BORDER (2018)

"The entire human race is a disease..."

Swedish Customs officer Tina lives an empty life.  Her job seems to be nothing more than a glorified drug dog (sniffing passengers as they get off a ferry), her elderly father lives in a nursing home and disapproves of her living with the listless Roland who appears taking advantage of Tina for a free place to crash.  Even worse than all of that is Tina suffers from a chromosomal abnormality that makes her look like a caveman.  Or does she?  Her life is turned upside-down one day when a passenger gets off the ferry and he looks a lot like her.  Tina’s life pretty much goes to shit after that.

I really enjoyed the basic idea of BORDER (by the way, that is a horrible name for this movie) and was super into for about 20 minutes, then the story slowly started drifting off into various paths that I found uninteresting and, while I still watched it, I began to lose interest.  Also, the character of Vore was such a grotesque and vile shitbag that I could barely even stand looking at that worthless shit stain.  Tina seemed to be a genuine and likeable character and then when she finally meets somebody of her own kind, the person is an absolute horror.  I didn’t care for that.  But, I guess, that is just life for you.

Up and down pace, beautiful camerawork, a few enhanced shots that were distracting, above average acting, some nudity that I didn’t want to see, interesting story that could have been much better, beautiful Swedish countryside, impressive lighting.  Overall, BORDER is an interesting film that would have been better off if it hadn’t pulled its punches.  Or just told a completely different story with the same character of Tina.  Still, it’s worth watching, just don’t expect too much.

AMITYVILLE IN SPACE (2022)

Fucking awful.  A priest confronts Satan at the Amityville house, which then, for some reason, blasts off into outer space.  Fast-forward to the year 3015 and a spaceship that is cruising around looking for “rogue black holes in space” comes across the Amityville Mojo Dojo Casa House still fully intact just leisurely floating around.  Three crew members board the mysterious house and find the priest alive and well.  Shit happens and I got more and more depressed that I was watching this Satanic bowel movement.

Slow pace, zero nudity, zero gore, zero blood, non-acting that bordered on people just reciting lines, beyond shit special effects, shit sets, the voice of the evil character so garbled that I could barely understand anything he said, zero cheerleaders, zero ninjas, a house supposedly floating in deep space in the year 3015 but you can see cars driving by outside the window, horrid lighting, disappointing ending, crap story.

Honestly, outside of making fun of this with your friends, there is no reason that you should watch this turd.  AMITYVILLE IN SPACE is not the worst thing ever made, but there are so many better things you can do with your time.

Skip it with a vengeance and never look back.

INSOMNIA (2002)

"Don't lose your way."

Crooked Los Angeles homicide detective Al Pacino and his partner are called to the remote fishing village of Nightmute, Alaska to investigate the murder of a local teenager.  Right from the very beginning, Pacino’s character seems unstable, but then when stress and the town’s perpetual summer daylight cause him to not be able to sleep (I guess, they haven’t heard of blackout curtains yet in Nightmute), Pacino starts stumbling around like the Drunk Stork in the Looney Tunes cartoons.  “Congratu…congr…congratulations. You’re a mother.”  Soon, Pacino’s sleepwalking existence turns into a nightmare when he shoots and kills his partner. D’oh!

INSOMNIA is a good film and definitely watchable.  Unfortunately, the emotional pace of the film is flat for pretty much the entire film.  Yeah, yeah there are a few moments of heightened interest (the fog scene, the dog corpse), but for the vast majority of the film we’re merely watching two despicable characters going around being turds.  Then again EBOLA SYNDROME is one of the most entertaining things ever filmed and it’s just a single dude running around like a total asshole for the entire movie, so what do I know?  I’m so goddamn heartbroken and confused and depressed that I cannot construct full thoughts.  I should lay off the serious movies for a few more months.  I thought I was ready.  I guess not.  It was sad, it was sad, it was sad.

Eh, whatever.  I enjoyed the film and always love watching Al Pacino chewing up scenery.  Steady pace, gorgeous locations, above average acting, one guy with an annoying mustache, a Pantera poster, a video store sign over a florist shop, ol’ girl from GINGER SNAPS, good lighting, nowhere even close to being as violent as I had expected, Twin Peaks vibes, SEVEN vibes, THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS vibes.  Good movie, but it could have been much better.

Original - Insomnia (1997)