I’m seeing good reviews of the new Omen film. Anyone seen or planning to see it?

Olimite wrote:

I’m seeing good reviews of the new Omen film. Anyone seen or planning to see it?

Aye my horror youtube channels I follow were surprised by how decent it is. Looking forward to it.

OG Omen is bobbing around my top 20. Great film. Will watch the new one if the buzz is there.

First film has some of the best FX around. Can't remember much about the other two tbh, other than crows/truck and ice scene.

Folk Horror Friday continues…

The Wicker Man (1973) - The horniest musical I have ever seen.

I watched the theatrical cut because I heard mixed things about the later cuts and it sounds like the restored materials don’t have as good video quality - I wanted to compare the visuals to Witchfinder General and Blood on Satan’s Claw so went with the original.

The 4K transfer is very nice - it’s difficult to directly compare to the previous two as there are more indoor scenes in this but the outdoor scenes are similarly nice with tasteful use of HDR brightness and there’s lots of good use of colour in here.

I think this might be the first horror I’ve seen where I thought the victim had it coming. I’m surprised we haven’t had a remake or prequel or something with Ewan McGregor as the policeman guy.

I think this hangs together better than the other ‘unholy trinity’ folk horror films - it’s very entertaining and actually has a protagonist. It’s easy to see why this has a strong following as a cult classic. ★★★★★

They could do loads of Christopher Lee Ewan McGregor Easter Eggs.

The longer cut shows a bit on the mainland giving more insight into Woodward's character before he leaves for the island. I don't recall much else of a difference to be honest.

If there is one Brit horror I'd love to see a remake of it would be Devil Rides Out, mainly because a few of the effects really creak now. Adds to the charm but it could be a real cracker of a film with modern tech. But they'd only fuck it up.  Lee could have redone his part before he got too old (he was an older character in the book than presented in the original film) and pre-disgrace Kevin Spacey would have been a marvellous Mocata replacing the superb Charles Gray.

Davy knows. The Devil Rides Out was the gold standard in occult horror when I was a lad.

Cinema Paradiso (1988) - A young boy befriends the curmudgeonly projectionist at his local cinema, sparking a long relationship with both the projectionist, the local cinema and cinema as a whole.

I can see why this is perceived as a classic, the majority of it before the final timeskip is really original and, especially in 2024, is a look back at a heyday of projected cinema that has disappeared.

Edit: also, the theatrical cut fits in a whole experience in just over two hours, it almost feels like an animated film in terms of density and making every minute count.

To me, Old Toto feels like a different guy to the previous two Totos, which kinda broke my immersion a bit. I also just didn’t feel much of a sense of who Toto was at this point of his life, which kinda made me less sure of what the overarching point of the film was supposed to be. Apparently the director’s cut has more scenes in this section of the film - perhaps that’s a cut that would suit me better.

Anyway, really good and worth watching. ★★★★☆

I was like ‘Aww’ but also ‘Isn’t this a health and safety risk?’.

The “director’s cut” should be avoided in the case of this film.
Theatrical cut is an all-timer.
Director’s cut is a time waster.

Monkey Man (2024) - Dev Patel, who struggles to make a living as a not-very-good underground boxer, is real mad at these two guys in the wealthy elite for their roles in his mother’s death. He decides to infiltrate a restaurant-slash-brothel frequented by one of the guys, but does he have what it takes to achieve his revenge?

This is good but perhaps not as polished as the trailer suggests - it’s Dev Patel’s directorial debut and, while it’s a good debut, it does somewhat show. The issues are mainly front-loaded in that the first part of the film is not that action-heavy as the film takes its time establishing the plot - but simultaneously, Patel’s motivations are deliberately kept quite vague until a flashback sequence in the middle of the film, so the film is essentially holding back on all fronts for a good while.

Once it gets going, there’s oodles of violence and there’s a lot more thought gone into the story and world than many action films - it’s night-and-day from Road House for example. That said, the political themes don’t go as deep as you might think given they almost prevented the film from getting on screens.

Overall, it’s an accomplished debut that could have done with just a little bit more finesse around the story. Some critics have compared this to Only God Forgives, which I kinda get but actually this is significantly better. ★★★★☆

ShabbyMcCrabby wrote:

g.man wrote:

Davy knows. The Devil Rides Out was the gold standard in occult horror when I was a lad.

I do love me an occult movie. I'll check it out

in for a treat. It is absolute peak Hammer.

Kazuo wrote:

Also saw Monkey Man over the weekend. Very stylish and kinetic, and good fun while you're immersed in it. But it's over-long by a good 30 mins, with an achingly slow start and far too much emphasis placed on establishing his motivation through flashbacks which seem to take forever. Enjoyed watching it but then walking away from the cinema we just found ourselves picking it apart, from hanging plot threads to missed opportunities. The hyper-mobile camera work also gave me a bit of a headache. patel definitely has some action chops though, will be good to see what comes next.

I think it would have been better if it had just been a more linear “here’s all the bad stuff that happened to Patel, now he wants revenge” instead of holding on to the backstory until the middle of the film.

EvilRedEye wrote:

Kazuo wrote:

Also saw Monkey Man over the weekend. Very stylish and kinetic, and good fun while you're immersed in it. But it's over-long by a good 30 mins, with an achingly slow start and far too much emphasis placed on establishing his motivation through flashbacks which seem to take forever. Enjoyed watching it but then walking away from the cinema we just found ourselves picking it apart, from hanging plot threads to missed opportunities. The hyper-mobile camera work also gave me a bit of a headache. patel definitely has some action chops though, will be good to see what comes next.

I think it would have been better if it had just been a more linear “here’s all the bad stuff that happened to Patel, now he wants revenge” instead of holding on to the backstory until the middle of the film.

Exactly what I thought. Plus they could cut at least half of the slow-mo forest footage with the mum, we'd sort of gotten the idea the first time. I wonder whether it spent so long in the editing room with the release date up in the air that they just started to overthink it.