BloodRayne

Hey there, gang! Well I hope you enjoyed the review of House of the Living Dead as much as I enjoyed watching it!  Oh wait. That is, I hope you found it clever and witty but are completely scared off from watching the forty gallons of diaper gravy.  Speaking of diaper gravy, I am back with an Uwe Boll movie.   I understand if many of you want to jump ship at this point and I can't say I blame you.  For those brave few willing to go down the rabbit hole with me, I thank you. This film as quotes of non-stop action and incredible special effects. Uh huh. With a fairly ensemble cast, this filth-ridden stink nugget slaps its source material in the same fashion Paul W.S. Anderson did for Resident Evil. This is Bloodrayne.

Dhampir genes or Maybeline?

Yes, I did review a Bloodrayne movie.  It was the third one because...well Natassia Malthe is yummy and The Third Reich was the only one of the three films that came close to being ANYTHING like the actual game. Kinda...sorta...okay, not really.  Today's pile of steaming donkey flop hails from the 18^th Century in...Europestown? Europesburg??? Yeah guess what? Never mentioned what region of the planet it is. Medieval Romania perhaps?

Anywho, the fans of the two games will know the hunters gathering, the Brimstone Society is roaming through ancient Romania (seems easy to say that, than I don't have a damn cluesville) because of master vampire Kagan is searching for the ancient relics of Belial. Again, game fans will know this character as the first devil that was overthrown by Mephisto and his various body parts that were scattered all over the planet obtain certain levels of power that you would deem them unholy relics.

In derpity derp derp film?? Belial's an antediluvian vampire of great legend that his body parts make vampires unstoppable.

Subtle vampires. No wonder they're easy to spot.

So three members of the Brimstone Society hear tale of a dhamphir (Human/Vampire Hybrid, yes like Blade) hiding in plain sight in a freakshow for a traveling circus.

The girl Rayne (Kristanna Loken of Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines, BloodRayne, Painkiller Jane, Bounty Killer, The L Word and Burn Notice) has fewer weaknesses than normal vampires that...constantly gets contradicted. Holy water unneeded in these here parts, folks. Well or tap water does plenty.  Also the town is a bit too nonchalant with a vampire being gacked but whatever.

After leaving the circus were she fed on several members of the troupe (Yup, no thirst issues!) she flees to a neighboring town where a fortune teller explains that Kagan (Sir Ben Kingsley of Coronation Street, Gandhi, Bugsy, Schindler's List, Anne Frank: The Whole Story and The House of Sand and Fog) has become the most powerful vampire of all and the only way to defeat him is to seek out the various body parts of Belial to strengthen her.

Yeah she took a big steaming plot dump there, folks. That was a ton of exposition that relied heavily of a) Fortune teller recognizing a dhampir b) having knowledge of these legends and locations of primordial relics and c) that Rayne might even be up to the task as she was captured by humans for entertainment.    Apparently Kagan has also heard the rumors of a dhampir child IN HIS FRIGGIN KINGDOM...yet has been unable to find her. Really busting ass there, bub.

Now before we go further, let me point out why I am being so harsh to this film. First off, I loved these two games, Rayne is a solid protagonist, fearless and has a cause to help the humans as well as, get even with her undead dick of a dad. Secondly, the storyline using elements of myth, legend and Dante's Inferno just made for good story telling. Third, she got to razzle Nazis!!!!

This film?   NONE OF THAT!!!  Bad Touch Boll didn't give any love to the source material at all.

Back to our cinematic oeuvre. Yeah, I know things. I don't just watch crappy films and critique. Sheesh.

Moving along, Rayne gets recruited by the Council of Ninny Hammers as they plan to kill of Kagan once and for all. You know, that old chestnut.  But enough about deeznuts, we see that Katarin (Michelle Rodriguez of The Fast and the Furious, Resident Evil, S.W.A.T. Blue Crush) doesn't trust Rayne while her mentor Vladimir (Michael Madsen of Resivoir Dogs, Species, Kill Bill Vol: 1, Hell Ride and Vigilantes Diaries) does seem to believe Rayne can be forged into a weapon.  HEY!  Why that's like the game!  When in 1933, Mynce, Rayne's mentor argues with John about Rayne's power could benefit them rather than they kill her.   Jinkies!   You did something right, Boll! Yeah, don't let it go to that pinhead.

Can Rayne and the Knights Who Say Nee thwart Kagan?? What the hell is Meat Loaf and Billy Zane doing in this stinker?? Has Sir Kingsley wiped this film from his IMDB Pro account???

Aside from basically ignoring all the fundamental concepts of the game series, this is a dull, slow paced film with decent CGI, choppy editing, piss poor camera work (PUT THE CAM BACK ON A STABLIZER YOU DAFT KRAUT!!!) visual goofs and so much continuity issues.

The flick turned a decent hack and slash adventure game into a sword and sorcery goofy romp. VO actress Laura Bailey (Dragon Ball Z, BloodRayne, BloodRayne 2,Fullmetal Alchemist, World of Warcraft, Final Fantasy XIII, The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim- Dawnguard and Gears of War 4), the original Rayne of the games must have been embarrassed as hell to see this flick.

Just loved some of the goofs. Our "director" part of the crowd watching the dhampir getting tortured is wearing an Omega wrist watch in the medieval crowd, Black Powder from China is a stupid line. 18^th century. FLINTLOCKS been around a while that point...for say about oh...200 years, you ass! Kagan's half-assed henchman, a vampire was able to cross running water and ride his horse out in the daylight. Um, say doesn't that contradict at least two legends??

Non stop action? No one was seated during the Billy Zane dictates a letter scene!!! You want a realistic subtitle?   BloodRayne: The Colon Stopper! Never has your ass fallen asleep so quickly!

So yes if you need a film tropes drinking game, this is your movie. You want to take your brain off the hook for 94 minutes? This is your movie. If you want complex characters, fascinating epic struggle against good and evil and developed plot that would stagger the naysayers of the ages??? Go get a decent book. 

Hot Topic Actionwear!

House of the Living Dead

Hey folks. You can all relax. I'm back. Working on an audio review for the YouTubes and got caught up in that, forgetting not everyone subscribes to that. So back ta da blog!

Well found YET ANOTHER Zombie flick and yes it also has multiple titles. This hails from a 12 pack by Mill Creek Entertainment and shock of shocks, it also has Horror of the Zombies a.k.a. Ghost Galleon and predictably, Night of the Living Dead in its illustrious alumni. On a South African plantation, a diseased maniac is rampant, killing first the plantation animals and then sets on the humans! Gasp! This is House of the Living Dead a.k.a. Curse of the Dead a.k.a. Doctor Maniac a.k.a. Kill, Baby, Kill.

Ring Wraith stealing a goat in daylight??!!

Well with that fine collection of titles, how can we go wrong? Just looked at 15 different covers, just looking at the print of this poor film; it has been treated like the town trollop. Passed around again and again. Redistribution to the likes of Night of the Living Dead. Ahem, with that in mind, on with the film.

Under the cover of day, a hooded figure in a black cloak abducts a baboon because... oh hell your guess as good as many and possibly less filthy.    A mad scientist Dr. Breckinridge Brattling (Yes I swear that is the character's name!) is conducting illegal human experiments on his family estate. Guess the sound proofing there dulls down the screams. Twisting God's work into his own hellish nightmares, he dare put his scientific curiosity before common decency. So in general, he's a dick. Striving to put different souls into other people, (Yeah I can't make this nonsense up) he has had a few setbacks.

The town villagers are convinced something is going on but seem reluctant to gather pitchforks and torches to go and kill the monster. Kind of surprising really.

Oh ho, my milkshake does bring all the boys to the yard.

With various animals disappearing in the village, you think people would figure out that just possibly that it could be THE HOODED FIGURE roaming the countryside acting all suspicious??!!! FYI, not the Hooded Figure in Rotten Reelz Reviews Video Reviews. Pretty sure he's not abducting animals and people. Well, more or less sure.

A set of twins runs the plantation. Breckinridge's brother Michael (Mark Burns of Death in Venice, A Day at the Beach, Juggernaut, Rosebud and The Maids) runs the household while Insano Breck performs his madcap experiments attempting to transmigrate a soul outside the human body. Hmm, maybe some opids might be in the doctor's diet.

Jiggly fiancee' Mary (Shirley Anne Field of Peeping Tom, Saturday Night and Sunday Morning, These Are the Damned and Wild for Kicks) cannot wait to marry MichaelNow, many of you know I abhor two things. A vacuum and spoilers. That being said, THERE ARE NO ZOMBIES! Yes, with all the potential voodoo, genetic experimentation, viral outbreak and how about Hell just getting full of pervs, people that talk in the theater and Nazis?

So yeah, I can only reason it was titled thus so to cash in on Romero's success of Night of the Living Dead; given Dawn of the Dead wasn't released until 1978. Redistribution is probably closer to blame.

Made in 1973 but took an entire year to release (Yup we are in good hands), our magnum Opus was actually filmed in South Africa. Nifty, right? Look, Vancouver has been Faux Detroit, NYC, Chicago, San Francisco and Post Apocalyptic Jersey and that is just the handful of flicks I have seen, so yes I am surprised they got shot on proper location. I TAKE MY HAPPYS WERE I CAN!!! STOP JUDGING MEEEEEE!!!!

Shot in 35 mm Spherical on Arriflex Cameras, yes the sound is mono but thankfully in Color and not Technocolor. The print is positively horrendous. This was a VHS to DVD translation and never went through an image rendering process. Loosely translated, it looks like crap. Which is too bad because it was professionally shot well but again VHS crap!!!

Now to change Bobo into a donkey.  Because SCIENCE!!!

Hollow Point

And I am back. Yes I have been delinquent in my writing. I am currently assisting my folks because they can use the help. I won't go into detail due to that being personal and not really relevant for this blog. Today's movie hails from the forgotten time of 1996.   Why, some of you weren't even born yet. For those my age or a tad younger, yeah you were a teenager. Our movie is brought to us by NU Image a.k.a. Millennium Films (Homefront, Rambo, Leatherface and The Expendables) and our director Sidney J. Furie (Swingers' Paradise, Lady Sings the Blues, Iron Eagle, Superman IV: The Quest for Peace, Iron Eagle II and The Taking of Beverly Hills) has managed multiple genres under his belt. So let's see some low budget, shoot 'em up action with some punchy dialogue and more than a handful of cars exploding. This is Hollowpoint.

So you don't remember me from Kull the Conqueror?

Shocking we have alternative titles Rysk Roulette and Lethal Point. Merging former rivalries of the Chinese, Italians and Russian mafias under one organization, Investment banker/gangster Thomas Livingston (John Lithgow of Terms of Endearment, Footloose, 2010: The Year We Made Contact, Cliffhanger, 3^rd Rock from the Sun, Dexter and Rise of the Planet of the Apes) has the DEA and FBI up his proverbial butt having one last major payday for his esteemed colleagues and that is all that is viable. He has devised a plan to assist his partners in their further criminal activities and keep them in money until the end of their days.

Breathing down his neck, FBI agent Diane Norwood (Tia Carrere of Zombie Nightmare,Wayne's World, True Lies, Merlin: The Return, Relic Hunter, Lilo & Stitch, Duck Dodgers and In Plain Sight), headstrong, determined and sadly low on the FBI food chain has been undercover as a means to get Livingston. The fiasco ensued and created a mass shootout with FBI and Russian mob that frankly should have destroyed a church. Seriously, it had to be close to 300 to 400 rounds dispatched between the two factions.  If this was a first person shooter MMORPG, these weapons were on infinite ammo.

Tia's hotness causes guns to blur.

With her assignment completely botched, Diane has to go back to square one. The head of the Russian Mob, Krezinsky (David Hemblen of Brainscan, Tommy Boy, Rollerball, X-Men animated series, A Nero Wolfe Mystery and Where the Truth Lies) demands blood and Livingston offers an olive branch of one of Diane's friends with the work to be done by an independent contractor Lawson (Donald Sutherland of Invasion of the Body Snatchers, M.A.S.H., JFK, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Punch, The Puppet Masters, Virus, Instinct, Panic and The Hunger Games), a freelance assassin with flair. 

Dr. Dick Solomon is not amused

With that in mind, Diane encounters DEA Max Parrish (Thomas Ian Griffith of The Karate Kid Part III, Excessive Force, Vampires, xXx, One Tree Hill, The Pirate's Curse, Cold Case and The Kidnapping) who knows about Livingston's cash and knows whoever finds the scratch gives it directly to his or her agency due to forced seizure. Now with the combined mobs feeling unease, Max and Diane are trying to deal with them, face their superiors, find the money and try to not kill each other with a shaky alliance. By the way, the cops response time in this flick is insane. They really book from location to location, it was a bit staggering.

Okay let me just point out, I enjoy the hell out of this movie. With the ridiculous amount of violence, explosions and one liners for our heroes and villains; this is a fun ride. Think of this as a live-action anime that is just nuts. I had so much fun with it.

All these parlors, I just want a therapeutic massage.

The Satanic Rites of Dracula

Hey gang. Sorry for the substantial delay. Between a hasty move, loading that away in a storage unit and some family emergency hospital stays, well I have been busy. So today, totally up my alley we go back to the Hammer Productions in the far away time of 1974 and yet IMDB swears it to be 1978.

We see how that lineage of Van Helsing is coping with its ancient evil nemesis, Dracula himself. As luck would have it, it is also (All together now!) has alternative titles. Sharpen those stakes, have holy water at the ready and prepare for the groovin' seventies. This is The Satanic Rites of Dracula.

Count Dooku?  RUUUUUUUUNNN!!!!

With a myriad of alternative titles such as: Count Dracula and His Vampire Bride, Dracula Is Alive and Well and Living in London, Dracula Is Dead...and Well and Living in London, Dracula and His Brides and Rites of Dracula. Yes, once again this still holds sway that all that is black arts, necromancy, demonic incantations automatically gets lumped into witchcraft. There's a difference, writers. It's called research. Try it.   Really makes you feel for the Wicca of the world.  Just worshiping elements and bestowing common decency.

Anywho, a gathering of black art practitioners have gotten around the man cave to resurrect Dracula (Sir Christopher Lee of The Blood of Dracula, The Hound of the Baskervilles, The Wicker Man, Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring and Star Wars: Attack of the Clones) have a standard white goat (Human sacrifice) at the ready to bring the awesome malefic vampire back. Something about a demon god assisting in this as well. They are kind of all over the map. A collective of prominent citizens strive to bring back the dark prince to usher in a new era.

Meanwhile in an adjacent room, some poor fellow is being held against his will by what looks like roadies for Bread. After a brief strangling and gimping his way out of the manor, he gets sped away in a car to Scotland Yard, where his report tells of these untouchable men and women in society could be engaging in blood rites and ancient practices that defy God.  Hmm sounds like Scientology to me. 

And that's when I dropped the occult and went into folk dancing.

Hehe, moving on. Inspector Murray (Michael Coles of Doctor Who and the Daleks, The Avengers, Department S, Dracula A.D. 1972, The Sweeney and Pie in the Sky) of Dracula '72 has worked with a an expert of the occult (sadly no it is not Damian Hellstrom, my Marvel fans) but none other than a Lorimar Van Helsing (Peter Cushing of The Curse of Frankenstein, Horror of Dracula, The Legend of the 7 Golden Vampires, The Ghoul, Land of the Minotaur, Shock Waves and The Uncanny) to aid in their endeavors and shed some much needed light on the subject.

Listening in his study Lormiar takes note of all the undercover agent has witnessed and fears for us all. Quick FYI, his granddaughter Jessica has timelady regenerated from Stephanie Beacham to Absolutely Fabulous's Joanna Lumley. Oh sure we could just say the actress was replaced but that's no fun at all.

With the combination of Scotland Yard and Helsing, they find out that one of the five men that was photographed is Professor Keeley (Freddie Jones of Dune, Krull, The Elephant Man, The Count of Monte Cristo and Emmerdale) who deals with virulent diseases pointing to a plague of biblical porportions. Inspector Murray and Jessica are looking over land deeds and noticing a building owned by a D.D. Denham, a wealthy individual that is a recluse, never seen in the light of day....hmmm...

Worse Craigslist orgy...ever.

Further investigations to the Pellham House where they discover what can only be described as a harem of vampire wenches. Yeah almost as someone is building a cadre of lethal lovelies.

Can this mean that Dracula has returned and if so, why does he do business with mortal men when he can pretty much take whatever he wants with a bit of mind control? I mean Lord of the Vampires is a fairly hefty title right? Something rotten in the as they find the headquarters Denham is a new building erected over the very church Dracula died two years prior. Helsing is convinced something is afoot and proceeds to take measures but can he do it in time before the Sabbat of the Undead takes place? Why does this feel a bit convoluted? What is the mystery of Sasquatch?

For the record, this isn't a bad follow-up to Dracula A.D. 1972 but it wasn't as clever. It had some cloak and dagger elements but it really just seemed like the aristocracy dealing with the lowly peasants and hoped that Dracula would not turn on them.  Perhaps they have been mesmerized to do Dracula's bidding.   A fun piece to be sure but you have to be a Hammer fan and not a causal viewer. Course by that same standing if you are just now diving into Hammer Dracula, why the hell would you start this far into the series?

You see the arse on Lumley? Damn.