Change Your Image
sarah-gallogly
Reviews
The Magic Toyshop (1987)
A truly fascinating film!
I saw this film when I was very young and it was shown on British TV. It made a huge impression on with its fairytale story and blackly humorous touches. Years went by and I hadnt thought of the film until I wanted to see the comments for it on IMDb.com. I managed to get a DVD copy It was even more brilliant than I remembered.
Melanie is orphaned when her parents die on holiday and is left to take her younger brother and sister to live with her strange uncle who has not had contact with the family. Her uncle owns a toyshop which is filled with wonderful toys and disturbing life like puppets. She also meets the rest of the family in his mute wife and her brothers. Her uncle puts on surreal plays with the puppets and makes Melanie take part. She develops a relationship with Finn who is her aunts brother and discovers the incestuous secret in the family.
I love this film because it is so quirky and deals with the subjects of growing up and relationships in such an interesting way. The dialogue works and the actors are all well cast, especially Melanie and her aunt. Tom Bell brings the right amount of creepiness as the uncle. The sets are all fab and really give a sense of a post war Britain (you will know what I mean when you see the bathroom!) Great film and I wish they would put this out on general release as I had a tough time trying to get a copy.
Midnight Kiss (1993)
Extremely cheesy vampire movie
Firstly, let me say that I am lovin the Horror channel which is showing all kinds of obscure B movies. I saw Midnight Kiss last night and it really is an amalgamation of every cheesy movie cliché you can think of. The main female character is a tough hardworking cop who is recently divorced and wants to get back on the homocide team. She has to go for a drink with her pervy boss who takes her to a strip club (nice!) and then gets assigned to investigate the recent spate of murders where the attractive young female victims have all been drained of blood. But there's more! Her ex husband is the chief of homocide and she is assigned to be his partner but there are still sparks there. This film is the worst kind of chewing gum for the brain. The dialogue is completely predictable and testosterone filled and the plot is, well its pathetic quite frankly. The only saving grace is the hunky blond vamp but even he is.....wooden, and thats being kind.