Dog Soldiers DVD Review

Dog Soldiers: British horror cult classic

The Brits are no stranger to horror. Their classic Hammer films (such as Plague of the Zombies) rate amongst the best creature features in the history of cinema. Dog Soldiers carries on in this proud tradition. A no nonsense, splatter flick that manages to create tension and be entertaining while still sticking to the commandments of horror. No surprises, just stylish cinematography, lucid editing, quirky dialogue, blood, guts and werewolves.

Plot

Yes, there is some of that. I think.

Review

I accidentally stumbled upon the term Splat Pack on Wikipedia. This term refers to the new breed of directors who make excessively gory and violent films - as if there were such a thing as an excessively gory film.

What a ridiculous and absolutely unnecessary name for something that's already been labelled splatterporn or torture porn. Besides, the first Saw film can hardly be described as horror porn. Similarly, Neil Marshall's films can hardly be described as containing themes that glamorise violence. If anything, Quintin Tarantino films are horror porn. Or perhaps his films are best described as horrible porn. Splat Pack must be some homage to the Rat Pack or the Brat Pack. Well, pack is apt when it comes to Dog Soldiers.


Quintin Tarantino winning an award. When you start winning awards like this, chances are your films suck.

Transformation

Central to the plot is the idea of transformation. This lycanthrope theme is something that reminds me of the ANC's attempts to start a media tribunal. The aim of this media tribunal is allegedly to combat the dangers of pornography. Specifically, the South African Film Publications Board is pushing for legislation whereby internet service providers would act as censors to filter pornography from the interwebz.

As we all know, the internet was made for porn. Regardless, let's not get ahead of ourselves and be hoodwinked to talk about pornography - which is exactly what the FPB and the ANC want. This is not about pornography. It is mind numbingly obvious that it is not the government's nor the FPB's role to dictate to parents what is appropriate for their children to watch.

If one looks at the recent media scandals on the political scene, such as the release of Schabir Shaik from prison due to a terminal illness that's about as terminal as an oxygen mask, the scandalous portrait of Nelson Mandela as the topic of the Anatomy Lesson of Dr Nicolaes Tulp (which only the savage mind can find offensive in any way) and the so-called tenderpreneurs riding the gravy train, it becomes abundantly clear that pornography is the last thing on the minds of our custodians of morality.

Similar to the werewolves in Dog Soldiers, such a censorship board can easily transform from an anthropomorphic friend to a zoo-tropic fiend. Half our government is already a bit far on the flea-carrying, animal side for my liking and in no position to lecture anyone on morality. Not even Hannibal Lecter.

No porn here

Fortunately, there is no porn in Dog Soldiers. None. Not even a werewolf dragging his nut sack across the lawn. You don't even see tits. Even if this retarded legislation goes through, we'd still be able to see films like Dog Soldiers in South Africa. In theory, at least, but in practice this is the coming of Zumababwe, or the return to the good old says during Apartheid when even Black Sabbath got banned.

Censorship means everyone loses

I really have no sympathy for children being exposed to porn. If you are a child living in a household where your parents don't even care to know you well enough to know what kind of material you download from the internet, then bare bottoms and naked breasts are probably the least dangerous things you get exposed to. If you are such negligent parents, you shouldn't be breeding. And the only thing government can fix is the national election.

The whole principle is wrong. It's like demanding that grown men live on skim milk because the baby can't have steak. - Robert Heinlein

Enough of the morons who run the country. If you aren't a savage then perhaps you'd appreciate some of Rembrandt's art. This is the painting that was referred to with the allegedly scandalous Nelson Mandela painting:




For bonus marks, put two and two together and try to understand what the artist was trying to say with his inter text.

As for Dog Soldiers, it's brilliant (not the same kind of brilliance as the old master Rembrandt) and you can pick it up for a paltry sum in the bargain bins in South Africa because the FPB probably redistributed some of their busted pirate goods.

Director

Neil Marshall

Cast

Emma Cleasby
Liam Cunningham
Kevin McKidd
Sean Pertwee
Thomas Lockyer as Cpl. Bruce Campbell, no less

Rating

Twilight Review by Sally Partridge

Sally Partridge is a popular South African writer of lewd teen fetish novels, which are not quite as explicit as those of Anne Rice. They aren't littered with that many adjectives and they don't take that long to get to the point. Her latest foray into this awkwardly popular genre, Fuse, will be released shortly despite the original publishing house burning down. Metal!

This is her guest post here on The Necro Files, because I am too busy procrastinating in the process of making the Herzbot facebook application right now to make any meaningful contribution to my blog.

Review

What do you get if you mix a lonely teenage emo starting out in a new school, a family of hungry vampires, a group of hungry nomad vampires and a horny werewolf?

The Twilight movie.

The film starts with Bella Swan (romantic, no?) saying goodbye to her old home, then pans dramatically over her new one and then pans some more. The cinematographer really wants you to take in how pretty Forks is, or else he might kick you in the pants.

Bella moves back to her childhood home, and immediately rouses the attention of the resident werewolf Jacob Black (whoops, did I just give that away?) and is given a rusty old truck to drive by her clueless father who looks like her older brother with a pasted-on moustache. (Is everyone in this movie beautiful?)

She starts school and is noticed by every male that falls within her eyeline, including the drop-dead gorgeous Edward Cullen, of the infamous Cullen family. (All adopted, all incestuous and all vampire)

In Biology, Edward takes one whiff of Bella and heads for the hills, leaving her thinking that she smells funny - she's half right.

He returns a week later and begins the he’s not that into you game that guys sometimes like to play, only to change his mind later on and declare his undying love and save her life, twice.

Bella discovers, through Google, that her wooer is a vampire, but doesn’t care because he’s just that hot.

• They date.


• They make out.


• They play baseball.

Then the movie starts to get interesting when a gang of renegade vampires come along and start trouble. When the hot blonde one, James, wants to eat Bella, the Cullen family have to hide her because obviously those six against one odds just ain’t worth the risk.

Bella falls for the oldest trick in the book, leaves her super-strong protectors behind and walks right into danger. Predictably, Edward saves her.

Bad guy gets snuffed. Edward and Bella have an emo moment where they swear never to leave each other. They go to the prom.

Jacob the werewolf doesn’t get any.

The end.

Director

Catherine Hardwicke.

Cast

Some teenage starlets I don't care about because they smell like teen spirit. Some of them include Kellan Lutz, Nikki Reed, Elizabeth Reaser, Robert Pattinson, Peter Facinelli, Ashley Greene and Jackson Rathbone.

Rating

Babes and badasses: Underworld (2003) Review

Conclusion

According to Roger Ebert: "This is a movie so paltry in its characters and shallow in its story that the war seems to exist primarily to provide graphic visuals."


Film critic Roger Ebert. He could star in the sequel to Zero Wing.

If you consider director Len Wiseman's commentary on the bonus features of the DVD, this is exactly what they had in mind. Wiseman, who also co-wrote Underworld with Kevin Grevioux and Danny McBride, wanted to create a film that resembled an action-packed graphic novel. The war does intentionally exist primarily to provide graphic visuals.

Paltry in its characters? Well, the characters are already werewolves and vampires. They are already half-man, half-beast. How can you possibly have any of them go through a catharsis that compares to turning into a beast? There's nothing paltry about being undead, unless of course you find survival paltry.

Shallow in its story? It took three writers to write this script. The story is so complex that there were lawsuits with no clear outcome over the exact origins of the story. Again, it's an action film about vampires and werewolves.

Plus there are babes in tight pvc. Babes in tight pvc, badasses who can turn into vampires or werewolves with badass guns. Paltry my ass.

Plot

Selene (Beckinsale) is a vampire and a death dealer. Death dealers hunt werewolves, or lycans. She and her partner follow some werewolves into a subway. They manage to kill most of the werewolves, but they realise something is awry.

Werewolves usually hunt humans for food. These werewolves seemed to want a particular human alive. This human, Michael Corvin (Speedman), gets kidnapped by Selene after a werewolf bit him. She takes him back to the the vampire mansion just in time for an entree of cucumber sandwiches and a Cabernet Sanguino.

Michael meets the fetching (very fetching) Erika (Sophia Myles) and escapes. The vampires are upset that Selene brought a werewolf into their mansion. Bloody peasants. The people are revolting, etc.

Selene gets banished for mixing with the peasants (bloody peasants) and uncovers a secret plot. The werewolves are trying to create a vampire-lycan hybrid to use as a secret weapon in their fight against the vampires. But they had some inside help...

Review

Let's see, we have:

• babes in pvc


• badasses with badass guns


• vampires


• werewolves


• a vampire-lycan hybrid

It would be very difficult to ruin this combination. One guaranteed way would be to introduce the soft and sensitive side of one of the characters ala Spiderman 3. Now now, there'll be none of that.

Some great touches are that all the werewolves seem to have facial hair, while the vampires don't. All the vampires speak in posh English accents. I was waiting for one of them to say: "Fetch me some orange shurburt!".

The only downside to me is the performance of Scott Speedman. Yes, it is necessary to have a geeky, whimpy Peter Parker lookalike. It is not necessary to be a Men's Health model. I can see why they cast him in the role of Michael Corvin, but when his character turns badass it's not nearly convincing enough.

By contrast, Shane Brolly is superbly cast as the worm-like Kraven. Roger Ebert is correct, this film is entirely comprised of paltry characters in a shallow story that exist merely for great graphic visuals, but it is not a bad thing at all. It is well-written, well-presented and you get to see fetching babes in pvc.

The babes

Kate Beckinsale. In tight pvc. Somebody call me a doctor.


Sophia Myles. Fetching, very fetching.

The badasses

Kevin Grevioux. This guy is just seriously badass. He also co-wrote Underworld.


Michael Sheen. Hands down, paws down the best actor in the Underworld series.

Director

Len Wiseman.

Cast

Kate Beckinsale, Kevin Grevioux, Sophia Myles, Michael Sheen, Scott Speedman.

Rating

Curse of the Devil (1973) Review

Conclusion

A legendary film with a cult following, also known as El Retorno de Walpurgis or 'the Return of the Walpurgis'. You can't really go wrong when your blood looks like molten crayons and your werewolf costume looks like one of the Berenstain Bears.

Actually, you can go very, very wrong when your werewolf costume looks that Semitic. Not that there is anything wrong with looking Semitic, just that it doesn't exactly conjure up images of a savage half man, half beast creature. I'm talking Ashkenazi Jews here.




Fair is foul and foul is fair. May every Daninsky be covered with hair.

This movie is entertaining because the translation leaves much to be desired and the blood looks like molten crayons and the werewolf costume looks like the Berenstain Bears. Pyjamas and all.

Plot

Waldemar Daninsky (Paul Naschy) accidentally kills a werewolf, thereby fulfilling an ancient prophecy. This prophecy holds that one of the Daninsky family would accidentally kill one of the Bathory family. My karma ran over your dogma who happens to be a werewolf.

The murder sets a curse that the Bathory family placed upon the Daninsky family in motion. The Daninsky curse in general falls onto Waldemar Daninsky in particular. The Bathory family were burnt at the stake by the Daninsky family on Walpurgis night, and from there the return of the Walpurgis in the title.



Exhibit A: Spot the difference between the Berenstain Bears and Waldemar Daninsky (this is Waldemar Daninsky).



Exhibit B: Spot the difference between the Berenstain Bears and Waldemar Daninsky (this is the Berenstain Bears). Taken from Pbase.com

During the film, Waldemar adds nearly as many notches to his bedpost as the average James Bond does, but with far more fleas.

Review

• Paul Naschy holds the record for playing the Berenstain Bear, er I mean wolf man the most number of times.


• In the first half hour, you have duelling knights, a black mass, a public execution by hanging, an occult curse by one Bathory and a burning at the stake. Somehow, this film does not manage to steer clear of the cheese after that either.


• In all fairness, this film is not bad at all. The acting and the set design are both great, and the plot gives a nod to ancient European superstitions. It is made with much passion, but it did not age that well and it is unintentionally hilarious at points.


• At the time, Paul Naschy had problems with the authorities regarding the religious, sexual and violent content of his wolf man films. This is hard to believe - almost as hard as believing that the actors managed to keep straight faces through all the molten crayon blood. The times they are a changing indeed.

There is however one aspect of Curse of the Devil that still applies to our times. This is of course the mass hysteria of the pitchfork wielding peasants. Despite some authors like James Surowiecki arguing that crowd wisdom is superior to individual wisdom, it is clear that as much as crowd participation compounds success, it also compounds dismal failure. In his book, The Wisdom of Crowds, Surowiecki identifies four elements required for a wise crowd:

Four Elements Required for a Wise Crowd

• Diversity of opinion, whereby each person should be privy to his own viewpoint, no matter how eccentric.


• Independence, which determines that each individual is allowed to formulate his own opinion without fear of favour or prejudice or death threats.


• Decentralisation, making provision for localised and/or specialised knowledge, like say the knowledge inherent in the separation of powers principle.


• Aggregation, which is a mechanism for orchestrating the various judgements into a cohesive decision. An example of such a mechanism is Dotmocracy.

It is clear that the pitchfork wielding peasants were not allowed a diversity of opinion, I mean either Wandinsky is the wolf man and deserves to be killed or... no, that's the only option really. They were thus not free to disagree with the mob leader either. Similarly, they did not allow for localised or specialised knowledge, since the investigator sent by the authorities was ultimately not allowed to give his input. Even after he allowed them to pursue their own ways of dealing with Wandinsky, they killed the investigator. There is also a noted absence of aggregation. The mob merely goes from one mob leader to the next, ironically much like a pack of wild dogs choosing its leader by virtue of him being the strongest. As usual, truth is stranger than fiction. Fiction has to make sense, as the famous quote goes.



Exhibit C: Spot the difference between a real mob and a fictitious mob (this is a fictitious mob exhibiting compound failure).



Exhibit D: Spot the difference between a real mob and a fictitious mob (this is a real mob exhibiting compound failure).

Note the similarities between the real mob and the fictitious mob. The one has made up its mind about who is guilty, who is innocent and no matter what the reality is, they already decided to kill those who oppose them. On the other hand, we have the pitchfork wielding peasants who run after Wandinsky in the Curse of the Devil.

For those outside South Africa who might still be in the dark, try this erudite legal opinion on the ANCYL leader Mamela's threat to kill those who oppose Jacob Zuma.

Director

Carlos Aured.

Cast

Fabiola Falcón, Anna Farra, Jacinto Molina, aka Paul Naschy, Inés Morales, Martiza Olivares.

Rating