Wednesday, October 31, 2018

HAPPY HALLOWEEN 2018 from DEMON RESURRECTION...

As befits the season, DEMON RESURRECTION has been enjoying an upward bump in viewership on Amazon Prime recently, so thanks to all those who have been checking the film out. While Amazon Prime members can view the film for free as part of their Prime subscription, we do get paid a small royalty from Amazon when you watch, so you get to see the film for free and we get to see a small return on our investment. A good deal all around. http://a.co/d/bTQJaZf
The Amazon Prime presentation of DEMON RESURRECTION is, if you'll pardon the expression, bare bones. It's just the film, with optional English subtitles, and it's DRM-protected, which may reduce picture quality somewhat. It comes with no extras, and is only available to viewers in the US and the UK.
For those who aren't crazy about these limitations, there are other options. For just a few dollars, you can rent or buy the film on VHX/Vimeo. This is a good bargain actually...
  • There's no DRM, so image quality is as high as it will ever be for this film...
  • It's available to viewers worldwide
  • It includes optional English and Spanish subtitles..
  • It comes with a ton of extras, including two versions of the film (the widescreen, HD version as well as the original SD, standard screen version), the director's audio commentary track, a 30-minute "Behind the Scenes" featurette, over 30 minutes of interviews with cast and crew, an MP3 file of the score and a hi-rez copy of the poster art.
You can rent all this for just $2.99 and revel in it for 3 full days. Or, for $4.99, you can buy it, download it, and immerse yourself in the screwy, spooky world of DEMON RESURRECTION as much as you want, any time you want, for the remainder of your natural life.
DEMON RESURRECTION is, as one discerning reviewer put it, the "perfect one to pop in on Halloween night," so what are you waiting for?
Watch DEMON RESURRECTION on VHX/Vimeo: http://dresurrection.vhx.tv


Wednesday, October 10, 2018

Catching up...


I recently came across a couple of very nice reviews of my film, DEMON RESURRECTION, that I somehow missed when they were first published online several years back...

First up is this review by Andrew Liverod, writing on his Tormented Imp blog...

DEMON RESURRECTION ★★★½ Review by Andrew Liverod, August 10, 2015

A young ex-cult member gives birth to a demon, whilst all around her zombies threaten the lives of her friends.

Demon Resurrection was shot on digital but has a real SOV feel to it. Maybe it's down to the 4:3 aspect ratio, but you could really imagine this being shot in the 80's. Where a lot of low-budget underground horror films take the easy route of cheesiness to counter any claims that the film is silly, Demon Resurrection has the balls to take itself seriously. There are no crappy jokes, no over-the-top performances, no gross-out scenes for the sake of it. Instead writer/director William Hopkins takes several elements from other films to create a decent and believable plot, builds atmosphere, and gives us a nice pay-off at the end. This is a film that wears it's influences on it's sleeve, from the one building location of Night of the Living Dead, the impregnation and subsequent birth of Rosemary's Baby, to the feel of Hammer's "Witchcraft" films The Devil Rides Out and To the Devil a Daughter. The influences don't stop there, there's also the cosmic horror of Lovecraft and even a Cthulhu-like beast makes an appearance, admittedly in book form, but it all adds depth.

Sure the film looks amateur but the director has a real feel for film making and there are some really nice shot choices. Occasionally you can tell that he was limited by lenses when he has trouble framing several subjects in an interior shot, but really, who gives a shit. The editing is nice as well, I have no idea if more than one camera was used but it really feels like there were several just like in a more expensively shot movie. The performances are well above the standard of usual low-budget films and no-one stands out as being particularly crappy. The sound can get a little muffled and fuzzy in places but otherwise it's nice and clean. The soundtrack is subtle, unobtrusive and adds to the creepy enclosed atmosphere. The video effects were minimal and well used; pretty much all the special effects were practical with CGI being limited to a green fuzz that surrounds the zombies and a couple of other scenes.

On to the blood and guts. The zombie creatures were really quite good. Sure you can tell they were wearing rubber masks and but they had a sort of endearing Rawhead Rex feel to them. I loved them! The blood was standard corn syrup and the guts were either good latex or pig innards. We've got some typical disembowelling (a windowpane evisceration was a stand-out), a broken zombie arm piercing a neck, the demon baby birthing scene (reminiscent of Alien), some boob chewing, and something you don't see in many films... someone pissing their pants. There are a couple of naked scenes but these are handled well and don't come over as softcore porn shoehorned in to sell DVDs.

Demon Resurrection has a good plot, decent effects, tension, jeopardy, and a nice twist at the end. Overall, really good fun for SOV junkies but glossy Platinum Dunes multiplex horror fans should stay clear.

You can read this and other reviews on Andrew's blog: https://tormentedimp.blogspot.com/2015/08/demon-resurrection-2009.html

Next up is this review from comic artist Reed Waller, of Omaha the Cat Dancer fame, originally posted on Amazon:

DEMON RESURRECTION ★★★★ Review by Reed Waller, April 12, 2017

They Don't Make Them Like This Anymore?

I didn't know anything about this movie, but took a chance. It has a zero-budget look and feel, but I didn't realize at first that was on purpose. Bunch of very assorted "friends" drive to isolated cabin to perform an intervention on girl with weird boyfriend. They're a pretty self-righteous lot. But they quickly discover that drugs are not the problem here. He has been pursuing a dangerous satanic cult and she was taken as a member. And they want her back! What follows is a classic cult-of-the-dead movie that rises above its budget, with taut direction, plenty of plot twists, taut cinematography that keeps all the nasty action close-up and personal and genuinely upsetting, surprisingly good acting, and some very effective practical effects helping the cast and crew build the familiar material to a fever-pitch, all-out scream-a-thon with some truly nasty gory kill scenes and -- most of all -- peak moments of true hair-raising in-your-face horror, the likes of which I haven't seen since the original Night of the Living Dead or Evil Dead. I was impressed.

You can read this and other reviews by Reed on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/gp/customer-reviews/RVTFWM6XX74DG?ref=pf_vv_at_pdctrvw_srp

You can also find complete collections of Reed's comics on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Complete-Omaha-Cat-Dancer-Volumes/dp/1561636010

My belated thanks to both Andrew and Reed for their very kind words about DEMON RESURRECTION.

The film is available for streaming here: http://dresurrection.vhx.tv

It's also available on Amazon (Prime members watch for free): http://a.co/d/gngXlm4

BTW, if you’d like to review DEMON RESURRECTION on your blog, vlog or website, please contact me and I’ll get a free online screener to you.

– William Hopkins, Director, DEMON RESURRECTION