Posts Tagged ‘gore’

Short Take: A rare remake with genuine inspiration beyond its predecessor, and the most impressive gore effects this side of Tom Savini

Director: Fede Alvarez

Screenwriters: Fede Alvarez and Rodo Sayagues

Cast: Jane Levy, Shiloh Fernandez, Lou Taylor Pucci, Jessica Lucas, Elizabeth Blackmore

Length: 1h 31m

Mia (Jane Levy), her brother David (Shiloh Fernandez), and a few of their friends are retreating to an old family-owned cabin deep in the woods in order to seclude Mia from everyday life. The reason for this is because Mia is trying desperately to force herself to kick her drug addiction, but needs the others’ help. Once at the cabin, however, evidence of an evil presence reveals itself in the form of a book with demonic incantations. After reading from the book the group begins suffering an onslaught of the foulest, most gruesome terrors they could ever imagine, until only one of them is left to survive the emergence of evil incarnate.

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Short Take: Contains satisfyingly creative deaths, and nothing else

Director: Steven Quale

Screenwriter: Eric Heisserer

Cast: Nicholas D’Agosto, Emma Bell, Miles Fisher, Jacqueline MacInnes Wood, David Koechner, Tony Todd

Length: 1h 32m

Synopsis: Sam (D’Agosto) is an office worker who in his free time is trying to pursue his passion for the culinary arts and win back his ex-girlfriend Molly (Bell), who is also an office coworker. The two join some fellow coworkers and their slimy boss Dennis (Koechner) on a bus to an office retreat, but while in route they narrowly survive a terrible bridge collapse that, were it not for Sam’s advisement to abruptly leave, would have caused their untimely and gruesome demises. The days following this divine intervention, however, prove to be no less perilous. One by one each survivor meets a grisly, macabre fate, leading the remaining few to assume that Death has intentions of correcting his oversights at any given moment.

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Short Take: Beyond its obvious faults it delivers exactly what it advtertises, and then some

Director: Alexandre Aja (High Tension, The Hills Have Eyes (2006))

Screenwriters: Pete Goldfinger and Josh Stolberg (Sorority Row)

Cast: Elizabeth Shue (Hamlet 2), Christopher Lloyd (Camp Nowhere), Ving Rhames (Surrogates), Jerry O’Connell (Obsessed), Adam Scott (TV’s Party Down)

Length: 1h 30m

Synopsis: After a subterranean tremor causes a rift that conjoins a mysterious underwater lake with the aboveground Lake Victoria community, a prehistoric predator proceeds to roam free and eat at will. That predator is the very first breed of Piranha, which are thousands strong and eager to feed on fresh meat. It just so happens that these ferocious fish escape during Spring Break, when every virile teenager and college student within fifty miles is congregating to drink, fornicate, and unknowingly serve themselves up as dinner. Gratuitous nudity and violence ensues on a level not seen in American theaters in some time. Read the rest of this entry »

Cliff:

Answering this question is not as easy as it might seem. For starters, I would like to make clear that I am a supporter of torture films (or what many people incorrectly call “torture porn”) as a subgenre of horror cinema, for reasons that can be best understood by reading my essay on the topic. In short, however, I would claim that torture films can be considered artistic, and thus if a torture film’s artistic merit can be defended then it is justifiable insofar that it is a valid cultural artifact. Not all torture films can be sufficiently defended, but the possibility is there nonetheless. Read the rest of this entry »