Tag: b-movie

Tormented (1960)

Public domain films are quite literally that. Films that for; whatever reason, have fallen out of copyright (Meaning noone legally owns the rights) and that the films are free to be used by the public in whatever manner suits them whether thats screening the film to a wider audience, cutting it up to spice up there own personal projects or even (As was very popular in the early 90s) chopping out the weirdest bits and using them to make a trippy Dance music video.

Arguably the most well known of these public domain films would be “Night of the living dead” but really its a sprawling and constantly growing set of content that cover most genres decades and styles.

Companies like Mill creek entertainment and Treeline films can make a tidy profit from grab bag compilation sets. charging between £10 and £20 for sets of 50 to 100 films all tied loosely to a specific genre…I myself own 3 of those sets (Horror classics, sci-fi classics and Nightmare worlds) and they’re infinately useful in bulking up a film collection and introducing you to films that are either so godawful you wouldnt touch them with a barge pole or so forgotten that they havent been re-evaluated since the late 80’s/early 90s

“Tormented” is one of these films. though arguably it had a hell of a boost in reputation by being featured on an episode of “Mystery Science theatre 3000”  (And its a very enjoyable episode thats currently up on youtube and I recommend watching the riffed version of this rather than the unriffed one) unriffed this film is quite slow and unfortunately I now own it at least 3 times (The MST3K version, the version on my mill creek set, and a copy on my “Something weird video” copy of “The Monsters Crash the Pyjama party Spooktacular Spectacular” (which I will talk about at some point because its a bloody interesting DVD release)

There isnt really a tremendous amount I recall about Tormented that I dont already mention in the review. Its definately not a masterpiece but at the same time it does have at least 1 or 2 small things that are trying to work in its favour…though I go into way more detail in my video review of this:

(The Poster is literally the coolest thing about this film…I want this film poster in my house some day…gorgeous stuff…)
by tytdreviews

Eraserhead (1977)

This was the first David Lynch film I chose to review on my channel and I chose it for a couple of reasons, first and formost I’m a massive fan of Lynch’s work (In particular all his works in “Twin Peaks”, Blue Velvet and Inland Empire…even if that last one is a bit overly long) his style is so unusual and tonally interesting it’s quite literally like walking into a dream/nightmare over which you have no control. Things just happen in Lynch’s films. they happen because things dont have to have a reason, life doesnt necissarily have a purpose and we’re all here just trying to give our lives a function till we expire. (A bit dark but yeh).

Lynch Straddles the line between Mainstream cinema and experimental video art and while he’s never quite been fully accepted into the mainstream. It could be argued that by many he is seen as the ambassador for experimental film to “Normal people” a wayward guide showing that the hard rules of storytelling and film making arnt actually as solid as first thought.

This subversive nature was what drew me into film making in the first place and what attracted me to video art ultimately…Eraserhead to me could be seen as the Catalyst that led me to where I am today so ultimately im very grateful to the “Lynch’s” of the world and we desperately need more subversive creative types in these modern turbulant times.

I also chose Eraserhead because; well. it’s a just plain weird experimental film. and when I think of Art house and experimental cinema my mind instantly flicks to anything from the chicken baby to the lady in the radiator to that surreal and mesmorising shot that is the films poster. The Red Triangle as a format exists to cover the kind of films that I cant do on TYTD. more extreme horror movies, Video nasties, erotic cinema, art house films. Stuff that I just wouldnt feel like I was doing justice placing it next to the likes of “Ring of Terror” or “Let’s ruin Dads day” and Eraserhead definitely deserves being in my “Red Triangle” series. This is another one that I kind of feel a bit mixed about in terms of my review. I feel like I didnt really fully nail down why I love this film in this review. I dunno;  I just kind of feel like I maybe could have said more…so I may end up revisiting this one again in future…But yeh! for now; enjoy! and I’ll be looking to do more Lynch in future!

(One dose of nightmare fuel and insecurity about parenthood comin’ riiiiiight up!)
by tytdreviews

The Descendents of Wing Chun (Fo Shan Zan xian sheng) (1978)

This was one of the biggest fake out’s I think i’ve had on my channel to date. I picked this movie up expecting basically a very straight laced Kung-fu movie. And in many ways I think in its original dub this film probably was a lot more straight played than the english dubbed version is. Popping the disc in however I felt like the floor had dropped out from under me. It became very clear very quickly that all the mysticism, philosphy and general profoundness found in the original dub had been completely binned in favour of funny voice acting and playing the film down. Im not saying that this film was intended to be completely without humour; there are moments here that defiantely have that vibe both physically and in the dub. But here it makes “On the Busses” look like “The Kings Speech” rediculously over the top but one I can ultimately reccommend in terms of just how weird tonally it is.

(My only regret is that the character “Fatty the Kung-fu Yorkshireman” never made it into another movie #Sadtimes)
by tytdreviews

Quatermass and the Pit – (Five Million Years to Earth) (1967)

I’ve seen my fair share of Hammer films in my time. Though I always feel like I could have seen more. Take “Quatermass and the pit” (Renamed Five Million Years to Earth for US audiences) for example. its a brilliantly shot and wonderfully performed piece that I’ve seen both on the big screen and in the comfort of my own home. combined with Hammers more horror inspired movies there should be little reason for me to watch any other studios movies at all! and yet I always seem to forget the Hammer films. I really should do more of them…

(How this film and “The Web of Fear” havent been mashed up yet at this point frankly astounds me…)
by tytdreviews

American Ninja 2: The Confrontation (1987)

American Ninja 2 (Often released with the subtitle “The Confrontation”) was a sequal to the original American ninja movie which came out in 1985. This is one of the few times I’ve spoken about a films sequel before I’ve delt with the original and there are a few reasons for that that were fairly tedious but basically boiled down to “When I started this channel I was only going to talk about Janky B-movies and experimental/erotic films” and the first American ninja movie is actually pretty good. its a bit slow in places but its fun enough…this film was a bit more unusual and weird and I thought at the time it would fit my channels tone a bit better. It may have also been down to the fact that i’d watched the first one only a week or 2 before I decided to start my channel in the first place and I really didnt feel up to rewatching a film like this so soon after i’d watched it for the first time. This was also the first episode I recorded for the second ever group of episodes I made 🙂

(I’ll be honest; im a sucker for a ninja film that features genetically modified super ninjas)

EDIT [22/01/21]:

So At some point around 18 months ago, for reasons youtube cant fully explain to me, a glitch happened on my youtube channel scrubbing approximately 8 minutes of footage from the Above American Ninja review. I worked with them over a couple of days to try and retrieve it. But as far as they were concerned it has sadly been lost. So! I decided to try and put this right. In part because I plan to cover more American Ninja films on my channel in future, and in part because I actually kind of like this review. Im not massively fond of my early work (As most youtubers will atest after a certain period your ‘early works’ come with a healthy dose of cringe at what you could have done better/differently.

So I decided to rebuild the review! I luckily keep the original isolated vocals of every review I make and, while doing some frame matching for the review itself I sourced better quality copies of the footage, I worked on the layout, processed the audio and generally tidied the whole thing up to make it look and feel a lot more in line with my current reviews. I wouldnt say it was a ground up remake. more that this is a 2.5D reimagining of a 2D review. it’s just a bit more polished. AND it brings the review back from near obscurity! So I hope you enjoy this; it didnt take a particularly long time to put together, but I felt it needed doing! 🙂

by tytdreviews