Hello, world. I’m MacDara Conroy, and this is my blog.


My Letterboxd reviews of The Da Vinci Code, Angels & Demons, Jug Face, Body Melt and A Bay of Blood

The Da Vinci Code:

Despite the presence of a likeable Tom Hanks, a magnetic Audrey Tautou and an EEEEEVIL Paul Bettany (playing yet another religious figure), not nearly enough happens to justify its near three-hour running time.

Angels & Demons:

A marked improvement over The Da Vinci Code, but still loses its way when Hanks and co stop solving puzzles and get led around the Vatican on a wild goose chase.

Jug Face:

This backwoods horror has got the makings of something different. But Jug Face doesn’t have the suspense, the directorial skill or the budget to pull it off.

Body Melt:

Early Peter Jackson meets Neighbours (quite literally – even Harold Bishop shows up) in this mess of a film from avant musician Philip Brophy. It doesn’t know whether it wants to be a nutzoid riff on body horror à la Street Trash, a send-up of Ozploitation tropes, or a post-modern satire of Australian mores, so it goes for all three, with demented but confused results. At least it’s an interesting failure, I’ll give it that much.

A Bay of Blood:

Shoddy performances and an unfocused plot detract from the fittingly sleazy, Agatha-Christie-on-psychoactives atmosphere Mario Bava captures in one of his more celebrated films, which also happens to be the foundation of the slasher horror — Friday the 13th being a direct lift in all but its story, and its wicked twist of an ending.