Screenhead

So today I’ve come in contact with one of the first ever examples of Screamkings online videomaking–the question is, is their short title For Indoor Use Only any good?  Let’s watch!

A young man, working with some Christmas lights, curses the holiday in a moment of frustration.  And when that happens, Christmas decides to take its revenge.

Admittedly, Christmas horror is in fairly short supply.  But this particular example is kind of sparse.  Sparse like the needles on Charlie Brown’s tree.  Oh, sure, what’s here is done fairly well, but it’s not very satisfying.  It’s almost like the Christmas mashed potatoes, or shaped sugar cookies without frosting.  Far from the best, but not necessarily offensive.

The Screenhead Ten Scale shrugs in the general direction of this lackluster title and awards it a five out of ten.  While there isn’t anything really wrong with it, it lacks the necessary force to be called good.  The best you can say about it is that it’s merely mediocre.

I’ve sampled horror flicks from all around the world, and I’ve found that most of them have a pretty regional flavor to them.  The Japanese and Koreans, for example, love ghost flicks.  The Europeans favor the theme of man’s inhumanity to man.  And most horror I’ve come across from other lands is at least fairly good.  Joining the ranks of the best, however, is a little title from Poland, The 206.

It’s about a guy who wakes up in a stairwell, semi-conscious, unable to figure out what’s going on.  As he sets out to reconstruct his life, he finds out there more going on here than he realizes.

The best part about this one?  There’s NO DIALOGUE.  The story is being told entirely through the actor and through the background music, both of which are quite thoroughly awesome.  The ending, however, is somewhat unclear and can be interpreted several ways, something I never like.

However, the rest of the film is enough to wrangle a rare eight out of ten from the Screenhead Ten Scale, who was sufficiently on edge through most of it to appreciate its sheer Hitchcockian tendencies.

As it turns out, there are a LOT of Saw parodies. I really didn’t see this coming, but a basic search for “Saw Parody” on YouTube turns up a whole lot of pieces.  Some of them I knew about, like Mad TV’s version.

But then there are those like Jigsaw’s Crib, today’s short film target, that just came out of nowhere.

Jigsaw’s Crib is a bizarre combination parody of Saw and MTV’s Cribs.  And as entertaining as that idea would be if it were played straight, the problem is in this case it’s played with absolutely NO CONNECTION to the Saw series.  I figured maybe they’d take us around that warehouse we saw in Saw III, or at least some facsimile thereof, but no.  No, we wandered around some kid’s house while he walked around doing three important things.

1. Talking like a rapper.

2. Being drowned out by the “background” music

3. Doing that ridiculous “air jerk” thing.

No, this was a good idea, and probably would have been hilarious if it were done right, as opposed to being mostly a badly cast episode of Cribs, complete with ludicrously oversized “joint”.  Because as we all know, Little Billy was a serious pothead.

No, he wasn’t. He was a PUPPET. And if these putzes had actually watched one of the Saw films, they might have realized that.

Wildly out of line, with only a minimal contact with the Saw films by virtue of Little Billy and a brief mention of Dr. Gordon, Jigsaw’s Crib is just like its MTV parent–a sad, sorry, sloppy mess.

The Screenhead Ten Scale shakes its head in disgust and hands Jigsaw’s Crib a two out of ten for barely having a clue what it was talking about.  This was a good idea that went horribly, horribly wrong.

Funny, hot shot and whippersnapper, director and producer Judd Apatow (The 40 Year-Old Virgin, Knocked Up) will be making a special visit to the Funny or Die writers’ room to answer fan-submitted questions on his latest film Funny People via a special live event on www.funnyordie.com on Wednesday, Nov 18 from 12:30 – 1:00 PM PT (3:30 -4:00 PM ET).

Funny People takes audiences on a hilarious and revealing look at the world of stand-up comedy with the story of George Simmons, a famous comedian who is given a second chance at life.

Funny Peopleis coming to two-disc Blu-Ray, two-disc Collector’s Edition DVD, single-disc DVD and digital download on November 24, 2009 from Universal Studios Home Entertainment. 

Apatow will answer pre-submitted questions from Funny or Die’s Facebook page (facebook.com/funnyordie) and live questions from Funny or Die’s Twitter account (twitter.com/funnyordie). Fans watching the special live event will also get to see sneak peeks of the Funny People2-disc Collector’s Edition Blu-ray and DVD releasing November 24, which will feature exclusive clips and behind-the-scenes footage.

It’s probably about time we got a few more amateur Saw parodies.  The franchise is indeed rife with possibilities, and today, we tackle Saw XIV, or, The One Where Saw Constantly Screws Up.

The title basically gives away the premise and the plot–Jigsaw’s death traps (now Hoffman’s death traps) have always been mechanically complex wonders of amateur engineering.  But what would happen if those darn death traps just wouldn’t work right?

They’ve got a really good point, actually.  All this stuff is incredibly complex–I mean, just one slipped gear or misfired sparkplug and the next thing you know, blammo! No death trap.

And the best part is, this is actually really funny.  Though as it turns out, it’s not alone.  Just because I hadn’t heard of them before, apparently there are a LOT of Saw parodies out there.

The downside here is that the movie was made clearly by people who either didn’t see the Saw series or didn’t watch much of it, as they’re continually referring to Jigsaw as “Saw”, not to mention dressing him up like Little Billy, when we really should be seeing either Jigsaw himself or the “replacement” Jigsaw that is Detective Hoffman.

Anyway, the Screenhead Ten Scale just wiped away a tear of hilarious laughter and hands Saw XIV a seven out of ten. Admittedly, it’s low budget, and they clearly only have a loose idea of what they’re parodying, but the comedy more than makes up for the lack of effects work.

John Calley was too ill to attend the ceremony. Steven Spielberg accepted the Oscar for Calley.

Roger Corman, Lauren Bacall and Gordon Willis and John Calley were awarded Oscars this weekend at a special presentation at Hollywood & Highland Center called Governors’ Awards. The affair was a nostalgic celebration with attendees referring to the good old days when Oscars were handed out in such casual affairs without time limits, where recipients’ acceptance speeches were not based on a two-minute stopwatch.  Although the ceremony was not televised, highlights of the toasts and acceptance speeches are available at the Academy’s website. 

I highly recommend visiting the site and taking the time to view each clip. It’s truly a celebrated time where each recipient deserves recognition from their esteemed colleagues.

The one thing I really love about short films is their openness.  Anybody can come along and shoot one of these on a shoestring in their backyard.  And today, we’re going to prove that exactly right with Dearest Mrs. Apple.

This is the story of a man, his unusual friendship, and the circumstances that led to its end.  I know, sounds kind of like some cheesy chick flick or something, but I assure you, someone will get eaten by the end of this.

Yeah. EATEN.

Dearest Mrs. Apple is actually pretty funny because of its ludicrous nature and its outlandish concept.  This is almost too stupid to be believed, but it will carry on anyway, despite the fact that it really has no business existing.

The Screenhead Ten Scale loves a quick cheap laugh, and thus hands Dearest Mrs. Apple a six out of ten for bringing the funny in short film.

So I found another interesting short on YouTube to take a run at, and it’s the hardest sort of film to discuss–the movie that’s so confusing that it’s downright scary.

It’s actually hard to give you a plot synopsis without spoilering, mostly because this film is only about two and a half minutes long.  But suffice it to say, anyone with a fear of clowns need not apply.  And anyone who’s not fond of unusual dinner choices should also stay waaaaaay far away from this.

It’s pretty awesome, in one sense–a lot of really creepy stuff is going to happen here, but the only real problem with it is that not much of it will make sense.  It’s pretty scary in that regard, because nothing here will exactly be expected, but at the same time, it’s SO far off kilter that it’s kind of tough to follow, and any coherence in the plot is just SHOT.

The Screenhead Ten Scale gives a quizzical look at the whole thing, shrugs, gives a hearty meh and hands A Kid At Heart a six out of ten.  It’s scary, sure, but it’s also really, REALLY, confusing.

There’s always something interesting to watch on YouTube–all you have to do is find it.  And today, I’m going to try to help you in that regard by offering up a new review target: the short film Murderers Don’t Ring Doorbells.

It features a young man walking home from a football game (or at least I think that’s the case, they weren’t very clear on that point) when suddenly he’s beset upon by a guy in a Michael Myers mask.  Yes, I know it’s a William Shatner mask, but let’s face it, Michael made it his own.

Anyway, the rest of the night for our young man will involve, mostly, running from killers.

I have to admit, I laughed at more than one point in here, but the whole thing suffers from unclear scripting and a huge muddle in every direction.  I barely understood what was going on half the time because it just plain old wasn’t very clear what they were trying to do.

The Screenhead Ten Scale, meanwhile, rewards effort and a few good laughs by issuing this unclear slush of a short film a four out of ten.  The next one will, hopefully, prove better.

I’m always pretty excited to talk about short films, especially all the short horror you see running around online.  You never know what you’re going to get when you tear into one of these little pieces of short film–it’s like nonstop Christmas.

So today we’re looking at Life Cycle, and it’s one movie that’s probably better called How The Zombie Apocalypse Might Begin.

Basically, some guy’s out walking on an empty stretch of beach when he finds a corpse that washes up.  But this corpse has a lot more life in him than anyone saw coming….

It’s always kind of interesting to consider how a zombie apocalypse might look in its very earliest stages, so this one definitely qualifies as interesting.  Of course, it being a short film, it’s over LONG before anything actually happens, so it’s not like we’re going to get a whole lot of entertainment out of it.

The Screenhead Ten Scale hands this interesting, well put together, but ultimately disappointing zombie title a six out of ten for doing what it could with what it had to work with well inside its rather sizable limits.