(2000)
Dir - Karmin Hussain
Overall: WOOF
It is thankfully rare that you come across a film so abysmally terrible that it belongs in its own hall of fame of awful. Subconscious Cruelty is just such a film. Karmin Hussain would go on to be the cinematographer on other junk such as We Are Still Here and to date has thankfully only directed one other movie besides this. Closely resembling E. Elias Merhige's jaw-droppingly horrible Begotten more than anything else, Cruelty bludgeons the senses with unwatchable grotesqueness that goes far beyond just being pointless in every possible way, but becomes absolutely laughable as an "art film". This is one of those avant-garde student movies that thinks it is being profound by showing genital mutilation, naked bodies riving around in ecstasy and pain, and even a guy dressed as Jesus having bloody and naked things done to him. The first segment which goes on for a torturous forty minutes involves a lunatic who spouts some of the most embarrassing "dark" dialog you will ever here, then we see a bunch of naked people eating dirt and performing fellatio on knives, then a guy jerks off and plays with his semen, (which also happens earlier), and fantasizes about getting his bloody wang jerked off and his body parts fed to other naked people. Pretentious nonsense of the worst kind.
(2006)
Dir - David Moreau/Xavier Palud
Overall: MEH
A prime example of the hoodie horror movement, (which is one of the sillier ones when you actually type it out), the French-Belgium Them, (Ils), strips everything down to an utterly elementary premise and execution, neither of which is all that bad. With basically one main location and a two person cast, the movie does as much as it can with its minimal ingredients and also thankfully keeps its running time quite brisk at a mere seventy-four minutes. The use of boo scares and very predictable set ups are liberal though and once the reveal as to what is happening is given to us, instead of it being more creepy, it actually is rather a let down. This may be due to overkill as the home invasion/cat and mouse style of horror has been very long played-out. Yet even when it is competently done as so here, one's mind can far too easily dance with the fantasy of something more supernatural or otherworldly occurring as opposed to just a bunch of bored kids who "just want to play". Some may find the complete opposite to be the case and to each their own, but Them is a little too generic and underwhelming despite it also being admittingly well made.
(2007)
Dir - Greg McLean
Overall: MEH
Australian filmmaker Greg McLean is a bit uneven with the terribly overrated, (and terrible), Wolf Creek franchise under his belt as well as the much better yet still pedestrian killer croc movie Rogue. Switching from the vast outback of Creek to the Australian jungle wilderness which is both beautiful and frightening, McLean goes relatively easy on the gore and focuses his efforts on tension as the viewer waits with bated breath for the giant killer animal to chomp up as many helpless people as it can. To point out anything particularly unique about Rogue compared to so many other nature horror movies is not really possible as its efficiently generic if not altogether lame. There is quite a long build up before the hear-racing stuff happens, which might make some of the audience go reaching for their phones in boredom. CGI wise, it is typically unconvincing and sad to say, stupid movie logic permeates where main, likeable characters who still need to have a humorous quip at the end miraculously survive when all possible logic would dictate that they would not. So most of the complains here can be aimed at the movie playing it very safe while being crowd pleasing all the same. So long as you are not looking for anything wheel inventing then, it will suffice.
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