J*A*S*M

For an hour it looked like I was going to grant another Boo!, but the last thirty minutes improved things considerably. It’s still not very clear to me, but it was watchable. The protagonist was very unpleasant. 50%.

Ouch! This was painful. An hour and a half of several dumb students, one scientist and a badass Asian woman running around in a forest, while their numbers decrease in an uninteresting fashion due to some funny digital apes. If you haven’t seen this film’s flock of flies, you are missing something. Had the creators meant this as a comedy, I would give it one star for the scene where the monkeys piss on the tents and our heroes believe it’s raining (it was incredible :D). Otherwise, clear Boo!

Still bad after the umpteenth time. Another copy of Scream that rips-off pretty much all its motifs: the masked killer and his identity, the telephone calls, the final twist, etc. The main problem is that everything is executed very blandly, and even though the last half has a corpse every five minutes, you get bored and look at your watch, wishing it will end soon. The characters and their behaviour are chapter on their own. The actors are OK for the standards of teenage-slashers, the problem is that they are not likeable and the things the script makes them do are hard to fathom (e.g. the girl who voluntarily gives the address of the place she’s at to the mysterious voice on the phone, even though a moment before she witnessed how that mysterious voice on the phone brutally murdered someone). And I’d rather not speak about the unintentionally funny detectives, who unfortunately show up several times. It’s a film that you could watch with a large group and comment the events on screen – that could be fun. PS: The opening scene is better than the entire hour and a half that follows it.

It might not be a terrifying cloak, but it is a cape of solid fear.

A criminal waste of the potential of the Egyptian plagues. It could have been first-rate horror, but the meek execution sent The Reaping to the realm of the average. It’s a pity, not even Hilary Swank could pull it to four stars, she was pretty good.

A bit worse than the first Hostel, but with some very good scenes. Overall, it’s a slightly above-par film that shouldn’t disappoint fans of the exploitation subgenre. The ending is quite impressive.

A poor sequel to Aja’s excellent remake. The illogical behaviour of the characters is painful to watch and there’s hardly any atmosphere. They didn’t spare on the gore, but it is awfully ineffective and unoriginal, and it’s all the film offers – without the gore, it’s about nothing. It’s sad, but only two stars – and I looked forward to it so much.

Utterly average film. The original story and the character of the ferryman are wasted by the derivative execution and the unlikeable actors. It’s alright to watch once, but don’t expect anything else, you will have forgotten it in a week due also to the confusing ending (the last scene) that it’s impossible to explain.

It begins as a decent teenage comedy that in the second half turns into a thriller that pulls you a bit into the story. Shia has a quite a lot of talent, he carries this film on his shoulders all the way to an above-average rating.

I liked Hard Candy, but 30 Days of Night almost took my breath away. Why almost? Because the ending was not very believable and the last scene doesn’t fit the film at all. But I have no complaints about the first half: perfect atmosphere, terrifying vampires, effective jump-scares, sharp axe… One of the best horror films of the year and a well deserved 85%.