The Batman vs. Dracula (Michael Goguen, USA, 2005)

THE BATMAN VS. DRACULA is a feature length catoon film made for television. I haven't watched the Batman cartoons since sometime in the early 90s when they ran on German tv (not that I ever lived in Germany mind you but via satellite tv). I feared this Batman take on the vampire story might be too, ahm, cartoonish but I think it's done quite well. And the darkness that Frank Miller introduced in the magazine is kept pretty good.

The plot: the ultimate insane inmate (guess who) from Arkham Asylum escapes and tries to find a hidden loot from some robbery. Another Arkham inmate (one Mr Oswald Cobblepot. LOL) follow suit, also to try and find the loot which is hidden somewhere at the Gotham cemetery. Obviously they find the wrong grave.

The film grabbed my attention all the way thru and altho you know the Bat man is probably going to make it to the end the road to there is uneven enough to make you wonder how it's all gonna end. The soundtrack is good and like I said I like that they are sticking to the dark style. Was it scary? Well, seasoned horror fans are not easily scared so no - but I certainly don't think THE BATMAN VS. DRACULA is aimed at the wee ones. All in all I enjoyed the movie heaps.

SPOILER: If there's one thing I disliked it was the fact that no one dies; I mean, come on, it's a vampire film for Christ's sakes! Even if it's set in the DC Comics universe. End of Spoiler.

The extras on the DVD consist of short interview bits, a making of the dubbing process which is fun to watch, and finally a handful of trailers. The film is subbed and dubbed in English/French/Spanish. I bought the reg. 1 DVD which, altho I got it from Amazon UK, was four times cheaper than the UK DVD! Go figure. o_O

The Broken (Sean Ellis, UK, 2008)

I watched the new (everything after 2000 is *new* to me in the world of horror movies!) British horror movie THE BROKEN the other day. I don't wanna reveal too much about the plot but it's kind of a variation on the old THE BODY SNATCHERS theme. The director, Sean Ellis, wanted a horror movie in the vain of the old films that didn't rely on gore or full blown monster makeup and I must say he did a great job in that direction (however there is ONE gore scene that's quite awesome. Look out for it!). There's thankfully no lame humour or "cool" one-liners and the actors are all good. It's a co-production with France so the main character's boyfriend obviously had to be from the land of the cooked frogs. LOL. The UK DVD is good altho the extras are pretty lame. Whoever invented the cut-up interview form ought to be tarred and feathered and run out of town! Overall a highly recommended film.


Thanks to Member-X for the tip.

More AWESOME stuff on an obsolete format

Argh! I have spent way, way too much money on HK films on VHS and LD from the US in the last 24 hours!!! But I had the green and I suddenly stumbled over three tons of films that I've been looking out for for year and years!!! The tapes listed in the last post are from a different seller (and I'll be getting more from him!) so for now I'll just show you these four HIGHLY COOL laserdiscs that I paid for a couple of hours ago. Hopefully they'll fly under the evil customs' VAT tax radar!!



Anthony Wong in the Cat. III film UNDERGROUND BANKER. I've been looking for that one for YEARS!



The Vietnam war film LEATHERNECKS (filmed in the Philippines) on HK LD!!! Awesome!!!



MANIACAL BEAUTY ON THE LOOSE. This is one of a handful of Cat. III films that I posted an article (written by somebody else) about in my zine STAY SICK! #1 from 2000 and that I've been wanting ever since!!!



LETHAL PANTHER!! On HK LD. If I remember correctly I've already got this one of two different DVDs, a video tape, and on VCD. But what the hell, this may be the best version and I love those oversized covers!

[insert Homer Simpson drool here]

Now this is really beyond awesome!! I've just won these two much wanted video tapes on an eBay auction. Argh. Insane! The two films are A SERIOUS SHOCK! YES MADAM (aka YES, MADAM '92: A SERIOUS SHOCK) (starring Cynthia Khan, Moon Lee & Yukari Oshima) and ANGEL TERMINATORS 2 (Moon Lee, Yukari Oshime & Sibelle Hu). Both films are insane GIRLS WITH GUNS/GIRLS KICK ASS AND LOOK CUTE films!! I've already got both films but getting them on VHS is awesome! Yay!!




Uh, I also bought 8 more rare tapes but I'll post those later.

Lejemorder in foreign

I've just added a translator thingy to the Danish section of this blog so now you can read all that "Dutch" stuff in your own language (or at least in English if your own lingo isn't listed)! Needless to say the translations are crap and look like literature from Bizarro World but, hey, you'll get a gist of what I'm babbling about.

Link to the Danish section to the right >>>>>>>

I get up early in the morning - no matter how disappointed I was the day before

I feel like he is here with me now - even though he's dead.

I own two Eels records. I should clearly buy more. :/

There's only one defender of the law that counts... and his name is ARBITRARY JUSTICE!

‎"The Reason is bigger than you!"

I discovered the Italian superhero GIUSTIZIA ARBITRARIA ("Arbitrary Justice" in English) completely by chance when surfing thru unknown blog land some months back. As far as I know the comic is the work of the blog author and the series isn't published outside that particular blog - which is a complete shame as ARBITRARY JUSTICE is AWESOME! The series is very funny and of course completely anarchistic; Arbitrary Justice upholds the law against you!! Hahaha. I've translated one of the stories and you can check more here (but they're only in Italian). Click on the scan twice to see it in full size.



Title: "Arbitrary Justice against self-esteem"
Text under headline: "Based on a true story"

Frame 1: From now on enough with the bullshit... We put everything back in line!

Frame 2: Say it! Say that you're a piece of shit!!!

Frame 3: I'm... I'm a piece of shit!

Frame 5: Then you die!!!

Frame 6: I hate shit...




Thanks to Francesco Maria Zaghini for a couple of corrections in regards to the translation.

Truly bad times!

If you've followed this blog for a while you'll remember my posts about our good friend Bill Barounis of the one-man run Onar Films in Greece (who only release more or less lost Turkish movies of the wild sort) and his difficult situation after his health went bad just over a year ago.

I'm not familiar with the details of his first "situation" but I believe he had a kind of seizure of the brain due to too much stress. He spent two weeks in hospital, came home, got a bit better, but was then diagnosed with brain tumour. He began getting treatments and this has been going for about a year now. Then about a week ago I got word from Miltos (head of Cinehound forum and also located in Athens) who told me Bill's condition had deteriorated but that he didn't have any specific details.

Today, Bill posted a brief piece of info on his Onar website to explain, and unfortunately he suffered a stroke last month! This is indeed terrible, terrible news!!!

Bill has always talked about how much of a jinx he is and how everything always goes wrong in his life in regards to Onar. The stories he's written about it have always been insane; stuff like he sent a guy to pick up a print but he fell down an elevator shaft! And someone else who was to do something for Onar got chased by gangsters. And one time there was a ghostly sound on a print and nobody in the sound studio could explain it. And lots more. And of course the worst thing was Bill's friend and Onar label mate Metin Demirhan (co-author of the book "Fantastic Turkish Cinema") who died untimely.



One time Bill said he wasn't going to post on Cinehound anymore cos he didn't want anything bad to happen to the forum since he was a jinx. I always laughed it off but, hell, maybe it's not so far fetched! It seems bad luck just haunts the poor guy. I can't tell you how truly and utterly sorry I am to learn about this latest chapter of Bill's condition! He truly deserves some good luck now! Bill, my friend, I wish you a full recovery and all the best.


From the Onar website today:

YOU MAY CARE TO KNOW THE LAST MONTH I SUFFERED A STROKE.
I SPENT MOST OF THE DAYS IN THE HOSPITAL.
NOW I CAME HOME ON A WHEELCHAIR. MY WIFE WE'LL TAKE OF THE UNSHIPPED STUFF.
SORRY. DON'T KNOW ANYMORE WHEN ZAGOR WILL COME OUT.

Photos: I haven't posted the two bottom pictures before. They are from an interview with Bill that was posted on a Turkish language website in 2008. You can read it here (or at least look at it). You'll notice they use Bill's Greek name, Vassilis Barounis.

The Abandoned - trailer

I watched the American horror movie THE ABANDONED quite a few years ago; It was around 2007 and I had the pleasure of watching it on eXtase editor (and Doomed Denmark promoter) Nils Markvardsen's big projector screen during a video night at his abode in Copenhagen. The film is really good. I haven't re-watched it since that initial screening so I'm definitely looking forward to it (which makes it a good thing I received it on DVD today, LOL). It was part of the first season of "8 Films to die for".

Noice, mate. Cheers!

Karl Brezdin of "Fist of B-list" blog posted this description of my other blog When the Vietnam War Raged... in the Philippines a few days ago:

When the Vietnam War raged... in the Philippines - One of the most unique editorial concepts you’re likely to find in the wide world of genre film blogging, executed to absolute perfection. Fantastic reading.

Needless to say it warms me ol'e cynical heart when other bloggers write stuff like that. Thanks so much, Karl, you're the best!! xD xD xD