ENDZEIT (Ever After) - Review By Greg Klymkiw - TIFF 2018 - Original Zombie Apocalypse Film

All female filmmakers yield original zombie apocalypse.

Endzeit - Ever After (2018)
Dir. Carolina Hellsgård
Scr. Olivia Vieweg
Starring: Gro Swantje Kohlhof, Maja Lehrer, Trine Dyrholm

Review By Greg Klymkiw

A plague has descended upon the Earth and as per usual, the zombies outnumber the living. Only two plague-free cities exist, in Germany, of course. They stand alone as fortresses against the hordes of slavering, flesh-eating creatures. Life within in them is, however, anything but normal. The citizens must slave constantly to keep the zombies out and every so often, if someone working along the fences isn't careful, the claws and jaws of a monster reach through to tear out a chunk or two of living flesh. Inevitably, the victim must be dispensed with - a bullet or blow to the head or, on occasion, a simple decapitation is the only solution.

And life, such as it is, goes on.

Sound familiar so far? Sure, why not? We've seen movie upon movie with similar situations and themes, but happily, Endzeit (Ever After) is unlike any of them. In fact, this is one of the most original apocalyptic zombie movies ever made.

Our story begins in the city of Weimar where young Vivi (Gro Swantje Kohlhof) spends her days in a huge old house, reflecting upon the tragedies which befell her family. Eventually, she finds herself outside on the perimeters of the city, assisting other plague survivors to reinforce the walls. Here she meets the tough-minded Eva (Maja Lehrer) and the two of them eventually escape Weimar together aboard an unmanned supply train headed for the city of Jena which, word has it, might provide more hope and humanity. Opposites not only attract, but compliment each other perfectly. When the train breaks down, the two women must wend their way across the harsh dangerous landscape on foot.

Yes, there are the usual challenges - bloodthirsty zombies at every turn - but eventually, they face something altogether new and mysterious. This is where Endzeit creeps into territory of the most original kind. Not only is emphasis placed on their burgeoning friendship and growing love, but it's what they discover that plunges the film into miraculously fresh territory. Nature, you see, has its own plans for the world and it is this biological shift that's truly surprising.

Surprise is the key word here - not in any typical genre film fashion. In spite of the traditional apocalyptic coat hanger with which the film adorns itself with all manner of deep philosophical rumination, we find ourselves always compelled to stay with these women on their journey in what proves to be a very brave, bold new world.

Olivia Vieweg's rich screenplay, based upon her graphic novel, takes us on roads seldom travelled in horror films and Carolina Hellsgård's direction manages to keep the forward thrust of the narrative taut whilst allowing for plenty of deep, slow-burn atmosphere. (And make no mistake, the slow-burn eventually yields an absolutely terrifying and thrilling series of climactic moments that elicit plenty of nail biting.)

Endzeit is creepy and scary, but it's also deeply and profoundly moving. One hesitates to reveal to much more. My own viewing was blessed by knowing very little about the film and the ride it took me on was equally dazzling and thought-provoking.

As the end credits unspooled, I discovered that every major key creative element of this zombie film was created by women. I'd still like to think that this is a work created by film artists of the highest order, no matter what their gender. However, another part of me thinks that women can and do see the world differently and in the case of a post-apocalyptic zombie movie, they have yielded a film that focuses upon that which truly haunts humanity in times of great tragedy - how our own actions to maintain survival at any cost creates that which haunts us the most - the ghosts and memories of those left to die. Finally, Endzeit is a horror film that is happy to scare us, but does so by being less interested in viscera and far more concerned with regeneration and love.

This is a good thing, a very good thing and I, for one, want to see more of this in the movies.

FILM CORNER RATING: **** 4-Stars

Endzeit - Ever After has its World Premiere in the TIFF 2018 Discovery Series.

BUSHWICK - Review By Greg Klymkiw - The Apocalypse comes to Brooklyn at Fantasia 2017

House of Worship, World of Shit, Apocalypse!!!

Bushwick (2017)
Dir. Jonathan Milott, Cary Murnion
Scr. Nick Damici, Graham Reznick
Starring: Dave Bautista, Brittany Snow, Angelic Zambrana

Review By Greg Klymkiw

You've just got off the subway with your boyfriend and are looking forward to introducing him to your Granny in Brooklyn. The platform is strangely empty until, naturally (it is the Bushwick district after all), a young gentleman in flames from head to toe barrels by, screaming in agony. As you and your beau ascend the stairs, you do so with trepidation - not only because a fiery human shishkebab just passed by, but now you can hear screams and gunshots. Your boyfriend bravely suggests you wait inside so he can go out to take a peek. Wrong move. He returns, near death, his flesh seared like charred corned beef. Once the love of your life expires, it's onwards and upwards.

What pretty young Lucy (Brittany Snow) discovers is Hell on Earth. People are rioting in the streets, looting is rampant and heavily armed military personnel in snappy, though scary-ass fascistic black uniforms (replete with helmets and dark, reflective faceplates) are firing into the bodies of innocent bystanders at will. She barely escapes certain death and hides out in a basement suite in the bowels of a nearby apartment building. The idyll doesn't last long. A few slavering gang banger thugs assail her.

Luckily, she's in the apartment of caretaker/janitor Stupe (Dave Bautista, WWE/MMA champ and the hilarious Drax in Guardians of the Galaxy), a tough-as-nails military veteran who dispatches the scumbags handily and saves her ass. This mismatched (clearly) pair become partners in survival as they wend their way through a veritable apocalypse.

America is under attack - by itself, it seems. A deadly army of redneck Southern secessionists has attacked the northern states and have concentrated their efforts in various New York boroughs, assuming, since they're ignorant racists (as most Deep Southerners must surely be) that they'll be able to have an easier time conquering "ethnics". Uh, not too bright, fellas. "Ethnics" fight back.

Bushwick is blessed with a first-rate screenplay that offers a simple, solid narrative coat hanger to deliver edge-of-the-seat suspense and plenty of action, but most off all, is infused with plenty of social/political layering and gorgeously-etched character shadings. This should come as no surprise to anyone who knows the name of the film's lead co-writer, the estimable Nick Damici, a terrific character actor who's also penned several brilliant scripts for director Jim Mickle (Mulberry Street, Stake Land, We Are What We Are, Cold in July). And yes, the script is always the thing, but it helps that co-directors Jonathan Milott and Cary Murnion handle the proceedings with skill, efficiency and verve. Often utilizing several long, gorgeously shot takes, their camera whirs and glides (and not in annoying shaky-cam) with the kind of expert action movie precision that puts many of its big budget studio blackbuster cousins to shame.

The big bonus here, is that both script and direction are blessed with a perfect combination of humanity and cynicism. Bushwick is an exceedingly dark picture and happily, it feels like it would have been at home and comfy amidst any number of classic dystopian 70s science-fiction/action thrillers. The picture gave me gooseflesh and by its nasty, shocking, horrifying conclusion, I was truly, deliciously, orgasmically spent.

THE FILM CORNER RATING: ****

Bushwick, a Search Engine Films release, opens theatrically August 2017 in Canada and enjoys its Canadian Premiere at Fantasia 2017.

THE QUIET HOUR - Review By Greg Klymkiw - NIFF 2015 - Low-Key Post-Apocalypse

The Quiet Hour (2014)
Dir. Stéphanie Joalland
Starring: Dakota Blue Richards, Karl Davies, Brigitte Millar, Jack McMullen

Review By Greg Klymkiw

After the Apocalypse, it's going to be very quiet.

At least that's the way it's got to be in Stéphanie Joalland's first feature film The Quiet Hour. The end of the world as we know it in the universe of the film is an alien invasion in which the unseen extraterrestrial critters (save for their hovering spaceship and mini-patrol-jets) are wiping out as many humans as possible and stripping the Earth of its natural resources.

Humanity has about two one-hour periods a day (hence the title) to wander about outdoors without getting zapped. The rest of the time, mankind needs to hunker down, ever-so quietly, lest they give their position away to the merciless space invaders.

Perhaps the most merciless creature on God's soon-to-NOT-be-green Earth is man. Food is scarce, so many marauders have turned to cannibalism. (This flesh munching is all handled a bit too discretely for my bloodthirsty tastes).

Safe havens are also in short supply, so if you've got one, it's eventually going to be under siege.

Placing a whopping emphasis upon character over action and suspense is probably not a bad thing to do, but every so often, it reminds the viewer that we're dealing with what is probably a very minuscule budget - hence: no onscreen aliens, only a handful of visible humans and most of the action confined to an isolated old farm house.

No matter. It's what happens inside the farmhouse that's important and writer-director Joalland acquits herself very well in this respect. Sarah (Dakota Blue Richards) is a hot babe (Thank Christ!), holed up in the stately country house with Tom (Jack McMullen), her blind younger brother. When Jude (Karl Davies), an army-fatigue-adorned young hunk shows up with a bullet wound in his leg, he's allowed, grudgingly, to stay and get patched up. The wounded lad claims to be a young father whose wife and child have been killed by marauders.

The plot thickens when a group of armed inbreds show up and demand Jude be turned over to them.

Hmmm. Why? Is he really who or what he says he is? Is he a killer? A scavenger lying in wait to decimate our plucky bro and sis? The reality, however, is that even if they acquiesce to the demands to give him up, the sibs risk losing an ally against a passel of dangerous scumbags.

Suspense and violence follow.

Very quietly, mind you.

The accent is on the relationships between these people in a world on the brink of disaster and much of the film involves three-hander interplay between them. Joalland's script is nicely written with an accent on character development and realistic dialogue. The performances are solid and as a director, her mise-en-scene deftly juggles the demands of making this claustrophobic setting work dramatically and cinematically.

I appreciated the muted quality of the film, but after awhile, I did expect a good, old fashioned Straw Dogs-like orgy of violence. There is violence, but it continues to play out in the muted realism of the rest of the movie. This, of course, is the noble way to play things out, but I do fear that many (including myself) will be a tad letdown by the lack of a truly, madly, deeply inspired donnybrook with geysers of blood-letting.

We deserve it. We've paid attention, justifiably so, to the good writing and fine acting and stately pace. Lacking a climactic dust-up seems a bit of a cop-out, taking things far too preciously for comfort. Still, it's an intelligent, considered work and one can't complain too much about that.

THE FILM CORNER RATING: *** 3 Stars

The Quiet Hour enjoys its Canadian Premiere at the Niagara Integrated Film Festival (NIFF 2015). For tix, times and venues, visit the festival's website by clicking HERE.

MAD MAX: FURY ROAD - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Now's My Time to Weigh-in on This

Mad Max: Fury Road (2015)
Dir. George Miller
Starring: Tom Hardy, Charlize Theron,
Nicholas Hoult, Hugh Keays-Byrne, Rosie Huntington-Whiteley

Review By Greg Klymkiw

There's no need at this point to make much of the perfectly-wrought slender plot of George Miller's spectacular ode to the glories of cinema via its wham-bam ultra-violence, save for the fact that Tom Hardy's Max Rockatansky, the immortal road warrior of the three movies starring Mel Gibson, hooks up with the hot, head-shaved, one-armed Imperator Furiosa (the hot, head-shaved, not-really-one-armed Charlize Theron) to make her way back to the paradise of her childhood homeland whilst rescuing a clutch of gorgeous babes held as breeders by the post-apocalyptic mutants who've carved out a massive kingdom of slavery and brutal repression.

The most interesting aspect of the tale is that our hero is initially captured by the mutants, forced to become a perpetual blood donor and then secured to the front of warrior Nux's (Nicholas Hoult) car as a "blood bag" (to explode in a shower of crimson if and when the roadster slams into something). For at least 30 of the film's 120 minutes, its hero is forced to wear a mask and trussed into complete immobility. He does, however, have a perfect view of the mad chase and carnage that ensues, happily giving us, the loyal audience, more than a few delectable points of view.

Then for another 30 of the film's 120 minutes, Max plays second fiddle to Furiosa until the final 60 of 120 minutes whereupon he's finally able to fully engage in the heroics Mel Gibson was allowed to indulge in during Mad Max and The Road Warrior.

The first hour of the film contains some of the most stunning, nail-biting chase sequences ever committed to the edification of action fans since the very dawn of cinema as well as imagery in the mutant kingdom which is so eye-poppingly grotesque that it rivals that of Fritz Lang's Metropolis, which director George Miller is clearly indebted to. At 72-years-old, director George Miller manages to easily take several huge dumps of superiority upon every other younger director in recent years who've purported to direct action blockbusters. This includes, but is not limited to the execrable Sam Mendes, J.J. Abrams, Bryan Singer, Joss Whedon and Christopher "One Idea" Nolan.

Miller's mise-en-scene is thankfully sans herky-jerky camera moves, ludicrously endless closeups, picture cutting that's almost solely dependent upon sound cues rather than visual dramatic action, an over-reliance upon digital effects and tin-eyed spatiality. His eye for action and his sense of rhythm is impeccable, his eye for the grotesque (the mutant villains, the earth-mother breast-milk slaves, the mohawk hairdos, body piercings, tattoos and the grandly retro mechanisms in the fortress) has seldom been paralleled, his commitment to driving everything dramatically because he's wisely utilized a simple narrative coat hanger to add all the necessary layers; all this and more points to his innate genius as a REAL filmmaker as opposed to most of the poseurs making blockbusters in contemporary Hollywood.

Though a part of me would have preferred if Miller had continued using the great Mel Gibson in the role of Max and added the layer of age to the character's bitterness, guilt and weariness, I'm happy enough with his selection of the strange stalwart intensity of Tom Hardy and the fine actor's chemistry (thankfully non-romantic or even vaguely sexual) with Charlize Theron's tough-as-nails-exterior masking her long-ago lost innocence of childhood.

And yes, though another part of me wished Miller had tried to bring his film's running time down to the 90-95-minutes of Mad Max and The Road Warrior, I was never bored during the 120 minutes of Fury Road, only occasionally fatigued by its relentlessness.

I love the first two Mad Max films so much that I'm grateful to Miller for not abandoning the spirit of them and using his previous work as a natural springboard into both the familiar and the fresh.

That the villain Immortan Joe (Hugh Keays-Byrne) is equally foul to such previous villains as The Toe Cutter and Humungous makes me very happy. Even happier to me is that Hugh Keays-Byrne played Toe Cutter AND Immortan Joe.

That the movie, by including a kick-ass female lead who is not just a woman pretending to be a macho Rambolina figure, but a woman driven to fight for the rights of fellow women and lay claim to a part of her that she lost, is what allows Miller to take his place as a genuine artist who heartily grasps the comfort of the familiar whilst building upon that and allowing it to blossom into a wholly new hybrid of insanely magnificent splendour.

That Miller has attempted a different approach to colour with Fury Road is also pleasing. I'll admit to always loving the occasional dapples of almost fluorescent colours amidst the sandy, dusty Australian outback, but I also love the high contrasts Miller employs here with varying shades to lighten or darken the proceedings when necessary.

That the movie uses real souped-up cars, trucks and motorcycles which are really driven by real stunt drivers and really smashed-up-real-good is the biggest bonus of all. (Porcupine-like killer cars, a big-wheeled monstrosity outfitted with banks of speakers and a heavy metal guitarist whose guitar shoots out flames and the terrifying gas tanker commandeered by Furiosa and Max are but a few of the vehicular delights on display.)

Finally, though, I do wish the film had had far more dystopian 70s-style melancholy infused into its a-bit-too-hopeful ending, especially since there's a sense of Max's final look to Furiosa, and to us, resembling the final looks of Ethan Edwards (John Wayne) in John Ford's The Searchers.

But, really now, who am I trying to kid?

I fucking loved this movie.

THE FILM CORNER RATING: **@** 5-Stars

Mad Max: Fury Road is in wide-mega-release all over the world via Warner Bros. It is presented in 3-D. I refuse to see it in that format as it annoys me. I've only watched it in normal 2-D and was quite satisfied with that, though I'll admit the 3-D might be less egregious to me than it normally is, given Miller's superb direction.