Botched (2007)

I must admit, I am intrigued.

Would you say it's worthy of a blind buy Alex?

WTF? Netflix doesn't have it yet as a "coming soon" title. It sure does look splatsticky!

Looks amazing. Although by the looks of it they give away all the really gory/funny parts away in the trailer. Hopefully my will-power is strong enough to not watch it 8 times a day until release so it will all be fresh in my head.

I suck at the game.

Awesome to hear the DVD will be out in May.

Just a reminder that this comes out today on R1 DVD.

Netflix has it finally, moved it to the top of my queue... and it's listed as "Very Long Wait".

Looks like I'm gonna blind buy this fucker.

I was thinking the same. Alex sold me on it.

Turns out it's been out here a while, I just happened upon it in the weekly section at work, and was like holy shit it's the movie Alex raved about, I don't think this was the unrated version though, as a few splats seemed prematurely cut away from. Alex was absolutely bang on in his review though, this movie seems like it's received a few blows to the head of it's own, but damned is it fun.

I might have to if the Netflix doesn't ship soon.

Yeah, it's at the top of my queue with a little, evil, red "Very Long Wait" next to it. Bummer.

I picked it up from Blockbuster this past weekend and watched it. I'll throw my hat into the ring with the rest of you cats - this was a fun movie. I especially liked the ex-Army guy. Guy stole the show. The bad guys were so over the top insane. And the girl from Dexter was hot. Thanks for the recommendation, Alex.

Colour it lost in translation, I guess -- this premiered at Frighfest to a rather lukewarm response, with good reason. This picture is pretty dreadful. Kudos to a first timer for getting it made at all, but from the turgid comedy accents to the turgidererer techno-folk music interludes and wackily histionic acting it's really the worst kind of post-modern-Tarantino/Ritchie-spawned spoof.

We should really be looking for more from our low budget horror, no? Wrong Turn 2 and Hatchet set a very bar. Which this slips under.

I'm amazed it gets so much of a pass.

question for those who got the American DVD, is the blurb on the back of the box as spoiler laden as the one we got? Between the pictures and the explanation I don't think I've ever seen such a spoilery back of a DVD.

Scan (Don't click it if you havn't seen the flick)

I bought earlier today and just finished watching it, I fuckin' loved it.

The R1 packaging isn't spoilerific. But I find that the R2 does have a pretty steel book available.

It meant to say "well hung bar".

Better and more original? Seriously? That's crazy talk -- Green and Lynch get it. That's blindingly obvious from frame one of both their pictures. Resources or liberal homage be damned (and by this point in a mostly moribund genre decade, that's an utterly moot point) they get the genre as much as a young Raimi or Jackson did in their rough-round-the-edges, make-shift days. They're worthy peers to Marshall or Roth or the younger Masters of Horror, if not squite the older ones yet - thojgh t here's a case that says they're more relevant than at least half that guard based on recent output. This Kit guy -- not so much, it seems. It's more about the (botched) gag-potential of off-kilter heist scenarios, which was tired when Skip Woods made Thursday. The horror element's not much cop either, is it?

Aside from thematic issues, Botched is also a clumsy picture. A bit ugly to look at too: overlit and lacking any kind of atmosphere.

Okay, it has some fairly nifty effects work and it'd edited to make the best of clumsy staging (and the one corridor they were able to use). But the performances are universally grotesque, the gags limp and the overall conception is -- with the exception of the rather nice opening steadicam fake-take -- pretty uninspiring. See Chris Smith/James Moran's Severence for how to do this kind of thing right.


Let's be honest, it's a competent romp. The guy got his film made, an achievement in itself. And it looks like a feature film, a real feature film. Score one up for him -- it's totally comendable. It's a first film of which one can be unashamed. But removed from that, I can't really see anything in it that makes it noteworthy as someone to watch out for. Someone to shoot fine TV maybe (not a bad vocation at all). Or to bring in something that's not a complete mess of contunuity or cheap looking video (it's not, say, Decadent Evil-bad). Or if the world's really looking for a new John Badham or something.

I'm just surprised that something so unremarkable is raising so many spirits, is all. I guess times are tough.

And here's to hoping that Netflix starts stocking this thing. it's been "very long wait" for almost three weeks. Might have to break my no-blind-buy rule.

Severance is better than all mentioned thus far, in my opinion (haven't seen Hatchet yet). Not that it's a race. Severance is not hit you over the head funny like Botched or even Wrong Turn, but I say it mixes the horror and the comedy better. It gets better on repeat viewings Alex, I swear. And I think it's just a beautifully made film.

Anyway, I think Botched is a lot of fun. Laughs are much more on its mind than horror. Sure, it's ugly-looking, but the performances and crazy premise won me over. Wrong Turn 2 is a throw away. It's fine, but the only stuff I really dug was the Rollins as Rambo stuff. I appreciated the amount of blood and gore the director covered the screen in, however. And I'll certainly watch what he has to offer in the future. But I think his intentions were better than the film he made.

Just to reiterate, I'm not comparing the films specifically to a young Raimi or Jackon's. I'm saying the spirit they infuse their films with can't help but remind one of that exuberance, that frantic pace and verve and energy. Something missing from Botched from its achingly slick-seeming opening frames -- it feels drowsy.

I can't for the life of me think why a poorly pantomimed recreation of a deranged grotesquely-acted Russian is any more or less of a credible villain than something like Victor Crowley (who's admittedly not a character for the ages but fits in nicely and unassumingly with that whole genre trope). In fact, that Crowley as an actual on-screen character wasn't overly dwelt upon was part of the success of Green's picture/homage (in the film, apart from -- importantly -- *other characters* talking him up, adding to his mythology and the silent flashback, Crwoley's practically a mere hulking shadow for the most part).

Compare that to Ryan's picture which just manages to dwell on the complete ridiculousness of its villains. He gives at least one of them turgidly OTT speeches and pontificating as if they were as viable n'er-do-wells as Peggy Cummins and John Dahl. Add to that a barrage of tonally deficient "comedy" music that wouldn't be out of place in a Meet the Spartans skit and the whole thing's farcical. If that weird running-on-the-spot chase scene is the only thing approaching true energy in the picture, no wonder if feels drawn out. Simple energy -- that what I feel Lynch/Green have on Ryan. They understand simple things like the power of an edit...they're better filmmakers.

From great experience, rowdy midnight crowds at film festivals (and I make this a very marked distinction from regular genre festival crowds) have been known to be appreciative of a lot of stuff that in the cold light of day dates incredibly badly. I've done it, certainly.

On another note: Matchstick's onto something with the way Severance manages to juggle (or aleast dovetail) tone -- the severed head gag set-up/pay-off is more adapt and sophisticated (relatively) than 20 minutes worth of Sean Pertwee attempting a Russian accent (some pleasure can be derived from discerning which execrable accent is worse -- Jamie Forman's or Pertwee's). There's a payoff to the set-ups in Severance that is completely missing from Botched -- something Severance writer James Moran's status as up and coming sci-fi writer du jour in the UK is testament to...And yes, it's extremely well made. Though I'm not a huge fan of Creep Chris Smith is a definite filmmaker to watch.

I seriously think it must be a trans-Atlantic point of difference.

I can't share the love either.
It wasn't bad. It was just lacking.
You need a better villain to offset all the craziness of the music and oddball characters.
Still, I'm glad I saw it. I would have missed it altogether if not for Alex's recommendation.

Toss me in the underwhelmed camp as well. It held my attention, but there's just too many acting and execution problems to put it in a win column. And Dorff seems to somehow be getting worse at acting as this decade progresses. He was better 21 years ago in the uniformly awful "The Gate" than he was here.

Caught it last night. It didn't rock my world, but I was pleased. Lots of humor and gore. It was overlit and the direction is a bit pedestrian (a few sections got a little samey/draggy), but I'm willing to forgive that due to the originality and effort on display. I honestly didn't know how it would all turn out. Some of the moments that stood out for me:

SPOILERS!

- Ivan the Terrible pirouetting to "Night on Bald Mountain"
- Jaime Murray's at-attention cleavage
- Molotov-rat