ROBOGEISHA (2009) - not quite a cult classic

ROBOGEISHA

(2009, Japan)

This should have been a winner...

Cross the polite, subservient world of Japanese geisha with the high-tech armaments of Robocop and this is what you get. Two wannabe geishas turned robot assassins, recruited into an army of… even more robot assassins, all working for an evil mastermind who wants to… well, you’ll have to watch to find out.

But I can’t quite explain it. This movie is packed with everything that I usually enjoy in a movie: killer robots, unnecessary gore, hidden weapons, girls with guns… even a giant monster. Admittedly the fantastic trailer had raised my expectations, but the movie didn’t deliver any more entertainment. I was a little wary because I hadn't enjoyed Machine Girl, and had skipped over Tokyo Gore Police completely. All three films are from the same production team.

I was also cautious because these are Japanese films that have been made specifically for a US audience. Presumably that meant more women in bikinis, no sex, loads of knives and guns, and plenty of blood. All perfectly understandable elements for the exploitation genre, but I think RoboGeisha misjudges what passes for American humour.

It’s good to treat this amount of cartoon violence with humour, but it’s mostly a Japanese sense of humour which really doesn’t translate. I appreciated the excessive number of weapons springing out of every item of clothing and bodily orifice, but that's all in the trailer. The overkill of a long, slow-motion gun battle is also very dull if every gunshot is a CGI flash, and every bullet-hit is a CGI blood splatter.


When FX make-up is used, it’s impressive, like the throwing stars in the face (above). There’s also some Savini-style blood-letting. I just wish they’d used these physical effects more, with one exception. ‘The samurai sword in the ass’ is too realistic and downright nasty to be funny (it’s in the trailer).

The constant switching between practical FX and computer wounds is very distracting. RoboGeisha has plenty of weapons, but many have no visible effect, meaning there's no threat. Even when the effect was just to have a little steam rising from someone’s acid-scarred face, why superimpose it later when they could have just blown some smoke up her shirt?


When there isn’t fighting, there’s drama. Mainly the rivalry between the two sisters, which is rather an unimaginative relationship, but well-acted. Both lead actresses are also good at comedy, but a cartoon tale of mayhem has no room for lengthy scenes of dialogue. This overplotting lengthens RoboGeisha to over 100 minutes, way too long for such a silly idea. It also takes the first half of the film to bring us up to speed with RoboGeisha’s origin.

This isn’t nearly as bad a let down as MegaShark vs Giant Octopus, with it’s similarly promising bonkers trailer. RoboGeisha delivers what it promises, but with too much repetition, too much plot and not enough laughs…

RoboGeisha is out on DVD and Blu-Ray in the UK, from CineAsia Extreme.

Here's the trailer...

My All-Star Picks

Every year I take a somewhat serious stance on all-star voting for the mlb all-star game. Every year a great player is sure to get snubbed, while a fan favorite who is not doing well makes the team. I understand that people vote in players they know by name or are on their team. I always was a stat based guy, it is what I attribute my success in fantasy baseball too. So when making my picks a lot of it is based of stats, but I also looked at what I thought would make a great overall team as well as what players I feel should go...So without delay here are my picks for the all-star game rosters. All stats mentioned are through 6/27/10

American League Starting All-Star Roster

1B - Miguel Cabrera - Detroit Tigers
Cabrera is off to a monster start so far. Batting .332/ 20HR/ 64 RBI. He leads all AL 1B in RBI and is tied for first in HR's with Paul Konerko, and is second in batting average. There are a lot of other good choices in this group of players but Cabrera stands out. Others who should make the team:Paul Konerko- White Sox, Justin Morneau- Twins, Kevin Youkilis - Red Sox


2B - Robinson Cano - New York Yankees
Cano is killing the ball this year and leads all AL 2B in Average (.359) , HR (15) and RBI (53). Not sure why there is any questions who else to vote for, it was probably the easiest choice I made this year. Others: Dustin Pedroia - Red Sox and Howie Kendrick- Angels


SS- Elvis Andrus - Texas Rangers
I am sure this pick is not most likely everyones choice, but hear me out. Andrus leads all AL SS (qualified) in Average (.291), Sb's (21), and Runs (51). I figure Jeter is a lock to make the team so why waste a vote on him, go for a guy who leads off for the best hitting team. He also has a great glove in field. Others: Alex Gonzales- Blue Jays and Derek Jeter - Yankees


3B - Adrian Beltre - Boston Red Sox
As much as I dislike this player this was an obvious choice. Beltre is having a monster year for the Red Sox. He is hitting .340/ 12 HR/ 52 RBI. Him and Evan Longoria have the same exact amount of HR and RBI, but Beltre is batting .340 and Longoria .297. Beltre also has one of the best gloves at 3b. Others: Evan Longoria -Rays, Michael Young- Rangers, Alex Rodriguez- Yankees.


C- Joe Mauer - Minnesota Twins
He is a fan favorite and is also having a great season, so I can't see why not to vote for him. He is hitting .304/ 3HR/ 33 RBI, he is third in AL Catcher's in RBI's. He also has a great glove and like I said he is someone people want to see in the game (including this blogger). Others: John Buck - Blue Jays, Victor Martinez - Red Sox, Kurt Suzuki - Oakland.


OF (3) - Josh Hamilton - Texas Rangers
Hamilton in just killing the ball this year, and is another fan favorite. But he really deserves to be an all star starter. He leads all AL Outfielders in Average at .346 and also has 18 HR/ 57 RBI.


Carl Crawford -Tampa Bay Rays
Crawford makes the team because he is a great fielder, runner, and base stealer. He leads all AL OF's in runs (56) and tied for second in SB's. He also has 7 HR and 38 RBI. Sorry Ichiro but there is a new guy in town.


Vernon Wells - Blue Jays
Wells has had a resurgence this year with the Blue Jays and is batting .285/ 19 HR
second in AL OF)/ 47 RBI as well as 44 runs scored. Wells numbers are just all around good, and I belive a Blue Jay should be starting this game based off how good the team has been hitting the ball. Wells also has one of the best arms in the game in the field.



Others: Ichiro - Mariners, Alex Rios - White Sox, Torri Hunter - Angels, Shin-Soo Choo - Indians

DH - Vladimir Guerrero - Texas Rangers
I know this makes 3 Rangers starting in the game, but they lead the the universe in offense and seeing Vlad come back to play in Anaheim should be fun sight. Plus Vlad really is deserving of the spot, he is hitting .327/ 15 HR/ 60 RBI/ 48 Runs.
Others: David Ortiz - Red Sox, Jose Guillen - Royals, Jose Bastista - Blue Jays


Starting Pitcher - David Price - Tampa Bay Rays
Price is having a season that shows why he was taken #1 overall in the draft. He leads the AL in wins with 11 and is second in ERA (2.44). He also has 84 K's and plays on a good Rays team. It would be nice to see some new blood starting in the game this season.
National League
1B - Albert Pujols - St. Louis Cardinals
This was the toughest choice I had to make, but its Pujols,,why shouldn't he make start? Well him, Joey Votto, and Adrian Gonzalez all have almost the exact same numbers, its almost scary how close they are. Pujols is batting .306, Votto .305, and Gonzalez .307. Pujols has 16 HR so does Votto and Gonzalez. Pujols has 51 RBI, Votto has 50, and Gonzalez has 49. Votto and Pujols also have the same exact number of SB, while Gonzalez and Pujols have the same amount of Runs (41)but Votto trumps them with (47). I give the nod to Pujols because he is a fan favorite, perennial MVP candidate, and leads in OBP. Others: Joey Votto - Reds, Adrian Gonzalez - Padres, Ryan Howard - Phillies.



2B - Brandon Phillips - Cincinnati Reds
Phillips leads all NL 2B in runs (57)and is batting .311/ 9HR/ 25 RBI/ 10 SB and unless you haven't watched the highlight he is always make some amazing catch or play in the field. The Reds are another surprise team who I would like to see get a starter in the game. Others:Martin Prado - Braves, Chase Utley - Phillies, Rickie Weeks - Brewers.


SS - Hanley Ramirez - Florida Marlins
Ramirez is my pick because he is having a great season once again, batting .296/ 11 HR/ 44 RBI/ 14 SB/ 41 Runs. Among qualified SS he is 3rd in batting, 2nd in HRs and 2nd in RBI (Juan Uribe leads in both those categories) . So why did I chose Ramirez over a player on my own team? Well as much as it pains me to say no one wants to see Juan Uribe start the All-Star game and Ramirez has a better average, stolen bases, and scores a tad more. Others: Juan Uribe - Giants,
Troy Tulowitzki - Rockies, Jose Reyes - Mets.


3B - David Wright - New York Mets
Wright is having a monster first half, much to my surprise. I looked at the stats and did not know he was doing so well this year. He is hitting .300/ 14 HR/ 61 RBI/ 13 SB/ 42 Runs. He is also the best 3B fielder in the NL and is another fan favorite and all around good player. Others: Scott Rolen - Reds, Casey McGehee - Brewers, Ryan Zimmerman - Nationals.



C- Miguel Olivo - Colorado Rockies
I bet no one else saw this pick coming. Catcher is a cateogry where most people pick players who they have picked every year before but I do not see why. Olivo is having a great season for the Rockies hitting .295/ 10 HR/ 34 RBI/ 31 Runs and even 4 SB. Among NL C's he is 3rd in runs scored, 2nd in HR, and leads all in RBI's, OPS, and SLG. He has the same Fielding % as Yadier Molina so he can field as well. Others: Brian McCann - Braves and Rod Barajas - Mets.


OF (3) - Andre Ethier - Los Angeles Dodgers
Ethier has had a big season for the Dodgers, a season where he missed a few weeks with an injury. But he is still batting .317/12HR/ 46 RBI. His numbers would probably lead the league if he wasn't out.


Ryan Braun - Milwaukee Brewers
Braun is becoming one of the most consistent players in the majors. He is having another great season batting .301/ 10 HR/ 47 RBI/ 11 SB/ and 47 Runs. I like seeing him play the game and would love seeing him start in the all-star game.


Andrew McCutchen - Pittsburgh Pirates
A Pirate starting??! Yep, I was looking at stats and he leads the NL OF in SB (19) and is second in Runs (48, Matt Kemp has 52), and he is on a terrible team! Plus he can play CF and is batting .301/ 7 HR/ 23 RBI.

Others: Colby Rasmus - Cardinals, Jayson Werth - Phillies, Corey Hart - Brewes, Chris Young - Diamondbacks, Shane Victorino - Phillies, Carlos Gonzalez - Rockies.

DH - Adrian Gonzalez - San Diego Padres
Again this could just as easily gone to Joey Votto, but the Padres have been the most surprising team in the majors this season. They do deserve to have a starter in the game and I am sure they will have a lot more pitchers represent them. Others: Joey Votto - Reds, Ryan Howard - Phillies, Corey Hart - Brewers, Troy Glaus - Braves, Adam Dunn- Nationals, Jayson Werth - Phillies,



Starting Pitcher - Ubaldo Jimenez - Colorado Rockies
I want my NL to win this year, having Ubaldo starting with his own catcher Olivo calling the signs would be nice. Plus let's face it this is one of the easiest choices I could make. Jimenez is having a season for the history books. He is 13-1 with an era of 1.60! Thats all I need to say.

Farewell, Frank Sidebottom - the death of a clown

Monday evening, I was shocked and saddened by the sudden death of Chris Sievey, a man whose face I'd never seen.

To the world he was mainly known as an alter-ego, his true identity as successfully shielded as Batman, for many years. Frank Sidebottom was his comedy creation, first on radio, then stage then TV. The characters he created for Manchester's Piccadilly Radio were as inventive and funny as those Kenny Everett created for London's Capital Radio. But Frank was even more anarchic, never pretending that his sidekick, the demented Little Frank, was anything more than a puppet made of cardboard.

Their adventures in space, football, pop music (Little Frank released records as well) and Sherwood Forest were little more than sound effects and library music, with Chris and a few friends ("Lard!") doing the voices, but they were as evocative as any radio play, and side-splittingly funny.

Having fronted bands before, notably The Freshies ('I Can't Get Bouncing Babies by The Teardrop Explodes'), it was easy for Chris to take Frank on stage to sing his songs, play his banjo or cheap synthesizer, and argue with Little Frank. The best joke was that Sidebottom's skills at ventriloquism were completely hidden by his mask. The huge proportion of Frank's head was due to the character originally being a schoolboy, broadcasting Timperley Radio from his mum's garden shed.

Frank's crap puppetry was all part of the fun. But if he invented a new character, the audience expected to see them up on stage too. Even Breville Toaster Puppet could make a grand entrance, riding in an Action Man jeep.

Frank's escalating popularity seemed to peak when he hit National Children's TV, like as a regular part of Saturday Morning's TX, presented by Tony Slattery. I thought this was the start of the big time for Frank, but no.

He continued touring, (supporting John Cooper Clarke earlier this year) but his music is only represented as a couple of belated compilation CDs, of his best songs and unforgettable medleys (A Tribute to Queen). Apparently, he had fans in the US and I'm pleased to hear his appeal travelled so far. Now that he's gone, I expect to fill in the gaps of just what he got upto through the years.

My fondest memory isn't of seeing Frank in concert, but when he recreating the madness of his radio sketches in one of his Christmas Pantomimes at a packed Timperley Labour Club. Effortlessly funny, he could create a whole evening's entertainment out of cardboard. If anything went wrong, he could improvise his way out, or simply blame Little Frank.

I was hoping one day to see an interview with the man behind the mask, and see Chris actually doing 'that voice', finally linking up the man to the character. But perhaps it's better this way.

Sadder news came later in the week, in that Chris was flat broke at the end. But his many fans are making sure he'll get a fitting send-off. Here's a fuller career obituary from The Independent. A picture gallery from The Guardian. Frank's blog is brimfull of all his recent works and remains online.

One of my favourite records was this medley of Frank's favourite sci-fi shows, bashed together into a medley.

There's still plenty of Frank Sidebottom on YouTube - clips of his TV shows, pop videos, live performances and even an animated visualisation of Frank's world, entirely made of cardboard.

Chris, Frank, I thank you.

OSS 117: LOST IN RIO (2009) - a very welcome sequel

OSS 117: LOST IN RIO
(2009, France, OSS 117: Rio Ne Repond Plus...)

France's most oblivious secret agent in the summer of love...

This is last year's sequel to the highly enjoyable OSS 117: Cairo - Nest of Spies (2006). OSS 117 was originally a serious character in books and films, a French secret agent who first appeared in 1949. These new films spoof the old OSS 117, James Bond films and, this time, even Hitchcock.


The year is 1968. Once again, France's best secret agent, (the best at vanity and pig-headedness) is on the case. Besides an important mission to Rio to deal with Nazi blackmailers, he's also being targeted by Chinese assassins. Going undercover to team up with the American and Israeli secret services, tracking the blackmailer leads him around some of Brazil's most spectacular tourist spots.


The fun begins from the very first second, with a spoof of the late 1960s use of complicated split screen images (think Grand Prix or The Thomas Crown Affair), filling the widescreen frame with a brilliantly co-ordinated overuse of parallel action. If you think you know split-screen from Brian De Palma films, when the image is neatly divided down the middle, prepare to be dazzled.

While I thought there wasn't quite enough action in the first film, there's no shortage of gun battles here. While the hail of bullets manage to miss our hero, he never, ever empties his clip.


OSS 117's ignorance of world politics and history missed the point of the entire Muslim nation while he was in Cairo. Now working with Israeli agents, it's similarly excruciating as he, gulp, only seems to remember the Nazis because of Hitler, rather than their treatment of Jewish people. Added to this are his complete insensitivity to the equality of women, the hippy revolution or innocent bystanders. There are very few back references to the first film and thankfully few repeated gags from the first film.

With advanced digital compositing, it's hard to say how much of Lost In Rio was actually shot there. But I recognised a few nods to the Bond film Moonraker (1979) which used some of the same Brazilian locations. Jean-Paul Belmondo's That Man From Rio (1964) may have been a reference too, which also visited Brasilia, while the city was still being built.

Thankfully OSS 117 gets to dance again. Once more, actor/comedian Jean DuJardin is effortlessly funny, and I'd like to see more of his films, comedy or otherwise, but none seem to be subtitled anywhere else in the world.

I also really liked the soundtrack, a very catchy mix of contemporary crooners and modern lounge pastiche, incorporating nods to John Barry, Henry Mancini and Bernard Herrmann. I can't find it on CD anywhere, but can be downloaded from iTunes and Amazon.

While a third film is supposed to be in production at the moment, OSS 117: Lost In Rio is out now on DVD in the UK from ICA Films, and coming soon to the US. The region 2 DVD only has English subtitles, with no dubbed audio track.


Here's the movie trailer on YouTube...

Toy Story 3

I know its only a kids movie but damn so far Toy Story 3 is probably my favorite movie of the year! If you haven't seen it I would strongly recommend you get your ass out to the theatre and see it now. It is getting to the point where CGI movies could be up for Best picture oscars, especially since they have upped the number of nominees to 10. For a movie like Toy Story 3 I do not see why it shouldn't be nominated it far superior then most live action movies released this year.

Anyway I loved this movie because, well it has to do with growing up and letting go of things you once held close. As a kid I had more then my fair share of toys (mostly GI Joe, Ghostbusters, and Starting Line-Ups) thanks to my father working at Toys R Us for twenty years. Toys were very important way to connect with my dad and my brother when I was a kid. When I started to grow I would collect less and less toys and only bought an occasional sports toy. I had to stop collecting and get on with being a grown up (of sorts).

In the movie Andy (the kid from Toy Story 1 and 2) is now going off to college and has to make the same choices that we all do as we grow up, what do you do with these plastic things that once meant so much to you? Sure you can throw them in the attic or display them but they never get played with. Then you have your own kids or move out and you no longer have space or time for your childhood relics. Toy Story 3 is a movie that really delves into the toys and the choices we make. Of course they are just plastic but the movie does a good job of showing how the toys would feel if they were real.

If you have to see one movie right now, I wouldn't bother wasting your money on Jonah Hex (but Megan Fox is hot!) or Shrek the Third(the first one was okay and every sequel since has been terrible). I have seen the movie twice now and both times I enjoyed it just as much. I saw the movie with 4 other heterosexual males and we all admitted to getting choked up near the end of film. Go see a movie that will take you back to the time when you were a kid and playing with toys is all that mattered to you.

STREET HAWK (1985) - finally on DVD

STREET HAWK

(1985, TV, USA)

The man... the machine... Street Hawk (rrrm rrrm)

I never missed an episode when this went out, and have been waiting years to get this on DVD. But a warning to newcomers - it's soooo 1980s...

A top secret government experiment involves a souped-up attack-motorbike to fight crime. Jesse Mach (Rex Smith) can't tell a soul that he's secretly the rider of the mysterious Street Hawk. He has a 'co-pilot', who co-ordinates Street Hawk's missions back at their hidden base, inventor Norman Tuttle (Joe Regalbuto). The secret street exit was hidden behind a sliding billboard in an alleyway, which always reminded me of Batgirl's similar Batbike exit. Can't have been much of a secret location because Mach's flashy bright yellow Mustang was always parked outside, next to Tuttle's station wagon...

The short-lived TV show had storylines and dialogue that a five-year old could follow, which didn't really sit comfortably with its atrocious lessons in road safety in road safety. Yes kids, try and jump your bike over police cars, through windows, and ride as fast as you can - you'll never hit anything, honestly you won't...


Like so many other family-friendly action shows, the characters are two-dimensional (grumpy police chief, geeky engineer), and the comedy relief is goofy rather than funny. I only ever saw Rex Smith (Jesse Mach) in TV bit parts after this, which was a real waste of a leading man - his half-naked turn in the foam-filled, suit-moulding tube (glimpsed in the theme tune) made me an instant fan. Joe Regalbuto (Norman) had previously been in the bonkers Conan knock-off The Sword and the Sorceror (1982) - he was good, funny, but looked rather out of place amongst all the barbarian mullets.


The technology is fantasy, rather than reality-based. A bike with jet thrusters, a laser, missiles! It's a comic strip, but at least it's an original custom-made concept, rather than an adaption. Despite the high-tech dressing, (when technology meant flashing lights and dry ice, and animation poses as computer displays) the thrills are not from the visual effects (like the 'particle beam') but from car chases and explosions, placing this in similar territory to Airwolf and Knight Rider.


BUT. For all its faults, where else can you get so many car and bike (and boat and helicopter) stunts in a weekly TV show today? In every episode, there's never a shortage of genuinely exciting stuntwork. Street Hawk actually deserved slow-motion for its leaps and crashes. From the high jump through a (closed) window, to chasing a helicopter at high speed.

The fake sped-up 'hyperthrust' mode wasn't as dangerous, but fired-up every episode - as Street Hawk was cleared to travel at 200 mph through Los Angeles at all times of the day. How traffic could be stopped for a stretch of twenty miles, with a guarantee of zero jaywalkers, was beside the point. The effect took a visual cue from Koyaanisqatsi - headlights and neon at night, flashing past as streaks.

Guest stars included Christopher Lloyd playing almost too nasty a villain to square up to such cartoony heroes. There's also Bianca Jagger, Sybil Danning (Battle Beyond the Stars) and Marjoe Gortner (Earthquake, Food of the Gods), but famously this was George Clooney's second-ever featured role. Rex Smith was making much of that episode, on his recent UK publicity tour for the DVD launch, saying that Clooney owed him a return favour for Smith giving Clooney his big break in Hollywood...


Another aspect that helps me rank this over Knight Rider, is the synthesizer soundtrack. Tangerine Dream's track Le Parc was used as the theme tune and the band provided the background score throughout. This is the same year they were brought in to score Ridley Scott's Legend for the re-edited US version, replacing Jerry Goldsmith's soundtrack.

The movie-length pilot episode (well, barely 75 minutes long) appeared on laserdisc, but this UK region 2 set is Street Hawk's world debut on DVD - the entire series runs only 13 episodes. It's coming to the US in July.

For absolutely everything else about Street Hawk, there's an extensive fansite here.

The theme tune is here on YouTube...

Too horrible for horror films – children as victims

Would you kill a child… character?

The new Icons of Suspense DVD set of Hammer films includes the previously rare Never Take Candy From A Stranger (1960). An extraordinary thriller that tackles taboo subject matter realistically, while also milking it for suspenseful entertainment. A daring balancing act, that still packs a punch fifty years later.


A British family moves into a quiet Canadian logging town, the father (Patrick Allen) taking over as principal of the local high school. Shortly after arriving, he discovers that his young daughter has been lured into a stranger’s house and persuaded to strip naked. When he tries to get the police involved, legal barriers (Janina Faye and Niall MacGinnis pictured in the courtroom, below) and community ties prevent the family from finding justice, leaving a monster free to roam the community...


Besides Hammer’s period costume horror films (usually in unspecified historical settings), the studio made many contemporary psychological thrillers, usually variations on the themes of split-personality and madness, largely influenced by Psycho (1960). Never Take Candy From A Stranger was different, with themes of unwelcome strangers and internal corruption usually found in the paranoid villages near Dracula’s castle. The ageing paedophile chases his prey like a lumbering mummy or a creation of Frankenstein.

This collision of genres, the classic monster movie blended with the modern horror of child sex abuse, was rare but a potent source of suspense. Too potent and controversial perhaps - the film has rarely been seen since its release, on TV or video.

It struck me as a very unusual film, leading me to wonder where else child characters were victims in horror movies. My research hasn’t been exhaustive, I’m working from memory, and I’m sure you can think of exceptions and further examples. But all the films mentioned here are recommended, intelligent thrillers, though obviously challenging for their content.



The rule...

'Thou shalt not kill a child' is the general rule. In hundreds of films we see young characters in peril, but they remain indestructible. In family action films, children may be under constant threat, but they’ll escape. Jurassic Park notably put it’s two youngest characters through extended hell for half the movie, including the incredibly intense scene where a plastic roof is the only thing between them and the mouth of the T Rex. But even disaster movies are predictable whenever a child is in the scene – we know they’re going to be safe.

Horror movies aimed at adults also follow this unwritten rule. The Devil could get away with murder if he looked like a cute toddler, in The Omen (1976). The character of Newt faced dozens of killer Aliens and survived against all odds. Horror films put children in peril, but rarely puts them to death. Rarely, but not never…



Breaking the rule…

While horror films aren't afraid to show us every variation of murder weapon and torture, it's teenagers that are normally the victims. This makes the rare exceptions even more shocking. Hitchcock learned that the golden rule shouldn't be broken when he dared to kill off a child character (in Saboteur, 1936). He outwitted audience expectations, but realised that he'd 'lost' their participation – and didn’t make the same mistake again. Steven Spielberg spectacularly broke the rule in Jaws (1975), possibly because it wasn't a premeditated murder, but a shark as a 'force of nature'. The scene is probably the most explicit and bloody scene of a child being killed.


Almost at the dawn of horror films, The Golem (1920) included an influential confrontation between child and monster (pictured). But it wasn’t long before children tangled with the monster and lost. In the original silent The Unholy Three (1925) and in Frankenstein (1931) there were censorship problems and the death scenes of children were cut out (Frankenstein has since been restored). There was also supposedly a scene filmed for Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (1931) - a horrifying photo remains of Fredric March as Hyde stamping on a child in the street - the scene was later echoed in Son of Frankenstein (1939), when the monster holds down the Baron’s son with his foot. As rules of conduct were laid down for Hollywood in the mid-1930s, violent scenes like these were then weeded out at the script stage. The censors kept the children safe… for a few decades at least.


John Carpenter relearned Hitchcock's lesson when he showed a little girl getting shot in Assault on Precinct 13 (1976). For the sake of a throwaway shock moment to establish how very bad the bad guys were, he was chastised by reviewers for going too far. George Romero also had child zombies cut down by an automatic rifle, but that was just one of many censorship problems he had with Dawn of the Dead (1978). Soon after, Italian horror had children fighting zombies... and losing (in City of the Living Dead) and being melted by acid (in The Beyond). Again these scenes would be censored in some countries.

The accidental death of the daughter at the start of Don’t Look Now (1973) showed the traumatic emotional effect on the parents. A devastating event from which they never fully recover. The red coat that the daughter used to wear still haunting the father. Toddler tragedies also triggered the stories of Pumpkinhead and Pet Sematary (both in 1989). In horror films, dead children more usually appear as ghosts, especially in Japanese horror, like the little boy of The Grudge movies.

To me, Freddy Krueger should have been the ultimate incarnation of a monstrous child murderer, but his original crimes (which got him tortured and killed) were unseen and only hinted at in flashbacks (meaning that his hideous origin is actually forgotten by casual viewers). For the many Nightmare on Elm Streets, Freddy’s attentions were always on older teenagers, and his status as horror’s ghastliest monster warped into a wise-cracking anti-hero. A figure of fun who I thought should be depicted as the worst monster of all.

'Killer kids' has been a popular horror genre, taunting adult characters into breaking the 'golden rule'. Children became a menace because they were evil, like in The Bad Seed (1956), or possessed, as in Village of the Damned (1960) and The Innocents (1960). The Spanish chiller Who Can Kill A Child? (Would You Kill a Child?) placed the quandary in the title. If children were roaming the streets killing adults, could anyone bring themselves to stop them?

The dilemma remained in The Good Son (1993), with Macaulay Culkin as an evil brat with the face of an angel (it could almost be the further exploits of sadistic little Kevin from Home Alone).


Younger still, were killer babies. Rosemary’s Baby (1968) was obviously going to be a handful. Then the It’s Alive trilogy started (in 1974) with a grotesque and powerful newborn monster clawing its way out of the womb, killing the doctors and nurses, and roaming the streets in a relentless search for… milk and cuddly toys. This mini-genre could be read as pushing the agenda for abortion - do you really want that THING on the loose?

There’s recently been a new wave of killer kids with The Children, Them, Orphan and The Strangers, perhaps a violent reaction to the perceived rise in child criminality - adult fears being exploited that children are now more likely to torture, murder and even molest other children.


A film that tackles the reality of child-on-child crime is Boy A (2007), a drama where a teenage child-killer tries to rejoin society (loosely based on one of the murderers of James Bulger). Having served time, Boy A is at risk from vigilante revenge. He gets a new identity and a strict set of rules to prevent him being found, though the tabloid press are keen to trace him and blow his cover...

There have always been actual cases of child murder, but the details are so shocking and tragic that we don’t want to be reminded in the cinema. Fiction only has to hint that children are in danger, for us to fear that we are actually going to see something horrible.

The Moors Murders, for instance, raised such deep public emotions that for decades the killers have only just recently appeared in dramatic recreations, and only on TV, not for cinema. While many movies, and much money, has been made from the crimes of serial killers, (enough to form another horror genre, ‘true crime’), public outcry has prevented the exploitation of Britain’s worst tragedies.



Worse things than death...

Never Take Candy From A Stranger hinted that the little girls are threatened not only by physical harm, but sexual. This extra element of suffering is almost too horrible for horror films, and usually only addressed in police thrillers and drama. In the story, the paedophile remains at large because he’s related to someone who unofficially ‘runs the town’. A similar scenario is the backbone of the later Canadian thriller The Little Girl Who Lives Down the Lane (1976, pictured below).


Shortly after the limited release of Never Take Candy From a Stranger, Cape Fear (1962) had Nancy running from psychotic Max Cady (Robert Mitchum), who assaults her in order to punish her father, (an echo of Night of the Hunter, where the two children run for their lives from their stepfather, played by Mitchum).


I’m guessing Fritz Lang's ‘M’ (1931) was the first film to portray a child molester, a character based on several German serial killers. Peter Lorre played the murderer who abducts children, but the story turns him from hunter to hunted as he is captured by the local underworld and subjected to a vigilante trial.

One of the cases that inspired ‘M’ was dramatised in The Tenderness of Wolves (1973), which pushed further into taboo territory by adding back the vampirism and cannibalism from the original case, of serial killer Fritz Haarman. His victims were all male, but mostly teenagers. The queasy recreations of blood-lettings predate the low-budget dramatisations that cashed in on the famous recent serial killers.


The same year, there was great public concern for a young actress playing Regan in The Exorcist – where a demon tortures and abuses her character through most of the story. But Linda Blair grew up happily unaffected by the experiences of filming, while audiences didn’t recover quite as easily.

Sean Connery broke the James Bond mould when he tackled The Offence (1973), as a detective who’ll stop at nothing to extract a confession from a suspect (Ian Bannen) for a string of child murders. Citizen X (1995) was another police thriller - the true story of a serial killer who went undetected for years in a remote area of Russian countryside. Most of America’s worst serial killers have had movies made about them, but none have been as sensitively and effectively made as this story.


The Woodsman (2004) and Little Children (2006) both centre on convicted paedophiles returning to suburbia after prison. Their crimes present an acid test for the legal system – is prison time punishment enough? Is it an effective solution? Can modern psychiatry successfully rehabilitate them?


The possibility that child characters in these films might be abused adds a terrifying amount of suspense. In this sense, they are a kind of horror film. It's hardly a coincidence that Jackie Earle Haley has been promoted from the role of child molester in Little Children (pictured), to child murderer Freddy Krueger, in this year’s relaunch of A Nightmare on Elm Street.

Never Take Candy From a Stranger tackled a taboo issue intelligently, then added almost a monster movie ending – with the paedophile literally presented as a lumbering monster. In the same location where Disney's Jim Hawkins was attacked by murderous pirates (in Treasure Island, 1950) and Hammer's Dracula stalked for virgins, a modern monster crept around the forest of West London's Black Park. As in Frankenstein, he’s portrayed as mentally abnormal, with the real problem being the people who allow him to roam free. I was impressed how the film made as logical points as emotional ones - a recurring theme of humanism in these dramas. Monster movies usually end with hordes of angry villagers, burning torches and rough justice.


To try and conclude, scenes where children are harmed are likely to be rejected or censored unless sensitively handled by scriptwriters and directors, and the situations are kept rooted in reality. Horror films rarely show children getting killed, the genre having enough trouble with controversy and censorship, except when children are portrayed as a threat.


Phew, all I started off wanting to say was that Never Take Candy From a Stranger was a very good thriller for its age…