THE DANMAN CAN

Where to begin with Grizzly II: Revenge ? First of all, I watched this film's predecessor, 1976's  Grizzly  ( review ), earlier this year and forgot that I had. That says something (though I thought I wasn't into " nature run amok " pictures, but it turns out I've seen more than I realized and enjoy some of them quite a bit). There is so… much in GII and yet so little substance. It was shot in 1983, shelved, additional footage was added, and it finally saw release in 2020. (There’s a fascinating article about the history of the film here .) We have pre-fame  Charlie Sheen , George Clooney , and  Laura Dern  (all three prominently advertised on the poster) who are in the movie for all but a combined total of less than five minutes (and Dern only there to be a nag and then strip down to her underwear which is gross because she was sixteen when she filmed her scenes). We have  John Rhys-Davies  as a French-Canadian trapper with a dodgy accent, a fierce ...

I don't have much to say about Cannibal Ferox (1981). I've never been a fan of cannibal films (and I've seen more than a few).  Cannibal Holocaust   (1980) is a well-made film within the genre (though still one I never need to see again, and I've seen it more than once) with some level of social commentary, but CF  is just mean-spirited and gory for the sake of being mean-spirited and gory (with some heavy-handed and weak attempts at the same type of commentary). That wouldn't bother me so much if it weren't for the cruelty toward and real killing of animals (in both of the above-mentioned films). It's one thing to capture footage of animals hunting each other in the wild or native people eating animals that are part of their regular diet, it's another to tie up an aardvark and film a snake strangling it solely to disturb the audience. Anyway, there is some funny dialogue and some good makeup f/x but otherwise this is just simply not a film for me (and...

Cub  (2014) is one disappointing film. It's a mess of underdeveloped elements, it lacks any semblance of backstory, it's full of nothing but mean-spirited and unrealistic characters who make puzzling decisions (I can't speak for Belgium, but I was a Boy Scout and there's no way almost an entire troupe, including the leaders, would be comprised of assholes). Any statements the film tries to make about bullying are heavy-handed and rendered moot by its reveling in violence and its completely unsympathetic lead. There is no weight to the deaths of any of the characters because we’re given no chance to connect with any of them. The only redeeming qualities are that it's incredibly well-made for a low budget film and Steve Moore 's score is, typically, excellent (not the first time a score of his has been far better than the film it was written for).

Very bad film.

My second time seeing this and definitely my last if I can help it. I'll admit, it was way more fun with an audience but it's still an awful film.