Enthusiast
Bio: "When I see a great film it stuns me, it is a mystery for me. What constitutes poetry, depth, vision and illumination in cinema I cannot name. It is the bad films that have really taught me about cinema." -- Werner Herzog
Featured Reviews
Check out Enthusiast's...
| 75 67% |  |
Near Dark (1987) - Rated 08 Dec 2008
"The ostentatious "vampire movie meets Western" affectation actually works in this film's favor, as the stark and desolate Texas settings beautifully highlight the disparities between night and day which are so crucial to these characters. With a proper ending this could have been gold, but it's still reasonably endearing."
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| 80 82% |  |
Night-Flowers (1979) - Rated 10 Jan 2010
"Unlike many of these dime-store "Taxi Driver"s that revel in 1970s New York's unmistakable grime (see "Combat Shock" for a great example), this entry seems almost staid and refined. The dispassionate camerawork, stagy direction and naturalistic performances carry a powerful blow through scenes that would otherwise have played out like typical exploitation trash, especially when cast against the bluish pallor of a 9th-gen VHS dub. Worth hunting down."
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| 85 90% |  |
Pumping Iron (1977) - Rated 26 May 2009
"While nowadays we've steered into some bizarre terrain with Donkey Kong tournaments and dudes trying to visit every Starbucks, this remains the archetype for documentaries about obsessive nerd subcultures. Technically this was before Arnold was a star, but as you watch his personality unfold you realize there never really was such a time."
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| 85 90% |  |
Wake in Fright (1971) - Rated 30 Jan 2010
"I really can't think of a film to compare this to; its violence is brutal and its atmosphere is indelibly harsh, yet nothing is overly stylized and you are never called on to suspend your disbelief at any stage of Grant's decline. This feels like a nightmare that clings to your brain so closely that days later you question if any of it was real. Also, I want to visit Australia now."
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| 85 90% |  |
The Candy Snatchers (1973) - Rated 21 Dec 2008
"Surprisingly decent acting, nice photography, and a tautly-woven, perfectly paced script make for a film that is very well aware of its exploitation milieu but harbors ambitions to rise above. Amazing that this was Guerdon Trueblood's only directorial credit."
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| 75 67% |  |
I Hired a Contract Killer (1990) - Rated 11 Jan 2010
"Despite the English settings and French lead, there's no avoiding how Finnish this film is: cold, taciturn, dryly funny. Aki's surrogate Helsinki is an immersive world, rendering a broad palette of emotion in the monochromatic hue of the absurd."
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| 55 14% |  |
An American Hippie in Israel (1972) - Rated 27 Jan 2010
"Its trailer might be the best trailer ever made; those three minutes not only convey the plot in its entirety, but -- aside from the dizzying madness of the ending -- represent the only scenes of action or narrative consequence whatsoever. There is literally about five minutes worth of film here, padded out to 90, but those five minutes are awesome beyond words; a veritable abbatoir full of steaming cinematic offal. YOU FOOLS."
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| 70 50% |  |
Galaxy of Terror (1981) - Rated 08 Mar 2009
"The mood here falls somewhere between Bava's "Planet of the Vampires" and "Event Horizon", only gorier and much more confused than either. Plot ranges from demented to just plain stupid, but despite its uncountable technical faults it's pretty entertaining throughout."
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| 55 14% |  |
Scalps (1983) - Rated 21 Jan 2010
"The opening act is marked by these roaming scuzz-verite shots of Ford-esque landscapes set to discomfiting ambient music, which create an indelible sense of tension that pit a rapidly modernizing world against a grudging respect for the simple & brutal justice of the ancients. It's too bad all this tension is utterly destroyed every time someone tries to act or convey a plot point in any way. Luckily (?) it turns to senseless gore and violence in the end. Cool movie."
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| 65 35% |  |
Enter the Dragon (1973) - Rated 07 May 2009
"The only draw here is watching the charismatic and surprisingly brotastic Lee break piles of human boards. The pacing is dreadful and the inanity of the plot had me shaking my head in disbelief. There's a few nicely composed shots here and there, but the only message I came away from this film with was that Bruce Lee was a fucking badass. Which for all I know makes this a success."
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