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My movie year (so far)

1) Khoht phetchakhaat, aka The Brutal River (2005 - Thailand), directed by Anat Yuangngern. You'd think after The Python I would have learned my lesson about jungle-oriented giant animal movies from places with real jungles, but I couldn't resist this giga-gator story-- until, that is, I started to watch it. The absence of subtitles was actually a plus, but I still realized in less than five minutes that it was a typical Asian love story movie with a big critter in it. So I just sped through to the end, going in for the literal kill. And it was pretty funny: the jilted boyfriend saves his best friend (the new boyfriend) by jumping into the river with a hand grenade and throwing himself in the path of the zooming gator. Not since the exploding whale has there been such a mess o' meat-chunks. No available DVD in the U.S. (no loss), but the website is nice-looking, and takes a lot less time than the film.

2) Cani arrabbiati, aka Rabid Dogs (1974 - Italy), directed by Mario Bava. After a career of filming beautiful, otherworldly stories and landscapes, Bava took his camera inside a car and made perhaps his scariest movie. "Killers with hostages" is all the plot you need, or should have, because the tricks and thrills in the film are genuinely surprising. And George Eastman, the giant in the back seat, is a true nightmare, one of the most frightening bad guys ever. (His character's name is "Thirty-Two," as in centimeters, as in 12 inches-- we learn this in a near-rape scene.) Perfect thriller with a perfect title. (By the way, ever see a rabid dog? Yow!)

3) Yeelen, aka Brightness (1987 - Mali/Burkina Faso/France/ West Germany), directed by Souleymane Cisse. I give most movies 30 minutes-- if I'm not interested by then, I give up, usually with no hard feelings. (Like you, I can spot a true POS in no time, and I bail out of those within minutes.) Half-an-hour into this lovely but slow fantasy about a duel between father and son sorcerers, I was debating whether to keep going, when a horrible alcoholic I know showed up unexpectedly at my door and made up my mind for me. By the time I kicked the drunken idiot out, the mood was broken. Ah, the perils of watching movies at home.

Posted by Steve Monaco at April 28, 2006 10:19 PM

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