Freddy's Friday Night Dance Party!: Product Placement Edition!

Changing things up for this weeks pajama jammy jam, I thought it would be nice to bring in one of the hottest DJ's working the tables in the underground hip-hop dance scene. Straight from San Fransisco, I now present you with D.J. Tanner! You know the House is always gonna be Full when D.J. Tanner is up in this piece - so lets get ready to enjoy this Hip-hop Happy Meal with Mac and Me!

Man...who the hell invited Kimmy Gibbler? She is totally going to ruin my party!



This 1988 E.T. ripoff is such a fantastic mess and this scene is so moronic, that I just had to include it in a dance party someday. With a large dose of heavy stuff like Coca-Cola, Skittles, and McDonald's, there are more addictive substances in Mac and Me than there are in this entire club! You can see the addiction in the dancers eyes too - the thumb moves, the footloose football players, and that jerk off kid in a wheelchair who can't even at least try to join in by doing some spin moves on one wheel cause he's too doped up on sugar and meal worms! Then there's the Mysterious Alien Creature, otherwise known as MAC, dancing all up on the counter, which is so unsanitary. What kind of germs did that alien asshole bring from planet Mickey D's I wonder?

The one thing I can't help but think is this would totally happen at the exact moment I went into Mac Donald's to get something to eat. I mean business when it comes to eating and all I want to do is get my food, eat it, and get out, but if a dance scene broke out, I can only imagine that there would be no time to make my food, let alone blend me a shake. "Umm…excuse me?! Could you maybe stop dancing and get me my fucking plain double cheeseburger? Maybe?"

CNAMB Presents: Holiday Monster of the Week!

Why not go a different route and make this months Monsters of the Week holiday themed? Some of the upcoming monsters might not be your typical antagonists that you would find in this segment, but they will be monsters in some capacity, therefor garnering them this prestigious honor.

Our first holiday monster is one that would certainly make it year round, but now would be the perfect time to show some love for this tiny terror. This weeks Monster of the Week is....

Stripe!

Created by Chris Columbus, Stripe made his big Hollywood debut in 1984 in Joe Dante's holiday classic, Gremlins. As the vicious leader of the rogue Mogwai, Stripe came about when dumb ass Billy accidentally spilt water all over his precious pet Mogwai, Gizmo. Voiced by Frank Welker, Stripe has appeared in numerous old school video games based off the Gremlins franchise and also was one of the baddies to some degree in Gremlins 2: The New Batch as Mohawk...a sort of off shoot of Stripe. I am a huge fan of both Gremlins films and it was only a matter of time before Stripe showed up as a Monster of the Week - what better time than during Death-cember?!

Instead of a trailer or a clip of Stripe in action, I will provide you with this fantastic fan made thingy. The Exorcist and Batman segments are so great!

Snow Angels

Brrrr...it sure is getting cold outside, but there is not yet a flake of snow to be seen in my neck of the woods, which is somewhat unfortunate. I love when it snows and being from Massachusetts, I have seen more than my fair share. I really only hate snow when it starts melting and gets all slushy and gross - otherwise, I love the look of it as it coats my surroundings in purity and solitude.

To help quench my thirst for the white stuff, I busted out a few of my favorite revenge based fight scenes that take place in the snow, with some women hot enough to melt their respective fighting surfaces.

A movie that everyone should see if you are a fan of Asian cinema and Martial Arts (or even if you're not), Lady Snowblood is amazing and has more style and originality than 90% of films made today. The film's star, Meiko Kaji is one of the most beautiful Japanese actresses to have ever graced the screen.

Lady Snowblood: Vengeance is A Dish Best Served Cold



Rarely (and surprisingly) do I use the NSFW tag, but it is necessary with this next clip for the pinky violence classic, Sex and Fury. I should warn you that you will have to watch this video a few times; it will take you at least one viewing to get over the fact that the "Snow Angel" in this clip, Reiko Ike is completely nude while she jacks these dudes up. Once you get over that, there is some awesome stuff to be seen here. The music is so great, as well as the way it's shot, in particular when you only see her legs, her shadow, and limbs hitting the ground.

Sex and Fury: Nude With A 'Tude - or - I think Your Headlights Are On



As you saw with the previous clips, Kill Bill was inspired heavily by both films and this "chilling" scene in particular by Sex and Fury's backdrop and look. I couldn't have the other two clips and leave this one out, because it truly is a goose bump inducing snow set fight scene and one of my favorites.

Kill Bill Volume 1: That Really Was A Hattori Hanzo Sword

It's Begining to Look A Lot Like Kwanzaa...

It is officially December and as you can tell from my inspired banner, it's time to start the Christmas celebration! First off, much like Chucktober, I decided to rename the month of December to fit my own personal liking. I have been going back and forth between calling it "Dismember" or "Death-cember" and in the end, I liked Death-cember a little better. So from now on, the month of December will forever be known as Death-cember (let's see how many times I fuck up the spelling...) here at CNAMB! If anyone would like to use Dismember for their own blog, then please send me a money order for $50 and a box of crayons, and it's all yours!

There are 10,926 horror blogs out there and at least 90% of them will be doing a Christmas Horror themed month, I am assuming. This causes me great grief knowing that so many others will be doing the same thing and there isn't that much to choose from to stay different (though I look forward to what others do). I'll think of something, hopefully, but I will definitely be covering a few Holiday Horror films throughout the month and along with those, I will cover a couple of films that are set in winter. Winter means snow and snow means my favorite movie aesthetic. Period. I LOVE snow in my movies and that could partially explain why I kinda love awful Hallmark Christmas films. Or it could be that I am a huge pansy, but whatever.

Another thing that kinda bums me out is something that came up in the comments section of a recent post about the eventual over saturation of holiday Horror blogging. Bee Ef Ef Emily, from The Deadly Doll's House of Horror Nonsense, brought up that she wished there were some Hanukkah (spell check?!) Horror films out there to cover and sadly, there really aren't any at all. I celebrate Christmas, because I believe in commercialism and I easily fall victim to pretty colors and sparkly fun things, but I feel it only fair to be able to cover some of the other holidays like Hanukkah or Kwanzaa. I don't even know if I have any readers that celebrate those holidays, but in the chance that I do, why should they be excluded from the holiday fun?!

Oh well...maybe someone will see there is a couple of holidays the need to be exploited and make some great Hanukkah/Kwanzaa sleaze in the future. I can only hope so at least. I do look forward to this month of Death-cember and I will begin by leaving you with this fun and very nostalgic clip to start off the holiday hoedown!

Suicide Solution

Shion Sono's Suicide Club (Jisatsu sâkuru or Suicide Circle) is a tough film to review...I don't even know where to begin; yet, here I am at the beginning, so I guess it has begun. That statement is as confusing as my thoughts about Suicide Club - a film that sat on my DVD shelf for a couple of years now and for whatever reason I never sat down and watched it. Not like there aren't tons of unwatched films in my collection, but I'm just saying. My only previous knowledge of the movie is about the same as most, which is the crazy opening involving a large group of Japanese schoolgirls that take a plunge right into an oncoming train. I heard that it was pretty good, but I feel like I heard that the train opening was the best scene in the movie and it never quite hits that level of madness again. Whoever said that could not have watched the same movie as I.

Suicide Club is a total mind fuck of a film. In theory, it is a simplistic tale of a rash of unexplained suicides that begin with the opening train slaughter. The local police, led by Detective Toshiharu Kuroda (Ryô Ishibashi) attempt to figure out what may be causing these suicides, ruling out the possibility that they could be caused by someone intentionally and chalking them up to a fad that kids have caught on to. There are so many themes in this film that I could do two full posts on the themes alone. Some of them may be a bit out of my knowledge range, as I only know so much about Japanese culture and how suicide seems to have found a way into the culture of Japanese society, but some of these ideas are very world-weary.

Most of these social commentaries individually factor into what may be the cause of these suicides. Each one adds a thick layer of oddity, while keeping you guessing throughout as to which of these things could be the reason, or even the cause of these self inflicted, life-ending decisions. Technology, selflessness, celebrity, fads, and even J-pop are all skewered in some capacity within Suicide Club's framework. All of them mix together to really throw off the viewer's sense of direction, a sense of direction you get with a lot of the detective aspects of the film - which work perfectly like a solid crime thriller. The police are what drive the film and everything unfolds around them for most of Suicide Club's run time. The value of family, friendship and even the connection to ones self is a thematic element found initially with the detectives portion of this tale.

Suicide Club is gruesome and at times almost comes close to being too over the top. In fact, it is over the top in a dark dark way and almost goes into the territory of more recent films like Tokyo Gore Police and Frankenstein Girl vs. Vampire Girl, films that also have outlandish next level (in comparison to Suicide Club) suicidal elements in them. While films like that make you say "What the fuck?!" It's in a, you cannot believe how crazy and almost silly kind of way, as opposed to the "What the fuck!" moments in Suicide Club, which are incredibly creepy and surreal even while being slightly over the top. Scenes of borderline humor that make you cringe in how they are presented and the way they unfold.

All of the peculiar elements are mainly outside of the police investigation aspect and almost work like little weird and wonderful vignettes that become increasingly strange as the film moves along. Throughout, I was captivated as to what was the cause of these suicides and as the movie rolled along, the more complex it became and the more interested I was in understanding what exactly is going on with this film. You know what? I really wasn't sure what had happened by time the films runtime ran dry. Suicide Club is one of those films that doesn't present you with a definitive explanation to what is going on. Something that may be a turn off for some, but for me, it makes it all the more mysterious.

There is one scene in particular, that is set very far into the movie that just comes from out of nowhere and I was not so sure about it at first. I thought that this was the moment where I would be let down. It is essentially a musical number involving a very effeminate male named Genesis (Rolly), who leads a small gang of murderous psycho's. The setting can be best described as a bowling alley of horrors, filled with sewn up white bed sheets containing various victims wiggling around, trying to get free. As the piano began, the music mixed with the squealing of a female victim became instantly recognizable as the underground Hip-Hop duo, The Leak Bros did a fantastic version of this song. Even with that recognizable sample, I still wasn't sure about this scene at all. However, as it went along, and it became more and more clear what was happening on screen and how disturbing it was, by the end, I was completely taken aback. Phenomenally haunting.

I cannot get this film out of my head for so many reasons and the ambiguity of an antagonist is a part of it. It is a movie that you can choose your own theory and there are plenty to choose from, but I think after some research, I have a better perspective of the happenings in Suicide Club. For me, the sign of a powerful film is the fact that I made the attempt and looked into understanding the story better after seeing it. If the movie were weak, I would have said "What a pile of stupid shit!" and left it at that. The intense imagery and frighteningly inspired ideas are captivating and Suicide Club may be one of the best Japanese horror films I have seen in many many years. The film is full of surprises from top to bottom and even when I thought I had the tone and style figured out, they threw in a gyro ball (get it?!) to throw off my game.

I barely tapped into the vastness of this movie in my review and I could really go on and on about so many things that I didn't even graze here. I hope that some of you have seen this and I would gather you would leave your thoughts if you did...this is a movie that I really would love to hear what other people that I know think about it.

The Horror Hangover

Ahhh...the long weekend that begins on a Thursday with Thanksgiving is nearing an end! Hopefully everyone had a nice one filled with a copious amount of food and drink and everything in between. Sadly, I got a pretty anemic hangover for you all today, but there are a few interesting things to check out, so not a complete loss I guess.

11:00 AM starts off with The Beast of Bray Road (2005) on SyFy. A film that I would guess would be your average cheese ball SyFy film, but the trailer actually looks really badass! It's about a Wisconsin set urban legend werewolf that has moved from livestock, to humans! The creature looks really cool and it appears there is some gore to be had, though this is afternoon cable, so who knows what you will actually see.



Keeping with the cycle of the wolf at SyFy, Cursed (2005) will be on at 1:00 PM. I never saw the entire film, just bits and pieces, which was more than enough to keep me away from this Williamson/Craven re-team. Still, Cursed may make for a mind numbingly acceptable watch while completely hungover and lacking any real brain function.

I said this was a weak hangover, so I am forced to already include something of the Christmas nature...at 2:00 PM A Christmas Carol (1984) is on Hallmark. I really enjoy this incarnation of A Christmas Carol and outside of Scrooged and the Disney animated film, it is a solid telling of the Charles Dickens' classic story.

At 3:30 PM, you better get off my lawn when The Enforcer (1976) is on ION (I am a lyrical assassin!). Love the Dirty Harry films and The Enforcer is one of the best. Pick of the week, punk!



3:00 brings us the non-Zemeckis Beowulf (1999) on SyFy. It's the story of Beowulf, but as played by uber movie tough guy, Christopher Lambert and the mega-hot, Rhona Mitra also stars. It says it all when you have an old English tale setting with the action pumped up to the max by techno music!



And for the final film of the day, at 3:30 PM, Demolition Man (1993) is on AMC. I have never seen this film and that may be due to my dislike for Sandy Bullock, which may just keep me away for another decade or so. Otherwise, I wouldn't mind checking it out.

Grace's Jones

I'm going to keep this one real quick as I wasn't even planning on doing a review for 2009's, uneaten baby film, Grace, but I felt compelled to write something about it. First off, I really enjoyed the film, the only issues I may have had were eradicated by the end of the movie. It seemed to be a little ambiguous as to where it was going, but where it went was fitting to the film as a whole. I did think that some of the vegan stuff was a little overdone and unnecessary in its in your face-ity (?). In your face-ness? No?

Grace is a very slow, brooding film that just keeps everything simple and stays away from almost obvious over the top temptations that must have been had with a story like this. It is superbly shot and the Zoran Popovic cinematography and direction from Paul Solet are tops, with the ominous and well crafted technical aspects really matching and pushing the eerie mood and tone of Grace's story.

The acting and character development was a very nice change of pace with this movie. There is a lot of depth to the secondary characters with a film that is essentially about a mother and her blood lovin' baby. Every character serves a purpose and is important to the story, and to the main characters, but carry their own individual back story too. One of the best of the secondary characters was Gabrielle Rose as Vivian Matheson, who puts forth a rendering that is remarkable in its creepy sadness and outright bitchiness.

A huge stand out was Jordan Ladd as Madeline Matheson. I have been a big fan of hers since Cabin Fever and to be honest, it was for her looks. Not that she was bad in other films, but in Grace, she completely puts herself out there and gives a fantastic performance. She carries a very emotional film here and is able to keep from going campy or over the top in a role that could invite an over the top portrayal.

What really got me about Grace was the birth scene, where Ladd really brings it. This scene is incredibly emotional and powerful...it was a very tough scene to watch and even as a man, who has no kids, I was very moved and saddened by it. Great slow burn and very subtle horror film that is one I recommend if you like that type of movie. In addition, I should note, the DVD extras are fantastic too, with great behind the scenes stuff and fun commentary from Solet and producer Adam Green. Shortest review eva!