know that it sounds crazy. But think for a moment. If you don't know who the people that made that movie are and someone tells you that this is the plot line of the new Takashi Miike film, all of us would be dying to see this picture. So, what I'm trying to say is that you must see the film without any prejudices. The picture takes us to an unpleasant and nihilistic downward spiral to the last days (almost hours) of a human soul. The history of a man betrayed by a system in which he believed in, first, by becoming what he hate most and after that by being abandoned by them after the brutal murder that I talked before. The movie is sad; yes, it has some macabre gags, but the face of Fallon in the fine montage at the beginning is what marks the tone of the movie. His facial expression is what you're remembering during the picture, because (and that is very intelligent way of using the expectations of the public by the filmmakers) we have seen lots of vigilante films

(spoilers!)

and we know what he'll do after the revenge is complete and why he'll do that.

(End of spoilers)

The movie perfectly reflects the anger and the rage that invades you after you're assaulted or your girlfriend is raped or simply when you're humiliated by your boss or betrayed by someone you love. A violent impulse that drives you to your limits and to the dark side of your soul where you reject everything that you believed in, that's what the movie is about and that's what happens to the main character. But to understand that you must see the movie with your mind open and ready to be punch. Because you will be punched, but with style; I hate to comment films talking about other films, but think that the style of the movie is like "PI" in vivid colors, without any budget and on steroids. You'll see a very inventive way to film a guy sniffing cocaine (there's also a VERY funny recurring way that pays tribute to "Scarface") and you'll also see that every killing of this movie is different from each other and most of the them are committed with very unusual weapons (the movie features a new way to play pool that Ruggero Deodato will enjoy a lot). Because, of course, "Deaden" is a serious movie but also a non stop fast paced action picture (filmmakers and editors, take notice of the rhythm) that pays tribute to the 80's and 70's action films; you'll appreciate references to "Dirty Harry", "Death Wish", Chuck Norris, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Dolph Lundgren, "Rocky" and all Sly Stallone's films and "Requiem for a dream" (don't be surprised by that, "Deaden" tells a story). And please remember what I told you before; don't have any prejudices when you're seeing that movie. Remember that is an old school action movie with a lot of social comment much more in the line of "Class of '84" (a film that almost only Roger Ebert defended in its premiere) than a Cannon film (that are great in their own way). And to you upcoming filmmakers and actors you must support Viel and Fallon's movie because it is made with little money but with lots of love. A film made by fans for fans. I hope that their next feature will be at the same category of that one, because "Deaden's" cult has just born.