It's Paramount you read this...

It’s been a while since I last wrote a blog. The truth is I haven’t been arsed and haven’t had anything to write about. However, the weekend just gone, I was watching a few films and even though some of the films were good, they still annoyed me and I felt compelled to vent my frustration here and share my views on how Hollywood spoon feeds us, the stupid public…

People from all walks of life like all kinds of films, which is great. It would be boring if we all liked the same thing. I have very eclectic tastes. I like big blockbusters, true life as well as foreign films, especially Far East films.

However, if one more person tells me how good The Notebook is I will shove my foot up their arse. It isn’t good and apparently because I didn’t cry when I watched it I am heartless. Stick a woman in front of something where love conquers all, where a dog dies or an old couple laid holding hands by the end of the film and they are sold. Throw in a dishy bloke too and you have a sure fire winner on your hands. Kleenex makes a fortune in handy tissue packs from over sensitive women with highly strung emotional issues!

My tastes do not include romance or chick flicks if you haven’t guessed, actresses like Rachel McAdams irritate and Ryan Gosling can go fuck himself… Oh and anything with Lindsay Lohan in can talk a long walk off a short pier too!

Why do you want to watch people just going about their every day lives?? Falling in love, losing their loved ones, falling apart with grief and dying for no apparent reason other than they’re old!! It’s like Monopoly, the board game, I can’t stand it… Why do you want to, for entertainment, deal with loans, mortgages and debt when in real life it sucks and is one of the biggest causes of stress?!?!?

I did once get emotional before I had my tear ducts surgically removed (crying shows weakness). I remember being reduced to tears at the climax of a film. It was James Cameron’s Titanic… I cried at the end as I could not believe I wasted nearly three hours of my life watching that dross… A lesson learned and hours I will never get back again.

For how much of a dislike I have for romance, it is quite the opposite for another genre. I have a massive soft spot for horror and all walks of horror, from the sublime like The Silence of the Lambs right through to the utter trash that is Pig Hunt or Feast. To be honest, the cheesier the horror film the better, but they do highlight the fact that film makers think the audience is dumb.

The rules of horror are simple…

Do not go in that big fuck off, run down scary house in the woods… there is a reason it is no longer inhabited!


Do not ever say "wait here, I will be back…" because you won’t be, your script has come to an abrupt end my friend!


Do not start running through the woods as your dumb-ass will only end up tripping (in slo-mo) over the biggest boulder or branch available!


Do not hide in the cupboard/wardrobe! There is no escape route and those doors wouldn’t hold a 5 year old having a tantrum, let alone a 7 ft. serial killer with an axe!!


Stab the killer twice, three times, blow him up, chop off his head and set fire to him… if you don’t do this he will begetting back up and he will be coming after you again!


Save energy! It could be Usain Bolt who is being hunted, it doesn’t matter, the killer’s hobbling walking pace will STILL catch up to you!


Never try to escape in a car because you know, even though you have planned your journey to the camp there and back, you still will not have put enough fuel in and so it will not start!


Never open a storage room door slowly… The killer won’t be in there anyway… he’ll be waiting behind the door as soon as you close it again even though he wasn’t there a moment ago.


Do not have sex! Especially do not have sex outdoors in woods, by a lake, up against a tree, in long grass, in a car, on the top bunk or in a shower… You will not be getting to orgasm stage!


And if your boyfriend goes to the fridge after sex and comes back disguised as something else, making no noise at all and is suddenly built like a brick shithouse, run!! That ain’t your boyfriend ignoring you or playing hard to get, that just ain’t your boyfriend!!


Don’t bother even trying to be quiet. Your meek frame will still make the floorboards creek, but the giant 20 stone killing machine will silently move around the house jumping out at every possible turn!


If you are the victim in an old horror movie – pre-digital – then don’t bother trying the phone, the lines have been cut… If you are a victim in the post digital world, don’t bother trying your mobile, you will be out of range or your battery will have died…


As a viewer of horror remember that the first build up of eerie music will only lead to a cat jumping out, a box falling down or a phone ringing…


And finally if you ever find yourself in a real life horror situation with a group of friends, make sure you are the geeky, but cute, looking virgin (usually with a back story like the death of your parents). If you are the slut, the jock or the cocky cock sure one… you are dead!

Of course these are the clichéd rules of horror and proper horror done well doesn’t have to rely on the gimmicks. But proper trashy, cheesy horror really does need some or all of these ingredients. The best horror films tick all these boxes… in fact play ‘trashy horror bingo’ and tick them off as you watch along! As a starting point, try Halloween…

My one pet peeve with any film though, be it horror or not, is how the film maker makes a point of something during the film, usually early on. This point will then be part of the climax – it is very much like painting with numbers.

The main character makes a point that when they were 9 years old they could knit and did it every weekend with their Gran. The little story or point has no relevancy to the actual conversation taking place, but then later in the film, when the only thing that can save Earth is a double loop stitch then the hero will pick up his or her knitting needles and save the day!!

It is very similar to the main characters talking to themselves in order to flesh out the points to the audience. I mean we all sit there and read out loud something horrific to ourselves, or something that enlightens us, don’t we??? Or we talk whilst we are laid on the sofa about some plot point that will come to fruition later in the film?? Surely??

Our hero is watching TV and musing over a scroll he found in the basement:

"Man, I am sat here on the sofa and if the planets suddenly aligned and the sun moved to the axis of X and Y then the entire planet could be blown up, but that hasn’t even come close to happening for 999 years, 11 months and 28 days… I wonder who is on Jeremy Kyle???"

The hero turns the channel to The Jeremy Kyle Show:

"Welcome to the Jeremy Kyle show where we are discussing the end of the world according to Mayans who predict that exactly every 1000 years the planets align…. But first we have Jeff from Norfolk who is sleeping with his tortoise!"

I could go on for a while on clichés in films, but do you know what, I often don’t care… Many times I don’t want to think about a film, I just want to enjoy it. So if the film thinks for me, then all the better for it!

I mean who cares how Bruce Wayne got out of that prison pit and travelled back to the USA with no money or passport OR how he got back to Gotham when all the bridges had been blown up… As long as he kicks ass and wins then that’s all that matters… In fact that irritates me more, people who rip a film to parts instead of just enjoying it!

Holy plot gaps Batman!!!