Set in an office building, five strangers enter an elevator that suddenly stops between floors. As they try to find a way out, even as the building’s security works to free them, strange and inexplicable things begin to happen. As the events increase in violence, the five prisoners realize one of them is the Devil.

I consider that a good thing. Centipede, on the surface, may turn stomachs, but you know what they say about books and covers. Beneath the screams and horror lies an enlightening tale about a lonely man who has a dead-serious passion for his work. And despite violating the cardinal rule of you “never go ass to mouth” — thanks Clerks! — Centipede wriggles and nests warmly in your brain in a way few movies can.

Said man is Dr. Heiter, played by Dieter Laser, who delivers a pitch-perfect crazed German surgeon with a reptilian stare and Dr. Mengele-like tendencies. Heiter doesn’t undress you with his eyes, he dissects you with them. Are you the right addition to his experiment in biological carpentry? Really, he’s just an elderly gentleman who wants to bring people together. Really together.

It’s the man’s methods that are most objectionable. While it isn’t explored much, Heiter’s first “centipede-ial” creation involved his three rottweilers. They eventually died, and a broken-hearten Heiter committed to moving on, and up — to humans. Discovering that success lay in having a shared digestive tract, Heiter brings together a trio of strangers, and teaches them to work as a team, leveraging their new-found connectedness. Having one’s face sewn to another’s posterior creates interesting mechanics, so it’s not an easy journey for either party.

Outside of Laser’s sharp performance, there is little acting on which to judge the film. Early dialogue (i.e., when certain characters could talk), proved flat and tedious, but this and other related shortcomings are quickly forgotten. Centipede is expectedly terrible in many ways, and unexpectedly awesome in others. The film is wonderfully shocking in proving that there are, indeed, things worse than death. Many horror films have too narrow a focus and dangle that mortal carrot over its victims.

But which is actually worse: Bleeding out at the hand of a masked villain, or taking the middle in a three-person human centipede? Heiter relegates one of his female victims — an appropriately cliche lost, aloof American tourist — to that position in line after she attempted an escape. That, however, is just the beginning of her suffering. The film forces you to evaluate what really makes your skin crawl, at the same time surfacing an undeniable depravity that can be felt (and feared) universally. See. Centipede brings people together. Whether they want to or not.

This was a creepy catchphrase when the original A Nightmare on Elm Street was released in 1984, but one that might be tough to heed while watching the drab, rebooted version.

With a rash of slasher film remakes in the past decade, it was inevitable that Nightmare would get its own update. In the company of more conventional films like Halloween, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Friday the 13th, and countless imitators, there’s probably no other horror movie of the era more worthy of a fresh look by a new audience.

When the first Nightmare premiered, the Friday the 13th franchise had already been four times around the chopping block, releasing its inaccurately named “Final Chapter” that same year. But director Wes Craven took the genre to a new place – more menacing, more psychological, blurring the very lines between fantasy and reality. This was the kind of horror movie that could actually, well, cause nightmares.

Burned stalker Freddy Krueger kept to the shadows, and was one of the few crazed killers who actually talked back, taunting his victims in their dreams. While later sequels (Craven never intended it to become a series) descended into camp, and Krueger eventually lost both his mystery and menace, the original still holds up quite well in terms of suspense and creepiness.

When not terrifying us, Craven actually posed questions about the meaning of dreams, and the nature of the bogeyman himself. In addition, he served up pre-Scream irony, character development, girl power, and not least of all, the introduction of Johnny Depp.

Sadly, all of those elements are missing in director Samuel Bayer’s re-imagining of the film. None of the main characters are particularly appealing or memorable, least of all protagonist Nancy, who is less terrorized every-girl and instead is portrayed as a damaged, goth high school student who happens to be both an amateur artist and a night-shift waitress.

The opening scene, which takes place at the diner where she works (and which conveniently introduces all the characters you need to know), is part of what’s wrong with the new movie.

The sleep-deprived teens of Springwood are starting to experience micro-naps as they go throughout their day, dropping into dream sleep virtually anytime and anywhere, often without warning. While this allows Freddy Krueger to terrorize them whenever and wherever he wants – crowded diners, drug stores, highways – it takes away some of the suspense and the ritual of sleep. It feels a bit like cheating.

And while the original built the plot slowly, fueled by black coffee and No-Doze, the remake is pumped full of adrenaline and Red Bull from the beginning, not surprising for the first feature film by a former music video director.

The plot loosely follows the original, and there are homages to Craven’s film throughout, including some iconic lines and shots (notably absent is the blood geyser scene that famously dispatched Depp in the first movie). But this time around, there’s a reason that Freddy is stalking this particular group of teens, which becomes apparent as Nancy and her friends begin discovering that their pasts are all linked.

One glaring difference from the original is Fred Krueger himself. It turns out that Robert Englund‘s sweater and fedora are hard to fill. Despite the same sharp claws, the new Freddy is much more of a blunt instrument. His burned features are a bit more realistic, but allow for a lot less expression. And Jackie Earle Haley’s monotone voice, while creepy, seems to be recycled from his character Rorschach in Watchmen.

More disturbing, the new Freddy is not just a former child murderer, but a child molester. This adds a bit of uncomfortable realism, and the equating of bad dreams with repressed memories is a different kind of horror for the teens, who all start to dream of what went on years ago in the same abandoned school.

But mostly, there is nothing truly new here, and a lot that is truly bad – including the dialogue, the performances, and the story itself. The film depends on the typical cheap surprises and a bit of gore to jolt the audience (although most elicit laughs rather than shrieks). The ending, which is equally jarring and disappointing as the original’s, leaves the door open for a sequel, if only this one makes enough money to warrant it.

For me though, the most personally disturbing part of the film had nothing to do with the violence. It comes when one of Nancy’s friends searches for clues in the attic above her garage. Looking through old photographs, toys, and children’s clothes, she rummages through a box labeled from the year she was in first grade – “way back” in 1996. Now that’s scary…

From director Alexandre Aja comes the new action thriller Piranha 3D. Every year the population of sleepy Lake Victoria explodes from 5,000 to 50,000 for Spring Break; a riot of sun and drunken fun. But this year, there’s something more to worry about than hangovers and complaints from local old timers; A new type of terror is about to be cut loose on Lake Victoria. After a sudden underwater tremor sets free scores of the prehistoric man-eating fish, an unlikely group of strangers must band together to stop themselves from becoming fish food for the area’s new razor-toothed resident

How exactly would a crowd react if a regular Joe wandered onto the field of a youth baseball game with a shotgun in tow and a blank stare leading his way? Director Breck Eisner handles this scenario and many other “not right” elements of The Crazies with surprising dexterity and evenness. While not a one-to-one remake of George Romero’s 1973 original, Eisner’s Crazies quietly tears at your sense of domestic security and calm with all the precision and destructiveness of a rusty scalpel. Call it a spontaneous outbreak of talent and inspiration. You wouldn’t expect the director of Sahara and writers of recent lame remakes (Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Amityville Horror) to create a warmed-over scare that actually scares. Don’t let the bad rep for horror remakes keep you from checking out The Crazies this weekend.

I caught what seemed like a new or extended trailer last night ahead of an early screening for Cop Out. The Platinum Dunes project seems like it’ll be a lot of fun, but I did get a worried feeling that Jackie Earle Haley may be channeling his Rorschach voice a bit too much. But maybe I need to hear more.

As the vampire-version of Buffy the Vampire Slayer‘s Willow liked to say, ”Bored now.” Maybe that’s not completely true for every minute of Cirque du Freak: The Vampire’s Assistant, but it certainly applies more often than not.

Continuing the trend of digging up anything vampire-related and dragging old texts into the light of day, Darren Shen’s “Cirque du Freak” series, first published in the UK in 2000, has been updated for the post-Twilight world. The Vampire’s Assistant, not to be confused with the television show The Vampire Diaries, also based on books aimed at teens a decade ago, tries to be funny, dark, lighthearted, and macabre — all at once. As with any project that attempts to be all things to all people, it has its moments of success and its moments of failure.

Darren (Chris Massoglia) is your typical good kid, while his best friend Steve (Josh Hutcherson) is the bad influence. But you wouldn’t know these distinctions when the duo sneaks out to attend the traveling freak show, and one steals a spider while the other begs to be turned into a vampire. In their tiny little town, once quaint but now surrounded by strip malls, the supernatural almost seems natural.

It’s no wonder Cirque du Freak piques the boys’ interest – the freaks are the most interesting part of the film. Featured, with sometimes nauseating clarity, are the ribless man (eat your heart out Cher), the man with two stomachs, the bearded lady (Salma Hayek) and the regenerating limbs woman (Jane Krakowski). The Freaks’ performances are brief but mesmerizing, and their winter campground is absolutely magical. Director Paul Weitz really focuses on this setting and nails it.

Daybreakers is certainly making an effort to stand out. The trailer smells of a pretty interesting recipe, and this poster is definitely in line with that flavor. I can’t wait for this one.

Posted via web from Popscorn

With the groundswell of support that’s spreading Paranormal Activity across the U.S. beyond its paltry initial distribution, the film is clearly going to be the sleeper success of the year. And considering its mockumentary style and subject matter, not to mention to a painfully low budget of $15,000, comparisons to 1999′s Blair Witch are spot-on. Yet whereas Witch was a pretty disturbing affair and took audiences to a different level of cinematic experience, Paranormal Activity does not. The real phantom here is the idea that Paranormal Activity is the scariest film in recent memory, and good enough to deserve one million votes to expand nationwide. It’s not. Activity‘s meager roots make it a solid accomplishment, to be sure, but the film, aside from two choice scenes, is largely pretty boring and lacks the convincing nature that made the Blair Witch so ground-breaking.

The central problem is the two-person cast, Katie and Micah, who play characters of the same name. It’s actually more of a one-person cast, since Micah does the majority of the filming while Katie feigns innocence and unease. The two virgin actors give it their all in attempting to create an air of realism, but you never really believe it; that is, as much as you can in a movie like this. At times, the rough, hand-held shots feel more like screen tests for Katie than genuine footage and reactions. Katie cannot carry the film, and unfortunately she’s the center of practically every scene. Micah doesn’t help the problem, and when he declares, “No one fucks with my girlfriend and gets away with it,” it’s hard not to roll your eyes.

The writing may be worse than the acting. As important as it is for the cast to surface real fear and emotions, the right words and dialogue must pull their own weight. Micah cracking jokes about using the camera for less-than-Christian activities gets old real quick. And Katie getting fed up with her boyfriend’s antics and lamenting how her fear is flat and contrived. If this were not a film that tried so hard to be believable, the jokes and comedy would be a lot more welcome. Micah has a number of solid lines that will definitely have you chuckling. But most people aren’t that funny in the real world, especially when it’s clear that something’s lurking in your house. The dialogue is simply too polished for the events the film is trying to portray.

Over the 99-minute run-time, too, the framework and pacing gets annoying and old. Katie and Micah, believing something haunts their two-floor home, set up a camera rig in their bedroom in the hopes of capturing whatever is causing the bumps in the night. The film is paced by markers, such as “Night #3,” extending all the way to “Night #21.” Part 1 of the pattern involves Katie and Micah retiring to bed, and a clock in the corner of the frame advancing to a late hour when the couple is surely asleep — the perfect time for the ghost to come out to throw keys on the floor or move a door. Part 2 is the morning after and the couple examining the evidence and talking about how creeped out they. As Micah says, “there’s a lot of cool stuff going on.” As the film progresses, the evidence becomes more compelling and the nightly sequences a bit more interesting. It takes a while to get there, however.

The culmination of Paranormal Activity will definitely leave you unsettled, and as with Blair Witch, leaves the most disturbing for last. With all of the modest variables that have brought the film to the theater, it’s hard not to recognize it as at least an accomplishment. But like the creaking in your house or the Boogey Man in your closet, the idea that Paranormal Activity is a landmark scare is just your imagination.