Perfect cast and a good story

It's a good bad... and worth a popcorn matinée. While it's easy to lament what could have been...

It is an exhilarating, distressing, funny and profound film, with one of the more memorable film scores in years,

Actress is magnificent and exudes a hypnotic screen presence in this affecting drama.

well, if anyone knows already. Shake Rattle & Roll is a time-old Filipino horror (plus comedic) film series that has been on since the 80s. It usually contains 3 short films in to one movie. Most themes in the movies do sometime connect with each other. But mainly an offbeat collection of mixed results making it either "you love some, you'll never wished to have seen some' sort of thing.here are some overviews on the 3eps of this installment...13th floor: 4/10 (not really a horror piece, but an overly fun time) an okay fun ghost story of an orphanage that was burnt down back in the 80s. apparently a group of party organizers come to cater the birthday party thrown for a little girl. sooner or later, each and every one of them start encountering strange occurrences of hauntings. then in no time go mad. this is one of the more 'FUN' ep of the film. it's somewhat trying to be a horror/comedy run. with an heartfelt message coming at the end.Yaya: 8/10 (the best out of the 3, even if it's recycling the ASWANG bit) personally, this is the best episode out of the 3 in the film. pretty much it recycles the ASWANG folklore that has been popular in the Philippines for a long time. i liked how it seemed more darker in it's atmosphere than the other installments. a practically good story. with some nice scary effects, and thrilling scenes.LRT 6/10 (2nd place, but it does good) nicely done for a small monster stalker piece. i liked how they go with a nice prosthetic costume, then a crappy CGI monster. there's really nice bit and pieces of blood. seeming a little bit WESTERNIZED for it's theme compared to it's stereotypical Asian horror. some scenes do leave questioned to how they were shot. but over all a some-what nice ep to finish the film. especially the end.over all a nice 7/10 for not being another bit as cheesy as the other installments.

The first segment of Shake, Rattle and Roll 8 may be forgettable and the last segment may be competent but it's the middle segment that is PURE CULT MOVIE GOLD! In his first mainstream short feature, Toppel Lee comes out with arms swinging and he scores an instant knockout. I've always thought that Filipino folklore is the deepest source of movie magic in this country and Topel knows it, too. His story is about an aswang, as jayexiomo.com says so above, a mythical creature that eats babies, just like Fat Bastard. Nash Aguas, the protagonist of the story, knows that his nanny is a Fat Bastard, and she's out to eat his little sibling. Nobody believes Nash though, because Nash has proved himself to be a prankster who has chased off nannies before. I guess it's like Nanny McPhee, the horror version, though I never did see Nanny McPhee.Anyway the aswang yaya (monster nanny) is played by the beautiful Iza Calzado, and even though I know this girl supposedly can talk like a sailor, she pulls off her scary character perfectly. I mean, how can someone so gorgeous and with a very ample bosom, be a baby eater. Maybe that's how she supplies here ample... anyway.So Topel, the director, is a genius. You know why? Because he knows how to cast people perfectly. He even casted Debraliz as the other mataray (catty) housemaid and Sheryll Cruz as the mom. Perfect! And one can not deny that Toppel gets atmosphere. The whole movie was full of it. You can feel it crackling in the air. When the yaya is going after the baby, the whole movie theater was riveted. I looked around (I like looking around during those moments), and I could feel the utter joy (and roller coaster fear) of the people around me. A new star is born. And his name is Toppel Lee.

Going Bulilit had it right. "Pag nanood ka ng Shake Rattle & Roll 8, ikaw ay manginginig, mangangatal, gugulong at kakain." I was shaken and disturbed by the deterioration and non-development of Pinoy movie imagination. I was rattled to embarrassment by the ripped-off story lines. I rolled on the floor laughing (or at least I wanted to) at the unbelievably unoriginal lines they could just have made a silent movie and everyone would still have understood the entire plot and subplots (if any). And, it would really have been a better idea if I just ate the 120 pesos I spent for the movie. Or, better yet, spend it on UNICEF's text drive. Text ON BATANGPINOY to 2800 for Globe. Dunno bout Smart. (I tried this service just now to check if my memory served me right. And, it replied 'this service is temporarily not available, try again later.' What's up with that? Back to the movie, the best part was the scream-shot of IC Mendoza after the stupid and effortless scrambling away from the killer-monster. The theater actors made the most of what they were given. The Broadway couple came out like swans among turkeys. Eugene Domingo gave it her best I think. The worst non-actor was Bearwin Meily who seemed like he was just having fun at his neighborhood sari-sari store. The dime-a-dozen teens' only talent were their looks. In this country, physical appearance IS a talent.The best scare was a non-SFX scene. Iza Calzado wielding a butcher knife at the kid. Nice!! I wanted to chop off the kid from the very first scene he appeared. Bad direction, the kid (if real) probably had schizophrenia or a really terrible case of personality disorder. They really could've done without the last romantic bit of Keempee & Manilyn just before going out the window to escape from the killer-monster who wins worst rip-off. (Hello M.Night Shyamalan!) My entire being went, "WHAA???"

Fast becoming the Filipino "Friday the 13th" in terms of longevity, Regal Films' horror-comedy franchise "Shake, Rattle and Roll" hits the big screen anew this season with its 8th installment. As usual, three episodes with three different set of filmmakers and actors fill up the film's entire running time and the resulting imbalance of the end product either works for or against it. As with previous installments, there will be one that stands out; but along with it, the viewer has to sit through the two that don't. Or vice versa.Easily the weakest of the three, Rahyan Carlos' "13th Floor" opens the proceedings with a tale of party organizers called to the job one day at a condominium that has a tragic past. Headed by Sonny (Bearwin Meily), the group is tasked to prepare a birthday party for 11-year old Alex (Jolina Reyes). But something's not right. Alex's visitors seem extremely apathetic and really weird things start happening.How much this episode works for you depends entirely on how well you can take it at face value. As campy horror films go, "13th Floor" functions on the same level as the 1995 Japanese family horror film "Haunted School (Gakko no Kaidan)" only with less verve and a more sloppy direction. Also, if the names of Meily and Keanna Reeves on the credit sequence don't tip you off on its exaggerated tongue-in-cheek nature, it might take you a while to get your bearings on and go with the flow.As he has shown in "Pamahiin," restraint is far from Carlos' mind. It's a similar case here. Fortunately, his tendency to overindulge on scares and skimp on subtlety is cushioned by the fact that nothing here is to be taken seriously. Besides, at a third less than the overall length of "Pamahiin," this episode barely avoids on overstaying its qualified welcome.The next episode - "Yaya" - is helmed by Topel Lee, who also directed "Dilim," an entry to last year's Cinema One Originals Film Festival. Treading virtually the same theme, "Yaya" stars the impressive "Star Circle Quest Grand Kid Questor" Nash Aguas as a young boy who believes his new nanny is an "aswang" - a Filipino mythical creature that goes bump at night and eats human innards for dinner.With crisp storytelling, nice shots, and a few genuinely terrifying moments, Lee's episode delivers the best among the bunch. He's also aided by Aguas' strong performance who, at a young age, surprisingly holds himself on screen better than some actors more than double his age. Iza Calzado as the nanny barely exhibits the creepy ambiguity required of her but that's just maybe because I'm so used to her playing characters on the opposite side of the spectrum.As if the fuss of rush hour and a service sometimes badly in need of a TQM seminar aren't enough, the LRT gets further bad rep with Mike Tuviera's "LRT," the installment's third and final episode. Here, it's business as usual as a handful of commuters take the last train going home late one night. But soon, something's amiss because the train doesn't stop at any station and no one seems to care that there are people still aboard. Eventually locked inside the main terminal of LRT-2 is Keempee de Leon as the de facto leader of the group, Manilyn Reynes as a mother of an asthmatic child, Eugene Domingo as a religious fanatic, Cassandra Ponti as a nurse every patient would die for, Mico Palanca as a hotheaded yuppie, and a few other younger faces. And they all must stick together if they all want to live because something's lurking in the shadows that wants to eat their hearts out. Literally.What starts like a promising narrative dives to something more like "Jeepers Creepers," which is not necessarily a bad thing. The thing is, since the whole plot is just a part of an entirety, it's heavily truncated. As such, characters are barely fleshed out (not that it matters in films like this) and there's barely someone to root for. Honestly, I didn't care who lived and who got offed. There's an attempt to humanize the characters of De Leon and Reynes towards the end but it's so awkwardly placed I'm not sure whether to take it seriously. Also, because it's a PG-13 film, gore is severely limited. (Awww, and I was getting in the mood for some "LRT Chainsaw Massacre.") In the end, "Shake, Rattle and Roll 8" in its entirety is a film that will appeal to those looking for nothing more than unabashed escapism. Personally, there's some fun to be had here, although the best part is stacked in the middle so it might be better off on DVD to be able to skip chapters. Besides, HD digital looks better there.