Late Phases

Hey there all you spooky freaky people. Time to go to your friendly Retirement Community. Full of older folks baking cookies, being nosy, and your blood thirsty neighborhood werewolf.

We are introduced to Ambrose. A blind senior who is moving to a local retirement community, and as you can guess, he is not very happy or pleasant Yep, he is the grumpy old man. He greets his neighbor nicely though, but the welcoming community, not so much. Anyways, he and his dog are settling in for their first night in their new home, when he hears a violent disturbance at his neighbors. He is then attacked by, as you can guess, a werewolf. He fights off the large lycan, learns about his neighbors bloody demise, and the fact that apparently once a month these types of attacks happen. With his heightened sense of smell and hearing, he goes off to track down the murderous creature and put it down.

This movie was not so bad. I mean there are a lot of bad werewolf movies out there and its so hard, at least for me, to find a good one. This one was decent. I like that the focus is around a very unlikely hero. I mean a blind senior man fighting werewolves? That is a pretty creative idea. Especially with the senior part. You always see these werewolf movies that are centered around younger people. Plus this takes place in a retirement community and spoiler alert, the werewolves are NOT young people. But you do keep guessing about who the werewolf is and your constantly rooting for this man who is the only one trying to do anything about it. The cops are pretty much portrayed as 'useless'. Especially the one who keeps making fun of the elderly even in serious situations. If your looking for a character to hate, go with the bad cop. I wish he would of been eaten by the werewolves.

I recommend this movie indefinably. Its not a big budget movie. The werewolves were pretty much people in obvious costumes. Not the best, but the transformation scenes were where the extra money went. They weren't 'American Werewolf in London' great, but it wasn't terrible. The story pretty much makes up for that. See it, and enjoy. Just beware of retirement communities and that friendly old lady. She may be making cookies by day, but becomes a vicious schnauzer at night. No granny, that's a bad granny! Stop chewing on your neighbors!

The Shrine

Hey there my fellow blood and gore fans. Time to bring out your creepy iron masks and passports, cause we are heading for Polish country.

Our story begins with a couple, Carmen and Marcus, heading for break-up town cause Carmen is so focused on her journalist job. Wanting to do something that is considered serious writing, she learns about a local guy who had gone missing in Poland. She and her intern, Sara, take up the case, and with Marcus, goes to the last place the missing man was seen, a small village called Alvania. Once there, the threesome find the villagers unwelcoming and very stand offish. As they wonder around they see what looks to be a thick fog cloud in the forest. As they head towards it they are stopped by the villagers who insist that they leave. That doesn't stop them though as they find another way to the fog. Carmen and Sara journey into the fog. What they find is a evil looking statue. What they don't know, is that once you see the statue, you have sealed your fate.

This movie  may not have been scary, but its a dang good story and thriller film. It was slow in the beginning, but once you got to Poland, wow. Your in for the time of your life. And the people you think are the bad guys, are not what you think. You learn the reason for the coldness that the villagers have to new people, you learn that nothing is as it seems, and you also learn that if you don't know Polish, you can't understand what the frack these people are saying! Seriously, would it have spoiled the plot if we had some subtitles??...maybe so. Very clever. Anyways, I highly recommend this movie. See it and enjoy!  
You know, if Silent Hill has taught me anything, its that places with permanent fog are to be avoided at all costs. Take the lesson people! You may not run into Pyramid Head in that fog, but you still will not like the results.

Alter

Alright my spooky children time to make our way back into an old haunted mansion and renovate the spirits out of it. Grab your sledge hammer, its time to check out the movie, Alter.

In a English country side a family is off to an old manor. Mom, being the main bread winner of the family, has been commissioned to restore the house to its former glory. Unknowing to her, a couple of spirits are awaken and as she goes about her job, her children start seeing funky ghosts and her husband starts going through a dark sinister change.

Now this movie held a lot of promise. The story seemed to be getting very compelling as it moved on, and you were intrigued by the change in the father and wanted to know more about the history of the house and its past occupants. Sadly, that's were it ends and you are left with more questions than answers. You want to know the history of the house but all you get is a quick 'oh, this artist lived here with his wife and they died'. That's the history lesson. You don't get a flashback to tell you what happened, you don't get a diary that one of the family members reads, you don't even get the ghost saying what happened to them. All you get is a quick internet search done by the mom and even that doesn't answer anything. If anything your sitting there thinking, 'what was the point? Who were these people and why are their spirits doing this? And why should I care? The ghost effects were pretty novice. It looked like a first year film students attempt at creating a ghost effect. And if leaving you with more questions than answers gets under your skin, than the ending will too.

Aside from all that, I think it was...eh. It did keep me interested. Its one of those movies that maybe if I watched it again I'd get the entire plot, I don't know. It wasn't terrible, but I'm not sure if I'd watch it again even if it meant getting the whole history of the manor. I leave it up to ya'll to decide. Now if you'll excuse me, I have a sledge hammer, and I'm not gonna let it go to waste. Dee smash!!!!