Budget: Unknown
Directed By: John Carpenter & Tobe Hooper
I love anthology stories, always have, always will (though they are few and far between these days)
This offering from horror veterans Carpenters and Hooper is a great addition to anyone's anthology collection.
Featuring all the usual things from both directors including musical scores etc from Carpenter, as well as nods to their other works, which i'll get too.
This particular film has three stories on each different in their own respects.
The Gas Station is a run of the mill scary murderer story.
Hair is an alien based horror story with elements of vanity biting you, quite literally.
The last is Eye, body horror story about a transplant gone wrong.
Each of these segments is introduced by what we think is the coroner (played by Carpenter too) until the end film.
I haven't been able to find info on the budget and the film also has some cameo's from other people too such as Tobe Hooper himself and Tom Arnold. So lets get on with each segment, also as a side note i may well spoil the the stories endings or may not, depends how the review of each segment goes, this doesn't mean they are bad it's just they are small and it's still worth the watch despite the spoilers!
The Gas Station:
A College student, Anne has gotten a job on a remote gas station in the middle of the night just as a crazy maniac has escaped from a mental asylum. Love the fact Haddonfield is referenced in this (afterall it is JC's segment) it's a nice little touch.
So she is dropped off by a friend and shown the ropes by the person who was on before her, Bill tells her about the keys for office and rules for the pumps etc then leaves her. We are treated to a few colourful customers and one Anne likes the look of who accidentally leaves his credit card behind.
After few jumpy moments Anne tries to contact Bill as the short keeps you guessing as to who the killer is, until this point.
It is one of the people we have already met but Anne also gets some help froma another returning face too!
A standard homage to a standard slasher film this short gets a 3 out of 5 stars from THN
Hair:
This is a vanity based horror with alien aspects to it too, because this relies on cgi effects which were new in 93' it doesn't hold up to well to today's scrutiny in that respect. So we join a man, one Richard Coberts who is extremely self conscious about losing his hair. His girlfriend claims she doesn't care but still tells him to go see a hair dresser friend of hers.
When he's not satisfied with what he does, Richard then buys loads of other products to try and cover up his bald spots. This ends up in him and his girlfriend breaking up. Spotting an ad on TV about a hair restoration clinic he goes to check it out.
They bring him in are kind and courteous to him and do a procedure to give him a full head of long hair. It works and the next day he reveals long dark brown locks of hair. His girlfriend who didn't care gets incredibly turned on by it too. Unfortunately he realises it keeps growing, a lot!
I even starts sprouting in the back of his throat and all over his face, going back to the clinic it is revealed the hair is tiny alien organisms eating his brain, these aliens use the fact that humans are vain in order to do this and gain sustenance.
THN thinks this one is silly and awards it only 2 stars out of 5
Eye:
Mark Hamill plays a baseball player (Brent Matthews) who has never quite made it really big who may well be in with a chance of hitting the big time in his next game. Unfortunately on the ride home in a storm a deer in the middle of the road forces his car off the road.
He is later found by some police and when he is turned around it is seen that shards of glass have destroyed his eye. When he come around in hospital he doesn't realise this until he told and it just happens to be his pitching eye too. Another doctor offers a new revolutionary transplant surgery to replace his eye with a healthy donor.
Of course he jumps at the offer and they proceed with the surgery right away as they have the donor available almost right away. Unfortunately Brent starts getting splitting head aches as a side effect, his wife tells him they're expecting too.
The side effects get worse as Brent starts to see images of murdered girls and himself being abused as a baby. His whole attitude starts to change too and he gets abusive towards his wife.
He finds out from the doctor the eye belonged to a murderer fascinated with killing young blondes then raping their corpses, When he later nearly kills his wife through being possessed by the eye he finally manages to stick some garden shears through the offending appendage.
This segment is good but i also feel it's very unfair also this poor man who has done nothing wrong to anyone who has tried hard all his life just has shit poured on him constantly only to then end up killing his possessed self leaving a pregnant wife behind.
For this THN awards Eye 2 out 5 stars.
So overall a very strong start and some amusing filler from the segments between each story with the gas station being a strong 3 Hair being a decent 2 and my reasons for Eye scoring so low Body Bags is going to get an overall score of a decent 3 stars out of 5
No comments:
Post a Comment