The Science Fiction Horror and Fantasy Film Review
One of a duo of spinoff films made to celebrate the tenth anniversary of the Ju-on/The Grudge series. Seven films in and the series is starting to resemble much of a muchness
This was the second of the films spun off from the 2000s Battlestar Galactica revival series, and ingeniously retells the events of the series as seen through the eyes of the Cylons
This is a wholly unnecessary sequel to Donnie Darko, featuring the same bafflingly inexplicable time-blurring things happening to his sister but without the same culty weirdness
An astonishingly perverse work where a mad surgeon abducts three people intending to connect their bodies as a single digestive tract. This is a work that pushes itself into truly warped territory
Another of Blue Sky Studios’ interminable animated sequels to its likeable original about prehistoric talking animals. This has little substance beyond a kinetic rush from one gag to the next
Passable sequel (or rather prequel) to the remote motel snuff movie thriller Vacancy. Even though a throwaway effort, it manages to build an okay head of steam
Enjoyable zombie comedy that has been regarded as a classic by many and contains an appealing nonchalant sense of humour and some great performances, even if it owes much to Shaun of the Dead
Sequel to the French action hit. The plot shuffles the same basic elements around but it is the action we have come for, which is slow to start but soon kicks into exhilarating high gear
Todd Solondz is one of the finest US indie directors. This sequel to his masterpiece Happiness lacks the original’s savage bite and is his weakest work to date
James Cameron’s film was a smash phenomenon. Cameron has relocated the plot of Dances With Wolves on another planet and uses motion capture to create one of the most dazzlingly realised alien worlds on film
The better of two spinoff films made for the tenth anniversary of the Ju-on/The Grudge series. The series is suffering over-familiarity, but this manage to create moments of uncanny spookiness
A WTF am I watching film where a performing freakshow troupe led by Pervo the Clown are pursued around a farm by topless zombie women
Alex Cox sequelizes his off-the-wall cult hit Repo Man but only turns it into an amateurish, meandering effort that is only trying to be wacky and cultish
![[Rec] 2 (2009) poster](https://moriareviews.com/rongulator/wp-content/uploads/rec-2-2009-poster.jpg)
Lesser sequel to the Spanish Found Footage zombie film [Rec] that repeats the original to variable effect but needlessly breaks up the single camera point-of-view
After the disaster of X-Men: The Last Stand, the decision was made to give a whole film over to the series’s most popular character, Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine, and to go with a prequel that told his origin story. Largely a film that exists as a series of superheroic action scenes
Ron Howard and Tom Hanks follow up their adaptation of The Da Vinci Code by turning to an earlier Dan Brown novel concerning conspiratorial goings-on in The Vatican but the show collapses amid absurdly contrived plotting
The first two of these films did ingenious things but now the inspiration is showing through and these films are starting to seem more like a personal fantasy on the director’s part
The first of the sequels to Alvin and the Chipmunks. Marginally less grating than the first film but that’s being relative – all the things that one hated the first time are back
This was the second of Luc Besson’s Minimoys films, partly animated children’s films set in a world of miniature creatures. Here the charms of the first film seem thinly stretched
Sequel to Tarsem Singh’s The Cell that feels made by people who haven’t even seen the original. The original’s fascinating journey into dream terrain is replaced by a dull psychic with a link to a serial killer plot
The fifth of the Universal Soldier films reuniting both Jean-Claude Van Damme and Dolph Lundgren, while being given a tough, brutal action punch by director John Hyams
The Ju-on/The Grudge series has spawned thirteen films to date. This was the second sequel to the English-language remake but by this point everything disappears into formulaic scares
Neil Marshall’s The Descent was a ferociously effective horror film that proved a sleeper success. This is an unnecessary sequel that only offers up a limited variation on the same jumps
A revival of the Nazi zombie film that comes from Norway! A hugely gore-drenched effort from Tommy Wirkola that soon plants tongue very much in cheek.
The second of the Neon Genesis Evangelion reboot films, this gets the essentials right and delivers some stunningly epic anime action scenes
The fourth Terminator film is slightly better than you would expect of something directed by the empty-headed McG. There are some undeniably spectacular action sequences, although the film still stands too much in the shadow of what has gone before
The fourth in the series of films about a series of deaths for survivors after premonition of disaster at a speedway. This is shot in 3D but the novelty death set-pieces have become preposterous
J.J. Abrams revives the Star Trek franchise by recasting it with younger faces and rewriting continuity. But in the appeal to a hipper, sexier vibe, it feels a long way from Gene Roddenberry’s creation – nowhere in evidence is the original’s concern with galactic politics and social issues of the day
Shinya Tsukamoto’s third Tetsuo film is a disappointingly commercial concession that waters down all of the surrealism and wild sexual fetishism that made the first film so amazing
The Three Investigators books were an essential part of my youth. This does a fair job of remaining faithful to the stories, albeit with the addition of some grating modernisations, and creates reasonable atmosphere as they investigate a seemingly spooky mansion
Stephen Sommers make a film based on the popular action toy line. Barring one exhilarating sequence in the middle, this consists of lots of sound and CGI fury amounting to very little at all
A directorial debut from one of the writers of the Saw sequels, a Torture Porn film that has a highly unusual set-up about a burglar stumbling into a family home that has been turned into a death trap by a serial killer
Rob Zombie’s follow-up to his Halloween remake is a better film and closer to what the previous film should have been but his approach is still based on callous brutality than John Carpenter’s eerie suspense
Sixth time around and the backstory is starting to become so excessively complicated it is hard to follow what is going on. All the gruesome torturings now seem passe, although this does redeem itself somewhat in making a few black digs at the medical health industry
Phil Lord and Chris Miller, later directors of The Lego Movie, create an animated film that is a delight with its nonsensical visions of a town inundated by weather phenomena made of food
Full-length follow-up to Hard Revenge, Milly and the same mix of ferocious action and over-the-top splatter. Despite a large budget, this is marginally the lesser in sheer entertainment
Sixth of the Harry Potter films, this feels like a step back from what its predecessor built up. The film suffers from trying to cram all of J.K. Rowling’s book into its running time and ends up being frustratingly mannered
Disappointing sequel to the modest original that does little but revisit and re-run the first film’s scenario with little to add to it
The first of Michael Bay’s Transformers sequels has even better effects and more copious mass destruction to the point it washes over you without any effect
Another supposed true-life ghost story, an early case by Ed and Lorraine Warren. The film exists as a progression of pop-up scares that through the need to keep producing effect produces no effect at all.
Transmorphers was The Asylum’s mockbuster copy of Michael Bay’s Transformers and one of their better films. When Bay released his sequel Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, The Asylum also made this prequel
George Romero’s sixth and final zombie film where he writes characters and a script with much more of a richness of theme than he did in the last two entries
The first sequel to Eli Roth’s film, directed by a then unknown Ti West who subsequently tried to have his name removed. The gore effects look cheap and cheesy and the film misses the comedic angle of the original
Third of the Underworld films, a prequel to the previous entries. In truth, it is just the same as the others – lots of kinetic action moves and Gothic poses with little in the way of plot
The Pang Brothers are some of the most exciting genre directors in the world. Here they take on the Wu Xia film and make a sequel to The Storm Riders that feels fuelled by too many viewings of 300
Strong and dramatically absorbing Swedish thriller featuring one of the most original and provocative heroines on screen in some time. A word of mouth hit that later underwent a lesser English-language remake
A strong and at times quite brutal film about a town that is terrorised by attacks from a feral cannibal family. The controversial The Woman was a better-known sequel
The Asylum’s answer to Paranormal Activity Oren Peli made his film for $15,000, which is about as cheap as it is possible to make a film; this manages to look even cheaper – simply someone wandering around with a camcorder that is at best aimed in the general direction of things happening
Sequel to the Ben Stiller hit offers more of the same with a bigger museum and more exhibits come to life but little else
The second of the Twilight films where the moderately grounded original is blown up into the near laughable with the ridiculously over-the-top hyper-sexualised posturing of its male leads
The Asylum’s first venture into the gonzo shark movie that would spin off a series of sequels and culminate in the Sharknado phenomenon. Despite one of the great attention grabbing titles of all time, this is an unmemorable affair
An alien invasion film that exists largely as a series of dazzling effects set-pieces, although proves frustrating when it comes to plot or explanatory rationale
The first sequel to The Asylum’s Mega Shark vs Giant Octopus and marginally a better film. This is less sparing with the cheap effects, while in every other regard it plants tongue-in-cheek and tries to make a virtue out of the sheer ridiculousness of the action
Luc Besson has made some phenomenal action films but I just can’t seem to get into his trilogy of children’s films. This was the third. A silly effort written down to a very juvenile level and padded with inane humour
A raucous and vulgar, if at times undeniably funny, comedy where John Cusack and three friends use a hot tub at a resort that causes them to travel back in time to the 1980s.
An animated effort about a mad scientist and three orphans. One entered this with zero expectation only for it to unexpectedly emerge as a side-splitting and completely charming pleasure
Tsui Hark returns to form in this lush Chinese-backed historical drama where his wildly fantastical martial arts combine with the story of the true-life detective De Renjie/Detective Dee
Cats & Dogs was amiable but this sequel struggles against the irritatingly cutsie elements that have come to dominate this mini-genre of live-action talking animals films
This necessarily lacks the surprise effect of the first film but still captures some of the same eerie dread anticipation as spooky things begin happening
Popular animated adaptation of a children’s book. This hits all the right story arcs and in sufficiently likeable measure to work amiably. Two sequels and a live-action remake followed.
Tron was a groundreaking work that predicted the advent of cyberspace. Three decades on, this sequel never does anything as imaginative, although advances in effects technology allow for a dazzling reinvention of The Grid
Albert Pyun makes a long promised sequel to his first film The Sword and the Sorcerer but delivers an impoverished mess that is all over the place plotwise
The fourth of the Shrek films. By this point, the freshness and originality of the first film has been buried under animated film formula, while the plot is a tired rehash of It’s a Wonderful Life
Strong and highly original film that takes place in a post-apocalyptic world overrun by vampires. This has more the feel of a zombie film or an existential Western but does some highly original things with its ideas
The third of the Twilight films. This extrudes the dramatic irresolution of the last film’s cliffhanger – should Bella marry Edward or does she really love Jacob? – with over-padded momentousness
Cloverfield by way of Stalker – a unique and original film about zones on Earth overrun by alien creatures. Director Gareth Edwards creates his own effects that far surpass many big budget efforts
The harrowing 1970s raped woman on a revenge spree film is given the remake treatment, although is watered down in many key areas. The revenge scenes however are played up for a particular nastiness
Sequel to the outrageously gory 2001 Maniacs, although here the horror comedy balance spills over into absurd farce and cheap gore effects. Crucially, the film seems cheaper and less polished, more messy and random in terms of its arrangements
Despite being hamstrung with Adrien Brody in Action Hero mode, this is a hard-edged film that goes some way to rescue the Predator franchise from its novelty crossovers with Alien(s)
One of several films around the same time about wannabes without powers playing at being superheroes. Matthew Vaughn delivers a film that falls between witty deflation of and a celebration of nerdy fantasy
Another lacklustre entry in the banal Lord of the Rings Lite franchise from C.S. Lewis’s books, a plodding run of the mill fantasy adventure for the most part. The mediocre reception killed off interest in the series
A low-budget film served by some witty fanboy humour, decent fight choreography and unexpectedly good acting
An exorcism film made Found Footage-style with Patrick Fabian as a conman exorcist. This is constantly confounding everything one expects of the genre with considerable cleverness
From the top wrestling superstar in the world in the early 00s to movie action hero to being dressed in a pink tutu with fairy wings, it is hard to believe that Dwayne Johnson’s box-office star would have ever recovered from this family film embarrassment that sees him cast as a fairy
Iron Man was very enjoyable. True to typical superhero sequel form, this complicates the original by introducing so many new villains and characters that it becomes an overcrowded narrative juggling act
Takashi Miike makes a sequel to his earlier superhero film filled with his typically eccentric touches
Hatchet was a homage to the 1980s slasher film that had a mild amusement. In the sequels, Adam Green upped the number of genre cameos and in-jokes, while pushing the gore effects to an extreme
Chris Columbus seeks to emulate the success of the Harry Potter films with this adaptation of a Young Adult series about the children of Greek gods. The film falls apart due to Columbus’s typical banal cues and effects overkill
Another videogame adapted film, this has almost entirely been conceived around a series of slick fight sequences and little else
Sequel to the modestly effective Alaskan-set vampire film 30 Days of Night, this holds up surprisingly well for something that gives all indication of being a throwaway video sequel
A contender in the animation stakes that never rises above formula and cutsie slapstick. Against its many competitors, it offers up only B-budget animation
Four films in and clear evidence that the Resident Evil series needs to be retired. This consists of tediously borrowed action moves now presented in 3D and a plot of random dead ends that make little sense
The penultimate chapter in the Harry Potter series surprisingly strips out most of the effects and is much slower, more character driven, while moving the saga towards an epic conclusion
A zombie film that stands out from shuffling horde by dint of the fact that it takes place in Africa and is a survival horror work that takes itself seriously rather than tongue-in-cheek. Low key but achieves some often haunted effect
On a pure plot level, this is largely a generic haunted house story but director James Wan creates an eerie atmosphere and manages to undeniably jangle the audience’s nerves on a number of occasions
I never much cared for Nanny McPhee. This is a sequel that replicates the original in fairly much the same amount mix of plot elements, slapstick sequences and nonsensical absurdism
Another in the fad for 70s/80s remakes where Alexandre Aja for once captures the spirit of Joe Dante’s 1978 original by planting tongue in cheek and wading in with mind-bogglingly gory enthusiasm
Amid the fad for deliberately absurd killer shark films viz Sharknado, this surely takes the prize for ridiculousness of conception and delivery – a hybrid creature with the head of a shark and the tentacles of an octopus. I defy you not to burst into laughter at some of the scenes (*)
A sequel to Alexandre Aja’s Mirrors that abandons most of the basics of the first film and strips everything down to a series of gory, novelty deaths
Heavily disappointing remake of the Ray Harryhausen film where the replacement of Harryhausen’s stop-motion animation with CGI fails to achieve any magic
Supposedly the final chapter of the Saw saga – where the sole novelty on offer is gore and body parts coming out the screen in 3D. This is conducted with a tired lack of effort that makes for tedium-inducing watching
After such high standards with the previous two films, there is considerable onus on Pixar when it comes to this third entry nevertheless they manage to wring some strong and effective new twists on the familiar
The first of three sequels (actually a prequel) to Paul W.S. Anderson’s Death Race, this gives the origins of Frankenstein and the Death Race. This rehashes much of the first film as generic direct-to-dvd fodder
The third of Michael Bay’s Transformers films. While the human scenes opt for a ghastly miscalculated sense of humour, the effects houses are at the peak of their game, even if Bay allows them to drag the mass destruction out to a numbing excess
The Paranormal Activity series still manages to produce a reasonable amount of eerie scares and jumps a third time around, although by now the claim to still being found footage is starting to strain credulity
Sequel to Pixar’s Cars. While the original was a cutely appealing concept with a gentle contemplative message, this plays as more of an out-and-out spy caper making a virtue of its international locations
The best of Tom Cruise’s Mission: Impossible films to this point. The live-action directorial debut of Pixar director Brad Bird proves an inspired move and Bird gets all the gadgetry just right along with a series of sensational action sequences
The film adaptation of Marvel Comics’ The Mighty Thor is placed in the hands of Kenneth Branagh who delivers an okay film, if one where he never quite seems at home with the superheroic action
The third of Uwe Boll’s Bloodrayne trilogy and one of his better films. The action scenes are slickly choreographed and the film is largely made by Michael Paré and Clint Howard who play to the gallery with entertaining regard
The point where the Twilight series collapses under its pretensions and draws every detail of its wedding out for an excruciating hour. A series that has been all about preaching chastity then segues into Right to Life advocacy