Young Roscoe is lured to an underground dwelling dimension by an ancient demon of peace. The demon takes Roscoe as his pupil and mentors him for years the ways of the powerful dark arts, but when Roscoe unknowingly opens the gates of hell by releasing three powerful and evil demons from their vessels, his master is killed and Roscoe flees back to his quiet earthly town with the evil demons in tail. Now the three pure evil beasts ascend topside and reek havoc amongst the quaint little town using mind control upon their human prey, re-animating the dead back to life, and conjuring the evil out of innocents’ souls. Roscoe has the only supernatural power to stop them, taught and passed down to him by his late demon master, but will he have enough strength to save what’s left of his humanity?
First off, “The Demon’s Rook” is my first favorite release of the 2015! A freshman film from James Sizemore rises to the top and absolutely destroys, or rather obliterates, any horror release I’ve watched and reviewed the past two months. Sizemore eviscerates the 1980’s and early 1990’s horror, tangles and twists all the elements together, releasing a grotesquely creature-feature of awesomeness.
The detail on the practical effects are so finely tuned and done well that in trying to point out the rubbery, obviously fake demon body parts was seriously pointless. Every thing from costumes, to makeup, to exploding heads were rock hard solid in the results, even the sometimes over-zealous gore scenes in other gory films were exact and on point with camera angles, the right amount of blood, and not too hard to swallow when it came down to suspending disbelief.
The fantastic-driven story combines many horror subgenres from, the obvious, demonology, to the living undead. This doesn’t feel like another “run for your life while we’re being chased” type film as there are various facets and layered tangents to the story. Many characters are introduced and are quickly, but properly, disposed of and, for a film like “The Demon’s Rook,” this type of catch and release is suitable because death becomes a character and without death, in a movie with demons and zombies and black magic, you need death to breathe and live and in order to fully embody that death character you need victims and Sizemore, along with co-write Akom Tidwell, breaks the bank with disposable characters.
Tim Reis’s cinematography is beyond brilliant with the use of prominent coloring. The red, green, blue dense fog settings create an atmosphere like none other while the editing, cut also by Tim Reis, is easy on the transitions and easy to follow. Sizemore tackles the special effects department and seizes the moment to be relentless on the use of fake blood. These Georgian filmmakers will need to be watched closely as “The Demon Rook” is underground gold and I wouldn’t be surprised if we see rush of more films into production from this crew. The dialogue is my only small beef with “The Demon’s Rook” as it’s bit bland and a bit expositional, but I’m really reaching to find a flaw here. Most of the ambiance and dialogue becomes a bit jumbled at the beginning with sudden stops in sounds creating goofy transitions. However, this all seems to clear up fairly early.
Technically, the Cindedigm DVD looks amazing in a clarity sense with only a few blurry moments during forest scenes in it’s 16:9 widescreen format. The sound is balanced and consistent throughout even during the scenes or montages tracks from rock bands come into play. No sign of audio stifling nor hijacking. Plus, a good amount of extras come with the release such as deleted scenes, a making of, a gag reel, and bonus short film from Sizemore entitled “Goat Witch” which is just as amazingly disturbing.
Bringing old time practical monster classiness to the modern age is risky business, but director James Sizemore’s and Akom Tidewell’s passion and thirst for hallmark classic demons and zombies resurrects legends back to the indie scene and by adding in his own terroristic tastes, the Black Rider Productions duo also conjures up something new with the vibrant coloring. I would compare Sizemore to the satanic or cult likes of Rob Zombie, to a young George A. Romero with the zombies, and to a special effects genius such as Tom Savini. Don’t consider Sizemore a hack of icons; he’s certainly not, but he displays his own style by slowly sliding that sharp blade into the stomach with perverseness pleasure and that, my friends, is Sizemore’s contribution to chaos.
Tag Archives: walking dead
Syfy’s “Z Nation” S1Ep8 ‘Zunami’
Murphy has put himself the blurred line category when speaking of heros for “Z Nation.” Episode eight, ‘Zunami,’ pits our heros against a migrated cloud of fleshing eating zombies that will rip through the midwest like a shredder. A dehydrated and weary group of survivors must rely on Murphy’s anti-zombie blood to aid them in their con of hiding from the human-feasters.
This episode is really all about the Murphy character and his choices. He crosses the line in actually wanting to stick with the group, but at the same time makes a drastic decision to exhaust the life of two survivors to spare his own group. Now not only is Murphy slowly and painfully transforming physically and mentally into a Z, he’s crossed that imaginary line of morals and ethics by taking a life indirectly.
Citizen Z finally received a lot of air time. I was wondering when isolation would get the best of our scrawny NSA agent. Isolation and a compound load of harmful, delusion inducing carbon-monoxide gases. The outcome was obvious, but there whole invent of the imaginary astronaut for ISS sparked something in Citizen Z and at the same depressed him a bit as well. His “astronaut friend’s” realization was a bit bittersweet.
This episode paid their dues to Murphy and Citizen Z characters. I’m still waiting on more exquisite and gory zombie death scenes. We haven’t seen much since ‘Philly Feast.’ Yea, you get the occasional headshot, but that’s getting old real quick. In fact, this episode lacked many deaths I think only one or two if I recall. I hope that this will deter any viewers and I also hope that this isn’t a decline from a very spectacular start of episodes for “Z Nation”
AMC’s “The Walking Dead” S5Ep3 ‘Four Walls and a Roof’
As one chapter closes, another opens when Rick faces off agains’t what’s left of Terminus and Daryl and Carol discover a whole new dire situation. Bob has been returned to the group sans a leg and informs Rick and company that his time is near as he was also bit on a run. Poor Bob. Lawrence Gilliard Jr. will be missed as Bob Stookey, a level headed, positive thinker who gave much of the group hope. His alcoholic and lonely past turned for the better when he met the group. He was a shining example all that was potentially good. Well, a good thing can’t last forever as this episode hints.
I’m a bit glad that Gareth, played by Andrew J. West, wasn’t another Governor character. Instead, Gareth becomes a short lived catalyst vehicle that may or may not have split Rick’s group into two halves – one half doesn’t trust anybody new and becomes violent against the against the grain riders and then there are those who believe everybody is good and you just have to sift through that darkness. Carl and Rick are the prime examples of each category which will make for good television later on in the series because I’m sure Carl will once again blame his dad Rick for something. However, Rick has been right for most of the show’s life.
I’m still curious about Father Gabriel. His guilt runs deep, but how did he survive for so long being a coward. Rick still doesn’t trust him, but Father Gabriel didn’t rat out the group with Terminus hooligans make their threatening entrance into the church looking for revenge blood. However, Rick decided he was going to keep his promise to Gareth and Sasha had some revenge on her mind against Terminus folks as well.
Next episode will be something we haven’t seen before; a new group of foes unlike the show has ever given us. We’ll find out what happened to Beth and where Carol and Daryl discovers her. This should be interesting as this gives Rick and his group a new path and takes them off their now stagnant stay at the Church and leave Terminus in the past for good.
AMC’s “The Walking Dead” S5Ep1 ‘No Sanctuary’
“The Walking Dead” is back, finally! Season 5’s premiere episode is the critically acclaimed show’s best yet starting right off where we left in the last episode in season four. ‘No Sanctuary’ is gruesomely heart felt where scene after scene gore and emotion. There were so many gut wrench scenes that play havoc on all the areas of your brain that you don’t know whether to cringe or cry.
Rick and friends are locked in a train held hostage by Terminus hostiles. You can bet your ass that this episode is about the group trying to escape among other story line tangents like Carol and Tyreese figuring out what to do with baby Judith. Rick’s is on the edge looking for blood and revenge while the others passive methods keep Rick grounded. There is a great parallel between Terminus group and Rick’s group and that could prove costly our heros in future episodes.
Abraham Ford, Sasha, and Eugene are still trying to make their virus ending trek to Washington. The Eugene character is still a mystery to us all because he carries himself as a mullet sporting ‘scientist’ who has played one too many role playing games in his mother’s basement. Abraham follows Eugene blindly and I think Sasha just follows Abraham because she’s wants ride on his handle bar mustache (just sayin’). The three have some sort of secret that the rest of the group doesn’t know yet, but I’m sure more will come to light in later episodes.
Special effects guru and director of ‘No Sanctuary’ Greg Nicotero has a bag of new tricks for audiences this season. When you think there was enough blood in a season, this very first episode had probably outdone all the rest of the season’s combined. Ruthless intentions, compelling dynamics, and exploding zombie parts! Check out after credits to reveal a surprise reprisal of a form character! Get ready to geek out with your inner zombie out!
Syfy’s “Z Nation” S1Ep5 “Home Sweet Zombie”
After a rampant, blood-soaked four episodes into the first season of Syfy’s “Z Nation”, the fifth episode showed signs of slowing down the film’s onslaught of zombie bashing and disemboweling humans and drives a nail deep into the emotional side of most of the characters. This doesn’t mean that “Z Nation” is turning for gold to bronze, but rather taking a path change that will keep the show fresh because sometimes, you know, carnage can get a bit old (yeah, right!)
Roberta, Garnett, and the rest of the survivors land in Tornado Alley country where a nasty weather storm is brewing and they must find shelter before mother nature starts to rain down flesh devouring zombies on them. Low of supplies, they bunker down at Roberta’s hometown home while also trying to find her long lost husband who may or may not be one of the living dead. As the wind whips all around them with debris and, literally, zombies, Roberta searches for her husband while the others just try to stay bolted to the ground.
Like I was saying, “Home Sweet Zombie” focuses on more on character development especially with Roberta, Addy, Murphy, and a little bit between 10K and Cassandra. Roberta struggles with the memory of being called to National Guard deployment without waiting her firefighting husband to come out to say goodbye and in part the reason why the group goes to her home. Roberta, through the first four episodes, doesn’t lose much of her cool and, in fact, she is downright ruthless, but episode five gives her character more girth than an icy vein zombie fragger.
Addy’s memory is triggered by the thunderous storm outside. A memory that recalls the death of perhaps her undead parents – my theory. She becomes distant and paralyzed by quick flashbacks of knives giving mercy to zombies. This is isolating Mack from his ever-fun and beautiful girlfriend. Addy’s story will come soon and maybe in the next episode much like Cassandra’s story did – a two part episode displaying their background.
Being a possible answer to the human race’s survival, Murphy pessimistic attitude and outlook on life has been nothing but a pain in the ass for the team who didn’t exactly want to take this road trip mission to the west coast in the first place. Gradually, Murphy is coming around to the idea of being with the ground mostly because of the fun loving Doc character. However, Murphy is struggling internally. The virus antidote might not be working and Murphy feels to slow transformation into a Z. To thwart the group from suspecting his physical transformation, he shaves his head and facial hair making him even more creepy. His scene with one of the zombies speaks to this notion and we’ll have to see what happens with Murphy in later episodes.
The little thing between 10K and Cassandra is more sexual than anything else. The tension between them can be cut with a knife. Nothing really more to say there.
“Home Sweet Zombie” is the “Sharknado” homage episode. Both “Z Nation” and “Sharknado” are produced by The Asylum so there lies no surprise here that this idea was concocted. Plus, witnessing zombies fly through the area spattering into trees and overturned cars can’t be beat. You won’t see that on The Walking Dead. Not a bad fifth episode and I’m sure we’ll see mroe of our fair share of zombie massacring through the rest of the season, but take this episode for what that is – character development.
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