Jeanskynebu the audience applauded

FeistyUpper If you don't like this, we can't be friends.

CommentsXp Best movie ever!

Lucia Ayala It's simply great fun, a winsome film and an occasionally over-the-top luxury fantasy that never flags.

Smoreni Zmaj This is a series of 26 one-hour horror films, directed by 19 different directors, which for some reason have been selected as "masters of horror". While some of them really are masters, the choice of others quite surprised me. Some movies have original stories, some are adaptations of the giants of the genre, such as Edgar Allan Poe, H.P. Lovecraft or Clive Barker. The quality varies from barely watchful crap to really excellent short films. The series overall is far from a masterpiece, but most episodes hold attention and everyone will find something for themselves. There is some really horrific horror and gore and serious drama, and there's also plenty of dark humor and effects that look like those from B movies of the '80s, where monsters, rather than being scary, wake nostalgia and bring smile to our faces. And there's also a couple of really painful embarrassment transfers. The second season is significantly weaker and I'm not surprised that the series has been canceled, but the fans of the horror should not miss it. I especially recommend "Valerie on the Stairs" (Barker), "Jenifer" (Argento), "Dreams in the Witch-House" (Lovecraft) and "The Black Cat" (Poe).7/10

Ali Catterall Among the roster of 'Masters' (Dario Argento, Tobe Hooper, etc) showcasing their knockoffs for this anthology one name may leap out as glaringly unfamiliar. William Malone? Who he? Well, among other things, Malone directed 1999's The House On Haunted Hill remake and 2002's FeardotCom. Oh, and an episode of 'Honey I Shrunk The Kids: The TV Show'.Not impressed? Really, give the guy a break! When you consider, say, Argento's laughable Jenifer from the same series, perhaps we ought to give this rank outsider and his Fair-Haired Child a chance.Now, unfold those crossed arms because, aside from Malone's uncredited perfromance as George Harrison in Robert Zemeckis' superb debut I Wanna Hold Your Hand, he's also way more influential in the horror game than you might think, having helped to create dozens of movie monster masks - along with Michael Myers' 'Shape' visage for John Carpenter's Halloween (admittedly, that one was easy - he simply sprayed a William Shatner mask white, but still).A riff on WW Jacobs' Edwardian classic 'The Monkey's Paw' (and latterly, Clive Barker's 'Hellraiser'), Fair-Haired Child sees two eccentric classical musicians, Judith (Petty) and husband Anton (Samples) attempt to bring their son Johnny (Haddock) back from the dead after he accidentally drowned on his fifteenth birthday. And, through black magick, they do - after a fashion.Trouble is, their waterlogged offspring now resembles the result of some giggling gangbang between Dan Dare's Mekon and HR Giger's Alien Queen. To keep him in anything vaguely resembling humanoid form they must sacrifice a dozen teenagers, one every year, on the boy's birthday. With each virgin's blood spilled, Johnny morphs a little closer to complete restoration. As the half-crazed Anton figures, "the dead shall live again - new blood for old." The couple's twelfth candidate for sacrifice, class outcast Tara (Pulsipher), is kidnapped from her local high school; knocked off her bike, chloroformed, and bundled into a van - as the funereal adagio from Beethoven's 'Seventh' saws ominously away on the soundtrack in its sly, elitist and deeply untrustworthy way. Flung into a basement, graffitied with the pleas of previous blood donors, Tara encounters a cupboard full of severed heads that would make Jeffrey Dahmer blink, a bathtub spattered with human vino, and what she at first imagines is another sacrificial lamb; a mute, guilt-ridden Johhny - who's having a little trouble keeping his skin on. It's a distressing process for both parties. As that great 1980s bard El DeBarge put it, "Who's Johnny, she said, and tried to look the other way." Shockingly, given our emotional investment in Tara thus far, the now transformed cellar-dweller goes to work on her like Fanny Craddock with a dead chicken. Further shocks - and a predictable twist - will be along in a minute.The worst you can say about The Fair Haired Child is it looks and feels pretty much like what it is: an anthology movie in the 'Tales From The Crypt' vein, with an extra helping of giblets. It's also a touch repetitive towards the end and, despite its expectation-confounding turns, once you've spotted the twist stomping over the hill, even a little draggy.Oddly, given the director's pedigree, the rubbery-looking monster's not much cop either. That said, Malone makes a virtue of his dark fairytale's budgetary constraints, offering lashings of atmosphere, creepy flashbacks and unnerving dream sequences (shot in the now-familiar monochrome style), while the cast put it some believable and sympathetic performances (particularly Lori Petty who, as a mother driven mad with grief, at least has something better to work with here than in Tank Girl).

Randolf Carter Okay, so I'm a Lovecraft freak, so what? There's lots of us out there....lurking. Okay, I'll add the Clive Barker episode, too (Haekler's Tale). Well, I personally thought that one was really Lovecraftian, too. Okay, first, Dreams in the Witch House. Not too bad. Pretty typical Stuart Gordon (particularly with changing most of the story). The main character, Ezra Godden seems to be able to hold his own in the acting arena, so I imagine die-hard Combs fans won't die outright. It worked. Since that was such a short story, it all fit into the alloted episode time, without leaving out too much. Overall, it was a pretty good adaption, so all you Lovecraft fans won't be disappointed.Now, Onto Haekler's Tale. The HPL influence is really strong in some modern writer's material. This is no exception to the rule. The setting was done really well, and the mood, nice and evil.It's to bad this series was canceled. It was very good for a horror series and there was plenty of good episodes.It's too bad so many people prefer "Loser TV" (aka reality shows). Get a life, losers! TV is to entertain people, not point and laugh at the misfortune of others. I don't know about the rest of you out there, but I for one and very sick of seeing the EXACT SAME THING with different names clogging up channel after channel.And, yes, this is relevant. Good shows get canceled, because everyone seems to want 5 different versions of American Idol.

astonmartin7 The Masters of Horror series which began in 2005 is certainly a mixed bag. Not only are there many different film-makers working on these episodes, but the budgets seem to be limited on some level.Like the first 5 seasons of The X-Files, the episodes are shot in Vancouver and the British Columbia environment in Canada, so directors need to be creative in order to make it all work as effectively as possible.The best of the bunch that I've seen so far are: William Malone's The Fair Haired Child (which is an emotional and horrific fairy-tale), Joe Dante's surprisingly effective and detailed Homecoming (bear with the opening 5 minutes or so), Don Coscarelli's Incident On and Off a Mountain Road, Lucky McKee's Sick Girl and Dario Argento's second offering Pelts which may have the highest level of gore and sleaze in all the Masters of Horror so far! Way to go, Dario! You're still the man!Next tier down would be Takashi Miike's Imprint, John Carpenter's Cigarette Burns and possible Larry Cohen's Pick Me Up. There are about three more I've seen which I won't mention (out of respect for the film-makers!).