The 10 Best B-Movies of 2013

 

Like with 2011 and then 2012, this is my Annual list of my personal favorite B-Movie releases of the last year. There is still plenty of movies from this past year that I haven't yet seen, so it's possible I've potentially skipped over a few diamonds in the rough due to that, since this list is based off what I've actually watched myself. Also, this list is solely based off what has hit home video formats and Video On Demand services in 2013, so movies that aired on TV stations like Lifetime or the SyFy Channel this year, but never came out on DVD, BluRay, and VOD services yet, does not count for this. I want this as a list of movies that you could potentially pick up yourself or have easy access to legally obtaining. Likewise, some of these movies may have aired on TV in 2011 or 2012, but didn't actually get released on home video formats or VOD until 2013, thus I count them as 2013 movies for that reason.

The following list won't be in any specific order, as I clearly love all of them for them to even be on the list to begin with, so putting them in any kind of ranking order beyond that is a bit moot.

- Age of Dinosaurs is not just The Asylum's best movie to date, it's also the most just plain fun dinosaur movie I've watched in a long time. Never taking itself too seriously, we get tons of fun-filled dino attack scene after fun-filled dino attack scene that plays like a Best-Of compilation of those classic 'Dinosaur Attacks!' cards. Add to that some of the most impressive CGI to come from Asylum yet, in addition to well-crafted Carnosaur-esque practical effects and puppetry, as well as Treat Williams being Treat Williams, and you have a guaranteed shot at a fun time. You can read my full previously-posted review of this one here. 

 - Found Footage is an easy genre to tackle, yet many movies fumble while trying. Europa Report may not be scary, or even a horror movie. In fact, it's more of a slow-burn character study drama than anything else, set within the plot of traveling through Space to another planet. But the way it handles the Found Footage aspect is among the best I've ever seen, plus the movie is actually really good and well-made as well. You can read my full previously-posted review of this one here.

- Exceptional CGI special effects and good acting from some familiar faces dominates Spiders, a fun-filled creepy-crawly killer spider flick released early this year. Starts in with the action pretty quickly and hardly lets-up for its entire runtime. If you're a fan of Creature Features, especially giant killer spider ones, this is surely not one you want to miss. Especially once the giant mutant alien spider starts destroying the city - fun times! You can read my full previously-posted review of this one here.
 
 

 - You didn't think I'd have a Best Of list without the most infamous of the 2013 B-Movies, did you? The cult phenomenon surrounding Asylum's Sharknado is arguably even more interesting than anything in the wacky movie itself. Still, by even 20 minutes in it's pretty easy to see why this obtained it's pop culture status, and that's because the movie is as insanely stupid... and awesome... as it sounds, and B-Movie fans are sure to love every minute of it. You can read my full previously-posted review of this one here.

 - Attack From Beneath, aka Atlantic Rim was Asylum's well-timed mockbuster of Pacific Rim, and while it may have had a teeny tiny fraction of that Hollywood movie's gigantic budget, it's every bit as entertaining. Acting and Effects are top-notch stuff for an Asylum production, and it was filled with a non-stop supply of hilariously-delivered one liners and fun popcorn action scenes involving Power Rangers-esque Mech Robots battling giant monsters. What more can you want in a low budget B-Movie? You can read my full previously-posted review of this one here.

- Having already hit Home Video everywhere else in the world last year, Grabbers, an Irish monster horror/comedy in the style of Shaun of the Dead and Slither, only hit American VOD services this year. You know you're in for a hilarious good time when a movie deals with a slimy tentacled alien invasion where the beastie of note is allergic to alcohol so the remaining townsfolk have to get totally and completely hammered at the local pub in order to fight it. Why this amazing little gem is having such a difficult time finding proper distribution in America, I'll never know.

- The only Christopher R. Mihm movie I don't yet have a review done for, but that doesn't mean that The Giant Spider isn't a fun movie worthy of a spot in his filmography. It just means, honestly, that I've been lazy. The Giant Spider is a great and hilarious black and white homage to the classic 1950's monster B-movies with the best style of effects seen in a Mihm movie yet. It's super short runtime also means there's very little of the movie where something fun isn't happening. Though due to the massive amounts of references to past Mihm movies I wouldn't recommend starting with this one, but for fans of his filmography, you do not want to miss it.

- After two comedic entries (one of which I loved, one I think is the worst movie ever made), the Child's Play series returns to it's straight-up horror roots with this new entry. It's smaller budget is very much noticeable, but that doesn't stop Curse of Chucky from being a very worthy return to form. Includes good kills, good Chucky lines, loads of tension, and some references to all previous movies, so mix those things with its return to its horror roots, and every fan of the classic movies should be happy with this one.

- Frankenstein's Army is one creepy WWII-set Found Footage horror movie that includes not only an interesting story, well-placed tension, and buckets of blood and gore, but also amazing monster designs worthy of a theatrical movie, with excellent practical effects to bring those designs to life. However, Frankenstein's Army is a prime example of a Found Footage movie that I think could have been even better had it been a traditionally-shot movie instead of Found Footage.

- Not only one of my favorite B-Movies of the year, Big Ass Spider (previously Mega Spider) is one of my favorite movies of the year, period. Well acted, well-done CGI spider effects, a good story, and equal parts hilarious and just plain awesome. Out of all the movies on this list, this is the one that should have had a wide theatrical release because the overall quality and talent on display here is really fitting of that. You can read my full previously-posted review of this one here.



All in all, another great year for B-Movie fans, and seeing as how a grand total of three of these movies on my list are killer spider movies, it's safe to say that 2013 was the Year of the Spider for me and it was great seeing the shark dethroned for a year (even though there were a couple fun shark titles as well, such as Ghost Shark). And while these are just my personal favorite ten, there are still plenty of other good, fun, worthy B-Movies from this past year that fans can sink their teeth into as well.

Actually, below you'll find three such movies that almost made my list but, for one reason or another, just couldn't quite be included.

 HONORABLE MENTIONS

- Jurassic Attack still has not yet been released in America, other then on the SyFy Channel as Rise of the Dinosaurs. It also has just a few too many minor flaws that add up enough to prevent it from being included among the 'Best of the Best' for me, but it was still one really fun ride of a dinosaur adventure movie that I enjoy re-watching from time to time and that is certainly worth your time if you can land yourself a copy. You can read my full previously-posted review of this one here.

 

 - Another SyFy-aired movie that has yet to be released, Grave Halloween was a big surprise for me as I found it to be far above the caliber of the Original Movies SyFy tends to air. Being more of a creepy, atmospheric, haunting kind of movie, Grave Halloween dealt with the infamous and spine-tingling real-life location of Aokigahara, Japan's Suicide Forest, which is a terribly depressing and creepy location even when not factoring in the ghost legends. However, as much as I enjoyed it as a whole, I do have major issues with a couple parts, including the entire climax.

 - The Dyatlov Pass Incident (or Devil's Pass as it's been renamed in America) has an amazing near-perfect first half that acts great as a "Dyatlov Pass Incident 101" of the real-life mystery that the movie is based around. It's also atmospheric as hell, creepy, mysterious, and well acted. That first half is among my favorite stuff of the year, especially when it comes to Found Footage. But it all utterly comes apart during the second half of the movie, which in turn just about ruins it all for me. To understand further as to why, you can read my full previously-posted review of this one here.

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Spiders (2013)

REVIEW BY: Jeffrey Long

COMPANY: Nu Image

RUNTIME: 90 mins

FORMAT: BluRay

PLOT: After a Soviet space station crashes into a New York City subway tunnel, a new species of dangerous venomous spiders is discovered, and soon they start mutating to gigantic proportions and wreak havoc on the city.

REVIEW: When Spiders (Spiders 3D for its limited theatrical run) was first announced and we started getting news of it here and there, I was a bit confused as to what kind of movie it was - remake, sequel, or something original? See, back in 2000 and 2001 there were a couple SyFy Channel style B-Movies also titled Spiders and Spiders II: Breeding Grounds. Like this one, they also dealt with genetically-modified mutant killer spiders brought down on something crashing from space, and they too began growing to immense size during the films. I had no idea initially if this was supposed to be a new sequel to that series (with the 3 in 3D being the number of the movie), a remake to the first, or just a brand new movie with the same unimaginative title and an almost exact same plot. Well it turns out it's that last one, and while that was slightly disappointing to me at first, in the end I completely forgot all about any other similar movies because this one was just so damn good.

As far as expectations for low budget cheesy B-Movies go, this one surpassed them in pretty much every regard. The acting is actually pretty good from everyone, no matter how minor or major the role, and when you take into account just how many Unknowns and B-Movie actors are in this, that's quite the feat - even the child actor didn't bother me at all here and came across as very natural. Also, Patrick Muldoon (here playing subway tracks manager and loving father that has to find his family amidst the spider-caused chaos in the city) has clearly discovered the Fountain of Youth as he hasn't aged a single day since his time on the original Starship Troopers, and he's equally a joy to watch here as he was in that classic.

The special effects of the mutant spiders ranged from ok to great and were always well-above average for what you would expect from such a movie. From the normal-sized little critters that plagued the subway tracks and other dimly-lit locations, to the dog-sized buggers that ran up the sides of the buildings and chased people through warehouses, to the car-sized horrors that occupied the mostly-deserted streets and back alleys, to the gigantic building-sized monstrosity that created mass chaos and destruction across the city, they all looked pretty excellent and the CGI models for them interacted with the physical world almost flawlessly. As a hated of any kind of arachnids, I can assure you that the CGI models in this movie will be giving me nightmares for weeks to come. Likewise, the set designs were excellent as well and actually looked realistic. Even though the movie was filmed in Romania or Bucharest or some place like that, I never once questioned if this was actually NYC I was seeing as it looked pretty spot-on to me. If I hadn't read in another article where this movie had been filmed, I would have never guessed that it hadn't been in New York City.

It's also a nice added bonus that the majority of the movie takes place at night or in dimly-lit shadowed areas, which is something I miss from 80's and 90's B-Movies that seems to not happen much anymore, if at all - so many B-Movies today (especially SyFy Channel ones) take place entirely during the day, and they loose such great potential for atmosphere by doing that (not to mention it helps mask any terrible CGI a bit). Even having a couple night time attack scenes go a long way, so it was a nice surprise when this one was filled with them. Hell, even the main plot of the movie (that being the spiders coming down from space and infesting New York City) happens within the first 5-10 minutes, which was another welcomed change as so many of these kinds of movies take so long to get to the point, but here it starts almost right away and wastes no time.

However, where it does waste time, is with the Government Conspiracy subplot. See, there's this rather large section of the movie devoted to the Government evacuated the city and quarantining sections of it off, threatening those that try to cross by way of on-the-spot execution. In addition to this going on, the Government is also employing very Mission: Impossible style tactics to 'get rid of' (I.E. murder) anyone with real knowledge on the reason the city is being evacuated, that being due to giant mutating alien spiders. On paper I'm sure it looked great, and even in-action it's not the idea of it that I don't like, it's just that far too much time is spent on it, and spent on characters within it that have no bearing on anything else in the movie, and I feel it kind of takes you out of the main meat of fun far more often then not. It brings down an otherwise perfect flow to the movie and that whole subplot could easily have been shortened down or cut out all together and the movie would have been better off for it.

Along those lines there's an extension of that subplot, dealing with a Government scientist and the lead military general doing tests on a captured spider that involves some revelations, that while I didn't mind nearly as much as the previously-mentioned stuff, I still could have done without. I say it all too often, but that's only because these movies do it all too often, but I really hate it when killer animal B-movies feel the need to throw in human villains, as I find it takes some of the threat away from the killer animals, plus nobody tunes into a giant mutated killer alien spider movie to watch a couple questionable humans make some bad decisions and act all tough about it. Don't get me wrong, I liked having the military involved, especially for some of those awesome and fun military vs giant spiders action scenes, but it's just having the lead General and scientist kind of being the obligatory 'evil military general' and 'mad scientist' characters that I could have done without. However, it at least it gave us a couple more main characters to focus on, and they did impact other parts of the movie as well as interacted with our main leads on occasion, so at least they have a good reason to be here, unlike the whole Government cover-up stuff that I mentioned earlier.

Those quibbles aside, this is a near-perfect B-Movie and it's a hell of a lot of fun. I just wish they would have come up with a better, more interesting title then simply 'Spiders'. Especially since there's already an almost identical movie about mutated alien spiders getting loose after escaping a falling man-made outer space object and growing to giant size, ALSO with the exact same generic title of 'Spiders' that was released back in 2000. But whatevs. Nobody probably even remembers that movie other than me anyway.

As for this one, I have no idea why it never got a wider theatrical release then it did. As far as I'm concerned, the acting, CGI effects, and even the movie as a whole is at least on-par with, if not better than, Eight Legged Freaks which did get a theatrical release back in 2002, and in my opinion, this one deserved a far better release treatment then it ultimately got.

8/10  rooms in the Psych Ward

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