FREAKSHOW

The Asylum Home Entertainment is a company specializing in quality shot-on-film direct-to-video movies. While they may not have the budget of the latest direct-to-video Sony produced Steven Seagal epic, they can usually pull some terrific entertainment from a very small budget.

Sadly for all of the pros of their latest offering "Freakshow," it is hard to recommend it as casual entertainment for two reasons; 1) it becomes a hardgore exploitation offering, and I mean HARDgore and 2) it is extremely boring for most of the running time.

While I get to the gore in a second, "Freakshow" first and foremost deals with a 'family' of carnival folk who live and work together who are unknowingly involved in a plot to be robbed. Slowly the thieves try to work their way into the family, and while things are going smoothly at first, the criminals get sloppy. While it seems straightforward enough the story being told here is often times murky and hard to follow. As I said before the film moves at a snail's pace and doesn't pick up until the last ten minutes, which results in some of the most harsh and shocking scenes I have seen in quite a while.

The make up effects by Tom Devlin are fantastic and gruesome. While his work is limited to mostly gore on the film, we do get to see one prosthetic 'freak' design as most of the carnies in the film are actual 'freaks.'

If you are a fan of exploitation, the rent is worthwhile on this film. It looks fantastic and carries a very sleazy tone throughout, but the slow pacing will kill it for most. If anything, the last ten minutes are a gore fan's wet dream.

"ZOMBIE" - Lucio Fulci

Lucio Fulci's "Zombie" will always hold a special place in my heart. Unlike American zombie films Italians have seemed to perfected the true feeling of dread in certain films, especially Fulci with this masterpiece of gore, and with his later film "The Beyond."

If you are a horror fan, then you already have heard about "Zombie" on multiple occasions. Fulci milks every bit of atmosphere from the Caribbean islands he shot at, creating a very eerie almost Gothic mood. Sadly this is overlooked most of the time for Gianetto De Rossi's grotesque walking corpses and gore effects. Never, even until this day have zombies looked this disgusting and DEAD. Some people may have a hard-on for Savini's make-up in "Day of the Dead", but let's face it...they don't look this good! Given conquistadors from a few hundred years ago would most likely be skeleton's, you can literally smell the stink from these corpses.

"Zombie" is one of my favorite horror movies bar none. While it might not be every one's cup of tea, it gets my vote as the best zombie film ever made.

THE MARINE

WWE films strikes again with more cinematic cheese after the hugely entertaining, if extremely by-the-numbers, "See No Evil" with "The Marine." John Cena stars as a Marine, go figure, who is about to watch his fellow Marines get executed in Iraq. John Triton ( Cena) will have none of that and then proceeds to kick all kinds of ass in the violent, frantic, and extremely unbloody, desert.

Fast forward to not too long after that and low and behold Triton is dishonorably discharged for disobeying a direct order, even if it meant saving people's lives. Triton sucks it up, heads home to his gorgeous wife, and together they decide to take a little trip to the mountains. But by chance the unlucky couple run across a gang of violent jewel thieves led by the always cool Robert Patrick.

"The Marine" is a very simple film. It's essentially "Commando" minus a real budget, minus Arnold (although Cena is built much like a pro bodybuilder), and minus the firepower Arnold has at his disposal. Sometimes it is just fun to sit back and enjoy a film without having to follow twists or characterization. "The Marine" is one of those films. Often times these films seem to take themselves seriously, but "The Marine" offers a fairly light tone right up until the end. I would have enjoyed Cena killing off people in ultra-violent ways to get his wife back, but essentially it wouldn't make a difference. I am not sure how much the pg-13 rating had cut from the version I saw, but it couldn't be much. I can only think of one scene in particular involving blood, but other than that this is one dry film.

Cena looks too big and bulky to be a soldier in my opinion, but his look definitely fits right in with the 'unstoppable 80's action hero mold.' Robert Patrick hammed it up, but seemed to relish playing a wise-cracking psychotic murderer. No one else is worth mentioning, as it seems paychecks were just collected.

"The Marine" is Saturday afternoon entertainment. It has big budget explosions wrapped in a direct-to-video film. It entertains, if nothing else. Guys will like the explosions and fighting while their girlfriends get to look at a buff Cena. A decent rental, but try to catch it on cable TV instead.

** out of ****

Gordo Loving

Popping the Cherry

The first post. Doesn't feel too bad.