J*A*S*M

I expected pretty much anything from my first Troma film and I really looked forward to it. Unfortunately, I’m very disappointed. All that incredibly gratuitous nastiness was a truly unpleasant surprise, and what’s worse is that the film is not even funny (which makes it all the more cringe), something I didn’t expect considering the general consensus on Troma. The only interesting thing in Poultrygeist is (perhaps) the bloodiness, the perversion and the amount of over-the-top gore (which all go hand in hand), but that’s far from enough for me and I think I will avoid other productions by this studio. How can this get five-star ratings? I can’t understand it, do people really like this?

Incredible! One of the biggest pieces of crap I have ever suffered, it ruined an hour and a half of my life. If I were to enumerate all that is bad in this thing (let’s call it a thing, I refuse to call this shit a film), I wouldn’t know where to begin – the stupid actors, the stupid script that forces the stupid actors to do stupid things, or the stupid direction that directs the stupid actors doing stupid things. Truly unique. Recommended only for collectors of film (no, that’s not right) curiosities.

Not as awful as the later episodes of Tele Tele. Today’s part with Zdeňek Troška was a lot of fun, that guy is really a moron.

Damn! Proper exploitation (it’s not classic exploitation, really, but it doesn’t matter). Utter insanity, not recommended for people of a weaker nature, and one of the most depressive films I’ve ever seen. There were moments when I asked myself why I was watching it, but I was unable to turn it off. The main characters are tortured by a duo of young douchebags, while the viewers torture themselves. Some scenes are intentionally tedious (one is almost lethal), with the camera moving only when it’s strictly necessary and focusing on something else whenever there’s violence. And yet you wish you could see more, but why, really? Funny Games is a satire intended for the people it’s aimed at… evil. The performances are flawless, Naomi is really good in horror remakes. The 5/5 mark is well deserved, but I don’t want to watch it again. And I’m supposed to go to sleep after this?

After this film I feel like no longer bothering with low-budget semi-amateur horror, it was truly abominable. There were several times when I realised that I was staring at the window instead of watching the screen, something that happens very rarely to me. And now I notice that I don’t remember anything about this film, except a hilariously bad scene when someone is fried with the electricity of a hot plate… fortunately. Ignore it.

I really looked forward to this film, mostly for study purposes. Yes, it’s the first Uwe film I saw face to face and I was ready for pretty much anything, so I’m not that shocked at the result. It’s not such a bad piece of work, there’s much worse crap out there, but Boll is a truly bad narrator, I believe that even if he had the best and most original story that has ever seen the light of day, he would give it a treatment that would not offer anything to the viewer. Seed is one of those stories, its plot is very trivial and doesn't waste any time rushing to the climax at an uneven pace. Oh, and speaking of the climax… or the ending, rather, because there’s nothing that could be called a “climax”. I was surprised by Uwe’s inability to shoot at least one tense scene. All the opportunities that he had (and he had plenty) are utterly ruined either by bad composition, editing and actors, or by a poorly chosen score. Seed is a below-par film in every aspect, but it’s not as bad as I expected and for that it deserves one star.

Not very good horror. The main shortcomings are the script, which wreaks havoc on the “they came, they stayed, they died” plot template, and the awful main characters, who are impossible to sympathise with. The ending is something I’d rather ignore, because I felt it was very weird and pointless. If you want to watch this film, don’t make the same mistake I did and watch it at night – the film is so dark that at times it was hard to figure out what was happening on screen. Otherwise, The Sick House is not that bad visually (except fort the last 15 minutes, where the creators went over-the-top) and the blue filters look nice. Some of the monsters are good, we don’t get to enjoy them much, but when they do show up, they are impressive. I don’t know why, but looking at them reminded me of Snow White and the dwarves :) 40%

It took me quite a long time to get the courage to watch this film (I was put off by the awful ratings on IMDb), but the fears were unwarranted. To my surprise, it is an above-average ghost story that, though not very original, held my attention and even scared me a couple of times, for which I’m grateful. The directors managed to build a decent atmosphere and there are so many different ghosts that fans will probably love it. I have it at 7/10.

I’m glad that my 200th review fell on this excellent TV show that in my eyes is well above Heroes and almost on par with Lost. It’s true that the first season is not that great, but the quality improves with each episode, the story develops in an interesting way and some parts are very good. Many people complain about the unlikeable main characters, but I don’t agree with that. I really liked the two protagonist and I regretted the departure (even if it was short-term) of any of the more important characters. Another thing I liked was the complexity of the characters, almost none of them (with a couple of exceptions) can be said to be fully bad or good. I also loved Jeffrey Combs in the role of Kevin Burkhoff. Another thing worth praise is the lack of pathetic and kitschy dialogues (unlike Heroes) about predetermination, fate and heroism; here, the conversations on those topics are satisfactorily “grounded”. Edit after watching all the seasons: Fully satisfied. 4400 is one of those few shows whose quality increases with every season, and the second half of the fourth season is a must see for fans of mystery. Season 1: 75%. Season 2: 90%. Season 3: 95%. Season 4: 100%

I’m sorry, but I can’t be bothered with this. Once again, I let myself be drawn into Asian weirdness, I looked forward again, I got bored again, and I again told myself that I won’t do it again. It’s so tedious and slow, and pointlessly bleak in the second half. The story is weirdly curious (which is good), but it goes from nowhere to nowhere (which is bad). This time there wasn’t even a good climax; massive disappointment overall. I’m giving it two stars in appreciation for at least the diversity and the good cinematography.