The Refrigerator 1991 Review

The Refrigerator

Attack of the kitchen appliances from hell

You know those movies, where the name and the premise is half the fun? Like killer klown from outer space or return of the killer tomatoes?

Yeah, so here’s a movie about a killer fridge from hell, do with that information whatever you want.

Released in 1991, this weird thing I’m unsure to call a movie or a bad joke someone made on a late Saturday night after a whiskey intoxication, is brought to us by Nicholas Jacobs, who unfortunately never really did anything else worthwhile.

A movie about a killer fridge, *sight* seems like just yesterday that I used to review normal movies…wait, I never did review a movie based on any plane of normality, why am I complaining??

Ilene and Michael Bateman (not sure if it’s a reference to the book American Psycho, seen as it was published in the same year this movie came out), a young and ambitious couple decide to buy a place in the less rat infested parts of new York, little do they know that their refrigerator has a minor case of the satanz and goes around munching on unimportant extra’s during it’s free time.

But it seems Michael is getting more and more willing to listen to the little people living in his fridge telling him to kill his wife as the movie goes on, and yes, I wish I could make sh8t like this up as I go along. But thankfully, Ilene gets help from the greatest man alive, Super-plumber Juan, who with his pornstash and epic dancing skills manages to even give Bruce Campbell a run for his money. My god is that man awesome.

So what is there to say about this movie? Besides that it’s about a fridge that goes ballistic that is. Well, I guess you can say it’s about the fear of committing, as Ilene and Michael seem to take each other for granted and their relationship slowly start to break down to the simple factor of mistrust, or you could say it’s about a GODAMN KILLER FRIDGE FROM HELL THAT EATS PEOPLE.

Seriously, do I need to say more? People, there is a motion picture in which a refrigerator eats a man whole by comically opening and shutting it’s door.

I guess I could talk about the needless dialogue or the plot that gets crammed in there too tight like it’s trying to overshadow the killer fridge, like the constant flashbacks from Ilene about her youth that ends up going, guess where? Nowhere at all of course!

I mean we get scenes upon scenes of her childhood trauma that all ends up in a big fat cry and f8ck all else. No character motivation, just the super plumber and his unusual good people skills (I’m serious, I can’t find a single flaw with this guy).

But there are some great scenes, I’ll give this cheap movie that much, there is a scene that just might be the best moment in cinematography of all time. I mean really, how can you even start to top a scene in which a depressed workaholic husband wakes up in the middle of the night with a smile that would put the Cheshire cat to shame just to say: “I am the wafflemaker!”

I tip my hat off to you “The Refrigerator”, you have out random’d me mister, may the blessing of the great space homophobic squirrel lord go with you.
but all joking aside, this movie is silly, really silly. Maybe not in the way that 'Robo-Geisha' is silly in a self-acknowledged way, but more based on the premise, while the movie tries it’s darn hardest to pass a serious story about a troubled falling apart couple that just so happen to have a killer doorway to hell located in their fridge, and also the best plumber I’ve ever seen, seriously, I can’t get over this guy, I think I have a bro-crush.

Death by fridge, now I've seen everything

So should you watch this movie?

Yes, as a matter of fact, you owe it to yourself to see this movie, simply because you’ll then be able to brag to your friends that you've seen everything. But really, it’s kinda slow and a lot of story goes nowhere, but at least you’ll see a guy gets eaten by a fridge, that’s something I guess.

Personal rating: 6.5/10

Critical rating: 4.5/10

Things I’ve learned from “The refrigerator”:

- I knew living in New York was tough, but damn.

- Good names don’t make good movies

- Plumbers are awesome, bonus points for the mustache

- When little people inside you fridge start telling you how to live your life, it’s time to put down the waffle maker belt and seek some help.

- Can’t wait for “the mixer of doom” or “The little toaster massacre"

[special award] 
Greatest moment in cinema history:
The Wafflemaker

Brainscan 1994 Review

Brainscan

Pre Virtual-Boy of doom

I get the distinctive idea that people in the 90’s saw us gamers as a bunch of psychopaths waiting to snap, then again, here we have “Brainscan”, a flag holder for worried mommies all over the nation blaming anything but their own parental skills for their kids sudden homicidal tendencies.

A movie about a violent video game in the 90’s? my my, this sounds interesting.

Brought to us in 1994, a glorious year for us gorehounds, this little movie tackles the question of how far one is willing to fall to erase the consequences of a remorseless act.

So let’s go back to a time where the SEGA CD was still a ‘thing’ and figure out why video games are apparently the devil incarnated.

Peeping tom extraordinaire sixteen years old Micheal finds time between his voyeurism sessions and chillaxing like a baller with his typical ”far out dude!” bro to try the game everyone is talking about, Brainscan, a game that is played directly with your brain. Unfortunately after having finished the first disc and mission, that involved sneaking into some poor sod’s house and going Norman Bates on his ass, Michael realizes that the game seems to have consequences in the real world, and he finds himself screwed when the police don’t buy his puppy dog eyes alibi. Even worse, a strange entity follows him around calling himself “the trickster” to make his life a living hell and force him to continue playing, acting like Micheal’s conscience forcing him to take care of the witnesses and erase his tracks. All while we witness the poor little Micheal make time to ask the girl next door out and Micheal’s best friend recreate dialogue from ‘Bill and Ted’s excellent adventure’.

As Micheal continues playing and digs his grave deeper and deeper, reality starts to shift as Trickster makes the game more and more difficult and detective Mc-coldface abnormally good intuitions lead him to his murderer.

can't tell if his face says
"Let's play some super smash brawl"
or "Squeal like a little piggy!"

Okay, let’s get this out of the way, I frigging love this movie. Maybe strange seeing as that in my review of “Satan’s little helper” I criticized it for shining such a negative light on gamers. But in this movie the subject is approached in a much more mature angle. Sure Micheal and his friend are obsessed by horror movies simply for the gore and will play any game with blood in it, and above all doesn't even question the idea of playing a game where the main objective is to perform ruthless homicidal acts for the Lulz.

But the real question this movie asks is: how far is someone gonna go if they believe that their acts are without consequence. Which is a really good and interesting subject regarding the human psychology and the sick dark place that lurks in the human creativity.

So do I like the story? Yes, it’s a murder case  with a bit of a supernatural angle and seen from the perspective of the killer. The message is maybe a little too preachy for me, video games are violent and so on, but let’s remember that it was a very difficult time then, and the idea of blaming something new was simpler than looking at the truth. The questions the movie asks are interesting and it’s an entertaining situation to watch our protagonist get out of.

The characters were all right for the most part, the kid that played Micheal did a good job, and the Trickster is damn entertaining to see. He’s the kind of devil you could have a good laugh with and that could kill you the next moment, all while abusing your house with his questionable feeding habits. I’ll admit that the Trickster is probably the main reason why you should watch this movie, a strange sadistic entity that forces you to continue murdering with as leverage the fear of getting caught? What’s not to love?

And off course we are treated to pre-perfection 90’s CGI and some great practical effects.

The CGI is actually pretty interesting, at time it’s your average 90’s lightning effects, but sometime it seems like they add a painted effect to some of the morphing effects on the Trickster, which give a pretty interesting combination of pre CGI and other canvas techniques.

I really recommend this movie, the story’s good and the ending always makes me laugh. For anyone looking for a cheezy 90’s horror/gore movie with a good twist, I promise you won’t be disappointed, if you don’t mind the teenage drama sprinkled here and there.

Personal rating: 8,5/10

Critical rating: 7/10

Thing I’ve learned from “Brainscan”:

-Damn, so SEGA was evil back in the days, who knew, well, apart from those who know about sonic.EXE I guess.

- Didn’t know the Goblin King and the Leprechaun had a kid, good to know he went into the gaming industry, instead of kidnapping babies or murdering one sixth of  the cast of ‘Friends’.

-Man, I want Micheal’s room. Kid’s got a own electronic butler named Igor. All I got as a kid was a pet lizard I had to catch on my own.

-Who else thinks that “horror movie club” is the best idea for a high school since forcing girls into miniskirts?

Motor Home Massacre 2005 Review

Motorhome Massacre

Because “trailer park of horror” was already taken

What do you get if you give a redneck a camcorder?

You mean apart from the tons of hilarious videos of them doing stupid sh8t as a result of their intoxication on tasteless scotch? Well, there’s also the fact that one of them might get the idea stuck  in his thick head that he wants to make a movie. And thus, we end up with Motor Home Massacre, I’m sure the stereotypical redneck is highly exaggerate, but movies like these keep slapping me in the face with the cold hard fact that they just might be all too true.

Brought to us in 2005 by an amateur movie director Allan Wilbanks, this shot on crackmera violent schmuck flew right under the radar for, well, more than obvious reasons.

Seeing from the title, an obvious parody of a much better movie, it will come as no surprise that this movie takes itself as seriously as Charles Mason giving Ed Gain a piggy back ride on a peace rally.

But what else can be said about this one and a half hours’ worth of brain cells holocaust?

Well, quite a lot actually.

Seven teenagers decide to take a motorhome to the middle of nowhere and have a good time, little do they know that they are about to embark in a tale filled with every single cliché in the book, creepy store clerk telling them about a horrible series of murders in the area, check, picking up an hitchhiker along the way, check, dumb blonds getting what’s coming to them, check.

Yes, the group gets harassed by an unknown killer, who picks them up one by one and kills them in brutal and cheesy ways, but the real question is: what did you expect from a movie called ‘motor home massacre’? you know it’s a bunch of idiots in a motorhome getting Jason-Voorhees’D.

So is this movie any good? Well the short answer would be no, the long answer would be that this movie doesn’t just fail as a horror, but also as a parody, which is a shame really. They had all the cliches, all the cheesy effects, but they just didn’t use them to their advantage, only one scene of five seconds made me laugh near the end throughout the entire movie, and it was all based on a guy looking down at his newly found amputation and saying “damn” with such nonchalance like he just had stepped in a dog turd on his way to the mall.

But apart from that one scene, nothing really stands out, all the actors seems to have gone to the Nic cage school of acting, which sounds pretty cool, but it really works on your nerves after a while.

The effects were okay, if noting a little cheap, but then again, we’re talking about motor home massacre here.

And now the soundtrack, oh god the soundtrack. I swear to god, if I ever hear the song ‘Truck lovin’man’ one more time I’m gonna personally find whoever decided to put this wretched thing in any motion picture and shove my foot so far up his a** he’ll be shitting boots for the rest of his life.

Apart from that horrid song, the rest of the soundtrack sounds like a emo band trying to slit their wrists with their instruments. Well, that’s what I thought of the soundtrack until the mother of all misplaced great song found its way into this little mess of a movie. Skin-dropped by buttonhook(the first credit song), my god does that gem of a song have nothing to do in a movie like this, unfortunately due to the failure of this movie’s success, that song and that band are harder to find than Shaq’s movie career.

So is this movie worth watching? Probably not, unless if you’re into awkward sex scenes and kindergarten-level dialogue.

Personal rating: 4/10

Critical rating: 3/10

Things I've learned from "Motor home massacre":
- Dating someone who has the voice of Satan might not have been a good idea in hindsight.

- The cops are d8cks in this movie, forcing a group of teenagers to stay in the same woods where there has been a murder? Why not give them giant neon signs with “fresh meat” on them while you’re at it.

- Slasher killers are the best mechanics 

I'm Back!

That’s right, after a short unplanned absence from this blog I finally have some time for myself again.

First off, I’d like to apologies for my lack of reviews the past few weeks, and for not mentioning or warning you all for the upcoming lack of attention. But from now on, I’ve decided to keep a strict agenda, and I promise at least one review each week. I’m not sure of the day yet, and how to deal with the possible delay, but we’ll figure something out, won’t we?

Grimmbreak