The B-Movie Shelf

A young family finds themselves in the Australian Outback, being hunted by a gigantic bloodthirsty wild pig. REVIEW: Creature Features have always been my favorite type of B-Movie, so I always try to make a point of watching new ones when they come out. Boar is, quite honestly, nothing too special if you watch a lot of these types of movies, as it doesn't really do anything different or unique. However, sometimes I'm not looking for something different, sometimes something familiar is exactly what I need. Plus with all the killer shark, snake, spider, crocodile/alligator movies that make up 90% of the creature feature market, the fact that its a gigantic killer boar is enough of a visual change-up from the norm for me to make me fine with the fact that everything else about it feels so familiar. The Boar itself is almost always done with a practical animatronic as well, which looked fantastic and creepy as hell, even if its movements looked a bit too rob...

A team of young eco-terrorists set out to reveal the secrets of an area removed from modern day maps and hidden behind electric fences. However, once they reach the center of the lake, they discover an island that harbors an abandoned facility with a horrific legacy: the island is home to a deadly predator eager to feast on those dumb enough to ignore the warnings. REVIEW: Lake Placid: Legacy is the latest in a long line of SyFy Channel-made TV sequels to the original 1999 creature feature Lake Placid. Luckily I love SyFy-made movies, and their Lake Placid sequels are pretty much my top favorite things they've made, so while I understand that a lot of people may not like the low budget direction the series ultimately went in, I love that shit. This latest entry in the franchise however, is quite different from their other Lake Placid sequels, on many fronts. To start, it has nothing at all to do with any of the other SyFy Lake Placid sequels. This entry comp...

Fin has to go back in time to rejoin his shark-battling friends to save the future by stopping the random Sharknados that are mysteriously popping up at major historical events throughout history. REVIEW: After five movies in five years , and a massively surprising pop culture phenomenon, it all comes down to this one last movie by The Asylum and the SyFy Channel, The Last Sharknado: It's About Time. Much of my issues with Sharknado 6 are actually pretty much the same issues I had with Sharknado 5: Global Swarming - Most of the jokes I didn't find funny, the plot is all over the place, they throw way too much random stuff into the script just to see what sticks and most of it doesn't, the special effects (which, to be fair, have never been good to begin with) are pretty much the worst they've been in the entire franchise, and it just moves from pretty much one random action scene directly into the next with very little (or none at all, in some cases) d...

After suspecting that their police officer neighbor is a serial killer, a group of teenage friends spend their summer spying on him and gathering evidence, but as they get closer to discovering the truth, things get dangerous REVIEW: Summer of 84 is the new blast of 80s nostalgia from the creators of Turbo Kid, one of the best movies of 2015 and equally filled with 1980s nostalgia, although done in a much different way. This time around it's a much more grounded thriller, about a group of teen friends in 1984 that think their cop neighbor is responsible for a string of teen murders in town, so they secretly investigate him, in ways that only teens from the 1980s can, to get to the bottom of the mystery. This movie is filled with that exact same Stranger Things/1980s type throwback tone, complete with a synth score. I know a lot of people are taking issue with this movie using so much nostalgia, but that's kind of the entire point of this movie, just like it...

All hell breaks loose when a strange force animates the puppets up for auction at a convention for a series of infamous murders, setting them on a bloody killing spree that's motivated by an evil as old as time. REVIEW: Puppet Master: The Littlest Reich is the latest in a very long long long line of Puppet Master movies, a series that has pretty much Full Moon Entertainment's bread and butter ever since the 80s. For me personally though, I haven't enjoyed a single Puppet Master movie since about the 5th or 6th one back in the mid 90s. Every single one from Retro Puppet Master onwards I've pretty much hated, so initially I had no interest in this project. But then word came that it was being made by different people, and that it would be a fresh reboot unconnected to the larger series. Usually that would be stuff I hate to hear, but in this case it made me glad. Then reviews started coming in that it was actually not only good, but god damn fantastic. ...

Even though I reviewed the very first Sharknado movie way back when it first came out, I never reviewed any of the others on here. And even though Guest Reviewer Michael Banno sent in his review for Part 2 , there's never been any reviews for any of the other movies on here in any capacity since then. Seeing as how the 6th (!!!) and final movie airs on TV on the SyFy Channel (Space, here in Canada) tomorrow night, I figured this was a great time to put up a few of my quick thoughts on each and every movie in the franchise up to this point, and just collect them all together in one big post. When a freak hurricane swamps Los Angeles, nature's deadliest killer rules sea, land, and air as thousands of sharks terrorize the waterlogged populace.  REVIEW: This very first Sharknado is the one that started it all. I have to admit, even as a long-time fan of these types of movies, I never expected this to catch on the way it did with mainstream audiences and become the pop c...

After an alien spacecraft destroys Washington, D.C., the residents of a small town must fight off a unit of alien soldiers on the hunt for the President of the United States and the mysterious device he's carrying after his escape chopper crash lands nearby. REVIEW: Alien Siege is the first 2018 Asylum-released movie that I haven’t really liked. The acting is about average for an Asylum production, with some actors doing better than others but nobody really being painfully bad like in some Asylum productions, and the CG special effects for the alien spaceships look fantastic by their standards, and the directing itself is serviceable for this type of low budget fare. Unfortunately, that's where the things I enjoy end. Even though the acting was serviceable, the characters themselves are written to be so incredibly flat and boring that it makes it difficult to follow them for the movie's runtime and actually care about anything that's happening to t...

In 1983, financially struggling college student Samantha Hughes takes a strange babysitting job that coincides with a full lunar eclipse. She slowly realizes her clients harbor a terrifying secret, putting her life in mortal danger.  REVIEW: The House of the Devil, brought to us by horror director Ti West back in 2009, is a very well-done and faithful throwback to the 1970's/1980's devil-cult horror movies of old, which any diehard fan of the horror genre should appreciate. It’s very well-acted, makes excellent use of building the uneasy tension throughout, and it culminates into nail-biting terror in the final half hour when the shit truly hits the fan. My only lone semi-complaint is that this movie does indeed move at a snail's pace and not a whole lot really happens, story-wise, until that final half hour. Personally, that didn't bother me too much, because I really appreciated how it used that time to make us acquainted with the main characte...

Alexandra reluctantly tags along for Slasher Sleepout, an extreme event that is part camping trip, part haunted house, and part escape room. But when the fun turns deadly, Alex has to play the game if she wants to make it out alive. REVIEW: Ruin Me is the latest Shudder Exclusive to go up on the streaming service, and it's strangely below their usual standards. This one feels more like a SyFy Original or an Uncork'd Entertainment movie. It's more of a 'Horror-Lite' type movie, made for people just starting out in the genre as opposed to hardcore horror veterans that the streaming service is aimed at. The plot is certainly interesting enough, and quite similar to another movie that came out over the last couple years, Fear Inc, where the characters don't know what's actually part of this immersive horror-themed game and what's real (if any of it), and the acting is surprisingly good from most of the actors, considering everything else...

Former Sergeant Barnes becomes head of security for Senator Charlie Roan, a Presidential candidate targeted for death on the annual Purge night due to her vow to eliminate the Purge.  REVIEW: After the claustrophobic home invasion first Purge movie and the fantastic world-building insane sequel , The Purge: Election Year is unfortunately my least favorite in the series. I still enjoyed it, but it's the one I can see myself rewatching the least. It's pretty much just the exact same movie as the second one, with a lot of the same types of characters and even subplots to it, just with a political spin added into the mix. What I loved most about the first movie going into the second is that each of those had a different feel and tone to them, making each one feel unique from each other, where-as this just feels like The Purge: Anarchy, Part 2. Granted, the new masks are still creepy, the death scenes still quite fun and inventive, and the political...

Three groups of people intertwine and are left stranded in the streets on the annual Purge Night, trying to survive the chaos and violence that occurs during the deadly 12-hour period. REVIEW: After the claustrophobic, personal, home invasion first Purge movie , the sequel, The Purge: Anarchy, opens up to show us the world at large during the annual Purge, having us follow multiple groups of people that get stuck out in the thick of it, in the streets, during Purge night and must team up and work together to get to safety and survive the night. And holy Jesus Christ, this movie is insane . This is the movie most people wanted the first one to be, and while I was perfectly fine with the smaller home invasion aspect of the first movie to start out, I'm glad we got this much bigger, much more insane, world building story for the sequel. Everything about this is just crazy and wild, and you'll find yourself saying 'Holy Shit.... ' multiple t...

A wealthy family are held hostage inside their own home for harboring the target of a murderous syndicate during the Purge, a 12-hour period, once a year, in which any and all crime is legal. REVIEW: I know a lot of people hate the first movie in The Purge series, but personally I really love it. It's an original horror movie (which is rare these days), a nd even though it's *just* a home invasion type flick, which I know is why most people don't like it, I love home invasion type flicks so that aspect didn't bother me at all. Plus it's a home invasion type flick with a fresh and unique background to the story, that being the entire idea of the Purge itself. The movie also had a great sense of atmosphere about it, and the director did a great job with mixing that atmosphere with tension as the movie went on. I know I definitely jumped a couple times throughout, and that's rare these days. Sure, th...

As Abraham Lincoln labors over the Gettysburg address, the importance of which he is fully aware, he learns that a menace from his past has returned, threatening to tear the already fractured nation to pieces. He must journey behind enemy lines to face an foe far more fearsome than the Confederate army: the walking dead. REVIEW: The Asylum is normally a pretty solid source of fun, campy, entertaining low budget B-Movies and Mockbusters (low budget rip-offs of big budget theatrical movies), to the point where they're actually my favorite low budget company, and Abraham Lincoln vs Zombies, their obvious mockbuster on the much-more popular Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter, is no exception. Actually, if anything, this was one of Asylum's best efforts at the time of release in 2012; It has great gore, exciting well-shot action scenes, realistic-looking set pieces and locations for the time period it was set in, above-average acting by their standards, catchy mus...

"Found Footage" of a lost military expedition to the jungle that spends several days under attack by an unknown extraterrestrial force, eventually coming to a discovery that exposes the shocking origins of life on earth. REVIEW: As far as Found Footage movies by The Asylum goes, Alien Origin from 2012 is probably their best one, although it’s still far from perfect. This one is surprisingly well-acted, and where almost every other Asylum-made Found Footage movie takes place in a single house or building, this one is wide open with quite a large scope spanning a town/military base, jungles, cave systems, half-crumbled Mayan temples, and more. I really loved the visual variety to the set pieces. I also really enjoyed the uneasy creepy feeling and tension they portrayed quite well whenever there was a quick glimpse of the UFO, or when they find the skeletal remains of an alien in the caves. My one big complaint though, and it does bring the score down for me...

Rehaan and Shaina are newly married and Rehaan gets a job offer in Romania, After moving and while on a business trip, Rehan receives a frantic call from Shaina requesting help as she is trapped in telephone booth in a rural area where she had gone to seek help on paranormal activities happening around her. Shaina and Rehaan take the help of a local Priest but he can't help them much as the evil spirit is just too powerful. REVIEW: Raaz Reboot is the fourth entry in a long-running Bollywood horror franchise, of which I've reviewed the first three already here , here , and here . Although why they call it a 'reboot' instead of just Part 4 I have no idea, since this entire series is more like an anthology - each movie is totally stand-alone and has nothing at all to do with one another other than a couple of actors returning to play new roles, so every entry is technically a ‘reboot’. This newest one is, unfortunately, the low point of the series. The s...