Ashley Greene is a little whore, hitchhiking through Asscrack, Nowhere on a quest to find her long lost Father. She's picked up by a guy named Tom Rape, who coincidentally tries to mouth rape her, and she ends up almost shooting his peen off. What kind of girl carries a gun in their purse? The same kind that won't give random road head to someone who was nice enough to offer them a ride. A prude, that's who! The dangers of road head. As she travels in search of her long lost Daddy, she does some shoplifting, smokes weed, drinks, goes home with a local rube whom she meets in a skanky bar, and begs him to take her upstairs and fuck her. I told you she was a whore. Meanwhile, the random guy's Mom licks the door in twisted longing while her son scrumps the drifter trollop. Not just a bar whore, but a traveling bar whore. Before long, Ashely Greene's whoring lands her in a whole heap of serial-killer-family trouble, and she finds herself being held prisoner in an odd sex garden in the basement. Summer's Blood Available from these sellers. Special offers and product promotions. Get a $75.00 statement credit after first Amazon.com purchase made with new. Jul 27, 2011. Summer's Moon or Summer's Blood as its also known lets you know right from the start what the film is going to be about. A man's voice speaks as we see the bloodstained body of a female victim; the man speaks about how important family is. He tells the corpse that she never would have ended up in the. Sep 23, 2012 - 41 min - Uploaded by KrisDiAshA family of serial killers stalk a young woman who's out to find the father she's never known. Summer's Blood. Summer's Blood (also known as Summer and Summer's Moon) is a Canadian horror film starring Ashley Greene. When Dad calls, announcing that he's coming home, the fit really hits the shan; because Dad is one sick twist. He's also very charismatic and believes in the bond of family over anything else. That's kind of refreshing in this day and age. What a charmer. Will Ashley Greene ever escape the sex garden? Will she ever find her long lost Dad? Will the big 'twist' in this movie work out exactly like you thought it would about 10 minutes in? Yep, yep, and well of course it will. Or is it just the beginning? Dun, dun, dun!!!! Stephen McHattie's performance as a Serial Killing Dad was the highlight of this one, and without it, I may have forgotten this movie about three seconds after watching it. There's just something about the guy that makes you love watching him, much like say a Bill Moseley, and I really hope he keeps working in Genre pictures for a long time. The movie itself was harmless enough, but just wasn't all that gripping or original. I've seen this movie dozens of times before, and aside from McHattie's performance, it's been done better every single time. That's not to say that some people might not find it fun or enjoyable, I'm just saying that it will give most Horror fans an underwhelming feeling of Deja Vu. Now you're fucked, honey. Hardened teenager Summer is on the road looking to meet her estranged father. Her only clue to his whereabouts is a letter from a rural community called Massey. Once she arrives in town Summer is rescued from a run-in with the law by a charming local handyman Named. The couple quickly hit it off and head back to the house Tom shares with his mother Gaia. Knocked unconscious by the demented family, Summer is bound with chains inside a box filled with dirt. Surrounded by lush plants, grow lights, human skulls and a girl on the verge of death; Summer is the latest flower in Tom's 'Human Garden'.
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Set in a 19th century European village, this stop-motion, animated feature follows the story of Victor (voiced by JOHNNY DEPP), a young man who is whisked away to the underworld and wed to a mysterious Corpse Bride, while his real bride, Victoria, waits bereft in the land of the living. Though life in the Land of the Dead proves to be a lot more colorful than his strict Victorian upbringing, Victor learns that there is nothing in this world, or the next, that can keep him away from his one true love MPAA Rating: PG (c) 2005 Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. All Rights Reserved. 'Tim Burton's Corpse Bride' is not the macabre horror story the title suggests, but a sweet and visually lovely tale of love lost. In an era when most animated films look relentlessly bright and colorful, 'Corpse Bride' creates two palettes, and not the ones we expect. The world of the living is a drab and overcast place with much of the color drained from it, and the remaining grays and purples and greens so muted they seem apologetic. The world of the dead, on the other hand, is where you'd want to spent your vacation. It's livelier, cheerier and with brighter colors. Also, as the hero discovers when he visits there, it is true that when your pets die, they go to the same place you go: Victor Van Dort is greeted ecstatically by Scraps, the dog he had as a child. Scraps, to be sure, is all bones, but look at it this way: No more fleas. Or maybe skeletal fleas. I'm not sure about all the fine points. Victor is voiced by, and reflects the current trend in animation by also looking like Johnny Depp. Once cartoons were voiced by anonymous drudges, but now big names do the work, and lend their images to the characters. As the movie opens, a marriage is being arranged between Victor's parents and the Everglots. Nell and William Van Dort ( and ) are rich fishmongers; as for Victoria Everglot (), her parents Maudeline and Finnie ( and ) are poor aristocrats. Tim Burton's Corpse Bride - Victor (Johnny Depp) and Victoria's (Emily Watson) families have arranged their marriage. Though they like each other, Victor. Buy Tim Burton's Corpse Bride: Read 1077 Movies & TV Reviews - Amazon.com. 7.4/10 208,897 votes 2005 PG. Just as he's about to be married, Victor is sucked into the underworld by a Corpse Bride who desires him for herself in this Tim Burton tale. Watch trailers & learn more. Corpse Bride (2005) cast and crew credits, including actors, actresses, directors, writers and more. A marriage would provide her family with money and his with class. Victor and Victoria have never met, except in the title of a comedy, but when they're finally introduced, they're surprised to find that, despite everything, they love each other. But is it meant to be? Victor is so shy he cannot blurt out the words of his marriage vow and flees to the overgrown graveyard outside the church to practice. Repeating the words to memorize them, he places the wedding ring on a twig that is not a twig but the desiccated finger of Emily, the Corpse Bride (Helena Bonham Carter), whose arm is reaching up from the grave. This marriage, according to the rules of the netherworld, is a legitimate one, and soon Victor is at a wedding celebration where jolly skeletons sing and dance to a score by, and the wedding cake is made of bones but looks yummy. The movie's inspiration is to make Emily a figure of sympathy, not horror. She lost her own chance at happiness when she was murdered on the eve of her wedding and now wants to be a good wife for Victor. She's rather sexy, in a spectral way, with those big eyes and plump lips, and only a few places where the skin has rotted away to reveal the bone beneath. Long dresses would be a good fashion choice. A piano is shown at one point in the movie, and we get just a glimpse of its nameplate. It's a Harryhausen. That would be Burton's tribute to Ray Harryhausen, the man who brought stop-motion animation to the level of artistry ('Jason and the Argonauts,' 'The Golden Voyage of Sinbad'). These days most animated movies are computer-generated, creating effortlessly flowing images. But in the days when they had to be laboriously drawn one frame at a time, it was scarcely more trouble to do table-top animation, building model figures and moving them a tiny bit between each frame. Famous creatures like King Kong were partly made of stop-frame animation, shot in smaller scale and then combined with live action in an optical printer so that Kong seemed enormous. When you watch 'King Kong,' you may notice that his fur seems to crawl or bristle slightly; you are looking at disturbances made by the fingers of the animators between each shot. My own feeling is that the artificiality of stop-action animation adds a quality that standard animation lacks, an eerie otherworldly magical quality that's hard to pin down. Certainly the macabre world of 'Corpse Bride' benefits from it, and somehow it is appropriate that a skeleton would move with a subtle jerkiness. The same odd visual quality added to the appeal of Burton's 'The Nightmare Before Christmas.' Meanwhile, above ground, the blameless Victoria is about to be married off by her heartless parents to a Victorian villain with the Dickensian name Barkis Bittern (). She deserves better. It is, after all, not her fault that Victor contracted an unexpected marriage. Nor, really, is it Victor's. Nor, for that matter, the Corpse Bride's. Three young people are unhappy when two of them should be blissful; it's not fair, even if one of them is dead. As he does in all of his pictures, Burton fills the frame with small grace touches and droll details. He seems to have a natural affinity for the Gothic, and his live-action 'Legend of Sleepy Hollow' (also with Johnny Depp) remains one of the most visually beautiful films I've seen. He likes moonlight and dreary places, trees forming ominous shapes in the gloom, eyes peering uneasily into the incredible and love struggling to prevail in worlds of complex menace. All of that is a lot for an animated fantasy to convey, but 'Tim Burton's Corpse Bride' not only conveys it, but does it, yes, charmingly. Note: The PG rating is about right, I think, although quite young or impressionable children may be scared by the skeletal characters. Everyone is relatively jolly, however, so maybe not. May 20, 2015. We have the answer at long last in “The Assassin,” a mesmerizing slow burn of a martial-arts movie that boldly merges stasis and kinesis, turns momentum into abstraction, and achieves breathtaking new heights of compositional elegance: Shot for shot, it's perhaps the most ravishingly beautiful film Hou. Directed by Hsiao-Hsien Hou. With Qi Shu, Chen Chang, Yun Zhou, Satoshi Tsumabuki. A female assassin receives a dangerous mission to kill a political leader in eighth. Synonyms of assassin from the Merriam-Webster Thesaurus, with definitions, antonyms, and related words. Find a better way to say it. Subscribe to INDIE & FILM FESTIVALS: Subscribe to TRAILERS: Subscribe to COMING SOON: Like us on FACEBOOK: Follow us on TWITTER: The Assassin Official Trailer 1 (2015) - Hou Hsiao-Hsien Movie HD In 9th-century China, Nie Yinniang is a young woman who was abducted in childhood from the family of a decorated general and raised by a nun who trained her in the martial arts. After 13 years of exile, she is returned to the land of her birth as an exceptional assassin, with orders to kill her former betrothed. She must confront her parents, her memories, and her long-repressed feelings in a choice to sacrifice the man she loves or break forever with the sacred way of the righteous assassins. Rich with shimmering, breathing texture and punctuated by brief but unforgettable bursts of action, THE ASSASSIN is a martial arts film like none made before it. You're quite the artsy one, aren't you? Fandango MOVIECLIPS FILM FESTIVALS & INDIE TRAILERS is the destination for.well, all things related to Film Festivals & Indie Films. If you want to keep up with the latest festival news, art house openings, indie movie content, film reviews, and so much more, then you have found the right channel. • • • Assassins (: ٱلْحَشَّاشِين al-Ḥashāshīn) is the common name used to refer to an formally known as the. Often described as a secret order led by a mysterious ', the Nizari Ismailis formed in the late after a split within – a branch of. The Nizaris posed a strategic threat to by capturing and inhabiting several throughout and later, under the leadership of.,, and were often an employed tactic of the assassins, drawing their opponents into submission rather than risk killing them. While 'Assassins' typically refers to the entire sect, only a group of acolytes known as the actually engaged in conflict. Lacking their own army, the Nizari relied on these warriors to carry out espionage and assassinations of key enemy figures, and over the course of 300 years successfully killed two caliphs, and many viziers, sultans, and Crusader leaders. Under leadership of Imam, the Nizari state declined internally, and was eventually destroyed as the Imam surrendered the castles to the. Sources on the history and thought of the Ismailis in this period are therefore lacking and the majority extant are written by their detractors. Long after their near-eradication, mentions of Assassins were preserved within European sources – such as the writings of Marco Polo – where they are depicted as trained killers, responsible for the systematic elimination of opposing figures. The word ' has been used ever since to describe a hired or professional killer, leading to the related term ', which denotes any action involving murder of a high-profile target for political reasons. The Nizari were acknowledged and feared by the. The stories of the Assassins were further embellished. European historians in the 19th century – such as – also referred to the Nizari in their works and tended to write about the Nizari based on accounts by medieval Sunni Arab and Persian authors. Artistic rendering of. The origins of the Assassins can be traced back to just before the, around 1094 in Alamut, north of modern Iran, during a crisis of succession to the. There has been great difficulty finding out much information about the origins of the Assassins because most early sources are written by enemies of the order, are based on legends, or both. [ ] Most sources dealing with the order's inner workings were destroyed with the capture of, the Assassins' headquarters, by the in 1256. However, it is possible to trace the beginnings of the cult back to its first Grandmaster, (1050s–1124). A passionate devotee of Isma'ili beliefs, was well-liked throughout, and most of the by other Isma'ili, which led to a number of people becoming his followers. Using his fame and popularity, Sabbah founded the Order of the Assassins. While his motives for founding this order are ultimately unknown, it was said to be all for his own political and personal gain and to also exact vengeance on his enemies. Because of the unrest in caused by the, Hassan-i Sabbah found himself not only fighting for power with other, but also with the invading Christian forces. After creating the Order, Sabbah searched for a location that would be fit for a sturdy headquarters and decided on at in what is now northwestern. It is still disputed whether Sabbah built the fortress himself or if it was already built at the time of his arrival. In either case, Sabbah adapted the fortress to suit his needs not only for defense from hostile forces, but also for indoctrination of his followers. After laying claim to the fortress at Alamut, Sabbah began expanding his influence outwards to nearby towns and districts, using his agents to gain political favour and to intimidate the local populations. Spending most of his days at Alamut producing religious works and developing doctrines for his Order, Sabbah would never leave his fortress again in his lifetime. He had established a secret society of deadly assassins, which was built on a hierarchical structure. Below Sabbah, the Grand Headmaster of the Order, were those known as 'Greater Propagandists', followed by the normal 'Propagandists', the Rafiqs ('Companions'), and the Lasiqs ('Adherents'). It was the Lasiqs who were trained to become some of the most feared assassins, or as they were called, 'Fida'i' (self-sacrificing agent). However, it is unknown how Hassan-i-Sabbah was able to get his 'Fida'in' to perform with such fervent loyalty. One theory, possibly the best known but also the most criticized, comes from the reports of during his travels to the Orient. He recounts a story he heard, of the 'Old Man of the Mountain' (Sabbah) who would drug his young followers with, lead them to a 'paradise', and then claim that only he had the means to allow for their return. Perceiving that Sabbah was either a prophet or magician, his disciples, believing that only he could return them to 'paradise', were fully committed to his cause and willing to carry out his every request. However, this story is disputed [ ] due to the fact that Sabbah died in 1124 and, who is frequently known as the 'Old Man of the Mountain', died in 1192, whereas Marco Polo was not born until around 1254. With his new weapons, Sabbah began to order assassinations, ranging from politicians to great generals. Assassins would rarely attack ordinary citizens though, and tended not to be hostile towards them. Although the 'Fida'yin' were the lowest rank in Sabbah's order and were only used as expendable pawns to do the Grandmaster's bidding, much time and many resources were put into training them. The Assassins were generally young in age, giving them the physical strength and stamina which would be required to carry out these murders. However, physical prowess was not the only trait that was required to be a 'Fida'i'. To get to their targets, the Assassins had to be patient, cold, and calculating. They were generally intelligent and well-read because they were required to possess not only knowledge about their enemy, but his or her culture and their native language. They were trained by their masters to disguise themselves and sneak into enemy territory to perform the assassinations, instead of simply attacking their target outright. Etymology [ ]. One of the most famous historical sites in Syria and the most famous castle of the Syrian Assassins The Assassins were finally linked by the 19th-century orientalist scholar to the Arabic word using their variant names assassin and assissini in the 19th century. Citing the example of one of the first written applications of the term hashish to the Ismailis by 13th-century historian Abu Shama, de Sacy demonstrated its connection to the name given to the Ismailis throughout Western scholarship. The first known usage of the term hashishi has been traced back to 1122 when the employed it in derogatory reference to the Syrian Nizaris. Used figuratively, the term hashishi connoted meanings such as outcasts or rabble. Without actually accusing the group of using the hashish drug, the used the term in a pejorative manner. This label was quickly adopted by anti-Ismaili historians and applied to the Ismailis of Syria and Persia. The spread of the term was further facilitated through military encounters between the Nizaris and the, whose chroniclers adopted the term and disseminated it across Europe. During the period, Western scholarship on the Ismailis contributed to the popular view of the community as a radical sect of assassins, believed to be trained for the precise murder of their adversaries. By the 14th century, European scholarship on the topic had not advanced much beyond the work and tales from the Crusaders. The origins of the word forgotten, across Europe the term Assassin had taken the meaning of 'professional murderer'. In 1603, the first Western publication on the topic of the Assassins was authored by a court official for of and was mainly based on the narratives of from his visits to the. While he assembled the accounts of many Western travellers, the author failed to explain the etymology of the term Assassin. According to the Lebanese writer, based on texts from Alamut, Hassan-i Sabbah tended to call his disciples Asāsīyūn ( أساسيون, meaning 'people who are faithful to the foundation [of the faith]'), and derivation from the term hashish is a misunderstanding by foreign travelers. Another modern author, Edward Burman, states that: Many scholars have argued, and demonstrated convincingly, that the attribution of the epithet 'hashish eaters' or 'hashish takers' is a misnomer derived from enemies of the Isma'ilis and was never used by Muslim chroniclers or sources. It was therefore used in a pejorative sense of 'enemies' or 'disreputable people'. This sense of the term survived into modern times with the common Egyptian usage of the term Hashasheen in the 1930s to mean simply 'noisy or riotous'. It is unlikely that the austere Hassan-i Sabbah indulged personally in drug taking. There is no mention of that drug hashish in connection with the Persian Assassins – especially in the library of Alamut ('the secret archives'). The name 'Assassin' is often said to derive from the word Hashishin or 'users of ', (which can be used as a derogatory term in Arabic and it is the equivalent of 'drug addict', in this case, 'hashish addict') was originally applied to the Nizari Ismaelis by the rival Ismailis during the fall of the Ismaili and the separation of the two Ismaili streams, there is little evidence hashish was used to motivate the assassins, contrary to the beliefs of their medieval enemies. It is possible that the term hashishiyya or hashishi in Arabic sources was used metaphorically in its abusive sense relating to use of hashish, which due to its effects on the mind state, is outlawed in Islam. Modern versions of this word include Mahashish used in the same derogatory sense, albeit less offensive nowadays, as the use of the substance is more widespread. [ ] Military tactics [ ]. Remains of the in, Iran In pursuit of their religious and political goals, the Ismailis adopted various military strategies popular in the. One such method was that of assassination, the selective elimination of prominent rival figures. The murders of political adversaries were usually carried out in public spaces, creating resounding intimidation for other possible enemies. Throughout history, many groups have resorted to assassination as a means of achieving political ends. In the Ismaili context, these assignments were performed by fida'is (devotees) of the Ismaili mission. The assassinations were committed against those whose elimination would most greatly reduce aggression against the Ismailis and, in particular, against those who had perpetrated massacres against the community. A single assassination was usually employed in contrast with the widespread bloodshed which generally resulted from factional combat. Hashashin are also said to be adept in, or the Islamic warrior code, where they are trained in combat, disguises, and. [ ] are followed, and the hashashin are taught in the art of war, linguistics, and strategies. Hashashin never allowed their women to be at their fortresses during military campaigns, both for protection and secrecy. This is a tradition first made by Hassan when he sent his wife and daughters to when a was created during the Seljuk siege of Alamut. For about two centuries, the hashashin specialized in assassinating their religious and political enemies. The Grand Master of the Assassins at successfully kept off his territory. The first instance of murder in the effort to establish a Nizari Ismaili state in Persia is widely considered to be the killing of,. Carried out by a man dressed as a whose identity remains unclear, the vizier's murder in a Seljuq court is distinctive of exactly the type of visibility for which missions of the fida'is have been significantly exaggerated. While the Seljuqs and both employed murder as a military means of disposing of factional enemies, during the Alamut period almost any murder of political significance in the Islamic lands was attributed to the Ismailis. So inflated had this association grown that, in the work of orientalist scholars such as, the Ismailis were equated with the politically active fida'is and thus were regarded as a radical and sect known as the Assassins. The military approach of the Nizari Ismaili state was largely a defensive one, with strategically chosen sites that appeared to avoid confrontation wherever possible without the loss of life. But the defining characteristic of the Nizari Ismaili state was that it was scattered geographically throughout Persia and Syria. The Alamut castle therefore was only one of a nexus of strongholds throughout the regions where Ismailis could retreat to safety if necessary. West of Alamut in the Shahrud Valley, the major fortress of Lamasar served as just one example of such a retreat. In the context of their political uprising, the various spaces of Ismaili military presence took on the name dar al-hijra ( دار الهجرة; land of migration, place of refuge). The notion of the dar al-hijra originates from the time of, who migrated with his followers from alleged persecution to a safe haven in Yathrib (). In this way, the found their dar al-hijra in North Africa. From 1101 to 1118, attacks and sieges were made on the fortresses, conducted by combined forces of Seljuk, Berkyaruq, and Sanjar. Although with the cost of lives and the capture and execution of assassin Ahmad ibn Hattash, the hashashin managed to hold their ground and repel the attacks until the Mongol invasion. Likewise, during the revolt against the Seljuqs, several fortresses served as spaces of refuge for the Ismailis. Assassination [ ]. 14th-century painting of the successful assassination of, vizier of the Seljuq Empire, by an Assassin. It is often considered their most significant assassination. At their peak, many of the of the day were often attributed to the hashashin. Even though the Crusaders and the other factions employed personal assassins, the fact that the hashashin performed their assassinations in full view of the public, often in broad daylight, gave them the reputation assigned to them., and attacking the enemy's psyche was another often employed tactic of the hashashin, who would sometimes attempt to draw their opponents into submission rather than risk killing them. During the Seljuk invasion after the death of, a new Seljuk sultan emerged with the coronation of Tapar's son. When Sanjar rebuffed the hashashin ambassadors who were sent by Hassan for peace negotiations, Hassan sent his hashashin to the sultan. Sanjar woke up one morning with a dagger stuck in the ground beside his bed. Alarmed, he kept the matter a secret. A messenger from Hassan arrived and stated, 'Did I not wish the sultan well that the dagger which was struck in the hard ground would have been planted on your soft breast'. For the next several decades there ensued a ceasefire between the Nizaris and the Seljuk. Sanjar himself pensioned the hashashin on taxes collected from the lands they owned, gave them grants and licenses, and even allowed them to collect tolls from travelers. Downfall and aftermath [ ]. View of Alamut besieged. The last Grand Master of the Assassins at Imam Rukn al-Din Khurshah (1255–1256) was executed by after a devastating siege The Assassins were eradicated by the during the well-documented invasion of. They probably dispatched their assassins to kill. Thus, a decree was handed over to the Mongol commander who began to assault several Hashashin fortresses in 1253 before advance in 1256. The besieged on December 15, 1256. The Assassins recaptured and held Alamut for a few months in 1275, but they were crushed and their political power was lost forever. [ ] The Syrian branch of the Assassins was taken over by the in 1273. The Mamluks continued to use the services of the remaining Assassins: in the 14th century reported their fixed rate of pay per murder. In exchange, they were allowed to exist. Eventually, they resorted to the act of (dissimulation), hiding their true identities until their Imams would awaken them. [ ] According to the historian, the, (Izmaleita or Ismaili/) denomination of Muslims who lived in the from the 10th to the 13th centuries, were employed as mercenaries by the kings of Hungary. However, following the establishment of the Christian, their community was vanquished by the end of the 13th century due to the ordered by the Catholic Church during the reign of. It is said that the Assassins are the ancestors of those given the surname Hajaly, derived from the word 'hajal', a rare species of bird found in the mountains of Syria near. The (bird) was often used as a symbol of the Assassin's order. [ ] Legends and folklore [ ] The legends of the Assassins had much to do with the training and instruction of Nizari fida'is, famed for their public missions during which they often gave their lives to eliminate adversaries. Historians have contributed to the tales of fida'is being fed with hashish as part of their training. Whether fida'is were actually trained or dispatched by Nizari leaders is unconfirmed, but scholars including purport that the assassinations of key figures including Saljuq vizier Nizam al-Mulk likely provided encouraging impetus to others in the community who sought to secure the Nizaris protection from political aggression. Originally, a 'local and popular term' first applied to the Ismailis of Syria, the label was orally transmitted to Western historians and thus found itself in their histories of the Nizaris. The tales of the fida'is ' training collected from anti-Ismaili historians and orientalist writers were compounded and compiled in Marco Polo's account, in which he described a 'secret garden of paradise'. After being drugged, the Ismaili devotees were said to be taken to a paradise-like garden filled with attractive young maidens and beautiful plants in which these fida'is would awaken. Here, they were told by an 'old' man that they were witnessing their place in Paradise and that should they wish to return to this garden permanently, they must serve the Nizari cause. So went the tale of the 'Old Man in the Mountain', assembled by Marco Polo and accepted by, an 18th-century orientalist writer responsible for much of the spread of this legend. Until the 1930s, von Hammer's retelling of the Assassin legends served as the standard account of the Nizaris across Europe. Another one of Hassan's recorded methods includes causing the hashashin to be vilified by their contemporaries. One story goes that Hassan al-Sabah set up a trick to make it appear as if he had one of his hashashin and the 'dead' hashashin's head lay at the foot of his throne. It was actually one of his men buried up to his neck covered with blood. He invited his hashashin to speak to it. He said that he used special powers to allow it to communicate. The supposed talking head would tell the hashashin about paradise after death if they gave all their hearts to the cause. After the trick was played, Hassan had the man killed and his head placed on a stake in order to cement the deception. A well-known legend tells how Count Henry of Champagne, returning from, spoke with Grand Master Rashid ad-Din Sinan at al-Kahf. The count claimed to have the most powerful army and at any moment he claimed he could defeat the Hashshashin, because his army was 10 times larger. Rashid replied that his army was instead the most powerful, and to prove it he told one of his men to jump off from the top of the castle in which they were staying. Surprised, the count immediately recognized that Rashid's army was indeed the strongest, because it did everything at his command, and Rashid further gained the count's respect. Modern works on the Nizaris have elucidated their history and, in doing so, dispelled popular histories from the past as mere legends. In 1933, under the direction of the,, the Islamic Research Association was developed. Historian Vladimir Ivanov was central to both this institution and the 1946 Ismaili Society of. Cataloguing a number of Ismaili texts, Ivanov provided the ground for great strides in modern Ismaili scholarship. In recent years, Peter Willey has provided interesting evidence that goes against the Assassin folklore of earlier scholars. Drawing on its established esoteric doctrine, Willey asserts that the Ismaili understanding of Paradise is a deeply symbolic one. While the description of Heaven includes natural imagery, Willey argues that no Nizari fida'i would seriously believe that he was witnessing Paradise simply by awakening in a beauteous garden. The Nizaris' symbolic interpretation of the Qur'anic description of Paradise serves as evidence against the possibility of such an exotic garden used as motivation for the devotees to carry out their armed missions. Furthermore, Willey points out that a courtier of,, surveyed the Alamut castle just before the Mongol invasion. In his reports about the fortress, there are elaborate descriptions of sophisticated storage facilities and the famous Alamut library. However, even this anti-Ismaili historian makes no mention of the gardens on the Alamut grounds. Having destroyed a number of texts in the library's collection, deemed by Juvayni to be heretical, it would be expected that he would pay significant attention to the Nizari gardens, particularly if they were the site of drug use and temptation. Having not once mentioned such gardens, Willey concludes that there is no sound evidence in favour of these legends. These legends feature in certain works of fiction, including 's 1938 novel, and 's First Crusade novels The Waste Land and The Flowers of Evil. In the latter, the author suggests that the origin of the name Assassin is the Turkish word hashhash meaning opium, partly on the basis that this drug is more suitable for producing the effects suggested in the legends than hashish. Fortresses in Syria [ ]. Map of the, showing the area controlled by the Assassins around, slightly above the center, in white. During the mid-12th century the Assassins captured or acquired several fortresses in the in coastal Syria, including,,,,,,,,, and. For the most part, the Assassins maintained full control over these fortresses until 1270–73 when the sultan annexed them. Most were dismantled afterwards, while those at Masyaf and Ulayqa were later rebuilt. From then on, the Ismailis maintained limited autonomy over those former strongholds as loyal subjects of the Mamluks. In popular culture [ ]. SMITHY FARM CAMPSITE is now open. The campsite offers free access to the animal park, play area. The farm shop sells milk, bacon, eggs, logs and charcoal and much more. New toilet block now open. Shower facilities available between 7am -10pm. Oct 09, 2015 A glimpse back in time over 100 years to a camping scene. Feb 10, 2017 - 2 min - Uploaded by Olex Melnyk26 A camp smithy Robert W Paul, 1899 - Duration: 1:34. Shahdhaval369 188 views 1:34. Smithy's Seaside Adventures. Camp in the community. Took the family for a two night trip out to Smithy's and could have stayed for a year! Oct 17, 2015 A glimpse back in time over 100 years to a camping scene. CHANGE BEFORE GOING PRODUCTIONS: http. Smithy Farm is situated 7 miles from Blackpool, Fleetwood, Lytham St.Annes.There is a service station with a Spar shop just 200 yards away. There are also restaurants and pub just a 15 minute walk away. Tents from £15.00 a pitch, 50% deposit payable by cheque or card. To reserve and check dates please contact us.. For card bookings please ring mobile number. Cheques payable to STUART SALTHOUSE. THIS IS A CHILD FRIENDLY SITE, NO LATE NOISE OR RAVES. This is a DOG friendly site. 50% deposit on booking 100% if less than seven days. Non refundable but can be transferred to another date. CAMPSITE CHARGES FOR 2018 Advance bookings Sunday.to Thursday £15.00 per pitch, plus £3.00 per adult (14 and over) £2.00 for each child (3 and over). Friday and Saturday £20.00per pitch £3.00 per adult and £2.00 per child. Electric hoock ups £5.00. Showers £1.00. Late deals available subject to availability on the day. Books.google.com.tr - This carefully crafted ebook: “Smithy and Nobby Series: 6 Book Collection with 90+ Stories in One Volume” is formatted for your eReader with a functional and detailed table of contents. Edgar Wallace (1875 – 1932) was an English writer. As well as journalism, Wallace wrote screen plays, poetry. Smithy and Nobby Series: 6 Book Collection with 90+ Stories in One Volume. Watch Simple Creature Online Full Movie HD at movies4u For Free. Top 2016 Horror Movie Free Streaming Online HD 1080p Quality. Fast Online Stream All Genre Movies Here Without Registration. Instant Free Movies Watch For Free 123movies Online Complete All Genre Stream. Also Where to Watch Online Complete Simple Creature 2016 Film Online? Simple Creature The movie tells the story of a college student who almost dies in a bus accident. However, thanks to the hybrid technology performed by her biotech. Simple Creature Trailer An obliviously modern college student gets into a near-fatal bus accident, but is reborn through hybrid technology by her biotech father and his. Movies4u Only top Streaming Site To Watch Latest American and Old Movies of Hollywood Free Online Movies4u. Full Online Watch All Movies Free Simple Creature 2016 Watch All Genre Hollywood Without Signup Ads Free Movies Sci-Fi Film to Watch. Start Streaming over 5000 free online movies Documentaries and TV shows Online With English Subtitltes. Watch All Genre Movies Online Free Full Fast. Now Free Steam Simple Creature Top Most Watched film of All Time With English Subtitles. Simple Creature explores the idea of how far humans can be enhanced technologically and still feel human. Science and superheroes: how close are we to creating real. Moreover Full Fast Stream Simple Creature in Top High Quality Watch all your favorite movies and tv shows online for free on Putlocker. Demand American Films of All Category Latest 2016 Horror Film in 1080p Quality. Simple Creature One of the Most Favorite Latest Horror Film Now Watch only at movies4u With All Other Horror Movies Free. Gostream All Latest Films For Free. Watch Simple Creature Fmovies, Cmovies, Solarmovies Movies4u • Initial Release: 28 May 2016 (USA) • Director: Andrew Finnigan • Writers: Andrew Finnigan (story), Andrew Finnigan • Stars: Alycia Delmore, Russell Hodgkinson, D’Angelo Midili • Country: United States of America. August 2nd, 2017 This ’s winner on the theater average chart is an unusual one. It is rare for documentaries to get a sequel and it is rare for documentaries to land in first place on the theater average chart. Opened with an average of $31,206 in four theaters, which is a good sign going forward. Looks like it will be another success for, as it earned an average of $20,693 in three theaters. Is planning to expand wide on Friday, so its average of $17,510 in 20 theaters is a good start. Was the final film in the $10,000 club earning an average of $13,217 in three theaters. July 28th, 2017 There are a lot of great movies on this week’s list, including,,,, and. That last film is opening in limited release, but it deserves box office success, so hopefully this won’t hurt. Isn’t quite great, but it is good enough to be worth seeing. July 11th, 2017 This week, the home market is led by, which is the number one film both in terms of worldwide box office and alphabetically. It earned well over $1 billion worldwide, but it is losing the charm the thrived on during the past few installments. As for the Pick of the Week, I’m going with Underground,, or the. Action Two Jedi Knights escape a hostile blockade to find allies and come across a young boy who may bring balance to the Force, but the long dormant Sith resurface to claim their old glory. About the Movie Experience the heroic action and unforgettable adventures of Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace. See the first fateful steps in the journey of Anakin Skywalker. Stranded on the desert planet Tatooine after rescuing young Queen Amidala from the impending invasion of Naboo, Jedi apprentice Obi-Wan Kenobi and his Jedi Master Qui-Gon Jinn discover nine-year-old Anakin, a young slave unusually strong in the Force. Anakin wins a thrilling Podrace and with it his freedom as he leaves his home to be trained as a Jedi. The heroes return to Naboo where Anakin and the Queen face massive invasion forces while the two Jedi contend with a deadly foe named Darth Maul. Only then do they realize the invasion is merely the first step in a sinister scheme by the re-emergent forces of darkness known as the Sith. By Dino-Specialist! Oh, it's tough to talk about this one. There are good things about this film. And regretably there are some things about the film that could of been cut out. The CGI is good for the most part, but it's noticable in some areas. The plot is actually interesting, but needed to be condensed a bit more. And Jar Jar Binks. I don't hate the character, in fact I thought he was alright when I was younger. And that's the thing: Children would like him and that's fine. I'm more concerned about the plot: A princess fights to free her planet from oppression of the Trade Federation, and the Jedi help her. Along the way, they meet Anakin Skywalker. That sounds like a great story. Unfortunately, it wasn't done to its fullest potential. But despite its flaws, its an alright film. The best thing about this film is the lightsaber fight between Qui Gon Jin and Obi Wan Kenobi vs. Plus John William's score is great, as always. Around the 20-minute mark of Jon Shenk’s miraculous documentary, The Beginning, about the making of Episode I, the true villain of The Phantom Menace makes a cameo appearance. You can glimpse the shadowy figure lurking in the background as Ewan McGregor gets his Padawan buzz cut. His name is Jett Lucas, adopted son of George, and seasoned Star Wars apologists should take note of his most insidious characteristic - he is around the same age as Jake Lloyd’s Anakin Skywalker. A great many fluffed details derailed the most anticipated movie of all time, but the miscalculation that undermined the entire prequel enterprise was George Lucas’ insistence that when we first meet the future Darth Vader he is a little boy who cries when he is separated from his mother. Lucas risked his legacy based on a father’s simple conviction that bad things can happen to good people and a divorcee’s guilt that children from single parent families are more vulnerable than most. To make his point painfully obvious Lucas arranges the action of his first movie since his separation from Marcia Lucas in 1983 around the discovery of a miracle child by a doomed father figure and the eventual passing of this boy from his natural mother to an adoptive parent who is perhaps not yet mature enough to master the task alone. But to accommodate this one action Lucas is forced to postpone every other key event to a later movie – how could a nine-year old participate in the Clone Wars? – and effectively botches up his starting position. It is a mistake from which the prequels never recover. Things get off to a cold start with the much parodied credit crawl. Where Episode IV goes for the in media res jugular – “It is a time of civil war!” - problems in Episode I are not quite so pressing. Events are “alarming” perhaps, there’s certainly plenty of “turmoil” and we all know “taxation” is a thorny issue but the context is clear: like Anakin, this conflict still has some growing up to do. The menace is still phantom. An inexcusably lazy establishing shot - the Jedi shuttle cruises past the camera - and lethargic opening sequence hardly help pick up the pace. In A New Hope’s famous opening salvo the bad guys fire first and ask questions later, in The Phantom Menace the Jedi are ushered into a meeting room while the semi-bad guys go into video conference with Darth Sidious about whether an invasion of Naboo is legal or not. This arse-numbing inactivity recurs throughout The Phantom Menace: because the battles lines are not yet drawn and sides are still being taken there is always much explaining to be done, characters are forever having update meetings or being introduced to one another. The plot machinery lumbers through the gears, hampered further by the strange declarative dialogue and by an apparent disinterest in making these scenes visually interesting. Critics complained that Lucas had got yet worse at writing for humans in the twenty-two years since Star Wars, in fact it is simply that, beyond Alec Guinness talking about the force, the plot of A New Hope requires no exposition - The Phantom Menace on the other hand is all explanation, much of it, like the midichlorians, unwanted and unnecessary. (To be fair, Lucas waited a generation before spoiling his enigmatic myth with background material, the Wachowski’s jumped that particular shark in film two.) And yet there is still much pleasure to be had watching our full-blown Jedi guides in action. Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan quickly discover that things are mercifully worse than the credit crawl predicted, a robot invasion force is being unpacked, Naboo is under actual threat. Sadly, we never actually see any of the massacres that are apparently taking place, instead we land somewhere that looks suspiciously like the woods near Leavesden and meet one of the galaxy’s more annoying comedy sidekicks (although not as annoying as fans frantically searching for a scapegoat would have you believe). After all, this film has at its hero a small boy – it cannot visit the dark 12A places. What Lucas later confessed was a “jazz riff” of a plot wafts our heroes to the holy ground of Tatooine, all sense of urgency dissipated. In A New Hope Luke and Ben, heading the other way, are already too late: Alderaan is gone. From that moment it is a race against time (collapsed to provide greater unity) and a struggle just to stay alive. In The Phantom Menace our heroes are waylaid by a faulty engine. The fate of the galaxy hangs in the balance and Qui-Gon prefers to gamble with a junk-yard dealer than twat him with his lightsaber. Tatooine turns out to be a total bust. They leave Obi-Wan behind, Amidala pretends to be Padme for no good reason, Anakin whines a lot, there’s some mumbo jumbo about a mystical birth and at absolutely no point does Han Solo turn up. This is a section so flabby that even the electrifying pod race goes on for one lap too long. But hell, we meet Vader Jnr. And he says goodbye to his mother, which is the only essential action of the movie, so it’s almost worth the trip. Despite the unspeakable Yoda puppet, more endless politicking and some iffy CGI, the arrival on Coruscant and the subsequent battle of Naboo provide most of the lasting excuses for forgiving The Phantom Menace. At last there are new worlds to explore, new creatures to encounter and new wrinkles to the Star Wars myth. On Coruscant we are free to marvel at the work of Doug Chiang’s design department - every bit the equal of the original trilogy. And during the saga’s very best lightsaber battle John Williams adds another classic theme (Duel Of The Fates) to his masterpiece. The final act is a mess of conflicting ideas and we are forced to root for a tweenage space pilot but you certainly can’t fault it for pace. Perhaps best of all, we have the death of Qui-Gon. Liam Neeson has manfully carried the action on his shoulders throughout (the subsequent prequels desperately miss him) and his final words – “Obi-Wan, promise. Promise me you will train the boy” - provide the movie with its only real weight. Lucas probably imagined that Anakin’s goodbye would be the real heartbreaker but he couldn’t write it and Jake Lloyd couldn’t act it. The irony is, we don’t need it. Given where he is destined to end up, Anakin doesn’t need to be innocence personified when we meet him. Indeed, we are told that the kid is too old to be trained and that the Jedi council fear him, facts that are utterly lost on an audience who see only a bowl-headed brat. And yet if only Lucas could have stopped thinking like a fearful father and acted more like the fearless myth-maker of old, there’s a quick fix that would change everything. Imagine for a moment a street urchin orphaned by the Clone Wars, a scoundrel scamming to survive, already using the force without even realising it. Imagine a cocky fifteen-year old robbing Qui-Gonn, competing with Obi-Wan and flirting with Padme. Imagine, for a second, an Anakin invested with the spirit of a young Han Solo With the galaxy of hype now far, far away Menace seems much less of a public menace. It's been two years since the outbreak, and Breht is a lone hunter in an urban wilderness of zombies. The undead are his prey and he’s learned their ways – learned to survive amongst them. Dispatching them to their final rest, he sells their possessions at isolated settlements, then moves on. He can’t connect with people anymore and some think he’s a freak. When he encount It's been two years since the outbreak, and Breht is a lone hunter in an urban wilderness of zombies. The undead are his prey and he’s learned their ways – learned to survive amongst them. Dispatching them to their final rest, he sells their possessions at isolated settlements, then moves on. He can’t connect with people anymore and some think he’s a freak. When he encounters a teenage girl on the run from a settlement, he is caught in a dilemma. Without him, she won’t last a day. Oct 10, 2012. First of all, I'd like to thank my good friend Amber Porter for suggesting The Dead Undead as a Netflix's Basement review candidate. It's such a rare thing to actually feel the minutes of one's life slipping away, second by painful second. As bad movies go, this one has to be one of the worst. Then again, The. A peaceful camping trip becomes a nightmare when the solitude of a mountain idyll is shattered by the onslaught of a ravenous zombie horde. Fleeing to what appears to. Directed by Matthew R. Anderson, Edward Conna. With Luke Goss, Matthew R. Anderson, Spice Williams-Crosby, Luke LaFontaine. Good Vampires battle Zombie Vampires while. But of the most blessed of all, when this now UnDead be made to rest as true dead, then the soul of the poor lady whom we love shall again be free. Mar 17, 2015 Mix - Hollywood Undead - Day Of The Dead YouTube; Hollywood Undead - Everywhere I Go - Duration: 4:06. HollywoodUndeadVEVO 34,189,603 views. But if he agrees to help her, he’ll not only break the solitude he craves. He’ll provoke deadly new enemies who’d like nothing better than to see him dead. This is closer to 3.5 than 3. The author did some interesting things with the main character that I really liked. The story begins from the POV of a zombie that then connects to the main character Breht (don't get me started on the dumb spelling of his name - it was really annoying throughout the book.) I liked the parallels between Breht and the zombies, and how Breht had isolated himself to the extent that he was on the border of becoming like them. He'd become completely self-sufficient, able This is closer to 3.5 than 3. The author did some interesting things with the main character that I really liked. The story begins from the POV of a zombie that then connects to the main character Breht (don't get me started on the dumb spelling of his name - it was really annoying throughout the book.) I liked the parallels between Breht and the zombies, and how Breht had isolated himself to the extent that he was on the border of becoming like them. He'd become completely self-sufficient, able to survive outside of an enclave, but at what cost? While the action was fast paced and well done, it was Breht's evolution from an almost robotic existence to becoming human again that interested me the most. By the end, he still wasn't all warm and embarrassing of all things human, but he on his way to being better than where he started. I also liked Jana a lot. Determined, able to listen, temperamental but able to control it for the sake of survival. Scared, but at the core, brave. A lot of typical zombie tropes for fans of the genre, but some interesting ideas that make this different from other zombie books. Elizabethtown is a city in and the county seat of Hardin County, Kentucky, United States. The population was 28,531 at the 2010 census, making it the eleventh-largest city in the state. Offers information on government, utilities, maps, census details and code requirements. It is the principal city of and is included in the Elizabethtown, Kentucky Metropolitan Statistical Area, which is included in the Louisville–Jefferson County–Elizabethtown–Scottsburg, KY-IN Combined Statistical Area. Elizabethtown is located at 37°42′10″N 85°51′58″W / 37.70278°N 85.86611°W / 37.70278; -85.86611 (37.702674, −85.866173). According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of 25.8 square miles (66.9 km2). 25.4 square miles (65.7 km2) of it is land and 0.5 square miles (1.2 km2) of it (1.77%) is water. Jun 11, 2008. A shocking crime brings together a frightened girl and a battle-hardened cop in this drama from writer and director Ryoichi Kimizuka. When two children are found murdered, an eighteen-year-old high school student becomes the prime suspect, and the case quickly becomes a media sensation. Sections of this page. Accessibility Help. Press alt + / to open this menu. The Funamuras seem like a ordinary suburban family of four until the police barge into their home to arrest their eldest child. It turns out that their 18-year-old son is the leading suspect in a highly-publicized murder of two grade school sisters. Tokyo police Detective Katsuura is forced to postpone his vacation to assist in the protection of family members of the murder suspect. The police manual for this type of assignment calls for separating family members and taking them to undisclosed locations for questioning. Katsuura is put in charge of protecting the 15-year-old daughter, Saori, but the media circus proves impossible to shake, forcing them to flee Tokyo for the countryside. But even there, angry citizens hunt them down. With no place to hide, Katsuura and Saori find themselves resigned to confront their overturned lives. The popular media maw, from the Brit tabloids to the Hollywood paparazzi, chews up its subjects, from celebs to criminals, everywhere, anytime. If you’re at the receiving end, it’s probably an awful experience. Nonetheless, there’s something special about the voracity of the Japanese media, with its huge, never-ending appetite for smut, scandal, crime — and actors making vapid remarks on movie theater stages. (Watching my fellow hacks frantically recording those remarks, I am always glad I work for publications with little or no need for them.) In Hollywood movies, the media is usually an ineffectual nuisance that the good characters treat with sarcasm or silence. In many Japanese films, however, from Akira Kurosawa’s “Shubun” (“Scandal,” 1950) to Satoru Isaka’s “Focus” (1996) and even Keiichi Hara’s “Kappa no Coo to Natsuyasumi” (“Summer Days with Coo,” 2007), an anime for children, the media is portrayed as a relentless menace, savaging careers and lives. In Ryoichi Kimizuka’s “Dare mo Mamote Kurenai” (“Nobody to Watch Over Me”), this menace has grown beyond its traditional breeding grounds — the weeklies and their ilk — to the Internet with its millions of bloggers and anonymous message-board posters. The film, Kimizuka’s third as a director and umpteenth as a scriptwriter (his many TV and film credits including the megahit “Odoru Daisosasen” [“Bayside Shakedown”] franchise), sensationalizes this threat, with shot after shot of fingers typing away with a voracious insect energy, like army ants swarming over a meal. Dare mo Mamotte Kurenai Rating • • • • • 3.5 out of 5 out of 5 Director Ryoichi Kimizuka Run Time 118 minutes Language Japanese Opens Now showing (Jan. 30, 2009) At the same time, I was reminded of a recent phone conversation I had with a YouTube celebrity, who pleaded with me not to use her real name in a story because she had been receiving death threats. My image of YouTube celeb haters, I must admit, was that of harmless losers, but she was sincerely frightened. The Funamuras seem like a ordinary suburban family of four until the police barge into their home to arrest their eldest child. It turns out that their 18-year-old. Jan 30, 2009 The popular media maw, from the Brit tabloids to the Hollywood paparazzi, chews up its subjects, from celebs to criminals, everywhere, anytime. “Daremo” brings the causes of those fears to vivid demonic life, while claiming, accurately enough, that the victims will find no peace this side of the grave. The central target for the film’s media feeding frenzy is Saori (Mirai Shida), a fresh-faced 15-year-old whose disturbed older brother has been arrested for the murder of two young sisters. Within hours of this monstrous crime, Saori’s ordinary suburban home is invaded by dozens of police and surrounded by hundreds of reporters and cameramen, while Saori and her parents sit trapped and stunned inside, their lives changed forever. Two of the cops, the weary Katsuura (Koichi Sato) and the cynical Mishima (Ryohei Matsuda), are assigned to protect Saori from the media hordes. Katsuura, who has a daughter about the same age, living with his former wife, takes a more than usual interest in this job, whisking the girl from place to place, including the apartment of his current lover (Yoshino Kimura), just one step ahead of the press mob. One reporter (Kuranosuke Sasaki), enraged that the cops are protecting the family of the killer, becomes determined to track Katsuura and his charge to the ends of the Earth, especially after he learns that, three years earlier, Katsuura had failed to stop a criminal he was following from fatally knifing a four-year-old boy. Meanwhile, Saori loses whatever trust she had in the police when she hears that her mother has committed suicide while in their custody. Kimizuka and cinematographer Naoki Kayono have shot the film in a breathless, agitated hand-held style, like a TV news crew following an elusive quarry, which is right for the subject matter, while disguising the overly determined, just-so nature of the plotting. But when Katsuura and Saori take uneasy refuge in an Izu inn run by the parents of the murdered boy (!), and find themselves surrounded by angry netizens, the film begins to feel less like a semi-documentary, more like a TV melodrama about Internet-induced mass hysteria. Also, though Katsuura and Saori become closer, the expected catharsis never quite arrives. This is not a failure of the actors: Both veteran Sato and newcomer Shida acquit themselves well, with Sato making Katsuura’s habitual hand tremor look less like a groan-inducing cliche and more like a genuine expression of his traumatized character. But the plot, with its iron focus on Katsuura’s redemption, doesn’t give their relationship enough room to truly breathe. Still, the timing of “Dare mo Mamote Kurenai” is perfect, given all the current anxieties about not just the Internet, but the state of a world in which our political and economic protectors have proven to be so chillingly incompetent. We can only hope that a few real-life Katsuuras come along, albeit it with steadier hands. Mardi Gras Massacre is a 1978 American horror film written and directed by Jack Weis. It is a semi-remake of the 1963 film Blood Feast. The plot follows a serial killer roaming the streets of New Orleans, Louisiana, sacrificing women to a Peruvian god. The film is notable for its reputation as a 'video nasty,' having been. Mardi Gras Massacre Color, 1978, 93m. Directed by Jack Weis Starring William Metzo, Curt Dawson, Gwen Arment, Ronald Tanet, Laura Misch (Blu-ray & DVD) (US R0 HD/NTSC) / WS (1.78:1) (16:9) Filmed the same year as Halloween but a lot more like on a cocaine bender, this is one of the strangest intersections between the fledgling slasher film and the roughie subgenre. The soundtrack pulses with a great, naked women get sliced up on an alter in a room filled with red drapes, and people sit around in ratty New Orleans restaurants and bars talking about terrible everything is. A psycho Aztec priest named John (Metzo) is stalking the streets of the Big Easy just before Mardi Gras looking for the most corrupt women he can find as offerings to his god. His victim selection is pretty simple, consisting of wandering into bars and asking who's the most evil woman in the room. Then he ties the women down nude and spread-eagled on an altar in his red-lined sacrificial room and slices them up to appease his deity. When bodies start piling up all over town, it's up to two schlubby cops (Dawson and Tanet) to stop before he clears through all the hookers and starts picking off the tourists. Released unrated (and with very good reason) several years later and fairly popular on VHS alongside other slicker sickies like Maniac, this is one seriously filthy number from the guys who made Crypt of Dark Secrets and. Not surprisingly, it also wound up on the final list of the UK's Video Nasties list and got slapped with an X rating by the MPAA, which the distributor dodged by refusing a rating entirely. There's really no filmmaking finesse to be found here from the New Orleans production team, sticking to static compositions straight out of the TV drama playbook. Fortunately that doesn't matter at all given the seedy characters (all of the women are treated like garbage but the men are far sleazier, including the obligatory cop-hooker romantic subplot), aforementioned soundtrack, and truly extreme levels of gore, with lots of fake guts, latex, and stage blood at regular intervals. Code Red first brought this to DVD in 2012 with a disclaimer about the fact that only a one-inch master in the VCX vaults was available for the disc, but it actually looks pretty strong under the circumstances with better detail and color separation than the VHS version. (That ancient tape provided the source for the insultingly overpriced bootleg disc from Jef Films/Televista, which should be avoided at all costs.) A 12-minute interview with Metzo is the only really substantial extra, but it's a doozy; he talks about getting the job on the spot without auditioning, shooting around Jackson Square, working with scantily clad actresses on the sacrifice scenes in freezing conditions, and pulling that car out of the Mississippi River. As extra icing you also get trailers for Blood Mania, The Hearse, and The Babysitter. In 2016, the label revisited the film for a Blu-ray release and. This seemed like a film that might never get a fresh new transfer, but here we are with this grubby slasher looking like. Well, maybe not a million bucks, but at least several thousand more than it has before. Detail sharpens up and improves dramatically, those frequent heavy reds are now perfectly resolved, and the framing seems more balanced (while also revealing some amusing, protracted goofs with those latex appliances). The DTS-HD MA English mono tracks also sounds much more impressive, delivering some nice bass during those disco interludes and dialogue coming through with extra clarity. Both the Maria hosting bits and the Metzo interview have been carried over, while the theatrical trailer (4x3 letterboxed) has been added on as well. Reviewed on September 22, 2016. Mardi Gras Massacre is based on the movie that broke the barrier in showing gore on screen, the 1963 Blood Feast, but Massacre puts the gore in New Orleans and makes the ancient rituals Aztec. In this version of the same story, an Aztec priest goes around the world looking for prostitutes to sacrifice to Coatla, the Goddess of the Four Directions and Queen of Evil. Since the sacrifice involves removing the victim's heart, in one victim after the next, even the gore starts to match the tedium of the rest of the movie long before the final prostitute is dispatched. |
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