The X List: Found Footage Films

By Jeffery X Martin

The Bay, 2012

On the evening of May 20, 2014, Jeffery X Martin was asked to write an article on the best ten found footage films ever made. He told his wife he was about to start work on it. After a few hours of furious typing, and a couple of stiff drinks, he went to bed to dream his little dreamy-dreams. The next morning, this list you are about to read was found on Martin’s desktop. After a furious search, Martin was discovered in his living room, eating soft-boiled eggs and watching professional wrestling matches from 1987. He sent the article in to his editor, who presents it to you now, as she received it.

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Music Review: Rene Lopez, Paint The Moon Gold

By Melissa Bratcher

On his new album, Paint The Moon Gold, New York City musician Rene Lopez draws upon the rich musical tapestry of his city and pens a love letter—to New York, his family, and his heritage. The charismatic Mr. Lopez almost has an old school jazz singer vibe, though he calls his style of music “Electric Latin Soul,” which is as good of a descriptor as anything. Paint The Moon Gold is a cohesive, high-energy album that is paced cleverly. In fact, the album picks up in pace in the last quarter, leaving the listener on a high, rather than drifting off to sleep, lulled by quiet songs and quiet ideas. It’s a smart trick.

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Waxing Nostalgic: Joy Division, “She’s Lost Control”

By Jeffery X Martin

Joy Division was the ultimate Manchester band, encapsulating that town’s darkness, smoke, and despair in their music as surely as if they had encased it in Lucite. It’s a paperweight. It’s a time capsule. It’s like eavesdropping on someone’s lowest thoughts, hearing the sounds their brains make, the constant loop that brings about madness.

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Music Review: Nikki Lane, All Or Nothin’

By Melissa Bratcher

On her second album, All Or Nothin’, Nikki Lane (with the help of producer Dan Auerbach of the Black Keys) lets fly with incredibly hook-filled songs about drinking, smoking pot, one night stands, and crappy ex-boyfriends. Nikki Lane is a hard one to pin down: her music easily thematically fits into the “outlaw country” camp, and her voice is a magical mix of Loretta Lynn and Dusty Springfield, and All Or Nothin’ is crazy with the steel guitar of country, but she’s not exactly country. The most striking tracks on All Or Nothin’ sound like they’re straight off of the Red Bird label, the early ’60s girl group record company founded by Leiber and Stoller.

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VHS Visions: Iced (1988)

By Brad Henderson

There are quite a few slashers out there and among them are some underrated ones. Last month I focused on Hide and Go Shriek for VHS Visions and now I bring you another hidden gem called Iced.

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Blu-Ray Review: Home Of The Brave

By Brad Henderson

One of my goals in life is to watch every single film in existence. That isn’t a realistic goal but I would love to think I could achieve it someday. There are many films out there that I’ve never heard of and that is why I love companies like Olive Films. They release things that are popular amongst a certain fan base but that fan base is usually an older audience. The films they release please their existing audience as well as people like me because I get to see films I would probably never seek out because they are hard to find or just not in existence anymore.

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Blu-Ray Review: Way Of The Wicked

By Brad Henderson

A question I often ask myself is: what happened to Christian Slater? I honestly don’t know the answer but ever since 2004 he has had a weird career. I’ve always thought he was a fun actor and decent in the movies he was in. I know people tend to laugh at that but I honestly don’t know what people have against him. It’s true that he doesn’t act in the best films these days but still, where did it all go wrong and how did we end up disliking Christian Slater?

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Blu-Ray Review: Private

By Brad Henderson

I enjoyed Tinto Brass’ film Cheeky recently (review) so I was excited to watch another feature by him, in this case Private, which is also known as Fallo! and Do It! It’s an anthology about . . . sex. Of course it’s about sex; what else would Tinto Brass make a movie about?

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Blu-Ray Review: Cheeky

By Brad Henderson

I’ve heard the name Tinto Brass thrown around for a number of years but never watched any films he’s made. For these past few months, I’ve been delving into the more risqué side of cinema and watching vintage hardcore and softcore porn. Apparently, Tinto Brass is a “god” when it comes to this stuff, but I have a different outlook on films like this.

Cheeky is a softcore film with a few harder shots but all in all, it’s a silly comedy about a girl looking for an apartment and her boyfriend trying to find out if she actually cheated on him. Yeah, these films don’t have great plots.

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Blu-Ray Review: Mr. Jones

By Brad Henderson

As we all know and as I’ve said before: found footage movies usually get an eye roll, which you can hear miles away when those films are announced. Sure, people claim this way of telling a story is just a gimmick, but that is incorrect. I give this method of storytelling praise if it is executed without being used as one. Using found footage to tell a story is special to me in many ways. Mostly it’s because these stories are told from a person’s point of view, which can make something more terrifying and real. That doesn’t happen in all cases, of course, and is not the case with Mr. Jones.

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