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Under Siege 2: Dark Territory

While this sequel doesn’t quite reach the heights of the original film, it remains a solid entry in the action genre, delivering enough thrills to keep viewers engaged. The movie takes a different approach to its action sequences, offering more variety in both choreography and settings than its predecessor. The decision to set much of the film in the claustrophobic confines of a moving train creates an intensity and sense of urgency that rivals the tension established in the first installment.

Steven Seagal’s performance continues to showcase his limited range as an actor, relying heavily on his physical presence rather than emotional depth or nuanced character work. Unfortunately, the supporting cast doesn’t elevate the material either, with performances that range from serviceable to forgettable. The chemistry between characters feels forced at times, and the dialogue often falls flat.

Despite these shortcomings, the film has carved out its own place in action movie history. While it may not have produced as many iconic moments as the original, certain scenes and quotable lines have achieved a cult following over the years. The practical stunts and old-school action choreography, viewed through a modern lens, possess a certain charm that CGI-heavy contemporary films sometimes lack. For fans of 90s action cinema, this movie serves as an entertaining, if imperfect, time capsule of the era’s particular brand of testosterone-fueled entertainment.

Storyline

Seal Team Commander Casey Ryback has retired from the Navy since the conclusion of the events in the first movie and is now a chef at the Mile High Cafe in Denver, Colorado. Ryback is taking his niece, Sarah Ryback, on vacation to reconnect and commiserate with her after the death of her parents. They board a westbound train through the Rocky Mountains from Denver to LA. With the help of gun-for-hire Marcus Penn and a couple of dozen of his mercenaries, ex-CIA brain (and mentally unstable) Travis Dane commandeers the train, takes the passengers and crew hostage, and sets up a mobile control center. He hacks into the CIA database and takes control of a Top-Secret defense satellite he designed during his Agency days, which has just been deployed. Funded by various foreign interests, he stands to make 1 billion dollars for using the space weapon to blow up the Eastern seaboard by targeting a nuclear reactor housed beneath the Pentagon. Dane taunts the Joint Chiefs in the Pentagon Situation Room by using it to blow up a Chinese chemical weapons plant and the two stealth planes sent to intercept him, secure in the knowledge that he cannot be stopped because his location can’t be traced as long as the train keeps moving. Ryback, aided by young porter Bobby Zachs, is the only one who can take out the bad guys, rescue the hostages, and prevent the destruction of the eastern seaboard before Dane can realize his dastardly plans.

Stockholm Bloodbath

This film is another historical action-drama that doesn’t take itself too seriously. It features a fast-paced sequence of events as we follow two women seeking revenge against the Danish men who murdered their family. The movie bears some resemblance to a modern retelling of a historical event, much like the tragic story of Marie Antoinette. The music is loud and contemporary, and the dialogue between the characters is often quite humorous. While it’s not a bad watch, it’s important to note that it doesn’t prioritize historical accuracy.

About

A group of Swedish aristocrats wants out of the Scandinavian Kalmar Union and is conspiring to overthrow Christian II of Denmark, who is on his way to Stockholm to put an end to Sten Sture and the Swedish rebels. Meanwhile, Anne Eriksson and her foster sister Freja are seeking revenge on those who killed their family on Anne’s wedding day.

Under Siege

The acting is poor and the story predictable, but I can’t help but like Seagal’s first blockbuster. It epitomizes everything that defined the short era between the 1980’s up until movies became dull and less entertaining. Erika Eleniak’s iconic cake dance scene made me laugh. Seagal’s acting added another layer of comedy to the movie. This movie is perhaps not as bad as I suggest it is. It surely ranks among the favorites of the decade. The storyline resembles Die Hard in many ways, but the pace is different. Altogether a good movie.

About

The battleship Missouri is about to be decommissioned. Casey Ryback is Captain Adam’s personal cook. And Ryback is always butting heads with the ship’s XO Commander Krill, but the Captain always intercedes. One day, after the President visits the ship, which is also the Captain’s birthday, the Captain learns that a helicopter has been cleared to land on the ship by Commander Krill, which he was not informed of. When questioned, Krill tells the Captain that it’s a surprise for his birthday, and the Captain then allows it. Later, after another one of their scuffles, Krill has Ryback locked in the freezer. During the party, the rock band reveals itself to be mercenaries, led by William Stranix, a CIA operative, who is in league with Krill to unload all of the ship’s nuclear warheads. They lock up all of the crew and make preparations to remove the warheads. And Krill remembers Ryback, Stranix sends two of his men to take care of Ryback, the only thing is that Ryback took care of them. Upon discovering their bodies, Stranix deduces that Ryback is more than a cook. He then sends Krill to check on him, and Krill discovers that Ryback’s a NAVY SEAL who got busted down to a cook after an incident in Panama. And Ryback continues to create trouble for them, so Stranix tries to hunt him down. Along the way, Ryback meets Jordan, a former playmate, who was supposed to entertain at the party but was also forgotten.

Caligula

A film that I have wanted to see for a long time. Before the screening, I knew that it was full of sexual and pure sadistic content. Despite the warning, I wasn’t entirely sure what to expect. It was all that and then some. A mixture of pornography and madness, filled with disgustingly chaotic scenes. Despite that, I can not help but like the movie. Not because of the content, but because of how well it has stood as a cult classic. It is disgustingly timeless.

About

Original screenwriter Gore Vidal and film director Tinto Brass both disavowed the extensive changes made to their contributions, with Brass being dismissed before editing began. Financier/producer Bob Guccione, founder of Penthouse magazine, engaged Giancarlo Lui to film post-production scenes featuring hardcore sex, significantly altering the film’s tone and style.

Initially released to Italian cinemas in 1979, then screened in the United States the following year, Caligula was met with legal issues and controversies over its violent and sexual content. Different abridged versions were released worldwide, while its uncut form remains banned in several countries. Despite a generally negative reception, the film has gained notoriety as a cult classic with significant merit for its political content and historical portrayal.

The Substance

An underrated gem of a slasher film! The story gradually sneaks up on you, like an alien hiding inside a space shuttle. The movie itself is relatively slow-paced, except for the end, when the storyline accelerates rapidly. The film leaves viewers with a bitter taste – and an ethical dilemma that we urgently need to reflect on.

About

Have you ever dreamed of a better version of yourself? You. Only better in every way. Seriously. You’ve got to try this new product. It’s called the Substance. It changed my life. It generates another you. A new, younger, more beautiful, more perfect you. And there’s only one rule: you share time. One week for you. One week for the new you. Seven days each. A perfect balance. Easy, right? If you respect the balance, what could go wrong?

Fair Game

I rather enjoyed this B-movie. The film is considered an Ozplotation classic.

About the movie

A young woman running a wildlife sanctuary in the Australian outback is in for trouble when three kangaroo hunters confront her. Bored with killing kangaroos, they decide to kill the animals in the sanctuary, and when they see how attractive the owner is, they decide to have a little “fun” with her, too. They may get a bit more “fun” than they bargained for.

About Ozplotation

Ozploitation films are exploitation films – a category of low-budget horror, comedy, sexploitation, and action films – made in Australia after introducing the R rating in 1971. The year also marked the beginnings of the Australian New Wave movement, and the Ozploitation style peaked within the same time frame (early 1970s to late 1980s).

Ozploitation is often considered a minor wave within the New Wave, covering a wide range of genres from sexploitation, biker films, horror and even martial arts.

The origin of the term “Ozploitation” is credited to the documentary Not Quite Hollywood: The Wild, Untold Story of Ozploitation. This 2008 feature explores Ozploitation films made during the Australian New Wave. The film includes interviews with numerous figures involved in Ozploitation, as well as fans of the genre, including American director Quentin Tarantino, who coined the phrase “Aussiesploitation”, which director Mark Hartley then shortened to “Ozploitation”.

Australian horror film production trebled from fewer than 20 films in the 1990s to over 60 films between 2000 and 2008. According to one researcher, “global forces and emerging production and distribution models are challenging the ‘narrowness’ of cultural policy – a narrowness that mandates a particular film culture, circumscribes certain notions of value and limits the variety of films produced domestically. Despite their low-culture status, horror films have been well suited to the Australian film industry’s financial limitations, they are a growth strategy for producers, and a training ground for emerging filmmakers”.

Hilma

The film explores Hilma af Klint’s enigmatic life, now recognized as one of the Western world’s first abstract artists. It is a well-played portrait of a woman today regarded as an icon in the art world.

About Hilma af Klint

Hilma af Klint (26 October 1862 – 21 October 1944) was a Swedish artist and mystic whose paintings are considered among the first abstract works known in Western art history. A considerable body of her work predates the first purely abstract compositions by Kandinsky, Malevich, and Mondrian. She belonged to a group called “The Five,” comprising a circle of women inspired by Theosophy, who believed in the importance of trying to contact the so-called “High Masters”—often by way of séances. Her paintings, which sometimes resemble diagrams, visually represented complex spiritual ideas.

In 1880, her younger sister Hermina died, and at this time, the spiritual dimension of her life began to develop. Her interest in abstraction and symbolism came from Hilma af Klint’s involvement in spiritism, very much in vogue at the end of the nineteenth and beginning of the twentieth century. Her experiments in spiritual investigation started in 1879. She became interested in the Theosophy of Madame Blavatsky and the philosophy of Christian Rosencreutz. In 1908, she met Rudolf Steiner, the founder of the Anthroposophical Society, who was visiting Stockholm. Steiner introduced her to his own theories regarding the arts, and would have some influence on her paintings later in life. Several years later, in 1920, she met him again at the Goetheanum in Dornach, Switzerland, the headquarters of the Anthroposophical Society. Between 1921 and 1930 she spent long periods at the Goetheanum.

Af Klint’s work can be understood in the broader context of the modernist search for new forms in artistic, spiritual, political, and scientific systems at the beginning of the twentieth century. There was a similar interest in spirituality by other artists during this same period, including Wassily Kandinsky, Piet Mondrian, Kasimir Malevich, Fidus, and the French Nabis, in which many, like af Klint, were inspired by the Theosophical Movement.

The works of Hilma af Klint are mainly spiritual, and her artistic work is a consequence of this. She felt the abstract work and the meaning within were so groundbreaking that the world was not ready to see it, and she wished for the work to remain unseen for 20 years after her death.

The Pope’s Exorcist

An entertaining film (if you can label a supernatural horror film that) directed by Julius Avery from a screenplay by Michael Petroni and Evan Spiliotopoulos, based on the 1990 book An Exorcist Tells His Story and the 1992 book An Exorcist: More Stories by Father Gabriele Amorth.

About Father Amorth

Gabriele Amorth S.S.P. (Italian: [ɡabriˈɛːle ˈaːmort]; May 1, 1925 – September 16, 2016) was an Italian Catholic priest of the Paulines and an exorcist for the Diocese of Rome. Amorth and five other priests founded the International Association of Exorcists.

His work in demonology and exorcism gained him international recognition. Father Amorth claimed to have performed tens of thousands of exorcisms, at least 60,000 throughout his career. He became one of the most prominent and controversial figures in the Catholic Church in the modern era.

Amorth was born in Modena, Emilia-Romagna, Italy, on May 1, 1925. He was ordained a Roman Catholic priest in 1954 and was appointed an exorcist of the Diocese of Rome in June 1986 under the tutelage of Candido Amantini. He was a member of the Society of St. Paul, the congregation founded by Giacomo Alberione in 1914. In 1990, he founded the International Association of Exorcists and was president until his retirement in 2000.

Both Father Amorth’s father and grandfather were lawyers. His contributions during World War II as a courageous fighter for the Italian resistance movement were followed by his pursuit of legal studies. Additionally, Father Amorth served as a deputy to Giulio Andreotti, a prominent figure in Italian politics who would later become Prime Minister within the influential political organization of the Young Christian Democrats.

Amorth died at the age of 91 on September 16, 2016, a short time after he was hospitalized for pulmonary complications.

Leonardo

Interesting costume drama which focuses on Leonardo’s emotional life.

In 1506, Leonardo da Vinci, the most famous artist of his time, is accused of the murder of Caterina da Cremona. Questioned by Stefano Giraldi, an ambitious officer of the Duchy of Milan, Leonardo begins to tell his life, starting from the first meeting with Caterina in Andrea del Verrocchio’s workshop. Giraldi, fascinated by the artist’s personality, begins to suspect that Leonardo may be innocent and investigates to discover the truth.

Homecoming

Madde lives a hectic life in Stockholm. One day she receives a letter from her father Leif who wants her to come back to her childhood home. An intense weekend with her father changes her attitude to the rural area she left a long time ago.

A rather predictable movie portraying a broken father-daugther relationship.