Thursday, October 15, 2015

The Human Centipede: First Sequence (2009)



Number Rolled: 39
Movie Name/Year: The Human Centipede: First Sequence (2009)
Tagline: 100% medically accurate
Genre: Horror
Length: 91 minutes
Rating: NR
Production Companies: Six Entertainment
Executive Producer: Ilona Six
Director: Tom Six
Writer: Tom Six
Actors: Dieter Laser, Ashley C. Williams, Ashlynn Yennie, Akihiro Kitamura, Andreas Leupold, Peter Blankenstein, Bernd Kostrau, Rene de Wit

Two girls are visiting Germany and decide to head to a club. After getting a flat tire, they come upon a house where a man creepily asks them if they’re alone, they say yes and go inside.

Selina’s Point of View:
There have been very few movies made that I’ve looked forward to seeing less than this.

Actually, now that I think about it? There aren’t any.

I blame Cat completely for this one. Sure, she had never heard of it and thought it would be a creature feature, I still blame her.

I didn’t want to see this film. The premise alone made me shake my head. The movie is even worse than the premise. From acting to writing, this film is terrible. It’s not even the kind of bad that could be laughed at. It was bad and boring.

Congratulations Human Centipede, I think you are the worst film I’ve ever seen. Seriously? I’d watch House of the Dead, the Uwe Boll version, twice over before I watched this one again.

If you’re curious, there’s an episode of Tosh.O that tells the entire story. It was more entertaining than the film. Go watch that instead.

Cat’s Point of View:
This film squarely falls into the category of ‘Things That Cannot be Unseen.’ What aisle is the brain bleach on, again?

At first, I thought this might be some sort of mad-science creature feature. My mind’s eye painted the picture of some mutated creature terrorizing…someone. The reality of this film was a far cry from my imaginings. My guess was practically a flight of fancy through a field of unicorns in comparison to what I watched.

The trailer pretty much gives most of the plot away, though. If you have a high threshold for things absolutely disgusting, and want to be surprised; don’t watch it.

It felt like someone took The Island of Dr. Moreau (1996) and Hostel (2005), threw them in a blender, and then splattered the resulting mess all over the room.

I can’t tell you how many times I felt like I might just vomit, as the film progressed. I lost count.

The acting was hot and cold for me. Undeniably, Dieter Laser (Baltic Storm, I Am the Other Woman, The Human Centipede III:Final Sequence) gave a fantastic performance of being entirely off his rocker.

I do feel I need to give credit to Ashley C. Williams (Empty, Paranormal Movie, Julia), Ashlynn Yennie (American Maniacs, Fractured, The Scribbler),  and Akihiro Kitamura (I'll Be There With You, It's a Beautiful Day, Tokyo Tribe). Their roles took a lot of guts; due to such awkward situations to be stuck in day in and day out of filming. (It had to be that, or desperation.)

I will never watch this film again. Further, I strongly encourage that anyone whom cannot deal with scat in films stay as far from this movie as possible.

Rotten Tomatoes Critic Score – 49%
Rotten Tomatoes Audience Score – 25%

Netflix’s Prediction for Selina – 1.5/5
Selina’s Trust-the-Dice Score0/5

Netflix’s Prediction for Cat – 1.5/5
Cat’s Trust-the-Dice Score1/5

The Random Rating: R

Movie Trailer:

Monday, October 12, 2015

Scenic Route (2013)



Number Rolled: N/A (Suggestion made by Movie Decisionmakers, @HeySense)
Movie Name/Year: Scenic Route (2013)
Tagline: There is no turning back
Genre: Thriller
Length: 86 minutes
Rating: R
Production Companies: Anonymous Content, Best Medicine Productions
Executive Producer: Paul Green, Keith Redmon
Director: Kevin Goetz, Michael Goetz
Writer: Kyle Killen
Actors: Josh Duhamel, Dan Fogler, Peter Michael Goetz, Christie Burson, Jamie Donovan, Miracle Laurie, Ethan Maher

Mitchell and Carter are close friends hanging out on vacation. While driving through the desert, the men become stranded.

Selina’s Point of View:
You’d think a movie concentrating on two guys stranded in the desert wouldn’t really be all that thrilling. Sure, you might be able to see it as a comedy, especially since it’s starring Dan Fogler (Secrets and Lies, Don Peyote, Good Luck Chuck) and Josh Duhamel (You’re Not You, Bravetown, Las Vegas), but a thriller?

It worked, though. There were parts of this film that were absolutely harrowing.

Scenic Route didn’t really follow the recipe for many of the thrillers out there. In fact, at times, it followed that popular sitcom recipe of two disagreeing parties being trapped in an elevator, or a basement, or a bathroom, or a plane, or a…. you get the point. Instead of taking that sitcom-comedy route, however, the movie shows a whole other side of human nature that really only exists during crisis or in life-threatening situations.

They say you don’t really know someone until you’ve seen them in crisis. That’s when we show what we are really made of.

The downfall in movies that have only two characters with very little support tends to come from the actors. It’s more important in small-cast movies for the actors to really make a connection with the audience than in large-cast films. Usually, the story relies on it.

That downfall didn’t plague this film.

Duhamel and Fogler created enough of a connection that I actually cared about them and their relationship to each other.

Also, I have to say it, Duhamel in a Mohawk…. I might have drooled a little.

That being said, you might have noticed that we didn’t actually roll for this film. It was still random to us, though. We were contacted on Twitter by a service called Movie Decisionmakers (@HeySense). They’re fellow Netflixers, so I decided to look into it.

The service seems to be relatively new, they joined Twitter in October 2014. The service they provide is free and it’s kind of interesting. They give users a short survey to find out what kind of movies they enjoy and then suggest a random film from Netflix for them to watch. It’s an instant recommendation based on what you enjoy. It’s cool. Hit them up on Twitter and check it out.

Cat’s Point of View:
Have you ever had that one road trip where just absolutely nothing went the way it was supposed to? If you travel with any frequency; the law of averages says that it’s bound to happen. What happens to this pair of friends makes every travel snafu I’ve ever experienced look like cake walk.

I laughed, face-palmed, rolled my eyes, cringed, and fussed at the characters through my screen. I felt like I was watching a ‘what not to do if you get stranded in the desert’ film.

The dilemma they found themselves in was more of a backdrop, however, to the interaction between the two friends. There’s nothing like a tense situation to bring all sorts of bottled up issues to the surface.

Josh Duhamel (Turistas, When in Rome, Safe Haven) and Dan Fogler (Fanboys, Mars Needs Moms, Hellbenders) masterfully embodied the spiral of their characters’ experience. That is also a real Mohawk that Duhamel is sporting – no strange skull-cap prosthetics for him!

Movies such as this one illustrate clearly that you don’t need a multi-million-dollar movie set to create a great film.

I really enjoyed this movie. I may just watch it again, soon, to see if I can pick up on anything I might have missed along the way.

Rotten Tomatoes Critic Score – 65%
Rotten Tomatoes Audience Score – 50%

Netflix’s Prediction for Selina – 4.5/5
Selina’s Trust-the-Dice Score4/5

Netflix’s Prediction for Cat – 3.5/5
Cat’s Trust-the-Dice Score4/5

Movie Trailer: