Choker

I saw the movie at a screening in Los Angeles about 4 months ago or so, at a film festival.

I discovered Choker through the movie's writer and director Nick Vallenlonga's IMDb page. I found out about him after seeing an earlier movie of his, Corporate Ladder which starred Tony Denison and Jon Pollito, who both used to be on Crime Story together.

Anyway, I got to see Choker and I was impressed by the actors performances. My favorite in the film was the alien "leader", Haley DuMond. She can really act and I see she is in Vallenlonga's upcoming film as well, nice. The rest of the cast were also very good: Tony Denison was great as usual. Robert Shafer provided some well timed humor. Colleen Porch was the "beauty" of the movie, and the lead, Paul Sloan, was intense.

This movie was fun and did what it what meant to do, entertain.

Choker is not a huge budget production so don't expect complex CGI or anything really fancy. The movie was somewhat serious at times, somewhat tongue in cheek sci-fi at times. If you want to watch this movie , watch it with the intent of having fun. What I got out of it was kind of a 50's B sci-fi flick set in present time.

DuMond and Denison were not at the screening I attended, unfortunately, but Shafer, Harry Manfredini (who composed all the Friday the 13ths), Paul Sloan and Vallenlonga were there.

It's coming out on DVD and I recommend checking it out. I for one am hoping that the DVD contains a simultaneous director's commentary feature. It would be interesting to hear how quickly a particuar scene was shot since Choker was filmed in a little over a week.

You see the box. You check out the actors in it. You sniff the disc. You KNOW it's going to be sh*t, but you can't help yourself... You have to give it a taste...

It's just as bad as you feared. You watch the fight sequences, that are beyond parody. You try to follow the story, but fail as you're not high on Class A drugs. The acting... What acting? As for the 'special' effects... They must have been done by 'special' needs people on a ZX Spectrum. No, too advanced. A pocket calculator perhaps? Who on Earth paid for this @:><{?!...

Then it hits you. We NEED films like this to put into perspective how hard it is to make a good movie. It makes you cherish even the mediocre flicks, when you stack movies like this up next to it. So rather than feel I've wasted my time on this crap, next time I sit through an underwhelming 90 minute production I can say: It wasn't great but... At least it wasn't B.E.I.N.G. Or Choker. Or Disturbance. Or whatever the heck they're calling it these days.

Cosmic logic at its finest.

The serial-killer Hud Masters (Paul Sloan) and his partner Logan (Colleen Porch) have been recruited by a governmental agency to hunt down aliens that can survive for a period inhabiting human bodies. Logan reports their murders to her boss Frank Russo (Nick Vallelonga), a family man married with Stacy Russo (Susse Budde) with a daughter, who has a team to remove the bodies and any evidence.

When an alien switch bodies to escape from Hud, Lt. Murcer (Anthony John), Lt. Clark (Bobby Ray Shafer) and the coroner Santo (Katrina Law) are forced to return the bodies and Hud, who had been captured by the detectives, to Frank that explains that one hundred aliens from an evolved race had moved to Earth since their planet is doomed. Now Hud has to chase the dangerous Leader (Hayley DuMond), who has adapted to the atmosphere of our planet and wants to breed.

"Choker" is definitely not a good or an unforgettable sci-fi movie. However, considering the extremely low-budget, it works reasonably well on DVD. The storyline is a rip-off of "The Hidden" and the writer / director Nick Vallelonga is too fat for a skilled agent. One question: if the aliens die in the delivery of their offspring, how could Hud and the Leader be brothers? My vote is five.

Title (Brazil): "Comando: Exterminador" ("Commando: Extermination")

Considering what the film makers and cast of "Choker" had to work with as far as budget, time and resources, the film is a triumph of creativity and indie spirit.

Script delivers a fine twisty road to a fun, pulpy resolution and the cast dials in excellent performances in some just-this-side-of-stereotypical roles. The triple-threat of Colleen Porch, Paul Sloan and (especially) Hayley DuMond are a joy to watch on screen.

Technically, flick suffers from occasionally rushed-feeling or under-lit or under-choreographed sequences, but again, considered these folks had 12 days to shoot the film, they did a wonderful job! Overall the film feels more thriller than horror and is quite enjoyable.

Smart, stylish and imaginative - A fun story, sexy cast and even some moving performances combined to give you a twisty, pulpy ride through what seems to be an eternal dark night of alien hunting, fights, secret government agendas and human drama.

"Choker" thinks it's a much bigger film than it is, like a tiny dog that doesn't know how tiny it is or how tiny it should act. No one told these guys that little films can't be deep, can't have sprawling story lines, can't have tons of locations and set pieces or can't have accomplished actors. Applaud these guys for ignoring the obvious constraints of time and money and bringing home some good old entertainment.