Film According to Mr Cinema review: "Escape From New York" 1981

John Carpenter’s 1981 film “Escape From New York” was one of the director’s early feature films. The futuristic story sees Snake Plissken (Kurt Russel), a dangerous criminal who is sentenced to be captivated in the now sealed off maximum security prison of the former state of Manhattan. As he is being prepared for arrival, he is conned by police commissioner: Hauk (Lee Van Cleef) into saving the President who had become trapped within the perimeter walls on his way to a summit meeting.

The movie, in my humble opinion, is ordinary at best. Though the visuals and concepts were nothing short of stunning, none of the characters really developed terribly much, nor did they really show much personality at all. I also feel as though most of the characters were heavily under-utilised, especially the madcap, somewhat joker-esque Romero (Frank Doubleday) who, I felt, showed a lot of promise as a villain. The final thing that I found somewhat annoying was that The Duke (Isaac Hayes) was not as evil and merciless as his reputation would lead one to believe; he was just a powerful man in prison who was no meaner than any other hardened criminal. I did, however enjoy seeing the colourful and vibrant world that Carpenter had dreamed up and executed with skill and precision.

Rating: 6/10

Film According to Mr Cinema review: Jacob's Ladder (1990)

Adrian Lyne’s innovative 1990 horror classic “Jacob’s Ladder” really gets under my skin more than any film I’ve seen since the original Japanese “Ringu”. “Jacob’s Ladder” trails Jacob Singer, a veteran of the Vietnam War, who after an odd incident among his platoon is sent home. The film jumps in time between his experiences in ‘Nam and his current life, in which he finds himself being chased and tormented by hellish, demonic creatures intent on murdering Jacob. Soon he is contacted by an old friend, who was in the same squadron as Jacob, and confides in Jacob to seeing similar horrific images and dies soon afterwards; after consulting several other friends from his army division who have all been seeing the same thing, Jacob becomes intent on finding the reason for this.

This film, though, through my description may sound pretty standard fare for a horror movie, is anything but standard. It is truly a very creepy and bizarre film. Jacob’s ladder is truly an unnerving film that is quite unlike anything else I have seen before. The movie was the first to use the patented horror technique of speeding up blurred images to create a scary supernatural effect. For the fact that this film managed to successfully freak me out while managing to fascinate me, I would recommend this movie to most any serious horror fan. If there was anything that bothered me about the film, it would be that it peaked too quickly and lost some level of intensity through that, however this is easily overlookable through the fact that it is an otherwise extraordinary and completely uncanny picture.

Rating: 8.5/10