TV Heaven

Television is like music, there is plenty of it, most of it is drokk, but the good stuff makes it all worthwhile. As all the new seasons of our favourite shows begin to start, we at DVD Purgatory take a look at some of the better shows out now on dvd.

Point Pleasant
We all know that God had a son right ( no, not John From Cincinatti, the other one ), but did you know the Devil has a daughter? The series starts like the OC, but unlike that upper crust emo-lovefest, improves to be actually good within a few episodes, as the aftermath of the teenage Antichrist washing up on the beach is felt. This decade's American Gothic.

Dead Like Me
Surly Ellen Muth dies and is recruited by Mandy Potemkin ( er... I think you mean Patinkin. unless you're implying he's as big as a battleship these days, in which case you should either be more clear or less nasty in future- ed ) to join his emotionally challenged team of Reapers to escort the souls of the dead to the afterlife. Dry, black humour complete with teenage angst.

Battlestar Galactica
This is the nastiest show on TV, rivaled only by The Shield. Full of deception, brutality, desperation... and a thinly veiled metaphor for the U.S government and its various ongoing wars around the world. Nothing like the original, or any of the namby-pamby, future is bright and eventually we'll all get along, politically correct Star Treks.

Lexx
Lexx is an organic spaceship crewed by an infatuated robot head, an undead assassin, a love slave merged with a cluster lizard, and an inept ex-security guard. But don't let that disuade you, it's actually weirder than it sounds. A little more twisted and adult than the likes of Red Dwarf or Quark. Series 1 and 2 are great, 3 is okay, but 4 is only for completists.

Dexter
Dexter is a forensic scientist who likes to kill criminals at night. He is like Batman, but without the costume, moral restrictions, or young male companion. The most interesting aspect of the show is his constant struggle to appear normal and understand what normal people do. Sometimes popular shows are good. Just not often.

DVD player

Cloverfield

JJ Abrams (Lost, Alias, Fringe) produces a film written by regular Lost writer Drew Goddard that combines the Blair Witch Project with Godzilla (not the cool Japanese Godzilla, but the awful American version). The movie is based on the footage from a video camera found in New York City which is under attack by a monster. It’s a good concept, capitalising of post 9-11 fear, where we know nothing of the monster and see little of it. The story is all about the group of friends who own the camera and how they try to survive while the city is in turmoil. Sometimes a good idea is not enough. Who in Hollywood is vetoing the quality or, at least, entertaining projects, and I am sure there must be some, and red lighting this drivel to be made. It makes Transformers look like a work of art. All films should be approved by us. Especially monster movies.

And here are the stars at the premiere, trying not to go back and watch the finished film...

Heroes... no not the tv show...

Donnie Darko

Southland Tales

Rambling, confusing, insightful, pretentious, long, post-apocalyptic, time travel story by the writer and director of Donny Darko, Richard Kelly. Set in the near future, America is recovering from a nuclear attack and impending environmental disaster. The best thing going for this film is its humour and huge ensemble cast, including Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson as an amnesiac movie star, Sarah Michelle Gellar as a self promoting porn star, Sean William Scott as a confused cop, plus Christopher Lambert, Jon Lovitz, Janeane Garafalo, Bai Ling, and many more. The worse thing going for it is its length and lack of coherent plot. Remember, Scientists are saying the future is going to be far more futuristic than they originally predicted.

The Devil made me do it

Hellboy 2 is out and made us think about the Devil. Not the truly evil like the warmongering George W Bush, or randy devils like David Duchovny, and not even the type that wears Prada, but other devilish characters.

Bedazzled (1967)
Dweeby Dudley Moore sells his soul to the suave Devil, Peter Cook, in exchange for seven wishes. Of course the Devil cheats him at every turn. Cook and Moore were ‘the’ British comedy team of the sixties and this film captures their irreverence, cynicism, and surrealism. Don’t bother with the pretend sixties Austin Powers, see the real thing. The remake may very well be the work of Satan.

Rosemary's Baby (1968)
Poor little Rosemary Woodhouse ( Mia farrow ) is impregnated with the the spawn of the devil and hilarity ensues. Still, after what the bitch put Woody thru, its the least she deserved, right??

Angel Heart (1987)
Lisa Bonet from the Cosby shows cavorts naked in voodoo rituals. Mickey Rourke appears as harry Angel ( curiously named due to some of the things he and Lisa Bonet get up to ), pre-his surgery to remove most of his acting ability. Robert DeNiro peels an egg. Devilishous.

Warlock (1989)
17th Century Warlock Julian Sands avoids execution by jumping in to modern world, but is pursued by Witchhunter Richard E Grant. Sands is after the Devil’s Bible with which he will uncreate the world, so Grant teams up with the sceptical Lori Singer to stop him. The film is full of clever ideas (Sands boils the fat of unbaptised children so he can fly) and great acting. I can’t say the same about the sequels.

The Covenant: Brotherhood of Evil (2006)
Michael Madsen plays an ex-SS officer with a supply of satanic canes he uses to lure Edward Furlong down the path of evil. Have you noticed that Madsen doesn’t even bother trying to act anymore? The only horror elements of this movie are Furlong’s teeth and Madsen’s fake goatee. Some of the effects made me laugh.

Class of 1984

Forget Napoleon Dynamite. Forget Fast Times At Ridgemont High. This is high school.

In 1982, with the Cold War in full effect, the future looked bleak and villains in movies looked like they belonged in the Plasmatics (see Mad Max 2 or any Italian post-apocalyptic film for proof). Perry King (The Day After Tomorrow) starts teaching at a violent school and, rather than accept the situation like Roddy McDowall (Planet Of The Apes), he tries to change the status quo. Head of the vicious students is Timothy Van Patten (half brother of Eight Is Enough’s Dick Van Patten) and he has a gang of misfits to do his bidding. King is not completely alone, he has a nerdy Michael J Fox (Back To The Future) for moral support, but don’t expect his presence to give the film any Family Ties wholesomeness, as when King decides to fight violence with violence, flesh-churning carnage ensues.

Watching this film 26 years after it was released places it in a different context. Schools in America have become places of extreme violence where students are scanned for weapons. The brutality in this film might seem surreal, but so would the Columbine Massacre if we didn’t know it was true. This film is nasty and bloodthirsty enough it could claim, along with Evil Dead released the previous year and Basket Case the same year, to have started the eighties splatter film avalanche (I am deliberately ignoring the seventies contributions like I Spit On Your Grave). Four years later the Class Of Nuke’m High was released and continued the high school trend, but with comedy, while Massacre At Central High (1976) did something similar earlier. Nonetheless, Class Of ’84 remains strangely prescient for a B-movie.

Goodbye Lenin

Beowulf

Bears

Hugh Grant

Grant dated actress Elizabeth Hurley for many years, before finally separating in 2000. What a stupid prat. I mean, seriously... if you could tap that, would you let Divine Brown anywhere near any part of you? No, I didn't think so.

PS - I never understand the criticism of Hugh Grant, or Mister J's negativity. His work in Lair Of The White Worm was great. As is his hair. And as for his personal life? I consider him a role model. - fabulous sebastian

Croc

This film is a mystery. It's not actually a mystery film, but any viewer with even a rudimentary knowlege of modern cinema will immediately struggle to understand why Michael Madsen ( Sin City, Reservoir Dogs ) is in it. Was he that desperate for a paid holiday to Thailand? Did he owe someone a favour? A really, really BIG favour?? This film is awful, and not even Madsen's appearence as a crocodile hunter can save it.
Only a small part of this movie ( which recycles the Jaws story and throws in a touch of Greg McLean's Rogue ) is about the killer croc, and the rest is about shady property development and multiple love interests... Is there anything more pitiful than a wannabe monster movie?
At least we see children being taken... something most filmakers shy away from.

Hammer Time

Hammer Film Productions is a film production company in the United Kingdom. Founded in 1934, the company is best known for a series of Gothic "Hammer Horror" films produced from the late 1950s until the 1970s. Hammer also produced science fiction, thrillers and comedies — and in later years, television series. Hammer films were cheap to produce but nonetheless appeared lavish, making use of quality British actors and cleverly designed sets. During its most successful years, Hammer dominated the horror film market, enjoying worldwide distribution and considerable financial success. This success was due, in part, to distribution partnerships with major United States studios, such as Warner Brothers.During the late 1960s and 1970s the saturation of the horror market by competitors and the loss of American funding forced changes to the previously lucrative Hammer-formula, with varying degrees of success. The company eventually ceased production in the mid-1980s and has remained in effective hibernation since. In 2000 the studio announced plans to begin making films again after being bought by a consortium including advertising guru and art collector Charles Saatchi, but no films have been produced since. In May 2007 the company behind the movies was sold to a group headed by Big Brother creator John de Mol. At least $50m (£25m) will be spent on new horror films after Hammer Film Productions was sold to Dutch consortium Cyrte Investments. The new owners have also acquired the Hammer group's back catalogue.

- from wikipedia

As anyone who knows me knows, I am a big fan of horror movies, and of Hammer specifically.
Thus, I was happy to hear that they are to be producing new films.

Happy, but tentative... concerned just how their new work would measure up to the wonderful films of old.Having just recently completed watching their new film "Beyond The Rave" (which was being released in 5 minute or so installments twice a week on myspace, check it out - http://www.myspace.com/beyondtherave), I have to admit... I'm quite impressed.
Following similar paths to recent UK Horror films such as Dog Soldiers, Descent, and 28 Days Later, Hammer have brought their own gothic feel into a contemporary world, and done so very well.

Throwing in Sadie Frost, an ex-Eastender, and the always cute Nora-Jane Noone doesn't hurt either.But again, here we come to cartoon, which was really just an excuse to draw the Frankenstein monster, and to recommend you all to check out Beyond the Rave... You'll be glad you did.

Monsters

Before the hoax was exposed last week, did you wonder what the body of the "Georgia Bigfoot " really was? Over the years there have been many Bigfoot sightings, but could it be those sightings actually just coincide with the well traveled and often shirtless Ron Jeremy's public appearences? Perhaps Mulder and Scully needn't have reunited after all, as we at DVD Purgatory are now solving mysteries for them.

Or maybe it is merely the corpse of Andre the Giant, who everyone surely remembers as Bigfoot on the Six Million Dollar Man.

Certainly he appeared there, far cuddlier and less frightening than he was in his final years of wrestling, where in one match he sat his 500lb frame on a wrestler, put his back out and was unable to get off him. That was bad surely, but even worse, was that the trauma of his back injury also caused his bowels to release over his opponent, the ironically, but aptly named, Bad News Brown.Monstrous indeed... which leads me on to these guys.

Rogue
Michael Vartan (Alias) was probably looking forward to filming in Australia, not realising he'd end up in the somewhat scenic but climately torturous Northern territory rather than a Gold Coast beach. A giant crocodile kills people with ease, except for the unfeasibly resilient stars. It garners little suspense and less thrills, but somehow a whole lot of annoying characters. It is good to see Australia making horror films. I hope one day they get it right.

The Hive
The Thorax team is called in to save the planet from killer ants. I had low expectations and still ended up disappointed... even with such great unexpected plot developments as the ants building a living computer. Who would have seen that coming?? All this film has going for it is a psycho Tom (The Dukes Of Hazzard) Wopat and the line, "We are not going to negotiate with ants".

and finally...
Harry and the Hendersons
I for one am always glad when film-makers break the taboos set by modern society. "Crying Game" surprised us, and then made heterosexual males feel a little awkward in the cinema... and "Boys Dont Cry" took us to places we had questioned ever since Tripitaka from Monkey confused the hell out of us as teens. Now, finally writer/director William Dear (Donald Duck's Super Secret All-Purpose Sauce) brings this last taboo out into the open and shouts to the world "yes, it is ok for a man to love his Sasquatch!!"
I for one applaud his bravery and honesty... and so does Lee Majors.
( OK, I have nothing to back that up, beyond this incriminating photo )