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John Allman

If you’ve ever wandered the aisles at the video store or surfed the DVR pay-per-view options and seen a bunch of movies that you’ve never heard of, chances are John has watched them. Why? He loves movies. All kinds of movies. Good, bad, so-bad-they’re good, even the truly unwatchable ones. He mostly loves horror and science-fiction and drive-in exploitation movies that most upstanding model citizens wouldn’t dare watch. Then he writes up his thoughts so you can decide - watch, don’t watch or avoid at all costs. Sometimes he even gets to talk to the cool folks who make some of your favorite films.

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John Allman

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New Releases for Tuesday, Dec. 27, 2011

Posted Dec 30, 2011 by John Allman

Updated Dec 30, 2011 at 06:49 PM

What’s new in stores and on video shelves this week:

Final Destination 5
Genre: Horror/Sequel
Directed by: Steven Quale
Run time: 92 minutes
Rating: R
Format: Blu-Ray

The Lowdown: So, let’s see – there has been a midair plane explosion, a vicious interstate pileup, a roller coaster mishap, a stadium-destroying Nascar crash and now, in “Final Destination 5,” a suspension bridge collapse that ranks among the series’ best opening disasters.

As a franchise, “Final Destination” had pretty much exhausted itself by the end of 2009’s “The Final Destination,” which was filmed in 3D and heavily promoted as the last blast for the series.

Of course, horror fans have been served that plate of steaming BS before from “Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter” to “Freddy’s Dead: The Final Nightmare,” and yet we always manage to find it in our hearts to forgive such premeditated marketing misdirection.

But why would we go willingly into another “Final Destination” when we know exactly what’s going to happen: There will be an opening disaster. One (un)lucky teenager will experience a premonition. He/she will save a handful of non-believers. And then they will get picked off one by one in spectacularly bloody, increasingly destructive dénouements.

And, frankly, as evidenced by Part 4, the proceedings had grown, how to say, pretty, dreadfully dull.

Fans of the films know that the best of the bunch, until now, was David R. Ellis’ “Final Destination 2,” which took a sadistic delight in concocting some of the most elaborately gruesome deaths ever put on film.

I’m happy to report that “Final Destination 5” rivals Part 2 in every way. The suspension bridge disaster is impressive in its execution, and the subsequent death scenes are more satisfying than any installment since. Director Steven Quale and writer Eric Heisserer seem energized by an unholy inspiration, offering up elaborate and unexpected demises for the unlucky survivors, allowing their imaginations to run wild. There is an awesome gymnastics scene that expertly builds tension with a misplaced screw, a fan, a drip of water from an air conditioning unit and a handful of chalk dust to a jaw-dropping, jump out of your seat payoff.

The duo sprints off from there, showing a chauvinistic pig gets his deserved comeuppance at a massage parlor where the “happy ending” is anything but, and a bespeckled beauty who finds herself in a precarious position while visiting a Lasik eye clinic.

The best part about “FD5” is that, FINALLY, the filmmakers have given fans something that the previous films lacked – an actual story, a dramatic arc that fuels the action between deaths. They give Tony Todd’s mysterious mortician, William Bludworth, something more than a cameo appearance, although I suspect there is still a lot left untold about his knowledge of death’s design. And they introduce the best notion yet – the idea that the survivors can thwart death’s direction by taking action and killing someone themselves as a way of satisfying the supernatural payback.

The final act of “FD5” plays as much like an action film as it does a horror film, keeping fans guessing as to whether or not death can be cheated. And then, just when you think you’ve made it out alive, Quale and Heisserer pull one of the best WTF rabbits out of their hat, improbably but satisfyingly tying the fifth film back to the first.

“Final Destination 5” likely should be the last in the series, but IF there is to be a sixth entry, hopefully someone will pick up the creative torch lit by this film and continue to examine the interesting ideas offered here. Why do a select few see their deaths early on through eerie premonitions. How are they picked? Who is responsible for bestowing this gift? And what is the actual endgame?

The Stuff You Care About:
Hot chicks – Yes.
Nudity – No.
Gore – Considerable.
Drug use – No.
Bad Guys/Killers – Death.
Buy/Rent – Rent it.
Blu-Ray Bonus Features – Kind of weak extras, including “Alternate Death Scenes,” “Circle of Death” and “Visual Effects of Death.”
On the Web – http://finaldestinationmovie.warnerbros.com/dvd/

Hostel: Part III (Sony, 88 minutes, Unrated, DVD): You might not realize how good of a filmmaker Eli Roth can be until you check out this, the third installment of his “Hostel” torture porn series, which was not released in theaters.

The action this time moves from overseas to Las Vegas where the uber-exclusive Elite Hunting Club has set up shop in an abandoned hotel property well off the strip.

“Hostel: Part III” is directed by longtime genre veteran Scott Spiegel, whose own gorefest “Intruder,” was recently released on Blu-Ray. Spiegel is OK behind the camera, but too much of “Part III” feels padded and unnecessary. The scenes inside the Elite Hunting Club’s millionaire sicko resort, where wealthy business men and women pay top dollar for the chance to kill another human being, are pretty good. The gore is decent, the kills somewhat creative, but the whole thing just plays flat.

As someone who greatly enjoyed “Hostel: Part II,” which was superior to Roth’s first foray into ultra-stylized violence, it is disappointing to report that “Part III” is a curiosity at best, something to be watched by fans of the first two films, but it should not be the starting point for anyone unfamiliar with the franchise.

Apollo 18 (Anchor Bay, 87 minutes, R, Blu-Ray): A made-on-the-cheap found footage flick about the allegedly top-secret 18th manned mission to the moon suffers from the constraints of its should-have-been crazy claustrophobic environment. For one, the film is supposedly culled from 80-some hours of grainy footage uploaded to a conspiracy-theory rich space website, but much of the action that is displayed on screen is clearly not shot from a fixed or hand-held camera, particularly the bulk of the third act. And while inventive, “Apollo 18” should have been just a straight thriller that didn’t need to rely on the “found footage” gimmick. By freeing up the use of multiple cameras, director Gonzalo López-Gallego’s film would have been much more enjoyable, maybe even scary. As it is, this is one trip to the moon that you can avoid.

The Increasingly Poor Decisions of Todd Margaret: Season One (MPI, 255 minutes, Unrated, DVD): David Cross is a master of uncomfortable comedy. From “Mr. Show” to “Arrested Development” to his various film appearances, Cross has learned well how to make people squirm in their seats while watching his inventively inept characters flail and careen through an escalating series of misadventures.

Cross plays Todd Margaret, a woefully naïve sales associate, who gets promoted by his meathead boss (the wonderful Will Arnett in full-on worst boss ever mode) after his boss overhears Todd practicing how to be tough on a sales call. The boss declares Todd the perfect person to relocate over to the United Kingdom to spearhead the launch of a new energy drink.

Bad things happen. Wonderfully funny, terrible things.

This show is a joy, a subtle, subversive slice of unconventional comedy where you are made to feel bad about laughing at another person’s misfortune, even if you can’t stop yourself from cracking up.

The second season of “Todd Margaret” is set to debut in January. Here’s a great chance to catch up just in time for the premiere.

The Pool Boys (E1, 88 minutes, R, Blu-Ray): Remember the rowdy, randy sex comedies of the 1980s like “The Wild Life” or “Fraternity Vacation”?

“The Pool Boys” surely hopes you do. Sadly, this fish-out-of-water tale about a high school graduate hoping to pay for his college education at Harvard takes a wrong turn at “Risky Business” and tries to make you suspend belief long enough to accept that a pool cleaning service could instantly morph into a top-dollar escort service.

The filmmakers wisely throw in bare breasts whenever possible, and they enlist Matthew Lillard to serve as the lazy layabout who somehow lucks into the job of a lifetime, but nothing really gels. The jokes feel dated, the guys are too geeky and the girls improbably hot.

It’s like watching an endless loop of an adolescent teen’s fantasy daydreams. You might appreciate it if you were the teen having the fantasies, but not so much if you feel stuck watching someone else’s trainwreck of a life.

Also Available:

The Hunters – Surprise! An unexpectedly interesting setup for a direct-to-DVD survival thriller gets muddled by an increasingly clichéd middle act.

A Good Old Fashioned Orgy – Jason Sudekis and Tyler Labine lead an ensemble cast game for some good old sex comedy.

The Borgias: The Complete First Season – Fans of “The Tudors” get more bawdy shenanigans and backstabbing politics.

Brighton Rock – Helen Mirren stars in a rare direct-to-DVD thriller.

In the Name of the King 2 – Dolph Lundgren returns in this direct-to-DVD sequel to the Uwe Boll original that starred Jason Statham.