Film Review: Closed For The Season (2010)

 

I recorded this film as I love anything set in abandoned places. Closed For The Season is about a girl, Kristy (Aimee Brooks) who wakes up in a local theme park which she spent time in as a child. She is haunted by past memories as she tries to find her lost teddy and a way out. She is aided by James (Damien Maffei) who's parents were the caretakers. The film is directed by Jay Woelfel.

Film Review: Identity (2003)

"As I was going up the stair,

I met a man who wasn't there

He wasn't there again today

I wish, I wish he'd go away"

I remember watching this film shortly after it came out on DVD whilst I was a teenager at a girly sleepover years ago. Although I couldn't remember a lot of the details I remember the rain. Strangely, the best part of the film for me is the rain. The noise and look of the rain is awesome and really adds to the sense of drama and entrapment at the hotel.

The plot sees 10 complete strangers becoming stranded at a motel in the torrential rain. The local area is flooded so they have no choice but to wait there for the night. Murders begin occurring and one by one the 10 become fewer and fewer without knowing who is doing it. A seemingly unrelated storyline runs throughout which sees a group of professionals discussing the case of a death row inmate. I won't ruin the end but the twist is a great spin on the plot.

The characters cover a wide spread of individual personalities. There's the hero limo driver (John Cusack), the angry cop (Ray Liotta) escorting a prisoner (Jake Busey), a prostitute heading for a new life (Amanda Peet), a bitchy actress (Rebecca De Mornay) along with a family (John C McGinley, Leila Kenzle and Brett Loehr), newly weds (Clea DuVall and William Lee Scott) and the shady motel owner (John Hawkes). The whole cast is fabulous and create really believable characters. Their relationships with each other are dynamic and leave you wanting to see more. Although the characters are mostly likable, it's hard to know who to trust and for most of the film everyone is a suspect.

Director James Mangold has directed some of my favourite films; Girl, Interrupted (1999) and Walk The Line (2005). So, I will definitely be adding some more of his films to my LoveFilm list. I really like the style of the film, it could have ended up a lot more cliched but Mangold keeps it fresh and tense throughout.

I couldn't rate this film enough. It's got an intriguing plot that keeps you gripped throughout, great sets, a mix of different personalities within the characters and is strung together with tension and mystery. Personally, I would have like to have seen a little more focus on the characters trying to work out their connections to each other although I do think it is covered in general in the film.

Rating: 9/10

Beauty Comes From The Soul

I like tattoos. I find them to be artistic and a visually pleasant way to express yourself, providing it has some sort of meaning to the person wearing it. Although I have heard/seen photos of Rick Genest previous to his appearance in Lady Gaga's music video and his catwalk work for Mugler, after seeing the 'Go Beyond The Cover' advertisment for DermaBlend, I was inspired to learn more about the person behind such life changing tattoos. From several interview video clips you can clearly see that this man is simply a creative personality whom comes across as genuine and intelligent.

I think Rick inspires debate as to what the true definition of beauty is; is it a series of boxes upon a list to be complied with and ticked off, or is it more relaxed, individual and specific to the subject in question? Personally, I feel that we have images of what the media and retailers feel should be considered beautiful thrust in our faces on such a regular basis that we now really have to take time out to stop, think and look before deciding for ourselves what we deem beautiful. But even then, many feel apprehensive about going against the grain to see alternate beauty. I like the fact that what one person finds repulsive, someone else can find beautiful, and resent people who criticise for others for holding opposite opinions to their own.

I'd love to be able to meet him, as I'm sure many people would. However, I wouldn't waste time asking him 'why?' as it is obvious that to him this is what beauty and feeling comfortable in your own skin entails. Instead, I would simply want to admire the artwork that adorns his body, as I am afterall a massive fan of horror films and the macabre myself.

I'll leave you to make your own conclusions about him and his tattoos, but I am inspired.



Go Beyond The Cover advert for DermaBlend:


Interview with Rick Genest:

Dead By Dawn Festival 2010

For part of my Masters course we are expected to make some sort of effort to gain experience within the film industry in some form. For my first attempt at gaining this experience, I volunteered to help out at Dead By Dawn Film Festival in Edinburgh, Scotland. The film festival is primarily a horror film festival run by the lovely Adele Hartley at the Filmhouse in Edinburgh. I was required to swap day passes for the relevant tickets, answer general enquiries and look after the guests: Australian actress Mollie King, director Thomas Hefferon and their guests. Even though the day was long, it was good fun, everyone I spoke to was really lovely and it was nice to be around people who also had such a passion for film. There were some incredible films shown at the festival and it made it really worthwhile travelling all the way up to Edinburgh.

My absolute favourite film of the day, and now one of my favourite pieces of film I’ve ever seen, was the visually stunning Danse Macabre by Pedro Pires. I love anything to do with the romantic side of death, and this film showing the journey of a corpse from several seconds before death to being eventually taken to a morgue and later to being turned into ashes at a crematorium. The concept is explained via elegant dance based movement, and has really made me appreciate how beautiful macabre dance can really be. I couldn’t even begin to describe how beautiful this film really is, it honestly makes me speechless whenever I even think about it!
Danse Macabre Official Site

My second favourite film, and again now one of my favourite documentaries, was Cropsey. A documentary about the Staten Island, New York urban legend of a deranged killer who lived in the grounds of the local abandoned mental asylum. The film makers traced this urban myth back to its roots and discovered that ‘Cropsey’ may have in fact been based upon a string of missing children cases spread over a number of years; thought to have been committed by a former orderly at the asylum who later lived in the grounds of the building, mainly in the masses of tunnels underneath the building with a range of other mentally unstable people. I really felt that this documentary has been one of the few pieces of film, either real or fiction that Ive ever seen that genuinely left me feeling unsettled. I’d been so absorbed in the film that it took me a good 15 mins to get round the fact that I was actually in the middle of a busy city rather than tramping through the asylum grounds with the filmmakers. I think Cropsey really takes the viewer on a journey with the film makers to discover more about the real story behind the legend.
Cropsey Official Site


Another film worth mentioning was 5150, Rue Des Ormes a French-Canadian film about a local filmmaker who is taken captive by a local part time vigilante father obsessed with chess and being righteous. I loved the twist of Jacques Beaulieu having made an entire dead human chess set completely out of the ‘unrighteous’ people for the black side and ‘good’ people for the white side, it made a nice twist to a film that builds its tension around the multiple escape attempts made by the captured yet innocent Yannick. The film is also captivating as we see Yannick almost losing his mind when himself becoming obsessed with winning just a single game of chess in order to secure his release. I also loved the actors cast to play the main family and Yannick and really thought they did their characters justice, making them completely believable.
5150, Rue Des Ormes Official Site

Another couple of films worth mentioning were Tufty, the short film that could offer an answer to where teddy bears really come from; The Pool, a film about the disappearance of a boy whilst playing in a local pool (directed by Thomas Hefferon) and Sunshowers, about a girl who accidentally hits an old man whilst driving a stolen car.

Overall, the festival and the film choices were fantastic and I will definitely be going next year, whether it’s as a volunteer or as an audience member. I would highly recommend this festival to anyone who loves the dark, macabre and the horrific.
Dead By Dawn Festival Official Site