WP Error: Empty Term.

Sex Games

Terrible pursuit flick that proves that any movie that mentions online video sites or"influencers"is still, in 2024, an instant avoid. A couple takes a challenge to film themselves having sex in different places for online prizes, when some murdered chases and kills them because, movie. Weird because it seems like maybe this was a 40 minute long movie, so they padded it out with scenes of a convincingly sleazy youtube host talking about what they're doing, as if he the one running the contest and getting updates from them, when they never actually mention or refer to him in any way. Which, actually, was kind of funny. But not funny enough to make this movie worth watching.
|  Permanent URL: https://michaelkupietz.com?p=9913  |  Share this page  |  Embed link
WP Error: Empty Term.

3 Slices Of Life

That rarest bird, the"so bad it's good"movie I actually like. Mostly because this is exactly what I imagine we would have gotten if John Waters had watched a bunch of David Cronenberg films and decided to make an anthology horror movie instead of a trashy social satire, but was still John Waters. A dumped-on office worker releases nanobots to make his coworkers like him, which turn them into monsters, because, movie. Plus two other similarly ludicrous segments filled with fake gore that I've already otherwise forgotten.
|  Permanent URL: https://michaelkupietz.com?p=9912  |  Share this page  |  Embed link
WP Error: Empty Term.

The Arrangement

A truly strange sub-TV-movie with the most intricate plot I've seen. People's faces appear in a polaroid before they die. Some cops investigate, but they may be involved, I don't know, the whole thing has a lot of characters and a lot going on and a lot of twists and turns and it's all really confusing the director was not in any way capable of pulling it off. And the acting is terrible actors giving it an admirable amount of gung-ho.
|  Permanent URL: https://michaelkupietz.com?p=9911  |  Share this page  |  Embed link
WP Error: Empty Term.

Matriarch

A stunningly original story in which a young pregnant couple's car breaks down in the countryside where, in an unexpected twist, there's no cell service, so they go to, get this, a nearby farmhouse, which turns out to be inhabited by, you'll never believe this, a crazy family that takes them prisoner and wants to keep the baby. Finally, get this, in the end, only the woman survives to escape. How in the world do they come up with this stuff? I mean, other than maybe watching the 3000 other movies with the same exact plot?
|  Permanent URL: https://michaelkupietz.com?p=9910  |  Share this page  |  Embed link
WP Error: Empty Term.

Robbin

unexpectedly semi-alright crime/revenge thriller. An up-and-coming young executive is framed for embezzling, so she recruits her old friends from the South Central in an elaborate revenge scheme. Very amateurish, but, somehow, so committed to what it wants to be that it gets entertaining at points. Plus, somehow they pulled together the budget for a decent car chase at the end with helicopters and all. Not as good as it wants to be, but not anywhere near as bad sa it should have been.
|  Permanent URL: https://michaelkupietz.com?p=9909  |  Share this page  |  Embed link
Movie Reviews » Je nais se quois

Island Zero

Crusty maine island fishermen, plus a local novelist and a local biologist, confront an unseen monster emerging from the sea. I liked it well enough that I remembered it, can't say much more than that.
|  Permanent URL: https://michaelkupietz.com?p=9908  |  Share this page  |  Embed link
WP Error: Empty Term.

The Devil’s Chair

Disappointing. English horror flick with gritty, almost"Trainspotting"type production values about an electric-chair type contraption found in an abandoned hospital, which either transports the seated person to another dimension, drives them insane, or summons a demon. Actually starts out alright but by halfway through the decent performances and unusually gritty production values can't support the muddled story. Clive Barker could've made this as punchy as it wanted to be, or Danny Boyle could have made it as clever and narratively strong as it wants to be, but neither of them was anywhere near this.
|  Permanent URL: https://michaelkupietz.com?p=9907  |  Share this page  |  Embed link
Movie Reviews » Bad but I liked it

C.O.R.N.: The Field Of Screams

You know, weirdly, I liked this strictly B-movie. It was sort of a bad movie that's saved by good direction and kind of a weirdly original approach. Brother and sister get trapped in a farm town taken over by rogue artists who do taxidermy on people. I, you know, kind of enjoyed it, which surprised me. Definitely not one I'd go out of my way to see, but kind of fun for a 2nd rate"teen scream"flick.
|  Permanent URL: https://michaelkupietz.com?p=9906  |  Share this page  |  Embed link
WP Error: Empty Term.

The Depraved (aka”Urban Explorer”)

(not to be confused with"Depraved", the very good"Frankenstein"update previously reviewed) Captivity/pursuit flick. Urban explorers in the tunnels below Berlin encounter a seemingly helpful denizen of the depths when one of them is seriously injured in a fall, who turns out, once he's lured them back to his lair, to be bonkers. A slightly unusual last few minutes for this sort of fare (in that it foregoes any redemption or sign of hope at the end; ok, that's actually different), decent performances including from the leering bad guy, and half the dialogue being in German are the only distinguishing qualities this movie has.
|  Permanent URL: https://michaelkupietz.com?p=9905  |  Share this page  |  Embed link
WP Error: Empty Term.

Outpost 11

A sci-fi alternate history tale about three men stationed in an Arctic outpost during a steampunk version of WWII that gas stretched into the mid-1950s. An enemy mind-control weapon drives them all mad, and has the deadly side effect of turning a really interesting concept into a really dull movie.
|  Permanent URL: https://michaelkupietz.com?p=9904  |  Share this page  |  Embed link
Movie Reviews » Trash

Anna: Scream Queen Killer

Scream Queen Killer: A"scream queen"actress auditioning for a role by doing about 15 minutes of 30 secone takes on various situations, because, I guess, if you only saw her"act like there's an invisible presence in the room for 30 seconds...act like you're turning into a vampire for 30 seconds"for 12 or 13 minutes, the point wouldn't have been made. Fellas, there's editing now. You should use it.
|  Permanent URL: https://michaelkupietz.com?p=9903  |  Share this page  |  Embed link
WP Error: Empty Term.

Demented

Proving that every rule has an exception, this awful sub-"USA Up All nite"stars Felissa Rose, who apparently takes the roles Linnea Quiqley would have once turned down as being beneath her, as a cop investigating some sort of snuff film ring. An attempt to appeal to fans of basic brutality by a director not competent enough even to provide basic brutality.
|  Permanent URL: https://michaelkupietz.com?p=9901  |  Share this page  |  Embed link
Movie Reviews » Je nais se quois

LX 2048

Takes a while to get going, but sort of fun future technodystopia where a company sells"insurance"where if a spouse dies, you get a clone within 48 hours... with the ability to request small custom improvements, of course. What could go wrong? (Hint: everything.) Not quite the movie it wants to be, padded out with unnecessary secondary ideas that are explored then just dropped, and so takes a little while to get going ... would have been a very good Black Mirror episode, with tighter plotting. At twice that length feels a little long for the idea, but still, I'd give it a 'B'. Reasonably well done, not great but definitely not crap.
|  Permanent URL: https://michaelkupietz.com?p=9900  |  Share this page  |  Embed link
Movie Reviews » Bad but I liked it

Alien Weekend

Fun little flick. Sci-fi comedy about a couple of 20-something friends who stumble into some intrigue involving a crashed ufo and a missing alien egg. Reminiscent of quirky indie sci-fi comedies like Buckaroo Bonzai, Repo Man, Bill & Ted, that sort of thing, although it doesn't really rise to anywhere near that level—it's still too much of a teen film for that—but nonetheless, a likable cast and fairly consistently successful comic elements make it a fun view. Definitely doesn't suck. Could maybe be a minor cult favorite, I bet, to people who haven't seen this sort of thing before.
|  Permanent URL: https://michaelkupietz.com?p=9899  |  Share this page  |  Embed link
Movie Reviews » "Found Footage" crap

Nyctophobia

another dreadful first-person shooter that looks like someone had a spare weekend so they decided to make a movie on their iphone with their friends. Nothing happens for 25 minutes, and then all the lights go out, and it's like an hour and a half of people running around a darkened house shouting at each other. That's it. Monsters are heard outside and never seen. Nonstop nauseatingly shaky cellphone-shot video never sits still long enough to see what's going on. Seems like they made it up as they went along. What Hath The Blair Witch Project Wrought?
|  Permanent URL: https://michaelkupietz.com?p=9897  |  Share this page  |  Embed link
Movie Reviews » "Found Footage" crap

Moth

Absolutely dreadfully boring first person shooter. Two people spend half the movie driving around doing nothing, then they spend half the movie running through the woods and arguing. And that's really it. They talk and yell and run and nothing else happens. It's not even"found footage horror"any more. They might as well make a found footage movie of paint drying.
|  Permanent URL: https://michaelkupietz.com?p=9896  |  Share this page  |  Embed link
WP Error: Empty Term.

The Call (2022)

Teenage bullies drive a woman to suicide, so her husband forces them to take a strange phone call which is her exacting her revenge from the other side. a c-grade horror movie that somehow got Tobin Bell and Lin Shaye to star in it, making it a strange hodgepodge of occasionally creepy and intense, because, Tobin Bell and Lin Shaye, but, mostly boring c-grade horror movie crap.
|  Permanent URL: https://michaelkupietz.com?p=9895  |  Share this page  |  Embed link
Movie Reviews » Bad but I liked it

Mustang Sally’s Horror House

A true aberration, the rare"so bad it's good"movie I enjoyed. This thoroughly"USA Up All Nite"-level fare about a bunch of frat boys who go to a bordello and are killed one-by-one by the ladies is, well, thoroughly"USA Up All Nite"-level fare, from start to finish. It doesn't really try too hard, and plays like something made in about 1972. These movies, you know, they remind me of my shiftless year or two right after college, working a shit admin assistant job by day and smoking weed and watching"USA Up All Nite"every weekend. Hard not to feel a little affection for a movie that evokes that this well. I'd never recommend anybody watch it, but I may again, if there's nothing else on someday. Suprisingly, this is from 2006. I would have given it no later than 1992 at the absolute latest, and probably earlier.
|  Permanent URL: https://michaelkupietz.com?p=9894  |  Share this page  |  Embed link
WP Error: Empty Term.

Room 0

the dullest time loop movie ever. One character, a woman in a motel room caught in a time look, supposed to deliver a time looping device to a mafioso who is also caught in the loop with her, talks to people on the phone who sound like voice over artists given lines to read, and tries to figure out how to get out of it. That's the whole movie. Nothing but her talking on the phone to a million different fake-sounding people over and over.
|  Permanent URL: https://michaelkupietz.com?p=9893  |  Share this page  |  Embed link
WP Error: Empty Term.

Ragmork

incomprehensible, ponderous, thoroughly amateurish mishmash filmed in black and white. Note to amateur film makers: if you're tempted to make an"artsy"film, find something else to do with your time. Only David Lynch has ever pulled that off as an amateur, and you're not him.
|  Permanent URL: https://michaelkupietz.com?p=9891  |  Share this page  |  Embed link
WP Error: Empty Term.

Killers [1996]

This must be the worst-edited movie ever. A clear child of the Natural Born Killers/Pulp Fiction Era, except, with such poor editing that it's impossible to make sense of the story. Escaped killers pick a random suburban house to hide out, and it slowly becomes apparent that the clean-cut family living there is anything but normal. Picture the"Gimp"sene from pulp fiction stretched to feature length. The husband even calls the wife"Honeybunny"at one point. Criminals give impassioned speeches about their taste in movies, or pause to recite poetry in the middle of action sequences. The wife is suddenly hanging all over one of the murderers and the husband is tied up; suddenly the husband is free, and is wearing makeup, and when the police arrive to rescue him, he kills them with an axe for no apparent reason. Then he's not wearing makeup anymore and his wife is back with him and the murderer. An unexplained deformed brother of the family pops in and out. Then the gorgeous surviving police sergeant, who came to the house in pursuit of the escaped murderer, is running through the dungeon (did I happen to mention this surburban house has a dungeon?) with the murderer, chased by the completely unexplained people down there. The police sergeant are holding hands, and they kiss. The sergeant is shot, and her last words to the main killer are"Kill them all"for some reason. Then the killers stop to put on skull facepaint and shoot rifles that it's never explained how they got into the darkness, to just say"Hey, we're cool", I guess. Along the way it's mentioned casually in passing that the father and daughter are sleeping together. The whole thing would almost be so bad and over-the-top that it's worth seeing for the sheer spectacle, but the complete lack of sense or explanation for anything makes it unwatchable. It's like a director kept thinking of unrelated scenes,"Wouldn't it be cool if this happened now", and nobody knew how to edit it into a movie.
|  Permanent URL: https://michaelkupietz.com?p=9890  |  Share this page  |  Embed link
Movie Reviews » Honorable Mention

The Signal (2007) [second viewing]

As described in my last review, compilation of three interwoven short tales, revolving around a broadcast signal driving people insane. I like this one a lot, very well done. (Note: there's another 2014 horror movie called"The Signal"that isn't nearly as good.) I just recently, 10 or 15 years after it had faded to a distant memory of a film Ihad especially enjoyed, popped back up on Tubi (which, among the seemingly thousands of awful horror films it gets, seems to also manage to get these distantly-remembered, hard-to-find favorites.) I remember why I liked it. It's gorier than I remember, and, I don't know, I can't say it's exactly a great movie, but it seriously well done for what it is and the kind of gem I would say non-horror fans shouldn't go out of their way to see, but, every horror fan should see it. As noted elsewhere, the first of the three episodes, directed by the guy who went on to do"The Ritual"and a bunch of better stuff I noted in my review of that film, is the best of the three, very effectively ratcheting up the suspense. The rest is nearly as good though. The second two rely a little bit on camp humor, not my favorite thing, but it's strong enough all the way through to pull off this off-kilter and gory end-of-humanity tale. Also, never realized unti now, the female lead was also one of the leads in"YellowBrickRoad"another favorite deep cut.
|  Permanent URL: https://michaelkupietz.com?p=9889  |  Share this page  |  Embed link
WP Error: Empty Term.

The Darkness Of The Road

Swing and a serious miss. Pretty decent lighting and cinematography for what little you can see of this movie (most of it is set on a desolate, deserted road at night) tries to be profound and twisty but succeeds mostly at meaningless"408"-style disjoined"what's another weird scary thing we can have happen?"scenes. Najarra Townsend ("Contaminated", a film I'm fond of) and the nice visuals do little to save this. Reading up on IMDB afterwards, it turns out it does have a cohesive idea behind it and make sense if you know what it's trying to say, but I didn't. Too bad.
|  Permanent URL: https://michaelkupietz.com?p=9888  |  Share this page  |  Embed link
Movie Reviews » Bad but I liked it

Bug (1975)

THIS IS IT! You found it-the one, the only BUG, the single greatest cinematic achievement not just in the admittedly crowded field of mid-20th-century apocalyptic giant insect scifi horror film, nor even just in the scifi or horror film genres, but in human motion picture history writ large, itself. The unrelenting cinematic greatness that this movie doles out in heaping helpings upon your uncomprehending cerebellum-line after line, minute after minute, scene after scene, shrieking burning head explosion after shrieking burning head explosion, without pause, from the opening preacher's sermon to the closing descent into the stygian bowels of the earth itself-simply cannot be adequately conveyed within the constraints of this forum. It must be experienced firsthand. The mere fact that this is one of the very few opportunities in American cinema to see a woman's head get set on fire in the Brady Bunch kitchen would likely be among the chief draws of any more ordinary film it might appear in. But this is no ordinary film, and even something that would obviously be the highlight of most movie-goers' entire seasons is here only the very most trivial, the most trifling beginning to the veritable cavalcade of entertainments bestowed upon the lucky viewer of this inestimable apotheosis of thrilling visual storytelling. To say any more would both unfairly rob the viewer of the opportunity to fully experience the unfolding of this stunning film firsthand, and, necessarily fall short in the effort, because words simply can not suffice. Bug. There is no substitute, no other film experience that can compare. On the rarified mountaintop of cinematic achievement, Bug stands alone. If you disagree with a single word of this review, you should know it was written by my 7-year-old self. And my 7-year-old self knows a BUTTLOAD about movies. You are not likely to convince him he's wrong. As of this writing,"Bug"is, happily, currently streaming on Netflix, and the world feels just that much more right.
|  Permanent URL: https://michaelkupietz.com?p=9887  |  Share this page  |  Embed link
Movie Reviews » Je nais se quois

ReSet

Ok, so starts, and proceeds through the first half as amusingly terrible take on the Groundhog Day trope. Girl is abducted from a party by an"incel"-stereotype stalker, wakes up in his guest room every time he kills her, after a brief trip to heaven to see her dead grandfather who encourages her along. I'm seriously unsure if this is meant to be a comedy or not. But then, it starts getting into character development, actually spends a little time talking than showing action, finally showing an almost sympathetic side the villain... almost. And the heroine comes off, despite everything she does being justified by everything she's been put through, slightly cruel. All in all, after a really terrible start, I'd almost say this could be chalked up as an"interesting failure"of the kind I might rewatch occasionally. If the first half had been as good as the second half, it would have been.
|  Permanent URL: https://michaelkupietz.com?p=9885  |  Share this page  |  Embed link
WP Error: Empty Term.

Sapien

The worst mess of a film I've ever seen. A social media influencer (always a promising start) leaves her fiance, becomes homeless, and goes through two hours of scenes that don't make sense in which apparently she talks to unseen people, apparently kills a family with a machete, talks shit to Jehovah's Witnesses who knock at the front door, becomes homeless, winds up in a hotel, curls up in a tent in a homeless camp with an unexplained mummified corpse and tells it she loves it, gets chased by guys in animal masks, gets kidnapped by human traffickers, is made to fight in a cage death match, and does a dance routine, but it's impossible to know for sure because things just jump around in a disconnected series of images for two hours. I think this is supposed to be an art film, but, nobody involved actually knew how to make a movie? It did actually have one creepy scene, though: she encounters an unseen"wood spirit"that speaks to her around a corner, and the voice keeps changing to different people. That was cool.
|  Permanent URL: https://michaelkupietz.com?p=9884  |  Share this page  |  Embed link