Dylan Dog: Dead of Night

Director: Kevin Munroe
Writers: Thomas Dean Donnelly & Joshua Oppenheimer
Based on: Comic Book Series written by Tiziano Sclavi
Released: 2011
Labels: Action|Comedy|Monster|2010's

Based on one of the world's bestselling comic book series with over 70 million readers worldwide, "Dylan Dog: Dead of Night" blends horror and humor set in the backstreets of New Orleans...a city with a long and storied history with the supernatural. The story revolves around Dylan Dog, the world's only private investigator of the undead with a business card that features his slogan, "No pulse, No problem."

Having left the world of the supernatural behind after the death of his wife, Dylan is pulled back into action to solve the murder of a mysterious woman's father. Along with his zombie assistant Marcus, he finds himself drawn into the middle of a battle between the clans of vampire, werewolf and zombie for possession of a rare artifact to control both the mortal and monster world. Dylan must go where the living date not in order to solve the case, save mankind and keep his partner from losing any more body parts. (Taken from Official Website)

It doesn't take much investigation to discover that Dylan Dog: Dead of Night is hated by fans of the original Italian comic book on which it is based. This seems to be because the filmmakers have not even tried to stick to the original concept and feel. The biggest complaints are that the movie makes light where there should be dark and that major liberties have been taken with key characters and settings. So putting the source material aside let's look at this film as a piece of horror genre cinema.

The film places it's flag firmly in the camp (pun intended) of horror-comedy. The interplay between the characters is rife with wit and sarcasm, much of which is well written and entertaining, particularly the relationship between Dylan Dog, played by Brandon Routh and his un-dead sidekick Marcus, played by Sam Huntington. If this pairing seems familiar, thats because they played Clark Kent/Superman and Jimmy Olsen respectively in the 2006 film ''Superman Returns''. Routh's fresh-faced-superman good looks doesn't really lend itself to a portrayal of a hardened PI for the supernatural underworld, but his strong physicality backs up the role. Overall the acting is good throughout including a small but fantastically campy performance from Peter Stormare (Fargo).

The realtively low-budget of $20M ensures that this movie looks like a TV pilot rather than a cinematic experience, and the special effects are certainly akin to the production values of Buffy the Vampire Slayer or Supernatural. The Werewolves are very much in the B-movie humanoid style, the Vampires are dark, hip and hedonistic (as they always are nowadays), and the Zombies provide the comic relief with some nice gags about diet, spare body parts and a support group.

The story is a bit tired in an ''ancient artifact has power to release mythical beast from slumber to wreak havoc on the world, it mustn't fall into the wrong hands'' type way, but the regular introduction of new un-dead creatures and scenarios keeps you interested along with some tidily directed action sequences.

As you can imagine there really is no depth here but it is an enjoyable romp and very easy to enjoy for what it is.

Dylan Dog: Dead of Night Official Website

Dylan Dog: Dead of Night on IMDb

Dylan Dog: Dead of Night on Wikipedia

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The Thing (1982)

Writer: John W. Campbell Jr. (story), Bill Lancaster (screenplay)
Director: John Carpenter
Released: 1982
Labels: Monster|Sci-Fi|1980's

Continuing our current theme of Universal Studios horror with milestone special effects, we decided to feature John Carpenter's The Thing.

A re-working of the 1951 film The Thing from Another World based on the story Who Goes There? by John W Campbell Jr, The Thing is set in as about a remote place as you can get, the Antarctic. A group of scientists become cut-off from civilization as events unfold and are preyed upon by a shape-shifting alien life-form. The "thing," as it becomes known, is able to take on the appearance of it's victims and gives our team at the base the secondary terror of not knowing who is human and who is the Thing! 

John Carpenter's films are famously hit and miss (Halloween is a must-see but films like Christine and The Ward really don't live up to the promise) but 'The Thing' has got to rate as one of his best. 

The film impresses with its incredibly bleak look and sound, a low bassy score by genius film composer Ennio Morricone adds to the claustrophobic tension that builds throughout. Much like the characters in the film you are kept guessing as to who has been infected by the Thing and in-fact you never really know what happens to a few of the characters, and rather than an oversight this is entirely intentional as it gives you a taste of the confusion in the base. You can't even say for certain if our hero, MacReady (played perfectly by Kurt Russell) is infected or not! 

The special effects by Rob Bottin (The Howling, Witches of Eastwick, Se7en) and his team may look a little dated 30 years on but are still very impressive nonetheless. Plenty of slimy shape-shifting, body-ripping gore and teeth and tentacles will keep you squirming but it in no way lessens the dramatic impact of the film. 

Universal Studios Orlando Horror Make-up Show

A really well detailed feature on the creation of these effects can be found at the excellent fan-site Outpost #31.

The Thing performed poorly at the box office and was not well received critically, apparently audiences weren't quite ready for this level of body horror, and because of this it has remained relatively unknown in this genre in comparison to films like Alien or Predator. It is good news that this year they intend on releasing a prequel (confusingly also entitled The Thing) which we are told will reveal what happens right up to the opening credits of the original and remain true to all that has been told thus far, and in addition will also give some conclusion to the original film. We just hope that this new movie will re-kindle some interest in the original and allow many more horror fans to experience this excellent film.

The Thing theatrical trailer

The Thing at iMDB

The Thing at Wikipedia

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An American Werewolf in London

Writer: John Landis
Director: John Landis
Released: 1981
Labels: Monster|Comedy|1980's

Brief Synopsis:

Two young American backpackers, David and Jack, are attacked by a werewolf in a remote British village; Jack is killed, but David is just wounded. He awakes in a London hospital, has dreams and visions of his own burgeoning blood-lust and of random (and quite bizarre) scary scenarios, not least the military rampaging zombies that massacre his family! Jack re-visits David and explains that he is stuck in limbo as an "un-dead" until the werewolf bloodline is severed and insists that David kill himself.  A pretty young nurse, Alex, takes pity on David and invites him to stay with her. Full moon inevitably comes around and David becomes a werewolf and sets about doing what werewolves do best, all over London.

Our recent trip to Universal Studios Horror Make-up Show (see separate post) prompted this re-watch of  "An American Werewolf in London" as we were shown some of the props and techniques employed in the making of this film.

Made in 1981 by Universal pictures and directed by John Landis (The Blues Brothers, Twilight Zone ,  Animal House) it harks back to the movie making style of the classic British Hammer Film horrors from the 1950's 60's & 70's. (It is interesting to note that the "Hammer Horrors" thrived because, after the initial success of their first Dracula release, Universal Studios opened up their library and gave them license to remake all their iconic monster movies). It is a movie that has no CGI effects and in fact has a relatively small amount of gore and action compared to the modern horror, but it does have plenty of charm and humor. Actually it uses comedy to great effect (particularly in Jack (Griffin Dunne) whose pissed off un-dead laconic style is really funny) and there are some amusing sight gags too. This is, however, a true horror movie and it does not fail to create suspense and tension throughout, there is plenty to make you jump and you also do feel for the tragedy of David's plight.

The film is renowned for its transformation scene, and it really is a work of genius from legendary special effects artist Rick Baker (The Ring, Men in Black, Hellboy ... the list goes on and on....). There is no animation here, all that you see has been created with the use of prosthetics, make-up, animatronics and some intense acting from David Naughton. It won a 1981 academy award in a category specifically introduced for this piece of work, we couldn't resist giving it to you here in all its magnificence. so......

More of Rick Bakers make-up effects teams work. This was particularly uncomfortable for David Naughton as the contact lenses were made of glass back then! 

Oh and by the way...this face pretty much traumatized us! (it reminded us of the demonic subliminal images throughout the Exorcist)

This movie has so many interesting facts and trivia titbits that it's impossible to list them all but a couple of our favorites are:

*Frank Oz (of Muppets fame) makes two appearances in the film, one as an American embassy worker and the other as Miss Piggy!

*The songs used in the film all have 'Moon' in the title.

*Oh, and keep your eye on the credits for a royal message!

Yes, this film comes across as a bit dated now, and it's not as slick as modern productions, but we love this movie for everything that it is not, as much as everything that it is.

An American Werewolf in London Trailer

An American Werewolf at iMDB

An American Werewolf at Wikipedia

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Feast

Writers: Marcus Dunstan, Patrick Melton
Director: John Gulager
Released: 2005
Labels: Comedy|Gore|Monster


Monster Movie Checklist:

1. Violent monsters with a thirst for blood.....check.

2. A mismatched band of heroes, villains and dumbasses 

    that have to team up to fight for survival......check.

3. A remote setting leaving our victims totally isolated (also 

    a cheap location shoot)........check.

4. An inconceivable amount of blood and fluids to be 

    ejected from said victims......check.

So everything seems to be in place for a great, gory time...however, Feast (2005) just manages to fall short of being the complete package.

The base humor is clunky and does not sit particularly well amongst the slickly directed action and gore it is achieved much more successfully in 'From Dusk til Dawn' or even in the more recent 'Zombieland'. Occasionally we are given scenes of sentimentality, but we just don't care about the characters enough for that to engage us.


It must be said though, as a straight up crazy, smash-and-grab monster movie it does deliver the goods, the effects, which appear to have little or no CGI, are excellent and the originality of some of the gorier moments are delightfully sick (ever seen an alien baby monster face-f**k a mutilated human-bomb woman?.. Nope, neither had we!).

The monsters were cool in design, wearing roadkill as clothing to start with and eventually revealing themselves to be fang-toothed muscular bi-peds (think 'Alien' had a love child with a mutant from 'I Am Legend').

The cast consists of a few familiar faces, Balthazar Getty, Henry Rollins and Krista Allen for example, all of which play their roles satisfactorily. The recent version of Piranha (also from Dimension films) was a similar comedy splatterfest and the two films have a lot in common, so if you enjoyed Piranha then you should def check this one out......

Feast Trailer

Feast at iMDB 

Feast at Wikipedia

sequels and 'you might also likes'......