Cold Prey 3

Set in the late 80s, evident by the Mel & Kim on the soundtrack and the bright yellow sports Walkman, COLD PREY III returns us to Norway, without any snow this time, and a group of early-twenty somethings seeking out a hotel that has become infamous for a set of gruesome murders. Of course we the viewer already know about this particular hotel, its history and who resides there all year round.

One of the girls changes her mind and the group end up camping out doors but that does not exempt them from coming to the attention of a certain parka wearing psychopath.

There is no real originality in the Cold Prey series and yet this Norwegian slasher franchise has brought more class to the scene than any other franchise I can think of recently. This prequel brings to mind the first entry in the WRONG TURN series and sets itself up as COLD PREY: THE BEGINNING and whilst not ground breaking offers the same quality cinematography and less cliched plot but it is always going to be undone by knowing what comes along next in the story/the original COLD PREY. Essentially a Norwegian variation on the Friday The 13th model I would put my neck out there and say I'd rather watch any of the 3 CP movies over a Jason film anyday.

Semi-erect.

Drive Angry 3D

Drive Angry is about a bad ass chick, who is hotter than the sun, a bad ass grandfather who has escaped the clutches of Hell, literally, in order to avenge the death of his daughter and rescue his grandchild while being persued by the harass Accoutant who is none less than the Devils right hand man. This film is, well badass is just not good enough to describe it.

Sadly Drive Angry has gone the way of Grindhouse and made no money. It seems the online community who rapidly devout themselves to following the development of this sort of movie are just not strong enough to sustain the box office of this sort of movie. It is a sad fact that we truly are at the mercy of those who would rather spend money on watching dull, impotent and repetitive movies made by multiple choice and commitee rather than something with balls and talent and, yeah, more than a little whacked.

It's plain fun and Nic "I Seem To Be REALLY Fuckin' Crazy Like In REAL Life" Cage belongs in this sort o arena even though William Ficthner steals the damn(ed) show and you can barely peel your eyes off the just outright stunning Amber Heard.

Full on hard on and ejaculation.

Hobo With A Shotgun

Jason Eisner won the SXSW competition to have his grindhouse style trailer featured in some territories as part of the GRINDHOUSE package. Now Eisner gets to expand that wonderful exploitation trailer into the film that never was.

The premise is simple enough, Rudger Hauer is the titular down and out who comes to town a rather fucked up almost post-apocalyptic Nova Scotia where he is trying to mind his own business and gather up a few bucks to buy a lawnmower and earn an honest living but this dis-honest town won't let him. From the broadcast "bumfights" in the street to the wanton prostitution and drug dealing this hobo has had enough so he buys a shotgun...

HOBO WITH A SHOTGUN is a wack job of a movie and a delightful one at that. Eisner is more of the generation of crappy VHS movies than grindhouse cinema and the garish colours and pulsating synthised soundtrack testify to this as much as the inclusion of 80's action star Rudger Hauer. Shooting in his home town of Nova Scotia invokes a totally different world than the LA and Hollywood scenes we are used to seeing on the big screen and lends HOBO that home made feel like in Rodriguez EL MARIACHI. Troma style gore and the inclusion of the bizarre bounty hunter team The Plague who look like a set of Doctor Who villains take this ode to movies gone by down a route that Happy Horror Hard On never expected.








It's a fun movie if you are sick, twisted and abnormal, which we all are.

A semi-erection for HOBO WITH A SHOTGUN.

Mothers Day

The Koffin boys (terrible name) have robbed a bank (I think you never see it happen) and one of their number has been shot. Mortally wounded the boys retreat to their mothers house where they find it occupies by an up and coming young couple and their friends. The unhinged young men seize control and being in their cool and calculate mother to deal with the situation. As a remake of the Troma realeased original this home invasion thriller turns away from the comedic backwoods slasher in favour of a more modern type of horror film.

MOTHERS DAY is a movie with problems. The scenes are disjointed, the geography of the house puzzling. There's too many characters to cover and control and no real threat to feel as people just stand about waiting on action to unfold in other parts of the room. Many of the shocks are quite tame in relation to some of the envelope pushing we have seen in recent horror flicks. There are strengths, Rebecca Di Mornay's performance is great but even she is left walking up and down stairs to carry out conversations and Briana Evigan always meets Happy Horro Hard On's approval.

As a big Darren Lynn Bousman fan (I feel he did just as much to establish the formula of SAW than Leigh Whannel and James Wan did) I was disappointed that MOTHER'S DAY did not work for me. The majority of other viewers at the Frightfest screening enjoyed the movie a lot so Happy Horror Hard In will return to the movie on its he media release and see if the lay of the lam changes from that perspective.

In the mean time it is a floppy for MOTHERS DAY.

Territories (Checkpoint)

Returning to the States from a friends wedding in Canada a car full of young friends runs into trouble with the border patrol. Two unforgiving cops subject them to a rather aggressive stop and search resulting in the inevitable drug find and the shocking unprovoked shooting of one of the group. The night of misery does not end there as the two cops are revealed to be imposters and the group find themselves interned in a replica of Guantanamo Bay and it's now infamous torture techniques. it may not be the most subtle political statement made by a horror movie but it certainly serves as a sharp reminder of humanities misguided attempts to maintain the status qui by harming others.

TERRITORIES carries a French pedigree with it's director and production team as well as being a Canadian/French co-production and despite its lack of subtitles it very much belongs in the grim bleak ouvre of French horror with some nasty extreme torture sequences and an unconventional narrative approach where the third act is almost an entirely different film. The film makers also adopt an unusual approach to the deaths of the characters as one by one they are forgotten about and they slip from memory. Sometimes people are just forgotten about and that may be a tough selling point to those who do not like ambiguity in a movie.

Brutal, bleak and quite brilliant the only proviso I would ask for when Arrow Video release this in the UK is please do not change the title to CHECKPOINT I'm still annoyed at SWITCHBLADE ROMANCE!

Full on hard on for TERRITORIES.

Rubber

Yes it is a killer tire movie. Yes it is from the director of the Flat Eric/puppet Levi adverts. Yes i don't think there is anything else out there quite like this. Yes i love it and it is cemented in my top five films for the year end.

RUBBER opens with a hilarious intoductory speech from one of the principle characters, the town sheriff, who explains that what you are about to see happens for no reason and needs no reason. What follows is a meta-feature that is more than flavoured with ingredients from Spike Jonze and Michael Gondry. A car tire rises out of the dump and begins to roll through an unnamed desert. As he encounters obsticles, bottles, insects, humans, the tire becomes increasingly aggressive and develops psychic powers using them to explode heads.

The whole film is rich in silliness and cool with style. Its strength comes from taking a serious art approach rather than spoofery with slick photography and sonorous sound design which results in a peculiar and brilliant little oddity.

Full on hard on and ejaculation!