60-second cinema

the odd minor spoiler I've always been a bit of a sucker for special effects in films, but — if you'll pardon the pun — they've got to be effective to really command my respect. Whether that's through inspiring awe, horror, or merely by being unnoticeable, they've got to work in the context of the film. Otherwise, they're just some kind of self-congratulatory distraction. Humour me while I share some of my favourites (and feel free to add your own in the comments). Probably the first effect that made a real impression on me was that of the fighting skeletons in Jason and the Argonauts . Those buggers gave me nightmares. More recently, Hannibal managed to be the only film ever to truly repulse me with the believability of its gross depictions. Of course, I can watch that scene quite happily now, but at the time, it was enough to make me look away from the screen. The recent War of the Worlds remake is another film whose effects have me in awe. However,...

some thought On the message boards at work, there's a thread in which people are posting their all-time favourite horror films. (Yep, we work really hard here.) It's interesting to see what kinds of thing people consider to be horror. In among the first few responses were a couple of votes for films in the Alien series. I thought these were just straightforward sci-fi. Good job I don't categorise my reviews by genre, I guess. :) And, for the record, my favourite horror so far is probably either Candyman or The Descent. What about yours?

another go Earlier this year, this site had loads of reviews being posted on it. January had 8 reviews, February had 17, March had 8, and then it all tailed off. The last 6 months have seen a grand total of just 6 reviews. I blame the credit crunch. I'm just not getting out to the cinema as much as I used to. :( However... there are another 9 (nine) contributors on this blog. Surely someone's seen something for which they'd like to share a review? Well, ok, maybe not Colin, but I've given up on cajoling him. ;)