smudged68

This film is alright. A film directed by Ridley Scott ? Alright ? I am a big fan of Scott's movies. He has an incredible visual sense and very strong storytelling skills. But am I the only one to notice how unevenly paced this film is ? It just feels like it's been tampered with and is not the film that was intended.

For instance, the death of one character in the film is given a degree of weight that his one or two lines previously do not deserve. There are other scenes that go on a long time after their point has been made. I t actually made me physically uncomfortable.

This is not like Ridley Scott. It makes me feel that someone may have tampered with the film in the editing room. Anyone any ideas ? I did enjoy this film. Orlando Bloom manages to convince in the lead role (despite my initial misgivings), the fight scenes are suitably spectacular and graphic and there is huge visual scope.

But do we have to wait for the DVD to find if there was another cut ?

If the casual film fan has ever heard of or seen a Norman J. Warren film, chances are that film is 'Inseminoid', one of the first films to be a big hit on sell-through video in the early 80's.

However, 'Terror' is not as obscure a movie as you may think. It was the top grossing film in the UK for one week and in the States it actually made No. 19 in Variety's Top 50 grossing movies for 1979.

'Inseminoid' is usually referred to, perhaps a little unfairly, as a cheap rip-off of 'Alien'. 'Terror' is definitely a cheap rip-off of Dario Argento's 'Suspiria'.

The story involves a witch who is burnt at the stake. She curses the family responsible for her plight and promises to wipe out their line. Flash forward a couple of hundred years and we discover that what we have been watching is a movie. Then...everybody gets killed. There's very little plot for the rest of the film. Some characters arrive for no apparent reason...and then get killed...for no apparent reason.

What's this all got to do with 'Suspiria' then ? Well, here's a little checklist.

Suspiria - Terror

Supernatural story involving witches - Check

Film made with emphasis of style over narrative - Check

Scenes lit in lots of bright reds and greens - Check

Soundtrack full of atonality, clanging and wailing voices - Check

Film set in ballet school - The girls live in a school but they all seem to work at a 'Gentleman's Club'.

Lots of blood and girls dressed in white - Check

Death by disembodied hand through a window - Death by disembodied hand through a wall

Running through a storm pursued by a killer - Check

Knives entering flesh in jagged close-up - Check

Strange, overly made-up, androgynous-looking older women - Check

A hulking giant who may or may not be involved - Check (Peter 'Chewbacca' Mayhew)

A nightmarish masterpiece of a horror movie - Erm...

But the really interesting one that's made me think is when one of the characters dies by decapitation due to a broken window. There is a scene exactly like it in Argento's 'Inferno'. But 'Inferno' was made after 'Terror'. This is pure speculation but I wonder did Argento see 'Terror' at some point and say (in Italian, obviously) "Well, this bloke nicked so much from me. I'm going to nick this from him". Or was it just a weird coincidence. I am intrigued.

However, while 'Suspiria' is undoubtedly one of the greatest horror films ever made - a real experience - 'Terror' is unfortunately not. It is interesting to watch someone try to copy Argento but there is no real understanding here of what makes his films work. 'Terror' lacks a decent script, decent actors and decent direction. Of interest to Argento fans only.

Yes - Payback & Point Blank (1967) are very similar. But there is a very good reason for that. Both films are based on the novel 'The Hunter' by Richard Stark, a pseudonym for Donald E Westlake.

The films share several character names such as Brewster, Carter, Stegman and Fairfax and similar plots. In both cases the anti-hero Porter (or Walker) is trying to recover a sum of money after being double-crossed.

Now, I am a huge fan of Point Blank. It takes a relatively simple plot and makes a bit of cinematic poetry out of it. And if I was forced to compare Lee Marvin and Mel Gibson's performances, then I'm sorry but Gibson would lose big time. However, Payback is a much better film than I thought it would be. There are sufficient differences to make the story interesting and though it is told in a much more straightforward and, dare I say, 'safe' way than Point Blank, it is a very well made film and tells a compelling story well. And it's nice to see Gibson return to a somewhat morally ambiguous character a la Mad Max.

When you watch an exploitation horror movie you sit down with a certain expectation of what you're going to get. To put it bluntly, sex and violence. It's what you watch films like this for. And yet, why did I come away from this film with such a nasty taste in my mouth ?

Well, to start with, this film was made by a misogynist. Okay, it's a film about a rapist-murderer so there's obviously going to be violence towards women but every female character in this film is either damaged:- drug addict, victim of abuse, potential suicide or completely ineffectual (more of that later).

There is also here a screenwriter who has a serious problem with psychiatrists. The police psychiatrist is shoved out of the way during a briefing ("we don't need any of this psycho mumbo jumbo") and the main protagonist is not only a psychiatrist but also - whisper it quietly - a woman!

There's a scene that highlights this misogyny and hatred of psychiatrists. In fact, it is otherwise irrelevant to the plot.

A woman is on the top of a tall building threatening to jump when the police arrive. The woman psychiatrist, Dr. Gail., is trying to talk her down. "How long's she been there ?" asks the cop. "Two hours" says the patrolman. "How long's Dr. Gail been talking to her ?" "15 minutes" "Is she doing any good ?" "No."

So the cop pushes Dr. Gail aside and basically says "Stop it. Behave yourself. Get down." At which the woman rushes into his arms. He then, of course, ends up in bed with Dr. Gail.

Even the killer, who has severe mental problems, ridicules the psychiatrist when she tries to reach him. Oh, he happens to be tying her to a chair at this point.

Which brings me to the policemen. There are two main cops, Lt. McCabe and Sgt. Hatcher, and they are complete idiots. I couldn't work out whether they were supposed to be taken seriously or not. I'm still not sure. They seem to ignore anyone who has any insight or actual information on the case, saying they're just doing their job. And when they 'do their job' - well...

They arrive at a suspect's house. Hatcher wants to break in but McCabe says they haven't got a warrant (why not ?) and if they break in anything they find would be inadmissible as evidence. Hatcher: "I wanna do it anyway" McCabe: "okay". Eh ?

So does this film have any redeeming qualities ? Well, maybe. Bizarrely it's The Killer or The Strangler. He's billed as both though his character has a name and more of a personality than anyone else in the film. Nicholas Worth in this part gives something close to a performance which sets him head and shoulders above anybody else in this film although his is a totally repellent character.

Having said all that, this film is not particularly graphic. Though that may just be the print I saw as there seemed to be some very abrupt edit points. However, I have absolutely no desire to see an uncut version.

Let me be clear. I'm a fan of the genre. I enjoy Friday 13th movies (even the duff ones), the Halloween series, and a lot of other stalk 'n' slash stuff so I'm no horror prude. But this is a film that hits you over the head with a sledgehammer to make it clear that women have no place in the world and are only good for sex. Avoid.

PS: Don't think this film sounds so bad it must be good. It's not. It's so bad it's bad.

Christopher Lee in "Circus Of Fear". It's got to be a horror movie, right ? Well, no. "Circus Of Fear" is a pretty classic-style whodunnit full of red herrings and characters with skeletons in their cupboards.

It starts with a very dramatic and almost silent armoured car heist which goes terribly wrong when a security guard is shot and killed. The gang escape and divide up the loot, saving one share for their boss who only communicates with them via the phone and who none of them have ever seen. The action soon moves to the winter quarters of Barberini's circus - which appears to be somewhere in Berkshire! There is a quite surreal shot of a line of elephants and camels moving down a suburban street. The rest of the film takes place here, its anglo-German cast perfectly capturing the international flavour of the circus. And it is here that the murder mystery element of the film really takes off. Leo Genn is 'Gentleman Jim' Elliott, the police inspector investigating the heist. Though it seems most of the circus folk are keeping an eye on each other. Christopher Lee makes a startling appearance as Gregor, the lion tamer, who wears a black hood at all times to hide the horrible scars he received when he was attacked by a lion. The film was written and produced by Harry Alan Towers, for whom Lee made the series of Fu Manchu pictures, and directed by John Moxey, for whom he had made the 1959 occult chiller "City Of The Dead". There are pleasures to be had from cameo appearances by the likes of Cecil Parker as Elliott's superior and Klaus Kinski who gets to lurk menacingly as a member of the gang. It's not long before more bodies start piling up. But who is the killer ? Is it Barberini, the circus owner with financial troubles ? Mario, the jealous knife-thrower ? Maybe it's Mr. Big, the blackmailer ? Or Karl, the ringmaster with an unhealthy interest in Gina, Mario's girlfriend ? Or maybe it's Gregor, whose brother is in jail for murder ? I've seen the film. I know the truth. The killer is..Aaaarghh!