End of Watch is a new installment in the buddy patrol cop genre, set in gangland Los Angeles focusing on Brian Taylor (Jake Gyllenhaal) and Mike Zavala (Michael Pena). The movie swiftly establishes the level of violence with a high speed pursuit ending in a shootout and the reputation of the films two stars as the gunslinging good guys, all before the opening credits roll to … [Read more...]
Paranormal Activity 4 (2012) review by That Film Guy
As inevitable as Halloween itself is the next installment in a horror franchise that is cheap to make and keeps making good money. Previously the home of Final Destination or Saw, the found footage juggernaut of Paranormal Activity rolls through its fourth entry. Made for a budget of around $5m it found itself in profit after its opening night. Within the chronology of the … [Read more...]
The Tunnel (2010) review by That Film Guy
The crowd-funding method of film production has provided film-makers a new way to raise money for their creative projects. The most famous of these films is the 2010-released The Tunnel, which was part of the 135k Project used it's website and social media to sell frames of the film for $1 a piece. The idea being that a 90 minute film has 135,000 frames and thus with a dollar a … [Read more...]
The Last Exorcism (2010) review by That Film Guy
Released in 2010 and heavily influenced by The Exorcist, the Eli Roth-produced The Last Exorcism is one a host of modern found footage horrors. Working on the basis that the footage you're watching was found after the traumatic events of the film, it became a popular movement in Hollywood after the staggering success of The Blair Witch Project. The micro-budget of most found … [Read more...]
Chernobyl Diaries (2012) review by That Film Guy
One of the innovators of the found footage genre returns with Chernobyl Diaries. Following the birth of the found footage film with Cannibal Holocaust, the genre was blown wide open in 1999 by The Blair Witch Project. In more recent years Oren Peli's name has become the latest to be associated with the films after the release of his seminal classic Paranormal Activity. His … [Read more...]
District 9 (2009) review by That Film Dude
Once in a while, something happens which gives you hope for the film industry. District 9 is one such something. It was originally supposed to be an adaptation of the Halo videogame series, but when that idea fortunately fell apart, it was reconstituted as a feature length take on director Neill Blomkamp's short film Alive in Joburg. The result was a relatively low budget, … [Read more...]
Review: The Devil Inside (2012)
1973 saw the release of not only the best exorcism film of all time, but the best horror of all time in William Friedkin's The Exorcist. Since then there have been a number of sequels, remakes and imitations that try to channel the same religious fear that this masterpiece inspired. Using similar marketing techniques, such as audience reaction and apocryphal tales of people … [Read more...]
Review: Project X (2012)
Project X, released by producer Todd Phillips of The Hangover, The Hangover Part 2 and Old School fame, and follows three teenagers who try to throw a 'game-changing' party and increase their popularity at school and use that to 'hook up' with hot chicks. Project X was a place-holder name for the film while it went into production, but the mysteriousness of it all convinced the … [Read more...]
Review: Chronicle (2012)
The 'found footage' genre has made steady progress in Hollywood since The Blair Witch Project burst through the barrier of success in 1999. JJ Abrams took it a step further by adding Hollywood special effects in his viral hit Cloverfield and this brings us neatly, via the Paranormal Activity series to Chronicle. Written by Max Landis, the son of 80s icon John Landis and … [Read more...]
Review: Trollhunter (2010, Norwegian)
When film-maker Andre Ovredal wrote the screenplay for The Troll Hunter he based it on a single comment from Norwegian Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg about the true existence of Trolls and how pylons were actually fences to keep them in trapped. It's a wonderful little moment that none of the gathered press at the conference picked up on and when taken out of context creates … [Read more...]