whispers from another cell: News From Within The Asylum

1st Furry Valentine Details Released

Last week The Asylum put up the page for their first announced feature of 2011, 1st Furry Valentine. I linked to the page the other day, and while I mentioned the director - Rachel Lee Goldenberg - and the plot - a princess(?) comes to live with American relatives and befriends a pony(??) held by a mean carnival owner(?!?) - but didn't get a chance to acknowledge some of the details, like cast.

Here's the low down - Fiona Perry, first-billed, is a little girl. My guess? She's our princess. Then there's Bobbi Joe Lathan, an older actress who's done a lot of TV; an American relative, perhaps. Also older, Ron Hajak, whose first film was The Swinging Cheerleaders, so, props there, and who recently returned to acting after a nearly two-decade hiatus; another American relative, probably. And finally there's Bill Oberst, Jr. a creepy-looking fella I'm willing to bet is the shady carnival owner.

So them's the deets for now. A family film. From The Asylum. About a princess and a pony, the two, like, greatest things in the history of ever as far as girl kids are concerned. Early prediction, this one's gonna do real well for The Asylum. I manage a video store (shock, I know), and the amount of direct-to-DVD schlock that comes out aimed at kids makes the direct-to-DVD horror flow look like a trickle. Kids'll watch anything with a bright cover, and their parents will let them. So put that pony nice and big on the cover, boys, and get that princess all princessed-up in the saddle, and I guarantee it'll bolt off the shelves like Secretariat at the Preakness. Ooh pink! Can you put the princess in pink? Awesome.

This one lands January 25th, in the New Year

Yet Another New Title Announced

But I covered this one yesterday, so click here or just scroll down a bit for all the juicy details (that exist thus far) on The Battle of Los Angeles, due out February 21st of next year. 

The one update I can give here, today, is another picture from The Asylum's twitter feed, this one of director Mark Atkins and actresses Nia Peeples and Theresa June-Tao on set. I can also tell you that the event the film is based on, is kinda true. That's it for now, but rest assured when I know more, you'll know more, guaranteed.

Keep 'em coming, guys!

Brothers in Blogs

A couple of foreign-based Asylum blogs have cropped up over the last couple of months. There's this one in Russian, and this inventive fella here in Hungarian. I don't understand a word of what's going on here, but I'm glad there's an international community of Asylum aficionados taking to the web to spread the love. Give 'em some hits, even if you don't speak the language. 

Birthday Wishes/ inmate profile: Paul Logan

In Paul Logan, The Asylum got more than a pretty face and a chiseled physique, they got their first bona-fide action star. A veteran of six Asylum films (plus some uncredited stunt work, according to IMDB, on Titanic II), Logan possesses, as I think I've alluded to before, the stern charm of a pre-Over The Top Sylvester Stallone, teamed with the husky confidence of Jason Statham, and just a dash of the bulky fighting style of Governor Schwarzenegger. So imagine those three having a baby somehow, and Paul Logan is pretty much what you end up with. Good guy, bad guys, good guys with some bad tendencies or bad guys with good leanings, PL has totally owned every role he's taken for The Asylum, and as it stands, along with Kim Little, he is the longest-active Asylum actor, having worked with the gang from their very first film - Killers - all the way up to three releases this year. So he's thoroughly committed. And, as I know I've alluded to before, he has the best run in The Asylum. Really, watching this guy run, it's like stumbling upon a wild Clydesdale. Such command. Anyway, I digress; below please find Paul Logan's filmography with The Asylum. He can next be seen in Ballistica, a Bourne-looking action/spy thriller, releasing on November 16th.

• Killers...Nicky
• The Terminators...TR-4
• MegaFault...Major Boyd Grayson
• Ballistica...Damian
• Mega Piranha...Jason Fitch
• #1 Cheerleader Camp...Tom

It is also no coincidence that Mr. Logan's profile is posted today, because today is Mr. Logan's 38th birthday. Many happy returns of the day, Mr. Logan!

Consider yourself saluted.

Another NEW Asylum Title! UPDATED!!!

Thanks to the ever-handy Asylum twitter feed I've discovered another new title in production. It's called The Battle of Los Angeles  and it stars - or at least prominently features, Kel Mitchell, the other half of Kenan & Kel (Kenan is the Kenan on SNL). Good Burger is a classic in my book, and that's always been because of Kel, so it's great to see him working in something I'll see. No release dates or further details at this point, but for right now, the following picture tells me everything I need to know:

 

Man oh man is this one going to be awesome.

UPDATE: so, although there isn't mention of it on their home page, there is a product page for this film, seen here, which gives a little more information, the most notable of which is that the film is written and directed by none other than the prolific and versatile Mark Atkins. In other casting notes, Nia Peeples of North Shore and "Fame," well, fame, makes her first appearance for The Asylum, and Theresa Jun-Tao, another newbie, who appears to be some kind of dancer. The plot, as described by The Asylum:

"In January 1942 US forces engaged an unidentified flying object above Los Angeles. Now almost 70 years later, the alien invaders have returned. "

Allow me to reiterate my above statement: man oh man is this one going to be awesome. 

observation notes: I Am Omega

Just so you know where all this is going, I'm going to be bold and open these observation notes with the declaration that I Am Omega is one of the greatest productions The Asylum has ever pulled off, and remember, that's coming from a guy who loves all these films, good or bad, but this one, this one enters a pantheon reserved for a precious few like Monster and The Beast of Bray Road. This is an especial accomplishment when you remember that I Am Omega isn't just a tie-in to the Will Smith flick I Am Legend, but also to two other incarnations of this story: The Last Man on Earth (1964) with Vincent Price and The Omega Man (1971) with Charlton Heston; all films are based on the novella by Richard Matheson, and the Smith version is the only one to retain the original name. But aside from that, the story here is basically the same as the others, with a few notable exceptions: the life and trials of the supposed last man on Earth (Mark Dacascos, Double Dragon and TV-Crow) in the apocalyptic wake of some pandemic virus fuck-all that turned most of society into ravenous mutant/vampire/zombie predators. As such, for the first half hour or so, the film focuses on MD's day-to-day survival routine, scrounging for supplies and, on this day at least, planting hella explosives around a natural gas pipeline. Two major differences from the other films emerge at this point: one, MD isn't scrounging off a major metropolitan area, so there are no luxuries - no fast cars, no ripe grocery stores or department stores, none of that, calling for a more hand-to-mouth existence set among a rural, desert landscape that helps raise the level of peril; and two, MD isn't an M.D. like the protagonists of other versions, he isn't conveniently the only guy ever who could figure out a cure for all this, he's just an average guy with exceptional fighting skills in a truly shitty situation, mentally fragile, on the verge of some deeper insanity, and so lost in his isolation that when all of a sudden he receives a video message from another survivor, instead of rejoicing, he flips the fuck out and shuts off the power. MD is a man with no hope of finding a way out of this hell, so he just plain has no hope.

Finally, though, he answers the video message and it's - lucky lucky - a hot single chick (Jennifer Lee Wiggins) trapped downtown in need of rescue. She says she's on her way to Antioch, a utopic survivors' compound nearby, and if MD comes for her, he can go with her to salvation. So as it turns out, MD isn't the last man on Earth at all, he's just the last recluse. Long story short, he turns her down, reps from Antioch come looking for him anyway, saying the girl carries the anti-virus in her blood so they gotta get her out, but they also know about the explosives and what MD's planning on blowing up: the whole fucking city. So they need him to use his sewer-layout knowledge to get them to the girl and out again before the city blows. Still MD isn't feeling the whole rescue mission, but in the end, they don't really give him a choice. At all.

So into the sewers they go, and from here on in it's mostly spoilers so I'll cease with the plot reveal but to say the set-up more than delivers, and the action continues to mount all the way to a spectacular ending, the culmination of races against time, explosives, zombies, fraudulent heroes, hope and salvation.

Overall, this feels more like a straight-up remake of The Last Man on Earth than it does a tie-in to I Am Legend. Another key difference - and the one, I believe, that makes this film so exceptional - is its subtle but thorough exploration of the psychosis factor involved, that is, the mental effects of being, well, Omega, the last person on Earth (if only in your mind). MD is not some flawless, wise-cracking action hero here, he is a very disturbed man fighting for his life every waking second, dealing with terror, grief, confusion and rage non-stop. The toll of this would be almost unbearable, and MD does an exceptional job portraying a man in such dire straits. In addition to his superb martial arts skills - employed here in a way that wasn't too obvious or distracting from the story - Dacascos brings an emotional intensity that results in a truly stirring performance, the best of his career for its equal parts power and passion, strength and extreme vulnerability.

His co-star Jennifer Lee Wiggins, a six-time Asylum vet (Shapeshifter, King of the Lost World, Dracula's Curse, Pirates..., and The 9/11 Commission Report) somehow manages to bring a playful sexiness to a distressed role, humanizing the character and making her more empathetic than perhaps she's written. But the highlight of this film, trivia-wise, for me, comes in the form of Geoff Meed, who plays Vincent, the brutish, mohawked Antioch rep, your typical over-trained thug. Not only has Meed performed in five Asylum films - including Airline Disaster and 100 Million B.C. - he's also written three: Universal Soldiers, 6 Guns and I Am Omega. I'm gonna call him the Bo Jackson of The Asylum from now on. You heard it here first.

I Am Omega was directed by Griff Furst, who's done some work with The Asylum before (he directed Universal Soldiers and 100 Million B.C. and had acting roles in Transmorphers and The Hitchhiker), but has also done some work outside the walls that have found mention in these virtual pages (Lake Placid 3, upcoming Swamp Shark). He's the captain at the helm of this film, an intense, scary thriller that stands on it's own feet and that grabbed me from the first scene and never let go. If you've never seen an Asylum film, make this one of the first three you watch.

Birthday Wishes!!

...are extended to day to Greg Evigan - star of Asylum features Journey to the Center of the Earth, 100 Million B.C. and 6 Guns - who turns a cruel 57 years old today (Cruel because at 57 he looks better than most of us did at 27. You attractive bastard, Evigan.) There's nothing at present in Evigan's filmography linking him to The Asylum, but talent like this won't lay dormant for long. Many happy returns of the day, Greg!

Creature Feature: SUPERCROC

Along with sharks, crocodiles are among the oldest predators on the planet, the product of millennia upon millennia of evolution. With their surprising quickness both in the water and on land, their razor-sharp claws, jagged, piercing teeth, strong, powerful tails and near-impenetrable hides, crocodiles are also among the most formidable predators on the planet. But as tough as they are now, you should have seen the primordial version from a couple million years back; those guys were real assholes. Oh, wait, you can see one - in Supercroc.

Freed from stasis in a Pacific trench following an undersea earthquake, Supercroc, by The Asylum's own measurements, runs 50 feet long and stands 25 feet high, the rough equivalent of one double-decker bus towing another. Think about that for a second, try to conceptualize: one double-decker bus towing another. That would have to make the teeth on this fucker, like, the size of your average ten-year-old. Half a second's chew in those and you're ground chuck, no doubt. Next to this guy, you're going to look, well, as fucked as the dude below:

 

In terms of weight, a thing this huge - based on what I could find from prehistoric estimates and extrapolations from modern giant crocodiles - Supercroc is going to be tipping the scales at between 8 and 9 tons, or 16-18,000 pounds, the average weight of your major metropolitan area garbage truck. Might not seem like a lot, but when it's bearing down on you and snarling, I bet it feels like a lot. 

Okay, you might be thinking, so it's long, and really fucking big, really fucking heavy, but it's still an animal, just shoot the son of a bitch and be done with. Uh-uh. That hide I mentioned earlier, you do know what "impenetrable" means, right? No bullets, no mortar rounds, no everyday explosives are going to do the job against skin so think and coarse it might as well be a tank shell. Perhaps it's best understood as such: the ease with which the Supercroc could pierce your flesh? Comparatively that's how hard it would be for you to pierce his. Which is the inevitable conundrum every enemy of the Supercroc eventually has to come to terms with, best-phrased in this instance by actress Kim Little:

"For all of our advanced technology, we have not created anything that comes close to the aggression, resiliency, and overall fighting power of the ancient crocodile."

Damn right we haven't. Fucker can take a helicopter out of the air without breaking a sweat.

This is the best shot of this I could get. The point, I think, is made.

In the months and year to come, Supercroc's reign at the top of the heap, for crocodiles at least, will be called into contention via not one, but possibly two challengers: Crocosaurus, the underdog in the upcoming Mega Shark vs. Crocosaurus (avail 12/21/2010!!!) - some kind of dinocroc thing that isn't Dinocroc, I pray - and - depending on what the hell it is - possibly also Gatoroid from the upcoming Mega Python vs. Gatoroid. I say "possibly" because it seems Gatoroid is obviously an alligator, not a crocodile, but also maybe some sort of machine, given the "-oid" suffix. So perhaps it gets disqualified. The one thing that is certain at the moment, however, is that there isn't a badder reptile in The Asylum's menagerie, no matter how many motherfucking snakes were on that motherfucking train.

Much respect.

outside the walls: Non-Asylum Inkings

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

977's Unsolicited Yet Copyrighted Pitch #3: THE RUN

In the spirit of the new direction 6 Guns pointed The Asylum, I humbly present this killer-gang thriller that's part western, part 70's-era slasher flick, and part revenge story. I call it, simply, The Run.

Based on the same historical anecdote that inspired both Samuel Fuller's Run of the Arrow and Cornell Wilde's The Naked Prey - the run of Lewis & Clark trailblazer John Colter from Blackfeet Indians - The Run begins at the outskirts of the Eastern Oregon desert, late summer 1978. Our protagonist, Franklin Delano Lund, 35, is relocating his wife, two sons and ailing father-in-law from Maryland to Oregon in search of work. He is a boatbuilder, trading Baltimore for Portland. When we meet him it is dawn of their tenth day on the road, and FDL is waking in his hammock to the rays of the new sun. If all goes well, by the time the sun sets again, they should be in Portland. If all goes well.

All Not Going Well #1: Soon after FDL and the fam hit the road that morning, the radiator in their old pickup truck cracks, stranding them along an isolated stretch of highway.

All Not Going Well #2: It takes well into that night before another vehicle is seen to approach them.

All Not Going Well #3: The vehicle in question is a pickup truck carrying seven men - rogues, scoundrels, sweaty psychos - who after feigning assistance, attack and abduct FDL and his family, dragging them off screaming into the empty night.

They are taken to a barn even further into the isolated desert where for the next few days they are humiliated and abused for the inebriated and heartless amusement of their captors, mostly FDL, that we see, but by the time these few days are over, FDL is the only member of his family left alive, and the fun has ended for his captors; now it's time to dispose of the last remaining witness (I'm leaving out a lot of details about their time in the barn, the little events that build to this Act One climax, because they're too sweet to give away here. one would hypothetically have to read the script.). But Roscoe, the leader of the gang, sees promise in FDL, he sees fire, so he doesn't want to just kill him, he wants to play with him for one last contest: the run of the arrow.

The run of the arrow works as follows: FDL is made to strip naked. Then, the gang's best archer (yes, they have a best archer) fires an arrow as far as he can into the desert. Upon this arrow landing, FDL is instructed to walk to it, and when he reaches it, he's told he should start to run. Why? FDL wants to know. Because, Roscoe informs him slyly, That's when the men start giving chase. That's when the game becomes kill or be killed. 

(FDL's naked, tired, dehydrated, hungry, battered and unarmed, of course, while his captors are whiskey-fueled, vicious, well-armed and used to hunting human prey. so...his odds aren't great [which makes him that much more empathetic and badass])

The next two acts of the film are this chase, FDL running through the desert, trying to gain any advantage he can, as one-by-one the men pursue him, forcing violent conflicts only one can walk away from. And when it isn't the men he's battling, it's the environment, the heat, the sand, his own thirst and hunger; every instant becomes survival. This chase is also a flight from character, as FDL struggles to save what is still good within himself from the rising murderous rage he feels over the deaths of his family, the cruel fate that brought him here, and the men who would play with his life like he was a bug. Ultimately, however, he realizes the only way he is going to survive is to have his revenge, to become like the men he despises - a ruthless, wanton killer. 

I won't give away any more - every detail is a spoiler in this one - but to say that in addition to his pursuers and the environment, FDL must also contend with mountain lions, deranged mountain folk, a coyote and heartbreak after heartbreak courtesy of thwarted salvation. And the ending, specifically the final scene, is, in my humble, responsible opinion, awesome

An engaging action-thriller and an intense character study, The Run is equal parts brutal and fragile, as are the psyches of most men pushed beyond their limits. It's about more than physical survival, more than cold vengeance, it's about what, if anything, can survive - emotionally, mentally, morally - when everything is ripped away from you and destroyed needlessly before your eyes. 

Think Cormac McCarthy meets Wes Craven, if I may be so pretentious, or Texas Chainsaw Massacre in Oregon minus the chainsaw. I'm seeing Jeff Denton as FDL, Sarah Lieving as his wife, and perhaps Paul Logan - if we can dirty him up, think Killers-era PL - as vicious alpha male Roscoe. And this pitch comes with a finished script.

I'm just sayin'.

1st Furry Valentine Wraps Production! Details Revealed!

The Asylum's webpage is reporting that production on 1st Furry Valentine has wrapped, less than two weeks after we first heard mention of it. Gotta love that Asylum productivity. Along with the first images, available here, we also received word today that the film is in fact a children's movie, the first ever in Asylum history. So why the foray into a heretofor unexplored market for The Asylum? Who cares? It's a kids movie, from the people who brought you The 18 Year Old Virgin and When a Killer Calls; how could this be anything less than awesome?

observation notes: 6 Guns

6 Guns is the first out-and-out western by The Asylum, and as straight-to-DVD films of such a genre go, it's a success.

The story, written by Geoff Meed (Universal Soldiers, I Am Omega), concerns a family of homesteaders - Pa, Ma and two boys - whose domestic bliss is shattered by a pack of vigilantes come to enact vengeance for the death of their leader(also Geoff Meed)'s father, killed by Pa back when he was a quick-drawing lawman. Long story short, the men folk are killed and Ma is assaulted multiple times and left for dead. Big mistake.

At this point the film becomes a kind of feminist take on the Randolph Scott/Budd Boetticher revenge classic 7 Men From Now, here with Sage Mears as the wife substituting for Randolph Scott's grieving widower, seeking to enact a vengeance of her own.

(This follows an extended dance between Wifey and the bottle that at last comes to an end when she meets Bounty Hunter Extraordinaire Barry Van Dyke, who she asks to take shootin' lessons from, the training she needs for the recently-mentioned mission of vengeance. This is a pretty big plot point to be a parenthetical, I know, but this is how things got structured in my head, so here we are.)

Said training is finished just in time, fortunately enough, for the murderous vigilantes' return to town. From here there be spoilers, so let's just leave it at, the third act is the best, bringing to fruition all the lingering questions of character raised in the films 1st 2 3rds. One leaves the film fulfilled, if not a little uneasily hopeful, which I suspect was Meed's intention. Real nice resolution, and just a fine tale all around, well-executed.

Barry Van Dyke ("Diagnosis Murder," "Airwolf," "Galactica 1980") carries the film on his reserved grizzled-ness, his performance that of a calmly tortured, conflicted anti-hero of the sort westerns are supposed to have. Sage Mears is equally sweet and sour, soft and rigid, believable as both a victim and an avenger, as a woman ripped from her cocoon of happiness and hardening to the ways of a new world she finds herself navigating alone. Here's hoping this is only the first of Ms. Mears' collaborations with The Asylum.

And I can't forget the always-great Greg Evigan (100 Million B.C., Journey to the Center of the Earth), who shows up in this one as the local peacekeeper, endearingly played as amiable yet stern, a man long in his position and perhaps too comfortable as such, performing his duties with relaxed aplomb and a false sense of security.

Other standouts include, of course, screenwriter Meed as the mirthfully ruthless vigilante leader Lee Horn, a grade-A sociopath, Jude Gerard Prest (Mega Piranha) as the bartender/ whoremaster, and Shane Van Dyke (Barry's son, writer/director/star of Titanic II and the director of this here fine film as well) as a member of the vigilante pack. 6 Guns marks the third film Mr. Van Dyke the younger has directed for The Asylum, and the first time he's directed his father. The look of the film isn't typical of The Asylum, it feels a little cleaner, a little more cable-ready, a little more accessible. There's been a boom in direct-to-DVD westerns in the last three or four years, and this film feels like a wading-job by The Asylum, a test to see how warm the waters are. And like wading in murky water, it's tense fun. The script is tight, true to western themes, and cognizant of the cruelty and brutality that typified this often-glamorized era of American history. There are a few stereotypes present, but each is performed beyond that level by a confident and capable cast. The end result is a fine film, tense and thrilling, engaging and unnerving in parts, in short a quality western, roped together and hog-tied by Shane Van Dyke, who, along with his work on Titanic II has proven himself - if ever there were any doubters - as more than just a legacy; the guy's got genuine talent. Looking forward to a lot more from him, on both sides of the camera.

This one gets high marks all around. I'd love to see more films in this vein.

Clearing Up The Misperceptions

Great quick post here from someone high up at The Asylum, it's not attributed so I can't tell if it's Latt, Rimawi or Bales re-establishing The Asylum's view of itself for the clueless, kinda hateful masses who still don't get what's going on. 

I echo every one of these sentiments as a fan; what's described here is exactly the reason I love the work of The Asylum. We all have the big, important, meaningful films we want to see, but bottom line, we live in the real world - the real, taxing, draining, arduous, exhausting world - and by the time I flop down on my couch after a day's work, I don't always have the mental energy to engage or interact with a film. After all, it's the film's job to entertain me, not my job to be entertained. The Asylum shoulders this labor for me, giving me something I can put in, press play and be carried by for 80 to 90 minutes. "Art" is for students, teachers, critics and other sorts of men who can't grow proper facial hair. For the rest of us, the real us, there's media, there's culture, there's escapism; there's The Asylum.

P.S.  show a little love on the comments when you visit the link, let the guys know you care!

inmate profile: Eric Forsberg

Writer/Director Eric Forsberg has been a major productive force over at The Asylum for the last few years, with a seemingly-inexhaustible creativity that indicates he'll be churning out the hits for a while to come.

A native of Chicago, Forsberg started his writing and directing in the theater world, specifically in comedy, where one of his early successes was a noir-homage called Knatt Scatt Private Eye, starring a certain actor named Steve Carrell. This was in 1985. He also worked as an improv instructor for the famed Second City, teaching future notables such as - I shit you not - Stephen Colbert, Tim Meadows, Amy Sedaris and Rachel Dratch. So the guy knows talent, raw and honed. He's been in Hollywood going on 15 years and has carved a very comfortable - and well-deserved - spot at the big-kids table, Asylum-wise. Check his resume:

Writer or co-writer on:

Alien Abduction, Monster, Snakes on a Train, 30,000 Leagues Under the Sea, War of the Worlds 2: The Next Wave, Sex Pot and Mega Piranha.

Director of:

Alien Abduction, Sex Pot and Mega Piranha

Quickly becoming our next auteur, this inmate has a feeling Forsberg's on the verge of dropping a bomb on us, and not the bad kind, like, "wow, that movie bombed," but like, big explosions and cool fire and shit like that, you know, the "bomb." Lingo isn't a strong suit of mine. My point being, give this guy a treatment with vs. in the title, and I got a feeling the bar's going to be blown through the roof. Bar, as in a thing that's raised, not a place one drinks. Jeez.

Eric Forsberg, consider yourself saluted.

Help Mega Shark Reign Supreme!

There's a real travesty happening on the web right now, one that only we, devoted inmates of The Asylum, can remedy. Over at an ordinarily bitchin' website, SucksOrRules.com, there's a battle brewing to see who sucks and who rules between our beloved Mega Shark and that laughable freak of nature Sharktopus. 

And friends, as it stands, Sharktopus Rules. Which means...I can't even say it.

Get thee to the web page, register (it's super easy and doesn't come with a bunch of spam bullshit, just good, geeky fun) and help turn this cultural frown upside down and re-install Mega Shark to his rightful throne as most bad-ass movie shark ever.

If we don't stand up to stuff like this, who will?

1st Furry Valentine IS Princess and the Pony

So, as I kind of reported earlier, there were a couple of new title hints from The Asylum last week, one listed under their COMING SOON page as 1st Furry Valentine, and another hinted at from photos on their twitter feed listed as The Princess and the Pony. Well, thanks to this new page on The Asylum website, we now know these two titles are to be one and the same movie, slated to come out January 25 of next year. Seems our princess' 1st furry valentine is a pony owned by a shady carnival owner she meets when coming to visit American relatives. As reported earlier, 1st Furry Valentine will be written and directed by Rachel Lee Goldenberg, most recently of Sherlock Holmes. This is it for now, but next Whispers From Another Cell I'll have more on this. Until then...

observation notes: Mega Piranha

"They were created to save mankind. Something went wrong."

Something always does.

The Asylum's answer to Alexandre Aja's mega-hit Piranha 3D, released months in advance of the big-budget gore-fest, ups the ante infinitely by making the hungry little Amazonian buggers not so little at all.

The film opens with the genre-tested maxim that you can let a hot chick lead you to water, but it's only going to get you eaten, in this case by a school of enraged and rapidly-growing Venezuelan piranha. From these horny bathers the school moves on to topless party-boaters and a pair of sleazy politicians, one of whom is the ridiculously corpulent ambassador to the United States. Well, you know we don't play that shit, so cue special forces operative and The Asylum's #1 badass, Paul Logan. While he's amassing weapons of massive-piranha annihilation, former pop sensation and COMMITTED-favorite Tiffany, starring here as some sort of fish scientist, along with her team of other fish scientists - the same team, as fate would have it, whose DNA tampering is responsible for this mega-problem - is discovering the danger for themselves. Tiffany, ever the moralist, breaks protocol to alert PL to the danger and enlist his help against both the Mega Piranha and the local, typically-stubborn and lazily-tyrannical military honchos. PL, at the behest of CIA director Greg Brady, decides to trust Tiff and go rogue, and it isn't long before this decision proves fruitful: they have to admit the piranha are getting mega, getting mega all the time, and, naturally, heading for every river system in the western hemisphere.

What ensues from here is a two-way struggle for our heroes, against both the mega piranha and the egotistical lieutenant seemingly hellbent on making a bad situation worse for no reason whatsoever. It's all spoilers from here on in, so I'll back off but to say it also becomes a struggle against time, because there's no ceiling to just how mega these piranha can get; by the end of the day, they'll be the size of whales - fucking whales - with no sign of cellular stabilization in sight. Meaning they could grow to the size of what? The Queen Mary? A skyscraper? Cleveland? That's fucking Mega, folks.

As for the FX, Tiny Juggernaut once again brings home the bacon, making the piranha equally fearsome and ferocious, no matter what their size, though things get proportionally more awesome the bigger they get, especially once they start stampeding and going all kamikaze and shit on coastal communities. Writer/Director and Asylum-staple Eric Forsberg (Sex Pot, Alien Abduction) shoots this one a little differently than other Asylum films, choosing a style slightly reminiscent of Crank or Smokin' Aces with ample title cards and McG-esque color schemes and quick cuts, and even motion-tampering. The fight scenes - that is the fights between PL and the MP - are especially cool, with an extra tip of the hat to the kick-fighting scene, and there are a few death scenes a la Deep Blue Sea that nearly made me spill my SoCo and Sprite (I'm amidst a no-beer bet with my wife).

As for performances, you guys know how I feel about Tiffany. I think she's the greatest thing to happen to the genre since Roy Scheider, I honestly do, and I think she's got a lot of room to grow the more and more films of this ilk she makes (re: Necrosis, Mega Python vs. Gatoroid ((fingers x-ed))), but here, well, how to say...let's just leave it at, I knew I was watching a pop star act.

Paul Logan, on the other hand, never plays an Asylum role he wasn't built for, and here is no exception. PL commands the screen with the prowess of a young Stallone and the steely gaze of Jason Statham. Charming, aggressive and snarky, and - I know I've said it before - but he's still got the best run of anyone in The Asylum's stable.

Rounding out the cast, as mentioned, is Greg "my name is Barry Williams, dammit" Brady as the CIA director. More often than not Greg's on screen by himself talking into a Blackberry, shot beneath blue or green lights, making him more than reminiscent of Howie Mandel in Little Monsters. But I didn't disbelieve him in the role, so that's something.

All in all, Mega Piranha isn't the best film The Asylum's made that starts with "Mega," but if you look away from some stilted dialogue and wordy scientific exposition, what you end up with is a fun, frightening Saturday night, and there ain't a damn thing wrong with that.

At Last! Video Clip of The Asylum on Carson Daly!

It took a few days, but at last the video of The Asylum on Carson Daly from last Friday night has been posted, and I happily link to it here, for all to enjoy. 

After you give it a watch or three, come on back here and blow up my comments' board with what you think. Let's get a dialogue started here, people!

outside the walls: Non-Asylum Inkings

So I'll admit it, there are films not produced by The Asylum. There always have been, always will be. These glasses I wear are not rose-colored. They are clear, and occasionally smudged with fingerprints. A sampling of non-Asylum films due soon and news that might spark the interest of Asylum fans. Just remember, Sweet 'n Low ain't Sugar.

Mothman Mini-Review

I had the fortune of catching this 2010 SyFy release based on the same - albeit differently realized - legend behind The Mothman Prophecies; whereas the other film posits the being as a benevolent, if creepy and shrill, spirit who manifests itself to humans in places of and before great tragedy, such as the bridge collapse in Point Pleasant, West Virginia, in this particular film the Mothman is a spirit of vengeance, attaining justice for the very specific offense of murder gotten-away-with. The spirit is still confined to Point Pleasant, where apparently there are enough unsolved murders to satiate it.

Anywho, the film opens with 3 couples, school chums (including "Firefly" uber-hottie-next-door Jewel Staite), cavorting and drinking down by the local river. When a prank (conveniently utilizing the mothman myth) results in the accidental drowning of a young boy, the group decides, of course, not to "ruin the rest of our lives" by reporting the death, and thus cover it up by each smashing the dead boy in the head with a rock, you know, just so they're all nice and guilty. Flash forward ten years when a newspaper assignment sends journalist Jewel home again, where she is reunited with her old partners in crime just in time for the Mothman to begin enacting his vengeance.

Overall, I suppose it was a neat take on the legend - the turning of this caveat spirit into one of lethal justice - that gave an interesting spin to the hidden-groupcrime story, kind of like I Know What You Did in Mothman Country Ten Years Ago. The FX I really enjoyed; the mothman looked like a shadowy Frightener, and never came across - to me, at least - as overtly or obviously CGI. Jewel Staite just charms you even more, if that's possible.

Taken together, these elements make Mothman worth a watch, should you happen to be near SyFy when it's on, because as of yet there's no date for a DVD release. Jewel has a problem with that.


Mega-Shark-Ripoff Hauls in Major Ratings

It's true, the Roger Corman-backed SyFy original movie Sharktopus  raked in some major ratings when it premiered last Saturday night, 2.5 million viewers, to be precise. This made it a major player on cable for the week, trumping both the most recent episode of "Mad Men" on AMC and the season premiere of "Dexter," which still brought in it's highest ratings for a premiere episode to date.

What in the world does this mean? you might be asking yourself. It means people love sharks, they just fucking love them, everything about them - marveling at them, respecting them, fearing them - and why not? They're perfect, the most evolved species on the planet, and yes, I'm including us in that assessment. People love sharks, always have, always will. Too bad Sharktopus sucks. I mean it's lousy. Neat FX, sure, interesting concept, I guess, but the story, like the last Corman-shark-outing, Dinoshark was shit, and the dialogue worse. Eric Roberts is better than this, goddamnit. And if he's willing to do this tripe, I think he'd be damn proud to come over to The Asylum and make some quality creature features; there's a mega-something with his name all over it.

For those of you who tuned in and were as disappointed as I, join me in baited breath for the December 21st DVD release of Mega Shark vs. Crocosaurus. It's going to be okay.


Red: Werewolf Hunter Trailer Released

SyFy dropped their latest original trailer last weeks for the upcoming Red: Werewolf Hunter, starring Felicia Day ("Buffy...," "Dr. Horrible...," "The Guild," ahem). The film, best I can tell, revolves around Felicia("Red")'s family, secret werewolf hunters and the combination of revealing themselves to the world through Felicia's boyfriend and some new kind of werwolf that threatens all they know. Check out the trailer here, then tune in to SyFy, Saturday night, October 30th, to see how it all goes down.

Thanks For 2,000 Hits!

As of 5 a.m. PST today, COMMITTED logged its 2,000th hit since going live on August 27 of this year. Not to get mushy or blow this out of proportion, I just wanted to say thanks for everybody that's been coming by. I've been having a lot of fun doing this, and it's nice to know I'm not doing it in a vacuum. Thanks also to The Asylum, who as of this point has yet to serve me with a cease and desist order, so, you know, that's good too.

It's going to be a big fall for The Asylum, four more films are slated to come out before the end of the year, including Mega Shark vs. Crocosaurus, which, if my finger on the cultural pulse is correct, should be the biggest Asylum picture to date, so rest assured if you like what I've been doing, you'll love what's coming up. Conversely, if you loathe what I've been doing, perhaps some new additions might change your mind.

Either way, we've only just begun, my fellow inmates, and thanks again for making this blog more than just an nutty fan's self-serving forum. You guys rock.

observation notes: King of the Lost World

This is where the distinction between "tie-in" and "mockbuster," I believe, is the most vivid. King of the Lost World is of course meant to draft attention from fans of King Kong, but instead of making a rote reinvention, The Asylum has here - as they did with Princess of Mars, the Avatar tie-in and The Land That Time Forgot, a Land of the Lost tie-in - returned to the source material, of sorts. King Kong is not based on a book, but there are tales it was suggested by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's novel "The Lost World," which also inspired "Jurassic Park" and Jurassic Park (and the sequel to the latter, of course; it's subtitled The Lost World.) It also feels as if The Asylum, when putting a modern touch on the storyline, was inspired by a certain television show that premiered just the year before. See how many words you get into the following sentence before you figure out what show I'm referring to; if it takes more than four, you're blocked for ten minutes: when a plane crashes on a strange island, survivors are left with a struggle for life that's going to take more than mere survival.

The survivors - a collection of Asylum all-stars including Bruce Boxleitner (Legion of the Dead, "Babylon 5"), Jeff Denton (The Beast of Bray Road, Pirates of Treasure Island), Rhett Giles (Frankenstein Reborn, Dracula's Curse), Andrew Lauer (Jane White is Sick & Twisted, War of the Worlds) and Sarah Lieving (pick any Asylum movie; 70-80% of the time she'll be in it) - make the inevitable decision to leave the beach in search of other survivors and the airplane's black box, not realizing they're entering a monstrous menagerie of Vernesian proportions: animals, insects, plants - you name it, it's out to get you on this island. So, predictably, things go south real quick.

First the toga-ed, juggalo-ed natives appear. Then the survivors come across a footprint the size of a fucking starter home. I don't know how other people travel, but me, if I come across something like that, a footprint I could park my car in, I go back the fuck where I came from. But instead of retreating to the beach and visibility from the air, our survivors decide to test that designation by tromping further into the obviously foreboding jungle. Along the way they find a downed plane with working missiles - lucky break, that - and a deranged Steve Railsback (Helter Skelter, The Stunt Man, Intermedio). The rest I'll let you unravel for yourself - say no to spoilers - but needless to say, creatures, fire and sweat-stained tank-tops abound. There's even a gratuitous breast scene that turns kinda lesbian, followed promptly by mild jungle torture, creature violence and revelations. And the monkey, the king of the lost world, I'll say just two things: it's really, really fucking big, really; and it makes a laaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaate appearance in the film.

Bottom line, I found the film to be enthralling, original and character driven instead of FX-heavy, though the FX present are effective. They're not Peter-Jackson FX, but aside from that monkey-T. Rex brawl, who the fuck cared? Bruce Boxleitner is viciously stoic as the passenger with a secret, and a gun, while Steve Railsback is rightfully ornery and emaciated, a convincing castaway madman, spouting "Lost" season one theories that the island is their Hell. Sarah Lieving and Jeff Denton are lovers once again as they were in The Beast of Bray Road, the former her typically hyper-motivated, fiercely-independent self, strong and brash, but still able to break just like a little girl, and the latter furrowedly concerned and quietly relentless.

Brought to you by the same writing triumvirate of Pirates of Treasure Island, and directed, as was that film, by Leigh Scott, the Peter Jackson of The Asylum, King of the Lost world is B-movie gold, and a goddamn good time.

Creature Feature: MEGA SHARK

New Column Alert! 


See, here at COMMITTED I'm waging a constant battle between my enthusiasm for Asylum films and the finite number of said films that have been made. To date, The Asylum has produced roughly 70 films, and whereas they're one of the most, if not the most, prolific studios in Hollywood, putting out a good ten or dozen a year, problem is I've already covered at least a third of these in posts or posts-in-waiting. So I gotta find other stuff to do besides just reviews, otherwise I'm going to enthusiastically write myself out of work.

Therefore I present to you COMMITTED's first Creature Feature, essentially the same thing as an Inmate Profile, but for the fact that the inmates profiled here are not human but, well, creatures. And what better creature to start things off with, what more iconic and emblematic illustration of the fine work by the fine folks at The Asylum than their greatest, most famous creation - the Mega Shark.

In his first outing for The Asylum, MS took on a merely giant octopus - in-between wreaking massive havoc on aircraft carriers, span bridges, etc. - and made a quick calamari (i know calamari is squid) of him (this is a spoiler, true, but only after the mega-spoiler of, you know, a sequel that isn't called Giant Octopus vs. Crocosaurus) - after all, what hope are tentacles against rows upon rows of razor-sharp teeth?


Let's consider the stats, culled from a combination of sources including the film itself, the venerable Wikipedia and this neat-o graphic I've posted before courtesy of Stephen Taubman (the infographics this guy creates are fucking awesome. i want to wallpaper my creepy basement with them and just geek the fuck out.): the mega shark is purported to be twice the size of the ancient megalodon, a.k.a. the biggest shark ever known. The megalodon typically came in at approximately 19 - 20 meters, or 62 - 65 feet, which would make - utilizing the breadth of my mathematical skills - our boy approximately 38 - 40 meters long, or roughly 120 -130 feet. Some other things that are roughly 120 -130 feet long: cell phone towers, thirteen-story buildings (if you can find one that will admit it), and the distance between home plate and second base on professional regulation baseball diamonds. As for weight, the megalodon tipped the scales at 100 - 120 tons, or 200,000 - 240,000 pounds. That would set MS at nearly half a million pounds, 400,000 - 480,000. Some other things totaling such a mass: 50 full-grown male African elephants, a blue whale and one calf, and 833 Andre the Giants at the time of Wrestlemania 3.

Essentially what we're dealing with here is a massive fucking eating machine capable of launching itself more than a mile into the air to take down a fully-loaded passenger jet. So suck on that, Jaws. Until they actually make a "MEG" movie (i am not counting this junk), you can forget the genetically-modified fare of Deep Blue Sea or Sharktopus, Mega Shark is the baddest thing in the water. Recognize.                                                             

But not all predators live (exclusively) in the water: on December 21, 2010, in DVD stores and cues everywhere, Mega Shark vs. Crocosaurus drops hard. I foresee a tougher battle for MS this go-round; the croc may have less gripping appendages, but he's got more teeth, and that vicious tail, and he can escape onto land. If he was only a supercroc, I'd say this one was in the bag, but this is a crocosaurus, implying some age and evolution to him, which always equates to primal viciousness.

For the moment, however, this marvel of biology and animation (thanks, Tiny Juggernaut!) is the king of the hill when it comes to Asylum creatures, the one to topple if you want the crown. Crocosaurus is taking his shot this Christmas. Other suckers can feel free to take a number, because, one more time, can a Crocosaurus do this?

            
Doubt it. (but i fucking hope so).