絲克伍事件

等待方舟

　　Set in an underground dungeon inhabited by bundled, ragged human beings, after the nuclear holocaust. The story follows the wanderings of a hero through the situations of survival. People wait for the Ark to arrive and rescue them while their habitat falls apart.　　Delving deep into the dusty and long abandonded vaults of b-cinema in search of lost gems always leaves me with a bittersweet taste. On one hand the discovery of unexpected gems where no one would think them possible is a rewarding experience. On the other hand though it makes one wonder how many of these remarkable low-budget oddities, personal love affairs of directors never quite famous and now all but forgotten, have almost forever slipped from memory?　　n any case what we have here is a little post-apocalyptic gem from Poland that is really better than it has any right to. The dystopian near future of O-BI, O-BA finds a group of survivors of the nuclear war that ravaged the Earth inhabiting an underworld concrete bunker and biding their time as they wait for the mysterious Ark, an air ship of some kind that will come and save them. The Ark proves to be an elaborate hoax, carefully designed to give hope to the malnourished and desperate denizens of the bunker, while in the meantime the dome that separates their miserable existence from the nuclear winter outside is slowly caving in.　　What first striked me about the movie is the design of the bunker and the depiction of the survivors. The survivors are gaunt, filthy and terrible-looking penitents, dressed in rags and aimlessly wandering the neon-lit halls of the bunker like automatons. The bunker is a rundown, seedy place, with bright neon lights peering from all sides like the eyes of malignant beasts.　　On one hand it is a slightly 80's depiction of the dystopian future but the movie never stoops down to MAD MAX cheese. Instead it combines biting political satire with the bleak outlook of a world with no future, black comedy with barbs on apathy, religion and power. The survivors, for example, are fed some kind of flour dropping from a tube that hovers in the air - later on we discover the food supervisor uses books and the Bible itself as filler for this meagre meal. There are many such short symbolic touches, perhaps not life-changing or faith-restoring, yet playful, clever and inspired.　　One thing is for sure; O-BI, O-BA is not your run-of-the-mill sci-fi schlock. It overcomes its modest budget with creativity and has genuine artistic aspirations both from a writing and directing perspective. My opinion is that it should have been filmed in black and white instead of colour though. The director uses atmospheric light and shadow to great effect and it would have registered even better in stark black and white. The blue-green neon on the other hand outstays its welcome after a while. Just a minor gripe in an otherwise solid b-movie with its heart set in all the right places.　　Imagine a less bleak THE ROAD (Cormac McCarthy) being injected with the satire and humour of DR.STRANGELOVE and you're getting there. See it if you can find it.

壞繼母

　　Following the sudden and mysterious death of their father, a brother and sister return home to their sprawling New Orleans estate and encounter their unhinged stepmother, who will stop at nothing to gain control of their inheritance.

毛骨悚然撞鬼經 25周年特別篇

幽靈鬼屋

　　影片靈感來自迪士尼樂園同名游樂設施，“在一個讓人不寒而栗的鬼屋中進行一趟令人毛骨悚然的旅行，有幽靈、食尸鬼和超自然力量帶來的驚嚇”，聚焦一個搬進了這棟豪宅的家庭。

洛杉磯之戰

　　2011年夏天，無數枚隕石墜落地球，竟導致12個國家的沿海城市系數毀滅。原來隕石實則有一群神秘的外星人操縱。外星人憑借隕石著陸地球，展開殘酷無情的屠殺和破壞。作為世界上的頭號超級大國，美國自然也無法避免這場災難，隨著入侵者的則多，美國只有西太平洋的洛杉磯暫未淪陷。海軍陸戰隊中士麥克·納茲（艾倫·艾克哈特 Aaron Eckhart 飾）受命編入威廉姆·馬丁內斯中尉（拉蒙·羅德里格茲 Ramon Rodriguez 飾）的小分隊，準備與外星人展開殊死搏殺。　　適值此時，外星入侵者成功登陸，并殺入人口稠密的圣莫尼卡區。軍方決定誘敵深入，再對敵人施以空中打擊。為了營救無辜，納茲和馬丁內斯的小分隊義無反顧沖了進去……