Mark Ayling

Mark Ayling

Favorite films

  • Blade Runner
  • Pulp Fiction
  • The French Connection
  • The Exorcist

Recent activity

All
  • Sundown: The Vampire in Retreat

    ★★★

  • Pennies from Heaven

    ★★★★

  • Sharknado 4: The 4th Awakens

    ★★

  • Johnny Guitar

    ★★★★★

Recent reviews

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  • Sundown: The Vampire in Retreat

    Sundown: The Vampire in Retreat

    ★★★

    Late 80s comedic vampire/western hybrid from b movie perennial Anthony Hickox about a group of abstinent vampires led by David Carradine’s dapper Count Mardulak who have set up a commune in the desert where they drink synthesised blood and try to figure out how best to integrate with humanity. 
    Naturally there are a couple of blood suckers who want to get back to hunting humans and who are plotting to stage a coup with modern weapons to seize control. 

    Whilst…

  • Pennies from Heaven

    Pennies from Heaven

    ★★★★

    A depression era musical that takes the good time vibes of music and cinema from the period and inverts it to tell a melancholy story about an unhappily married salesman played by Steve Martin and his affair with a meek school teacher played by Bernadette Peters. 

    As their lives and dreams and intersecting narratives drift towards tragedy, punctuated throughout by fantastical dance routines and Edward Hopper inspired late night encounters, the viewer is treated to a tonally unsettling, tragic, at…

Popular reviews

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  • Oppenheimer

    Oppenheimer

    ★★★★★

    Probably the best film of the year so far and probably one of the most important films of the decade.

    Nolan's scripting and direction is impeccable, whilst the sound design, score and cinematography are in perfect harmony throughout, ensuring that Oppenheimer's nightmare vision of a world careering out of control toward self destruction is beautifully and frighteningly realised.

    Everyone involved in this riveting biographical take on the father of the atom bomb, deserves a round of applause.

    The film is…

  • Johnny Guitar

    Johnny Guitar

    ★★★★★

    Proto-revisionist western with Joan Crawford in the lead as a casino/saloon owner up against it from a bunch of witch hunting locals. 

    Feminism and the McCarthy witch-hunts get a good airing in Nicholas Ray’s moody western. Plenty of chunky dialogue, intimacy, sexual tension and gunslinger action on offer. Slow to build but culminates in a juicy climax. Excellent stuff. Bit of a genre classic.