Maybe
it’s because I just recently had to suffer through ‘Razorteeth’, but I
found this killer fish movie fairly entertaining. ‘Frankenfish’ is yet
another ‘Jaws’ rip-off, full of one dimensional characters and generic
plot devices. But the monsters are kinda’ cool, it delivers on the gore
(even if it is CGI), and the actors are good enough to play this goofy
material straight and almost make you buy it. Speaking of the actors,
is male lead Tory Kittles (who plays “Sam Rivers”) Denzel Washington’s
understudy? Watch this movie and tell me if I’m crazy.
Anyway, medical examiner Rivers and Mary Callahan
(China Chow), a biologist, are investigating a chewed up corpse found on
the bayou. A friendly Cajun fisherman takes the two to a small
settlement of house boats where the fish food… I mean supporting cast
are. There’s also a “great white hunter” type responsible for letting
the fish get out in the first place who turns up with his lackeys. One
of the people on the houseboat is the lovely Eliza (K.D. Aubert), who
has been nursing a crush on Sam since high school, although she’s
currently involved with an asshole lawyer (is there any other kind in
cheesy horror movies?). In typical horror movie fashion, the characters
are put under siege by the titular beasties.
By no
means is this a great, or even a good movie. But it is a fairly
enjoyable way to kill 90 minutes if you’re in the mood for a giant
killer fish movie. The tagged on “set up the sequel” ending is stupid,
and I’d like to say unnecessary, but I fully expect ‘Frankenfish 2’ or
‘Frankenfish vs. Python vs. Boa’ to hit the video store shelves any day
now. Aside from the gore, things that might interest schlock fans
include a little bit of nudity, a blowjob scene, some “where the hell
did that come from?” dialogue about lesbianism, a pet cheetah cub for no
reason, and a Viet Nam vet character eating the heart of one of the
fish. Not surprisingly, this has played on Sci-Fi channel with the gore
toned down and the nudity cut. (Bob Ignizio)
This
one has been a long time coming. A real long time. Ever since ‘Day Of The
Dead’ was released in the summer of 1985, fans have been waiting patiently
for the finale to the most celebrated series in the history of horror film.
Numerous projects were proposed or talked about through the years but none
ever came to being. But times changed and horror is now a highly profitable
genre. So after years of bad zombie movies (like the ‘Resident Evil’
series), unofficial sequels (that dreadful ‘Day Of The Dead’ sequel), a
completely pointless remake (‘Dawn Of The Dead’) and one halfway decent
zombie movie (‘28 Days Later’), word spread that George Romero had been
given the go ahead to finish up his series. And after the extremely long
wait, I'm stuck writing a real hard review. I can't help shake the feeling
I get that this, while far from a bad movie, could have been a lot lot lot
lot lot better. I'm not even referring to the gore, which will be restored
to the inevitable director’s cut DVD. I'm referring to the sense that when
it ends, I kind of sat there wondering to myself, "Is that it?"
Now don't get me wrong, this is a good horror movie and
it's not often you get to see intestines splash across the screen in a major
release movie like this. In fact, the gore is a lot more than what I was
expecting. There are numerous head shots, throat gnawings, arm choppings,
zombie bites and other filth to please most horror fans. Watch for the
scene with the corpse getting his insides pulled out of his mouth. Nice!
It’s definitely not a blood bath on the level of ‘Day of the Dead’, but
there is still some good grue here. Besides that, the action moves along
well, pretty much dealing with two separate groups of people, one looking
for the other. There is a lot of personal interaction with the characters
and, thank God, none of the acting is real bad because it would have ruined
the movie. John Leguizamo, who I sometimes hate, was even pretty good.
Dennis Hopper wasn't as bad as I have read he was, but he seemed out of
place here and his eventual demise was a lot less than I was hoping for.
And genre star Asia Argento is here as well. I've been obsessed with her
since ‘The Church’ (1989) and she is fantastic here. The person I saw this
with said that, and I agree, the pace of the movie picks up when she
arrives. It was like she brought some big energy to the movie. And lastly,
the rest of the group is made up of random characters, the most likable of
which is a mentally slow burn victim. So there was definitely effort on
creating some likeable characters.
Don't read this paragraph if you have not seen the
movie. My only big huge complaint with the movie was that barely any of the
main characters die. All the zombie munchings are mostly characters we only
know for a few minutes or random people who appear, only to be eaten a few
seconds later. I think a big chance was passed up on some David (‘Dawn of
the Dead’) Emge quality reanimations. Because when the movie ended, I was
wondering why so much of the main cast was still alive.
Now you can
read if you have not seen the movie. Ok, so we waited years and years for
this and I am about 80% pleased with this, I just wish I could shake the "it
could have been more" feeling. I predict two things. One, this will
either be a complete flop and George Romero will never make another major
release movie. Or, two, it will be a huge hit, make millions of dollars and
he will spend the rest of his career making the movies he wants to make with
the money he should have been given for this. I am hoping for two, because
it is nice to see one of the masters doing what he does best and while not
great, this is 100 times better than any theatre released horror movie that
I have seen in a long while. (Edward Black)
A
group of robbers attempt top rob a bank, but things go wrong and people
wind up dead and then the robbers wind up on the run from police. One
of them even manages to kidnap a mother and daughter on his way to the
house. The robbers split up and agree to meet at a house.
Unfortunately for the robbers, the house has a nasty past. This is a
full throttle 100% homage to the slasher movies of the 1980's. In fact,
if I had not known about this movie before I had seen it and someone had
said, "hey this came out in 1987", I would have believed it. But that
is where the movies fault lies. Everything from slasher movies of days
past is seemingly lifted, borrowed or paid tribute to in this. The
strange synth score, the killer’s hood, the "is he dead or isn't he"
multiple endings, the late tie-in to the prologue, the jump into frame
scares; it's all here.
While it is all obviously completely unoriginal, it
is very well made and the acting is pretty good for a real low budget
movie like this. There are even one or two scares that got me. But
besides that, the fact that it is such a homage to prior slasher movies
that I had more fun picking out all the stuff that I had seen elsewhere
than I did watching the actual movie. Know what I mean? It's a wonder
this won some awards at film festivals. Fans of 80's slasher movies
(and this won't really appeal to anyone besides those people) will want
to see this to pick out all the scenes from their favorite movies.
Beyond that, I'm afraid it won't really appeal to anyone else. On a
side note, it is very competently made, so I will definitely keep my
eyes open for what director Steven Mena does next, as he very clearly
has some talent. (Edward Black)
Okay,
it’s not like Man-Thing is exactly one of the greatest comic book
characters. Bascially he was Marvel’s rip-off of DC’s Swamp Thing.
Both were (initially, at least) men transformed into walking piles of
vegetation, with Swamp Thing being more or less heroic while Man-Thing
was a mindless empath. As the tagline of Man-Thing’s second run as a
regular series stated, “Whoever knows fear burns at the touch of the
Man-Thing”. This was about the only marginally interesting thing about
the character. So of course, the filmmakers did away with it. With
what little motivation Man-Thing gone, he’s just another generic monster
in this cheap and stupid film version. And to add insult to injury,
Man-Thing is little more than a guest star in his own movie. The main
story is about a bland sheriff trying to solve the murders our swamp
monster has been committing. There’s some attempt to pass off these
violent actions as Man-Thing somehow protecting the swamp from evil
industrialists, but since Man-Thing kills any and every person dumb
enough to cross his path, it doesn’t really fly. The acting and
production values are competent, but whether you’re a fan of the comic
this was based on or not, there’s nothing in ‘Man-Thing’ even remotely
interesting or fun. ‘Man-Thing’ had its debut on the Sci-Fi channel,
but for the DVD release some gore and nudity have been restored to earn
this flick an ‘R’ rating. Even if you consider that a plus, it still
doesn’t add up to much. (Bob Ignizio)
Maybe
it’s because I just recently had to suffer through ‘Razorteeth’, but I
found this killer fish movie fairly entertaining. ‘Frankenfish’ is yet
another ‘Jaws’ rip-off, full of one dimensional characters and generic
plot devices. But the monsters are kinda’ cool, it delivers on the gore
(even if it is CGI), and the actors are good enough to play this goofy
material straight and almost make you buy it. Speaking of the actors,
is male lead Tory Kittles (who plays “Sam Rivers”) Denzel Washington’s
understudy? Watch this movie and tell me if I’m crazy. 
This
one has been a long time coming. A real long time. Ever since ‘Day Of The
Dead’ was released in the summer of 1985, fans have been waiting patiently
for the finale to the most celebrated series in the history of horror film.
Numerous projects were proposed or talked about through the years but none
ever came to being. But times changed and horror is now a highly profitable
genre. So after years of bad zombie movies (like the ‘Resident Evil’
series), unofficial sequels (that dreadful ‘Day Of The Dead’ sequel), a
completely pointless remake (‘Dawn Of The Dead’) and one halfway decent
zombie movie (‘28 Days Later’), word spread that George Romero had been
given the go ahead to finish up his series. And after the extremely long
wait, I'm stuck writing a real hard review. I can't help shake the feeling
I get that this, while far from a bad movie, could have been a lot lot lot
lot lot better. I'm not even referring to the gore, which will be restored
to the inevitable director’s cut DVD. I'm referring to the sense that when
it ends, I kind of sat there wondering to myself, "Is that it?" 
A
group of robbers attempt top rob a bank, but things go wrong and people
wind up dead and then the robbers wind up on the run from police. One
of them even manages to kidnap a mother and daughter on his way to the
house. The robbers split up and agree to meet at a house.
Unfortunately for the robbers, the house has a nasty past. This is a
full throttle 100% homage to the slasher movies of the 1980's. In fact,
if I had not known about this movie before I had seen it and someone had
said, "hey this came out in 1987", I would have believed it. But that
is where the movies fault lies. Everything from slasher movies of days
past is seemingly lifted, borrowed or paid tribute to in this. The
strange synth score, the killer’s hood, the "is he dead or isn't he"
multiple endings, the late tie-in to the prologue, the jump into frame
scares; it's all here. 
Okay,
it’s not like Man-Thing is exactly one of the greatest comic book
characters. Bascially he was Marvel’s rip-off of DC’s Swamp Thing.
Both were (initially, at least) men transformed into walking piles of
vegetation, with Swamp Thing being more or less heroic while Man-Thing
was a mindless empath. As the tagline of Man-Thing’s second run as a
regular series stated, “Whoever knows fear burns at the touch of the
Man-Thing”. This was about the only marginally interesting thing about
the character. So of course, the filmmakers did away with it. With
what little motivation Man-Thing gone, he’s just another generic monster
in this cheap and stupid film version. And to add insult to injury,
Man-Thing is little more than a guest star in his own movie. The main
story is about a bland sheriff trying to solve the murders our swamp
monster has been committing. There’s some attempt to pass off these
violent actions as Man-Thing somehow protecting the swamp from evil
industrialists, but since Man-Thing kills any and every person dumb
enough to cross his path, it doesn’t really fly. The acting and
production values are competent, but whether you’re a fan of the comic
this was based on or not, there’s nothing in ‘Man-Thing’ even remotely
interesting or fun. ‘Man-Thing’ had its debut on the Sci-Fi channel,
but for the DVD release some gore and nudity have been restored to earn
this flick an ‘R’ rating. Even if you consider that a plus, it still
doesn’t add up to much. (Bob Ignizio)