Wednesday, March 31, 2010

A Nightmare On Elm St. 4: The Dream Master


CAST

Tuesday Knight as Kristen Parker
Ken Sagoes as Roland Kincaid
Rodney Eastman as Joey Crusel
Lisa Wilcox as Alice Johnson
Andras Jones as Rick Johnson
Danny Hassel as Dan Jordan
Brooke Theiss as Debbie Stevens
Toy Newkirk as Sheila Kopecky
Robert Englund as Freddy Krueger

Plot

Once again Freddy returns to torment young teens in
their dreams! That's right...Freddy is back! And he plans
to pick up where he left off. His goal is to gain the souls
of the last of the Elm St. kids. Kristen also returns, along
with her ability to bring others into her dreams. By now she
has learned how to use her gift fairly well. She ends up giving
her gift to Alice once she realizes her own demise is inevitable.
Alice also has a secret...can her secret help her defeat Freddy?


Review

A Nightmare on Elm St. 4: The Dream Master was released August 19, 1988. It was directed by Renny Harlin and Produced by Robert Shaye and Rachel Talalay. Starring Robert Englund who continues to reprise his role as the razor gloved nightmare maniac known as Freddy Krueger. Kristen Parker, now played by Tuesday Knight along with her two friends Joey and Kincaid have all been released from the institution and have been trying to carry on normal lives as teenagers going to high school and doing what makes teens "teens". But soon Kristen starts to feel a very familiar eerily sense that Freddy is coming back soon. And of course no one believes her. And she cant tell her new friends of her troubles, at least yet anyway. But as luck would have it Kincaid wakes up one night to find himself locked in the trunk of an old car in the very same junkyard Freddy was previously buried in the last film. Starting to sense Kristen may in fact be right about Freddy's imminent return, Kincaid starts to panic. He spots his dog acting freakishly weird digging and sniffing around the area Freddy was buried. The dog takes a hot piss, literally and the ground starts to quake and open up. Freddy's bones reconstruct themselves, complete with burnt flesh and all! And POOF! Freddy's indeed back! Kincaid meets his demise as well as Joey that night. Joey is once again tricked into believing a beautiful woman wants him, this time inside his water bed. Freddy bursts thru killing Joey. The next day at school, Kristen realizes that the two must be dead when she sees their seats are empty in class. She freaks and decides she has no choice but to confide in her new friends. But they don't believe her until its to late. Kristen eventually meets her demise, but not before she is able to gift Alice with her ability to bring others into her dreams. After every death that takes place Alice receives her friends strongest ability. But Freddy gets their souls. Alice is determined to take Freddy down and set all the souls free that Freddy has held captive for so long. During the battle between the two, it looks as if Freddy is going to put an end to Alice. But then Alice quickly remembers the rest of the Dream Master nursery rhyme that her mother taught her when she was a little girl. As she repeats the lines of the Dream Master rhyme, she grabs a piece of reflective debri and Freddy sees his reflection! It is at this time that all the souls start to turn on Freddy and begin to release themselves from this evil monster that has held them all captive for so long. Freddy can no longer hold them and use them to be powerful. Once all are released Freddy goes down like one of his own helpless victims. Freddy has been defeated by Alice and the power of the Dream Master! Is he gone forever? Not hardly, its Freddy! Nightmare on Elm St. 4: The Dream Master was supposedly the second highest grossing Elm St. movie other then Freddy Vs. Jason. Nightmare on Elm St. 4 was quite different from what we are used to with an Elm St. movie. Which that could be why this movie gained so many mixed reviews. Nightmare 4 is most notable for when Freddy decides to take on a new role as stand up comic/crazed killer. I never could get used to that whole new wise crackin Freddy. Sure he came off with some funny shit. But that's not why we watch Nightmare movies. If we wanted comedy, we would turn on the comedy channel. So the funny Freddy never appealed to me much. And one of the biggest reasons why i lost enthusiasm for the franchise. But don't get me wrong, i love the movies, just some more then others. And i can completely show respect to Freddy Krueger as one of the most original iconic killers in horror movie history. I just think some people took the franchise down a few wrong paths. The films seemed to rely more on fancy special effects more then anything else after a while. Not that its a bad thing. But i always felt there was great potential for the series if it just stayed true to its original roots. Anyway, part 4 wasn't a complete mess. It had its moments. And we got a new female super hero, Alice! Alice was seen as the new "Nancy" to many. And i thought the soundtrack was pretty good, that is for its time. The Fat Boys featured Robert Englund performing "Are you ready for Freddy" and included Freddy rapping. There is even audio of Nancy from the first film saying "don't fall asleep". The video is on the 1999 box set bonus DVD. I thought this video also played on the first ever VHS release as well. Vinnie Vincent Invasion performs "Love Kills" on the soundtrack to. Tuesday Knight sings the song "Running from this Nightmare" that's played at the start of the film. But don't worry, Freddy wont be gone for long! You can find him in the next sequel!

RATING: 3/5

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Wednesday, March 24, 2010

A Nightmare On Elm St. 3: Dream Warriors


CAST

Heather Langenkamp as Nancy Thompson
Craig Wasson as Neil Gordon
Patricia Arquette as Kristen Parker
Robert Englund as Freddy Krueger
Ken Sagoes as Kincaid
Rodney Eastman as Joey
Jennifer Rubin as Taryn
Bradley Gregg as Phillip
Ira Heiden as Will
Laurence Fishburne as Max
Penelope Sudrow as Jennifer
John Saxon as Donald Thompson
Plot

Kristen Parker is plagued by nightmares. She has an usual
gift, the ability to bring other people into her dreams. Kristen
is later taken to an institution for her eratic behavior. Here is
where she meets other teens experiencing the same disturbing
nightmares as she does. She also meets a new staff member
who turns out to be Nancy Thompson. Nancy is the survivor of
the first Nightmare on Elm St. Nancy comes to learn that these
kids are all being tormented by Freddy Krueger in their dreams.
She now realizes that she herself may have to once again
battle the badly burned man in a dirty red and green sweater
all over again. But this time she has help...can they save
themselves from nightmare hell?

Review

A Nightmare on Elm St: 3 Dream Warriors was released on February 27, 1987. Directed by Chuck Russell, Produced by Robert Shaye. Was written by Wes Craven and Bruce Wagner. Also back for Nightmare on Elm St. 3 was Heather Langenkamp and John Saxon. Wes always loved Heather and wanted her back for the 3rd installment. Which this made many fans happy to have her return as many was expecting to see her in Nightmare on Elm St. 2: Freddys Revenge. Had Wes Craven been involved with Freddys Revenge things may have been different. Apparently, Wes Craven never intended on the Nightmare on Elm St. series becoming a francise. And his full intention here was to put an end to the Elm Street series. But as we can see, that never happened. Wes Craven never wanted Heather's Character killed off either. Neither did the majority of the fans. I was one of those fans. I was quite disappointed when i seen Nancy getting killed off in part 3. Well, actually i was pissed. More so at the way they made it happen. It was such an easy kill for Freddy and i felt that if they were going to kill her off, why not make it at least a good fight. I felt Heathers character Nancy deserved so much more then to be tricked and a razor glove to the gut. Nancy was considered the iconic heroine of Elm St. She was labled Freddys ultimate nemesis. So she should have never went out so easily like that. I myself never forgave the francise for that mistake. And what a mistake it turned out to be. Realizing this, the makers tried to create a new female hero for the series. Kristen Parker. But she never really was accepted amongst the more hardcore fans. So they tried again, with Alice. Alice was much more accepted then Kristen. I personally didnt care much for the Kristen Parker role. I found Patricia Arquettes performance to be very irritating really. Her voice in this movie could crack and break glass. But thats just my opinion. Wes Craven originally used the idea to have Freddy come into the real world and terrorize the cast and crew trying to film a sequel for Nightmare on Elm St., but New Line Cinema said no to that idea. But years later they accepted it and it was called Wes Cravens New Nightmare! Actually Wes Craven didnt get a whole lot his way with his involvment with part 3. Cravens first draft of Dream Warriors had the characters completely different from what we originally saw in the finished product. And the story was slightly different as well. There was no Sister Mary Helena/Amanda Krueger. Taryns character was originally going to be African-American. John Saxon's character always knew from the get go that Freddy was real and lurking around somewhere. Joey and Kincaids characters were to be killed off in part 3. The deaths in Wes Cravens original draft were supposed to be much more extreme and grusome. And Freddy wasnt supposed to be as talkative. Part 3 is where they started to gradually make Freddy humorous. In my opinion, i always felt making Freddy funny was their second mistake with the francise. I dont feel Freddy should have ever been made into a funny persona. Or ever talk as much as he ended up talking in the movies period. But thats just me. I loved the first movie and the concept. I originally found Freddy then to be so frightful and scary that even i didnt want to sleep. But i felt that was gradually demenishing with the start of Dream Warriors and on from there. It just seemed to get kinda ridiculous after a while. I never could understand why they ruined the "creepy/scary" factor with Freddy. There was so much more potential there. But nontheless i loved the Nightmare on Elm St. movies and Freddy despite the directions they ended up taking it in. But in the end after watching A Nightmare on Elm St. 3 despite some of paths the makers took the film in, i did enjoy it. I loved the part where Freddy comes out of the T.V. and grabs one of the girls and says "Welcome to primetime, bitch!". That line was actually improvised by Robert Englund. And even though i didnt care to much for the Kristen Parker character or Patricia's portrayal of it, i did like the dream ability she had. I felt that could have been used just a bit more creatively. Most of the cast is very likable, and the kids in this movie all seem to grow on you fairly quickly and you hate to see anything happen to them. They all have very unique dream abilities. I also liked Wills ability, the wizard master! I always thought he had the strongest ability, to bad he rushed up to close to Freddy. He could have used that ability for a more teamly advantage. Im still not sure how i feel about the ending of part 3. It seemed to easily predicted once you knew what Gordon had to do. Although the fight between the two with Freddys skeleton coming to life was pretty cool. The ending just seem to be missing something in my opinion. Dream Warriors did help put the francise back on its feet and got quite a bit of positive feedback. So you know what that means! Another sequel. The soundtrack featured a band called Dokken, Dokken provided the theme song for Nightmare on Elm St. 3, Dream Warriors was the title of the song. The single was actually quite successful. Check it out!

Rating: 4/5

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Late Fee


CAST

J.D. Brown as The Boy
Stephanie Danielson as The Girl
Rick Poli as Devil
Victor Bonacore as Dracula
Jimmy Creamer as Black Metal Guy
Chris Cusano as The Man (segment "The Pick Up") / The Doctor (segment "Damnation")
Georgia Kate Haege as The Woman (segment "The Pick Up") / Elsa (segment "Damnation")

PLOT

Its Halloween night and the Boy and the Girl show up and this movie rental store just in time to catch him closing the store. Well they beg him to let them inside to just rent a few movies for the night. So finally he gives in and allows them to come inside. When they enter, they see several other people in the store in costumes. So they're like, "thought you were closed?" He says he was and that this was just a small personal Halloween party he was throwing. So the 2 look around and either they cant find anything good to rent because its out already or what is in looks like it would suck. So they spot these 2 movies to rent and the video guy dressed like a devil tells them that they can not rent these 2 movies and that they weren't supposed to be even on the self. He gives them both a line of shit as to why. Finally the couple talks him into letting them rent them out for a few hours, BUT he says they have to be back BY MIDNIGHT or else! He says they have a very severe LATE FEE!

Review

This was directed by John Carchietta and Carl Morano. Released October 27, 2009....
I don't have alot to say about this movie, other then it started out very promising. It started out looking like a late 80's early 90's horror movie. I thought gee, this could bring back some old memories etc. But when the couple goes home to watch movies that's when things start to go down hill. Little did i know that when they watched movies that i would be watching them with them as well. This movie is sort of like Creepshow where you get to see a couple of short movies within a movie. Which is fine, i just wasn't expecting that. Anyway, the first movie they watch is called The Pick Up. It starts out very slow going. This man is married and appears to be wealthy. He has an upscale prostitute with him and they go back to a motel that the slut has recommended. The motel dude is weird, but you later find out why. They go inside, she gets dressed for sex etc. When she finally gets her ass on top of him to ride in the horse, she starts turning into this god awful creature! But i have to say, it was one of the more entertaining kill scenes i have seen in a while. As shes riding him, shes killing him at the same time. She rips his dick off and tosses it in the wine or champagne bucket with ice. At least that's what it looked like sitting in the bucket later. But she does rip off his junk! The next movie they watch is called Damnation! And its just as crazy. There is this corrupt female cop that pulls over this chick and arrests her. Takes her back to this freakish prison, that you obviously can tell its no REAL prison. Even the Judge was in on it and not real. They never do tell her why she was arrested. Just throws her in a cell, next to this other chick they have done the same thing to. You can tell this place is ran by some heavy occultists. Anyway, this other chick in jail is pregnant. They take her to the "doctor" who is also in on this. They have this weird ass cannibalistic chick locked up as a pet or their sick servant or whatever their purpose is. This time they use this cannibal chick to perform an abortion on this other girl. And what an abortion it is! Its the best kill in the Damnation movie. She fists the girl with a furious thrust, reaches up in her and yanks out the fetus! Then she bites off the cord and eats the fetus! Gotta see it to get the full affect! Jumping to the next part here...both movies have been watched and guess what? Its PAST MIDNIGHT! Oh O! So the video man comes to the couples home with his party goers and they kill the couple! Big surprise huh? Well, the next day a worker at the video store is putting out new movies! And on the cover of their new releases is the couple they just killed the night before! The End!

RATING: 2/5

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Saturday, March 6, 2010

Amityville II: The Possession -Review-


CAST

James Olson as Father Adamsky
Burt Young as Anthony Montelli
Rutanya Alda as Dolores Montelli
Jack Magner as Sonny Montelli
Andrew Prine as Father Tom
Diane Franklin as Patricia Montelli
Moses Gunn as Detective Turner

Plot

Amityville 2: The Possession appears to take place
before the Lutz family moved in. The Montellis move into
the creepy looking old home with their 4 children. Two
small children, a boy and girl. And two teenagers, also
a boy and a girl. Immediately things start to not feel so
right within the home. The family constantly bickers. The
father, who seemed to be unstable as it is before they moved
in, only seemingly gets worse. And the older son eventually
becomes possessed. Now the film doesn't come right out
and say it, but you get the sense that the Montellis are
actually supposed to be portraying the DeFeo family.
A very loosely based portrayal i want to add. But you
will understand what i mean if you see it.

Review

Amityville 2: The Possession was released September 24, 1981. It
was directed by Damiano Damiani. And written by Tommy Lee Wallace.
This movie seems very loosely based on the family that lived in the house just before the Lutz family. So that's one of the reasons why you get the sense this family, the Montellis, might actually be portraying the DeFeos. There are several similarities between the two families. If indeed the Montellis are supposed to be the DeFeos, the story is mostly fiction. What is true, is the unstable relationship between the older son and father. The older son hearing voices. And the biggest connection, the older son ultimately killing his whole family with shooting them. George Lutz ended up suing the producer Dino De Laurentis because he decided to go with a sequel based on Murder In Amityville and not base it off the book The Amityville Horror Part 2. But George lost the suit. Technically this film has no real affiliation with the Lutz family. And there are minor inconsistencies between this film and the movie The Amityville Horror. But other then that, the movie did quite well at the box office despite alot of negative reviews. For a horror movie this film seems to deal with alot of sensitive issues. Like for instance, the father slapping his youngest children across the face, quite hard actually. And going at them relentlessly, is bordering child abuse. You see him attack his wife etc. Which you could blame it on the house having a negative affect on him yes, but you get an overwhelming sense at the beginning that the father isn't very stable to begin with and you start to wonder if this is the first time he has raised his hand to his wife and children or is there a history of abuse way before they moved into the hell house. And also you seem to sense a sexual attraction between the two older siblings at the beginning of the film. Which also starts to make you wonder how long that feeling has been lingering around before they moved into the Amityville house. And its not long before the siblings give in to temptation and go through with having sex. By that time the older boy was influenced by an evil spirit yes, but the older sister was not and she completely complied with her brothers wishes by removing her clothes and exposing herself to him. And later in the film you come to realize that she had no remorse or guilt for what happened and you kinda get the feeling she would do it again. So there is something that wasn't quite right with the Montellis family in the first place. At least that is my observation and opinion. Anyway, the movie is pretty good despite the moral issues at hand. There is no huge scary exorcism in this movie if your wondering. There is however a decent scene of the demon physically leaving the older boys body. To me there wasn't alot of scares here, more creepy feelings then anything else. The same music score that was used in The Amityville Horror was also used in this film. The ending in my opinion was disappointing. I think there could have been an ending that was alot better then this. Which i wont go into it just in case someone hasn't seen this and decides to check it out. It is worth a watch, so i would recommend it. Just don't expect to much from this. And there are plenty sequels to choose from after this one.

RATING: 3/5

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Tuesday, March 2, 2010

Beyond The Door -Review-



CAST

Juliet Mills as Jessica Barrett
Gabriele Lavia as Robert Barrett
Richard Johnson as Dimitri
Nino Segurini as Dr. George Staton
Elizabeth Turner as Barbara Staton
Barbara Fiorini as Gail Barrett

Plot

A woman in San Francisco becomes pregnant...is it the
devils baby? Maybe. The woman ends up possessed by
a demonic force also.


Review

Beyond the Door was released November 21, 1974 in Italy and
it was also released July 31, 1975 in the U.S. Written and Directed
by Ovidio G. Assonitis and produced by Edward L. Montoro and
Ovidio G. Assonitis. This film has a very controversial back story
behind it. Warner Bros. sued the makers of this movie for copyright
infringement. But the lawsuit was eventually thrown out due to the
fact that Warner Bros. couldn't claim copyrights to specific scenes
that were similar to those used in the movie the Exorcist. Beyond
the door has always been accused of ripping off the Exorcist.
Despite the controversy the movie made a decent amount of
money, about 15 million actually. The film has many other titles
also. The original Italian title of this movie is called Chi Sei.
In Australia its known as Behind The Door. Theres quite a list
of other names to. There is about 15 extra minutes included in
some other versions of the film as well. There are sequels,
Beyond The Door 2 and Beyond The Door 3. But if you are
looking for a continuation of the original story of the first
Beyond The Door, you can forget it. There is no continuation
of the original story. The film was finally released on DVD
back in 2008. So if your interested in checking out the movie
to find out what all the controversy is about with this film
then feel free to. Otherwise, i didn't find it all that interesting.
I found it to be quite slow and the basics of the story has all
been done before. So nothing outstanding here. Don't be
fooled by the trailer. The trailer is way more entertaining then
the movie.

RATING: 1/5

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Monday, March 1, 2010

Slumber Party Massacre 2 -Review-


CAST

Crystal Bernard as Courtney Bates
Jennifer Rhodes as Mrs. Bates
Kimberly McArthur as Amy
Patrick Lowe as Matt Arbicost
Juliette Cummins as Sheila Barrington
Heidi Kozak as Sally Burns
Cindy Eilbacher as Valerie Bates
Atanas Ilitch as The Driller Killer
Joel Hoffman as T.J.
Scott Westmoreland as Jeff
Michael Delano as Officer Kreuger
Hamilton Mitchell as Officer Voorhies

Plot

Well if you remember from the first movie Courtney Bates is the younger sister of Valerie Bates. Valerie was the one who put a stop to Russ Thorns murderous rampage once and for all. Courtney, all growed up now still has problems with what happened that night. She has nightmares, hallucinations and to top it off her older sister Valerie was committed to an institution. Courtney is part of an all girl rock band made up of some friends. Well they decide to take a trip and stay at a condo, During the trip Courtney has her spastic moments with seeing things that aren't really happening. Once they arrive at the condo Courtney's episodes gradually get worse. And then eventually her worst nightmares start playing out in reality!

Review

Slumber Party Massacre 2 was released October 30, 1987. Was written and directed by Deborah Brock. Also stars Crystal Bernard, better known in her role on the t.v. show Wings. Slumber Party Massacre 2 is very different from the first movie. Even though the sequel stays true to the story's main characters of the first. The story here is Courtney, younger sister of Valerie Bates, is having terrible dreams brought on by that fateful night of when her and her sister was attacked by nut job Russ Thorn. Valerie has since been placed into a psyche institute and Courtney also having a difficult time dealing with that also. Courtney seems to space out alot, during these times she has visions of the man she dreams about and at times of her sister. As if her sister is trying to warn her about the doom to come. The man she dreams about doesn't appear to be real, no one has seen him but her. He mimics Elvis and even sings! He carries this red electric rocker style guitar, which is very cool looking actually, that is also a drill at the top of the neck. Courtney thinks that maybe all she needs is to get away for a while. So her and a few of her rocker band gal pals run off to a condo for the weekend for some band practicing and a girls night out weekend. But Courtney is already feeling bad before she leaves for the trip because her mother wanted her to go up and see Valerie with her that same weekend. Guilt can have quite the influence on a person mentally and may be exactly why Courtney's dreams and hallucinations get worse once she arrives at the condo. She trys to tell her friends about the dreams, but they don't believe her. They never do until its to late. So as you can guess, one by one Courtney's friends get the drill. This movie does something you don't see everyday in the horror genre. It incorporates the musical style theme you mostly see in movies like Grease etc. And i think the movie actually makes it work fairly decently. Not only are the tunes the girls sing catchy, but even the songs the driller killer sings is quite catchy and entertaining as well. A singing, dancing serial killer...got to admit its def different. And in some odd sick way, even though the driller killer wants to kill Courtney, you get this dreadful sense that he is in love with her to. So maybe we could call this movie Grease 3: The Domestic Violence Chronicles. Another aspect of this movie i think was taken from A Nightmare on Elm St. with the whole dream killer formula, especially when he finally comes out of her dreams and manifests in real life to start killing her friends. And if you pay attention to the two officers in the movie their names are officer Voorhies and officer Kreuger. Even though they spell them differently, i think we get the inside joke. I never found this movie to be boring and its one i can watch more then once. I think its a very fun type of movie, mostly because of the musical aspect. Once again, i didn't find the kills that creative in this series. But it does have its moments mainly in the dream and hallucination states. One scene that's hard to forget is when one of the girls comes up missing and Courtney freaks and swears up and down shes been murdered. So they finally call the cops, Voorhies & Kreuger. Well what do you know, their friend shows up. She had left to go get some oxy ten because she had a zit. But as shes telling Courtney this, Courtney starts to hallucinate this zit being 50 times bigger then what it really is on her face. And then it explodes! So there are a few memorable scenes. And of course your fair share of nudity. But sorry, no nudity for Crystal Bernard. The cast is very likable and seems to genuinely mesh well together though. Juliette Cummins also stars in this movie. You may know her better as Robin in Friday The 13th: A New Beginning. Even the driller killer is likable. So i would suggest this film for a watch. I found it quite entertaining in my opinion.

RATING: 3/5

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