Film and Horror

Fragile

(15) 97min

16 Aug 2007

HORROR You wouldn’t think Calista Flockhart would be the first name on most casting directors’ wishlists for a creepy UK horror film. Do you really want Ally McBeal wandering round your carefully constructed haunted hospital? And, while you can never…

Jess Weixler

9 Aug 2007

Jess Weixler is so all-American she looks like she’s jumped straight out of a photograph of high school cheerleaders. Her long blond hair and blue eyes make her the archetypal American beauty – just like all those Britney Spears wannabes lusted after by…

Also Released

2 Jul 2007

Die Hard 4.0 (15) 128min, 3 Stars Renegade cop and one man destroyer of municipal property John McClane (Bruce Willis) steps up to the plate one more time. Older, but not much wiser this time out, he has to contend with a bunch of über geek terrorists.

DVD - Ghost Ship

2 Jul 2007

HORROR In this genial, seaworthy but fright-lite low budget British horror film from 1952, a couple purchase an old steam boat with the intention of turning it into a luxury love nest only to find the crate has a history akin to that of the Marie…

Shutter

19 Jun 2007

In lieu of a forthcoming US remake, this half arsed 2004 Thai ghost story is getting an overdue and limited release. Driving home after getting drunk with a few of his old friends, photographer Tun (Ananda Everingham) and his girlfriend Jane…

The Beast Must Die

DVD

19 Jun 2007

HORROR Made in 1974, this British monster movie produced by Hammer-alike outfit Amicus attempted to bridge the transatlantic divide by capitalising on the post-Shaft blaxploitation craze and casting handsome African-American actor Calvin Lockhart in…

Paradise Lost

21 May 2007

Having already flopped under the title Turistas in the US last November, John Stockwell’s limp lettuce of a thriller finally emerges in the UK as little more than a smudged photocopy of Eli Roth’s Hostel. It’s not Slovenia but Brazil that young…

28 Weeks Later …

7 May 2007

As voracious as their flesh-eating antagonists, zombie movies can’t help coming back for more until a franchise has been picked clean. In order to maintain some semblance of fine dining from their 2003 sleeper hit 28 Days Later... director Danny Boyle…

The Breed

(15) 87min

23 Apr 2007

HORROR ‘Give my best to Cujo!’ yells Nikki (Michelle Rodriguez) as she torches the secret research facility where she’s been trapped by a pack of savage hounds. Yes, it’s another mongrel killer-dog movie (see also Man’s Best Friend, Rottweiler and…

The Reaping

(15) 96min

11 Apr 2007

HORROR What the hell is Hilary Swank playing at? This glossy, but in all other ways substandard supernatural chiller is the kind of by-the-numbers chick horror flick that Sandra Bullock churns out periodically, not what you’d expect a two-time Oscar…

DVD - Masters Of Horror Series 1: Volume 2

Masters Of Horror Series 1: Volume 2

26 Mar 2007

HORROR SHORTS After the reasonable standard of the first set of these made-for-TV horror shorts, this second batch comes as something of a disappointment, particularly given some of the names involved. Perhaps the best of them, Larry Cohen’s Pick Me…

The Messengers

(15) 91min

26 Mar 2007

HORROR Asian filmmaking is the strongest theme in modern horror. Sleeper hit Ringu irrefutably changed the landscape and made US execs sit up and take notice. Here the Pang brothers (Danny and the wonderfully named Oxide) are the latest victims wooed…

DVD - See No Evil

See No Evil

26 Mar 2007

HORROR This rank imitation of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Friday the 13th and the orgy of weaker variations made since, pulls few punches with its gore content but is as predictable as a film can be that’s called See No Evil and features a…

Glasgow Film Festival - horror movies

Day of the dead

31 Jan 2007

The all-day marathon is a right of passage for any horrorphile; a chance to wallow in the garish glory of the most extreme cinematic genres. For the second year, GFF features FrightFest in association with Zone Horror.

Them

(15) 78min

15 Jan 2007

A young French couple living in an old mansion 30 kilometres outside of Bucharest are woken one dark night by the sounds of intruders. Thereafter, a game of cat and mouse commences as the man and woman creep around their labyrinthine home stalked by…

Heirloom, The - DVD review

The Heirloom

3 Jan 2007

HORROR In this polished haunted house movie, an architect returns from the UK to take up his inheritance: a huge but dilapidated mansion on the outskirts of Taipei. At first his girlfriend and friends can’t get enough of the house, with its high…

Masters of Horror Series 1: Volume

(18) 1684min (Anchor Bay UK DVD retail/rental)

27 Nov 2006

HORROR Whenever a compendium of horror films comes along, you know you’re in for a mixed bag. Even the old Amicus portmanteaus tended to contain at least one duff entry. These new one-hour films from some of the supposed greatest directors working in…

Requiem

(12A) 92min

13 Nov 2006

DRAMA/HORROR One year on from the release of The Exorcism of Emily Rose - the risible US exploitation horror which expropriated the real life story of German girl Anneliese Michel, comes German film Requiem, an infinitely more interesting look at the…

Nun and the Devil, The - DVD review

The Nun and the Devil

13 Nov 2006

HORROR/SOFT CORE PORN The nun movie pretty much became a genre of its own in the 70s, with The Devils, Flavia, Killer Nun and Behind Convent Walls among the ‘nun-sploitation’ movies that got into the habit. The genre’s reputation as a titillating way…

Ultimate Hammer Box Set, The - DVD review

The Ultimate Hammer Box Set

17 Oct 2006

HORROR That the words ‘Hammer’ and ‘horror’ are synonymous is testament to the British production company’s significance in cinema history and to the enduring appeal of the films it produced. Although Hammer Film Productions Ltd had been making films…

The Grudge 2

12 Oct 2006

With four Japanese Ju-On: The Grudge films under his belt, a fifth in the works and now a pair of US remakes to his name, writer-director Takashi Shimizu has rung a lucrative career out of his simple idea of a malign ghost that haunts one victim after…

Countess Dracula

(18) 93min (Network DVD retail)

2 Oct 2006

HORROR Having sunk her fangs into the heaving flesh of Kate O’Mara and other voluptuous beauties in the 1970 Hammer hit The Vampire Lovers, Polish scream queen Ingrid Pitt was immediately cast in another softcore horror. Drafted in to replace Diana…

Three ... Extremes

(18) 121min (Tartan DVD retail)

4 Sep 2006

HORROR This 2004 anthology of Asian horror allows three directors from across the continent to showcase their capacity for creating extreme content. The wonderfully named Fruit Chan weighs in with the queasy Dumplings, which has since been expanded…