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Hack
(2007 - DVD)
Hack is one of those self-referential "insider" horror films like
Scream. You know the drill by now. The seven main characters in the film,
kids stranded and vulnerable, talk about making films, especially horror
films. They discuss stereotypical casting, cliches, outrageous plot
twists, and so forth in ways that are supposed to make us arch an eyebrow
at the obvious irony involved in their blissful ignorance that all the
situations they discuss parallel their own.
As it turns out, there's kinda sorta a good explanation for why they
seem to be in a horror film, other than the fact that they are in the one
we are watching. You see, the seven biology students have been stranded on
their island as part of a master plot to create a "reality horror" movie,
in which they will die in the manner of classic horror movie deaths while
the producers film all the action, unbeknownst to the victims. From the
audience point of view, the plot is driven by curiosity about who exactly
is pulling all the strings. The last twenty minutes consist of a series of
convoluted twists and turns in which the presumed killers either get
killed or are revealed either to be good guys, and it turns out that there
are more and more levels to the film-within-a-film. In other words,
perhaps it is a film within a film within a film and somebody else is
making a movie about other people making a snuff movie. Or maybe somebody
else is making a movie about that. And so on.
People rise from the dead again and again. The (presumed) villains are
a couple who mimic Morticia and Gomez Addams. The dialogue and situations
consist almost entirely of homages to memorable films, from the horror
genre and elsewhere. It's all just a bunch of silliness, and it is not
meant to be taken seriously.
While it is not a great movie, it is far better than the IMDb score of
2.6. I have no idea what's up with that. The proper score is in the 5s
somewhere, comparable to the Scream sequels, which score 5.3 and 5.8. In
fact, I liked it better than either of those films, but then again maybe I
liked it because it was made for movie buffs as a game of "spot the
reference." But I don't think that's the only reason I liked it. The film
also looks gorgeous, and contains the minimum daily requirements of the
lurid guilty pleasures that the genre is heir to: a beautiful naked woman
(three nude scenes for Gabrielle Richens), demented evildoers, comic
relief, and bizarre deaths. In an touch of absurdity, it also features
William Forsythe as Groundskeeper Willie, with outrageous accent, facial
hair and all. I kid you not. No, it doesn't make any sense in context.
He's just there because he's there.
The only time the movie falls off is when it sails in the narrow
channel between B-movie land and spoof land. There are times when the
spoofery is so subdued that it seems like one is simply watching a bad
movie. (It's a straight-faced parody, not a broad "nudge-nudge" farce like
Scary Movie. A lot of IMDb commenters seem to be unaware that the film was
fuckin' with them.) It has its dead spots, but all in all, I think it's a
reasonably entertaining entry in the Dr. Phibes line, which consists of
the horror movies which know that they are campy and ridiculous and use
that knowledge as part of the entertainment.
Gabrielle Richens is quite a hot tootsie.
Film clips here. Sample
frames below.
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OTHER CRAP:
Catch the deluxe
version of Other Crap in real time, with all the bells and whistles,
here.
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Hell Hunters
1986
"A Nazi scientist, wanted as a war criminal, develops a spider
serum that turns people into fascist Nazi zombies." While this was
not particularly effective as a part of the plan to establish the
Master Race, it was more effective than the earlier plan to use
libertarian Nazi zombies, who just gave their victims too much
latitude.
Candice Daly film clips. Collage below.
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Notes and collages
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Dancing at the Blue Iguana
2000
Director Michael Radford has also made such respected films as Il
Postino, 1984, and The Merchant of Venice (Pacino as Shylock). Since he
established those credentials, we can say that in the history of
legitimate films from respected directors, there are very few examples
with more nudity from more gorgeous famous women than this one.
It will take several days to cover this flick. We start it off with
Charlotte Ayanna, who looked absolutely spectacular.
Film clips here, images below.
Strangely enough, the two great bodies covered today, Eva Green (The
Dreamers, in the Rokwatch section) and Charlotte Ayanna, who did copious
nudity in these two films, never really did any other significant
exposure after their spectacular nude debuts. Green has none none at all
since The Dreamers. The beautiful Ayanna did a topless scene in Love the
Hard Way in 2001, then nothing else since. I don't expect much more from
Ayanna. Although she is frozen at Blue Iguana age in my head, she is
actually 32 now, and I haven't seen her in years. Oh, those blue eyes!
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The Wizard of Gore
2007
If you like your horror straightforward and simple, just blood and guts
not too tangled up with a plot, then you may not care for the 2007 version
of the 1970 cult classic The Wizard of Gore. While this version is loaded
with sub-plots and misdirection, fans of old-fashioned gory horror will
probably get tired of trying to figure it all out. The one thing that the
new version brings to the party is the Suicide Girls. The original, while
it had sexy ladies, had no nudity, let alone the tattooed variety.
Montag the Magnificent is an unparalleled illusionist who performs at
underground venues and raves. He selects seemingly unwilling females from
the audience, and to their abject horror, disembowels or dismembers the
subject while the audience gets hysterical. At the very end, he produces
his victim unharmed.
Montag attracts the attention of underground journalist Edmund Bigelow
when the subjects begin appearing the next day, murdered in the same
fashion that they were during the trick the night before, but what Edmund
discovers simply confuses him even more.
I really liked this flick myself, whereas I did NOT care for the
schlocky 1970 original, but I must tell you, only half the people who saw
it claimed to like it, while the other half disliked it intensely, so
you'll have to take a chance. Either way, though, the suicide girls are
worth seeing.
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| Amina Munster |
Anomalisa |
Bijou Phillips |
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| various |
Flux Suicide |
Cricket Demanuel |
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enter the DragonScan |
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Colleen O'Brien in Orgy of the Dead |
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Film Clip
Anna
Walton and Morven Macbeth in Vampire Diary (2007)
The women of La Orca (1976):
Rena Niehaus and
Livia Cerini
The women of the sequel, Oedipus Orca (1977):
Rena Niehaus and
Carmen Scarpitta.
Both of the Orca films (scandalous kidnap capers involving underage
female victims) contain some nice flesh levels.
Scarpitta's story is kind of an interesting one. She is the rare
American born in Hollywood in the 1930s. Her father was a famous
sculptor and she aspired to be an opera singer. Despite the facts
that she was born in Hollywood, attended USC, and became a film
actress, she worked almost exclusively in Italian movies! She just
passed away a few months ago.
The women of Snowboarder:
Clara Morgane,
Juliette Goudot,
and Simone
Moterthies. Although snowboarding was popular in Switzerland
before 2003, it took them a long time to produce this movie. they
were waiting for Goudot.
Giada
Colagrande in Before it Had a Name (2005)
Ubiquitous
Misty Mundae in Lust in the Mummy's Tomb (2002). She has 55 film
credits at IMDB since 1998. The only person I know to have more is
Eric Roberts with 66. (There may be others.)
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