Zombieland (2009) - 4K UHD Review

Review:

*Originally written October 5th, 2019*

It's amazing to think that Zombieland is 10 years old now. A film I used to watch constantly when I was about 13. While my expectations for the sequel are pretty low, probably due to the fact Ruben Fleischer hasn't made a great film since this released and the trailers have been underwhelming to say the least, despite all the cast returning and still carrying the same wacky humour. I guess I'll find out in a couple of weeks.

I'd been wanting to revisit this for a while. Part of me wasn't sure it would hold up, but to my surprise, for the most part it's still great fun. I even watched it twice this week due to having to watch both the Blu-ray and the 4K for reasons. Some of the effects are a bit iffy as a lot of it is CGI that is very noticeable and out of place among the always much better practical effects that pop up every now and then. Everything else though, is pretty great.

Zombie comedies seem like something we get a lot, but for me nothing even come close to Shaun of the Dead when it comes to the horror comedy genre, Zombieland is still a worthy entry though. What really elevates this though is the excellent chemistry between the cast. Jesse Eisenberg, Woody Harrelson, Emma Stone and Abigail Breslin all work wonderfully well together as the dysfunctional make-shift family of strangers put together in this zombie apocalypse.

Harrelson is obviously the stand-out with his cowboy like personality and his deeply relatable quest to find a Twinkie (I remember this film kick-started my interest in Twinkies, which were impossible to find in the UK until well after this film released. Needless to say, once I had one, I understood why he wanted one). Eisenberg carries his usual dorky charm while being a pretty strong lead character as he works the audiences through his rules to surviving Zombieland. Then Stone and Breslin bring a lot of fun to their roles as they con their way through the Apocalypse. 

The balance of horror and humour is very solid. I was genuinely surprised at how well a lot of the humour still works 10 years on. A certain cameo is certainly the highlight and leads to a dark and hilarious resolution to that detour. Where the humour mostly works though is just the interactions between the leads as they slowly bond and learn about each other on their adventure. It even has just the right amount of heart, enough so that despite the poor trailers for the sequel and the fact the time might have passed, I'm still interested in spending more time with this group of people.

Forgot how stylish this was too. Fleischer's direction brings some unique visual touches, the opening titles to Metallica are wonderful and some of the slow-motion shots look really cool. I also love the use of random stuff going on around Zombieland like the "Zombie Kill of the Week" which is a great and funny gag, but it's never explained how anyone even knows about it, but it's stuff like that where Zombieland comes into its own and thrives on its unique personality. It's very clear that they wanted to expand the world, but it obviously never happened until now. Oh, and that cancelled Amazon Prime series no one ever talks about or remembers.


Zombieland still holds up very well thanks to its cast of fun and memorable characters, stylish visuals and solid mix of gore and laughs. The 4K disc is also another winner from Sony, who just continue to pump out amazing discs like no other studio. Great fun and always worth a revisit. 

8/10 Dans

Zombieland is out now on 4K UHD and Blu-ray in the UK with a 4K UHD Steelbook available from Zavvi
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Halloween 2 (2009) Blu-ray Review

Review:

*Originally written December 3rd, 2018*

After revisiting Rob Zombie's first Halloween film and being pleasantly surprised, I thought maybe it was time to go back to this one and see if it was as terrible as I remember, or I was just wrong. While Halloween 2 suffers from a lot of the same problems as the first, it's not quite as bad as I remember, but it is far from good.

Zombie's decision to shoot on 16mm film makes for an ugly and nasty looking film that retains a lot of the grittiness and feeling of trashiness he was going for. It also captures the pure barbaric nature of the Myers violence, but Zombie fails to film his kills with any real tension or decent framing. This is something that gets worse in Zombie's career as he went on to favour shakey-cam in the truly awful 31. 

There's a baffling amount of story decisions in Halloween 2 that just feel off and far too weird for a film like this. I appreciate Zombie was let off the leash for this one and allowed to do his own thing, but this is far removed from the spirit of the Halloween franchise we know. We learn more about Michael's motivation from his hallucinations of his dead mother who orders him to get his sister back. It's nice to explore what's making Michael tick, but it is done in such lame and purely executed fashion that it's hard not to cringe. It's a huge creative misstep and I feel someone should have been handling Zombie's ideas a bit more.

Speaking of missteps, part of me both loves and hates the opening the film, a 20 minute prologue that ultimately meant nothing to the film. It's clearly a homage to the original Halloween 2's hospital setting, but having this event as a dream sequence feels like an outrageous amount of padding to get the film up to an acceptable length. What's most frustrating about it is the hospital scene actually has some real tension and brutality here, far better than anything later in the film. I just wished they saved it for something that actually happens in the film.

It's not all bad though, Malcolm McDowell is back and wonderful as ever as Dr. Loomis. I'd guess a lot of fans would not be a fan of this portrayal of Loomis as it portrays him as a money hungry profiteer off the misery of the people who had died in the previous film and his failure to treat Michael. It's not particularly deep or clever, but it's fun to see McDowell play Loomis as such a sellout in a performance that clearly isn't taking itself as seriously as the rest of the film.

I was also pretty impressed with Scout Taylor-Thompson's role as Laurie Strode this time, they actually do a lot of interesting things with her in the first half as she learns the truth about her connection to Michael while she suffers from PTSD after the events of the first one. It's no Jamie Lee Curtis from Halloween 2018, but it's definitely a step above a lot of other horror film final girls.

Some part of me wishes we got a trilogy of the Rob Zombie Halloween films, while we waited 9 years for the Excellent David Gordon Green film, it would have been nice to see this canon of the story told and wrapped up. Whether it would have been better or worse than this one is another story, because the ending stinger implies something a lot more stupid than this one. Hey-ho, this canon is dead now so it doesn't matter anyway.


Rob Zombie's Halloween 2 is a huge misstep after the decent first, but it still has Zombie's aggressive flare and enough interesting moments to make it one of the better Halloween films. I feel I'm giving this a really low score, despite kind of enjoying it, but it really is a mess. I might like this one more in the future. After this watch, I'm surprised and confused as to why I hated this so much when it came out?

4/10 Dans

Halloween 2 is out now on Blu-ray and DVD in the UK
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Avatar (2009) - Film Review

Review:

*Originally written April 17th, 2016*

"All Looks, No Soul"

Well, he we are, the highest grossing film of all time. The insane phenomenon that was Avatar and 7 years on it still holds up about the same as I remember. Visually incredible but remarkably hollow and in all honesty, kinda bland.

Avatar follows Sam Worthington's Jake Sully, a paralysed soldier who takes his dead brother's place in the 'Avatar' programme, an experiment that allows you to transfer your conciseness to a blank body. The blank bodies in question being the inhabitants of a planet that humans need to mine for energy or something.

It's fairly generic stuff. It doesn't help that the script is utter garbage filled with cliche lines like "You ain't in Kansas anymore" and "I didn't sign up for this shit", a lot of these lines had me rolling my eyes. There's nothing really original or smart about the story, it's all about the spectacle.

The villain is also so laughably generic, a hardened war colonel with no soul or sense of fun. It's a shame too, as Stephen Lang is a very capable actor worthy of much more than this.  At least the other villain played by that guy from Ted and My Name is Earl had fun with his role, but the main villain was just brutal.

There is also a strong supporting cast that help things along too. Michelle Rodriguez does her usual tough girl thing from the Fast and Furious films, while Sigourney Weaver comes off much better than a lot of the other actors here.

It's fine to make a film that's all about spectacle, but it's no excuse for such boring storytelling. And such a bland lead, seriously, what the hell is Sam Worthington? He's so uncharismatic and just dull, I never cared for his character once in the barbarically overlong 3 hour run-time. Yeah, this is 3 hours, which you already know, but it hurt me and was a struggle to sit through.

On a technical level, Avatar is insanely impressive. James Cameron has made a world that feels alive, there are some great ideas and designs. Despite the whole thing being CGI, it feels real and life-like and the scale of the action is pretty awesome at times.

I suppose I could have stomached this better as a tech demo for Cameron's creative vision had it been at least an hour shorter, but with the run-time it had, it was just tedious. It doesn't help with the variety of special/extended editions that don't bring a lot to the table.

Avatar is a visual feast for the eyes, but beyond that it's a pretty hollow and outrageously overlong film with bland characters, a generic story and a script that is at times laughable.


Cameron has just announced he's working on 4 more films in the Avatar franchise and to be honest, I am pretty interested to see where he goes with it. I like the world he's set up, but there is a lot of room for improvement.

5/10 Dans

Avatar is out now on Blu-ray and DVD in the UK
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Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (2009) - Film Review

Review:

*Originally written December 19th, 2016*

While I somewhat enjoyed Michael Bay's first Transformers for an extent, this reignited my fears on why I hate this franchise. All the worst elements of the first ramped up to 11. Due to the success of the first film, I guess they let Bay of the rails as he delivers one of the most annoying and bombastic blockbusters I can think of.

I'll get the small bits of good out the way first. Once again, there is a variety of interesting and technically interesting set-pieces. The action is stylish, fast and oddly brutal at times. While most of the action is decent, this finale is a wet noodle. Completely boring and very lacklustre compared to the LA streets carnage of the first. Although that might be because I had long checked out due to the absurd 150 minute run time.

Optimus Prime being.. fine?

Where Revenge of the Fallen fails horrifically is once again with its characters, run time and awful, awful humour. Bay ramps up the annoying racial stereotypes that plagued the first one. I can't believe any producer thought it was okay to allow him to portray characters like this.

It's also bizarelly overlong. It's insane that this was anywhere near 150 minutes. 2 and a half fucking hours. It would have been fine if it had at least been fun, but it wasn't it's a trainwreck of bombastic garbage. I nearly threw up when I checked how long was left and I was only at the 90 minute mark. Part of me died that I don't think I'll be getting back any time soon.

Along with the misguided racial humour, all the characters are annoying. Shia LeBeouf is once again just a jabbering idiot who got on my nerves with his awkardness. Megan Fox is defined with her opening shot, which is her bent over a bike. Worst of all, the Witwicky family get more screentime is increasingly lame comic scenes. Wanted to see the mum accidentally eat a pot brownie and make a fool or herself? Me neither.

The terrible humour doesn't stop with the characters either. There's some really crude and pathetic shots at jokes which involve things like a small Transformer with a penis for a gun, Megan Fox getting her leg dry humped by a robot and a Decepticon with a massive pair of testicles. This is the most unhinged and demonic Bay has been since the monstrosity that was Bad Boys 2.

Michael Bay leers at Megan Fox with his camera like a disgusting pervert

Revenge of the Fallen even had the balls to try and get some emotional response out the audience with its last act. Like we were meant to feel something when we thought Sam Witwicky had died. It was embarassing. This is a character that's had nearly 5 hours of screentime, but we feel nothing. 

There is nothing to the side characters to even grip on to. I cannot tell you a single thing other than John Turtorro works in a kebab shop after the events of the first. It really makes me sad seeing Turtorro lowered to levels like this.

Yeah, it's awful. Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen is all the worst parts of the first thrown into an absurd run time of 150 minutes of horrific displays of Bay without a leash.

3/10 Dans

Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen is out now on Blu-ray and DVD in the UK
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