Maria is beginning a serious depression. Her husband, Victor, has been gone for three weeks, and Maria is really feeling his loss ("I thought I didn't need friends with Victor around, and now that he's gone, my friends have decided the same thing."). Maria is neglecting her work--she is the inventor of an experimental female fertility drug, and her colleague, Vladimir, is picking up the slack. Vladimir is also willing to replace any other missing facets of her life, if Maria will let him in. Maria lives day by day, slowly floating away from reality. As Maria's drama unfolds, a black-gloved killer is roaming around the city, targeting young women.
Roman Prygunov's
Solitude of Blood (2002) is a thriller which has as its main protagonist a beautiful, intelligent, and obsessive female character at the helm.
Ingeborga Dapkunaite, as Maria, joins fellow actresses, Nanako Matsushima in Hideo Nakata's
Ring (1998); Lorenza Indovina in Alex Infascelli's
Almost Blue (2000); Naomi Watts in Gore Verbinski's
The Ring (2002); and Stefania Rocca in Dario Argento's
The Card Player (2004). While the quality of those films varies, all of the films,
Solitude included, have strong performances from the female leads. Often the lead performance is the saving grace of the film. Prygunov's film has quite a few additional strong points. However, Dapukunaite's performance is the highlight.
In
Solitude, the viewer accompanies Maria as she wanders the streets or spends time in her apartment, doing the day-to-day things of life. Prygunov shoots all the scenes with harsh light, giving the surroundings an air of artificiality. Nothing looks real any more, not even at her workplace, where Maria's work involves the creation of life. The use of green hue is a perfect touch. Green is a color synonymous with sickness and its judicious use works. In one of the film's best green scenes, Maria awakens to enter the bathroom. She removes bandages from previous wounds (from a car accident earlier in the film) and begins to cut open her stitches with a straight razor. Maria pulls tape from all of her wounds and completely soaked in blood, she makes a makeshift cassette with an eerie message.
The murders in the film and the would-be subplot involving a conspiracy at the lab take a backseat to Maria's decline into depression and madness. Maria eventually uncovers the identity of the killer, but by that time, she has fallen away. The murder scenes are filmed in a very giallo-esque fashion and quite stylish. Although the film is around a hundred minutes,
Solitude moves at a leisurely pace, to say the least. At times, this is a strength of the film and at others, a serious weakness. The screenwriter,
Pavel Ruminov, pens a very interesting but uneven story. He would go on to write and direct
Dead Daughters (2007) to some acclaim. Prygunov constructs some terrific visuals with some simple haunting audio. Above all, this film is worth seeing for Ingeborga Dapkunaite's performance. The closeness that the viewer gets to this character is refreshing, even though it is a descent into madness
Old school science fiction's fun. I have a small magnet on my fridge from a pest control company with a large termite looming in the shadows, Cloverfield-style. I believe the fear that it attempts to instill in me is the severe reduction in value that the little critters will bring to my home in a dwindling economic market, rather than the fear of a large horde of mutated insects coming to destroy my home, my neighborhood, the state, and the world in a quest for world domination. Old school science fiction also has the wonderfully ironic addition of the absence of any modern technology: no cell phones, laptops, fax machines, or readily-accessible and on every street corner, weapons of mass destruction. Almost all technology comes from the imagination: super-groovy radars that monitor the atmosphere for meteors, one-button rocket panels, and Darth Vader-ish radiation outfits. Old school science fiction is full of fear and speculation, primarily of a growing dependence on technology and also of unknown outerspace. In the Nigel Kneale penned and Val Guest directed Quatermass 2 (1957), those fears are real. Professor Bernard Quatermass (Brian Donlevy) uncovers an alien invasion in the British countryside and attempts to expose the situation and cure it. However, from the local village folk to London, he is met with contempt and derision. Quatermass is seemingly alone in his quest; no one wants to acknowledge that there's a problem and deal with it. I'm so grateful that that problem doesn't exist today. Quatermass 2 is a gem from the early days Hammer studios, based upon Nigel Kneale's BBC serials of the same name.
Quatermass 2 opens with a couple rushing to get help. A young woman's beau has been infected by the gas seeping from a rock that fell out the sky. Meanwhile, Quatermass is huffing and puffing with anger: his rocket project funding has been cut off. No trips to outer space for anyone anytime soon. That's okay, because the visitors are coming to Earth and they're taking over with the not-so-subtle use of mind control. An entire village has been reduced to rubble while a large man-made metal structure looms over countryside. Supposedly it's for food production, but Quatermass knows better. His biggest enemy in his quest to save the world from alien invasion is government bureaucracy and local mob mentality. 
Val Guest's direction is more suitable for the stage rather than the screen, although Quatermass 2 does have its visual flourishes. The large metal outpost is shot effectively as imposing and looming in wide angles. The best scenes are within those walls. When Quatermass is able to convince someone in the government to do an impromptu inspection of the plant, Guest is able to make the modern-looking steelworks appear completely alien. Kneale's screenplay reflects that attitude: humankind's quest to destroy itself through a seriously advanced chronological jump in technology. The local villagers want to keep hush about the situation at the plant, because it's their source of economic viability. It isn't until that it's revealed that the occupants of the plant want to kill them that the villagers are willing to do anything about it.
The performances are all good and predate modern method-acting. The artificiality of the acting and the visual style can be annoying to modern viewers, but I'm quite a fan of cinema of old. I'm also a huge fan of Hammer films, so expect to see more on these pages. Quatermass 2 is certainly campy. John Carpenter channeled this vibe in the eighties with his wonderful They Live (1988) and Prince of Darkness (1987). In fact, if you substituted the seriousness of Quatermass 2 with spoof, then it would become a perfect episode of South Park. However, regardless of the era, Quatermass 2 will always be fun, because good science fiction always says something about humanity. What it says doesn't change, just when we are willing to recognize it. 
Gianfranco Giagni's Spider Labyrinth (1988) shows a strong influence from H.P. Lovecraft and Italian horror maestro, Dario Argento. Giagni employs the wonderful out-dated color scheme of Suspiria (1977) and Inferno (1980), combined with the atmospheric European architecture, to excellent effect. The sleek and slow steadicam is also note-worthy and gives Spider Labyrinth an appropriate ethereal feel. 
The plot of the film is familiar to any reader of H.P. Lovecraft and its mystery is an old but interesting one. The script's most serious flaw, other than some daft dialogue, is the rendering of the main character, Whitmore. Lovecraft penned some of the most intelligent and resourceful scholars in his literature, but he never penned one this stupid. Whitmore acts like a lost child looking for his toy in most of the scenes. Clues to the mystery are literally shown or handed to him, and it's almost as if H.P. Lovecraft was giving him a supernatural kick to the pants to get him through the mystery. To his credit, Roland Wybenga plays an endearing idiot. Paola Rinaldi, as Genevieve, is not given much to do but take her clothes off, smile, and chew the scenery. Muzi's terrific in her small role as the maid, Maria, and genre stalwart William Berger gives another professional and competent performance. As flawed as the plot and characterizations are, Spider Labyrinth doesn't suffer much: like Argento's work, the viewer can bask in the atmosphere and the scares and leave the brain's legwork to Lovecraft's fiction.
As a kid in the 80s, I lived on a steady diet of action films, direct-to-video horror, and pee-wee football. While watching Stallone in Ted Kotcheff's First Blood (1982), Norris in Joseph Zito's Missing in Action (1984), or Schwarzenegger in Mark Lester's Commando (1985), for example, I never thought about any of the political over- or undertones of the films. I was too wrapped up in the soldier action, feasting my eyes on one-man killing machines. Big explosions and big guns were symbols of 80s action movies, but now as an adult looking back, I realize that some of those films had something to say. However, those films were also spectacular--the filmmakers were going to die trying to entertain the viewer, as well.
Hell Raiders is a film of that elk, as its English title conveys. Samtani shoots his film for coverage, sacrificing the slick shot to show as much as possible within the frame. Raiders lives and breathes with its action scenes, as soon as one ends, another starts up. The final thirty minutes of the film is a Dutch massacre of an Indonesian village followed by the Indonesian rebels retaliation at Dutch headquarters. Plenty of bullets are shot, and many squibs explode. The squibs are slick, but the blood is thin. Most characters look as if they spilled their Cherry Kool-Aid all down the front of their clothes. I did that a lot too in the 80s, so I know. As such, the budget looks tight for this epic of a film. What Samtani lacks in money, he most certainly makes up with emotion. It's hard not to love these characters and follow their quest for independence. Hell Raiders is also two hours of rousing 80s action. Take your pick...or take both.
Director 
Massi adopts the gialli eye for Black Angel, e.g. the voyeur. Not an inch of flesh is spared of sexy Tinì Cansino, whose role appears her last. The camera eye roves over her body continually, often in subjective shots of the killer. The sensational scenes, especially the scene of Deborah cruising the strip for male hustlers, are wildly atmospheric, and the police procedural scenes are handled perfunctorily, as in the numerous Eurocrime films Massi helmed before. As such, the plot ain't new nor is it really that exciting. Anyone familiar with late-80s, late-nite Skin-emax flicks have seen this one coming way before Paul Verhoeven blew the lid off in Basic Instinct (1992). Black Angel is seething with sexuality, from the sex scenes to the murders to Frank's relationship with his live-in mother, Marta (genre legend Evelyn Stewart, ne 
I've never seen Massi plumb the depths as he does in Black Angel. Not even Snake Plissken in John Carpenter's Escape from New York (1981) found this much sleaze in the underground, but for the willing, Massi puts it down there for the curious to find.
Jung-jae Lee is a wonderful actor with a very expressionistic face. He plays Thunder as a reluctant leader who doesn't think before he speaks. Although he's a great fighter, trash talking is about ninety percent of his game. "Don't call Big Gun, Man-deuk," Thunder is told, "or there will be bloodshed." At a meeting of the crime bosses, Thunder drops Man-deuk's name, not once but twice. Suk-hoon Kim is stellar as the flamboyant Man-deuk and his comedy is a terrific foil to Jung-jae Lee's performance. Not least of all Ok-bin Kim, as Dishy, steals nearly every scene that she's in and her performance runs the dramatic range, from sexy to funny to quiet to sad. She performs a dance at the crime boss meeting where she dips her soles in paint and steps on to a white tarp. With lithe, balletic movements, her dance is beautiful to watch, and the painting it produces is beautiful as well. 
The Accidental Gangster and the Mistaken Courtesan is a light film. Although, there is some bloodshed towards the end, it's overall very funny and exciting. Accidental Gangster is sentimental, escapist cinema, which is always welcome. The visuals are incredible: Kyun-dong Yeo's film is totally slick and well-paced. The few fight scenes are brilliant, especially the fight at the end (two guesses and you'll know the participants). I thought this film was total fun and pure popcorn. 
Based on a novel by popular 
Yosuke's mourning the loss of one of his best friends, who always called him "gutless" and Yosuke is continuing his friend's opinion of him: he no longer cares about anything and thinks the world is set to self-destruct. He's a prankster and a clown but is not ready to take any real risks in life. Eri is mourning a loss, as well, and if it weren't for her supernatural battles (or really Yosuke), she would be wandering, too. The two bond over the most bizarre circumstances and blossom into a wonderful romance. I enjoyed both performances as the two leads had great chemistry, comedic timing, and dramatic resonance. 
The mixture of the fantastic and the mundane in Negative Happy Chainsaw Edge has the feel of Magic Realism to it, like Nacho Vigalondo's Timecrimes (2007). The characters accept and recognize the fantastic or supernatural aspects, and when the storyteller blends the two elements successfully, the viewer is able to accept the fantastic elements as well. First-time director, 
Finally, the actual battle scenes are terrific but are truly collateral to the film. I grew up on John Hughes's films, and if you could imagine Weird Science (1985) and its vibe being channeled today, then you would have something like Negative Happy Chainsaw Edge.
Wright has a strong love for disaffected youth: Romper Stomper (1992), Metal Skin (1994) and Cherry Falls (2000). In some ways, he continues this theme with Macbeth, starring Sam Worthington as Macbeth and Victoria Hill as Lady Macbeth, who also co-wrote and co-produced. The relationship between the two leads is Wright's central focus, and Shakespeare's play becomes not a tale of ambition but answers the question: where else are we supposed to go? This film is one hundred and eighty degrees different from fellow countryman, Baz Luhrmann's Romeo and Juliet (1996). 
Modern Macbeth is set in the criminal underworld. Worthington's Macbeth looks as if he shares a closet with Kakihara from Miike's Ichi the Killer (2001) and at times, Hill's Lady Macbeth looks eerily like Amy Winehouse. Shot on digital video, Macbeth has a strong resemblance to a music video. The colors range the technicolor spectrum with no shortage of red blood. The violence is amazingly brutal and frequent. Worthington and Hill's performances contain the deserved reverence for the Bard's language and as such their performances are quite good. Wright also shows the same reverence, for when any character begins to speak, the camera becomes still and its focus is the face of the speaker. The flourishes are saved for the action or in a particularly interesting touch, the scenes with the witches. Wright imagines them as figments of Macbeth's mind in the form of three red-headed schoolgirls. These scenes are indulgent and sexy and often counterbalance the seriousness of the subject matter. 
Macbeth is the very definition of a divisive film: either it comes of as crass and commercial or brave and interesting. Either way that it's viewed, it is indisputable that Macbeth is a quintessential Wright film. And Wright is making some of the most interesting cinema today.
The first hour of Martyrs reflects the impulsive actions of Lucie and Anna. Overcome with anger and revenge, Lucie make a series of actions with unforeseen consequences, as they also encounter unforeseen characters and events. The film is quite kinetic and fast-moving; however, I never forgot while watching that there was an undercurrent of something premeditated and calculated relating to the why Lucie and Anna were reacting and acting the way that they were. The film is rife with dark material and themes. The subject of child abuse is shown as it is, completely reprehensible. However, Laugier's imagery is shown with very bright and clinical light--almost nothing is hidden in shadows. If something is hidden, it's usually revealed as quite hideous. Also, the plot feels totally alien and unreal, but the brutal violence is shown with a visceral realism. Victims are shown emaciated, like mutated monsters, while the perpetrators, the true monsters, look like everyone else.