We are the Sprocket Holes vol. 38

more movie ratings;

Santa Sangre - 9.5/10: Alejandro Jodorowsky's forgotten gem. A gory circus of brutal murder, soulful symbolism, and crow-black humor.

Lord of the Flies (1990) - 5/10: As Roger Ebert put it; a Classics Illustrated version of the cautionary fable. Mostly limp in the areas of atmosphere and character... more concerned with the the fate of characters Piggy and Simon than with anything that made the fate of those characters so heartbreaking. In the book, Simon and Piggy represent abstract thought and philosophical logic (respectively), so when they meet their end in the book, it represents a base, violent society overtaking a society of reason and accountability. in the film, Piggy is basically a whinier, mopier version of Chunk from the Goonies, and Simon has little more to do than stare at a fly covered boar's head (the importance of the fly covered boars head is also left untouched in the film version.... pretty retarded since that fly covered boar's head is THE LORD OF THE ASS FUCK FLIES). When they were killed, in Simon's case i didn't even care, and in Piggy's case i was relived that such a misinterpreted cliff-notes version of the story's primary thinker was put out of his misery.

Resident Evil - pfffft/10: Milla Jovovich in a skimpy red dress and knee high black boots... and this movie still bored the piss out of me. Nonsensical, derivative plot, cheesy FX, and bland characters.

Joshua - 8/10: Fantastic update on the classic Bad Seed story. compared to the Omen and the execrable Machauly Culkin vehicle the Good Son, but instead of making Joshua demon incarnate or merely born bad, he's a stunningly observant, and is actually interested not so much in causing chaos for it's own sake or just to see if he can get away with it, but to better he and his infant sister's situation. He recognizes that his parents are either disinterested in him or merely not physically or mentally capable of catering to him and his sister's needs, so he engineers a plot that will ensure a better life for himself and his young sister.

Inland Empire - 9/10: David Lynch makes the weirdest damn movie of his entire career. Too strange and obtuse to be interpreted or even understood, but too shocking and beautiful to be ignored or denied. This is pure dream logic.

Mirrors - WHOAREYOUWORKINGFORARRRRRRGH!/10: Kiefer Sutherland yells, cries, screams, punches stuff, drinks, watches Shin Chan, shoots things, and combats superpowered zombie mirrors haunted by the psychological despair of a schizophrenic she-nun turned skinless rape demon. not even as cool as it sounds.

H6: The Diary of a Serial Killer - 9/10: Brilliant Spanish slasher. Thoughtfully filthy.

the Cell - 6.5/10: Hadn't seen this one since it was originally released. The directing/cinematography is outstanding and rich... the mental landscape of Vincent D'Nofrio's villain being some of the most stunningly surreal moments ever presented in a mainstream thriller. Where the film fails is in the shit-sandwitch casting of Vince Vaughn and Jeniffer Lopez as the film's protagonists. Lopez looks amazing in skimpy panties and an unbuttoned blue shirt, but her performance acting wise is fucking abysmal. Vaughn is also miscast as a brooding detective. the film would have been truly excellent with anyone else playing those parts, but then again you would'nt have had a scene with J-Lo stumbling around her apartment in her undies.

Faces of Death - 7/10: i'd like some cheese with my meat.

Cool World - 7/10: not nearly as sleazy as it could've been.

A Scanner Darkly - 6.5/10: like Robert Downey Jr. and Rory Cochran, but the look of the film was distracting and obnoxious, and i fucking hate Keanue Reeves in everything.

Halloween (Rob Zombie version) - godfuckingdamnitno / 10: son of an asshole, talk about not getting it. Everything that was good about the original is mournfully absent here. The babysitters don't talk like teenage babysitters, but pornstars playing teenage babysitters (though i'll admit a minor tent was pitched when Danielle Harris said "tell me you wanna fuck me"). Most of the people Meyers kills are complete and utter assholes (two of them violently rape a female prisoner in front of Meyers while calling him names), so there is no villainy to the murders cause he's butchering people you can't relate to or don't wanna relate to. They try to paint Meyers as an abused kid one minute, than pure evil the next, so which fucking is it? Is it his upbringing, or was he born to kill? The movie gets murky on that detail, cause Rob Zombie is more concerned with uncultured white trash having overwritten verbal sparring sessions that go nowhere and prove no point other than seeing how many "fucks" and "assholes" Zombie can squeeze into every line of dialouge before losing the film to the profane. The film also looks terrible...too self consciously dark and gritty in an attempt to mask Zombie's ineffectual atmosphere and cliche-lazy plot points. an across-the-board failure that will hopefully be the begining of the end for Zombie and his all-blow-no-show contemporaries.