Insidious

Matt & I saw Insidious last weekend because I was too excited to wait another week. I am a fan of the guys who started the Saw franchise (if not a fan of the movies past maybe the second one...you know when they stopped being about the horror and all about the gore) and their other venture, Dead Silence, so when I saw they had this one coming out I was pretty excited.

Insidious is about a family that is settling in to a new home, unpacking, getting used to the things that go bump in the night in a new home. Unfortunately something does really go bump, it's not just weird noises or critters in the walls.

The movies goes from traditional haunted house, to weird, off-beat horror, to almost carnival tricks at the end. It's a wonderful mix of the unexpected. There were many scares and jumps to be had (ask Matt how many times I jumped) and I was engrossed for the entire movie.

I don't want to say too much and give anything away, because you really need to go into this with a blank slate as much as possible. Just know that it is an awesome blend of Poltergeist (references abound), goofy 70's horror, and even more traditional haunted house stories like Hill House.

Rating: 5 purrs...loved all of it


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Piranha (2010)

I finally got to the theater to see Aja's remake of one of my all time favorites- Piranha. (I watched the original on Bruce here on the way back to DFW Friday, so the it was fresh in my mind.) To sum it up- it was one of the funnest, goriest, boob-fests I have seen in a very long time. From the very opening scenes with a clap-worthy homage to one of my other favorites, Jaws, to the hilarious and somewhat gratuitous "wild wild girls" & the spring break partiers, to Jerry O'Connell eating up the screen as the soft-core porn producer, it seriously was just so much fun. Even the various comments from the Tweens in the row behind us could dispel the fun.

Elizabeth Shue plays the town sheriff with a teenager who shirks his babysitting responsibilities to give the wild wild girls a tour of the best spots to film. This filing includes a lovely amount of nakedness, including an underwater ballet scene that had me tears and wishing we had seen the movie in 3D after all. Dina Meyer has about 2 seconds in the film, along with Ving Rhames. I kept seeing people and saying- hey look at that, there's so and so (including Eli Roth, who seems to be cameoing in every movie rather than hurrying up and filming Thanksgiving. Dude, hurry up.) the plot is still pretty much the same as the original, you know, hungry fish attack people in an Arizona lake. Lots of chomp chomp. Lots of blood. Lots and lots of gore. Plucky heroine, wry humor from the main hero.

I have really liked Aja and what he has come up with, even Mirrors, so when I saw he was remaking Piranha, I knew it was in good hands. I was not wrong.

Rating: 5 Purrs: Really, seriously you should just go see it. It was awesome. I might even see it again in the theater.

- Posted using BlogPress from Bruce

Splice

I have been pretty excited about Splice for awhile, from way back when I first read about it in EW ages ago. When I saw it was coming to a theater near me, I was thrilled. I ended up pleased but not overwhelmingly so. It was good, and had potential, but it wasn't the movie I had in my head.

Sarah Polley and Adrien Brody are two rock star geneticists. They create some weird creatures that create proteins for a pharmaceutical company, and they want to go on to splice with the human genome. When told no, they do what normal movie scientists would do. They go there. As these things go, of course it was a bad decision. Regret and bloodshed ho!

All in all, I loved the ultra trendy scientists, the idea, etc., but it felt slow towards the middle. I expected more action and bloodshed a la James Cameron's Aliens and instead got slow burning drama a la Ridley Scott's Alien. It's not a bad thing, I just expected something different. Sarah Polley was a wonderful cross between Lady MacBeth and Dr. Frankenstein. I loved the mixed parallels. It telegraphed too much though, so when it went full throttle to the end I knew fairly well how this would play out.

Rating: 4 Purrs for a horror movie that didn't tread a whole lot of new ground but did make it fun while it lasted.

Horrorfest 4

This year's entries into Horrorfest have been much better than past years.

• Dread: This one based on a Clive Barker story and stars a Cullen, but man it sure was icky. These college kids decide to run an experiment investigating people's biggest fears. Problem is, the ringleader just happens to be nuts, and he decides to make people face their biggest fears in hopes of learning how to cure his own. The paintings in this one were beautiful.
  
• The Final: The opening says this was based on a true story and it was filmed in McKinney and area up here in North Texas, so I can't help but like the story of a group of tormented high-schoolers who turn the tables on their bullies in most gruesome and psychological ways. One even wears an Audition costume, so of course I like it.
  
• Kill Theory: A group of long-time college friends head out to the lake to celebrate graduation, only to find themselves trapped by a psycho who says they must kill each other one by one and have one left standing at 6 AM or he will kill them all. This one was quite good. I can see why maybe it didn't make it to the theater but it is definitely worth a watch.
• The Graves: Sisters Megan and Abby Graves are taking a cross country trip before Megan starts a new job in New York. On the way, they decide to check out the road-side attraction called Skull City Mine. As these things go, they find something not so pleasant. Slicing and dicing and spooky stuff happens, and things get a bit disjointed towards the end, but I can't help but love a movie that has two goth girls who love comics and can kick ass.
  
• The Reeds: A group of Londonites take a weekend trip through the reeds of Norfolk on a hired boat. From the start, things get creepy, with the crochety old boat guy and the pesky teens that keep popping up here and there. It ends up in disaster and blood, and a mystery to be solved. It was quite good.
  
• Lake Mungo: A somewhat slow, creepy supernatural movie that deals with an Australian family's grief at losing their teenage daughter to drowning. It's shot documentary style. I was watching it by myself and I got a bit creeped out, so stick with it.
  
• Hidden: The foreign film entry into this year's horrorfest. A guy goes back home after his mother's death and faces the fears from his childhood. Someone is murdering people- is it a ghost, is it the boy from his childhood? It was spooky in places but also very slow.
  
• Zombies of Mass Destruction: Zombies! Need I say more? Yes, well then - zombies started by terrorists in a small town, gore and hilarity happens, boy comes out to mom, girl comes to term with her roots, brains get munched on.
  

Nightmare on Elm Street (remake)

The original Nightmare on Elm Street scared the hell out of me the first time I saw it. Freddy Krueger was terrifying. The idea of being attacked in your dreams, unable to wake up, unable to fall asleep because you might die. Yikes. The remake doesn't change much of that formula, which was nice, but it changed enough that it wasn't a complete retread.

Things I liked:

• I jumped several times in my seat. Sure it might have been because of the loud Boo! music, but I jumped.
  
• Kellen Lutz! The opening scenes with him are tense.
• They didn't puss out with Kreuger. I thought they were going to, but they didn't. If they had, I would have not liked this movie at all.
• Jackie Earle Haley. Wow. While he was pretty much replaying Rorschach, he does it well. Creepy.
• There were plenty of homages to the original, but not complete re-dos.
  

Things I didn't like:

• Why oh why don't they use real special effects any more? Why do movie makers these days feel so compelled to CGI the shit out of everything? I want real fake blood people. Not CGI blood. It never looks real.
  
• Why oh why does Nancy have to be emo chick? Why can't she be the sweet, scrubbed up teen like the first one?
  
• I hated her little booties she wore. Ugh. I know, I know. A shoe complaint in a horror movie. I'm a girl. Sue me.
• No Johnny Depp death scene. Not even close. Dang it.

Overall, it was a decent remake. You can't recreate the atmosphere of the original, no matter how hard you try, but these guys did a decent job of remaking Texas Chainsaw Massacre and they did a decent job this time. I would of paid full price for this one, but I am a bit of a horror junkie, as you know.

Rating: 4 Purrs

Watch Instantly Day 3

Once again it's laundry day! You know what that means - time for the Roku.

The Haunting of Molly Hartley showed up in NetFlix Watch Instantly recently so of course I had to watch it. I never would have bothered getting a DVD of it to watch, but since it was so easy...well how could I not? Molly's mom goes a bit nuts and tries to kill her to save her before her 18th birthday. Why? Well it seems someone made a deal with the devil, so to speak. This was a fun little movie - not much substance but nothing terrible here.

Underworld: Rise of the Lycans also showed up. I went into this one with very low expectations and was very surprised to find a decent, romantic, gothy, slaves vs masters, vampires vs lycans story. It too was short to have a whole lot of fluff and it was interesting to see the backstory of why the vampires and werewolves hate each other so much. I would too, man. I would too. Hello, Michael Sheen & his buff self. Also very nice to look at. Towards the end - totally riveted to the action sword play. Yay for gothy music. Now I feel compelled to watch the others. I know. I am sad.

Black Hole by Charles Burns

I picked up Black Hole by Charles Burns awhile ago because the cover looked interesting and it showed up as an item in my QPB catalog. I thought Steve would enjoy reading it but never really expected to ick it up myself. Then I read an article on MTV's Splash Page that listed it as one of the contributor's favorite horror comics. Well, that put it in a different light altogether. Of course I had to pick it up then.

In Black Hole, the teens in town either have "the bug" or not. "The bug" is an STD that passes from one to the other, causing some mutation or another. Some mutations aren't so bad, maybe an extra small mouth or your skin sheds. Some are really bad - disfiguring the face so much you can't recognize what the person looked like before. Regardless, once you have it, you have it forever.

The stories are sad and lonely, the art is stark black & white with severe shading that only enhances the feeling of separateness felt by the teens. It's horrific- the mutations, the alienation, the rage these kids feel, but I wouldn't consider it horror, at least not in the sense as I define it. It was however terribly good. I highly recommend it.

Rating: 5 Purrs for a haunting, sad, eerie story told with beautiful art

Watch Instantly Day 2

I am currently addicted to watching horror movies on NetFlix Watch Instantly. I have been catching up on chores so I figure why not?

Here's today's haul:

Laid to Rest: This one ended up being a pretty decent slasher flick, surprisingly enough. A girl wakes up in a coffin with no idea who she is or where she is. She soon figures out that the guy in the Destro mask is out to kill her, and she must fight her way through this very small town to safety before he kills her. Lena Headley and Johnathan Schaech have small parts. The acting is good in this one. The plot isn't terribly original but the gore is rampant. Not bad for a rainy day.

Mega Shark vs. Giant Octopus: You know you want to watch. You know you can't turn away. Nothing beats a movie that stars Debbie Gibson as an oceanographer who discovers the polar ice caps melting have released a giant octopus that devours oils rigs and a giant shark who leaps out of the ocean to snags planes from the air. This movie is epic. Debbie Gibson does science and stuff with test tubes! It even stars Lorenzo Lamas. How can you *not* watch it? I may have to buy this on DVD. It's so bad it's awesome.

Cold Prey: This Norwegian thriller is so very good. A group of friends go snowboarding off the beaten path to avoid the lines and tourists. Of course one of the friends hurts themselves and they ahve to take shelter for the night in a deserted inn. It's very creepy - my favorite setting is the old deserted location (you know, ghost ship, haunted houses, abandoned hospitals, etc.). The hapless, unsuspecting kiddos are sliced and diced but what's best about is you hardly ever see the killer. You see snippets of the boots, the axe, the parka, but it's like Jaws. No shark until the end. Really, this one is worth watching. It's tense, it's bloody, it's scary, it's got eye candy. The worse thing is the over-dubbing on the Watch Instantly version. The voices are bad and a bit cheesy. Definitely worth a watch - must look for the sequel.

My Name Is Bruce

"Consider yourself officially exempt from my wrath sweetcakes, and if you're lucky a little later I'll let you play with my boomstick."

Okay, let's get one thing straight. I love Bruce Campbell. I'll watch him in anything. I'll watch Briscoe County, Jr. I watch Burn Notice because of him. I have even watched some of those really bad B-movies this movie makes fun of in droves. I.Love.Bruce.Campbell. After watching My Name Is Bruce, I can't help but love him even more. I mean the entore movie is pretty much him making fun of himself. His string of B-Movies. His string of C-Movies. His Hollywood "fame" or lack thereof. His ways with women. His chin. This movie felt like Drop Dead Gorgeous, where nothing was off limits, only instead of Lutherans, God, and beauty pageants, it's nothing is off limits in relation to Bruce Campbell & his career.

In My Name Is Bruce, Bruce Campbell is filming another one in a long line of C-Movies. He's a drunk and a womanizer. However, there is one true fan out there, and he needs Bruce's help. You see he awoke a Chinese demon in his small town, and that demon is slash happy. Who do you call? Well, Bruce Campbell of course. Unfortunately for Mr. Campbell, he discovers that the guy in the rubber suit is in fact a demon, and this whole thing is not a movie set like he thought. Will Bruce gather the courage to defeat the demon and win the lovely lady? You must watch to find out.

I fully acknowledge that this was a low budget, goofy, stupidly written movie. But come on - Bruce Campbell! Making fun of himself! It rarely gets better than that.

Rating: 5 Purrs - loved every stupid, god-awful, man-in-rubber suit minute of it.

Just After Sunset by Stephen King

To be honest, I didn't think Just After Sunset was nearly as good as Everything's Eventual, Stephen King's previous short story collection, but I do love how King writes those short stories. 

I think my favorite might be The Gingerbread Girl. The main character here takes up running after a tragedy strikes her family. When I say takes up running, I mean seriously running. Like all the time until she feels like dropping dead (which I have totally felt before but that's because running is like Heaven and dying to me. It's a weird combo, I know.). Of course, this obsessive/compulsive running comes into play later in the story when she has to run with purpose. 

Otherwise, the stories all kind of ran together for me. I'm not saying they weren't good, but none of them really stood out to me like The Gingerbread Girl, except for maybe N., which channels Lovecraft (even if King says it doesn't). I love the play on obsessive/compulsive behavior in that story. 

Overall, I will always love Stephen King's ability to write short stories. It seems like a lost art form these days.  But despite that, I can't wax poetic about this collection.

Rating: 4 Purrs for The Gingerbread Girl, 3 1/2 for everything else

Horrorfest 2009 - How many horror movies can I watch? Part 3

Monday Night's Viewing

Tonight is the night of goof-ball, B-Movies.

• Horror Planet: This low-budget horror flick is pretty silly. A group of explorers are working some sort of mine on a far away planet and they discover some crystals that wake up some really big-eyed alien who decides he likes one of the chickies. Lots of people dies, the girl gets knocked up by the alien, and then everybody goes crazy. Some pretty interesting deaths, but really you could skip it. I watched it for nostalgia's sake after I found it on my Roku.
• Killer Klowns from Outer Space: Basset Hound (my second choice for a dog after the Welsh Corgi)! No horrorfest is complete without a viewing of Killer Klowns. Really, what other movie has a gun that turns people into big balls of cotton candy?
• Chopping Mall: I have a fondness for this movie because it's by the same guy who directed my favorite Christmas story - Night of the Comet, plus it stars Kelli Maroney, also star of Night of the Comet. It's cheeseball at it's cheesiest. Robots patrol the shopping mall, but unfortunately a lightning strike makes them go haywire crazy on a group of kids who sneak into the mall to have a sleepover. Blood, explosions, cheesy 80's hair. It's awesome. "It's not you, Ferdy. I'm just not used to be chased around a mall in the middle of the night by killer robots. " Where else would something like that make sense? 

The Beast Within

"He Was On The Verge Of Becoming A Man... Eater!"

I really love The Beast Within. It's such an early 80's horror flick with balloon make-up, gratuitous rape scenes, over-the-top backwoods characters, and a big old beastie.

Bibi Besch and  Ronny Cox are on their honeymoon when their car goes off the road. Ronny goes out to find some help and Bibi leaves the car to chase the dog. There she meets the beastie, who beats her up and rapes her. Flash forward 17 years and Ronny's and Bibi's son, Michael, is sick. The doctors don't know what's up, so Ronny & Bibi have to go back to the small Louisiana town where the elephant in the room happened to see if they can find out Mike's biological father's medical history. Mike follows them, and that's where the real fun begins, because he starts going a bit nuts, hearing cicadas, and having some serious cravings for meat - the bloodier the better. What's going on with Mike? What is he turning into?

Seriously, it's a bit silly, but what big beastie movie from the 80's isn't? I watched this once before a year or so ago and liked it then, but I think I liked it even better this time around. The make-up is appropriately cheesy, the teeth are bad, and Bibi Besch's wardrobe is almost as good as Faye Dunaway's in The Eyes of Laura Mars. You even have John Dennis Johnston as the dad of Mike's new love interest, playing the part with some serious creepiness. You can't tell if he is just over-protective or just inappropriately involved with his daughter. He does, however, favor a shot gun and wife beaters. Ah, the South. Now I know my dad was a bit overprotective when I started to date, and even joked about bringing a shotgun to the door when the guys would pick me up, but never did he do so drunk and wearing a wife-beater. You can make this out to be a tale of sexual awakening or going through puberty and all that, but why bother? It's fun on its own without looking for any deeper meaning.

Rating: 3 1/2 purrs for the awesomeness that is the big beastie. It's like Kaftka!

The Tattooist

I'll watch almost anything with Jason Behr in it. I've been hooked on him since watching Roswell reruns on SciFi channel, so of course I picked up The Tattooist when I found it on NetFlix. (I think he needs to get more work. He's a pretty decent actor and nice to look at.)

In this horror film from New Zealand, an American tattoo artist specializes in tattoos that "heal." Jake is a wanderer, learning about different cultures and exploiting the design and symbols in his tattoo designs. While at an expo in Singapore, Jake sees his first traditional Samoan  tattoo ritual, called tatau, and of course falls for the exotic woman involved in the ritual. He swipes something belonging to the group, and by doing so, awakens an angry spirit who stalks and kills everyone Jake has tattooed since he stole from the group. The bad news: Jake has tattooed the new girl he's dating. Can he save her in time and figure out who or what is killing his clients?

The Tattooist isn't bad. In fact, it's pretty good. Nice scenery, nice acting, interesting culture. I hate that Jake is a callous American who cares very little about using and abusing the rituals and history of the cultures he visits, but I guess that kind of helps push the plot. Like I said before, I really wish Jason Behr would get more work. If you have seen a few Asian horrors with the long-haired ghosts, then you probably won't be surprised by the plot or some of the scares. 

Rating: 4 Purrs for Jason Behr's lovely chest, the interesting take on cultures and respecting what you don't know

The Sookie Stackhouse Mysteries by Charlaine Harris

I first read Dead Until Dark and Living Dead in Dallas by Charlaine Harris several years ago, at the same time I was reading the Anita Blake series. I gave them up after two books because I thought they were way to close to the other series, which had really grabbed me and pulled me in at that time. Later the Anita Blake series got to be too much sex and no plot, so I put those away, and really didn't read the vampire type books at all for a long while. Then I picked up Twilight, and when I was finished with that series, my future sis-in-law said, here read these. So back to Sookie I came, and this time I read every single one as quickly as I could. I couldn't put them down. On the tail end of that came the HBO series True Blood, and the sis-in-law and another fiend started coming over for Sookie Sundays. Now my friend is reading the Sookie books, and we are sufficiently hooked and waiting for the next installment.

The Sookie Stackhouse Mysteries, starting with Dead Until Dark, are all about Sookie Stackhouse. She's a telepath, and most of the folks in her small town of Louisiana, Bon Temps, aren't quite sure if they should pity her or fear her, so they do a little bit of both.  In Sookie's universe, vampires are real and they have come out of the coffin, so to speak. There's this synthetic blood developed by the Japanese that allows the vamps to "main stream," so a few try it. Enter Bill the Vampire. One night he walks into Sookie's bar (where she waitresses) and her life will never be the same. Bill's mind is the one she can't read, and so she becomes fascinated. The relationship between those two is at the heart of most of the books, and as the series goes on, more and more supernatural things become a part of Sookie's world. In the process, Sookie realizes her telepathy may not be such a curse, as she can use it to help, sometimes most reluctantly, to aid those in the supernatural community.

I love these books. They are sweet and frothy, not too bad on the violence (except Sookie does seem to get herself into some pickles that can turn bloody), and pretty light even on the mystery. However, Sookie's voice is so refreshing. She's no nonsense, hopeful, sarcastic, and romantic. She's got that Southern thing going on, which on one hand bothers me because we are not all chicken-fried down here, thank you very much, but then again, some of us are. I really detest the clothes. I know that seems weird, but Sookie's fashion sense is appalling, and I wouldn't care except that Charlaine Harris spends a lot of time talking about banana clips, short denim skirts, and big blue bows.  The secondary characters are eccentric and varied, but none are well developed, but you aren't really reading for those guys, you are reading for Sookie and her various cohorts and new loves. 

One thing that I think kept me from reading the books for so long is the fact that my grandmother had a cow named Sookie, and every time (even now) that I read that name I picture my grandmother standing in the back pasture calling, "Soooo-kie! Come 'ere girl!" I would recommend them to anyone who might like a bit of southern-fried mystery, and who doesn't mind the batter a bit thick. You should also watch True Blood, but don't expect the series to follow to closely to the books. Major characters have been changed, but it didn't bother me too much. The series can be a little heavy-handed when trying to use the vampire as a metaphor for racism and gay rights, where the book does it in a way that you could almost miss it.  It seems like it would be better to have a happy medium in there somewhere. 

Rating: 4 Purrs for Sookie and Bill. No matter what, I'll be Team Bill over Team anyone else Charlaine Harris throws in the mix. 

Jack Brooks Monster Slayer

I'll admit to you right up front that I had pretty low expectations for Jack Brooks: Monster Slayer. I saw the poster somewhere and thought, "Hm, that looks funny." And lo and behold, it was funny. It was darn funny.

Jack Brooks is just your average guy. Well, except that tricky monster attack when he was 10-ish that killed his whole family. It's haunts him into his 20's. Now he's a plumber with a harpy for a girlfriend, he's taking night school classes that he could care less about, he has a temper that gets him into a ton of trouble, and he's harboring a crush on the girl in the front row. His therapist is afraid of him, and now, it looks like his professor is becoming something nasty. Something possibly monster-like. What's an average guy to do?

Robert Englund plays the professor, and man he is a treat. He's just funny. Trevor Matthews is funny as Jack Brooks. I mean, there aren't any Oscar worthy performances here, but the acting in this is better than many of the "Movies to die for" series and Sci Fi channel Originals. The whole thing plays like a B-Movie, and it does it well. I love that they used "men in suits" and puppetry to make the monsters. CGI can be so bad, especially in a low budget situation. The Professor monster was awesome, so gross and almost Jabba the Hut like.

Jack Brooks: Monster Slayer is worth a rental if you are looking for a funny, low budget B Movie. It won't kill you to miss it, but I think we might see good things from these guys in the future.

Rating: 4 Purrs for surpassing my expectations and the tentacle monster - yikes!

The Mist

“Lady, your tongue must be hung in the middle so that it can waggle at both ends.”

The Mist is one of my favorite Stephen King short stories. When I heard they were making a movie version I was torn. On the one hand, I loved the idea of seeing the story brought to life, but on the other, I know that sometimes his stories just don't translate well. What I loved about the written story was the lack of a reason why behind the mist. And well, we know that movies don't exactly let the reason behind why things occur just hide in the background anymore. They like to spoon-feed it to you. 

So yes, the bulk of the story remains the same. Dave Drayton travels into town one day to pick up supplies after a terrible storm has knocked a whole heck of a lot around his lovely lake-front home. He takes his son with him, leaving the wife to guard the homestead. Once in town, strange things start to happen. A mist is moving across the town, and something's in the mist. Something that likes to eat people. Dave and his son are trapped in the grocery store with some other townsfolk, including the crazy religious freak, Mrs. Carmody, who declares it the "end times" and starts ranting about sacrifices and the second coming. Tension build between those who begin to follow Mrs. Carmody and those who hold to reason and fact. The question becomes will Dave and his band of "common sense" folks survive, or will they be sacrificed at the hands of the new religious fever infecting the survivors? Will they stay in the store or will they take their chances in the mist? Has the mist overtaken just the town, or has it reached everywhere?

What I liked? I thought the actors did a very fine job here - Thomas Jane was Dave and Marcia Gay Harden is sufficiently creepy as Mrs. Carmody. Although, she does tend to turn into a stereotype after awhile, but then I don't know how you could not make that character over the top, seeing as her purpose to the story. The creatures were scary, the atmosphere spooky, and there were some moments where I definitely jumped in my seat. 

What I didn't like? Andre Braugher was woefully underutilized. He was a really nice foil for Thomas Jane's character. And the ending. Yes, I didn't like it. I understand it was approved by Stephen King (he's credited as saying he wished he'd thought of it), but I just didn't get that he and the others had reached that point of despair. It seemed too much like an ending Hollywood decided on for shock value, rather than it being true to the characters. Also, the reason behind the mist was of course inferred rather heavily, rather than left up to the imagination. 

I wasn't disappointed in the movie version at all, but I don't think it could ever be as fascinating and as much of a draw on my imagination as the story itself. 

Rating: 4 Purrs for some awesome dialog, spooky atmosphere, and of course, The Punisher, Mr. Thomas Jane

The Ruins by Scott Smith

I picked up The Ruins ages ago, back when we were wandering around a Wal-Mart in Taos, New Mexico last year and I had heard it was a good read. It has to be, hands down, one of the ickiest horror novels I have ever read. There were points I actually winced. I don't mean for this to sound like a bad thing. In fact, it's an awesome thing. I was even more pleased to watch the Unrated movie version and see that some of the most skin-crawling aspects of the book were kept, in spirit anyway.

In The Ruins, two college-age couples are vacationing at a Mexican resort. Jeff, Amy, Eric, and Stacy are getting tans, drinking too much, and relaxing near the water. It's pretty much what you would hope for a sun-drenched vacation to be. They've made some friends - 3 crazy, non-English speaking Greeks and a German named Matthias. Matthias's brother, Henrich, hasn't returned from the archeological dig he ran off to (he met the love of his life and followed her there), and Matthias wants to run out there for the day and hunt him down. Despite some initial unease from Amy, the two couples and the sole sober Greek agree to accompany him, thinking they will be in for an adventurous hike through the woods to see some ancient ruins. Unfortunately, these ruins aren't your average Tulum and these kids are woefully unprepared for a hike through the jungle. This place, they find, is home to an unbelievable force. It's going to take them one by one, and as the stress increases, these kids slowly fall further into denial or almost psychosis. Will any of them survive to warn others away? Will someone come to find them?

Scott Smith does a great job of slowly building suspense in the novel, but the real charmer here is the baddie. Like I said before, there are some scenes that just make your skin crawl. It makes me ick just thinking about it ( I have this wisteria at home that just grows and grows. Makes me wonder if Mr. Smith also has a wisteria vine growing in his garden...maybe that is where he got his idea). You honestly don't know if anyone will make it out alive, if there will be a final girl or guy, if they will all turn on each other before the baddie gets them, or if the Greeks will ever show up. 

I don't read a whole lot of horror novels, which probably sounds weird since I watch a ton of horror movies, but this one is a keeper. Just be prepared to never think about visiting Mayan ruins again the same way, or the vines growing in your garden, or even a simple hiking trip. It's got suspense, great pacing, and enough cringe-worthy moments to make you want to put the book down but you just can't stop reading it so you don't. The movie eliminated some characters, switched some things around, and focused more on the gore than the suspense, but I picked up a copy after seeing it. It wasn't the book, but they hardly ever are. 

Rating: 5 stars for still making me shiver when thinking about the vines. As odd as t was, the thought of it growing...well, I won't spoil it. Ugh.

Recent Acquisitions to the Library

My latest haul from Quality Paperback Books:

• An Incomplete Revenge: A Maisie Dobbs Novel by Jacqueline Winspear - I love these mysteries. 
• Not Quite What I Was Planning: Six-Word Memoirs by Writers Famous and Obscure by Rachel Fershleiser - This sounded so intriguing.
• Monster, 1959 by David Maine - A monster from the 50's comes to life. 
• Love Is a Mix Tape: Life and Loss, One Song at a Time by Rob Sheffield - I hear this one is a tear-jerker. 
• Obedience: A Novel by Will Lavender - A prof tells his students that their assignment is to save the girl he's got trapped somewhere by the end of the semester.
• The Vicious Circle: Mystery and Crime Stories by Members of the Algonquin Round Table by Otto Penzler - An anthology of mysteries from those sharp-tongued members of the Round Table.
• Secret Lives of Great Authors: What Your Teachers Never Told You About Famous Novelists, Poets, and Playwrights by Robert Schnakenberg - I love this series of books. 
• The Serpent's Tale by Ariana Franklin - The second in the series of medieval CSI. 
  

Ah vacation...

Vacation - the days where you can read a million books, take a million pictures, relax...

Well, I didn't quite get a million books read, and maybe not a million pictures, but I did read a whole heck of a bunch (I was only gone a week or so) and took so many pictures it's going to take me weeks of cropping, etc., before I can get them all posted.

I took about twice as many books as I actually read on my trip last week, which is pretty normal. My goal was to take things I wanted to read, even if I had read them before many times. I took some new stuff too, but I took some old favorites to revisit because I can never seem to convince myself to re-read things when it's "regular" reading.

What I read while I was gone:

• Bare Bones by Kathy Reichs - I picked these up because I love Bones. While the characters in the book are quite different from the TV Show, I still enjoy the dual mystery and forensics detailed in this series. I didn't think this was nearly as good as some of the former entries in the Temperance Brennan series of books. Here Dr. Brennan is trying to take a vacation with the hunky cop from Canada, but instead she find a big cache of bones that might be bear and might have some human there too. The investigation, death threats, and gore ensues. There's a lot of detail about endangered species here and you can't help but think that it's a topic close to Ms. Reichs' heart. I'd recommend it if you like forensics and want a pretty detailed look at the science.
  
• The Dispatch by Bentley Little - I like Bentley Little. His books are like horror cotton candy. They are tasty, fun, easy to eat up, but sometimes they give you a stomach ache after. This one is a bout a guy who writes letters. The letters he writes end up making things happen, and someone notices and wants to use him for something not so ethical. It's not his best work. I'd recommend The Walking or The Collection (short stories) first.
• The Maul and The Pear Tree by P. D. James and T. A. Critchley - A non-fiction work about the Ratcliffe Highway murders that took place in the early/mid 1800's. The book was very thoroughly researched, but the story felt sort of dry. Not nearly as engrossing as P.D. James' mystery stories. It's nice on a completist's perspective to have read this too, but I think I'll stick to her fiction from now on.
• The Mummy : or Ramses the Damned by Anne Rice - I can't help it. I love this book. Always have, always will. Julie's dad dig's up Ramses' tomb, only to discover he's an immortal. An immortal who fell for Cleopatra. Chaos ensues. Romance blooms. Things blow up and people die. Seriously, it's not Pulitzer Prize material, but I love it anyway. It's my favorite Anne Rice book, ever.
• No Escape by Heather Lowell - It's a romance/thriller/mystery. I know. So sue me.
  
• Sunshine by Robin McKinley - Robin McKinley, one of my favorite authors of all time, writes a vampire novel. It's an interesting take - Rae, nicknamed Sunshine, likes to bake things. She's the Queen of Cinnamon rolls. She wants to just do that, but when some vampires kidnap her, she remembers what her Grandmother taught her - how to transmute objects. When she decides to save the life of Con, the vampire chained to the wall (she's supposed to be his lunch but he won't eat her), her life will never be the same. What I like about this book is that Con isn't a sympathetic, romantic vampire, at least not that much, and definitely not for most of the book. He's flawed, not really all that handsome, and Rae doesn't really find him attractive. In fact, she thinks something is very wrong with her for even helping him. I've read this before, and I picked it up again because of my sister-in-law getting me hooked on all of these Sookie Stackhouse vampire novels and those Twilight books. This one was much more complex and a completely different voice. I highly recommend it - and please Ms. McKinley, write the darn sequel.
  

Primeval

Primeval was that movie – you remember the trailer – that made you think it was about this super scary serial killer who had killed thousands of people. Then you find out it is about a great big man-eating crocodile. Really, it’s not that bad. Definitely not as bad as I thought it would be. In fact I was pleasantly surprised.

In Primeval, Dominic Purcell is a fancy pants journalist who doesn’t want to trek down to Africa like his boss is telling him to do. He has better things to do. But he goes, and takes Orlando Jones and Brooke Langton with him. They are on the “story of the century” to find, and with the help of a Steve Irwin type, trap the man-eating crocodile. Well, you know what happens next right – you’ve seen Anaconda? (Oh well, okay. Maybe that was just me…) Surprise – instead, there is an even bigger story – one about the evil warlord who wants to kill the group because of some pesky eye-opening footage. Off they go to avoid the croc and the warlord. Maybe they will make it, maybe not.

You know, even though the story was silly, the croc was silly, and the characters are kind of silly, I couldn’t help but get into the movie. Maybe it was just me. I do have a thing for gigantic attacking animal movies. Plus it is loosely based on a true story I believe, with the croc being part of the story. He gets so big and hungry for man flesh because of the warlord dumping copious amounts of bodies into the river where he lived. Kind of icky, when you think about it.

 
I don’t know if I can really recommend this one. It was no Anaconda. In fact, I’m not sure it’s even an Anaconda: The Hunt for the Blood Orchid. But I enjoyed it on a purely half-watching, easy Saturday afternoon sort of way.

Rating: 3 Purrs for a croc named Gustave.