Karanlik Sular

Yesterday afternoon I also watched a pretty good Turkish horror film from Onar Films entitled Karanlik Sular aka The Serpent's Tale. I must admit quite a bit of it was so weird it bordered on being right our surreal, however, in my book that's nothing to frown at. I liked it quite a bit. An American in Istanbul meets a guy who apparently, in reality, is dead. And he meets the guy's mum, and there's a vampire girl, and stuff. Yes, I'm rambling but it was pretty good never the less. The DVD release from Onar was of Onar's usual good quality in the extra material department, however, unfortunately, the print wasn't as good as one could have expected from a pretty recent movie like this. And it had burnt-in English subs which I'd be pretty annoyed about if I were Greek (cos the DVD has optional Greek subs which means you have two on-screen sets of subs if you go for the Greek option). Otherwise a good release and, oh yeah, there's also an interview with the director (who says he's tired of the film, ha ha). Only, it's a little sad to see the interview now as it was conducted by Metin Demirhan who died recently way too young. My mate Ayman Kole (in Sydney and of Cinehound) was friends with him and from what I can gather he was the biggest expert on Turkish fantastic cinema. and he co-wrote the book 'Fantastik Turk Sinemasý' [Turkish Fantastic Cinema]. He was only 42.

Gong Tau

This afternoon I watched Herman Yau's latest film, GONG TAU - An Oriental Black Magic, which is sort of an updated take on Shaw Brother's BLACK MAGIC series (Black Magic 1+2, and the third entry Seeding of a Ghost). A policeman's wife is possessed by black magic, gong tau, and there's all kindsa stuff. Pretty gory, dark, and definitely one of the best Hong Kong horror flicks in a long time. Some Herman Yau fans have complained about it not being as extreme as EBOLA SYNDROME but fuck that I say! Not everything has to be EBOLA SYNDROME!! It's a different film ffs! Out on a pretty good HK DVD with decent subs.

No Time To Die

Alright, I was gonna write some more intro stuff about glorious meee but, ush, I couldn't be arsed tonight (no, not a very good start, ha ha). Anyway, I watched an entertaining (although not that good) Indo flick (i.e. Indonesian film) called NO TIME TO DIE. Actually it's a German Indonesian co-production filmed in Indonesia. It stars Barry Prima and Chris Mitchum. Advent Bangun (also an Indo film regular) was also in it. As I said, it was okay without being neither as wild nor crazy as the other Indo movies I've seen. It's very rare these days but I got hold of a Japanese VHS from a seller in Sweden who advertised for it at the Cinehound forum. Hmm, I guess I should tell you about Cinehound shouldn't I. But not tonight, baby, I'm tired!