Review: The Purge (2013)

The Purge

IMDB rate: 5,5

Genre: Serial-Killer

Finally, time for another 2013 horror movie. I heard quite a few good things about this movie and when it was still in cinema the IMDB rate was around a 7,5 or something. As you can see, this drastically dropped since that moment. This isn't very weird since that it happens with most movies after awhile. What I find weird is that The Conjuring still has a high rating, sure it wasn't a bad movie but personally I thought this movie was a lot better compared with The Conjuring. I am aware that they are two very different movie, with a completely different subject, but I thought this one was a lot more original than The Conjuring.

In an America wracked by crime and overcrowded prisons, the government has sanctioned an annual 12-hour period in which any and all criminal activity -including murder- becomes legal. The police can't be called. Hospitals suspend help. It's one night when the citizenry regulates itself without thought of punishment. On this night plagued by violence and an epidemic of crime, one family wrestles with the decision of who they will become when a stranger comes knocking. When an intruder breaks into James Sandin's gated community during the yearly lockdown, he begins a sequence of events that threatens to tear a family apart. Now, it is up to James, his wife, Mary, and their kids to make it through the night without turning into the monsters from whom they hide.

What I loved most about The Purge was the concept. First of all, it was set in the future, which makes the happenings a lot more believable. Second, the whole concept of a 'killing day' was amazing. Well, of course not for the people who are being killed... but it's a cool idea to minimize crime overall. To be honest, I wouldn't be too surprised if America ever gained this Purge-day. It would be kinda fucked up, but I'm just saying that it wouldn't surprise me a whole lot.

The acting in this movie is very good. Ethan Hawke is an amazing actor. While I wasn't too much of a fan of Sinister, I liked the acting in it, especially from Ethan Hawke. And again, he did an amazing job. Lena Headey is of course the best known for Game of Thrones where she plays Cersei Lannister. A very different role from this one, and it was actually quite funny to see her play in a role like this one. I must admit that I expected an arrogant Cersei look or quote during the movie, just because I was so used to seeing her in that role, but of course that didn't happen. Other than that, Lena Headey is a brilliant actress.
The children weren't too great, the guy was okay but the girl was rather annoying. In my opinion she over-acted a bit, and her character was also quite annoying.

The scares weren't very surprising, actually, they were rather predictable. But besides that I didn't thought it was a bad movie. I've read many negative reviews, but seriously, it's a decent movie with an excellent concept. Perhaps the performance of this concept wasn't too well, a bit predictable and such but really, it wasn't bad.

The so called 'freaks' of this movie were actually rather scary with their masks on. They reminded me a lot of the ones in The Strangers, and I'm personally a big fan of The Strangers. I think that masks overall make a movie more interesting and more scary. The attacker is unknown that way which makes it much more a mystery.
The scenes with the girls were the most scary to me, their giggling the entire time was very unsettling.

The Purge is a very decent movie in my opinion. It's a lot less overhyped compared to The Conjuring and personally I liked The Purge a lot more. I don't exactly know why I keep comparing these two movies, perhaps because they came out around the same time, but anyway, The Conjuring was a lot less original compared with this one.
Great acting and an interesting concept. Perhaps not the most impressing scares or storytelling, but overall it was very good.

My personal rate: 7/10

The Walking Dead: Season 4, episode 8: Too Far Gone

FINALLY, a good episode of The Walking Dead. For those who read my previous reviews about the Walking Dead episodes know that the past few episodes had it's ups and downs. The main thing was about this illness and the governor and to be honest, it wasn't much interesting. It was tensive to watch the prison scenes where people were almost dying, because you were afraid that one of your favorite characters would die, but since that was the only tensive thing it's wasn't much interesting. Also, the whole governor story became a bit old and reminded me a lot of season 3.

Anyway, like I said this episode was finally good again. Absolutely my favorite episode of this season this far, but unfortunately we now have to wait until february for the next episodes :(.

!!SPOILERS!!

So we see that the Governor tries to take the prison once again, it's the same old story and I was getting afraid that things would be all the same again. He has a tank this time and was quite dangerous with it, and unfortunately, it was the last episode for one of the heroes thanks to the governor. Now, I've said it before and this will be the last time I say it, but there are massive spoilers ahead, so if you really don't want to know what happened, then I strongly recommend that you look the other way. 

The governor took Michonne and Hershel, and used them as a trading method. The governor wants the prison, and Rick can have Hershel and Michonne back. In the middle of the discussion, the governor gets impatient and slices Hershel's throat. This was such a sad moment because Hershel always was the soft, sweet and rational one of everyone. He was so wise and it's very sad to see him go. 

Of course, it was terrible to see Hershel get killed, but I must say that it was necessary that an important character would die again. The past episodes everyone of the main cast was always safe and the zombie world didn't really felt dangerous anymore. What I find ironic is that Hershel was killed by a human instead of a zombie. 

It was good that an important character died because it made me hate the governor even more. It put emotion in this episode, and that was exactly what was missing the past few ones.

Anyway, Michonne gets away while Rick and the rest opens fire on the Governor. There's a whole battle going on and everyone that isn't fighting tries to escape. 

At one point Tyreese is fighting a few of the other side, and almost got stuck while fighting them. Luckily, the children save him. Now, this was another great moment because these children are quite useless to the show, and seeing them kill someone that isn't dead is quite something. Also because Tyreese is quite a big fellow, and him getting saved by kids was pretty cute. Another great scene.

In this episode there is also briefly shown that there's a rat hammered to some door in the prison, meaning to attract walkers I guess. This is still a small question that needs to be answered, because someone is messing with the prison guys. Personally I suspect Bob, because he's always acting weird. 

Now the most important thing of this episode is of course, did the governor get what he wanted? What happened with everyone? Well, the governor got killed. HELL YES, you read that right, the motherf*cker is finally dead! One time by Michonne (that needed to happen) and the double tap shot by his 'new wife', the new wife who just lost her daughter because the governor was being a dick again. Personally, I thought it was amazing. The governor thing is finally over, and the way he got murdered was cool looking too. 

The people from the prison got chased away more or less by the governor and his people, and they basically have split up in 3 or maybe 4 groups, what will happen with them is not known yet and we'll have to wait until the next episode for that. There's still a question who got killed by the governor and his team, and who got injured. I don't think that another important character got killed, but perhaps some smaller ones. 

What do I expect from the other half of the series? Well, to see their new location is important. What will be the next storyline, what happened with Judith (Rick's baby), did she get killed or did someone take her on time? I'm quite curious about the next episode because this chapter of the governor and the prison is finally closed. 

Too Far Gone is the best episode of this season so far. Everything happened what should have happened, the prison is no longer their location, the governor is no longer a threat and we finally got some emotion again because of the killing of Hershel. I'm very sad about it, but damn this episode was amazing. I think The Walking Dead will finally be good again!

Rest in peace, Paul Waker

Rest in peace

Paul Walker

I wasn't really a fan of him, perhaps I saw one or two movies of him, but it's always sad when a young man dies. I liked his movie Joy Ride a lot, and to be honest, I've never seen a Fast and Furious movie of him, but I do know that he is a great actor. And with that, also a great human. He is well known for using his celebrity status for a good cause and for that I admire him. 

My thoughts are with his family and the ones affected by his loss. 

Review: We Are What We Are (2013)

We Are What We Are

IMDB rate: 5,7

Genre: Thriller

Another 2013 horror movie! Well, horror.. to be honest I didn't find We Are What We Are much of a horror movie. It discussed some horror elements, yes, but not only until the very last scene we actually saw something of this, and what we saw wasn't very frightening to me.

It reminded me a lot of the style of Stoker, it was very dark and quite slow. Stoker is also a slow movie, but it wasn't too slow. There were enough happenings that made the movie interesting. With We Are What We Are (let's call it WAWWA for short ;)) it was often too slow. It wasn't very interesting in my opinion, so often my thoughts were away from the movie.

A seemingly wholesome and benevolent family, the parkers have always kept to themselves, and for good reason. Behind closed doors, patriarch Frank rules his family with a rigorous fervor, determined to keep his ancestral customs intact at any cost. As a torrential rainstorm moves into the area, tragedy strikes and his daughters Iris and Rose are forced to assume responsibilities that extend beyond those of a typical family. As the unrelenting downpour continues to flood their small town, the local authorities begin to uncover clues that bring them closer to the secret that the Parkers have held closely for so many years.

It's quite obvious that there is something wrong with the Parker family, it's a modern time but they often sit in medieval clothing, especially during dinner. While it's not too obvious in the beginning what is actually wrong with this family, we get the right thoughts about it quite easily.
So beware, spoiler ahead, but the Parkers are all cannibals. While this should be very shocking, it didn't feel very shocking. So to me, the feeling wasn't very right in the movie. It didn't even feel as a true horror movie, more like a normal thriller, but with cannibalism in it.

In the movie they are talking about people missing from the village, but there are only 3 missing people in the last few years. Not really a reason to worry it seems to me. But in the nearby area there are 80 missing people, and while this is being said there isn't anything done with it. It's more listed as a fact rather than a concern.

Also, it's very briefly shown that there are people in the basements of the Parkers, which gives enough clues already about the cannibalism, but still it didn't worry me at all.
The movie is put up quite boring and slow, there is more shown about the family in general than the concerning fact that they are cannibals. It's more like 'here is a family that isn't really functioning well, oh, and they are eating your neighbors by the way'.

Also, the entire story is a bit weird. They are following some sort of old religion which makes them eat people. They seem to find their religion (where they are eating people) a lot more accurate than a normal religion to get a place in heaven. Everyone has their principles, I get that, but dude you should reconsider the cannibalism part.
The daughters seem to be utterly disgusted by the fact that they are forced to eat people, and when they finally had enough they are taking revenge! Yes finally, we've waited for this the entire movie! But isn't it a bit hypocrite that they are taking their revenge by eating their father?

Personally, I thought that WAWWA (that's like if a baby is talking) was quite a boring movie. It had no tension in it and the cannibalism seemed to be more of an after-effect. The beginning was quite fascinating because it looked very good, great pictures and the acting isn't bad either. I like cannibalism movies, they are very gruesome and always leave some sort of impression behind (The Road, Ravenous), but this movie didn't do that at all unfortunately. I have never seen the original (this one is a remake of a Mexican movie I believe), but I have seen some pictures of it and those pictures look a whole lot more interesting that the ones of this movie. Perhaps I will watch it someday.

My personal rate: 6/10

Review: Curse of Chucky (2013)

Curse of Chucky

IMDB rate: 5,6

Genre: Slasher

Man, how long I've waited for this movie to come out. After the terrible Chucky movie 'Seed of Chucky' we quite needed a make-up movie. And we did! Well, it wasn't as good as the first Child's Play movie, but it certainly had a few good surprises in it. 

It's quite a shame, but I've never seen Child's Play 2 and 3, I own 3 but because I never saw 2 I couldn't watch it yet. I did see the first one and the two comedic ones Bride and Seed of Chucky.

For a sequel, I think that Curse of Chucky did a fine job. It wasn't too great, laughable at times, but then there was this amazing ending which made a lot good again.

After the events of Seed of Chucky, Nica, a young woman forced to a wheelchair since birth, has to regroup her sister, Barb and her brother-in-law, Ian for a funeral after the death of her mother. While dealing with barb, Ian, along with their 5-year-old daughter, Alice; Nica receives an odd package - a creepy doll. After people start showing up dead, the fearless Nica soon suspects that the creepy doll is much more than a doll.

Curse of Chucky feels like another cliche standard sequel, and to be honest, it was quite cliche. The movie was very predictable and took many elements from the original Child's Play movies. The order in which everyone would die wasn't much of a secret either unfortunately.

What I disliked most about this movie was the way Chucky looked. At first he looked super fake and CGI like, nothing like the doll in Child's Play nor like the doll in Bride of Chucky. His hairs were longer, his face was way too smooth and his scars were gone. Now, it is a fact that Chucky has been beheaded, burned and cut multiple times in all these movies, and yet he manages to look normal again in the sequel of that movie. This wasn't the case with Bride and Seed of Chucky luckily, which made it a lot more believable. What was of course bothering in this movie was the fact that he was all normal again, even though he looked messed up in the last couple of movies. 

What made me very happy halfway through the movie was the fact that it wasn't real! He had some sort of wax on his face to hide his scars! Sure, there were a lot less scars, but still they were there. This made Chucky a lot more real again and the CGI effects appeared a lot less when he was scarred. 

Beneath I made a small collage of Chucky's looks through the years, the first being Child's Play 2, the second being Bride of Chucky and the last two both being from Curse of Chucky.

Now the biggest question of this movie is, which part is it following up to? Many say it's a follow up for Child's Play 3, meaning it ignores Bride and Seed of Chucky. Other say that it's a following up for Bride of Chucky, meaning it only ignores Seed of Chucky. But the fact is that it actually is a follow-up for Seed of Chucky. In the end of Seed of Chucky we see how Tiffany is going into Jennifer Tilly's body, which explains the fact how she can be alive again. So in fact it's Jennifer Tilly (both actress and character) but with the soul of Tiffany. How Chucky is once again alive, is always the biggest mystery but I'm trying to ignore that part. Also, Chucky mentions how he murdered the Tilly's, which also took place in Seed of Chucky. 

One scene that I did not get was where Chucky is doing the spell on the girl, did Tiffany send him to Alice or to Andy? Which took place when? Because that didn't really made sense. 

Well that being said, how awesome is it that both Tiffany and a much older Andy appear in this movie? I thought it was amazing and it made the movie a lot better.

Overall, Curse of Chucky is a decent movie. It's a good follow-up for Seed of Chucky since it get's rid of some loose ends, but what was mainly important is the fact that it's so much better than Seed of Chucky. We never found out what happened with Glen/Glenda unfortunately, but that does not really matter. It's sad that Chucky looks very fake through most of the movie, the CGI is way too much and very bothering at times. The movie isn't very unique but it has a few nice touches to it.

My personal rate: 6,5/10

The Walking Dead: Season 4, episode 7: Dead Weight

I'm sorry to start this little review so negative, but this was one terrible episode. It was boring, and to be honest, season 4 itself isn't really good yet. It has a few strong episodes, but overall it's taking all way too long and things happening aren't very interesting. The location gets boring and the dangers of it too, the only thing that's a bit interesting at the moment is who will survive this virus and will they finally leave this prison. 

To make this episode even worse, it was about the Governor, again. You see, I get why the previous episode was about the Governor, we saw a bit of his life after Woodbury and he even seemed to have better his life. But, this episode it was all about him again and we learn that he didn't change a bit. What makes me angry is the fact that this episode seems to ignore everything that happened in the previous episode. The governor was bad, went good and went bad again. Not very interesting and to me it makes the previous episode very useless.

So the fact is now that the Governor is still after the prison for some dumb reason. I don't even get why he wants it that badly. Dude, move on and get yourself and your new family a new place. 

Now we've seen two episodes about the Governor, first he seems to better his life but this was only fake which made it a very useless episode, this episode he found Martinez and he immediately kills him when he saved him. I'm sorry, but why? Why everything? I seriously don't get what these writers are doing because it's just so boring now. 

There are already two episodes without the main cast and we're nearing the mid-season finale, which probably means that we will get some stupid cliffhanger in the next episode. Personally I hope that they stop with the Governor stuff after the next episode because it's just a repeat of season 3. I'm really hoping that he will die the next episode, and that they will find a new place again. I really don't care at the moment who dies because the character development has been poor lately. I only care about Daryl and Michonne surviving to be honest.

At the moment I think that season 4 is worse than season 3. I liked season 3 but there were so many unnecessary episodes in it. With season 4 it's almost an exact repeat only with some illness hanging around and with even more useless episodes. I'm not even excited for the next episode anymore because this one was that boring. I really hope that the writers will come with something good in the next few episodes, because this is becoming absolutely worthless. Come back with the simple episodes of season 1, only 6 episodes and everything was clear. For the new seasons they come with 16 episodes and sorry, but that's totally unnecessary. 

I'm crossing my fingers that the next episode will finally be good again!

Short non-horror review: Catching Fire

The Hunger Games: Catching Fire

IMDB rate: 8,3

Genre: Adventure

Okay, I'm sorry for this absolutely not-horror related movie, but yesterday I went to the cinema and I finally saw Catching Fire!

For those who remember one of my earlier posts (last year somewhere), I'm a big fan of the Hunger Games trilogy. I've read all three books multiple times and I absolutely loved them. I thought the first movie was good, but the beginning was a bit annoying. There wasn't much talking and the camera was shaking way too much. After awhile it became a lot better and it had a big resemblance with the book (that's quite rare these days). 

Well, I read the second book too and I was very curious about how they would recreate this in a movie. There's a lot of information, a lot is happening and it wasn't explained all too well in the books. What made me most curious was the look of the new arena, since I couldn't really visualize it myself. 

So I've seen the second movie now and seriously, I loved it. I think I cried 2/3 of the movie, not because there were so many sad moments, but because I loved it so much. I know, this sounds so terrible, but I really really liked it a lot.

First of all, I thought it was a lot better than the first part. There wasn't a shaking camera and there was just normal talking. I recognized every element from the book, and it was put in the movie in a magnificent way. For me it was just absolutely perfect. Most of the time when a book is made into a movie, they skip a lot of stuff or change important things, and with Catching Fire, this wasn't the case at all. Well, perhaps they made Johanna (Jena Malone) a little less brutal, but that wasn't bothering at all. At first I was afraid that it would be as with the Harry Potter books. I'm also a big Harry Potter fan and while I like the movies, it missed so many important things from the books. 

What was so great about it was the fact that they didn't skip any important elements. There were a lot scenes that were very small, but I think that's what made it great because not every scene has to take that long. And because of these short scenes, important things could be kept in the movie. 

The acting is amazing, again. I think that Jennifer Lawrence is a perfect casting choice for casting. I saw her in a few interviews and she's very funny and sarcastic, and that sarcastic thing is exactly what Katniss has. For me, Jennifer is just Katniss. Amazing actress. I like Liam Hemsworth, but his part wasn't very big in this movie, I'm very curious about his character in the next movie. Two other great actors were Sam Claflin and Woody Harrelson. 

Personally, I loved this movie. It was everything I hoped for and perhaps even better than that. The acting was great, the happenings were all amazingly shown and everything was in it. I truly can't wait until Mockingjay comes out next year. The only thing that bothers me terribly is the fact that they made two parts out of it. Which means, I still have to wait two years until I've finally seen every part. The book isn't much thicker than Catching Fire, so it's hard for me to imagine that they need to split the movie, but we'll see how that will turn out.

My personal rate: 9,5/10

Review: Dark Skies (2013)

Dark Skies

IMDB rate: 6,2

Genre: Science-Fiction

Finally! Another 2013 movie! I'm finally catching up a bit with all these amazing movies made this year. And believe me, 2013 is a good horror year this far! Normally there is only one good -or reasonable- movie brought out in a year, but this year has brought us a lot more! Well, I won't continue talking about that, because this is only a review about one movie: Dark Skies. I saw the trailer of this movie in the beginning of the year and I've wanted to see it but I never got around watching it. The trailer looked cool, but well, from my experience when a trailer is cool, the movie most likely isn't. So I never really bothered watching it because I assumed it wasn't very good. 

Now, I finally saw it and I must say that I'm quite impressed by it!

As the Barret family's peaceful suburban life is rocked by an escalating series of disturbing events, they come to learn that a terrifying and deadly force is after them.

When I first saw the trailer I expected some sort of haunted house movie, perhaps with ghosts and stuff like that, I had no idea that it was about aliens! I'm not a big fan of Science-fiction movies but like I already said, I quite liked this one. 

Dark Skies is from the same producers as Insidious and Paranormal Activity, I quite liked the first and second PA but I disliked Insidious a lot, but now I've seen Dark Skies I'm convinced that this one is better than either of those movies.  

There are certainly a few elements from those movies in Dark Skies, for example the videocameras in the rooms, waking up in the middle of the night standing in the garden and some more stuff like that, but while it had similar stuff going on, it never looked too much like each other. 

The happenings started out really small, it seemed more like a prank than a treat. When days went by, these pranks turned a lot more serious. I actually got goosebumps while watching it, because there was so much tension in the movie. I loved it! 

We don't get to see these aliens until one of the last scenes. We didn't get a clear look but they looked quite scary from what I could see. In one scene we see one walking behind one of the characters, at first I didn't notice, but when I did... holy shit, I must admit that it did scare me for a second.

The acting is very good. I think Keri Russell is an amazing actress (I loved her so much in August Rush) and I wasn't sure how she would be in a horror movie, but again, she didn't fail to amaze me! I'm not really familiar with Josh Hamilton but he was excellent too. The kids acted reasonable, the little kid was adorable but I wasn't too sure of his acting. The older kid was decent too. 

The only thing that bothered me a lot was the same old horror mistake; people seem to forget that they have lamps in their homes. The alarm goes off, and those people ran downstairs to search the house, IN THE DARK. Some other weird stuff is going on, let's investigate again, IN THE DARK. I'm sorry but are all basic instincts lost when you're scared? Are we suddenly able to see incredibly good in the dark while we're in a rush? I'm sorry but it's so bothering that people in movies don't turn on the lights. 

Overall, I liked this movie quite a bit. It surprised me a lot! I really recommend watching this movie because I thought it was an amazing science-fiction/horror movie. Great acting, great scares and a great story! Honestly, I'm hoping for a sequel because the ending left me frightened!

My personal rate: 8/10

The Walking Dead: Season 4, episode 6: Live Bait

Oops, a bit late again. It was only until today that I finally had a bit time to watch The Walking Dead again. I was actually quite looking forward to it, since the last episode ended with a quick view of The Governor. The Walking Dead can use a bit of good action again so seeing a familiar face like The Governor had to make it interesting again.

With that I wouldn't say that the past few episodes were bad, but I definitely did not like them as much as I liked the previous seasons. Well, maybe I do like it as much, but on a different way. Season 1 and 2 were excellent, season 3 was good too, but unfortunately there were too many useless episodes which made it a bit less good again. Season 4 did have a few 'boring' episodes until this far, but it's not as bad yet as in season 3. 

What was nice about season 1, 2 and 3 was the fact that the location changed every time. With season 4 still in the prison it might become a bit dull, so I guess that it's a bit dangerous to use the same location again in a TV show like this one. 

What I notice in season 4 is that they focus a lot more on each individual. They focused a bit more on Michonne, Hershel and The Governor. In a way this is very clever because when they follow one individual, we get to see a new location every time they go out of the prison. It's also very interesting to get to know these characters a bit better, instead of just focusing on Rick. 

What I notice in season 4, this far, is that there's a lot less action. There are of course zombie attacks but on a different way I guess. They are quite neutral about it now, because they are facing these bastards for quite some time now. It's logical that they are becoming more neutral about seeing and killing the zombies, but for the action-level of the show it's a bit sad. 

As was it with this specific episode again. This episode was all about The Governor, we see what he did after Woodbury. He meets a family and actually helps them a bit. We know this Governor as a cruel bastard, but is he starting to show a bit of regret? I'm not quite sure yet, he was quite nice this episode and helped the family a lot. But personally I don't think that he can be trusted. I haven't read the comics of The Walking Dead, so correct me if I'm wrong but I heard that in the comics the Governor is the cruelest bastard alive, and sure that's also what we saw until this far, but is there a chance that he can be trusted again? I'm very curious to see how this Governor situation will develop in the next few episodes. 

The episode itself wasn't very exciting, the killing was kinda tame and since we are used to hating The Governor we can't really sympathize with him. I do think it was interesting to see what The Governor did after Woodbury, we perhaps start to get to know him better now.

I am very excited for the next episode though!

Book review: SPOOK Secrets

Spook Secrets

How much do you really know about classic Sci-fi/Horror?

Spook Secrets is not just an ordinary book, it's a quiz book! It's filled with huge amounts of Horror Trivia and believe me, I learned quite a few things reading this. While reading this I was testing myself, since it's written like a quiz. Every page contains 4 images with a question written above. There can be one answer, but also two, three or four! So it's incredibly hard. I think the book contains about 300 questions, and when I tested myself I only got 56 of them right.
The questions are really hard, but you also learn quite a bit of them.

Like I already said, it's not just a book because it's a quiz book. There are a few chapters in them, as stated in the index, but while taking the quiz we never see a thing of these chapters. I think it would be a bit more comfortable to read if there were some chapter-heads (or how do you call it?) in it. Maybe chapters made on base for each type of genre, like Science-fiction, horror, thriller, actors etc.
Like I said, there are chapters in them but if you click on them (it was a PDF) they seem to redirect you to a random question. There's no specific order in it which makes it a bit difficult to keep focused.

While it's a bit hard to keep focused, you do want to keep reading. Especially when you got a question right, you want to keep continuing testing your movie knowledge. It's a fun book for a die-hard Sci-fi or horror fan because you learn a lot about random stuff. What's also nice is that the book differs from the usual book.  

Do you think you know a lot about horror or sci-fi? Think again!

No but in all seriousness, it's a lot harder than what you would expect. 

Personally I quite enjoyed looking through it, I was pretty confident about my knowledge but this book kinda gave it a breakdown. Nevertheless, it was fun to get to know all this new trivia!

Review: The Conjuring (2013)

The Conjuring

IMDB rate: 7,6

Genre: Possession, Haunted House

The next video for my 2013 watching list! I'm a bit late to the party I guess, because every blogger already wrote a review about this movie, but hey, I'm very poor and the cinema is very expensive ;). I quite liked The Conjuring, it was a good movie to watch, BUT I must say that I expected a lot more of it. There's a whole hype about this movie and everyone says how brilliant and scary it is, but personally I thought it just felt like another possession movie. It's a good movie, sure, but to me it wasn't something  incredible or something. 

In 1971, Carolyn and Roger Perron move their family into a dilapidated Rhode Island farm house and soon strange things start happening around it with escalating nightmarish terror. In desperation, Carolyn contacts the noted paranormal investigators, Ed and Lorraine Warren, to examine the house. What the Warrens discover is a whole area steeped in a satanic haunting that is now targeting the Perron family wherever they go. To stop this evil, the Warrens will have to call upon all their skills and spiritual strength to defeat this spectral menace at it's source that threatens to destroy everyone involved.

When the movie started I was of course very curious about it because I've read so many good reviews about it. People said how refreshing it was and how original it felt. I don't think that a movie needs to be refreshing to be good, it can be good even if you're using stuff that has been used a thousand times already. To me The Conjuring didn't feel like a refreshing movie. It reminded me of movies like Amityville Horror, The Orphanage, Paranormal Activity and The Last Exorcism. I don't think that it's bad that it looks a lot like those movies, but it's wrong to call it refreshing in that case. It wasn't refreshing, it was just the same concept only put in this movie in a slightly different way. 

What I loved about this movie was the beginning, were we see a story about a doll. As you might know, I'm terrified of dolls and I love a good possessed doll movie (there aren't too many of those, unfortunately). I wasn't entirely sure what The Conjuring was about, and seeing this doll made me all excited because The Conjuring is from James Wan, who happens to be the creator of Dead Silence, my all time favorite horror doll movie. I guess I expected a bit of a haunted house story mixed with this doll, but unfortunately we only see this doll in the very beginning and a few seconds halfway through the movie. Fact is, the movie itself isn't about the doll, at all. I was quite sad about this and to me it felt like the doll story was a bit useless. I get it that the story in the beginning was some sort of introduction to Ed and Lorraine, but then halfway through the movie their daughter suddenly sees it? I was a tiny bit confused by this. 

The acting is very good. Vera Farmiga and Patrick Wilson are both excellent actors for horror movies, and again they carried this role very well. Ron Livingston and Lili Taylor were both excellent too. There were only a few jump-scares and they were quite predictable if you ask me.

What I disliked a bit about this movie was the overuse of so called scary stuff. The doll, the clapping, the sleep walking girl, the girl seeing stuff in her room, the little girl having a imaginary friend, the slamming doors. Sure, these are all scary effects, but together in one movie they seem like one big mess in an attempt to make it scary as hell. There was just too many, and many of them didn't fit together.The scares being used was almost a constant, which made the impact a lot less impressive. It felt to me as if there was a lot left unexplained.
But again, the trailer showed a lot of the scares already, so we know what to expect.

While this review might be slightly negative, I do think it's a good movie. I've seen horror movies far worse than this. But I think that it's a bit overhyped which gave me a lot of expectations for this movie. These expectations weren't fulfilled so I think that made the movie a bit worse for me. If I knew nothing about it I think I would have liked it a bit more. The Conjuring is a good or decent movie, but don't expect something incredibly refreshing because the movie itself is quite standard in my opinion.

My personal rate: 6,5/10

Review: I Spit on Your Grave 2 (2013)

I Spit on Your Grave 2

IMDB rate: 5,5

Genre: Torture, Revenge

With the end of the year coming up, I realized that I didn't watch a lot of horror movies coming from 2013 this year. A bit of a shame of course, because my 'Favorites of 2013' list would be very short. So today I decided to watch a few horror movies from 2013! Starting with I Spit on Your Grave 2. 

Those who read my review about the first part (click here) know how much I liked it. I was very curious about this one too because I read a few very good reviews about it. I quite liked watching this movie, although I must say that it's not as good as the first part. Again, I still haven't seen any of the original movies (will download it now), so can't say a whole lot about them. But when I've finally watched it, I'll write a review about it and I will compare the two movies.

Katie is trying to make it in the cutthroat world of modeling. When she innocently accepts an offer to have new photos taken for her portfolio, the experience quickly turns into an unthinkable nightmare of rape, torture and kidnapping. When a twist of fate finally frees her from her captors - beaten, battered, bruised, and broken, she will have to tap into the darkest places of the human psyche to not only survive her ordeal, but to ultimately find the strength to exact her brutal revenge.

Okay first of all, I'm from Europe and these movies are making me terrified about ever going to Eastern-Europe again. Watching all these movies (A Serbian Film, Hostel, Train) is absolutely not good for a countries good name. I mean, basically if you're watching a horror movie and there's someone from Eastern-Europe in it, you better start fucking running because there's no way that nothing is going to happen. 

What I really liked about this movie was the beginning. In every horror movie there are annoying scenes where a girl doesn't scream or doesn't try to run or something, that didn't happen in this movie. The girl immediately starts screaming when she figured something was wrong, she took a taser gun and instead of just treating that she's going to use it, she actually starts using it immediately. Even though she has three locks on her door, she managed to escape her room but unfortunately she got caught by her molester. In this time she was able to scream, and guess what? Somebody heard her and tried rescuing her! That didn't go well, but still, three horror cliches weren't used! I loved it!

The thing with these I Spit on Your Grave movies is that we've seen the previous parts already. Meaning that we know that a girl will be attacked and she will survive that, and then she will have a very brutal revenge. So the mystery of it isn't really there anymore. Nevertheless, the revenge scenes are always very tasteful and very amusing to watch. 

What I did not like a whole lot were the dialogues. So the first part of the movie is where the girl, Katie, is being raped and tortured. Her offenders say all these cliche things to her and that does not mind a whole lot, but eventually the roles are switched, meaning that Katie will attack her offenders. But to make things more brutal, she's saying the exact same things to them as what they said to her. Sure, I get the point of that, but after a while you can't help but think "I've all heard this a few times already, become a bit more original dude".

The acting was decent. Nothing special, but not terribly bad. Seeing Katie's crying and screaming face was a bit funny, so I had a bit trouble taking her seriously, but besides that her performance was good. The lightning was a bit poor at times. When she's buried under the ground we suddenly hear a lot of noise and suddenly she seems to be in a cave or something. I don't know but it seemed a bit random, especially because this cave led to people's living rooms. Perhaps the floor broke, I don't know but it was a bit of a weird and dark place.

The torturing scenes were again awesome, Georgie looking all infected and stuff, while Ivan's ball were smashed. All fun stuff to look at again.

Great movie, not as good as the first part, but certainly very enjoyable. A lot of brutal scenes that make you sick in your stomach and a lot of blood. Original deaths, and just look at this image above, how sick does his legs look? Brilliant.

I absolutely recommend watching this movie for fans of a bit more brutal movies. Believe me, it can be hard to watch at times. I thought it was worth it.

My personal rate: 7/10

Review: Sorority Row (2009)

Sorority Row

IMDB rate: 5,0

Genre: Slasher

I almost forgot that I've watched this movie! I think it was last week or something, I can't even remember anymore. Anyway, it's not really a movie worth to remember because it was kinda lame. To describe Sorority Row in short: It's almost exactly the same as I Know What You Did Last Summer, but with a lot of woman. Seriously, it was almost an exact copy. 

Now I've heard that this movie is a remake, so maybe it's better to say that I Know What You Did Last Summer was exactly the same as The House on Sorority Row (1983), but since I haven't seen the original movie I can't tell you.

After finding out a guy cheated on their sister, sorority house Theta Pi play a simple prank on him. They trick him into thinking that he has killed his girlfriend, then take him into the middle of nowhere to 'dismember' the body, only then revealing it was a prank. However, the prank goes horribly wrong and all involved swear never to speak of it again. A year later at graduation though, they are all reminded of the past.

Sorority Row is not a very interesting movie in my opinion, it looked a lot like I Know What You Did Last Summer and it definitely was not better than that one. In I Know What You Did Last Summer there was a lot more character development, a more interesting story and overall it was just a whole lot better. Maybe it's wrong to compare the two, but I couldn't stop thinking about I Know What You Did Last Summer while watching this movie. 

Personally I thought that these five woman are very stupid and very ignorant. Especially Jessica (Leah Pipes) was an annoying cunt and I couldn't wait for her to die. Her lines are so terribly cliche that it made me cringe a lot. 

Cassidy (Briana Evigan) was supposed to be some sort of hero but I thought she was only really annoying, her acting wasn't that bad but her face is a bit Kristen Stewart sometimes. 

Chugs (Margo Harshman) was a rather useless character since all her use in this movie was to be a slut. Also it was her brother who killed the girl and she doesn't even seem bothered by it. Hell, there was not a single connection between the two of them, and terrible actress by the way. 

Claire (Jaime Chung) was the only one who acted properly, but her role wasn't very big unfortunately. Then there is Ellie (Rumer Willis), not only was her character incredibly annoying, she acted terrible too. She cried every second of the movie, and when she didn't cry, she was only being all insecure about stuff. I'm sorry but if you're the daughter of Bruce Willis and Demi Moore, that doesn't make you an instant good actress. 

Oh, and this is not one of these girl but I'll just have to mention Maxx Hennard for his TERRIBLE acting.

At the end we of course figure out who the killer is and well, there was not even a good explanation for it. So hear me out, -spoilers-, the boyfriend of Cassidy heard of the murder, and since he wanted to have a future with her, he decides to kill everyone that knows about it. What he does before that is getting the corpse of the girl, and the jacket that she wears and hangs it somewhere in the house what of course some of these five girls will see. He also sends text messages to everyone to warn them (?) that he knows (He knows what they did last summer)! And after this warning he happily starts murdering everyone. 

Now what I don't get is, why putting all this effort in getting the corpse? Or why putting effort in scaring them first? Why not just immediately kill them?

Anyway, I thought this was a very crappy motive, if you can call it a motive.

I think slasher movies are amusing, we never know who the killer is and it's always the question who will survive. With slasher movies you can go so many ways and still make a decent movie. Personally I did not find this a very good movie because it was very lazy at some points. The acting was overall not very good. It's kinda sad really because the beginning was kinda amusing, the camera work looks great and the music is good too. Unfortunately, the script writing looks very sloppy compared with all the good things in this movie.

My personal rate: 5/10

Review: Misfits (Season 1)

Misfits

Season 1

IMDB rate: 8,4

Genre: Comedic, TV Show, Supernatural

Last week I started watching Misfits, I had no idea what it was about and I always thought that it was about some random kids doing bad things, so I was kinda surprised that it was actually kinda supernatural. Maybe this review isn't very fitting for a horror blog, but hey, it's is a bit supernatural and I really liked this show. Sure, it is about kids doing bad things, but they do have superpowers! How cool is that?

So, I was very surprised when watching this because it was absolutely not what I expected. It really is a good show, it has it's drama, it has it's supernatural stuff and it has it's comedic side. For me it was a very good combination. It has the typical British humor and personally I loved it. 

While the characters are actually a bit scumbags, they start to grow on you. You start caring for them, how strangely it may seem when you first start watching this show. 

I've just finished season 2, so I'll write a review about that too Luckily there are only 6-8 episodes in a season, so it doesn't take as long as watching Lost for example (around 25 episodes each season). 

So a bit about the characters:

!!SPOILERS!!

Nathan Young: Played by Robert Sheehan. How I hated this guy in the beginning, he was such a cunt and super annoying. But like I said, they start to grow on you, as is it with Nathan. I think that Robert Sheehan is a very good choice for playing Nathan. He just has the right looks and his acting is very convincing. His ability became known quite late, but it is quite a cool one. His ability is that he is immortal, and believe me when I say that he needed it quite a lot.

Alisha Daniels: Played by Antonia Thomas. Another character that started to grow on me, she too was an incredible bitch in the beginning, but I must say that her character became a lot softer after awhile. Antonia Thomas plays her character quite well, she can play both soft and bitchy very convincing so that's a good thing. Her ability is very lame though, if she touches a man he wants to have sex with her. Yeah well, very helpful.. 

Kelly Bailey: Played by Lauren Socha. Excellent casting if you ask me. If you only see her you can't help but think that she's trash. And when she starts to talk everything you thought about her gets confirmed. Amazing acting (or isn't it acted?). But she too get's to be a lot softer after awhile. Her superpower is that she can hear thoughts of everyone. Quite useful, but in my opinion it's isn't used a whole lot.

Simon Bellamy: Played by Iwan Rheon. Personally he is my favorite, he is incredibly adorable and shy and again, he is casted perfectly. I previously saw him as Ramsay Snow in season 3 of Game of Thrones, so this was quite a character switch. I already liked him since the very first episode, and that only grew a whole lot, so I guess I'm a new fan of Iwan. He can be invisible which is quite awesome and useful. It's also something that really fits his character since he is very shy and a bit introvert. 

Curtis Donovan: Played by Nathan Stewart-Jarrett. Not sure what to think of him. He seems okay and he stayed okay through entire season 1 and 2. I don't find him very interesting though. His acting is very good and I can imagine him being the same in real life as he is in character. His ability is to rewind back time. Quite useful but we don't see a whole lot of it unfortunately. He did manage to save everyone a few times though, so that's kinda cool. 

Episode discussing! It will be short I promise, but since there are only 6 episodes it's not too much to talk about.

Season 1, episode 1:

Great beginning. We get to know each character a bit better, in the beginning you may still think that it's only about a few random kids that did bad stuff but then when the lightning hits, things are starting to change! I'm glad this went that quickly or else I might have stopped watching. Great episode with a proper introduction to each character, we know what we can expect from them which is kinda good. We also immediately know that it's not just a show about random kids doing bad stuff, it's about some young folks with superpowers. Also, there's a lot happening which brings a good story for the rest of the season.

Season 1, episode 2: 

We now learn that the five young folks are not the only people who gained superpowers because of the storm. We also learn that these superpowers can be very big, but also very small and useless, for example, a man starts to think that he's a Jack Russell. I thought that was very original. Overall not a very interesting episode, but it was a funny one.

Season 1, episode 3: 

A lot of improvement in the case of this season, the dead body of their probation worker is almost being found so they search for a solution. Again, not a very interesting episode, but again it was a funny one.

Season 1, episode 4: 

Very good episode. Curtis rewinds time so he can make up for all his mistakes, but this has some serious consequences. Again, spoilers! Anyway, when he made up for one mistake, another one was being made. I thought it was brilliant that they all died when he was free, so clever because he saved them all the first time, so it's only logical that they didn't die. 

Season 1, episode 5:

A Simon involving episode, yay! Man, how sorry can I feel for this boy. I think that Iwan Rheon is an excellent (and if I may say, a very attractive) man. It was a very good episode which taught us a lot about Simon and his feelings, we also learn that you don't want to mess with him! But in all seriousness, I really liked this episode.

Season 1, episode 6:

Best episode this far. Nathan becomes a hero, sort of. It was an amazing episode with a lot of happenings. Also a mystery man shows up! Can't say a whole lot about this episode, besides that I loved it.

"We had it all, we fucked up bigger and better than any generation that came before us!"

As you may notice, I became quite a big fan of Misfits. It was absolutely not what I expected from it and that's what made it so great. I really like it and I recommend watching it!

Can't wait until I can watch season 3 tomorrow. And expect a review about season 2 too one of these days.

My personal rate: 9/10

The Walking Dead: Season 4, episode 5: Internment

Ah, finally it's time for another Walking Dead review!

 IMDB (or the users) rated this episode with a 9,0, which is the highest rate this far for season 4. And believe me, it was a good episode. 

Finally a good episode again! I think that's the correct thing to say, because in my opinion the last few episodes were a bit boring. They were slow and a bit melodramatic if you ask me. Nothing really interesting happens besides the illness, which caused a lot of random things to happen in the past few episodes. 

This episode is evolving a lot around Hershel, and I think that was quite an interesting choice. Hershel is probably also infected with this illness, we don't know yet for sure but I think we can assume he is. Anyway, he is with the other in quarantine to help them. We learned a bit about Hershel in the second season, and in the third one his leg got chopped off, but we never really got a fully Hershel involving episode, which is kinda sad because he seems a very interesting character. This episode was good because we saw a bit more of him and what we mainly saw was his caring side. He risked his own life going into quarantine, just to care for the others and that's a very noble thing to do. And if he wasn't there this whole time, I think that the things happened in this episode would have been much more dramatic, on a not-good-way because this already happened in the second episode. 

Meanwhile, Rick is trying to keep the gates up because there are so many walkers that the gates around the prison are giving up. This fails but luckily Carl and Rick shot everyone of them before this got out of hand. This seemed to be more of a side-story, and I was glad it was only a side-story because we know everything about Rick already, now things are less 'Rick-involved', things are getting more interesting again. 

It surprised me that Lizzie helped to get the zombie away from Glenn, because I was scared as hell that the zombie would bite Glenn. Lizzie seemed an useless character to me, a very weak girl, but she got my respect for this action. Very smart move. 

Also, I don't really get why the cells with the sick people inside aren't locked. It's not that strange that someone else will die because of this illness at some point, so it's very dangerous if they can walk around freely after they die. I mean, you can't keep an eye on everyone so just lock the doors man! We almost had a second big incident because of this stupid action!

Also, I really hope that Glenn and Sasha will survive this illness, they are way too important to die! 

In the very end we see a familiar face again, it's the Governor spying on the prison! I'm sorry but I think it's just brutal to let us wait ANOTHER week to see the next episode because personally I can't wait anymore. Seeing the Governor was very exciting to me, because it means that we can expect a lot action in the future!

Brilliant episode in my opinion, and I'm even willing to say that this is my favorite one this far (for this season). It was filled with action, a good story and an excellent ending. I had my knuckles clenched this entire time because it was extremely tensive. Hoping that no one of your favorite characters would die is a hell to go through and I'm afraid we will need to go through this again next week. I think it was an amazing episode and I can't will until the next one!

Review: Fright Night (2011)

Fright Night

IMDB rate: 6,4

Genre: Vampire

Fright Night, a movie that I did not have seen before. Hell, I haven't even seen the original yet. I saw this movie while looking through Netflix' horror movies (there are only 15 or so in The Netherlands, at the moment) and this was the only one that I haven't seen yet. 

I never really cared about watching this movie because it seemed a bit boring and standard to me, but I actually enjoyed it quite a lot. 

A remake of the 1985 original, teenager Charley Brewster guesses that his new neighbor Jerry Dandrige is a vampire responsible for a string of recent deaths. When no one he knows believes him, he enlists Peter Vincent, a self proclaimed vampire killer and Las Vegas magician, to help him take down Jerry.

I really liked watching this movie, it was funny and it looked amazing. The vampires were not overdone, and of course, they were not sparkling! Like I said, I have not seen the original movie yet, but I would love to watch it soon so I can compare the two movies. I know that many people dislike remakes, but I THINK this one did quite well.

The story is quite basic, perhaps a bit cliche, but I didn't really mind because somehow it felt refreshing. Normally there is a 1 hour build up before anything finally happens, but with this movie that wasn't the case.

What I also liked was the fact that no one was annoying. In every horror movie there is always one person who answers the door when there is specifically asked to not answer the door. There's always some annoying person that refuses to listen to things. Or when the kids try to tell their parents and they don't believe them, and when they try to show it nothing happens. Well, none of this happened in Fright Night. They never answered the door and something actually happened when the kid tried to show what he meant.

I think the special effects looked really cool. But the changing faces of the vampire Jerry were a bit confusing to me, it became more and more demonic, or sometimes it didn't change at all. A bit confusing. What I did like were the death scenes, they were very original, or the very good improvised scene where Jerry tries to get Charley out of his house.

I also loved the cast of this movie, Anton Yelchin is one of my favorite actors ever since Alpha Dog, and I kinda liked him in this movie. He played very sweet but also with a tough side. Really cool character. I'm not used to seeing Colin Farrell in a horror movie, so this was quite a nice change. I didn't think he would fit in a vampire role, but he did really good. Honorable mentions for Toni Collette, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, David Tennant and Imogen Poots. 

Personally I really enjoyed watching this movie, I think it's an excellent vampire movie with a good story and an excellent cast. Unfortunately I can't compare it with the original, but I'm sure that one is good too.
I really recommend watching this movie, it's fun and in my opinion quite good.

My personal rate: 7,5/10