Cannibal Apocalypse...

You've got to love a bit of action/horror exploitation from Italy, haven't you? It may not have the absolute onslaught of grue that Cannibal Holocaust displays (also from 1980), and it may not have the pervading sense of sleaze that the likes of The New York Ripper revels in, but it's actually a pretty decent flick.

More "Cannibal Skirmish" than Apocalypse mind you, as the build up is measured (bar a sudden jump into a violent stand-off at a flea market spurred on by a flesh-ripping attack in a cinema) and the scale the title promises never really shows up. However, it's still a good ride with an intelligent performance from John Saxon and an enjoyable wide-eyed turn from John Morghen (seen a year later in Umberto Lenzi's grotty Cannibal Ferox getting his knob hacked off, fact fans). Is it the best of Italian exploitation movies? No. Is it the worst? Certainly not - so over-the-piece fans of such fare should be plenty happy with a viewing, especially when the third act kicks in with guns, grue and gas-masked coppers pursuing the protagonists through the streets and sewers of Atlanta, Georgia.

What's more the DVD features a 50-odd minute featurette boasting a range of interviews with key players - such as Saxon, Morghen, and the director Antonio Margheriti (name-checked in Quentin Tarantino's Inglourious Basterds ... the Italian guise of Eli Roth's basterd in the third act) - which stretch beyond the remit of the film itself, allowing the interviewees to chat freely about their careers on the whole and Cannibal Apocalypse itself, making for fascinating viewing for the genre fans.

"T.I.D.O.Z.M." is almost done...

One more piece of the soundtrack, a musical 'sting', and some gamma correction ... then The Inevitable Decomposition of Zombie Man will be complete. I'm hoping therefore to have it uploaded onto YouTube sometime next week.

Click the image below for a full size (well, slightly larger size) glimpse at what the edit is currently looking like. See those three gaps in Track #6? Once those are filled, it's done. Figured I'd put this image up just as a bit of fun so you can kind of see what it looks like in the edit.

Borderlines Film Festival 2010 screening...

Saturday 27th February at 2.15pm, Hereford Courtyard Theatre, tickets are free.

http://www.borderlinesfilmfestival.co.uk/gaia.shtml

Updates...

There was another screening of Gaia & Genesis earlier this week, this time for Kleen Energy Week in Kington, Herefordshire.

http://kingtonblackboard.org/2010/01/film-gaia-genesis/

...

I have also updated the Credits Highlights section (down there on the right hand side with tons of other info about me and my filmmaking), with an updated list of Film Festival and TV screenings of my work.

Deadlands 2: Trapped - Official DVD Review...

In 2006 a low budget indie zombie flick called Deadlands: The Rising was released. Originally intended to be a short, it expanded into a feature length home made undead action flick seated stylistically somewhere between Demons and Return of the Living Dead.

Put together over a long period of time, the film showed what could be accomplished with $10,000, a community spirit, and a stubborn determination. The lessons of feature independent filmmaking are written large across all aspects of Deadlands: The Rising (both positive and negative), and consequentially the 2008 follow-up Deadlands 2: Trapped, confidently brandishes the fact that lessons have been learned throughout its 85 minute running time.

The DVD cover art.

Taking place on the night that a new nerve gas is to be tested upon an unsuspecting Maryland city population, Deadlands 2 is clearly a product of the George W. Bush era when controversy, tribalism and distrust in your own government seeped into the American public’s psyche like never before.

Pushed by a soulless, dead-hearted project leader Dr. Robert Mitchell (played by Jim Krut, aka the helicopter zombie from Dawn of the Dead), any in-house dissent is quelled as the intended effects of the nerve gas are soon felt amongst the target populace. Unwittingly about to be caught up in a tragic disaster, Ugarek (editor/writer/director) takes his time to establish his protagonists, who are all played proficiently by a young cast, with Joseph D. Durbin (Sean) giving a particularly strong and believable performance.

Joseph D. Durbin's Sean receives a bad call.

Before they know it, six strangers find themselves trapped within a local movie theatre, surrounded by an army of zombies and with few options for rescue or escape, as one of them slowly suffers the effects of a bite from one of these … experiments.

The zombies in Ugarek’s undead action flick are different from the traditional Romero breed. For a start, these are runners, but not only that, they’re smart runners capable of working together to lay primitive traps and launch attacks on the living. Undeniably, the runner is a controversial figure in the zombie sub-genre – 28 Days/Weeks Later never featured zombies (rather infected humans), and the glossy-but-shallow Dawn of the Dead remake threw out subtle, creeping shamblers for the blunt-force trauma of sprinters – but Deadlands 2 stands above the negative connotations of this updated horror antagonist.

The gore - punchy and violent.

This flick has more going for it than running zombies; indeed the zombie action isn’t the primary focus of the script, instead it’s the characters and plot. Deadlands 2 is also an independent film, and similar to its predecessor, the sense of community spirit shines throughout. What’s more, on a budget of merely $6,000, Ugarek has done the hardest thing of all – make a good indie movie with a bigger scope (certainly bigger than normal indie fare) on less money than the original film.

The stuff of kid's nightmares alright.

All aspects of the filmmaking process – acting, writing, directing, shooting, editing, the lot – have come on leaps and bounds from the rough-edged learning curve of Deadlands: The Rising (also available on DVD). Looking, feeling and sounding a damn sight better than what you’d usually see in an indie flick; it’s clear that Deadlands 2, with its ‘deep shadows & brilliant highlights’ visuals, has been crafted with intelligence and endurance. What’s more the film is even prefaced by a short introduction from Helena: The Hussy of Horror, an internet horror hostess (www.hussyofhorror.com).

Helena: The Hussy of Horror

Compared to the work print (which I saw some time ago now), this final version of the film has a sure and more consistent pace, as well as a real sense of urgency and action whenever a shot of adrenaline is injected into the heart of the plot. What we are presented with is a kick arse zombie flick, with a truly independent spirit, and something a bit deeper going on inside its head. Zombie fans, indie film fans, and horror fans in general should really check this movie out – it’s an impressive step up in all respects.

Jim Krut revels in being this movie's evil bastard.

Finally – the DVD package itself – available to buy from Anthem Pictures (www.anthemdvd.com/store), you will be treated to an informative and revealing set of interviews with the director (who also provides a commentary track) and cast, as well as a look inside the scoring process, and how to put together a convincing on-screen military presence with an extremely low budget.

Watch the official trailer on YouTube.

Central Cast:
Dr. Robert Mitchell (Jim Krut)
Sean (Joseph D. Durbin)
Chris (Christopher L. Clark)
Jack (Josh Davidson)
Casey (Ashley Young)
Shelly (Corrine Brush)

Cinematography:
Krystian Ramlogan

Editing:
Gary Ugarek

Music:
Brian Wright
Gary Ugarek
Marq-Paul LaRose

Producers:
Gary Ugarek
Chris Kiros
Elias Dancey

Writer/Director:
Gary Ugarek

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button...

None of my mates wanted to see this in the cinema over a year ago, which was a bit of a bugger, and then the double disc DVD was only released in America (and cost-prohibitive to import), which was even more of a bugger ... so that meant I've ended up waiting until it appeared on Sky Movies this week to give it a looksee.

Upon first hearing the basic concept, and that it was being directed by David Fincher (and starring his acting collaborator Brad Pitt), I was sold and greatly looking forward to it.

The opening twenty minutes was a bit sketchy though, I have to say, with the 85 year old Benjamin as a baby playing more disturbing than intriguing, but this soon settles as we really begin to recognise Pitt behind all the CGI trickery (which, for the most part, is excellent). I also thought the present day moments, taking place just prior to Hurricane Katrina striking New Orleans, were definite dips in the flow of the movie. I felt drawn out of the story at these moments, but then again without these moments the narration would sit uncomfortably without its contextual grounding.

Pitt, having already wowed me in 2007's sodding brilliant The Assassination of Jesse James, wows me again with a performance that charts the development of the titular character who ages backwards with intelligence, humour and grace.

Having initially found it a little hard to get into, with those bumpy opening twenty minutes or so, I soon found myself getting entirely caught up in the life story of this intriguing character. I'm pleased to say that Fincher continues to excell at this directing business, and has managed to direct Pitt towards one of his very best performances.

Quirky, warm-hearted, and with an ambient pace, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button is a real treat. It may have a few bum notes here and there, but ultimately the film is a definite must-see.

District 13...

The French seem to have a real talent for producing kick arse, low calorie action flicks, especially when Luc Besson is involved. District 13 has a plot with the depth of a chocolate biscuit, but that's not the point of the movie. The whole point is the breathless, fast-paced and inventive action set pieces, all of which have been given the Parkour treatment.

Parkour, or "free running", has become the new extreme sport craze of the last decade, as evidenced in the James Bond revamping Casino Royale, and Electronic Art's game Mirror's Edge, and being a French invention it was only a matter of time before we got a spiffing little action movie out of it.

Step forward District 13, set in a near-future dystopian Paris where troublesome districts of the city have been walled-off and left to rot. Throw in a couple of tough-guy free runners having to stop a bomb going off in the titular district, and that's about it really.

It's brief, light on your brain, fast and carefree entertainment. It's like an energy bar, no roast beef Sunday dinner, but it doesn't half give you a boost.

The Road...

Coming to our local Cineworld three weeks after release, I finally got to see the film version of Cormac McCarthy's moving and brutal post-apocalyptic father & son journey story The Road.

In 2008 I took part in a YouTube user collaborative project for Channel 4's "3 Minute Wonder" slot - everyone submitting footage that would then be re-edited into four short films that were inspired by McCarthy's Pulitzer Price winning book. At this stage I hadn't read the book - but got the jist of it before submitting my footage (which was one of the chosen pieces to be edited into the final films which showed during the last week of October 2008 on Channel 4).

Shortly afterwards I bought the book and was thoroughly impressed by the sparse verse that managed to convey such a strong sense of how an unexplained, but sweeping disaster, had turned the world into a cruel and vile place where the few good struggled endlessly against roaming gangs of cannibals (still few in number, but certainly out-numbering those refusing to succumb to cannibalism).

However, that is merely the world presented, the crux of The Road is "Man" and "Boy", a father and son who lumber on, following the road south to find a warmer climate, and how they cope along the way. It's a powerful and moving read, with some of the most heart-felt final pages ever written.

Similarly the film adaptation is uncompromisingly bleak in its presentation. The terrifying glimpses of cannibalistic behaviour in the book are now written large in brief moments of abject and visceral horror, but these are thankfully punctuated by quiet and caring moments between Viggo Mortenssen (perfect casting) and Kodi Smith-McPhee's (nailing the tone of his character from the book) "Man" and "Boy".

The discovery of a can of Coke (calm down "advertising!!!1!!!1!" freaks - it was in the book, and Coca Cola had to be personally convinced by Viggo himself to allow their product to be used), or sharing the spoils of a lucky find, or the father bathing his starving son - even the moment that they address the Man comes from a world entirely alien to that of the Boy, are all moving and fascinating moments.

While the book might go into more detail and speak of things that film can rarely show in such detail, the film is a more intense experience. You can put the book down every few pages if your reading time is brief, but the film grasps your attention for two whole hours and lays out the visuals in gritty, cold examination. So in terms of impact, it's a draw, but for different reasons on each side.

The book is a meandering journey with moments of sharp action or horror, so the film has a slow-burn pace that transcends your usual 'movie apocalypse' style. This isn't Mad Max, this is what the end of the world would really be like. It's harsh, cruel, bleak and at times intensely tragic - but in amongst it all are clutches of something brighter, of a glimmer of hope for the future no matter how uncertain it may be. Ultimately The Road (both book and film) is a rewarding experience. It most definitely isn't a barrel of laughs (duh), or a Hollywood action extravaganza (as one trailer so inexplicably painted it as) ... what it is, is a thoughtful and moving piece of filmmaking ... and it's a strong contender for my own personal Film of 2010.

As a side note to finish on, the score (by Nick Cave & Warren Ellis) is just superb. The pair had previously scored The Assassination of Jesse James (one of my all-time favourites), and proved they have unending skill and craft - with The Road, they have out-done themselves. Just like the film, the soundtrack is emotional and thought provoking. Incredible.