Month: Oct 2024

Frankenstein, 1931 – ★★★★

In the same year that ‘Dracula’ terrified audiences, Universal was already winding up the follow up 1-2 punch of the decade in the form of 1931’s adaptation of ‘Frankenstein’ I’ll admit, when it comes to the Universal monsters, I always had much more of a soft spot for Frank than Drac. but I feel its not without good reason.

Dracula is a romance film sold as a horror flick, but ‘Frankenstein’ is a horror flick with a touch of romance and macarbre comedy. Across the board it feels like a step up on ‘Dracula’ maintaining the style established in the Vampiric flick, but leaning much more into the surreal and nightmarish.

The script is a little slow boil by modern sensibilities, but at 70 minutes long, I really cant complain. the first and third acts are all rock solid action horror fun throughout, though the second act, to me, does sag a little as we end up spending elongated time with the Baron Frankenstein and talk of engagements and weddings abound…

The tone is a near perfect blend of horror, action and tragedy, with just a smidge of dark comedy for good measure. I feel they could have leant into the tragedy and dark comedy a bit more for my money…Though I dont think its spoilers really to say they do that more in the sequel.

The characters are all a tad eccentric and manic, a probably intentional choice to show just how grounded ‘The Creature’ is when compared to an actual god born man. my only critique? is they are a little one dimensional. Now, I could argue that years of pop culture oversaturation has made these characters feel one dimensional, when, at the time, they would have in fact felt quite fresh and unique…But then I wasnt born in the 1920’s to have had first hand experience on that front…So what do I know?

The direction once again embraces the german expressionist movement, if anything this film leans into it even more with superb end results. the creature design is iconic and simply excellent (though I feel the subtle refinements in ‘Bride’ really finish the design off) Its a gorgeous looking film with both its studio and location based sequences blowing the socks of anything that was coming out around this time.

The cine is also excellent, with a wide range of shot types, a rich and textured depth of field, some ASTOUNDING sound studio sets (the mansion set where you can actually see the ceiling has to be SEEN to be believed!) I also have to compliment the lighting which uttelry saves this picture, anything less than whats on screen would have failed to truely capture the macarbe in quite the same way.

The performances? Boris Karloff. Nuff said.

and the soundtracks a little stocky, but beautiful and haunting in its own way.

while probably not my ALL TIME favourite universal monster movie, Frankenstein is almost certainly top 5 for me. a powerful work that is still as striking as the day it was comitted to celluloid. and a major feat of the time. Recommended.

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/frankenstein-1931/

by tytdreviews

Seed of Chucky, 2004 – ★★½

6 Years after ‘Bride of Chucky’ introduced us to Tiff and bought our psychotic good guy back to the big screen in roaring fashion, I was honestly kind of surprised at the time to see Chucky reappear on the scene in ‘Seed of Chucky’. It had honestly been a long time coming and a lot of goodwill grew on ‘Bride’ in the years after its release. Unfortunately, ‘Seed’ to me feels like the cinematic equivilent of one of those guys who tells a mid-tier joke, gets a chuckle from the audience and then latches on to that quip/punchline for the entire rest of the evening reducing what could have been a quite enjoyable time to an insufferable and grating ‘trapped in an elevator’ experience.

The film picks up in present day 2004, and we’re introduced to Glen (Or Glenda!) the lovechild of Tiffany and Chucky as teased at the end of the last film, now all grown up (well…he’s 7 but apparently voo doo related pregnancies and births have an accellerated growth, so lord knows how old they actually are).

Glen was recovered by a gothey looking ventriloquist, who brought him back to the UK with him and basically abused him and used him as a dummy on the professional circuit. Glen has a ‘Made in Japan’ engraving on his wrist, and wouldnt you know it! One night while being allowed to watch TV, he catches an interview with Jennifer Tilly on the set of a new ‘Chucky’ movie thats being shot, and in the interview, Glen sees that Chucky has the same ‘Made in Japan’ tattoo on HIS wrist, meaning, Chucky and Tiffany MUST be his parents! SO! hitching a ride out of the UK over to LA, Glen is reunited with the dolls, ressurects them, and finds himself embroiled in a kidnapping attempt involving the actress Jennifer Tilly while ALSO coming to terms with the fact his parents are ACTUALLY notorious murderers AND having to battle a gender identity crisis that borders on transphobic (Not to get into TOO heavy a set of spoilers, but this DOES play on the murderous trans person trope…)

I just do NOT jam with this film…apart from the aforementioned mild transphobia (which somehow in some trans communities been reformed into Glen being an Icon? im not entirely sure how based on this film) the film is quite comfortable joking about sexual assault, gross out humour is the meal of the day, random nudity is pretty prevelent here (which, given NON of the childs play films up to this point have had ANY nudity at ALL really…was surprising.) It feels like an attempt at making a ‘Chucky’ film for a low brow audience, and I found myself tolerating the film for most of the runtime.

I landed on my exact feelings on this film a few years ago. If ‘Bride of Chucky’ was an independently rooted production from the mind of Don Mancini that married up the classic Universal monsters feel with undertones of John Waters style humour. Then ‘Seed of Chucky’ is an overt John Waters fan film. Its TOO blunt, TOO crass and TOO in your face, its not what the franchise is known for and not what its about. the tone of this film borders in places on ‘TV movie’ terratory, when I can compare your movie to the ‘Scary Movie’ franchise in terms of tone and humour, you know you’ve really lost your way.

The script is really more a series of happenings with the kidnapping and sexual assault of Jennifer Tilly being used as the THINNEST string to hold the whole production together. Make no. mistake, this is really just a vague series of happenings building to a rather predictable, parody heavy and eye rolling finale that feels tired…which is INSANE when you consider this was only the second ‘Chucky’ movie and that it had been 13 years since the series last had a regular and recurring sequel. This really could have been fertile ground. We had ‘Chucky in the 80s’, ‘Chucky in the post modern 90s’. and ‘Seed’ was ripe for a lampooning of post 9/11 celeb worship culture, cusp of social media..dom…and it just isnt…its Chucky and Tiff hanging around a mansion for 50 minutes occasionally picking people off for fun.

The scripts TOO self aware for its own good, theres too many pop culture references, too many 4th wall breaks, too many lazy attempts at humour, theres being inspired by John Waters, and then theres ACTUALLY cramming John Waters into your movie for some…random reason. I will overlook the occasional slur in this thing purely because of the time it came out (though that doesnt give it a free pass for the slurs it does use) But its SUCH a weak piece honestly.

The pacings all over the place and never quite right, its always either too slow and plodding, or too fast and incoherent. the tones totally off base, the characters are all too self aware and goofy for me. the good messages they TRY to promote get lost in a sea of banal randomness that seemed built more for online engagement, than for the benefit of making a coherent film.

The directions spot on for what its trying to do, but that doesnt mean I like it. its hypercolourful in a garish and unpleasent way, the planning for sequences is breakneck and equally incoherent, the overreliance on CGI is annoying and the quality quite poor even for the time. I didnt feel immersed in this films world, I felt like I was constantly on the verge of a commercial break.

The cine is probably this films strongest element, there are some strong shots in this, the compositions are both iconic and interesting, and even if the colour use in this made me feel nausious. I am at least somewhat grateful they DID bother to experiment with colour a bit more, given this film came out right at the start of the ‘Dirt brown and sludge orange’ era of horror movie colour grading.

What ruins it, is the editing. which is too fast paced, doesnt give the audience time to appreciate the shot structuring, experiments FAR too much with overlaying shots and just felt unpleasent to sit through.

Performance wise, Jennifer Tilly is the best thing in this film even somehow outshining the almighty Brad douriff in her duel role as Tiff and the actress Jennifer Tilly…its hardly a stretch lets be honest, she plays herself and arguably one of her most iconic characters…But, she does it really well and is arguably the one reason to really kind of check out this thing. I feel like this is Brads poorest performance as Chucky…he’s still great mind, but he just…doesnt really have a lot to do or say…most of his time in the film is just him reacting to things…it feels like he’s being upstaged in his own movie…

Billy Boyde as Glen really didnt do it for me, the english accent grated on me and left me desperately wishing they hadnt made that creative choice. Because Glen IS the movie…its a bit of a stink bomb performance that lingers WELL past my own tolerance level.

Add to this, the soundtrack just…isnt that great…its standard horror orchestral pieces and jukebox covers of pop classics…a BIG step down from ‘Bride’ that only further frustrated this production.

‘Seed of Chucky’ is an annoying film. while it absolutely has its moments, its trying SO hard to feel like a John Waters movie, it forgets what it ACTUALLY is and ends up, ironically, in a bit of an identity crisis over what it ACTUALLY wants to be. I didnt enjoy it particularly, I didnt hate it…But its absolutely not one i’ll be reaching for in future, and not one I can really recommend.

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/seed-of-chucky/

by tytdreviews

Bride of Chucky, 1998 – ★★★★½

After ‘Childs Play 3’ failed to set the box office on fire it would be almost 7 years until Don Mancini would bring our favourite Rubber renegade back to the big screen. In that time a lot of self reflection was held about the direction and nature of the series and how ‘Chucky in the 90s’ would really take shape. And I for one was absolutely delighted with the end product that is ‘Bride of Chucky’

The plot is pretty straightforward, the film takes place in present day 1998, in universe a year or so has happened between this film and ‘Childs Play 3’ and we’re introduced to a bit of a curveball right out of the gate in the form of ‘Tiffany’, Chuckys love interest from before he was murdered the first time. After his Death in November 1988, Tiff went to Charles’ apartment and found a ring on his mantel and figured that he was about to propose to her.

She then spent the following 10 years following the news headlines about a *supposed* rampaging killer doll, while booking up on ‘Voo Doo’ practices, eventually managing to bribe a police officer into breaking into an evidence locker (complete with several homages to horror icons past) to recover the shredded remains of the fan blended Chucky Doll.

Tiff reassembles the doll, does the chant and within minutes Chucky is back in the room. But its not as harmonious as it first appears, when its revealed that Chucky never really intended to propose to her, and that the ring was basically just left there, having been robbed from one of Charles victims because it was worth ‘5-6 grand’.

Spurned, Tiff decides to trap Chucky and torment him…This doesnt end well, and long story short, Tiff winds up made of plastic too. While all of this is going on we’re also introduced to ‘Jesse’ and ‘Jade’. Jade is the adopted daughter of the towns police captain, and he’s got her on a VERY tight leash. Jesse lives in the same trailer park as Tiff and gets by doing odd jobs around the park.

When Jades guardians push her too far on the night of her prom, the pair decide to elope, get married and start a new life in a new town. Jesse gets a call from Tiff asking for a favour, instructing Jesse to take two dolls to Hackensack New Jersey, with $500 promised on collection, and $500 on delivery. Jesse bites her hand off at the offer and thus a roadtrip of carnage unfolds as Chucky and Tiffany hitch a ride across state lines in yet another attempt to regain their human bodies, all the while pinning several muders both accidentally AND intentionally on Jesse and Jade in the process…leading the couple to believe that the other partner is a mass murderer!

And, this review for me is a pretty open and shut case. I love, love LOVE this movie. the decision to pivot out of ‘Horror comedy’ into ‘Comedy Horror’ is just the right angle to really pull this feature kicking and screaming into the post modern era.

The script appears to be strongly influenced by the works of John Waters, which I feel compliments and contrasts the return to ‘Universal Classic Monster’ style horror last seen in ‘Childs Play 2’ perfectly. You end up with surreal moments of domestic disharmony being played out by two semi mutilated dolls. its camp, its bliss.

The pacing is breakneck, at an hour and 28 minutes, this feels like its an hour long in real time. the act structuring is clear, smooth and feels effortless in ramping up the stakes, the characters are largely enjoyable, the right side of trashy and barring Jesse and Jade themselves who, for me kind of feel a little flat as far as characters go, everyone else is running with a wonderfully aggressive snark thats just delightful to sit through.

The dialogue *feels* very ‘John Waters-esq’ (‘Fuck Martha Stewart’ is absolutely SCREAMING ‘Serial Mom’ to me…How Mink Stole didnt get a cameo in this thing I’ll never know) Some of Chuckys best lines of the franchise are in this movie, Tiff gets some rock solid dialogue to and the whole thing is VERY keen to let you know that while this is a continuation, it really isnt TRYING to stay in line with whats come before it, It experiments, and it succeeds for me in experimenting, which I really appreciated.

The directions largely flawless for me, Ronny Yu delivers a creatively defining picture for the franchise with some inspired kills and interesting scene setups that homage the old Universal Monster movies, without being TOO overt about it, its not afraid to be in your face, but for me, the best moments were the ones that spoke more through the cinematography than in the dialogue choices or the archive clips. In fact, the only wobble I had really on the direction front is really more a case of it being a victim of its time in the sense that there are some VERY wobbly early CGI sequences dotted throughout, which to 2024 eyes are painfully noticable.

The cines rich, colourful, gorgeous. Shots are well composed with a rock solid depth of field and apart from the aforementioned CG and a couple of less than steller ‘blink and you’ll miss it’ green screen moments, this is a really solid work, all tied together by a stunning edit that again chimes back to the freshness I first felt watching ‘Childs Play 2’ a LOT of the story is told through the cine, and to be able to pull that much emotion from a reaction shot of a plastic doll using only the cine and editing is really quite astounding for the time.

The performances are pretty solid too, Brad Dourif once again brings a flawless performance as Chucky, noticably, the performance here pivots more into self aware comedy with quips about him getting too old for this and clashes between 80s serial killer mentalities and 90s new wave killer techniques. Jennifer Tilly hits the ground running as ‘Tiff’ giving a performance that left me ASTOUNDED that we couldnt have had her sooner. It really is probably the strongest introduction to a new permanent character in Horror film history.

The weak links here are unfortunately Katherine Heigl and Nick Stabile as Jessie and Jane who…arnt inherently bad perse, they’re just too normal, they dont have any depth. Im guessing thats kind of intentional really with the film being a postmodern take on the horror genre as a whole, and while the story does focus on their eloping, the film seems much more interested in the contrasting parallels with Chucky and Tiffany’s demented blossoming toxic romance. It kind of suffocates the main plot in favour of the subplot…But given I really enjoyed the subplot, im okay with that.

Add to this a KILLER soundtrack featuring hits from Rob Zombie, Kidney Theives, White Zombie, Blondie, Billy Idol and Slayer that is PERFECTLY utilized across the board, and I honestly found myself with very little to dislike…

‘Bride of Chucky’ marks a shift in the franchise that would stay in place for the next entry…Or the next 15 years depending on which one helps you sleep at night. and I feel it was the kick in the pants the series needed to get it back on track. a clear labour of love, if you enjoy the likes of ‘Pink Flamingos’, ‘Polyester’ or ‘Female Trouble’ but you wished it had more goring and ‘Hellraiser’ references…’Bride of Chucky’ is an absolute must!

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/bride-of-chucky/

by tytdreviews

Dracula, 1931 – ★★★

Im gonna keep this one brief because im pretty sure every man and his dog has seen the original Bela Lugosi ‘Dracula’, admittedly it’s been a few years since I last gave this one a spin, but the confession that I have about this one, is that I really just dont vibe with it. I was always much more of a ‘Frankenstein’ Universal guy honestly.

The reasons for my dislike are pretty simple, maybe a tad controversial, but understandable.

The film is marketed as ‘The beginning of the Universal Monster Movie series!’ but at the time this was sold as a romance film with horror elements more than anything else, and thats kind of what this is. I dont have a problem with Romance films when they’re done well, but the surprising thing I found with this film is that, even clocking in at only 84 minutes its PAINFULLY slow. 30s cinema was notorious for slow burn pacing and having to explain every single detail of the plot to the audience (presumably because subtext wasnt invented until the ‘atomic age’) but here, its particularly crawling. Its just scene after scene of people dumping exposition in rooms, atmostpheric rooms! but rooms non the less.

Honestly, I can ringfence the things I like about this film in a VERY succinct way, I love the ‘German Expressionist’ influence in the set design and lighting choices, but I wish they’d have gone a bit deeper into it, this is a sanitized take on the expressionist movement and as such very much feels a bit of a pale imitation than something really defining.

I ADORE Bela Lugosi and Dwight Frye as Dracula and Renfield in this, Lugosi has a corpse like ambience that absolutely sells you on the ‘otherworldly’ role he’s trying to play, and for the early 30s Frye is astoundingly demented as Renfield and instantly watchable the moment things start getting a bit crazy.

I appreciate the lighting, I appreciate the score which I feel suits the film perfectly.

Had I seen this film in the 1930s, I could imagine i’d have been fairly impressed with the scale, depth and effects for the time, but this films pushing 100 years old at this point, and even when I first caught it 15 years ago I felt it was slowburn to the point of narcalepsy.

The first act for around the first 10 minutes or so is enjoyable enough and has some of the first twitches of the Universal charm, the final 20 minutes or so do ramp things up, but it made me wish that the energy of that last 20 minutes was the base line for the film, not the exception.

Its a film made up of a small smattering of interesting moments, lost in a gulf of overexplanation and restrictive censorship, on this rewatch, I actually failed to notice the film ended, because I checked a notification on my phone for 20 seconds and in that time they silently killed dracula and his henchmen, silently wrapped things up and ran the end titles silently before dumping me back into the menu, I actually had to wind back to see, what was effectively a kind of bland finale.

If you get a kick out of this film, good on you. Im honestly glad you see something here that I dont. But for me? this was a bit of an endurance test honestly, and if it wasnt for a couple superb performances, some striking lighting, set work and cine and a decent score behind it. I’d have fallen asleep by the 30 minute mark.

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/dracula/

by tytdreviews