THE FACULTY (1998)

"Guaranteed to jack you up."

 

Borrowing heavily from the INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS idea, THE FACULTY is about a small group of teenagers who start to notice weird shit going on at their high school.  Turns out the faculty and most of their fellow students have been taken over by some outer space buttholes and if they don't stop 'em they're gonna take over the world!

 

As far as high school sci-fi horror movies go, THE FACULTY isn't too bad.  If you saw it as a teen back in '98 you probably have a special affection for it, but even without that it still holds up alright.  The story is about as unoriginal as it gets, but the acting is good and it was a lot of fun seeing a young Elijah Wood gettin' all stressed out and chased by a multi-tentacled monster.  Poorly lit (fake) topless scene, nice pace, worms, boring direction, a mic hanging down into the shot, a Venom shirt, a little blood, stereotypical high school cliques, zero gore.

 

Would make an okay double-feature with DISTURBING BEHAVIOR.

THE MASK OF DIMITRIOS (1944)

What a pleasant surprise this film was.  I sat down to watch it because I like both Peter Lorre and Sydney Greenstreet and it ended up being a really good film.  Set in 1938, Peter Lorre is a successful mystery novelist vacationing in Istanbul when his police chief friend tells him about a notorious criminal who's body just washed ashore.  Lorre is instantly fascinated by the mysterious criminal known as Dimitrios Makropoulos (Zachary Scott) and sets off looking for more information.  The trail leads him all over Europe and at each place he hears more incredible tales of what an asshole Dimitrios was.  Along the way he meets another fellow travel (Greenstreet) who seems innocent enough at first, but he's holding a secret.  Together they set off looking for more information about the mysterious Dimitrios Makropoulos.

If you're looking for an action-packed film then you're in for a bad time, but if, like me, you enjoy Lorre and Greenstreet and a good story then you're in for a treat.  Lorre is great just on his own, but then when Greenstreet enters the picture things really take off.  I loved the way they played off of each other.  And the camerawork was really impressive too.  Definitely worth checking out.