The Collector

Well this weekend was taken up with rugby and clearing away the satellite hard drive which allowed me to catch up with films I had missed during their cinema run. Friday evening I watched The Collector. This is a movie mashup of Saw and Home Alone. I enjoyed this simple tale, with its mysterious psychopathic main character. The Story is slight  a thief who sidelines as a handyman to case potential targets chooses the wrong night to breakin to his latest targets home. The family who should have been away, are being held captive by a mysterious masked figure (the Collector of the title) who has booby trapped their home with devious Saw style traps. What follows is a mix of Home alone and Saw. The anti hero becomes involved in a battle of whits with the villain and blood flows. It was a diverting piece of horror and didnt outstay its welcome at 90 minutes. The story raised many questions which were not answered at its conclusion and certainly you would have to suspend disbelief regarding the time it would have taken to booby trap the house. But its rapid pace ment these questions only hit home at the tales conclusion. Of course a sequel is hinted at. The Saw component is to be expected as the Director was involved with that franchise and certain traits carry over into this film.

Fish with Sharp teeth Piranha 3D and a week of classic films

I spent the last week catching up with blu ray's I had purchased and which were gathering dust, and trying to clear my satellite tv hard drive to make room for newer recordings. Nothing in the cinema appealed, I had learnt about settling for second best with Shark Night and was not eager to repeat that mistake.
     Then I saw Piranha  and my faith in the world of b movie horror was restored. It was exactly what the Doctor ordered and I was happy again. It was a well made update of the Joe Dante Original, a perfect blend of horror , girls and creatures with sharp teeth. It knew what needed to be delivered and did so in a fun gory manner. I loved it. It really put Shark night in the corner. Now I never got to see it in 3D, our local cinemas were just undergoing the 3D update. Only one venue local to me was showing it, and that was in Lower Hutt and I just didn't feel like making the effort to go and see it. But watching it in good old 2D last week did not diminish the pleasure. It felt like the good old days of the 80's when horror could be fun and usually had some Spielberg connection.
     The 80's when Dante delivered anarchic fun an Carpenter cold hard chills and thrills. When ET wanted to go home and the Goonies were off to find treasure. This film has that vibe  and I loved it.
    This is also the week I  previewed the Blade Runner Final Cut blu ray and came away gob smacked at the visual clarity. Watched Richard Burton and Clint Eastwood bring war time cool to Where Eagles Dare and gloried in one of my guilty little pleasures the Brotherhood of the Wolf a movie I just love.
    Blu ray just brings new clarity to classic films, Zulu is outstanding, brilliantly presented with an image that just comes to life bursting with colour, as does Casablanca in its wonderful black and white clarity ( I'm a big Bogart fan and as I keep revisiting Robert McKee's story every now  I tend to re watch and take on board some of Mr McKee's idea's about story and script construction)
   I have a cheap set up and aged Sony Tv that is just HD Ready but that is more than capable of doing the films justice. So I may not have been going to the cinema, but I have been enjoying my blu rays.
    But my week end might just get better. Peter Jackson's Frighteners is about to released on Blu ray down here and I cant wait. I love this movie, yes its a little disjointed with the humour and the comedy and the dark places it ventures into but like his Braindead I just love it. Its my guilty pleasure.
    But today the sad news of Steve Job's passing, to the techno's he is Apple, well to me he is one of the creative visionaries who when George Lucas sold Pixar,  saw the potential in the company and bought it. John Lassetter is the creative but Steve Job's was the man who laid the firm foundations for Pixar to grow and become the force it is now. God bless Steve and rest in peace.

Shark Night 3D

I'm a sucker for Shark movies, and as I had been experiencing a drought of movies that appealed to me, and bound for time, this was the only convenient showing yesterday that I could make. My ideal choice would have been to attend a showing of the Irish cop movie The Guard. However I missed that showing by two hours and out of boredom I decided to see this film instead.

 Bad choice, this is the Shark equivelant of Snakes on a Plane, but at least that movie had Samuel L Jackson on board.Not supprisingly the director of this mess had directed Snakes.  I knew I wasn't seeing Shakespeare, but there are bad movies that are enjoyable in their being so bad. An then there is Shark Night 3D. A hopeless movie that fails as entertainment on all levels.

Basically a bunch of college grads, poorly written head to one of the members parents house on the Lake. A convenient salt water lake, that just happens to be populated with Sharks of differing varieties.
They die in various outlandish ways.  God do I need to go on. In places the 3D shines, but for the most part its barely noticeable. The characters are mere death fodder, you don't care for them and the script as written is bad. Really bad, supported by some seriously terrible acting.

There is a scream element in that their is a man made reason for the sharks being in the lake, and so towards the end we have the big reveal. This is so bad its just not worth writing about and the great reveal you can see coming a mile off. Like Snakes on a plane, the idea is all there in the title, but the journey is not worth the trip. If your bored, and this is the only movie showing save yourself some money, boot up Jaws in your DVD player and watch a classic , or even Deep Blue sea. Anything is better than this poorly written crap.

Wellington and the Rugby World Cup and Weta

Being a welshman living in New Zealand last weekend was a major event for me. Wales were due to play their first pool game in Wellington on Sunday night, against the formidable Springboks.
The selection of movies on show locally was depressing and I was hotly anticipating the arrival of my Star Wars Blu rays. Tinkering or not, I still wanted them, and to be honest, I will always remember seeing the originals but since the Special Editions, no one under 10 is going to be aware of the constant Lucas tinkering and their his babies so tinker away.
Still last Sunday our local museum Te Papa held a welsh day so I donned my welsh jersey and with my wife and son in tow headed towards Wellington to savour the atmosphere.
So I've attached a few images from the day. They do however have a film link in that the sculpture created for the World Cup is a Weta Production.

This is a brilliant example of their creativity and is a stunning piece of  community art.