Last House On The Left (1972)

Wes Cravan's notorious banned 'nasty' sees its first uncut UK release by Metrodome. I have seen many versions of this film over the years and unfortunately its been cut and messed about with over its history meaning it's hard to say what I've seen or havn't seen. Im sure however I've seen a European version that has longer scenes in, but that's debatable. The story is a simple but effective tale of two teenagers who go to the city for a rock concert. Trying to score some grass they stumble into Krug (David Hess) and his criminal gang. The girls are kidnapped and suffer a humiliating ordeal before being exicuted in the woods. The story then shifts to examine how the peaceful parents of one of the teens can turn into ruthless killers just like Krug and friends. Being such a notorious genre piece my first thought is does it hold up now? The answer is yes. The film clearly shows the ugly side to the tranquil all American dream of the era, but even now has some geninely nasty and uncomfortable moments in it. Sandra Cassell's acting really packs a punch and is one of the key ingredients to this still holding up (David Hess and Fred Lincoln are great too). Iconic, groundbreaking and still worth a watch.
6/10

The Octagon (1980)

Chuck Norris plays the lead as a disillusioned martial arts specialist who is forced to put an end to a terroist ninja training camp who is being run by his evil half brother; Seikura, who Chuck seems to have some telepathic connection with. Unnesasary dialogue and plot makes the film drag to the point where it becomes like a strange cinematic opiate. Watching this late at night resulted in it taking 5 sittings! However, the combination of ninjas, Chucks painful wooden acting, bad script, shonky editing, A Team-esque scoring, all on a murky VHS like print makes it thoroughly enjoyable. The original poster art looks amazing and no doubt sold the film to a lot of martial arts fans... Who in true 80s style were probably a bit disapointed!
4.5/10

Drag Me To Hell (2009)

Directed by the legendary Sam Raimi, the film tells a moral heavy tale of a bank worker who refuses an old woman a loan and then suffers from a supernatural curse that tries pushing her to the edge of sanity. Back to the old school with Raimi's slapstick humour and gore, this plays out like a rollercoaster. Full of fun and thrills and never taking itself to seriously its a great watch.
7/10