Botched - Paura e delirio a Mosca

Good thing I have nothing against gore in movies. Because of that I had way more fun than I imagined when I rented this movie. It's completely hilarious, from beginning to the end. The overdone Russian accent without anybody ever speaking Russian through the whole movie, the weird characters and the twisted story add up nicely to a movie about one day in the life of one guy that just went completely wrong in every way you could imagine. I half expected a crappy ending to that story, but it fits nicely and left me with a satisfied grin on my face. However: If you can't stomach some gore, cheesy lines and over-the-top acting, then this movie is not for you.

While escaping from a successful heist of diamonds in an auction house for the Russian mobster lord Mr. Groznyi (Sean Pertwee), the driver of the runaway car crashes a wall and only the thief Ritchie Donovan (Stephen Dorff) survives. He runs with the wallet full of diamonds, but he is hit by a car and loses the stones on the street. The upset Mr. Groznyi sends Ritchie to Moscow to compensate his mistake and steal an ancient and valuable cross in the penthouse of a building with the clumsy Russian brothers Peter (Jamie Foreman) and Yuri (Russell Smith). However the plan goes wrong and Ritchie and his partners take a group of passengers from the elevator as hostage to the 13th floor. They negotiate with the police, but when they release the first hostage in good faith, they discover that their negotiator is not from the police but an evil serial-killer, beginning their night of terror trapped on the floor.

The gore "Botched" is an entertaining and forgettable dark comedy. The weird story has funny and silly moments, but something is missing to make "Botched" a cult-movie or at least a great movie. The jokes do not work well and it is strange to see the bizarre "Russian" characters speaking in English. The daughter of Billy Murray, Jaime Murray, is extremely sexy in the role of the executive Anna and shows a great chemistry with Stephen Dorff. My vote is six.

Title (Brazil): "13o Andar" ("!3th Floor")

I too saw this last night at the Fantasy Film fest in Berlin where it had its world premiere. I hadn't seen any previews for it and almost didn't go. At the last minute, I changed my mind and grabbed a ticket.

I'm so glad I did!

The first 20 minutes, I thought oh lord, this is going to be terrible. On the contrary, this 20 minutes established the plot line and the first few characters personality and allowed us to figure out who was "serious" and "normal" and who were the slapstick artists playing off the deadpan. Once established, this cheaply made movie was quite simply a laugh riot for those who have a morbid sense of humor and enjoy creative torture methods.

The description in the film fest magazine really says it all: "And you thought you were unlucky? - During a heist in Russia, a professional thief (Dorff) finds himself dealing with twin serial killers, insane hostages, double-crossing psycho Russian hard-men and the real possibility of a horrible death."

By the end, the audience was laughing so hard we had tears in our eyes. It was gruesome, gory, campy and funny. It's one I'm buying when it comes out on video - because it fits my morbid humor quite well.

~Rose

Expecting a different take on a heist gone wrong I never imagined this would be the result! Very few people realize that it is very hard to do comedy. And a comedy that is dark like this one is even harder to do. But because of the actors and the gore fest it works. Bronagh Gallagher (as Sonya) is marvelous evil. And Geoff Bell (as Boris) gives a good parody on the "perfect" Russian soldier. I must admit that at first I thought that the phony Russian accents were too much. But soon when I realized which direction the movie was going I understood why they used these accents. Everything supposed to be over the top,including the acting! If you don't get that than you won't like this movie. But if you do you will have a blast!

This movie starts out relatively straight with a diamond heist that goes wrong. Everything seemingly normal and slightly tedious, I thought.

The film then slides slowly by inches down the path towards B-movie insanity. The odd thing is, the weirder, gorier and more ridiculous things get, the funnier and more enjoyable it becomes as well.

This is not a dumb film and there is a consistent and thought out story that appears on film, despite the odd silly "rubber chicken" prop moment.

I didn't have any qualms about the acting as the cast did a fantastic job staying in (dodgy Russian) character.

Whilst Brad does a good job keeping the audiences sympathy, supported ably by the very foxy Jamie Murray, a horror movie is only as good as its villains. They don't disappoint and for me are the real stars of this movie with Boris the security guard running a very close second.