Change Your Image
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Reviews
The Day of the Triffids (2009)
Maximum disappointment
Two stars for effort of the cast with such a poor script. Started off OKay with a similar premise as the book, but totally, completely lost-the-plot early on. It turned into a very silly comic-book horror story full of very old and very tired clichés.
The book was never meant to be a 'horror story' about man-eating plants, but about us, about humanity, or a commentary on "Human Nature". For example, even when faced with a common enemy and such destruction, 'Man is still his own worst Enemy', is just one of the many themes explored in the book.
I will stick with the 1981 TV co-production version, which remains the best adaptation of this classic literary science-fiction novel.
Megan Is Missing (2011)
Insult to victims
"Inspired" torture kiddie-porn, trying to pass itself off as "serious" drama. I honestly wish I could rate this in the minus. I wish I had not been sucked in, or ripped off, by the clever marketing hype. Its an insult to the victims of such crimes.
The segments with the fictionalised "news footage" gives it away first, so poorly filmed, presented as satire, a sick joke about missing girls. The script sounds like a pedophile's wet dream. Don't believe the marketing, it presented as giving unstable men a thrill, far more than giving anyone a warning about internet pedophile predators.
If you just want shock/horror - try 'The Descent'. If you want a genuine serious dramatic treatment of this issue, I suggest you see films like 'El Traspatio' (aka Backyard), or 'Hard Candy'.
Pelon maantiede (2000)
Great addition to feminist film canon
This film is hard to find now, but I was not disappointed once I finally found a copy.
The main plot line, is of a young forensic dentist, Oili, whose younger sister, Laura, is viciously mugged and raped. Oili, is also working on a police case of a dead male 'John Doe', recovered from thawing ice. Through Laura, Oili subsequently meets a group of women, who undertake organised vigilante-style revenge against male abusers of women.
This film draws the sister's sometimes fiery relationship, as a parallel to the relationship between the liberal socialist view of feminism, and the more militant view.
While never quite supporting the militant view, even speaking against it and trying to encourage her little sister to leave the group, Oili, over time, does come to understand their reasons.
Broken (2006)
I'll stick to Japanese horror
Horror is an acquired taste of mine in much later life, found through certain Japanese foreign-language gems, like Battle Royale. I usually stay away from the B-grade Hollywood awful stuff designed for the teen girl sleep-over market, but some of them are so bad, they can still be fun anyway.
Not this one.
I expected better of the British, and was majorly disappointed. 'Broken' was way beyond awful. Despite some decent attempts at acting (they get a point for trying) & some great camera-work (if you like still shots), there was no story-line,no script, no characterisation other than thin stereotypes, no plot for the actors to work with. Its nothing but a collage of still photos of blood and gore, and boring, boring, repetition of the same blood & gore at that - just how many times do we need to see the guts with the razor-blade being cut & sewn??? Got it the first time, duh!
Here we go again, and again and again and again... besides the repeat looping of the same old boring blood & gore, and the crying, it was just way too unrealistic, implausible and too predictable...and nothing to empathise with in the characters, the women especially were unbelievably stupid.