Amityville: Descendants of Darkness

There are several really famous paranormal cases all over the world that´s been written about, both in books, newspapers and even inspired a lot of feature films. No matter what you believe regarding paranormal cases, if you actually think they really have happened or is just horse shit, i let everyone make up their own minds. Because i truly believe that everyone have the right to believe what they feel is right for them. For example a very famous paranormal case that´s been written several books about, is the world famous case known as The Amityville Horror. The book of the same name by author Jay Hanson, was published on September 13, 1977. Based on the horrible murders comitted by Ronald DeFeo Jr. on November 13, 1974, he shot and killed six members of his family at their home. It was later said that something evil remained in this house, some evil spirit that did not want to leave. I first came across this case when i got to see the 1979 film adaptation of The Amityville Horror, directed by Stuart Rosenberg ( director of the 1975 classic Paul Newman film The Drowning Pool ). What made this supernatural horror film so good, other than the wonderful acting performances from actors James Brolin, Margot Kidder and Rod Steiger, was how effective the horror scenes were on a limited budget. Since the original film there have been many Amityville sequels released ( the second film is still the best sequel in my opinion ), and even spin off films inspired by the story. They have even made silly low budget movies such as Amityville Thanksgiving, which is a terrible film in my opinion. I did buy a physical DVD of Amityville Thanksgiving several years ago, i still own it, but i will only watch it if i want a good laugh. Not that long ago i was sent a screener of a anthology horror film called Amityville: Descendants of Darkness. Since i am a fan of independent anthology horror films in general, i was curious to see if this film would be surprisingly good. Is this a film you should watch this summer, or should you watch the 2015 anthology horror film Soutbound instead?

4 different stories by 4 different director´s, all connected to the Amityville house, where all of your deepest darkest fears may rise to the surface.

Going into the film Amityville. Descendants of Darkness i basically knew nothing of this film, other than the title. And im glad that i never watched a trailer or read about the film before i watched a screener. Because this made my experience different from what i expected. At first i was thinking this might be a serious Amityville connected horror film, but it turned out to be a much more wild, and gory film experience. If you love gory horror comedies from the VHS era, then chances are that this is exactly what you are looking for in a story called The Shed. Lots of practical make up effects, very brutal killing scenes, you even have a pastor kicking demon ass. If you expect me to take segment seriously, i can´t. At least not in the first segment known as The Shed. And this is why i enjoy this specific story because it´s so over the top with so many different ideas thrown together, it becomes like a delightful desert where you find your favourite B movie ingredients mixed into a tasteful treat. Is the acting bad? Yes, but that´s the whole point with a story such as this, you are not meant to take The Shed seriously. So other than the fun practical make up effects and the gory scenes, what does Amtyville: Descendants of Darkness have to offer? I would say i like that this is made into an anthology horror film that´s connected to Amityville, different stories that somehow are connected to each other. The weakest story for me is the Spanish talking story known as the Possessed Relic. I tried to connect with the characters but i felt that this particular story wasn´t that interesting to me. However, we do have a story that´s actually told well and that is the segment known as Blood Moon Over Amityville. Some of the acting performances in this story is actually not that bad. The story called Echoes Of The Damned which is the final story, this is the most Amityville connected story that actually feels inspired by the classic case. Seeing film producer and actor Phil Herman in the lead role is fun, he have a charming screen presence. Echoes Of The Damned is clearly inspired by the paranormal case of Amityville, and i enjoyed this story. Since different director´s worked on this anthology horror film, i would say in general they did a good job. Amityville. Descendants of Darkness is an anthology horror film that will probably divide horror fans, if you either like all the stories or just some of them. I would still recommend that you check this film out if you enjoy this specific genre. Amityville: Descenendants of Darkness have a mixed bag of treats for everyone.

Rating: DDD

Protector

In cinema history we have seen actors do a lot unexpected changes in their career, for exampl for a very long time legendary comedian Robin Williams released his 2002 psychological thriller One Hour Photo. This is one of my personal favoutrite films of legendary actor Robin Williams, because i really feel he gave an incredible acting performance. He clearly proved that you can make a completely different character than we are used to see, and you simply have to see this film if you have not seen it. Another perfect example of an actor who did a complete different turn than we were used to see, is legendary actor Liam Neeson After doing a lot of different films in the 90´s and early 2000´s, everything from drama films to romantic comedies like Love Actually, he took on a role that would change his career completely in the year of 2008. It was the action thriller known as Taken, directed by Pierre Morel ( who also directed the French action movie District B13 ). Taken itself was a very simple movie, but what made this film so good was seeing Liam Neeson in full action mode as he is beating up criminals in rage mode, trying to save his kidnapped daughter. It will be considered as one of Liam Neeson´s classic films in the future, and i can still enjoy this film today. The sequels ( there are two of them ) are not that good, well if i had to pick i would probably prefer Taken 3 before the second film. There have been quite a lot of similar films made like Taken over the years, some of them have been ok while others have been....forgettable. So here we are with an action film that looks like something similar to Taken, but have a different plot plus a different lead actor. In the action film Protector we find Resident Evil actor Milla Jovovich kicking ass, and i have been a fan of her for movies for many years, ( yes i even liked In The Lost Lands and Monster Hunter ). I heard there is a female version of The Expendables that´s going to be made, i really hope Milla gets a role in that film, fingers crossed. Milla Jovovich fighting against a human traficking cartel, that sounds like fun right? I decided to give her film Protector a chance. Is this a must watch this summer at the barbecue party, or should you just rewatch the 2008 action thriller Taken instead?

Combat soldier Nikki Halstead ( Milla Jovovich ) stayed many years overseas fighting wars while missing out on her daughter Chloe Halsted´s childhood. As her military serive comes to an end, Nikki can finally retire and have a family life where she especially want to focus on having time together with Chloe ( Isabel Myers ). Until one night when she finds out her daughter celebrate her birthday out in a club, where she is kidnapped by a human trafficking cartel. Nikki manage to track down her daughter, by killing several of the cartel members. This makes things even more worse for Nikki, the cartel wants her dead and they want to kidnap her daughter again.

If you are not a fan of familiar films such as Taken, then i can guarantee that Protector may not be what you are looking for. What makes this fim stand out a little bit is especially one twist, and that is the friendship between lead character Nikki ( Milla Jovovich ) and her Colonel Lavelle ( played by 80´s and 90´s iconic actor Matthew Modine, who can forget his powerful performance in Stanley Kubrick´s  Full Metal Jacket? ). The chemistry between these characters felt like a similar chemistry betweem John Rambo ( Sylvester Stallone ) and Colonoel Trautman ( Richard Crenna in the Rambo franchise. Of course it´s not on the same level of chemistry that Sylvester Stallone and Richard Crenna had, nothing can replace that chemistry. But i do feel Milla Jovovich and Matthew Modine deliver some special moments in their dialogue scenes. When it comes to the action scenes we get quite a lot here. Both gun battles, but also fightiung scenes and some stabbings as well. So if you love old school VHS violence you are in for a treat with Protector. I have to say that Milla Jovovich at the age of  50 looks gorgeous. I always felt she is a beautiful woman, but what really stands out about her is she seems to be so nice in ordinary day life. So to see her as a combat soldier ( Monster Hunter influenced perhaps? ) is of course fun, she´s not taking shit from anyone. The actions scenes feel very traditional to VHS video violence i grew up with, and i had a good time in the best scenes. My only real issue with this film is that the bad guys don´t really have any interesting characters, i could barely remember one of them. So that´s something i feel they could have worked on, because evil characters are usually the funniest part of action movies. At the end of the day Protector feels like a light version of Taken, specifically made for fans of the Taken genre. Director Adrien Grunberg ( who directed the 5th Rambo film known as Rambo: Last Blood ) deliver an action film that don´t take any chances, it´s just created to entertain fans of the action genre. I prefer Rambo: Last Blood over this film, but i still had a good time with Protector. Worth a watch on streaming if you don´t know what else to watch.

Rating: DDD

Deadly Little Mermaid

Let´s travel back to the early summer of 1990 for a moment. I was 12 years old at that time and my little sister Isabelle was 5 years old. It was this summer when she got her hands on a VHS copy of the Disney animated film The Little Mermaid, and oh boy....i can not tell you how many times she watched this film. I would probably guess at least 57 times but i could be wrong, it might have been 52 at least. This was one of her favourite movies at that time while i got my own VHS copy of The Punisher with Dolph Lundgren. Looking back now im so grateful that i had a physical copy of The Punisher, because the musical numbers of The Little Mermaid was driving me insane. When you hear those songs constantly playing from your little sister´s room, you just want to escape to the sewer with The Punisher and kick some ass. I did see The Little Mermaid with my little sister ( i had no other option ) and i will give it this. The animation is good for a 1989 film, but i could care less about the film itself. After all around the summer of 1990 i was getting into a lot of action movies on VHS, horror and comedies as well. So i simply did not care much about Disney. At that time i already owned VHS action films like Lethal Weapon, Lethal Weapon 2, Predator, Rambo 3, Robocop and some other amazing titles. I would imagine that my sister Isabelle have good memories from the summer of 1990 considering she loved The Little Mermaid so much, just like i loved The Punisher with Dolph Lundgren. Since the 1989 animated Disney film The Little Mermaid was released we have had a number of different similar films released, based on the 1837 Danish fairytale of the same name by author Hans Christian Andersen. The best film adaptation i personally have sene so far is the Russian 2018 horror film The Mermaid: Lake Of The Dead, directed by Christopher Bevins and Svyatoslav Podgaevskiy. This film is more focused on the folklore story of the creature known as a mermaid, and there are actually some great creepy horror scenes in this film. I enjoy the creepy look of the mermaid itself, and her creature design fits quite well in the atmosphere of this specific lake. The version of this film i watched on DVD was dubbed in English language, i might have been able to listen to Russian language instead i just never checked. Either way, this does not affect the film in any way. If you love mermaids and love horror films in general, i would recommend picking up a UK DVD copy of The Mermaid: Lake Of The Dead. Speaking of mermaids i did notice a while ago a review of a independent horror film called Deadly Little Mermaid. The review was by YouTube film critic legend Geek Legion Of Doom, and even if the review wasn´t very positive i was curious checking out this film. Being a fan of independent horror film, did this latest mermaid horror film surprise me in a positive way, or is this just as terrible as Steven Seagal´s 2004 music studio album Songs From The Crystal Cave?

Tyler ( Elliot Eason ) is struggling mentally after his family´s loss. He is just doing his best to deal with everything day by day, not knowing if he will get back to a normal life. He rents out his Airbnb to a group of University friends. As the University student´s  explore the area outside the Airbnb, they have no idea that Tyler brought an unknown woman into his home, who turns out to be something completely different than an ordinary woman.

I am more open minded to bad special effects and terrible acting than most people i know would ever be, i can even accept films that most people would probably never see. While i do think The Mermaid: Lake Of The Dead is one of the best mermaid horror films i have ever seen, i have seen at least 7 other low budget horror films that included mermaids ( ? ) where some of them are not that good. For example the 2019 British low budget film The Mermaid´s Curse is a perfect example of this. Director Louisa Warren ( who for some reason made two of the worst Leprechaun low budget horror films i have ever seen, known as The Leprechaun´s Game, and The Leprechaun´s Curse ), i am sure she is a wonderful woman in real life, and i did enjoy her 2020 horror film Virtual Death Match. But over the years she have been making a lot of low budget films and The Mermaid´s Curse turned out to be a bit of a trainwreck. Not just because of the terrible practical make up effects, but what is supposed to be a so called mermaid doesn´t even look like one. And the horror scenes are absolutely silly if im being completely honest. Just avoid this film, that´s all i can say. Now, let´s get into the horror film Deadly Little Mermaid that Louisa Warrem have directed together with Cameron Uzoka. At least this film does have mermaid´s in the film so....that´s good i suppose? But here comes a huge mistake, and that is that they used scenes from The Mermaid´s Curse, added scenes from that film into Deadly Little Mermaid, almost as if they just run out of ideas and just added scenes just to get a longer playtime for this film. This is just a bad excuse unless you have a good idea of why you are using footage from another film. Was this supposed to be a sequel to The Mermaid´s Curse? While there are at least a few mermaid scenes that´s actually not all bad ( where you have women in a mermaid costume ), then you get the added scenes from The Mermaid´s Curse and this makes the film terrible anyway. Why did you have to add these scenes that no one asked for? If i have to mention something positive i did find the performance of actor Christian Ndodna a little bit fun, playing the character known as Jordan. The death metal music playing while mermaid´s attack is a little bit charming. That´s where the positive ends for me, and the rest of the film is just a dull attempt of a horror film with mermaids included. Director´s Cameron Uzoka and Louisa Warren could have made a fun B horror movie with Deadly Little Mermaid. Instead they just left us with a low budget horror film that´s just a extremely lazy attempt of cashing in on mermaid fans.

Rating: D

If you want to watch Deradly Little Mermaid you can watch it for free on YouTube on the following link

Deadly Little Mermaid (2026) Dangerous Tides [Horror] [Creature] | Full Movie

Terrible Movies Of The Late 1990´s: Steel ( 1997 )

The year of 1997 was an amazing movie year for a number of reasons. This was the year we got some really fun cinema releases such as:

*Face/Off

*Donnie Brasco

*Boogie Nights

*Men In Black

*Jackie Brown

*Copland

*Air Force One

*Con Air

*As Good As It Gets ( You can´t go wrong with Jack Nicholson delivering a brilliant acting performance )

I could probably mention at least 20 films more of this specific year if i wanted to, because the year of 1997 was the true last year of the 1990´s that delivered some of the finest cinema releases of this time period. There are some really good films released in both 1998 and in 1999, but compared to the year of 1997 they just didn´t manage to make the same cinema magic. Now, even if the year of 1997 had some wonderful cinema releases, we have to be honest with ourselves. There were some terrible films released as well that most people have forgotten about in 1997, for example how many of you remember the British 1997 comedy Spice World? This is basically the first film including the pop band Spice Girls? I know, no one remember this film for a very good reason, it is a massive mess. I personally did not see this film in cinema and wasn´t even planning to watch it. But it was showing on a movie channel called TV1000 one day so i just had a look. Let´s just say picking inside my nose would have been more fun than watching Spice World. The comedy scenes are truly awful, the acting? Was anyone acting at all? Anyway, aviod this film at all cost. Let´s stay withi the year of 1997 and mention a superhero movie. Oh, you mean the Batman & Robin film? Actually, no. We are talking about a completely different superhero character from DC comics. In 1997 director Kenneth Johnsson was hired to direct a movie adaptation of the comic book character Steel. I did not see this film in cinema back in 1997, probably because Swedish movie critics were tearing the film apart in reviews. I did rent the film on VHS though, just because i wanted to see NBA basketball player icon Shaquille O´Neal as a superhero. After watching it i had very mixed feelings, probably because i was hoping it would be better than it was. I didn´t watch this film for many years until Spain released a blu ray copy of the film. I decided to get a copy to revisit Steel and see how i feel about this film 28 years later. Have this film become better over the years or is this a horrible superhero movie adaptation no one asked for?

John Henry Irons ( Shaquille O´Neal ) is a weapons designer who invents high-tech laser guns, protective armor. and sonic sounds cannons for the Unites States military. One solider, Nathanial Burke ( Judd Nelson ), decides to show just what Irons´ can do and sets one of Irons´ cannons at the highest power setting, firing the device at an abandoned building, but the weapon backfires and destroys the building where the team is situated. Iron´s partner Susan "Sparky" Sparks ( Annabeth Gish ), is crushed by a large slab of concrete in the ensuing chaos. In court, Irons reveals Burke´s role in the incident, and Burke is dismissed from the military. Because his weapons resulted Sparks becoming a paraplegic, Irons resigns in disgust. Meanwhile, Burke have a plan to sell Irons weapons  to a criminal gang. Irons know if these guns hits the streets there will be chaos. With the help from Susan and his Uncle Joe ( Richard Roundtree ), he will become Steel who is designed to fight against any criminals.

I want to make this perfectly clear so no one misunderstood me, i think Shaquille O´Neal was an amazing basketball player and he is truly one of the sports legends of the 90´s. He also seems like a wonderful man, who have a big heart and have helped a lot of charity work and i admire him for this. With that said, i can´t lie and say he did a wonderful acting performance in the 1997 film Steel. Just because you are a world famous basketball player, that doesn´t make you a good actor. Of course you can become a good actor if you work really hard, there have been several actors who proved themselves like Jean-Claude Van Damme did in his 2008 action drama film JCVD. But regarding the film Steel you can tell lead actor Shaquile O´Neal is not a good choice for a superhero lead role in a film such as this. He tried at least, and i guess that´s fun in some ways. I can appreciate a fun terrible film if it actually have some charming scenes in it, or if i enjoy some of the characters in the film. That´s one of the big issues with the film Steel, there are not that many characters here that you will enjoy basically. Except for legendary actor Richard Roundtree ( the original Shaft ) as the character Uncle Joe, i would say that at least i can enjoy his performance in a cheesy, entertaining way. Because legendary actor Richard Roundtree have a magical screen presence, no matter what kind of character he portrait. And actor Judd Nelson ( from the 1985 film classic The Breakfast Club ) is a little bit fun as the villain character Nathaniel Burke . Let´s get into some other issues with the film Steel and as a superhero movie this is a pretty lame attempt to introduce this comic book character. The costume design of Steel does not look that cool, they probably tried to do what they could with the budget the film had. I think if you are telling a story of a superhero you have to make sure the character looks cool. If you don´t, you might think this is a parody instead of taking the character seriously. There are a few scenes where the action is....ok? But it never goes further than that, for the most part the action scenes feels quite dull at certain moments. I can see that director Kenneth Johnson tried to bring Steel to life, and with a better costume design plus a professional lead actor this could have worked. What we are left with is a superhero that feels very 90´s, but maybe not in a positive way. Not a total trainwreck, but i still can´t say Steel is a good film. Steel is if im being kind average at best in certain scenes and yet ends up being pretty terrible.

Rating: DD

Thrash

If there is one category of horror films that never seems to end, it is the category known as shark movies. I have seen it all, sharks armed with laser guns rided by nazis, sharks that can swim in sand, i have even seen sharks that roar in one of the most hated sequels ever, Jaws: The Revenge of course, ( and yes i do own a copy of the book The Shark Is Roaring - The Story Of Jaws: The Revenge, because i had to read the bakground story of how this film was made ). The amount of different kinds of shark movies seems endless, every single year we get so many different versions of shark attack films that i will admit, a lot of people are very creative coming up with cray plots. If you just want 2 fun B horror movies there are two films released in 2016, produced by the legendary B movie production company The Asylum. The titles that you should check out is Empire Of The Sharks, as well as Planet Of The Sharks. Both films seems to be inspired by the classic Mad Max franchise, while you also feel some vibes from the 1995 classic film Waterworld. The acting is bad in both films, but the characters are fun and the special effects are actually not as terrible as you might have expected. Check these films out on streaming, VOD or physical media. Now, let us stay within the year of 2016 for a while. Because this year we actually got one of the best shark movies in many years, and that is the shark horror movie known as The Shallows. Directed by Jaume Collet-Serra ( the director of the beloved horror film Orphan from 2009 ), this film tell the story of a young woman named Nancy Adams ( great performance by actress Blake Lively, who you should see in Ben Affleck´s excellent heist film The Town ), who loves to surf and travel to the same beach in Mexico that her mother used to surf while she was pregnant with Nancy. However, this becomes a pure nightmare when she is forced to survive from a shark attacking her out in the ocean. The Shallows is a very intense survival horror film with really solid acting from actress Blake Lively, and the shark scenes are very well made, including beautuful cinematography by Flavio Labiano ( who worked on the effective action thriller Non-Stop with Liam Neeson ). Definetely worth a watch on streaming unless you prefer a physical copy. Since we get shark movies every single year i wasn´t surprised to see that Netflix released one simply called Thrash. A survival horror film with sharks sounds like a  fun idea, but is this film any good at all or did Thrash deliver more entertainment than i ever would have expected?

The town of Annieville, South Carolina awaits the arrival of Category 5 hurricane Henry. When the storm hits and the storm surge destroy the town´s sea wall, causing Annieville to flood and cause massive damage to the entire town. A tanker truck carrying aniumal blood spills out in the ocean drawing in sharks across the flooded town. A group of survivirs will have to figure out how to get passed the sharks, before they are a part of their food chain.

If some of you remember the 2019 survival horror thriller known as Crawl, you might remember it was about a father and a daughter trying to survive against alligators. But not in the environment we are used to see, in over flooded houses during a hurricane which is a very interesting idea for a film with alligators. I really enjoyed Crawl for trying to go back to old school animal horror films such as the 1980 cult cinema classic Alligator. In some ways you could say that Thrash tries to follow a similar pattern as the 2019 film Crawl and im definetely on board for that. Obviously there is a big difference between alligators and sharks, so we can´t really say both of these films are similar when it comes to the plot of this film. Let´s talk about what Thrash manage to do well considering this is a survival horror film. The hurricane scenes are effective, you almost feel like you are at the location and experience the horrible weather conditions. The shark attacking scenes are far more bloodier than i expected so that was a nice surprise. In a lot of shark movies on a limited budget you barely see anyone getting their arm eaten, but you get to see this in Thrash and im grateful for that. Sometimes it´s just nice to see sharks rip bodies apart, it just takes me back to the wonderful summer days of the 1980´s. The acting in general is actually pretty good, i can´t say for each actor of course but, actress Whitney Peak ( who i recognized from the Disney + movie Hocus Pocus 2 ) especially surprised me as her character Dakota. A young woman struggling with agoraphobia, and i feel that she is able to capture a realistic portait of how someone may struggle with an anxiety disorder. The character known as Lisa ( played well by actress Phoebe Dynevor ) give this film some depth as well, considering she is pregnant fighting to survive, to be able to give birth to her son. Actor Djimon Hounsou is of course a highlight in this film. A survival horror film especially focused on female characters, so does thiss really work? Yes, it does. This is the kind of film you just have to take as pure entertainment, the plot is thin and it´s not original at all but Thrash deliver as a pure shark film. Does it have issues? Yes, but i honestly don´t care, This is a film made specifically for you who just want a fun popcorn film at home. Director Tommy Wirkola ( mostly known for the Norwegian horror comedy classic Dead Snow, including the crazy sequel ) have made a simple, yet fun shark survival horror film. You really don´t have to know more, just go watch Trash on Netflix and enjoy yourself.

Rating: DDD

Fathers

Kidnapping cases may not be something we hear a lot about on the news here in Sweden. Of course, this is a small country compared to many other countries around the world. And even if we don´t have that many cases here, if you take a look at other European countries the numbers are pretty scary. For example in France there are about 4000 kidnappings in one year. I know there are countries with far worse numbers than this, but still around 4000 people kidnapped in one year is still a lot. There may be a lot of reasons why some people are kidnapped of course, ransom for money, in some cases it may be connected to trafficking. There are a lot of different film adaptations that show different kinds of kidnapping cases. You have the 1990 classic psychological thriller Misery from legendary director Rob Reiner, where Kathy Bates delivered one of her most iconic cinema performances ever as psychotic kidnapper Annie Wilkies, keeping seriously injured author Paul Sheldon ( brilliant played by legendary actor James Cann ) locked inside her cabin. If you have not seen Misery for any reason ( based on the classic novel by Stephen King ), you simply have to see it. But let´s talk about a completely different film, that also bring up the subject of kidnapping. Let´s talk about the 2017 action thriller Kidnap, directed by Luis Prieto ( director of the 2012 British remake of Pusher, based on the 1996 Danish original film ). While the British version of Pusher was a big box office flop, Kidnap especially found it´s audience on physical media, digital rental and on streaming as well. Waitress and single mother Karla Dyson ( Hale Barry ) takes her siz-year-old son, Frankie ( Sage Correa ), to a carnival. While she recieves a call from her lawyer regarding a custody battle over Frankie, her son Frankie is suddenly missing. As she looks for him around the area, she see´s a woman dragging her son into a green Ford Mustang van. Why would someone take her son? Who is really behind this kidnapping? Kidnap is a well made action thriller that´s intensive and well acted where especially lead actress Hale Barry deliver the most effective dialogue. Worth a watch if you love well made thrillers. Speaking of kidnapping i recently got an oppurtunity to see director Harley Wallen´s latest film Fathers. I really enjoy most of the films of director Harley Wallen, so i was curious to see if his latest film would be his best film so far. Is the film Fathers a must see this summer, or should you watch Ash & Bone from director Harley Wallen instead?

A young girl Natalie ( Emilia Wallen ) is kidnapped by a mysterious man known as Bobby Nash ( Harley Wallen. Years go by and Natalie Dryden ( Kaiti Wallen ) is now an adult as she decides to escape from Bobby´s house. She is struggling with PTSD and is trying to remember what really happened. But as the truth is getting closer, things are maybe not as they seem to be...

I have always felt that director Harley Wallen is a very talented film maker, and a talented actor as well. I have had the honor to review every single film he have directed for many years now, and since we are both from Sweden this makes it special for me. Not just because Harley is originally from Sweden, but he proved that he may be one of the best director´s we have coming from Sweden in many years. And i sincerely mean this, i can not think of many Swedish director´s who have improved over the years, devoted to tell powerful stories in different categories. That´s not me trying to say we don´t have other talented director´s from Sweden, we do. It´s just that each film he have released over the years just keeps getting more professional, and i can tell that Harley have developed into a very passionate film maker. I would definetely say on a technical level, Fathers is his best looking film so far. Let´s move forward and discuss some very important details as well. Fathers is quite different from Harley Wallen´s previous films, in the sense that this is a kidnapping story that´s covered with some surprising twists and turns. I personally feel that Fathers needed a surprising twist, because it helps the film stand out from an ordinary kidnapping story. When it comes to acting in this film, there are especially four characters i feel deliver the strongest acting performances. Let us begin with actress Kaiti Wallen as the character Natalie. I have followed Kaiti´s acting career so far and i have to say, her acting is growing stronger for each film. She is able to balance different emotions, dealing with PTSD and capture everything through facial expressions, dialogue and body language. To be able to pull this off in a realistic way is not easy, and Kaiti knows exactly what she is doing. Actor Grover McCants ( who you might remember from TV series Tales Of Tails ) as the character Chief Norris is really delightful to witness. Grover feels like an old school Hollywood actor who capture your interest right away, through his powerful dialogue. Actor Deon hunt as Detective Parker is exactly what this film needed, a strong police character. Harley Wallen is as always charming on the big screen and that´s exactly the case here as his character Bobby. The psychological tiwists in Fathers manage to keep you intrigued, where we have to ask ourselves what is really going on with Natalie? As a mystery thriller Fathers have all the ingredients you could wish for, while the film still manage to deliver some surprises along the way. If you love specifically thrillers and appreciate strong characters, i am confident that Fathers will keep you on the edge of your seat.

Rating: DDDD

War Machine

Movies that portrait many different kinds of wars, i have seen some really good ones over the years. I have seen a couple of ones that are truly terrible, but in general most war films are still good enough to enjoy. Some of the best ones are usually the films that capture the war in a realistic way. Then you have the completely unrealistic war movies like Rambo: First Blood Part 2, which is still a fun movie to watch after so many years. If you are more a fan of classic war movies then one of the greatest is of course the 1979 war movie Apocalypse Now, from legendary director Francis Ford Coppola. This is truly a masterpiece in the category of war movies, and the longer version Apocalypse Now Redux ( that was released back in the year of 2001 ) is my favourite version of this film. Not only is this a brilliant film for showing a realistic portrait of how the Vietnam war really looked like, it had the most amazing cast and brilliant acting from each character. This film is a must have in your physical movie collection. We also have some more modern great war films that don´t get mentioned much at all. For example, how many of you have seen the 2018 war movie 12 Strong? I actually paid tickets to watch this film twice in cinema, which doesn´t happen often. This film is directed by Nicolai Fugisig, based on the book Horse Soldiers by author Doug Stanton. We follow a group from the U.S. Army Special Forces sent to Afghanistan immediately after the September 11 attacks. What i appreciate about 12 Strong is to see the companionship among American soldiers and Afghanistan soldiers, that is the ones who want to help U.S. Army Special Forces take down Taliban terrorists. In general there are some good acting performances in this film, especially from Chris Hemsworth and Michael Shannon. The cinematography by Rasmus Videbak ( who worked on the film adaptation of The Dark Tower, based on the novels of Stephen King ) looks really good, while director Nicolai Fuglsig manage to balance the story and capture the terrible atmopshere of how horrible a war can be. Well worth a watch on streamimg or physical media. Last year i was seeing onlime on different articles that director Patrick Hughes, who directed The Expendables 3 which i really enjoyed ( i know some people don´t because it´s PG13 ), his latest film War Machine was going to be released on Netflix. Since he did a really good job on The Expendables 3 regarding the action scenes, would he succeed with War Machine as well? I decided to sit down and review this film, hoping it would be a positive surprise. Is this a must see on Netflx, or should you skip War Machine and watch The Expendables 3 instead?

2 years have passed since Staff Seargent ( Alan Ritchson ) lost his brother in Afghanistan, during a Taliban terror attack on his team members. The Seargent joins RASP to earn assignment to a battalion of the consolidated 75th Ranger Regiment, and is given the candidate number of 81. It becomes very clear that 81 is very well trained, but don´t really get along with the other fellow recruits. Suddenly there are reports of a blasts in the sky, while everyone is doing the military exercise. Not knowing what crash landed, 81 lead a team of soldiers to find out what really happened. They are about to face their biggest mission yet, that could end their lives

What if you combined War Of The Worlds with the 2012 sci fi action film Battleship, and set most of the film up in forest areas? That sounds about the right combination for this Netflix sci fi action film War Machine. This is a very male macho driven military film that we used to get in the action shelves inside of video rental stores. And this is exactly why this is such a solid sci fi action movie, it´s shaped for a certain kind of audience that it was made for. Lots of violence, robotic machine figures, lots of ammo, the brotherhood that soldiers have together in war. You can pretty much say that War Machine is the ultimate war feast for movie nerds who really love effective CGI effects and simple story telling. And i will be honest and say this is probably one of the better military action films i have seen in a while. The plot is just as thin as Eric Trump´s pointless speeches, but at least War Machine have something to say compared to Eric Trump ( who anyone shouldn´t take seriously at all ). Where this film succeed the most is with the hard hitting action scenes. The war scenes are very well made, and even if we do have a lot of CGI effects they do look really good. The action scenes are intense and i have to say in general the actinng is actually good. We know from the past there have  been American sci fi action films that lacks good acting, so thankfully this film proves that you can actually find solid acting performances in War Machine. Lead actor Alan Ritchson ( who is really good in the Guy Ritchie film The Ministry Of Ungentlemanly Warfare ) as the character 81 have probably done his best acting performance in his career so far in this film War Machine. I feel that he really capture the personality of a broken soldier, who struggles every day but still go out there because he have to. The fact that he doesn´t want to be seen as a hero, just a man, this gives the character a much more deeper depth about his personality. War Machine tells a story of how important it is to stick together as humans beeings, even in the worst possible moments when all hope seems lost. War Machine is steady adrenaline pumped action film, that´s specifically made for fans of Battleship and similar films with science fiction influences. It´s violent, brutal and a hell of a good time. One of the better Netflix films released this year for sure. Director Patrick Hughes ( the director of The Expendables 3 ) proves with War Machine why he is such a talented film maker when it comes to making action movies, who actually understand what the audience wants.

Rating: DDDD