Author: unkle lancifer

God bless PONTYPOOL. I've been thinking lately about what a slobbering dope I am for eye candy. I can't help it, I'm a visual person. Is it shiny? Does it sparkle? I can overlook many a flaw in a film as long as it gives my retinas a hootchie-coochie dance. PONTYPOOL, though handsomely shot in a bare bones way, would be equally effective to a blind man (and was, in actuality, simultaneously produced as a radio show.) It enters your ear like that crazy worm from WRATH OF KHAN and it burrows into your brain like a corkscrew. Audiophiles listen closely, have I got a film for you.

Adapted by TONY BURGESS from his novel, PONTYPOOL CHANGES EVERYTHING and directed by BRUCE McDONALD (HARD CORE LOGO and the now suddenly interesting to me, TRACEY FRAGMENTS), PONTYPOOL is scholar smart, stoner weird and ten times more interesting than most of the porridge you've been served this year. A brain diddler from beginning to end, there are moments as soul chilling as a schizoid audio hallucination and some that are as jet black funny as a funeral parlor giggle fit. You may think you've seen it all as far as horror films go, but have you heard it all?

Pitch perfect STEPHEN McHATTIE stars as gruff Pontypool, Canada radio personality Grant Mazzy, whose normal broadcast is interrupted by reports of mad herds of people behaving ostensibly as zombies. Slowly it is unfolded that a virus is using language as a host and infecting anyone who hears certain key words, particularly words of endearment. Once infected the individual, out of frustration of not being able to express themselves, eventually comes to the conclusion that the only solution is to chew through the mouth of an uninfected person. Oh, and if a victim is not found, they vomit blood and die. Have you ever heard of anything like this before? Me neither.

Inspired a bit by H.G. WELLS' famous WAR OF THE WORLDS broadcast, a lot of the action here takes place in the audience's noggin. BE WARNED not all of you are going to dig this approach. If you had a disappointing experience with say, WILLIAM FRIEDKIN's BUG (which was based on a stage play), you may want to avoid this one. Personally, I was head over heels with this movie's adoration of semantics. Words are dissected and blown apart, poetry is made into garbage and garbage into poetry, meaning is ripped to shreds and communication is enemy and savior. Some call this a zombie movie but no, that word, like so many others, is wrong.

Thank you PONTYPOOL for gifting me an original horror experience. At times I thought I was watching the silliest, most preposterous joke and at other times I thought you were talking directly to me and that I might get infected myself. Either I'm going crazy or you PONTYPOOL are a genius. I can't tell you which because I don't know what either word means anymore.

I really love to travel especially when it involves not leaving my house. Norway, you are my new favorite place to visit through my T.V. , from my couch, covered in multiple blankets and adopted strays. Since I'm still experiencing a residual high after my duel satisfying experiences encountering COLD PREYs 1&2, I thought it was just about time to take a shot of that other Norwegian horror flick that I've been hearing so much about, DEAD SNOW. You know, the one with the Nazi zombies.

Now, if you think your Unkle Lancifer will just roll over for any movie that takes place in the snow involving Nazi zombies regardless of how well made it is then all I can say is thanks for paying attention and I'm so happy that you know who I am and what I'm about as a person. You officially know me better than most of my so-called friends. Honesty is not usually my forte, but I have no problem admitting that this movie's job seducing me was half done the moment it was put into the can.

As luck would have it, I don't have to feel to guilty for having a predetermined affection for DEAD SNOW. Its lighthearted, cartoonish fun, and it wears its admiration of all things EVIL DEAD right on its thermal sleeve. Still, DEAD SNOW is not without its yellow patches; its wafer thin characters and fuzzy logic keep it miles away from being as compelling as it could have been. Blame the script or lackadaisical casting but if I can only identify a character by what they are wearing or how long their hair is there's a problem. Not that they grow on trees but a BRUCE CAMPBELL or a INGRID BOLSO BERDAL would have made a gargantuan difference.

Having typed that, there is something to be said for a film that delivers the gore goods and action set pieces and doesn't tax emotionally. It may end up being drive-thru disposable but at least if you watch it with others, you'll never have to tell them to shut up during the important parts. I could have done without the dusty, eye-rolling "suiting up with kick ass weapons" montage but the fourteen-year-old ‘80s kid sitting behind the steering wheel in my brain deigned a scene with a head being ripped in two by hand notably rewind worthy. (I was equally heart-eyed over a bit that finds a guy hanging over a cliff by an intestine.)

DEAD SNOW is a visual stunner and a overall good time that could have been even better if there was even the slightest attempt at depth or characterization. Frankly, for all its splatter-ific glory, the scene that left me most disturbed involved two people having sex in an outhouse while one is actually sitting down on the toilet (!) Call me a prude, but THAT my kinderpals is just disgusting.

What would happen if you made a movie that was a ransom/heist comedy for an hour and then became a gory slasher movie for the last half hour? If you ask me, then you have just made a movie that is really boring for an hour and then only becomes good for the last half hour. Folks, have I ever introduced you to my friend THE COTTAGE? Yea, he's not funny or interesting unless he's in the mood and it takes him forever to get in the mood and then as soon as he gets in the mood he has to split. Sounds like a real blast right? It's not that I only have love for slasher movies; I love all kinds of movies with the absolute exception of any movie that involves a heist gone wrong (DOG DAY AFTERNOON being of course, the exception to the rule.) I don't care about your bag of money and I don't care that your bag of money is full of tissues and not money. Maybe these movies appeal to those who spend their days daydreaming about stealing bags of money. My private fantasies would probably be better served by watching 2012.

The sad thing is, if you watch the deleted scenes on the DVD you come to the exasperating conclusion that once upon a time they had a whole movie here until somebody decided that the action should start at precisely the same moment people are walking out of the theater or reaching for the remote. Don't be thinking that poor Unk does not get British humor and therefore this one flew over his head either, because that's all kinds of wrong. Unk put the "feel ya" in Anglophilia and shoots Bovril out of his nostrils for everything from BENNY HILL to SEVERANCE (and is currently in love with PULLING.) I think FRENCH AND SAUNDERS impersonating BANANARAMA is the height of comedy so that ain't it. This one just really missed my funny bone by a country mile. I guess I don't even care if your bag of money has pounds in it.

If it seems I'm being a bit rough with THE COTTAGE it is only because when it makes an effort it really works. That last half hour is a GOOD movie. The gory slapstick comedy IS amusing and there is actual tension and you care when certain characters are off-ed. I guess what I'm feeling is the frustration of knowing that they had what it took and decided to be coy and stingy with it for as long as humanly possible. It's sort of like when you break up with somebody and then they go out of their way to be the exact person you were begging them to be the whole time you were going out with them. It's too MUCH rather than too little too late and now I just want THE COTTAGE like any and all exes, to walk into the nearest open manhole.

I may try this one again in the future, it may be a less aggravating experience if I go into it with the knowledge that I'm not going to be completely rebuffed by film's end. In fact, now that I think of it there's nothing stopping me from cutting away the fat and starting the flick an hour in. That kidnapping gone awry crap might be ace nail filing time but there are moments in THE COTTAGE that really do impress. As a whole it doesn't really work but it does showcase the creepiest yellow kitchen I have ever seen in my life, not exactly your money's worth but not a bag full of tissues either.