Masters Of Horror: Imprint
by John Felix

A lot of horror fans complained after the bulk of the Masters of Horror series aired: how could so many revered directors (and William Malone – Oh snap!) of the horror genre churn out what they saw as sub par work? And yes, a lot of the Masters of Horror episodes did seem to resemble the gleeful, campy nature of Tales from the Crypt rather than the dark gore fests fans (including myself) expected.

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Meet The Robinsons
by John Felix

Leave it to Disney to attempt to coldly calculate an attempt to make “edgy” kids fare. I was in the appropriate age group as a real good wave of subversive programming was hitting the air, mainly thanks to cartoons like Ren and Stimpy, Rocco's Modern Life and the almighty Beavis and Butt-Head. Now, thanks to the aid of about ten years of production, seven writers and sixty percent reshoots, Disney brings us the outright diabolical Meet The Robinsons, a film that is as dazzling as it is maddening.

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My Big Fat Independent Movie
by John Felix

The front of the box reads, “The lowbrow comedy for the highbrow crowd.” It also features a collection of parodies and take-offs of various film icons both of independent films and, well, “quirky” films financed by major studios and their subsidiaries. (I’m not buying Fox Searchlight or Miramax circa ‘96 as independent film companies, guys). And let’s not forget that it’s actually called My Big Fat Independent Movie.

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National Lampoon's European Vacation
by John Felix

In the Chevy Chase filmography, which includes soaring highs, middling material, overlooked failures and god-awful bombs (I won’t name names when in reference to said scale; well, okay, Modern Problems is awesome), National Lampoon’s Vacation series certainly fills in every facet of the scale. The first Vacation is seen as the true classic of the series and certainly holds up to repeat viewings to this day. Christmas Vacation, while not the brightest of the bunch, certainly has a cult following surrounding it. And then there’s the bastard child of the series: European Vacation. Most people regard European Vacation as ranking somewhere between Funny Farm and Cops and Robbersons. At least most people had the best intentions when they forgot the very existence of Vegas Vacation.

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Nekromantik
by John Felix

Featuring a rotting corpse grasping firmly onto the bare breast of a voluptuous woman, Nekromantik is certainly a film I’ve been waiting to see ever since I first gained internet access and was able to type the phrase “horror movies” into Yahoo. I was around 14 years old and the internet provided me with two very important things: Hardcore pornography and volumes of information about horror movies that I wasn’t going to be finding at the local Blockbuster Video.

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The Nightmare Before Christmas
by John Felix

Has it really been so long since the name Tim Burton didn’t inspire at best an apathetic yawn out of me? Sure, I enjoyed the hell out of Batman Returns when it originally came out, but Burton’s brand name seemed to hit a high point with the one-two punch of The Nightmare Before Christmas in ‘93 and Ed Wood in ‘94. Oh, and Cabin Boy, too. I will defend Cabin Boy until the day I die.

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Pirates Of The Caribbean: At World's End (2-Disc Ltd. Edition)
by John Felix

As illustrated in my shot-down-in-its-prime series of articles titled A Year in Disneyland, I am quite the fan of the big mouse when it comes to its theme parks, but when it comes to its cinematic output, I probably lost interest in childhood.

The negativity sort of ebbed away when the first Pirates Of The Caribbean film hit theaters, and while a bit bloated, it still managed to bring a surprising amount of fun to the big screen despite the possible calamity a film based on a ride could be. Then something snapped - Pirates Of The Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest came along, and I know I'm in the minority with this opinion, it managed to trump the first film in every way by being absolutely fucking insane, coming off like an absurd, drug-fueled first draft that never got pulled back due to logistics and budget constraints. The things that people complained about, I fully embraced; the running time, the scenery chewing, the inability to make a lick of sense, everything. 

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Planet Terror - Extended and Unrated (2-Disc Special Ed.)
by John Felix

It's hard to argue that Planet Terror is a good movie.

Robert Rodriguez could probably be called the most professionally stunted director in the business - never changing, never progressing, never evolving. I look at a Robert Rodriguez picture and I think to myself, "Why can't Robert Rodriguez make a film that isn't so… Rodriguez-y?" That is the cold, logical part of my brain - the part that wants to write off Planet Terror and the whole Grindhouse fiasco as a smug fifty million dollar in-joke. 

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Reeker
by John Felix

How Goddamn stupid are we horror fans?

I can't think of a more undistinguished group than us - ready to swallow up absolutely anything labeled “horror,” without paying attention to the actual potential of the film, and sometimes, even absorbing a product of obvious poor quality. I've seen every Leprechaun film. I mark down MGM's Midnight Movie release dates on my calendar, no matter if I've seen the film or not. Uwe Boll, you say? I'm in.

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Ren & Stimpy - The Lost Episodes
by John Felix

If there was ever an argument that censors were doing a good thing, look no further than the original Ren And Stimpy show. While many episodes were chopped up, or cut completely from showing (which were then made available when the DVDs were produced), censors were an important part of the creative process, forcing creator John Kricfalusi and his team of writers to become more sneaky with the off-color humor. While the show was still full of boogers, fart jokes and idiocy, a lot of the humor flew under the radar, which meant the cartoon was just as enjoyable to adults (meaning drunk college boys) as it was to children.

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The Sarah Silverman Program - Season One
by John Felix

I approached The Sarah Silverman Program with a touch of trepidation.

You see, while the backlash against the comedian is growing stronger by the nanosecond, I truly believe Sarah Silverman is a funny gal. However, this endorsement (which, by the way, means absolutely nothing) comes with a caveat; while Silverman can be chokingly hysterical, the woman just plain hasn’t changed her act in about a decade. I don’t mean her innocent-ignorance shtick either – line for line, she’s been using the same material ad nauseam to near Gallagher proportions, from her early television appearances to her stand-up film, Jesus is Magic.

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Sins Of The Fleshapoids
by John Felix

One million years after a great war wiped out most of civilization, human beings finally reestablish themselves as the dominant force on the planet. Considering science to ultimately lead to the downfall of man, humans evolve their technology far enough to create Fleshapoids, robots encased in synthetic flesh. The Fleshapoids are dedicated to catering to every whim of their human masters, who now live in paradise, growing fat on ice cream cones, Clark bars, sex, ignorance and wax fruit.

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Small Gauge Trauma
by John Felix

The FanTasia film festival has been terrorizing Montreal for ten years now, bringing the widest selection of Genre Cinema to the masses. It's where films are sold, directors are noticed, and where Dimension films goes to pick up their sack-o-crap, which they then decide to sit on in hopes that a remake will manage to get off the ground. As mentioned on the back of the DVD case, this is the film festival where Hideto Nakata's Ringu was introduced to the west. This is where Nacho Cerda gained infamy with his own fetishistic films. And, like it or not, FanTasia was the first festival in North America to show a film by cinema terrorist Takashi Miike.

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Snakes On A Plane
by John Felix

A cult film is an honest piece of work, and cannot be intentionally created. This is why you will find the staff of embracing such films as The Fly II, or the works of Uwe Boll while simultaneously ignoring the ever-loving shit out of films like Razor Blade Smile. In short: we certainly love our underdogs, especially when they have conviction. 

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Street Trash
by John Felix

Hey, did you hear? Street Trash is out on DVD! Yeah! After literally 20 years of waiting, Synapse Films has released Street Trash on DVD! Ring the bells! Summon the dancers! Let the hobo jug wine flow freely! Bring forth the virgin sacrifice!

Okay, that might seem a little extreme, but it was a joy to hear that Synapse Films had released Street Trash on DVD. While the new barebones release might come as a disappointment to a few who haven’t been monitoring the release of the still-planned, 2 disc special edition, I still consider it a rather nice gesture that Synapse has chosen to release the film on its own.

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Tetsuo: The Iron Man
by John Felix

Shinya Tsukamoto’s Tetsuo: The Iron Man almost comes off as cinematic punishment. You could point fairly easily to its influences in David Cronenberg’s fascination with the manipulation and combination of flesh and machine, David Lynch’s fascination with sexual repression, abstraction and surrealism, and possibly even the technical achievements of animator Jan Svankmajer. But even if you’re well familiar with those reference points, Tetsuo can still leave you scratching your head and wondering just what the hell is wrong with the Japanese.

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Tokyo Psycho
by John Felix

I am rooting for the demise of the Japanese horror genre. Not that it doesn’t have artistic merit; there are many films I enjoy that fall under the expansive category of Japanese horror. But there definitely seems to be a dedicated little sub-genre called “dull” lurking in the shadows, waiting for the exact moment to unleash unfathomable direct-to-video hell. Of course, some would say that there is a large cultural difference – Japan’s direct-to-video market is a respectable business - but I would attribute such respectability to the fact that Lorenzo Lamas does not star in those films.

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The Toxic Avenger
by John Felix

Melvin Furd was just a 90-pound weak mop boy working at the Tromaville health club, constantly harassed and abused by his peers. After a particularly mean incident involving a pink and blue polka-dotted tutu and a sheep in what seems to be a rather modest cancer wig, Melvin ends up diving head-first into a bucket of nuclear waste, turning little Melvin into (everybody with me now) a hideously deformed creature of superhuman size and strength.

Also known as The Toxic Avenger, if you haven't figured it out yet.

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Twin Peaks - Definitive Gold Box Edition
by John Felix

There were very few things my mother and I refused to talk about. While we shared many of the same ideas, we also were mature enough to converse about, debate and accept each other’s personal beliefs on multiple topics – religion, politics, whatever. However, I remember that there were two specific things that we dared not speak of; less we got into a heated argument and eventual fistfight. One was the two-part series finale of The Prisoner, and the other one was the merits of David Lynch, Twin Peaks. Oddly enough, I received the Definitive Gold Box Edition of Twin Peaks on the anniversary of my mother’s passing. Bittersweet? Maybe. I just like to think of that little coincidence as an indication that I won that argument, because for the most part, Twin Peaks was awesome. Victory dances and high fives all around!

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Upright Citizens Brigade - Season One
by John Felix

It’s hard to talk about televised sketch comedy without instantly bringing up Saturday Night Live and how much it does/doesn’t suck. Ultimately, Saturday Night Live succeeds with its audience because it goes for the simple and clean pop culture-savvy joke-joke, and, theoretically at least, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with the gut-instinct laugh.

Even amongst its alternative comedy peers which includes such cult hits as The State, The Kids in the Hall and Mr. Show With Bob and David, Upright Citizens Brigade managed to differentiate itself by eliminating any post-1945 Celebrity imitation, cranking up the surrealism factor, delving deep into more sinister and uncomfortable territory and even finishes the whole package off with some hidden camera pranks that come across less like jokes and more like anarchic rioting. Without musical guests or bubbly 18-year-old hosts, Upright Citizens Brigade concentrates on the bizarre and often grotesque.

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Vacancy
by John Felix

It is really, really…

Really really really really really really really hard (maybe even impossible) for me to justify my love of the “horror porn” revival. From time to time, I like to think of myself as a fairly well-adjusted person - it doesn't happen often and when it does, I tend to relish it - but there's just something about seeing a human being tied up and knife-fucked that gets me going. Bear in mind that I made my mother take me to the filming location of the original The Hills Have Eyes when I was a young man, so maybe I was never really all there to begin with. 

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Wonder Showzen - Season 2
by John Felix

Quoting directly from my review of Wonder Showzen - Season One, I had this to say about the series:

"Wonder Showzen is dark, disturbing, subversive and so funny, it actually made me shoot cola out of my nose. Don’t be surprised when it’s cancelled next week.”

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Yo-Yo Girl Cop
by John Felix

Look, I’m just as intrigued as you probably are reading, no, not even reading this review, but glaring at the title and the title alone: Yo-Yo Girl Cop. You don’t even have to view the striking cover featuring Aya Matsuura in a Japanese schoolgirl outfit with the background literally exploding around her (though it helps) – Yo-Yo Girl Cop.  Just saying the name alone might elicit a giggle. Or if you’re particularly adventurous, you might imagine Tommy Smothers decked out in drag, beating the shit out of prison guards with his cunning use of Walk-The-Dog (my fantasy).

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Zach Galifianakis: Live at the Purple Onion
by John Felix

Alternative comedy. 

What the fuck does that even mean anymore? 

Sure, in the late '80s/early '90s when comedy was transforming from the traditional lounge lizard imagry into something more personal and observational, the “alternative” label actually meant something (note my lack of name-checking to keep the comedy snobs at bay, including myself), but the continued use of the phrase seems misused at this point. Eventually, stand-up succumbed to these changes and, well, when the alternative becomes the mainstream, where do you go from there?

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