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Reviews
Event Horizon (1997)
Great Movie Ruined By Silly Ending ***SPOILERS***
Paul Anderson certainly wont be mistaken for a virtuoso filmmaker any time soon, particularly if his work on 'AVP', 'Mortal Kombat' and 'Resident Evil' is anything to go by, but for one brief moment in the late 90's, he was on the verge of creating a genuine psycho-horror masterpiece. And then Evil Paul took over again and ruined everything about twenty minutes from the finish line.
The plot is thus: In the year 2047(which suddenly doesn't seem quite as far away as it probably did in 1997), Laurence Fishburne and Sam Neill lead a salvage operation into Neptune space to investigate the sudden re-appearance of the starship 'Event Horizon'. The ship had disappeared without a trace seven years prior during a complicated light-speed travel experiment, and it's the crew's job to rescue any survivors, salvage the ship and figure out what the hell went wrong.
Needless to say, the ship has been somewhere horrifying and has brought back something, well, let's just say it's not very nice. But it's also not what you'd expect - There's no acid dribbling alien killer here, in its place a tense, claustrophobic nightmare that truly defies description. In fact, it's that good that it reminds you of something Clive Barker or John Carpenter could have conceived.
So for the majority of its running time, 'Event Horizon' manages to be a genuinely frightening and surprisingly innovative sci-fi/horror show that is not only well written, but extremely well acted as well. The characters, the set-design, the extremely creepy central concept of an otherworldly hell dimension accessed through a black hole, are all excellent. And then suddenly Anderson loses the plot, and gurgles out possibly the silliest and most cringe-worthy finale since Denzel Washington impaled John Lithgow on the electric tower in 'Ricochet'.
If you don't want to know what happens, stop reading now. If you'd rather save yourself the torture of watching it, then Sam Neill suddenly tears his own eyes out and morphs into Pinhead from Hellraiser, the token comedic-relief-black-dude propels himself through space by dumping his oxygen tanks (yeah right) whilst delivering his best Eddie Murphy impression, and Morpheus (sorry, L. Fish) blows up the ship (much to the behest of Pinhead), looking as though even he realises how stupid this film has become and is glad to put an end to the madness.
Anderson could have had a classic on his hands here, but unfortunately his 'Resident Evil' side got the better of him in the latter stages of the film. That said, the rest of it has proved to be good enough to earn him a respected cult favourite, but one can only help but wonder what might have been if he had have exercised a little restraint in penning the finale. 7/10.
Billy Connolly Live at the Odeon Hammersmith London (1991)
Brilliant, gut busting stand-up comedy
This guy is up there with Richard Pryor and Eddie Murphy as being one of the funniest dudes around. What makes it all so great is its spontaneity; There's the feeling that none, or very little of this, is really rehearsed. He just gets up on stage, tells his stories, and drifts off on one hilarious tangent after another. At one point, he just breaks down with laughter, mumbling to himself, "what the f*$k am I talking about?". You just can't help but laugh along with him. If this doesn't bring a smile to your face, then nothing will.
Caution: If you're easily offended, then you will undoubtedly be offended by this, so avoid. For the rest of us, laugh out loud. The world needs more of it.
Land of the Dead (2005)
Disappointing
George A. Romero, the highly respected film-maker that brought us Night, Dawn and Day of the dead, has escaped his coffin and somehow conjured up a couple of million bucks to inflict some serious grief on the world of the living. After twenty years, Romero is back with a new zombie film imaginatively titled 'Land of the Dead'. The big question is, who cares? Unfotunately for Romero, the world has changed quite a bit since then, and for all of his great ideas, this film seems to be going absolutely nowhere. In order to put this all into perspective, I will give a brief outline of what goes on here; Years after the zombie apocalypse, the last of the human survivors have gathered together in a fortified, heavily guarded city where the rich live in a high-rise semi-paradise and the poor live on the streets. A team of highly trained special forces dudes venture out into zombie land now and then to gather essential supplies; things like food, medicine, Wild Turkey and cuban cigars.
While everyone on the inside seems to be completely happy with their hollow existence, on the outside the undead are getting smarter; they've even managed to begin working as a team, and they're headed straight for the city to take revenge on the rotten sods who show up in their towns and kill all their mates. There is more, but it's basically perfunctory and any sub-plots lose their meaning very quickly once the carnage begins.
Whilst it sounds interesting, it is surprisingly dull. The performances, coming from a collection of obscure cult icons, also-rans and ex-soapie stars, are ordinary at best with the usually unstoppable Dennis Hopper in particular looking like he is severely lacking sleep. The much talked about gore is admittedly pretty sadistic, but portrayed in such a way that it generally fails to have any real impact on the viewer, with the exception of pre-pubescent green horns who will undoubtedly exclaim things like, 'wow! did you see that guys face get peeled off?', and 'wicked! that was cool how they split that guys arm in half!'.
And as for Romero's direction and script, say what you will, but it looks amateur at best. It's poorly paced, lacking in suspense and really makes no real sense at all. In a world where the dead outnumber the living and there is no central government or economic market left, why the hell are they all fighting over money? Particularly considering that most of the principle characters are looking to skip town, which is probably the only place where it would buy you anything. If Romero thought that this made sense somehow, you would think he'd have gone to the trouble to explain why. Unfortunately, points like this can't be ignored for the comical value of watching undead minions of hell trying to remember how to play the tuba (I kid you not).
As for the message of the film, it seems unclear. What is he trying to say here, that zombies are people too? That they really just need a cuddle? They're really not such bad blokes, even if they do spend their spare time ripping people's faces off and dining on their genitals. Their land title rights are probably already protected by the constitution. Completely ridiculous.
I really wanted to like this film, which is probably why I ended up disliking it so much. Perhaps I expected too much. Regardless, if you want to watch a good zombie flick, ignore the fanboys and watch 28 Days Later. Because this, unfortunately, sucks.