Cinefantastique Online

You are browsing the archives of 2009 July.

RETURN TO HOUSE ON HAUNTED HILL is a disappointing sequel to the surprisingly enjoyable 1999 remake of the 1958 William Castle production, starring Vincent Price. It’s hard to imagine what Castle and Price would have thought of this sequel (no, it’s pretty easy, actually; they would have hated it), but if you’ve ever wondered what RAIDERS [...]

30 DAYS OF NIGHT: BLOOD TRAILS is twenty-minute short subject compiled from Fearnet.com’s online webisode series, which acted as a kind of prologue to 30 DAYS OF NIGHT (2007). As a sop to FEARnet’s target audience, the heroes are Internet geeks who unravel a terrifying secret; unfortunately, they are also complete idiots who have taken few [...]

When it comes to horror, fantasy, and science fiction title, this week’s big home video release is THE HAUNTING IN CONNECTICUT, which was a minor sleeper hit in theatres earlier this year. The film arrives on disc in three variations: a single-disc edition, an unrated special edition, and a Blu-ray disc.
The only other notable new [...]

This 48-minute Japanese animated film earned accolades back in 2000 for being ground-breaking in its technique – using computer-generated imagery to simulate the look of traditional anime – but once you get past that small achievement, BLOOD: THE LAST VAMPIRE is mediocre at best – a rather dull piece of work that feels almost exactly like what [...]

PARANORMAL ACITIVITY presents itself as “found footage” shot by a couple who became the victims of a demonic entity. Nearly a decade after THE BLAIR WITCH PROJECT, the faux-documentary approach is a little tired, as is the attempt to pass this story off as “true” (including a closing title card dedicated to the “victims”).
Fortunately, once [...]

DOOD EIND (a film from Amsterdam whose title translates into English as DEAD END) is about a group of friends out for an excursion in the forests of Scotland, where they run afoul of a pair of wild dogs and seek shelter in a nearby mansion. It turns out that the dogs were actually driving [...]

ALONE is an Asian import – not from the usual suspects Japan or Korea, but Thailand (technically, the film is partly set in Korea, but it is a Thai production). Although not a masterpiece, it is an intriguing tale told in a suitably spooky manner, offering evidence that, nearly a decade after the J-Horror wave [...]

Composer Scott Glasgow with GENE GENERATION director Tao Perry
Pearry Teo’s 2008 cyberpunk science fiction thriller, THE GENE GENERATION,  builds an effective futuristic environment, borrowing liberally from BLADE RUNNER, MAD MAX, and other cinematic cyberpunk landmarks, while creating its own unique post-modern landscape. The film is greatly aided by an excellent musical score from award winning [...]

A look at a lovely pair of import DVDs from Japan
CHANBARA BEAUTY (Onechanbara, Japan, 2008) is geek paradise: two gorgeous babes and a fat dude wander around the countryside killing zombies. One is a gorgeous sharpshooter who never misses. The other is a samurai in Western hat and serape – and little else save for a [...]

Lost in distribution limbo, this slasher film is entertaining but not the holy grail promised by early reviews. Director Jonathon Levine’s ALL THE BOYS LOVE MANDY LANE, starring Amber Heard (ALPHA DOGS), earned some enthusiastic buzz when it screened at the Toronto Film Festival in 2006 (Scott Weinberg called it the first “thinking man’s slasher film”), but that hasn’t helped the independent film find its way to American audiences.

An unusual suspense thriller that rides the line of outright horror without going over, HOMECOMING has a surprisingly tight structure and some effective performances that elevate it above the usual. It gives former O.C. starlet Mischa Barton a little more to chew on dramatically and she delivers even when the script places some genuine howlers [...]

ALL THE BOYS LOVE MANDY LANE seems doomed never to play in U.S. theatres. The Weinstein Brothers bought this slasher film after it earned positive buzz on the festival circuit in 2006, but theydid nothing with it.Then Senator Distribution, a new company aquired the rights and announced a release back in 2008, which never materialized. [...]

BLOOD: THE LAST VAMPIRE is a live-action horror film based on the 2001 anime short subject of the same title. Shot in the style of a Hong Kong fant-asia film, with lots of martial arts swordplay choreographed by Corey Yuen (THE ONE, X-MEN), BLOOD: THE LAST VAMPIRE is a Chinese-French co-production, with a French director [...]