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The First Power came out some years before Fallen but you can think of it as like what if Fallen had been an supernatural action-horror movie (in this case released by Orion Pictures), with over the top set-pieces and stunts.

 
I was looking up random associates of Bruno Mattei and was looking up one of his producers for the later period of his career where he made a shitload of Z grade movies in the Philippines when I came across this:

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt13757762/?ref_=nm_flmg_prd_6

A sequel to Anthropophagus. WTF? It looks like it's been completed too. I don't expect anything decent seeing as it's from the producer of Argento's Dracula 3D. Everything goes back to Dracula 3D nowadays in the last vestiges of Italian horror.

I am also very slightly excited over Argento's latest (and maybe last film since he's 81) since looking up the IMDB for it:


It's a script from 2002 before the mind rot of later Argento projects had fully set. It's also from the same screenwriter that worked with him on Demons, Phenomena, Trauma, and Stendhale Syndrome.
 
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Speaking of Dario Argento, I've realized there's about 3 main takes on horror among all types of horror media be it video games, movies etc.

They are, Raw, Gothic and Hellish.

Raw is something like Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Friday the 13th, Night of The Living Dead, Dawn of The Dead, The Evil Dead, anything that's very brutal and in your face, even if it might have a comedic bent ala Evil Dead 2.

Gothic is anything that contrasts horror with some other, ironic thing, in the case of Dario Argento, it's contrasting horror with beauty, ie the beautiful set designs of Suspiria, Gothic can also be something going for an eerier vibe ala any ghost story or Twilight Zone, Stephen King esque story, though in the case of Stephen King it's usually an ironic contrast with horror and mundane every day things and locations.

You can be as gory as you want with Gothic horror, but there' still got to be that contrast, picture murders happening a beautiful, Art Nouveau mansion as opposed to a rundown shack where a murderous hillbilly lives.

And finally there's Hellish, this is anything with literally hell like imagery ala Hellraiser or also includes anything with a deeper, more emotional bent to the horror, think Jacob's Ladder or Silent Hill.

I also want to clarify that I would consider thriller to be something different than horror, though obviously there's a lot of connections and similarities between the two, but, broadly speaking I think the are about 3 main takes.

You can also mix and mash up these things, Resident Evil is an interesting example because it's a combination of Raw and Gothic, you have the Raw horror of the Romero esque zombies but also the Argento esque Gothic horror of the Spencer mansion and other similar settings.

Thoughts?
 
Dom Cruise said:
Speaking of Dario Argento, I've realized there's about 3 main takes on horror among all types of horror media be it video games, movies etc.

They are, Raw, Gothic and Hellish.

Raw is something like Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Friday the 13th, Night of The Living Dead, Dawn of The Dead, The Evil Dead, anything that's very brutal and in your face, even if it might have a comedic bent ala Evil Dead 2.

Gothic is anything that contrasts horror with some other, ironic thing, in the case of Dario Argento, it's contrasting horror with beauty, ie the beautiful set designs of Suspiria, Gothic can also be something going for an eerier vibe ala any ghost story or Twilight Zone, Stephen King esque story, though in the case of Stephen King it's usually an ironic contrast with horror and mundane every day things and locations.

You can be as gory as you want with Gothic horror, but there' still got to be that contrast, picture murders happening a beautiful, Art Nouveau mansion as opposed to a rundown shack where a murderous hillbilly lives.

And finally there's Hellish, this is anything with literally hell like imagery ala Hellraiser or also includes anything with a deeper, more emotional bent to the horror, think Jacob's Ladder or Silent Hill.

I also want to clarify that I would consider thriller to be something different than horror, though obviously there's a lot of connections and similarities between the two, but, broadly speaking I think the are about 3 main takes.

You can also mix and mash up these things, Resident Evil is an interesting example because it's a combination of Raw and Gothic, you have the Raw horror of the Romero esque zombies but also the Argento esque Gothic horror of the Spencer mansion and other similar settings.

Thoughts?
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That's nice.
 
Internet War Criminal said:
I have finished rereading The Shining for the first time in maybe 15 years.

I'm gonna be rewatching The Shining for the first time in maybe 10 years.

I have a feeling that the movie will hold up as great movie on its own, but really shitty adaption of the book if my memory serves me right.
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There was also a godawful made-for-TV adaptation from 1997 if you want something that is closer to the book.
 
Internet War Criminal said:
So I finally watched The Invisible Man remake... Meh? Why did people cream their pants over it? It wasn't terrible but imo barely even makes it as a horror movie. It's more of a sci-fi thriller if anything.
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It did a good job at the start/middle when the main girl was staying with that policeman and slowly going crazy. There's that one silent jumpscare with the breath I like a lot. It really started to drag on later though.
 
trent said:
There was also a godawful made-for-TV adaptation from 1997 if you want something that is closer to the book.
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Stephen King said it was a much better adaptation, I plan on watching it next.

123hell said:
It did a good job at the start/middle when the main girl was staying with that policeman and slowly going crazy. There's that one silent jumpscare with the breath I like a lot. It really started to drag on later though.
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Yeah the first 40-50 minutes weren't terrible but it just got bogged down later on. The reveal with the brother was especially retarded.
 
BrunoMattei said:
Stephen King is an asshole.
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I can't even thunkful this, this is straight up facts

An asshole who can write really well, though.

The Shining (book) vs The Shining (movie)

There are definitely things that make it a very bad adaptation

Things they had no control over:
- The Hotel itself
There is no way they would be able to faithfully recreate the Overlook. It's described as a classy almost 1920s Great Gasby style place, and they had a tiny budget so it just looks like a gaudy 70s hotel inside, and we barely see any shots from the outside.

- The Topiary
There is no way they could make animal hedges threatening in the way that it was described in the book, and even with today's special effects I don't know how you could make it in a way that wouldn't look ridiculous, rather than as threatening as they were in the book.

- The Shining itself
It's really under-explained and under-utilized, but it's the kind of thing that doesn't really translate well from paper to film.



Things they did have control over:
-The lack of build up of atmosphere/dread
From the opening of the book, Danny is scared shitless of going to the overlook. Dick Halloran hates the place. None of that here. Even the 'It's all just pictures in a book, close your eyes and it goes away' doesn't make any sense/increase the tension if it's not part of the 'Don't you ever go to Room 217, ever ever ever, and steer clear from the topiary', speech etc..

Even getting the job is supposed to be an adversarial thing, with Ullman being an absolute posh cunt who talks down to Jack and makes him resent him (and to a certain point the hotel) and he feels like he deserves more than to be a caretaker, that this is a spiral downward. He's not meant to be happy when he goes there.

Instead what we get is them being incredibly happy to be there, nothing's going wrong, to things cranking up to 11 in a question of minutes.

-The lack of build up of their shitty marriage.
One of the first things we read about is how Wendy & Jack's relationship has been shit and on the rocks for years now, divorce is constantly on their mind and they are struggling. It's basically their last shot at repairing it, otherwise Jack knows that it's likely he's going to lose his family.

- The lack of build up of Jack's madness
We go from 'everything is peachy between Jack & Wendy' to 'BITCH DON'T INTERRUPT MY WRITING' right away. In the context of the movie, it doesn't make sense as we've never seen lose his temper sober and we've only heard that he accidentally hurt his son once while drunk but he didn't mean it. The whole backstory that he's had trouble with his temper all of his life, that he beat the shit out of a student which is what lead to him being kicked out of a job, etc.. all of this is swept aside.

In the span of less than 5 minutes we have him in bed, saying how much he enjoys himself, to him throwing a ball at the wall not knowing what to write, to him telling his wife to get the fuck out and never bother him when he's writing, to him staring outside the window at his family with his mouth ajar looking about as Jack Nicholson as he could.

- Danny's lack of fear of the hotel for most of the first part
Danny in the book is described as terrified by the hotel, and refuses to go into any parts.

- Wendy (and Jack)'s lack of characterization
In the book they are really fleshed out. In the movie, they do not seem to have much personality whatsoever. There's no slow unraveling of Jack's mind, his alcoholism symptoms coming back one by one because he's dry, Wendy's constant questioning whether her husband is going to hurt Danny, her fear of turning into her mother... Not only that, but it completely kills the 'Danny is daddy's boy', her feelings of jealousy.

- Changing horrific scenes for alternatives that don''t work
Some of them do work, but others feel very Kubrick-y and do not make sense. Clearly the fact that the old rotting woman in 217 is changed into a milf with a bush for the ages is meant to compact this scene with the one where Jack dances with an actual attractive woman, but it honestly makes her way less threatening. It goes from an old naked fat rotting woman who wants to strangle you to death to a ghost making pranks to gross you out. Not showing Danny seeing a dude with his brains blown out when they are visiting the presidential sweet, etc. Then he decided to remove scenes that could have been genuinely terrifying like the elevator going up and down by itself in the middle of the night, and them finding party stuff inside, etc.. and instead replace it with some weird imagery of blood flooding.



All of this creates tons of jarring moment, like the son going up to his dad out of nowhere going "Dad, would you ever hurt mommy and I?"' completely unprompted. Some of the great moments in the book are completely butchered, like Jack's nightmare, his reaction to the strangling marks on his son's neck when he hears Danny say that 'she did it' meaning the ghost. The actual ghost in 217... Jack Nicholson is completely the wrong choice for Jack. Spacek could have worked, if she had been better fleshed out.

As far as adaptations go, 2/10 at best. A fucking disaster. That's exactly how you don't do one.



That being said.

As far as the movie itself:

I'm not gonna write so much about the movie because blah blah masterpiece, blah blah kubrick, blah blah one of the greatest horror movies of all time... I will say this though:

Jack Nicholson's performance is really underwhelming during the first part of the movie... right until
Screen Shot 5782-08-23 at 12.25.06 PM.png

'Hi Lloyd, pretty slow tonight innit?'

That's when he comes to life. That's when he actually starts to enjoy himself and enjoy being part of that movie, instead of mostly phoning it in beforehand. That's when the movie itself comes to life.

I think the first part is both too slow, and doesn't flesh out the characters enough, but the ending of the movie more than makes up for it.

I still think it's a bit overrated as a movie (regardless of the fact it's a terrible adaptation, I'm talking on it's own merits), but still very good nonetheless. 9.5/10 Doesn't get a 10 because of the first part of the movie and genuine lack of characterization.

Conclusion
Kubrick decided to make The Shining his own, and it really succeeds as a movie, but really fails as an adaptation.
 
Internet War Criminal said:
So I finally watched The Invisible Man remake... Meh? Why did people cream their pants over it? It wasn't terrible but imo barely even makes it as a horror movie. It's more of a sci-fi thriller if anything.
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It pandered hard to the Girl Power™️ and Me Too™️ delusions in spades is why, complete with the 'UwU I'm so sexy that hot billionaires will do anything to be with me' female power fantasy, combined with the 'girls are smarter and stronger than men!' delusion. Its way too focused on the central theme of female narcissism to the point that the guy in the title, the Invisible Man, is practically an afterthought. He's not a character, he's just a plot device and it was a hamfisted attempt to slam the square peg of 'modern Ring of Gyges with science' into the round hole of 'domestic abuse is bad'. These two themes cannot co-exist.

First, the husband guy was an asshole before he became invisible, so you completely lose the moral and thematic message about what happens when you can get away with anything (because you're invisible.) Secondly, pre-movie events the bad guy is wealthy and powerful, and therefore already insulated from his bad acts. He never needed the power of invisibility to act badly and be free of the consequence at any point. The invisibility suit is completely unnecessary and just serves to complicate the plot which was already on very shaky ground with the whole 'he's dead and never see him' angle. What the fuck are you doing, trying to trick us into thinking he's a ghost or she's delusional? The title of the fucking movie is 'The Invisible Man' so the entire fake-out angle is just retarded.

The 2002 film Enough with Jessica Lopez did something very similar, but better. (It was still bad.) In Enough we get to see the wealthy husband guy be abusive, cheat on her, do violent things, send thugs to chase her down and do all kinds of terrible shit so we get to know and hate him for being a grade A asshole. J-Lo's character goes through a lot of direct threat, stress, and eventually comes up with a plan to murder him and does so after considerable effort and risk. Its not great but at least it makes some kind of sense, and you get a better connection to the characters and some investment because you actually see whats happening and its sort of grounded in something like a plausible, theoretical reality.

This remake movie is just another example of pretentious and politically obsessed assholes trying to contort and twist a premise into themes and propaganda that don't make any fucking sense together and, in fact, make everything collapse into a nonsensical mess.
BrunoMattei said:
It's got nothing on Hollow Man, that's for sure.
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Well they fucking knew what they were doing with Hollow Man, and stuck with the original themes inherent to the premise. It isn't a super complicated story, its 'guy gets plot device, is given power free from consequence-ish, guy does horrible stuff' leading to the theme of 'maybe we need guilt and consequences to keep from being evil' sort of thing. Not hard to execute if you avoid major mistakes like trying to make it about domestic abuse or tax fraud or whatever.
 
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JohnDoe said:
to the point that the guy in the title, the Invisible Man, is practically an afterthought. He's not a character, he's just a plot device
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Yeah, that's the core problem.

It never feels like he's an invisible man, it feels like he's just an invisible creature. She might as well be fighting an alien or a ghost, the threat is not defined, there's no idea of motivation or end goal or anything like that like you'd expect from a man who is not Michael Myers.
 
Oats12345 said:
Exactly. His better adaption sucks just like his personality
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It is a much better adaptation.

The problem is that it's a terrible movie/tv series that is almost all drama and no horror. It's literally a reverse of my earlier review, where it's definitely 9/10 in terms of being faithful to the book, but about a 4/10 in terms of quality. I mean it's by no means terrible, but it's 4h30 hours long. Holy shit that's way too much when you can't put up the level of quality Kubrick did.

Kubrick's version would have benefitted from an additional 20 minutes of extra characterization and amp up the horror in the beginning.

This one would have benefitted from cutting off an hour and a half, and amping the horror way up.

I will say this though: the roque mallet is superior to the axe. You can actually have him clubber the shit out of Wendy without killing her and raise up the stakes, unlike in Kubrick's version where she can't possibly be fighting against Jack so Kubrick just has her walking around seeing spoooooooky stuff because she has fuck all left to do.
 
The most disturbing part of The Shining miniseries was that the actor who played Danny physically cannot close his mouth. Like it seriously just hangs open all the time and he talks like he has a cold. I think he needed an operation or something and I hope he could afford it after the series aired. Anybody trying to crush that weird little mutant's head with a mallet is a hero in my book.

Shining-mini-Danny-e1463086820705.jpg
 
The Shining mini-series was awful, it's creation seems to have been mostly motivated by Stephen King rehashing his differences with Kubrick over the film, and when you think main actor in a dramatic role where a man descends into supernaturally-aided madness, you think "the guy who played the goofy, irresponsible brother on NBC's Wings".
 
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I tried to watch this POS Alien documentary but had to flush it after about 10-15 minutes:


There have already been multiple docu's about Alien and the franchise. The good one's are conveniently included as special features on the DVD and Blu's. This one doesn't go over anything new, has a really cringe bit at the beginning with humans waking up as vampires or some shit? Then reiterates the tired talking points but yet contradicts itself with "Star Wars comes out and it's a fun space adventure and everyone embraced it. Alien comes out and... Everyone embraced it. Which allowed The Thing to come out and people don't want that kind of alien, they want the ET kind of alien."

Same BS and TBQH the answer as to why The Thing bombed is relatively easy to explain. It was released in June of 82, faced direct competition with giant fucking movies up to and including Rocky 3, Star Trek 2, and not one but TWO Spielberg productions (Poltergeist and ET) coming out the same month. It came out the same day as Blade Runner and that one also bombed but no one talks about that for a billion god damn times. And on top of that, the critics had the knives out for The Thing which may have turned more of the public away.

But I digress (literally). This is a shit documentary and you should skip it.

Now allow me to recommend a somewhat obscure slow burn Sci Fi/Horror: Saturn 3.


Very good cast despite the great Harvey Keitel being dubbed. It's a slow movie but if you can get into it you will be rewarded. I know @Frank D'arbo is a fan of this one.
 
I know there have been a lot of these terrible DTV movies that feature "Amityville" in the title that may or may not actually reference the Amityville house, like a movie about a zombie outbreak that happens to take place in the burg of Amityville but someone has got to be just having a larf with this one, surely. Someone's idea of a joke, right?

 
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