Scarecrow's Blog From the Darkside

Initially meant for the weekly thread to come Sunday... ** Always Watching (2015) was a found footage movie that truthfully left me just kind of underwhelmed, with no passion or inspiration urging any sort of advanced critique, which I kind of felt belonged in a small paragraph in the current weekly review thread I've been producing for Sundays. From what I gather the Slender Man is the reasoning behind the faceless entity that leaves marks on his victims, eventually influencing them to kill others through a type of dark will. A camera operator, a news journalist, and their producer all embark on an article about a family seemingly lost, with video footage recorded from a cam showing a figure in suit with no face, and they themselves are eventually targeted. Marks on them as well, with no matter how far they try to escape doing no good. All the recordings become distorted and affected by the specter’s appearances, which start with the cameraman (Chris Marquette; Freddy vs. J

Sunday found me watching a movie that truly proved how impossibly bored I was. Just on when I turned on the Telly, Mad Money (2008) features the always watchable Diane Keaton as a suburban wife desperate to pay the debt accumulated in her family, in disarray since hubby Ted Danson was "downsized" from a company he worked for decades. This actually happened to my stepdad so I felt for Danson. It can happen just like that. Job gone. Working as janitorial labor at a federal facility where "old currency is obliterated for fresh bills to replace them", she sets in motion with two other employees (Queen Latifa and Katie Holmes) a well orchestrated skimming operation, destroying required amounts and escaping with *a little on the side*. Stephen Root is always stealing scenes he's in. He is a character actor thief that cracks you up with just an expression or character quirk. As the eyes of the corporation, with all the cops and security detail seemingly under his watch

Coming from a big fan of the Spanish ∆trapped in building, unable to get out∆ [•REC] movies, by the very talented filmmakers, Balaguero and Plaza, I was a bit miffed like other folks about Hollywood remaking yet another hit cult horror film that received a lot of buzz. This one, Quarantine (2008), isn't too shabby, though. It follows the general outline of its inspiration and it's structure is similar. •Through the eyes of the camera• is the approach such a standard now in the found footage genre, and Jennifer Carpenter is the lead we follow throughout. She's this news journalist with cameraman doing a story on city firemen, accompanying one truck outfit to a distress call in an apartment complex. I always seem to preface these movies by saying: yes, the cam goes through the ringer. Lighting, especially towards the end, and the camera’s eye glimpses what is in front of it than more than any capturing of mise-en-scène. This isn’t about visual stimuli. It isn’t abo

In reference to the second and third episodes of the first season, "Mine" and "Escape from Dragon House". It was rather clear in the very first episode that all that sexual tension and desire between Sookie and Bill would continue to build and build until there was the payoff. As "The First Taste" concluded, Sookie encountered three vampires from Bill's past, all embracing feeding from humans without worry of consequences...consequences he warns them of. The luscious waitress, sexpot Dawn (Lynn Collins), a playful and promiscuous frequent lover of Jason's, gets tired of his vampire racism and how he views her for being with one of them. She shoots a gun in her home multiple times to scare him out...this not long after a bit of rough sex where Jason took the identity of a home invading intruder. A neighbor hears them fighting and sees Jason engaging in verbal sparring with Dawn, tired of his insults. This will be the last night she's seen a

I'm going to join the parade. This fucking movie should never have seen the greenlight. I liked Eli Roth's Cabin Fever (2002). Saw it at the theater and thought its dark humor and grisly viscera was rather entertaining and unsettling. It had a rather gnarly cast, too. But this remake has no reason to exist. None at all. With a few alterations, the screenplay co-written by Roth follows his film somewhat closely. The skeleton is essentially the same. Young adults who grew up together take a trip to a cabin. The nearby reservoir is infected with a flesh-eating virus. As each drinks from the water, they are infected. And it is a nasty infection, too. The body bleeds, peels, and rots. There is the usual screaming, bickering, and dying. A dog is infected and it gets its fill. The pretty blond is the first to be infected. She is put in the shack near the cabin. One scene has the blond's potential boyfriend fucking his friend's girlfriend as she rots away in the shack! And