Titanic 666 (2023)

If you look through the films made by director Nick Lyon, or the films written by Jason Cooney or Jason White, you may notice a number of . . . interesting (yes, let's go with interesting) titles listed. Don't be too quick to dismiss their work though, because they all seem interested in making films that are at least fun, even if limited budgets and resources undermine whatever vision they're trying to put onscreen. That approach is also clear in the silly, but not entirely unenjoyable, Titanic 666.

The plot is on a level of silliness that you might expect. A group of people are on board the Titanic III - the usual mix of people you might root for, people you might hate, and someone who seems to have their own mysterious agenda - and there are also cabinets displaying items salvaged from the original Titanic. Could that be just asking for bad luck? Maybe, but Professor Hal Cochran (Jamie Bamber) doesn't believe so. He thinks there's a lot of money to be made. Idina Bess (Lydia Hearst), on the other hand, thinks that there's another way for people to pay for a piece of the past.

It's never scary, not really, but Titanic 666 is also never too dull, whether viewers are being introduced to the selection of characters (including a pair of influencers, played by AnnaLynne McCord and Derek Yates) or shown the appearance of numerous spirits about to cause havoc on the ship. It's typical of many movies from The Asylum, with very simple plotting, plenty of stereotypes populating the narrative, and runtime that's padded out by judicious use of stock footage, but those who know what they're getting into should find enough to enjoy here. While I wouldn't rush to rewatch this, nor would I recommend it to many people, I didn't have a bad time watching it. I wanted more AnnaLynne McCord, she's sadly underused, but everything else worked on the level I expected.

Aside from McCord, the cast members worth mentioning are Keesha Sharp (playing the Captain of the ship), Joseph Gatt (definitely up to something that may make the situation much worse), and both Bamber and Hearst, playing central characters with opposing viewpoints on the history of the Titanic, and the weight of the tragedy. 

The script is more concerned with filling time in between the minor ghostly set-pieces, and the direction is more competent than skilled, and let's not dwell on the quality of the special effects on display, but I cannot bring myself to loathe this. It was fine. I've seen plenty of other people eager to pick this apart. If you want to do that then there's plenty here to pick at. But if you just want to watch something that aims to entertain, something that isn't challenging or too complicated, then this is perfectly fine. I wouldn't call it good, but it does what it sets out to do.

4/10

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Cabin Fever: Patient Zero (2014)

For anyone interested, here is my review of Cabin Fever, and here is my review of Cabin Fever 2: Spring Fever. And now . . . . . . we return to our main programmed event.

Let's face it, Cabin Fever: Patient Zero is a movie that shouldn't really exist. The first Cabin Fever movie is fantastic (despite me taking a while to warm to it), but it didn't exactly cry out for sequels. When Cabin Fever 2: Spring Fever was released, I think there was more talk of the studio interference and problems that director Ti West had than an overwhelming love for the movie. And, on a side note, kudos to West for still visiting some screenings and pragmatically dealing with the end result.

Anyway, now we have a third movie, with the potential for more (I guess). Sean Astin plays the patient zero of the title, a man who is imprisoned, in a medical facility that's located on a fairly isolated island, and forced to try and help find a cure for the deadly disease that viewers of the previous two movies will already be familiar with. Astin doesn't want to be helpful. In fact, he wants to cause some problems. Which makes everything exceedingly dangerous when Marcus (Mitch Ryan) and friends land on the island, aiming to party and celebrate before Marcus gets married. It's not long until people start acting a bit rash.

Written by Jake Wade Wall and directed by Kaare Andrews, this is very standard sequel stuff. It's supposed to be a prequel, but I must confess my ignorance in not being able to see anything that would really pinpoint the timing of this particular instalment in comparison to the other movies. I may have missed a detail or two, but I suspect that this has been classed as a prequel due to the folk making it thinking that they're being clever. Because that's what I felt as the end credits rolled, with some other footage running throughout. This is a film with a script that is desperate to appear cool and clever, despite the fact that it isn't. Andrews tries to work with it, and at least remembers to include some great gore gags in the second half, but nothing ties together as it should.

The cast here is a real mixed bag. For the group arriving on the island, Mitch Ryan is okay, I guess, but he just feels a bit too bland to be a leading man. Thankfully, both Brando Eaton and Ryan Donowho match him in terms of just being a bit too unmemorable, although nobody is awful. Jillian Murray IS memorable, for a variety of reasons, and she gets a lot of great scenes. Elsewhere, Currie Graham is the cold doctor dealing with Astin, while Solly Duran and Lydia Hearst are the two main lab assistants also caught in the crisis zone when things start to turn sour.

There are some great special effects, courtesy of Vincent J. Guastani and his team, some fun moments in which selfishness is punished (of course), and one or two good ideas in the mix, but that undeserved sense of cockiness brings it back down a notch or two. As does the lack of any effective black humour.

Worth a watch, and even worth picking up if you can get it at a good price, but it's the weakest of the three.

6/10

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Cabin-Fever-Patient-Zero-Blu-ray/dp/B00GMFL9BQ/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1392807180&sr=8-2&keywords=cabin+fever+patient+zero