The Brain That Wouldn't Die (1962)

A surgeon (Jason Evers) with radical ideas and a Frankenstein-esque zeal for experimentation gets the opportunity to put his ideas into practice when he comes into possession of a severed female head.
It's hilariously bad at times, but that's only half of the story. Beneath the wooden acting there's a very sick-minded, twisted male lead to keep the story moving forward; you only need to analyse his motivations and actions to discover it. The dark humour that clings to him is very dark indeed.
The scenes with the head on a desk are fantastic. Virginia Leith bubbles with hatred just as the tubes that keep her alive are bubbling with mystery fluid.
If Hammer Studios had made it, upping the production values to their highest standards, it could've equalled even their own best efforts.

3 knocks from inside the closet door out of 5

Sometimes They Come Back... for More (1998)

I watched parts ONE and TWO in July 2013, but better late than never, right?
Two plucky military police persons enter an ice station 'research facility' at Antarctica to investigate a situation; i.e. there's dead people.
If you're thinking it might be a poor man's The Thing (1982), then think again becuase even a poor man would toss it away if it's all he had to trade.
Is it too late to retract what I said at the beginning? 'Never' would've been better than 'late'.

1 icy ring out of 5

Picture of a Nymph (1988)

It's so much like A Chinese Ghost Story (1987) that it wouldn't take a liar as accomplished as the Wife of Bath to convince someone that the two films were in fact part of the same series. Thankfully, it also shares the same appreciation of wonder, disregard for logic, sense of purpose and freedom of expression that makes Siu-tung's film such a joy to watch. It's one of the occasions where I consider mimicry to be a compliment.
And, really, who wouldn't want to see Joey Wong do her thing in flowing gowns and big sleeves once more?

3 flying paper umbrellas out of 5

Kafka (1991)

Soderbergh is a hit and miss director for me. With Kafka he categorically hit. It's not based on any one specific story but is rather an amalgamation of the author's themes. Translating them into film was achieved with occasional canted angles and a beautiful canvas of B+W contrasts courtesy of DoP Walt Lloyd. The deceptively simple depth of field holds within it things that stand out without being pointed out directly - there's a trust that the viewer will know not just where to look but how to look. Influences are plentiful, from Murnau to Lang, Huston, Welles, Reed and even Hitchcock, there's always something interesting to admire (that rooftop!).
Obviously, some knowledge of Kafka's published works will help with placing of references, but it's not necessary to enjoy the film.

4½ internal reverberations out of 5

Ju-on: The Final Curse (2015)

A sequel to The Beginning of the End (2014) that hopefully is the 'final' entry, because without Takashi Shimizu's input (he wasn't involved in either film) the series is going down the shitter faster than you can count the shades of brown that it used to cause in your trousers.
The sister of one of the victims from the previous film comes under the curse's influence while attempting to discover the whereabouts of her sibling. It decides that one Toshio wasn't scary enough, so throws over a dozen of the little shits into one scene. Hmmmm. If it's your first ever Japanese horror film you might be impressed; it'll last until you see one of the good ones.

1½ postal scares out of 5

Ju-on: The Beginning of the End (2014)

An unnecessary reboot of the franchise that doesn't improve upon the original film in any way, or even do enough that's different to justify its existence.
As usual there's more than one time period under the scope, this time with a total of eight stories split across them, each tied somehow to the Saeki house. It takes a long time to get to the scares, but when they do come they're decent enough for a while, even though by this stage we've seen the same things before in better films. The steady, creeping camera movements range from being merely perfunctory to nicely timed, and it's always great to see practical effects outnumber CGI, so credit for both of those things. However, the second half really drops the ball, and the ending is stupid.

2 house calls out of 5

GOKUDOU DAISENSOU [2015]

aka Yakuza Apocalypse

Director Takashi Miike's massive filmography is wildly inconsistent in quality but it's almost always guaranteed to be an off-the-wall spectacle of what-the-fuckeries.  Gokudō Daisensō is no exception.
It's about a young gangster, turned vampire by his dying crime boss, who is forced to go on a deranged mission of revenge and then things get weird.  Like, really really weird.
By stuffing everything but the kitchen sink into this film, it'll probably repel a lot of audiences who like coloring inside the lines.  There's a slight commentary on organized crime but for the most part Miike aims to be as nonsensical as possible and has a great ol' time doing it.  If you're not laughing then you're probably wondering what the flying fuck that giant frog is doing with his belly-button.
At times it's just a little too erratic for it's own good but it's still a pretty great film to pop in for a drunken midnight movie marathon.

3 leaky ears out of 5

STEVE JOBS [2015]

Director Danny Boyle & screenwriter Aaron Sorkin together craft a near-perfect autobiographical drama about priggish Apple co-founder, Steve Jobs.
Broken up into three distinct parts, the film follows Jobs' three major demo launches: the Macintosh, NeXT PC & the iMac G3, all while trying to juggle the troubles that surround his personal life.  
The film interestingly choses not to allow the settings take place anywhere else rather than back-stage of each launch given it a torando-esque feel of enticing dialogue and a fittingly hurried pace that never misses a beat.  Boyle knows the script is the star here and allows his usual frantic style of film-making to take a back-seat (apart from a few distractions) and resorting to using some subtle techniques only film-lovers will probably pick up on.
It's the welcome type of movie that isn't too heavy.  Isn't too light.  It's really just right.

4 Judy Jetson Easy-Bake Ovens out of 5

Blood from the Mummy's Tomb (1971)

Hammer's fourth and final Mummy feature is an excellent film overall. Some folks will disagree, with cries of "There's no actual Mummy!" It's true. The story is based on Bram Stoker's The Jewel of Seven Stars (1903) novel, focussing on the restless spirit of an Egyptian Priestess (Valerie Leon), with no dusty bandages in sight. But there's plenty of blood, tons of atmosphere and the connection between past and present is integrated better than usual.
It was the first of the series I ever saw, many years ago, and while there's certainly a feeling of nostalgia attached to each viewing, I genuinely do believe that it's deserving of the final score.

4 phases of the soul out of 5

WINTER ON FIRE: UKRAINE'S FIGHT FOR FREEDOM [2015]

Director Evgeny Afineevsky's Winter on Fire: Ukraine's Fight for Freedom is a tour de force documentary depicting an intimate and terrifying look at the Euromaiden protests that erupted during the winter months of 2013 & 2014.
Unlike the news footage the rest of the world saw, we get a dangerously close glimpse from the trenches into the cold, violent and heart-breaking moments that are so outrageous I couldn't believe what I was watching.  It's pretty obvious Afineevsky has no interest in allowing the viewer to pick sides but when the footage speaks for itself it's hard not to oppose the lies and brutality the government used upon it's own people.  Tightly edited, shot with precise staggering bravery and beautifully scored by Jasha Klebe, all makes for a whirlwind of emotions, both good and bad.
It's a violent reminder that as a community we can sometimes still make a difference no matter how much the odds are against us.

4 revolutions out of 5

Doggy Poo (2004)

A stop-motion + claymation short from Korea that's about a piece of shit but certainly can't be labelled as one, because, all jokes aside, it's a glorious, heart-warming story with a lot more depth than you'd expect it to have.
The ass-squirt is an adorable, rosy-cheeked little guy able to talk, think and feel; he even has a cute, pinched top curl. He becomes aware of his own existence while lying by the side of a road, and the terrors of what that mean begin to work upon him. I'd class it suitable for children, but the philosophical and existential themes it presents may be too much for some.

4 answers blowing in the wind out of 5

THE VISIT [2015]

Remember as a kid while visiting the grandparent's house overnight you'd hear weird sounds from around their scary old person home?
Director M. Night Shyamalan takes that creepy grandparents concept and runs wild with it in The Visit, his first journey into the found footage thriller genre.
After a good decade or so of cinematic failures, it's nice to see M. Night get his shit somewhat together with this absurdly silly yet amusing spin on The Grimm's Fairytales.  The scares will cause more nervous laughter than genuine frights but that's part of it's sinister charm.  It's not quite up to par with The Sixth Sense but it's certainly no After Earth, so maybe we can begin thinking about forgiving the director for harming our braincells for ever so long.

3 diaper facials out of 5

QUEEN OF EARTH [2015]

Director Alex Ross Perry's psychological horror film Queen of Earth is the type of subtle terror that you're not fully aware of until it's already crawled deep into your psyche.
It's about two besties whose friendship is growing apart as they grow older, resulting in one of the girls to lose grip on her already fragile sanity.
Mad Men's Elisabeth Moss delivers a powerfully convincing performance as the nutty as a fruitcake women that is quite frankly very unsettling to watch from beginning to end.  The film runs along a baffling pace that isn't easy to jump onto until you realize that was it's sinister intentions. The heavy feeling of unease is built up wonderfully over long scenes of awkward conversations, nerve-wracking sound effects & music, disorienting camera shots and dizzying character confrontations that are hilariously uncomfortable to watch.  It's not a particularly pleasant watch but an thoroughly easy film to admire for it's masterful nightmarish execution.

4 salads out of 5

CUCKOO [2009]

Director Richard Bracewell slow-burn thriller, the sexfully titled Cuckoo, spends all it's time brooding in the shadows.
At first it's really about a woman who begins losing her marbles as her life is falling apart around her but then it takes a jarring shift of focus and almost seems like it's aiming to lose the viewer's attachment to the story.
No one in the film seems to know how to turn on a damned light and leaves the whole thing wallowing in the shadows, which is occasionally effective but mostly it just doesn't sit right.  Fortunately there's some wonderful performances for some one-dimensional characters and Andrew Hewitt's chilling music is fantastic but distractingly out of place here.
It's a mess of a film that will win some with it's odd approach but in the end lose most because it's just not that well done.

2 voices in the dark out of 5

Doctor Faustus (1967)

A sometimes surreal and unabashed stage-like adaptation of Kit Marlowe's classic play. The trappings that surround the titular character are great, even though they're clearly fake, and the coloured lighting is unusual.
The demon Mephistopheles is a memorable character. But Burton's Faustus not so much; his delivery is often flat and overly-rehearsed.
Liz appears in various silly guises any time a woman to be desired is needed, but she speaketh not and her inclusion makes the whole thing feel more like a weird commentary on the couple's turbulent private life than it does a struggle of conscience for the soul of the tragic doctor. To be frank, it's a train wreck at times, or, considering the era and pace, a horse drawn cart wreck.

2 professed depths out of 5

CARTEL LAND [2015]

Director Matthew Heineman's Cartel Land documents the war against the Mexican drug cartel occurring on both sides of the border.
After both the American & Mexican government failed to protect their own people, some bat-shit crazy vigilantes found they had no choice but to fight to protect what they love and we get an in-depth look at their day-to-day life.
Littered with scenes of severed heads, bullet-dodging, cadavers galore and disturbingly brutal beatings it's pretty obvious there was no intention to candy-coat anything for the viewer.  Heineman isn't afraid to intimately approach those involved within Cartel and here is where the picture is proven to be not quite as black & white as we initially think it is.  The flow is a little wonky at times and it feels a bit pointless when we know there's nothing that will ever put a stop it to it.
It makes me think back to The Wire on how one can't call this shit a war, because wars actually end.

3 night-time cook-outs out of 5

SPOTLIGHT [2015]

Tom McCarthy was well on his way to becoming one of my favorite film directors but then The Cobbler dropped out of his ass and all that blew to hell.
Fortunately he redeems himself with the biographical drama Spotlight.
Based on the 2001 true story of a group of Boston Globe investigative reporters who struggle to expose a massively buried series of child sex abuse scandals, spanning across decades, within the local Catholic priest community.
It's impressive ensemble cast are fully committed to allowing the story speak for itself making it all the more engrossing with unglamorous believability.  Quite often films like this seem to bury themselves in holier-than-thou self-gratification but Spotlight is just as interested in honest journalism as it is solid story-telling.  It's an engrossing testament to why we can't forget about the blood, sweat & tears put into disappearing newsprint journalism in the digital age of social media.

3½ missing documents out of 5

Spike Lee's Chronicles of Brooklyn Collection

Spike's continuing exploration and documentation of the Brooklyn lifestyle and of the many different kinds of people that reside or work within it is something close to his heart due to his having lived in the area as a child.
Because I've reviewed all of the films to date, you can just click on the Spike Lee label to see them, but they're published out of production order, so I'm taking this opportunity to rectify that with a list that puts them in the order they were shot and released. And if the director chooses to continue the loosely connected series in the future it can be easily placed.

01. She's Gotta Have It (1986)
02. Do The Right Thing (1989)
03. Crooklyn (1994)
04. Clockers (1995)
05. He Got Game (1998)
06. Red Hook Summer (2012)

20th Century Boys 3: Redemption (2009)

Other than revealing who Tomodachi actually is, which is something I'd ceased caring about halfway through Part Two, showing past events in a different light and one successful emotional reunion is really all that Part Three has to offer. Having endured the stretched thin plot and weak ending you might be tempted to turn off as the credits roll, but please don’t, because following them is the lengthiest post-credit sequence that I've ever seen and it's the very best part of the entire trilogy combined. The first film captured a little of what's on display at the very end, but nothing else came close.

2 Blade Runner skylines out of 5

WRECKER [2015]

Director Micheal Bafaro's road movie thriller Wrecker wishes it was Duel.
Emily & Leslie are on their way out of state and pass by the wrong truck, leading to a murderous chase along the deserted California highway.
The two girls might be nicer to look at than Dennis Weaver was but they sure as hell aren't nearly as talented, enticing or as smart.  They're completely blank-minded twits with character "arcs"so  all over the map you can't help but smell the foul odor of bad writing.  Where there should be tension there's a huge lump of boredom gnawing into your brain, while you wait for the 80 minutes to finish up in a more hurried fashion.

1 rip-off, not remake out of 5.

CAPITÁO FALCÁO [2015]

aka Captain Falcon

Portuguese director João Leitão's Capitão Falcão is part gnashing political satire and part slapstick superhero comedy.
Set near the end of the Salazar years in Portugal, uber-patriotic fascist masked crusader Captain Falcon is out to save his country from the Communist pigs along with his trusted Chinese sidekick, Partridge Kid.
If you could imagine the Zucker Brothers & Jim Abrahams during their greatest year, directing an episode of the old Green Hornet series then you get the idea of the tone of the film.  It's silly.  Really really silly, but, boy, is it ever fucking funny.  Not only does it take some shit-eating grinned jabs at politics, it takes delight in offending anyone who has no idea of the dictatorship history of the country.  A complete box-office bomb in it's own home, Capitão Falcão set out to teach it's people a lesson no one was ready to learn.  

3½ Communinjas out of 5

20th Century Boys 2: The Last Hope (2009)

The second part of a trilogy based on the manga by Naoki Urasawa is set in the year 2015, which is when the first film began, so we've come full circle. Unfortunately, it's even less entertaining than what came before. Part One had the childhood to adult mystery to fall back on. Last Hope has Kanna Endō, now grown, continuing the quest to unmask Tomodachi. Airi Taira plays Kanna and does well with what she's given, her male helpers equally so, but giving them three or four really great scenes in movie that runs for 139 minutes is too few, especially when the remainder of the time it plods along like a lame duck with a similar amount of comedy value attached.

2½ good luck charms out of 5

THOUGHT CRIMES: THE CASE OF THE CANNIBAL COP [2015]

Director Erin Carr's documentary Thought Crimes: The Case of the Cannibal Cop isn't really the type of film that sets out to make you feel all warm and gooey inside.  Unless, of course you're a little weird, like the film's subject: former New York police officer Gilberto Valle.
This goof-ball cop never actually went through with his crimes but secretly went into great detail on a fetish website about how he'd go about raping, cooking and eating some of his female friends.  He went so far that he actually stalked the women and looked up their information on the police database.
Can he be sentenced to prison for a crime has not yet committed?
The film does a wonderful job at making it difficult to decide what side you should be taking and in the end it leaves it entirely up to you.  My head's still spinning as to what side to take, other than agreeing that he's definitely creepy and needs something to channel those thoughts.
It's not particularly well put together but the subject matter is interesting enough to give one a lot to think about.

3 Minority Reports out of 5

ROOM [2015]

Frank director Lenny Abrahamson delivers a whirlwind of emotions in Room, an adaptation of Irish-Canadian Emma Donoghue's critically acclaimed novel.
It tells the compelling story of a young woman (brilliantly played by Brie Larson) who's raised her five year old son in hostile captivity, forcing her to teach him everything she knows and hide the outside world from him to prevent any sort of trouble from their abusive captor.
It's essentially about the willful bond between a mother and her son, their different co-dependencies & independencies, as well as a series of short but necessarily powerful moments with other family members.  How they adjust to the world around them is difficult viewing that aims straight for the gut, with some huge emotional moments and others are so subtle and small you might not take note until much later.    In the end, I wanted to give my mom a big exhausted hug and thank her for everything she's sacrificed for my well-being, no matter how hard it all got.

5 rotten teeth out of 5

20th Century Boys 1: Beginning of the End (2008)

The first part of a trilogy based on the popular manga by Naoki Urasawa tells of convenience store owner Kenji Endō and his connection to a bizarre cult. It jumps around a lot in time near the beginning, laying a foundation upon which the decades-spanning mystery is built upon.
The foundation itself is decent enough, and what follows is at times even intriguing, but by the second half, when it turned from introspection to big-budget spectacle, my heart was no longer in it.
The portion of the trilogy that gets resolved in Part One was too choppy and the protagonist lacked depth, an occurrence that is very possibly a casualty of a twenty-two volume manga needing to be shortened for the screen. Maybe viewing the two subsequent parts will help the overall feeling.

3 saviour songs out of 5

Dazed and Confused (1993)

On the last day of term for the Class of 1976 the last thing any student wants is to make life-changing decisions, but life doesn't respect that kind of thinking.
There’s no one character that I identify with most in D and C, and perhaps in a fundamental way that’s the beauty of it; we can take what we want from each person and have that combination speak indirectly to us.
It's more than just another coming of age story; it casts recognisable shadows upon the unseen doorway into that fragile arena and draws a line from there to all the possible states of being that lead away from it.
It’s rooted to a specific era but is a film for the ages. Likewise, while it's true that the locations and events are US-specific (the asinine paddling, etc), the feelings and emotions it evokes are universally relatable.

4 summer priorities out of 5

CLOUDS OF SILS MARIA [2014]

Irma Vep director Oliver Assayas brings us Clouds of Sils Maria, a deceivingly complex French character drama that astounds with it's leading performances.
An aging actress (meticulously played by Juliette Binoche) accepts a role in a play that launched her career many years ago, only now she's playing the older woman opposite the younger role she once portrayed.
Watching Binoche and Kristen Stewart, as her PA, is an absolute delight as the two clash, bond and observe the world with different eyes with such clever nuance, playfulness and sincerity.  Toss Chloë Grace Moretz into the mix as a reckless, yet talented, actress and you have some of the best quiet character driven scenes composed in a long long time.  It's life imitates art story is a familiar one but rarely is it graced with these sort of performances and moments of tantalizing dialogues.
It might seem like it's moving at a snail's pace but find it's underlying lessons & questions and you'll discover a thoughtful cinematic gem.

4 brain snakes out of 5

DEATHGASM [2015]

Deathgasm.  It's called Deathgasm.
We'll let that sink in for a moment.
WETA visual FX-head Jason Lei Howden's feature length directorial debut is the latest in a long line of ridiculous Kiwi splatterfests.
It's the touching story of a bunch of New Zealand teenage metalheads and D&D nerds who willingly summon a demon lord after they rock out on some ancient sheet music they stumbled upon.
If this sounds like a premise you can get on board with then you probably won't be disappointed.  It's reasonably funny, absurdly gory, has plenty of heavy metal & RPG jokes that only the average head-banger will understand and a guy in corpse paint enjoying an ice-cream cone.  If this doesn't sound like your thing, then you're most definitely correct.  It's the type of film that'll make your parents angry, have poor ol' granny a hobblin' for the hills and frighten the bully preppies at high school.
In short, if this movie came out when I was 17, I'd have built a shrine for it.

2½ Rick Astley records out of 5

Yay for me for not once mentioning Braindead in this review.  :D

He Got Game (1998)

A talented Coney Island basketball player by the name of Jesus (Ray Allen) struggles with fame, raising his sister alone, choosing a college and the unexpected return of his estranged father. It's not a typical sports movie, thankfully, but nor is it free of their usual dross.
Interestingly, Dir. Spike Lee doesn't lay the film's message on as thick as he could have; he lets the subtleties do the work instead, but they aren't quite up to the task and it runs out of steam in the last third.
Denzel is decent as a shouty father but less interesting elsewhere. The subplot with his character and Milla's is ineffectual.
The musical score also occasionally lets the drama down, contrasted by a number of Public Enemy songs that actually work well.

3 slow-mo hoop shots out of 5

THE HATEFUL EIGHT [2015]

Writer/director Quentin Tarantino packs in some good ol' fashioned snowy film-making with his off-beat Western/thriller The Hateful Eight.
A pack of thugs, all strangers to each other, are trapped in a isolated cabin during a snowy blizzard, which inevitably leads to...well...some serious cabin fever aka obligatory Tarantino bloodshed and vulgar but engrossing monologues.
With this film, it's become clear the smug director has the rights to be smug, as he's got a confident and well-developed grasp on the art of cinematic storytelling.  It's beautifully shot, well-paced, jammed to the brim with wonderful performances from it's genre cast and never ceases to keep you guessing who's who and what's what.
It's essentially Rawhide meets Reservoir Dogs but, hot damn, if it's not a fully captivating mash-up of the two films.

4 Silent Nights out of 5

THE LOOK OF SILENCE [2014]

Director Joshua Oppenheimer's disturbing documentary The Act of Killing still haunts me to this very day, so why not add bit more to that load with his heartbreaking companion piece, The Look of Silence.
Taking a more conventional approach, as opposed it's surreal predecessor, Oppenheimer follows an anonymous optometrist who peacefully seeks out all the men responsible for the execution of his brother during the Indonesian Massacre in the mid '60's.
What's interesting here, is while most documentary film-makers want their subjects to forget the camera is on them, Oppenheimer pushes it forward, forcing the frightening interviewees to reveal more than they think they are.
Even after all these years, the wounds are still raw for everyone involved and it makes for some very unsettling conversations where the silence becomes unbearably unsettling yet so very hard to distant oneself from, no matter how stomach-turning it becomes.

4 jumping beans out of 5

SULEMANI KEEDA [2014]

aka Writers

In an unexpected turn, India gives us it's take on the mumblecore genre with writer/director Amit Masurkar's realistically funny Sulemani Keeda.
It follows two struggling screenwriters-to-be who hopelessly push their script around town, while juggling their own friendship, the blossoming relationships that come along the way as well as attempting to crank out a screenplay that doesn't follow the typical Bollywod formula.  There's plenty of in-jokes that will fly over Western audiences head, however they pack in enough universal humor and heart to never feel pretentious.   Narratively speaking there's nothing new here but it manages to pack in plenty of boys being boys giggles, some cleverly inventive editing and a warmth that is hard not to win one over by the end.

4 lustless, angry, dark orgies out of 5

THE GOOD DINOSAUR [2015]

2015 saw one of Pixar Animation's greatest achievements with Inside Out and, now with director Peter Sohn's feature length debut The Good Dinosaur, it's seen one of it's biggest fumbles as well.
The touching story of a dinosaur & his cave-boy, who bond as they journey through the savage wilderness in hopes to find their ways back home doesn't quite make it's mark.  
It features all the usual Pixar ingredients to make for a good time, including humor, a wide variety of colorful characters, beautifully rendered animation and a unique look at the world.  However it's missing the inventive storytelling full of depth and sophistication we've all come to expect from the studio, making it far from memorable compared to it's more mature predecessors.
It might not live up to the studios usual standards but it never feels like you're wasting your time because you could probably being doing a lot worse when it comes to the family-friendly films.

3 oddly placed drug trips out of 5

ANOMALISA [2015]

Never one to spoon-feed audiences, ambitious writer/director Charlie Kaufman (and co-director Duke Johnson) forces your jaw to the floor with the stop-motion animated masterpiece comical drama Anomalisa.
A depressed motivational speaker, who literally hears the same voice coming from everyone he meets, has a spark thrown into his life when he meets a woman who sounds completely different from the rest of the world.
The eerily realistic animated puppets are so engrossing you quite often forget it's not live-action, while you simultaneously get lost in it's tale of loneliness, depression, sex and a creepy Japanese automaton.  It's easy to admire the film from a technical standpoint, however at first it's a little difficult to enjoy the loathsome characters, until you know where it's leading you and it all becomes clear (sort of) as to why everything is the way it is.

4½ girls who wanna have fun out of 5

AMY [2015]

Asif Kapadia, the director of Senna, gives us a glimpse into the heart-breaking world of troubled neo-soul singer/songwriter Amy Winehouse, who sadly joined the 27 Club in 2011.
Amy collects a series of intimate interviews with the late songstress to tell her story in her own words, with scattered observations from the people who surrounded her, some of whom need a good punch square in the face.
When she was happy, Winehouse was a beautiful, funny, shy talent that glowed with tenderness, love and wonder.  However when her demons got the best of her, she was crass, unsightly and void of a care in the world.  The film portrays her as a victim to a world around that wanted nothing but to expose her talents for greed, self-service and made no apology at taking cruel potshots at her personal struggles.  As depressing as it all is, the film also shines a well-deserved spotlight on her inspiring talents, person and the passion she brought to the world.
I wasn't all that familiar with her work before this film but I've since become a fan.

4 shitty men in one's life out of 5

Capricorn One (1977)

A late 70s conspiracy thriller set around NASA's faking a manned mission to Mars. The three crew members of the Apollo 11 Capricorn One module aren't happy with the situation, but what can they do? The world is watching.
Dir. Hyams makes good use of his 2.35 frame and the now-familiar mission control setting lends believability to the scenario. I'm not sure why it's considered such a classic of the genre by some folks, but it's certainly an entertaining ride for as long as it lasts.

3 giant lies for mankind out of 5

The Mummy's Shroud (1967)

Film number three begins with an event that's almost biblical in fashion; admittedly, it's acted out in an amateur dramatic way, but I still liked it.
It's split between two camps for a time, a lost party and a search party, but when they come together things get more entertaining. The use of shadows and camera placements are periodically praiseworthy. The woman's role is on equal standing with that of her companions. The kills are brutal by Hammer standards. And the shroud of the title is actually relevant to the plot!

3 sacred words out of 5

Easy Rider (1969)

Two bikers with a secret cargo traverse the Southern parts of America en route to Mardi Gras, each one epitomising freedom in their own way.
Dennis Hopper's character is talkative, prone to frequent upset and often strung-out. In contrast, Peter Fonda's character is quiet, amiable and introspective. On the road they're at peace, self-governing and equal. But the closer they get to 'civilisation' the more hostile life becomes.
Counterculture films don't get much better or iconic than Easy Rider. The natural lighting and partly improvised script give it a kind of timely truth that other films lack. Almost everything about its structure just feels right. Even the freaky-deaky scene in the cemetery has a sincerity about it.
A ton of clones exist but nothing to equal it that I'm aware of. The soundtrack is so good that you even look forward to the musical montages.

5 campfire smokes out of 5