NateWatchesCoolMovies What do you get if you take a mixing bowl and toss in The Cell, The Grudge, some Stephen King, Alice In Wonderland, The Lovely Bones and a not-too-subtle anti abortion message? You get ReCycle, a visually unbelievable, absolutely terrifying, boundlessly imaginative Chinese horror fantasy that no one saw, got overlooked to the max, and occupies an eternal spot in my DVD collection. Novelist Tsui (The Eye's Anjelica Lee) is suffering from writer's block following two bestsellers, expected by her publisher to churn out another one posthaste. Plagued at first by paranormal visions in her apartment, she's suddenly thrown headlong into the otherworldly dimension of ReCycle, a place that can turn from beautiful to hellish and back again within minutes. Picture a surreal, abstract realm where everything that's ever lost, forgotten or abandoned ends up, thrown together in a gorgeous but threatening dream world with various levels, planes and passages, seemingly endless and never predictable. The dead also reside here, as she soon learns, some of which don't take kindly to intruders and can be pretty volatile. Forced to flee from one area of the realm to others and beyond, she's joined by the spirit of a lost little girl, and put through one hell of time trying to find her way out. Included are dilapidated, haunted amusement parks, fields and mountains that extend for millions of miles, eerie forests where the ghosts of hanged prisoners leer out at them, vast crumbling cities, acres of forgotten children's toys and in the film's most wtf sequence, a giant gooey room filled with aborted fetuses that spring to life and slime anyone within reach. That's right, the filmmakers aren't really subtle with their pro-life sentiment, especially near the end, but as long as you can get past that, the rest is all incredible. The sheer scope of the film commands attention though, and anyone who daydreams or lets their imagination run wild will get an absolute kick out of it. It's kind of like the world's weirdest video game in cinematic form, structured like a play-through but given all the disorienting unease of your worst nightmare.

rooprect Up front let's save a lot of people some time: this is NOT A HORROR MOVIE. So if you're looking for a flick that'll make you spill your popcorn and dig your nails into the flesh of the unlucky person sitting next to you (hopefully not a total stranger), you might want to look elsewhere."Re-Cycle" is the quintessential "morality tale". A morality tale is typically a fantasy that makes heavy use of symbolism and allegory, often personifying human traits into characters (like the 7 deadly sins). The protagonist undergoes a surreal journey with episodic events that relate to some moral message. "Dante's Inferno", the 14th century epic poem (not to be confused with "Dante's Peak" the 1997 flick about a guy chasing a volcano), is a great example of a morality tale. And now a few centuries later we have "Re-cycle" (original Cantonese title "Gwai wik" or "Ghost Land").The story is about a romance author Ting-Yin (Angelica Lee) who decides to write her first horror story. She is told in the beginning that writing horror stories brings out ghosts. And so the stage is set. But like I said, this is not a horror story but instead it's a dark (often scary) fantasy about Ting-Yin's descent into a bizarre, disturbing world of ghosts and creepers and AWESOME imagery.Enough about the plot; it's the imagery I want to focus on because the plot is best left for you to experience. Initially shot in very cold, claustrophobic scenes, the film comes alive once Ting-Yin enters the new realm. From there we see grand, majestic and terrible landscapes which I can only compare to the imaginative visuals of Tarsem ("The Cell", "The Fall"), Jean-Pierre Jeunet ("City of Lost Children") and Terry Gilliam ("Brazil"). A lot was done with digital effects, but a lot was also constructed with life-size props such as the stunning abandoned amusement park with its towering, rusted ferris wheel. Side note: that scene was a recreation of a real amusement park that was demolished years ago, and like a lot of sets, it has special significance to people familiar with the original Chinese locations they depict. Me, I've never been to China, but I watched the "Making Of" featurette where they explain a lot of this stuff.The movie carries a tense vibe, augmented with some very creepy moments which may actually make you spill your popcorn come to think of it. Then there are some absolutely poetic moments. If I had to fault this film for anything, it would be that I wanted more of the poetic moments, like the "orchard of abandoned love" deleted scene... why?? Well, I know why. Probably because they needed to keep things tense and scary for mass appeal. That comes with the business, I guess.The message of the movie is a great one, and it applies to each and every person out there. And no, it's not just about recycling your plastic haha. Watch it and you'll find out. If the film succeeds with you as it did with me, it may make you appreciate the little things in life a little bit more. For some odd reason I feel the uncontrollable urge to go rescue a dog from an animal shelter. That's not in the movie, but at the end maybe you'll understand my point.

shattering_glass47 Recycle is about a female writer who faces weird occurrences ever since she started to writer a new book. She's also facing relationship problems with her ex-husband.The reason I called this a salad bowl is because, as I watched the movie 'blind'(not knowing what exactly it is), I thought it's gonna be the typical girl-haunted-by-ghost horror movie. The first half of the movie is just painful to watch. If you watched horror movies, you know the typical drill. Weird shadows moving, sudden trumpet-loud noises, ghost appear behind the character, character turns and disappear. It's a freakin piously-text-book horror techniques.The second half of the film made me happy since it was a lot better, with an interesting premise but the first painful half left quite a scar. By then, I thought I was watching The Fall or Narnia, a fantasy-riddle movie. The places and the music fits so very well with a fantasy movie. Now throw in the relationship part, the twist part- you got a salad bowl.The premise of the movie is that all the unwanted, unfulfilled, abandoned, forgotten things are transported to a whole new spiritual world. It's a very exciting one to look at but some are horrible. For example, the first place was some slums with zombies. Clichéd, dull and boring. The last place was just some rocky mountains with floating rocks, again, what is noteworthy here? I just didn't find any! The interesting places are the "tunnel", "bookland" "toyland","playground land" and "graveyard". Sadly, for some of these places like bookland, playground and toyland, the characters just pass by them without developing and expanding more about the land. Who are the people there? What are the people doing with the books there? What's with the slums? The character while at the slums just look around, chased by zombies, moved on the next place. Running? Yes. Exposition? Explanation? Expanding? None.Just one last thing...What's with the overkill of onions?? I mean zombies! It's the only thing chasing after the character. Is zombies all that's is abondened as we know? We abandoned models after they get old, we abandoned soldiers at war, we abandoned old people in the shelter, the homeless in the alley, the whores in the gutter, the average teenager who committed suicide, the crippled in their hospital bed. But what's chasing the characters 90% of the movie? Zom-bies.

Ivy Meadows If you like movies with no discernible plot, with protagonists you don't care about, that leave you wanting to slit your wrists, by all means watch this! I gave it 3 stars because at least it was somewhat original in terms of visuals and had a surprise ending. But seriously, I have never had a movie with no real plot make me feel so depressed. It was horrifying, but not in the sense that you WANT in a horror movie. Word of caution - if you have ever had an abortion, had a fetus die or have any sensitivity to this topic, don't watch this movie, as it has some REALLY disgusting and emotionally sickening images/themes.