12 Days Of Dino Dicember #5: Claw (2021)

From Gerald Rascionato, mostly know as the director of Open Water 3: Cage Dive, this is the other dinosaur movie he made in 2021 that we mentioned in the review of Triassic Hunt, simply titled Claw.

The premise is fairly simple, with two friends forced to spend the night in a ghost town (after getting a flat tire), where they find themselves hunted by a prehistoric predator.

Almost immediatly i got Raptor Ranch vibes, since we also have a scientist creating dinosaurs via a ramshackle laboratory in a middle-of-nowhere town (here Southern California instead of the usual rural town of backwoods stereotypes), the dinosaur pen, the dinosaur outsmarting his creator, etc.

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Silent Night (2012) [REVIEW] | Remake Night

Ah yes, Christmas horror, a tradition now decades old, one that inevitably leads one to talk about the Silent Night, Deadly Night series, that – while not inventing the notion, as Bob Clark’s Black Christmas was already a decade old itself by then– had quite the impact back in 1984, and definitely helped the subgenre grow into a profitable niche, while also spawning two sequels and two other numbered entries that really had nothing to do with 1984’s Silent Night, Deadly Night at all.

So yeah, if you know me.. you already know we ain’t talking about any of those directly, there’s always a catch, so we’re revisiting the 2012 remake of the 1984 original Silent Night Deadly Night, simply called “Silent Night”, following the then common trend of remakes shortening titles.

It was either that or Silent Night, Bloody Night, which is – odd as it may sound – not a rip-off and actually pre-dates both the original Black Christmas and the original Silent Night, Deadly Night.

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[EXPRESSO] Dos (2021) | Flesh Sewn Shut

Browsing Netflix new releases and this caught my eyes, i mean, the simple title made me curious and i’m always in when it’s a spanish horror thriller about two complete strangers waking up to found themselves literally sewn together and placed into a room.

It’s not human-to-walrus surgery, but i will indulge regardless, it’s also fairly short, clocking just above 60 minutes (plus credits), quite surprising some other bloated films Netflix has as exclusives.

It has definitely an arthouse feel (the finale with the title reveal it’s really indicative of director Mar Taragona’s ambition), but the bold decision to compact it all in a shorter runtime pays off in spades, both for impact and in cutting out the fat from the narrative.

The main mystery keeping the story going is the identity of the culprit, and of course the purpose of joining together two people by literally sewning their flesh together, which is ultimately not the Saw-esque random ass gruesome torturer with a deviant penchant for justice and retribution you might think it’s gonna be revealed. It’s not that… exactly, and it’s a shame because the script never properly explore the themes it tackles, nor manages to fully utilize the isolated setting and premise, going for an arthouse ending, with some impact but ultimately not that satisfactory.

A shame since the movie is already intriguing before that, with plenty of questions and the grisly circumstances, while the two are trying to make sense of the really uncomfortable – even more since they’re butt naked – situation they’re in, leading to some good drama and time spent with this likeable and relatable “surprise duo”.

Shame it hasn’t much depth to it as it clearly wanted, (i’d guess it was originally meant to be a lot longer), but it’s a decent watch.

The Abominable Snowman (1957) [REVIEW] | Tibet Climbing, Joel

While i teased a Shriek Of The Mutilated review in the Snowbeast’s one…. i’m gonna keep teasing it a bit more, i’m not yet ready to rewatch and talk about that “fine specimen”, but i’m willing to keep the “yeti train” goin’, so let’s defrost a Peter Cushing film from the old Hammer catalogue with their 1957’s “The Abominable Snowman”, itself derived from their BBC series “The Creature”.

The plot sees antropologist John Rollason (Peter Cushing) and a scientist friend of his going to Tibet and being welcomed in a buddist monastery. The head monk questions them and he’s not convinced by John claiming to be there in order to study the local flora, and as soon as an american climber by the name of Tom Friend (Forrest Tucker) joins them, the actual reason for their travel becomes clear: they plan to climb the mountains in a quest for the legendary snowman, the yeti.

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The Iced Hunter (2018) [REVIEW] | Mozgus Chaser

Welcome to another installment of “no, you never heard of this one before, and i haven’t either”, with The Iced Hunter, an italian horror fantasy action film directed by Davide Cancila and about the titular “iced hunter” (you can tell his namesake was never intended to be translated in english, because it sounds like a fancy non-IBA approved cocktail or a Blooborne collaboration cafè item), a mysterious non-human warrior with fittingly mysterious origins and with memories not of his own, being trailed by the “Domini Lupi” sect, hellbent of getting rid of him at any cost.

Does this feel like a werewolf spiced live action “redo/reinterpretation” of the “Holy Iron Chain Order” arc in Berserk?

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[EXPRESSO] In The Trap (2019) | Spineless Haunting

Given the horror heritage Italy has, it may sound strange how nowadays the genre it’s basically extincty here, and the few attempts made by italian productions are often better forgotten.

Still, i wanted to try my luck with this one in theathers… before the first wave of COVID-19 here killed it’s planned 2020 theathrical release. I recently found out it was eventually licensed for streaming on Amazon Prime Video, so let’s go.

Directed by Alessio Liquori, In The Trap it’s a movie sold on lies, because both the synopsis for the expected cinema release and the one on Amazon Prime Video are quite deceptive, this is about a guy being haunted by a demon that killed his sister years ago, and later possessed his fianceè.

What the summary says it’s that the guy, Philip, it’s trapped in his own house for 2 years by a sinister force that doesn’t let him escape. One day he meets the girl living in the apartment above his, Sonia, and she tries to convince him that’s all in his head.

Problem is that synopsis actually refers only to the second act, and that’s there no doubt about the nature of the entity. The plot it’s senseless anyway, because the second act doesn’t even connect with the first one until the very end, and the last act “twist” are the very definition of not committing to anything, just throwing shit into the pot to have a positive ending.

I could forgive this deception, but the movie it’s another crappy & cliched exorcism-haunting film, with shitty dialogue and it’s just unsufferably boring and tiresome. It has a decent international cast and production values, but it’s part of “trojan horsing” audiences into watching this waste of time.

Quite glad i didn’t get to see it in theathers.

[EXPRESSO] The Whole Truth (2021) | Meet The Granps

Dipping into the Netflix waters these weeks more than planned since i’m not really interested in many theathrical releases until House Of Gucci (i can survive without seeing or reviewing Clifford The Big Red Dog live-action film, i feel you can as well).

So let’s talk about the Netflix esclusive Thai horror thriller The Whole Truth, about siblings that find a mysterious hole in their grandparents’ house (where they temporarily reside as their mother is in a coma after nearly dying in a car crash), leading to terrifying events and them discovering creepy secrets about their family.

The circumstances around the events might led you to believe this is going into The Visit territory, but it’s not like that at all, this isn’t one of those that play the supernatural angle only to have a twist undo-negate it either. It’s just a fairly typical supernatural asian horror movie, quite average, i’d say.

It’s not bad but it’s also not that involving, the movie tries to have some flair to it but the plot and the horror elements never move past being cliches, the subplots ain’t bad (arguably the granpa’s revenge subplot is kinda more interesting than most of the “ghost shit”) but it takes a lot for most of them to factor in to the main one, and to be honest the movie kinda feels stretched to 2 hours.

The decent acting and the execution make it so that you wanna stick around to the end, so there’s that, and a decently satisfying payoff, even it’s kinda oddly paced and “delayed”, but it plays well enough with the idea of truth, ending on a somewhat fittingly “positive” note.

Overall, The Whole Truth (gimmicky international-localized name aside) is alright, nothing special, really, but it’s worth seeing once at the very least.

Mother Krampus 2: Slay Ride (2018) [REVIEW] | Crazy Fat Grandma Myers

As i pointed out in the review of Mother Krampus (a.k.a. 12 Deaths Of Christmas), this isn’t really a sequel, even by the usual lax requirements you find in horror movies there’s no connection whatsover, but was ultimately called Mother Krampus 2: Slay Ride by the american distributor to cash in on the Krampus craze of these years, only to have the UK release confusingly titled just “Mother Krampus”.

At least on the box, the movie itself still says “Mother Krampus 2” (as you can see).

To fuel the confusion, technically this was slated for release in 2016 as “Naughty List”, and at one point was gonna be called “Lady Krampus”, i guess (and this is just speculation) because the other working title “Slay Bells” didn’t exactly wooed any marketing committee.

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Mother Krampus AKA 12 Deaths Of Christmas (2017) [REVIEW] | Christmas Hexe

Since we’re still having a “dinosaur christmas” this year too (though on a smaller and more canonical scale, as previously stated) and now it’s technically december, let’s look at a couple of Christmas horror flicks, just for kicks.

After the Krampus quick “discovery” and exploitation as another spin for chrismas horror movies (often by extremely low budget productions), something else had to be done, ransacking christmas folklore around the world as a way to some kind of legitimacy, which also leads to terribly confusing – even if somehow apt- titles like “Mother Krampus”.

While that itself isn’t confusing, keep in mind we’re talking about the 2017 movie by James Klass, there also Mother Krampus 2: Slay Ride, that came out in 2018, but released on DVD in the UK as just “Mother Krampus”. Not that the movies are connected in any way, but come on, this is some supreme titulatory bullshit, vintage bullshit that should have died out in the 80s.

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[EXPRESSO] Resident Evil: Welcome To Raccoon City (2021) | Herbal Bundle

Finally time to review this one, the first reboot movie for the Resident Evil film series, distancing itself from the previous films by Paul W. Anderson in order to make a more faithful adaptation.

Helmed by 47 Meters Down director Johannes Roberts, Resident Evil Welcome To Raccoon City basically provides an abridged retelling combining the plot of Resident Evil and Resident Evil 2 into a single one. Not completely random as both games’ plot take place in Raccon City, where in 1998 the farmaceutical megacorporation Umbrella Corporation had basically withdraw from operating, leaving the city to wither.

After an epidemic turns people and animals into undead monsters, a squad of local police officers is sent to investigate the Spencer Mansion in the nearby mountain area, while other survivors rally to survive the horrors left by Umbrella.

There are various changes and differences, often kinda necessary due to the merging of the two plots, which leads to the movie feeling rushed, as i feared. Aside from some hamfisted (but still cute) references, the movie actually captures pretty well the horror B-movie spirit of the games, and actually wants to be a horror film.

And it succeds, the atmosphere is nice and creepy, there’s a lot of practical effects, the characters are mostly quite accurate, and most of the elements from the games are used with sense in-context.

It’s not perfect, the cast is decent but there is some questionable acting and the “plot mix” it’s a source of other issues, but overall it’s actually quite solid and enjoyable.

Shame because this is arguably the better, more faithful RE live action adaptation… but it’s shaping up to be a box office bomb, not surprising since it was released in late November, and the “Thanksgiving holiday weekend” window makes sense only for Americans.