Fuck Your TPS Reports!: When Office Politics Turn Deadly
254. The Belko Experiment (2016)
255. Netherbeast Incorporated (2007)
256. Mayhem (2017)
It makes sense we’d have horror in the workplace. People get under stress trying to meet a deadline and they just snap. Most people spend more time around their co-workers than their family. So it stands to reason that if you are forced into social situations on a regular basis with somebody you actively don’t like, things will reach a boiling point. If anything, why aren’t there more of these?
The Belko Experiment, written by James Gunn, find a group of office drones suddenly thrown off their routine when they are greeted by armed guards while arriving at work that day. When an announcement over the intercom system declares that two people must die in two hours or even more will face severe repercussions, they are understandably confused but write it off as a prank. When the time’s up and multiple people’s heads explode, they decide to take it more seriously. As the death count starts to escalate, management decides to take charge in the most heartless way possible. This one is fine, playing out like Battle Royale in an office complex. It’s pretty predictable as to what will happen to who and what’s really going on (we’ve seen actual social experiments like this with the famous Stanford Prison Experiment for instance which has been adapted to film multiple times itself), so your enjoyment of it will just depend on how much you like the murder spree. I felt like it didn’t quite nail the tone either. Most of the film is deadly serious but the script occasionally injects jokes that feel out of place with the grim parade of death we see otherwise.
Netherbeast Incorporated on the other hand, dives in head first into the comedy side of the pool. Basically a group of ‘not-vampires’ referred to as Nether-folk (they have a heart defect that requires them to drink blood and eat human flesh but otherwise are pretty normal, friendly people) have over the years adapted to their situation by building a company entirely run by their kind where they can live in peace without causing waves. All of this is helpfully narrated up front by our protagonist Otto, played by Steve Burns (or as you may know him Steve from Blue’s Clues). Unfortunately, their kind also seems to succumb to a kind of brain rot disease that makes them forget who they are, which has started happening to the head of the company (played pretty hilariously at times by Darrell Hammond) who brings in an outside consultant (played by Judd Nelson) to interview the staff as he begins to suspect they are being infiltrated by vampires. The cast also includes David Foley (in his second funny role in two days for me) as wise middle manager who attempts to keep things running smoothly as chaos begins to set in. I thought this one was actually very funny in places. I can’t believe I had never heard of it. It feels like a cult classic waiting to happen that just no one ever watched for some reason. One of the few reviews I could find of it online referred to it as Office Space + vampires which is fine for shorthand but doesn’t do it justice as its own thing. I wasn’t keen on what all went down in the third act as the actual plot kicks in (although I have the same problem with Office Space so…eh) but overall this is still one of the better comedies I’ve seen this month.
Mayhem is one of the most aptly titled films I’ve watched in a while. Basically a red-eye virus is spreading around that removes people’s inhibitions and amplifies emotions. This has caused some to turn into psychotic rage monsters which the courts have ruled as non-prosecutable due to a kind of temporary insanity. When the virus infects the water supply of the very law firm that pushed through this ruling, a low level employee decides to help out a woman who’s losing her house by killing his way up to the top floor to force the partners into helping her (as well as getting some of his own personal revenge along the way). What follows is a manic killing spree using a wide variety of instruments of death (construction is going on in the building so lots of fun things to kill with like big pipe wrenches, nail guns, etc.). Unlike The Belko Experiment which shares a similar white-collar murder royale theme, Mayhem has a lot of fun with it’s premise, reveling in the violence with a lot of quips and charm courtesy of the two leads Steve Yuen and Samara Weaving. Weaving in particular I could watch in just about anything, and she’s having a hell of a time here.
Die For The Camera: Movies About Making Movies
257. Program na winyan akat a.k.a. Coming Soon (2008)
258. The Hills Run Red (2009)
259. Evil in the Woods (1986)
I had mentioned a couple of days ago that I’m a sucker for movies about movies (in reference to Urban Legends: Final Cut), so I decided to dive into a few more examples of the theme.
First up is Coming Soon which takes a decent premise of a guy who watches an advanced screening of a movie called Coming Soon and then starts observing creepy, mysterious things befalling anyone who has seen it. So he sets out to dig into the making of the film and what dark secrets it holds. This one could have been ok. It does feel a little derivative of Ringu but has enough of a decent idea to theoretically keep it afloat. Unfortunately, rather than develop an intense atmosphere, more often than not, it goes for cheap jump scares. I had a problem with the ending too but won’t go into it.
The Hills Run Red is about a guy who becomes fixated on rediscovering a lost slasher from long ago that legend told is the scariest, most intense movie ever made. What he discovers searching for the movie is that he probably should not have gone looking in the first place. This one has some of the usual slasher tropes of annoying characters and dumb decisions but a couple of things do cause it to stand out a little more. One is that it is incredibly gory, more than many released from a known studio. Additionally, I always enjoy seeing William Sadler, and he really chews into his role here. I’m not sure I’d wholeheartedly recommend this, but if you dig hyper gory slashers with a meta element to them, you might end up liking it.
Evil in the Woods is borderline incomprehensible. A kid picks up a book called “Evil in the Woods” from the library and when he starts to read it he gets pulled into the story, which takes place in Bumfuck Nowhere Georgia for reasons unknown. The story seems to be about a film crew in the woods making a bigfoot monster movie who get attacked by monsters themselves or something. Honestly I’m kinda guessing here. This feels similar to Spookies in that it feels like two or three different movies that have been chopped up and glued back together with little rhyme or reason. Although the budget for this one is MUCH lower than Spookies (yea…I know) and the plot is somehow even harder to follow. I will say though because of just the pure weird insanity of it, it may make for a fun party watch.
KIDDIE KORNER!
260. The Cat in the Hat Knows a Lot About Halloween! (2016)
Well, this is what I end up with when I let my kids pick a Halloween show to watch. Martin Short as The Cat is pretty damned annoying but still more palatable than Mike Myers’ old Jewish woman impersonation from the live action version. Although I would challenge how much The Cat actually knows about Halloween. Much of this perceived knowledge seems to be gibberish he’s making up as he goes to fuck with these kids.