“Gerald’s Game” Movie Review.

Gerald’s Game is a Stephan King adaptation, directed by Hill House creator Mike Flanagan. Starring Carla Gugino – another Hill House alumni – as Jessie, who travels to a remote holiday home with her husband Gerald (Bruce Greenwood) in an attempt to revitalise their faltering marriage. Things begin to escalate however when Gerald, now heavily dependent on Viagra to offset his beleaguered masculinity, proposes that they enact a sordid rape fantasy to spice up things in the bedroom, much to Jessie’s reluctance. She eventually accedes to her husbands desires, and while handcuffed to the bed, Gerald suffers a fatal heart-attack. With her hands bound, no leverage to escape nor means of communication, Jessie must devise a plan to prevent fatal dehydration and repel the advances of an all too ravenous hound!

I’ve always personally enjoyed character driven stories that rely on situational misfortune. A narrative centred in one specific location, that is elevated on the performance of its actors. In this case espousing the absurd premise of a women trapped on her bed in a remote country retreat, held captive by her own mind rather than an intruder. Its very reminiscent of Stephen King’s much vaunted adaptation of “Misery”. Depicting a similar sense of foreboding hopelessness that makes you wonder just how is this person intended to escape? Gerald’s Game executes this with meticulous precision, setting up moments that seem conspicuously obvious, though you’re not sure why. A glass of water placed upon a shelf. A price tag from a negligee casually discarded onto a bed-side cabinet. Little details that on the surface seem trivial, but have greater significance as the story develops. As well as convey Jessie’s inherent capacity to improvise and survive.

It’s such an unusual, as well as humiliating situation to find yourself confined to. A situation only compounded by the sense of isolation and dissolution expedited by her fragmented mind. A mind that begins to conjure hallucinations, manifesting as a pragmatic version of herself and an agnostic depiction of her husband. A duel psychosis competing for her desire to survive. Dealing with an impossible situation, as she clings to her sanity as well as her life. Staving off the figurative and literal presence of Death. With the smug posturing of her deceased husband mocking her attempts at escape. His body decaying by the bed as flesh is torn from his corpse by the lingering appetite of a feral dog, that’s beginning to crave fresher meat.

Because the setting is so minimalist, Gerald’s Game, though cinematic, is also very theatrical. I can see this being performed on a stage, far removed from the commercialised pomposity of the West End or Broadway. And though the explicit scene’s are gratuitous, they’re sparse. With it’s visceral intensity tempered by the far more disturbing abuse Jessie suffered as a child. Memories that have been exposed and must now also be confronted.

Stephan King as an author is someone I’m rather ambivalent too. As much as I respect his craft, it’s the adaptations of his works I find most compelling. The Shining, Shawshank’s and Misery’s may go down as some of the more distinguished adaptations, but “Gerald’s Game” might be his most modest. And certainly another illustration of Mike Flanagan’s exemplary direction of horror.

Resident Evil 2 Remake: A New Nostalgia.

As a kid playing Resident Evil 2 was an endurance of heightened sensations. I suffered increased anxiety, joy, fear, nausea, even legitimate physical afflictions such as sudden, debilitating stomach cramps, which invariably forced me to use the toilet. I get that same replicated stimulation from playing this remake that I experienced playing the original sequel. The fact that I’m writing this specific segment on my phone whilst on the toilet should give you some sordid indication of just how harrowing this remake is!

I hadn’t anticipated this reception: to be both humbled by nostalgia and aghast at the subtle innovation that retains the core tenants of the series that made Resident Evil such a cultural spectacle. This is a truly pivotal moment in my life, to experience Resident Evil 2 for the first time…..again! This remake, that functions more as a commemorative reinvention, supplants all of the geriatric controls and fixed camera angles that made the original such an arduous slog to play, while extracting the sheer bowel irritating fear that made your measured exploration around the RCPD such a ponderous and frightening experience. An element absent from the action orientated, boulder heaving sequels of Resident Evil 5 and 6. Seriously though, whoever designed the elaborate architecture for this police facility/museum was more sadistic than the current biologically challenged occupants!

You can’t settle, feel comfort or safety. Your only reprieve from the ravages of the infected are the designated save rooms scattered sparingly across the Raccoon City police department and the subterranean labyrinths that lurk below. It’s strange too trying to familiarise yourself to environment I once knew intimately, making knowing self-satisfied commentary as I make my way around, only to have the game completely dupe my nostalgic expectations, as it succeeds in unnerving my every footstep. Employing a rigorous assault to my faculties so hostile and personal that it’s like I’ve slighted the game in some way. That I’m being punished for even considering picking up the controller! It’s exhausting navigating the claustrophobic halls, blood speckled corridors and faint yet distinctive sound of the dead shuffling through the dimly lite alcoves. Participated by the quadriplegic scuttling and piercing, elongated tongue of the Lickers. Creatures I haven’t missed! All while you avoid the propagating advances of the towering monolith that is the Tyrant!

You can’t just kill everything that moves, shuffles or lurches as the limited ammo at your disposal will quickly deplete. Instead you have to be pragmatic, choosing when to shoot carefully and more importantly, precisely. Inventory management ensures you’re well prepared for any potential cartilage chompers, as well as amply spacious enough to pick up any crucial items you may need. Storing surplus components or supplies is crucial, otherwise you may find yourself having to navigate down perilous hallways you’d otherwise avoid just to make room in your inventory. Or worse discarding an item completely! The games inert adaptive difficulty also ensures that you are always being challenged. If you haven’t died the game ramps up the difficulty. Contrary, if you find yourself struggling the games eases up a little.

There are some obvious continuity lapses between the A and B scenario’s that were handled much better in the originals, with Claire and Leon able to communicate via a walkie-talkie at least. And it’s a shame really. With a few minor narrative amendments the two concurrent perspectives could have been separate stories told from different perceptions, instead of competing ones. But really these kind of discrepancies are negligible when compared to the rest of this well handled remakes of one of my favourite Resident Evil titles. In another game the jumps might seem cheap, like a ghost train at a travelling carnival. But because the jumps scares have been tempered by the twisted, uneasy ambience and the precarious nature of your safety, the sudden shocks feel genuinely frightening. You may think your safe fully laden with ammo and abundance of healing herbs, but it only takes one tiny, misplaced bullet to put you right back in danger.

This is survival horror, the way the genre was intended to be. And Resident Evil 2 has reminded me just how much I’ve missed it. Now you’ll have to excuse me, I have to find some more toilet tissue!

My First Time With Bloodborne.

Are you sadistic? Do you loathe the comfort of sanity? Have you scoured mountains using just a stick, some gloves and comfortable shoes but wish it were more difficult? Have you been stranded alone on a deserted island, surviving merely on your own cunning? Battling dehydration, sleep deprivation and starvation? Fashioning crude tools from your own dismembered leg bone, harvested of its enveloping flesh, which you carved off with your own elongated fingernails and cauterised in the midday sun? Finally escaping using your own body as a flotation device and swimming 400 miles against tides with crests 100’s of feet high and thinking “That was easier than I thought? Then you Sir/Madam are the ideal candidate to play Bloodborne! Yes you too can explain to your disgruntled neighbours why you’ve been embroiled in a 2 hour argument with your television, with an epitaph of profane language and engaging in a beleaguered fisticuffs with the air!

Available to download for free on PlayStation Plus this month, Bloodborne is, or at least “was” a game I intentionally avoided. Not because I didn’t think I’d enjoy it, but because of the familiar connotations associated with “Dark Souls”, a series that gleefully promotes a distinct challenge to participants that can’t be mitigated by an interchangeable difficulty setting. Essentially I’m not particularly fond of games that mock my ability as a gamer. And considering that the only way I was capable of finishing the original “Devil May Cry” was on easy difficulty, Bloodborne would likely dedicate an entire episode of “Saturday Night Live” mocking my faux gaming capabilities. So with that in mind let’s delve into my initial reaction to Bloodborne. *gulp*

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You don’t play Bloodborne, you endure it!

Bloodborne is the kind of game that demands sacrifice, patience, and a stubborn fortitude you either obtain through perseverance or is readily innate in you. It’s a game that relishes in your punishment, inciting you for repeating the same mistakes again and again. It’s perverted sensibilities and incessant cruelty harasses an inert retaliation that either provokes a defying resistance or a soul-destroying surrender. At present, I’m clinging to the former.

Bloodborne flaunts an anaemic city stunted by a hue of rancid decay, like a village afflicted by some devastating bubonic plague. The pallid tone and imposing, banal architecture looks as though it was constructed centuries ago from another decaying settlement looms over you, defiling your every cloistered step as if the environments themselves want to end you. This isolation can feel overwhelming, particularly when negotiating the densely narrow streets and overpasses.

Everything looks and feels distinct, almost hallucinatory, which also makes everything unfamiliar. The foreign utilities that litter the inventory possess very ubiquitous capabilities, such as rejuvenating health or burning aggressors to a crisp. But because of the uniquely aberrant depiction of these commonly used items it takes a little time to facilitate yourself with the lingual abnormalities. Even the melee weapon, the staple of any dungeon crawling adventure feels adapted to conform to the games distinct tone. There’s no fluidity to swinging your preferred implement of castration. Every sweeping flail of your scythe/axe is an effort, slow and cumbersome to respond. As if you’re wielding a weapon of significant weight, not some exalted gladius that can be brandished with little effort. And because of the weapons distinct lack of versatility, as well as your characters susceptibility to dying, every single strike has a profound impetus. You can’t miss and hope to follow-up with a flurry of expeditious slashes because you’ll more than likely already be dead.

I’m still in the preliminary stages of Bloodborne, hopelessly trying to understand this morbid and sadistic world. The game prods and snarls, harrying you into making a concerted effort to think before you act, which is a refreshing change to adjustable difficulty settings. There’s an unwieldy fervour about Bloodborne’s progression too, like stalling a Lamborghini every 5 minutes. At times your stupidity is arbiter of your demise, not the relentless bullying inflicted by the shambling villagers that assault you without provocation. There’s a genuine challenge here, one in which you will either embolden you with a purpose or expose you as a charlatan of gaming culture. The fact that you can’t even pause the game in the traditional sense just intensifies the fear!

The joy you leverage from Bloodborne will be largely dependent on the culmination of small victories that in other games would be considered negligible. Like that time you successfully evaded an enemies powerful attack or endured devastating defeat at the same formidable demon hound, only to finally succeed at the 16th time of asking. Bloodborne isn’t something you can play casually, nor really play at all. It’s something that you must survive, requiring dedicated resolve to overcome! I’ve no doubt that there will be infuriating challenges that will incite the same neighbour provoking concern mentioned in my opening digression. That a boss will pummel every ounce of fortitude from my broken and enraged spirit. But quite honestly I look forward to subjecting myself to this interminable torture!

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What games have you deliberately avoided? Let me know in the comments below. Cheers.

Dead By Daylight: Screwing Me Out Of A Win!

I’ve been lucky enough to have had this entire week off work for the purposes of rest, relaxation and general hermetic convalescence. “Ah, what a tender dream that is”. If anything this “week off” has been more demanding than my actual job, owing to my girlfriends drunk related incident that resulted in her restricted mobility and a 4 hour stint at casualty. The injury itself, a twisted ankle, though clearly painful wasn’t as serious as first thought. The positive diagnosis has still prevented us from doing any of the activities we’d had planned for our rare time together due to her interim lack of lateral stability. So with this restriction in mind and sleep a premium thanks to my daughters insistence on waking up at 6 am, bless her, gaming has taken a back seat until the latter stages of the evening. Such is the cruel symmetry of life. It wasn’t until late evening that I was assured of the peace required to engage in such frivolous activities. And even then I had neither the energy or inclination to indulge in anything that required a concerted mental aptitude. Focusing on a screen whilst synchronising simple button controls is about as stimulating and complex as my sleep deprived mind can handle. “Dead By Daylight” provides that simple yet engaging notion that can casually assimilate a player with minimum fuss. Dead By Daylight is an asymmetrical horror game where 4 survivors have to escape elaborately themed stages by activating randomly conjured generators scattered precariously throughout the map. All while trying to evade the pervasive stalking of a perusing murderer with a penchant for hooks that sacrifice the souls of those impaled to some ethereal, malevolent being. Whether you are the hunter or the hunted you will have to adapt your strategy to accommodate the varying environments and the distinctive variations of perks utilised by the prowess of these demented monkey farts. Sometimes the difference between winning and losing can be measured in seconds or inches, zigging when you should’ve zagged. Or in some instances a crippling glitch rips success from your grasp. Next time I think I’ll just go to bed. Enjoy.

Alien Convenent Review.

Alien, the seminal horror classic from 1979 is easily one of my favourite movies. Alien terrified generations with its dark temperament and gratuitous oral penetration, which incidentally culminated in one cinemas most brutal, nauseating scenes: a deadly Alien bursting through John Hurts now convulsing body, spurting blood through his exposed chest cavity, which is still the series most defining moment. Every scene, however trivial had a purpose. Whether it established chemistry amongst the crew, the occasional division between shipmates, the claustrophobic ambience of the Nostromo, the commercial towing vehicle carrying 20,000,000 tons of iron ore, or conveying the desolation of the vacant planet that accommodates adverse weather conditions seldom seen outside the UK and the now infamous reveal of the derelict alien spacecraft. Not to mention H.R Giger’s exquisite artistry that was the core inspiration for the ferocious, acidic blooded parasites; the Xenomorphs. It was conceptually bold, startlingly audacious movie that without the exuberant direction of Ridley Scott could’ve been a lambasted B movie, forgotten by critics and audiences alike. Alien spawned five sequels, one prequel, a host of comics books and further novelisations as well as merchandise, video games and innumerable parodies that have solidified Alien as cultural icon, thus creating an endearing legacy that has endured despite the economical inferiority of its proceeding attachments. After a 30 year absence from the series, Ridley Scott returned with 2014’s much maligned prequel “Prometheus”. With a vaguely defined story and abject crew of dumb scientists that treated obvious threats like a child would treat a puppy, Prometheus ultimately failed to resonate with any coherent investment. Scott, seemingly aware of the of the fans desire for a more affectionate consort to his original material sought to rectify this by not only including the parasitical organisms that sought refuge in John Hurts rib cage back into the movie, but include Alien in the title. What he achieved however is to prove that he could make the same movie 3 times, with various degree’s of success.

“Oh look its that guy, that girl and that other bloke!”

Alien: Covenant follows the terraforming crew of the eponymous ship destined for a planet suitable for human colonisation. Of course they intercept a distress signal along the way, things go wrong and are passively forced to land on a neighbouring planet that accommodates conditions even more perfect for human habitation. The expedition goes awry, people get infected and aliens begin bursting through every naturally occurring orifices and some fashioned through devastating force! The problem from the off is the sheer number of passengers on this ship. There are 15 or so, but only 5 or 6 of them will have more than a couple of lines of dialogue. Whereas the crew of the Nostromo felt like an ensemble, here most of the crew are there purely to die in the most gratuitous way possible. Nothing but mere subsidiary characters in metaphorical red shirts, that act as disposable cattle, bleating and mooing with as much depth as a puddle. Ridley Scott also has a penchant for killing marriages in this film? As well as lovers in an obligatory shower scene. Because motivations are so fleeting and people are dispatched just as quickly there isn’t really sufficient vigour amongst the cast to establish a report. Tennessee is probably the most affable character, with his interactions with others feeling more affluent and natural. Daniels, the main thrust of the female cast is certainly no Sigourney Weaver, but does an admirable job to a point. I just found her attempts to convey vulnerability were a little inconsistent and jarring, alternating between a scared infant to an embolden soldier a little too readily. What elevates the movie beyond the inept banality of Prometheus is Michael Fassbender’s performance. Or should that be Michael Fassbender’s?

“Who needs helmets when we have hats with flaps?”

He doesn’t just carry this movie, he’s heaving the languid script like Ripley carries Newt away from the Alien queen; with triumphant fervour. He can go from sincere to psychotic with the same intensity and fluidity as Anthony Hopkins in Silence Of The Lambs. He’s that good! He reprises his role as David, the egotistical synthetic with a proclivity for human experimentation, exhibiting all the traits of a deranged sociopath with aspirations of divination. Since Prometheus David has dedicated much of his time at his procured evil residence trying to create a new species of alien derived from the same space cobras and Hug O Squid from Prometheus. Why? Well there’s a labouring, vaguely defined reason for his Frankenstein incentives, but it’s negligible really. Needless to say his ambiguous intent in the previous movie has distended into pure madness, delivered with devious relish by Fassbender. Though doesn’t murderous artificial intelligence sound strangely familiar? That’s because the biggest problem with Covenant is crucially evident in its familiar routines.

“The Covenant looks beautiful inside and out.”

If I was being severely critical Covenant is really just a stylised “Alien” remake with Prometheus aesthetics and most importantly for Scott, Prometheus mythology. There’s certainly a leniency in terms of coherency and convoluted storytelling that impeded the fluency of Prometheus, and it does attempt to try new things such as the way the Aliens gestate, but it does so without ever really standing out. There’s such a reliance on the what’s come before that it all feels reconstituted. You have a crew member’s body, who is killed aboard the Covenant, jettisoned into space. A distress signal from an unknown source that must be investigated. A psychotic synthetic. Derelict ship. A stupid person putting there heads right over the top of obviously dangerous eggs. A female lead who bears an uncanny resemblance to original kick ass heroine Ellen Ripley. And an ending fight that extraneously amalgamates both that of Alien and Aliens final conflicts with a shrug. It becomes painfully obvious that Scott really doesn’t know where to take the franchise without compromising the integrity of his original classic. And it’s a shame because the imagery and visual style of both Prometheus and this are exceptional to look upon. The environments, the ship, the way he contrasts light and shadow, particularly in scenes with Fassbender, channelling some Shakespearean villain, it’s stunning. But so is Megan Fox, doesn’t mean I want to hear her discuss the science of alien genetics!

“Seriously, does no one know how to fly a space-craft?”

Alien Covenant represents the over inflated hubris of a man who has dedicated years trying to distance himself from this franchise. Its ambitious, yes, but don’t mistake that vision for anything profound. It seems so concerned with expanding a mythology that it forgets to be scary or even interesting. It’s essentially dumb scientists doing absurdly dumb sciencey things, devolving further into intellectual aberration and becoming at points unintentionally comedic. From the slapstick humour of two separate characters slipping over a pool of blood at crucial moments, to Michael Fassbender teaching “Himself” how to play the flute by erotically cooing “You blow. I’ll do the fingering”. You have to wonder whether the script was written by someone distracted by reruns of “Benny Hill” and “Carry on”. I guess I shouldn’t complain too much considering the steep, downward trajectory the series was taking with the blasphemous Alien Vs Predator tangent. With potential followup’s like Alien Vs Superman. Alien Vs John Wick. Alien Vs Marvin The Martian. Alien Vs Alzheimer.
Alien Covenant isn’t a bad film, but it’s not a great one either. The characters are underwhelming and extraneous, the plot meanders like my Nan trying to recite a joke she’s forgotten the punchline too, before accelerating off like a fart in a hurricane (the story, not my Nan). It culminates in a predictable ending that even M Night Shymalan would dismiss as derivative and stupid. Alien Covenant may well be the third best in the franchise, but by the same extension “Attack Of The Clones” is the third best Star Wars prequel.

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Have you seen Alien: Covenant? If so what did you think? And what is your favourite Alien movie in the franchise? Let me know in the comments below. Cheers.