Film and TV

Schlitter: Evil in the Woods is a well made and tense genre movie that I recommend, and at only 70 minutes long it certainly doesn’t outstay its welcome.

You could definitely call it an early ‘revisionist’ Western that was inspired by events of the 1864 Sand Creek massacre in Colorado, made in 1969 it’s also a glaring allegory for the then contemporary Vietnam War.

Family reunions can be a bit stressful at the best of times, but I can assure you that none that you have sat through have ever been as nerve wracking as that experienced by the Davison family.

Yes the movie is ridiculous, especially when Orca display Mensa intelligence while destroying a small fishing village, but at no point does it ever get boring. It has characters that you care about, a fantastic action set piece never far away, AND a bloody big whale going on a crazed rampage…what more could you want!?

This film is very much of its time, like an ‘all woman’ Fatal Attraction where the women are either mad and promiscuous or needy and pliable for their man, yet angry and empowered when an employer tries to make Allie give him a BJ.

While the narrative is a simple sharks vs humans trapped underwater, AND hampered by the fact that most of the characters are unlikeable (I found myself cheering for the sharks on more than one occasion), it has enough going for it that I never once looked at how long was remaining…always a good sign.

Based on the 1960s series of the same name The Man from U.N.C.L.E. directed and written by Guy Ritchie, so right away you know you’re in for a quirky film.

No spoilers here, just an enthusiastic recommendation for you to buy and watch this wonderful film. This is not a love story, it’s a life story, a soul story and yes it may have some extremely violent scenes in it, it has to be one of the best (along with I Saw The Devil) films to come out of Korea.

The intricacies and emotion in this are truly astounding and it is hands down, one of the best nature documentaries I have ever seen. It’s just beautiful, and you’d think watching a film for 90 mins about a tree would be hard work, but it is as exciting as any Bond film.

I can only describe this as a sort of mixture of Beetlejuice and every Gothy type teeny series on Netflix – like Sabrina and Wednesday, but with a darker (rapey, murdery) edge.