--/06/17 Dawn O The Dead (2004)

Reminds me of a thought I once had; do zombies still poo?

I mean, they're reanimated dead folk, so many functions would cease, or operate at a lower level. But they still eat people. Sometimes, it would appear, they eat a vast quantity of a person in one go. However, when was the last time you saw a film like this, or an episode of The Walking Dead with a zombie squatting down in the background crimping off a length?

It's just bloody unrealistic is what it is.

The concept of a zombie apocalypse, though, is well within the realms of reasonable possibility. Of course.

8.5/10

--/06/17 Pitching Tents (2017)

Dull coming of age thing where teenagers get drunk/high at parties and touch each other in the sex pipe. Yes, it's that original and groundbreaking a film. 

Tediously generic/10

--/06/17 Final Destination (2000)

It's a bit unlike us to enjoy a series of films like this, but they're undeniably entertaining and, although adhering to the formula laid down in the first, creatively fun.

--/06/17 Steelmanville Road (2017)

Prequel to Bad Ben, which we really liked.

This one... Not so good.

3.24/10

--/06/17 Once Upon A Time In Venice (2017)

Bruce Willis phone call to agent:

"I haven't been in enough utterly ballsack films lately. I need a vanity project that highlights how mediocre I'm willing to go"

"Well, there's a script going around at the moment about a private detective in his sixties. Seems like shite."

"I'll do it."

--/06/17 The Last Shark (1981)

Hard-hitting documentary that I reviewed previously here:

http://filmplop.blogspot.se/2014/03/190314-last-shark-1981.html

--/06/17 Wilson (2017)

Woody Harrelson plays a chap called Wilson. He's a bit grumpy, but in a likeable way. Discovers he fathered a daughter many years ago and tries to make up for lost time.

Dunno what else to put, really. Not really our sort of thing normally, but it was quite funny and all that stuff.

Life (2017)

Cover version of The Thing set on a ship full of science people. Space ship that is, not, like a P&O ferry.

Although that could be great.

"Miriam, there's a disturbance among the scones"

"Not now, Gary, I'm two numbers away from a full house. Oh... The announcer has just spouted an extra arm and two heads"

"As long as we get to Calais on time, I couldn't give a whistle. Another pot of tea?"

"Yes please."

7/10

--/06/17 Jawbone (2017)

Bleak, cliched, predictable film about a washed-up alcoholic former boxer who has one last chance.

That said, it is also very well acted, well scripted and worth a go if you're in the mood for it.

7.44/10

--/06/17 Death Wish 4 (1987)

There's not enough films about 65 year old men murdering people in hilarious ways. Funny as fuck.

--/06/17 The Creature Below (2016)

Which sounds like a profannisaurus entry rather than a film.

Anyway, a research scientist finds some small blob of something and appears to raise it in her cupboard until it becomes some kinda Lovecraftian Squid monster made from Lidl-budget CGI.

Every bit as good, or bad, as it sounds.

Squid/10

--/06/17 The Belko Experiment (2016)

Imagine Battle Royale, but with Americans in an office block rather than Japanese children on an island.

Pretty much that.

Some weak moments, but some cracking black humour (most of which I think is intended) and pleasingly OTT carnage.

7/10

--/96/17 Quarries (2016)

Same as below. I was spending more time watching the election stuff than the film I'd put on. Also, this film didn't help itself by being a bit boring and poo.

--/06/17 Tiger Raid (2016)

Film about two mercenaries who are in Mexico or Brazil or one of those other places in films where all the baddies wear white suits and live in tiled villas made from cocaine and palm trees.

Started off OK but seemed to just meander around doing nothing for the final fifty minutes.

That and I watched this as the exit polls and results speculation was just starting to come on TV from the general election.

The Tories got a bit of a kicking. Sadly not in the literal sense. And, frustratingly, are managing, just, to pretend they're still in government. Next few months could be interesting.

Election/10

--/06/17 Downhill (2016)

Some professional mountain bike racers go to Chile for some big mountainy bikey event.

Unfortunately they find themselves involved in what at first appears to be a crime scene when they stumble across an injured fellow being pursued by angry locals.

Turns out it something a bit different to what they thought as events take a turn for the strange and it becomes a sorta cover version of Blair Witch and The Thing. But not as good as either. Not bad at all for a cheapy though.

Obviously I only include the first Blair Witch in that. 

6.4/10

04/06/17 Dead Awake (2017)

A bit like a modern version of Elm Street... Yet somehow, even with the talent of Jocelin Donohoe, more shite than that series of terrible films.

Hey ho.

Meh/10

04/06/17 The Lego Batman Movie (2017)

Podd watched this as she didn't see it in the cinema when me and my brother did. She also enjoyed it.

8/10

04/06/17 Devil's Domain (2016)

Film about a bullied 18yr old girl who sells her soul for revenge, fame and lesbian sex.

Sadly not as interesting, fun or masturbatorially useful as that description would suggest. A fun idea weakly executed.

3.8/10

Perkin.

03/06/17 John Wick: Chapter two (2017)

The first was bad, this one is insultingly fucking piss-poor. Utterly terrible drivel, made presumably by and for cretinous 12yr old boys.

As for Keanu Reeves, his first screen credit on IMDB was from 1984. Proof, from an acting point of view, that practice doesn't make perfect.

Or even half decent.

Dude.

I'm sure, as a human, he's a fucking good guy, a quick read of his bio would suggest so, but, c'mon... I've seen traffic lights with more range on camera.

1/10

05/17 The Guest (2014)

Watched this again as I hadn't seen it for a few years and it's enjoyable nonsense. Imagine if Jason Bourne had done murders for fun instead of when necessary. Pretty much that.

7/10

05/17 Easy Money II: Hard to Kill (2012)

Swedish crime drama about Swedish criminals and their assorted dramas.

Pretty good.

Surprisingly absent amount of sauna based pornography.

Well, that's the lies we grew up with in the '80s.

7/10

05/17 A Dark Song (2016)

A bereaved woman hires an occultist to help her perform a complex, exhausting, months-long ritual that will allow her to talk to her dead son. After initially declining, her desperation twinges the small reserves of sympathy left in the misanthropic spell-caster and they begin the torturous process.

We here at 'Plop Towers have a thing for films with small budgets, small casts and small locations. Surely it's distilling the essence of what a story should be, when you take away the visual noise, and you're left with plot, dialogue and acting. If a film does that, and nails it, we're happy.

Aside from a rather silly ending, this one does a fine job. Cast of two, one house, compelling story and great acting.

Well worth a watch.

8.85/10

05/17 Lake Alice (2017)

A family go away for a pleasant Christmas in their isolated cabin and find themselves stuck in a generic slasher film instead. Hate it when that happens.

3.7/10

05/17 Welcome to Willits (2016)

Film about some innocent young folk who wonder into the territory of some crazed meth lab cookers who think the hikers are invading aliens. Starts off quite good, y'know, given the plot, but got too boring to bother watching by the end.

4/10

05/17 Kidnap (2017)

A film about a woman trying to rescue her kidnapped son. The plot's got holes big enough to throw an abducted child through, but it's enjoyable enough family-in-peril guff.

Peril. What a great word.

Be a good name for a pet as well.

Peril the fish. For example.

6.4/10

05/17 The Comedian (2017)

Robert De Niro plays a foul-mouth stand-up comedian who, nudging seventy, gets a second chance at making it big.

The plot is pretty much secondary to the gags, which, to his credit, De Niro does very well.

Bicklelaughs/10

05/17 Kill 'Em All (2017)

JeanClaude Van Damme (English: Jonathon Clyde Lorry Darn), is still terrible. Sadly he hasn't seemed to realise this.

Shite/10

05/17 I, Daniel Blake (2016)

Podd watched this as I can't bring myself to. She said it's excellent, I don't doubt for a moment that it is.

If you can't work out why, you've not read much of this blog.

If you're British and you read this, on June 8th, vote Labour.

If the option of a tactical vote is available in your area, where Labour aren't viable, that will unseat a Tory, use that.

Time is thin, chances diminishing, seize the opportunity to offer this country a better future.

If you're voting Tory, fuck you. Fuck your opinions. 

05/17 Mindhorn (2016)

If you've heard of this, you'll probably already have a fair idea what it's about. If not, to summarise: an ageing TV actor has to return to the location of his '80s detective show, in character, to assist police in finding a delusional murderer who thinks his character, the Mindhorn of the title, is real.

The trim dynamic actor of thirty years ago is now a forgotten, pot-bellied loser who needs a fake tan and a wig to emulate his previous self.

It's not much of a spoiler to say the actor/Mindhorn gets much more involved than planned, finding himself immersed in a conspiracy of murder, cover-ups, political corruption (on a local council level) and marital infidelity.

It's very silly and much funnier than we was expecting. Probably the biggest asset to the film is how it is very British, in a good way. Set on the Isle of Wright, with its modest locations and provincial status, the film doesn't try and pander to wider audiences, the fictional show's narrowness of vision, and the film playing it straight-faced make it all the more enjoyable.

8.58/10

05/17 Cool As Ice (Rifftrax) (1991)

Not sure having a team of professional comedians talk over this film actually makes it any funnier than it already is. With/without, either way you'll be laughing your dick off if you see it.

05/17 The Expendables (2010)

This was on TV and I couldn't be arsed to turn it over. Not sure why as I thought it was infantile shit the first time I saw it and my opinion hasn't changed. Note to self: Sometimes just turn the TV off.

1/10

Perkin.

05/17 In The Electric Mist (2009)

Tommy Lee Jones plays Sheriff Granite Craggyface, living in a humid swampy part of the southern U.S. Missing children, someone got shot thirty years ago, drunken actor, fighting and shooting. Not too bad.

6.4/10

05/17 Middle Man (2016)

A slobby, middle-aged man with dreams of becoming a standup comic decides to quit work, hit the road and give it a go. The only problem is that he's not funny, his idea of comedy is stuck in the genteel humour of 1950's radio plays, therefore his attempts to make a modern audience laugh fail miserably.

That is until he accidentally becomes involved in murder and dismemberment and works such deathly mishaps into his act. Which, to his surprise and reluctant gain, go down a storm.

The film itself isn't actually that funny, but it is certainly one that holds your attention due to its unusual tale. Or maybe it won't. How should I know? I'm not your attention span. 

6.8/10

05/17 Get Out (2017)

A young chap meets his girlfriend's wealthy parents for the first time. Turns out that they're right dodgy fuckers.

People have moaned about the racial aspects of the film, some that they're underplayed, others that they're included at all.

As is pointed out later into the flick, the racial element is pretty much an irrelevance. The true moral of this flick is don't trust rich people.

Good advice, worth heeding.

8.2/10