joshuadraineycma Reviews

Silent But Deadly (I) (2017)

Actions speak louder than words!

[7/10 · 28 July 2022]

If you're looking for some dumb fun, but don't want to make a commitment, check out "Silent But Deadly".

The main story is only about 45 minutes long, and then there are some after credits scenes.

It's an irreverent and ridiculous movie. It smartly pokes fun at a lot of stuff, but in a dumb way.

The acting in this movie is over the top. The jokes are over the top, and most of them lack any sense of subtlety. Nothing in this movie is taken seriously. That said, there's really a lot to like about this movie.

There's some interesting world building surrounding the mimes in this film. If this was a more serious film it could have been compelling, but for the most part it's played off as a joke. By more serious, I mean more along the lines of the classic clown flick "Stitches".

The characters are very overt archetypes for a cabin in the woods slasher, all of them played for laughs. My favorite of them is probably Gary, the guy who somehow gets invited to everything, but nobody knows how, why, or who invited him.

The mime kills or attempts to kill a couple of characters in a creative fashion.

This is a comedic horror film for fans of films like Bacon Head (2001) and Airplane, it's outlandish and nonsensical and a little non-sequitur.

It feels like a movie that had much more imagination than it could pull off with its budget, but knew it and in knowing it kept it short and stuck to the bits it could pull off.

I think that the mime could have been cast better and utilized more, but overall the actor does a decent job.

There's no nudity, there's very little in the way of gore and blood, most of the adult content in this stems from language and humor. It's fast paced. It's not a bad way to spend an hour, I enjoyed myself much more than I expected to.

Mutant Vampires from the Planet Neptune (2021)

Check it out

[8/10 · 12 July 2022]

If you go into this expecting gore, blood, violence, or gratuitous nudity you will be disappointed.

If you go into this expecting a light, fun film without anything too over the top you should enjoy yourself. This is a comedic horror film.

The characters are well cast and have good chemistry together.

The setting is used well. Luke Nelson is a believable oafish comical best friend, Buzz. Alex Onda's Yuri works as the straight man with slightly wounded puppy dog, yearning romantic. Chelsea Falbo and Jax Kellington are paired well as best friends, Cass and Starr. Julene Fontaine's Larissa is a solid fifth wheel and killjoy.

The mutant vampire looks great. The design on the vampire is a standout in the film.

Director McCarthy capitalizes on the woods and really sets the scene quite well with them.

There are a couple shots that really standout to me as well.

There's the shot where Larissa is leaving the cabin at night and the way that the cabin is lit is just very cool. It's a wide shot and from left to right the lighting goes from like a blue to a purple, but in the center beneath the entry way is an overhead light and it comes across as inspired by like giallo or Guillermo del Toro, and it works. It gives off kind of a haunted house attraction feel, which I like.

The other shot is when Larissa encounters the vampire, the way that the vampire fades into view from behind is very cool.

This is a nice homage to horror from the 50's and 60's, but with a little more violence and a lot more drug use. But still, overall it is not a very violent film.

The kills are executed well even if overall they aren't spectacular. They smack of a filmmaker who knows that their budget and ability to make a good looking kill is currently at a certain level, so rather than overreach and wind up with a bad looking over the top kill they chose to go with a well executed average kill.

Overall this is a fairly fun film. It comes across as a film that the director had a lot of fun with, and probably the cast did as well. My only real critiques are that the joints they rolled were really thin, and the finale was a little anti-climatic, but that's a risk one takes as an indie filmmaker because there's only so much risk you can take on to do a larger scale finale. I recommend watching this, it's streaming free on Tubi.

Drifter (I) (2014)

Another solid film from the people at Skullface Astronaut

[8/10 · 1 June 2022]

While this movie still has a lot of the humor as Joe Sherlock's other efforts, it has a darker tone overall.

The effects are fun. The characters are relatable. The score stands out, it's much better than it has a right to be. Solid performances all around.

I'm very quickly becoming a very big fan of Skullface Astronaut.

A Haunting in Ravenwood (2021)

Check it out

[7/10 · 31 May 2022]

This movie is competently directed.

Tim Coyle gives the standout performance as Gregory, he feels like the heart of the story to me.

Chynna Rae Shurts gives a solid performance as a woman who may or may not be losing her mind, often pushing the dial to 11.

Jon Meggison simmers appropriately as the husband.

It's a great depiction of gaslighting.

The ending is delightfully over the top.

It also features appearances by horror legends Eileen Dietz and Jackey Neyman Jones.

I appreciated the Easter Egg from "The Exorcist".

Amityville Vibrator (2020)

Who is this even for?

[7/10 · 26 May 2022]

This film knows what it's after and it goes for it with gusto. That said, I don't know who this film was made for.

On the one hand it is absolutely a silly, cheesy, b grade horror film with enough dumb humor to satisfy as a get together and get high movie.

On the other hand it is more sexually explicit than I would watch with a group of friends, unless I wanted everybody to feel more than a little uncomfortable.

When I say dumb humor I mean there is a scene where the main protagonist sees a ventriloquist dummy that wasn't there a minute ago. She goes and gets her friend to see it. When they walk back into the room our protagonist says "Where is it?" and her friend says "What are you talking about, it's right there", and they show the ventriloquist dummy, but it has on a fake mustache, and the protagonist says "It seems different for some reason." It's a gleefully dumb film that never takes itself too seriously. And don't worry, the ventriloquist dummy bangs our protagonist with its big doll penis.

There's a fair amount of blood and gore, and each sequence that includes either one is executed with varying degrees of success.

The ladies who get naked are easy enough on the eyes, but at no point did I find myself turned on.

The male who gets naked does so to comedic effect each time.

The lighting throughout often dilutes clarity, but never to any real detriment.

The ending is a muddled thing that doesn't give the audience any real closure.

Overall I found this to be a pretty enjoyable film, with my only complaints being that the ending is weak, and the nudity precludes it from being something I watch with a group of friends which is what it feels like you should do with it otherwise.

Channel 99 (2021)

They've Got It!

[7/10 · 23 May 2022]

If you go into this expecting the next "The Exorcist", you will be disappointed.

If you go into this expecting something more along the lines of something out of Tromaville, you will have a better chance of enjoying yourself. I'd say this is like Diet Troma. It's raunchy, and bloody, and there are plenty of naked women. It's a more humorous film, and definitely cheesy, but it never goes quite as far as a Troma film.

This is an anthology film, it includes a couple segments that are fairly short that are billed as "Coming attractions in February". They even include a "Pickman's Model" segment that opens up with the quote "Oh, Pickman, don't let those b****es get you down."

There are some fun effects such as the creature from the "Pickman's Model" segment. The gore is mostly limited to somebody getting sliced or stabbed, and then blood getting flung around. It's fairly light on story. It's quick, simple, silly fun.

The director does a decent job of making this feel like the kind of stuff you'd watch late at night on obscure channels, and they even include a sign off segment concluding the end of the broadcast day.

Legally I don't think you're permitted to review a Joe Sherlock film and not mention the naked women. What I appreciated about the naked women in this film is that they are all shapes and sizes and ages, and they are all treated as equally capable of being objects of desire. I don't recall seeing any jokes at the expense of these women's bodies. Each woman who disrobes is shown to the viewer as if that woman fits the standard definition of beauty, whether that woman is a slim, busty woman in her 20's, or a large, less busty woman in her 50's.

This is a fairly quick paced, breezy film. My only real complaint is that some of the segments end very abruptly and with little to no explanation, and it gives some of the segments an unfinished feel to them. But overall I enjoyed this film.