Summer Horror Roundup

Here's the skinny on the horror line-up this summer.


Predators
I have to admit this trailer is looking real good. First off, you have the acting powerhouses of Adrien Brody, also starring in this Summer’s genetic thriller Splice, and Grissom’s CSI replacement, Morpheus, heading up the cast of mercenary refugees stranded on Predator kill planet. I also have to applaud the film’s concept of a group of marooned killers playing a deadly game of catch and release with Predator warriors. Finally, we are getting back to basics. No convoluted plotlines about a Mayan/Aztec/Cambodian pyramid under forty feet of ice in the Arctic that harbors a huge, egg-laying mother alien… This time around it’s simply Man vs. Predator in the wild. This idea is what made the first Predator such a success, and perhaps it will do the same for this latest re-hash.


Suicide Girls Must Die
Billed as the first “reality horror movie,” this film sounds more like America’s Next Top Model meets the Blair Witch Project. Done and done. The flimsy premise is as follows: A bunch of Suicide Girls head to a remote cabin on the lake (Crystal Lake?) for a calendar photo shoot, several girls end up missing and slasher madness ensues. The film promises “no actors” and “no script” but why this would be a good thing escapes me.


Repo Men
Okay, so it’s practically a carbon copy of Repo: The Genetic Opera, minus the rad singing and Paris Hilton, but the more I see of this movie the more I’m willing to give it a chance. Jude Law is a Repo Man who collects the organs of past due clients, but when he finds himself on the business end of a heart transplant; he has to fight for survival against the organization he once worked for.


Resident Evil: Afterlife
I call dud on the Resident Evil franchise’s latest attempt to resurrect its ailing series of films. Apparently they didn’t think three was enough, when most us had cried uncle. Proof that this twinkie is all fluff and no filling, can be found in the trailer’s boast that R4 was filmed with the James Cameron/Vincent Pace Fusion Camera System and sports the latest in 3D technology. If these are the film’s only assets over basic things like plot and character resonance, I don’t see much hope on the horizon. The trailer is just a lot of jumping, shooting and slow motion throwing of sunglasses in wet and dry conditions. Pass.


Piranhas 3D
It is, what it is folks. A 200 foot fissure opens up in the ocean floor to reveal a host of dinosaur-era piranhas with a nasty bite and a taste for human flesh. There are only two things going for this movie: Christopher Lloyd stars as the whacked out scientist with all the answers (when does he not?), and Ving Rhames is a Lieutenant with the Sheriff’s office who fights off a hungry pack of piranha with speedboat propellers. Some other interesting appearances include Jerry O’Connell, Elizabeth Shue and Eli Roth as (of course) the wet T-shirt contest emcee.


Super 8
I’ll say the same thing about this film that I said when I discovered the films of Dario Argento: I don’t know what it is, but I like it. Directed by J.J. Abrams and produced by Steven Spielberg, Super 8 deals with something not-so-nice that escapes from Area 51.


Splice
See my extended rant here.

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