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 22. Robot Monster (1953) Dir: Phil Tucker (Washington Psychotronic Film Society) On an objective level, probably the worst thing I’ll watch all October. It’s legitimately one of the most confusing films I’ve seen in years. But I kinda love this? The creature design is iconic and the film makes such bewildering choices it’s adorable. Robot Monster is the gooniest monster. It feels like a movie characters in The Sims would watch. Friends Are Evil fucked around with this message at 02:44 on Oct 15, 2019 |
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Oct 15, 2019 02:21
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#16) The Devil's Carnival (2012) This was a fun little musical, continuing the theme from yesterday's movie. The difference is that The Devil's Carnival uses it's very loose story to push along the songs, whereas Phantom of the Paradise used it's very loose songs to push along the story. I will say that not all the songs landed with me, but I was pretty entertained the whole way through.  3/5
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Oct 15, 2019 02:21
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Random Stranger posted:I would legitimately not be surprised if Garth Marenghi was based on him. It is. The artwork of Garth Marenghi's novels are based off of those covers. Neil Gaiman is a big fan of him, and you can read interviews where he talks about collecting his novels.
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Oct 15, 2019 02:28
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 - (23). George A. Romero's Land of the Dead (2005) Available on Starz. Time has passed since the zombie apocalypse and humanity’s survivors have regrouped in secured communities like Fiddler’s Green where a feudal system has been established where a few live in comfort while others risk their lives to scavenge supplies and live in slums around the “castle.” Meanwhile the dead are evolving and beginning to learn humanity’s tricks and work around them. I rewatched this on a whim when I couldn’t sleep. I’ve seen it a bunch and usually thought it was unspectacular and clumsy but mostly fun. I was way more down on it this time, but that might have been my mood. I think Romero focused a lot on the scope of the film telling his biggest story with hundreds of survivors and huge sets, but he doesn’t really zero in on any characters or stories enough to really tell any kind of satisfying story. A couple of characters exist in more than one dimension but most are just kind of there’d the 3 main characters who get a little more time don’t really go anywhere. Riley tries a little too hard to tell us he’s selfish when he’s obviously always trying to do the right thing and the entire story of Cholo being a selfish rear end in a top hat who foolishly things he’ll be allowed to move up just never really feels like it has room to breath. Like I get the metaphor. Romero’s always talking about something else and its obvious its about the class system, the powers distracting the poor and getting them to fight against each other, how they can rise up and take down the system. I get it. Its hard not to get and I think this is Romero at his most overt. And I think he kind of misses its mark a a result. And like using the species who literally wants to eat you as a metaphor for the “other” who you don’t really have to be fighting is… awkward? Big Daddy’s intelligence level and the actual rules of the zombies gets kind of muddy too in the name of the metaphor. Like, at one time Big Daddy is unable to really understand why his jackhammer stopped working when it got unplugged and a few minutes later he’s clever enough to know what gasoline is, that it burns, works out a plan to use it, and then goes and gets a light. That’s… really advanced stuff for a guy who just figured out that if you press the button bullets come out of the gun. And like, there’s no real attempt to explain it or why the zombies would maybe stop eating people. Its just something we’re just supposed to buy into in the name of the metaphor. I don’t know, like I said maybe I was just in a mood. I’ve liked this a lot more in the past so maybe it was just a bad day. Franchescanado posted:SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #3: Horror Noire   20 (24). Ganja & Hess (1973) Available on Shudder, Kanopy, and Epix Dr. Hess Green is killed with an ancient dagger but rises immortal with an addiction for blood. He survives and wrestles with what he’s become until he meets and falls in love with Ganja who possesses many of the traits needed to live this way and starting a journey for both of desire and guilt. I made a decision not to subscribe to Shudder this October just to try and limit my list of movies somewhat since it really doesn’t have much to offer from my target years and I either would have not used it or ended up watching a bunch of stuff that didn’t fit my challenge and made it harder. So Horror Noire is off the table even though I’ve added it to my Shudder watchlist when next I subscribe in May or whenever. That narrowed my options down to this and Bones and while all the reviews kept drawing my interest I felt like the fact that everyone was watching Bones just meant I should make the choice for the less watched and reviewed one. It just feels truer to the “challenge” idea. And in some ways this film very much is a challenge. Bill Gunn tells his story in a very unconventional and intentionally disorientating way largely abandoning dialogue, exposition, or clear narratives and instead kind of asking you to just feel the film and the horror of what’s happening. Its not always clear exactly what’s happening or why someone is making the choices they make, but you pretty consistently know what they’re feeling when they make them. Spike Lee is a big fan of Gunn (and remade this film which is now on my list) and I think you can see Gunn’s influence in Lee’s work with the same kind of style and themes over narrative or “floating” story. Its mostly a 2 person story between Duane Jones (Ben from the original Night of the Living Dead) and Marlene Clark and both do a really tremendous job conveying the story with only sporadic bouts of mostly monologued dialogue. Gunn has a small role with a lot of importance but the only other actor to play a large role in the film is Sam Waymon who also contributed much of the music to the film which really went a long way to establishing the religious and moral themes being explored. Waymon also happened to be the brother of Nina Simone. Honestly, this feels like a film I’m just no informed or qualified enough to review properly. You see films get labeled historic or art but this is definitely one of the ones that feels more fully that and one that I should almost read a book about, take a class in, or listen to a seminar. There’s a whole ton in here about religion, sex, morality, guilt, and African American experiences and identity that I’m just not qualified to truly expand on. I feel like I came out of a lecture having learned just enough to want to come back for the next part. Highly recommended. September Pre-Game Tally - New (Total) 1. NOS4A2 (2019); - (2). Splice (2009); - (3). Drive Angry (2011); 2 (4). The Twilight Zone (2019); - (5). Event Horizon (1997); - (6). BrainDead (2016); 3 (7). The Dark Tower (2017); 4 (8). The Collector (2009); 5 (9). The Bad Batch (2016); - (10). Rose Red (2002); - (11). Salem’s Lot (1979) October Tally - New (Total) 1. The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920); 2. Nightmare Cinema (2018); 3. Dead of Night (1945); The Queen of Spades (1949); 5. Tragedy Girls (2017); 6. House of Wax (1953); SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #1: The Best Month: 7. The Autopsy of Jane Doe (2016); 8. In the Tall Grass (2019); 9. The Night of the Hunter (1955); 10. The Thing (1951); - (11). The Thing (1982); 11 (12). The Thing (2011); - (13). Halloween (1978); 12 (14). Dracula (1931); SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #2: Dead & Buried: 13 (15). Q (1982); 14 (16). The Black Cat (1934); 15 (17). The Unknown (1927); - (18). Halloween II (1981); 16 (19). The Seventh Victim (1943); 17 (20). The Beast With Five Fingers (1946); 18 (21). The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1923); 19 (22). The Curse of the Cat People (1944); - (23). George A. Romero's Land of the Dead (2005); SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #3: Horror Noire: 20 (24). Ganja & Hess (1973)
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Oct 15, 2019 02:49
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The Craft (1995, Amazon Prime Canada) This movie is about a new girl at a catholic school who gets involved in a teenage coven. This was decent, and the second best use of Neve Campbell as a catholic school girl in the 90s. My dogs were fighting during this so I can't say it had my undivided attention but I got the gist of it. The movie has a mid-90s look to it and it's always nice to see a movie from this era being in touch with its target audience though. It's not quite as hip as Scream was but the characters felt like mid 90s teens and while the soundtrack may seem dated now, it was the type of stuff that was popular at the time. The movie mainly focuses on the friendship between the four girls and the development of their powers, and then the eventual power struggle. The actresses all have good chemistry with each other and come off as genuine friends. There's some interesting subplots too, such as one of the witches dealing with a racist bully. I would recommend checking this out, especially if you were a teen in the 90s. The Wolfman (2010, Netflix) Samhain Challenge: Spooktober - keyword LegendThis is a pretty wide challenge that I could probably argue almost any movie fulfills, but I played it honest and looked for something that would really correspond with one of the words. So I browsed the list while browsing the horror collection on Netflix and came across this. The werewolf is a legendary character and I recalled the original wolfman movie dealt with gypsy legends so I decided to check this out. This turned out to be a good choice, at least for fulfilling the terms of the challenge. While this movie takes place in Victorian London, gypsy legends of the Wolfman help move the story along and provide backstory of the legend of the lycanthrope. The movie itself is fairly middling. Benecio Del Toro does a good job as the Lawrence Talbot/The Wolfman but the story itself is just kind of boring. The original wolfman movie is probably my least favourite of the original universal monster movies so I didn't have that high of expectations anyways. I did like the level of violence that we saw though, it was cool to see the wolfman as a ferocious killer that's capable of quick and brutal deaths. Watched (20): Brightburn, Tales from the Hood, Pet Semetary 2, Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer, One Cut of the Dead, Leatherface (1990), Summer of 84, Viy, Mandy, In the Tall Grass, Street Trash, See No Evil, Haunt, Idle Hands, Horror Noire, Hello Mary Lou: Prom Night 2, Doom Asylum, Eaten Alive, The Craft, The Wolfman (2010) Samhain Challenges: 1. The Best Month - Viy 2. Dead and Buried - coming soon 3. Horror Noire - Horror Noire 4. Inktober (legend) - The Wolfman (2010)
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Oct 15, 2019 03:06
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 #91) Scooby-Doo and the Goblin King (2008) OK, I was sure David Bowie wouldn't be in this, but it was still a disappointment to have that confirmed. Tim Curry is an acceptable replacement, though. Unfortunately, this movie is a step down from Pirates Ahoy!, and they're going overboard on the sound effects again. The plot sends Shaggy and Scooby off to what's essentially Halloweentown, due to some bullshit about a stage magician (voiced by Wayne Knight) stealing a fairy princess' powers, and the movie sticks with the two of them (plus a couple of one-off characters) for like 90% of its remaining time. Doesn't make for good team dynamics, but it does make the Shag and Scoob shtick wear thin faster than usual. Kind of stacked on the guest actor list, though, including Jay Leno as a Jack-O'-Lantern and Wallace Shawn as a magic shoppe proprietor. I'd probably point to the set designs as the high point of this, and the various monster designs are... above average. The corner-cutting in the animation gets most obvious during the songs, especially when it cuts to the musicians playing entirely off-beat. At one point, Shaggy refers to trick-'r-treating as a "hoax," and at another, he and Scooby dress as Daphne and Velma, respectively, to sex appeal their way into a party, which is numerous levels of messed-up. It feels like another batch of arbitrary rules gets introduced every ten minutes, and while the gang get transformed into monsters, it barely affects the situation. And the Mystery Machine gets turned into a monster, but they called it 'The Monstrous Machine' instead of 'The Monstery Machine' (I'm so steamed about that). If not for all the effort put into the designs, this would be a firmly mediocre entry in the Scooby-Doo canon. rating: 6/10"It's not my fault I'm a big phony!"
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Oct 15, 2019 03:09
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 73) Amityville: A New Generation - 1993 - TubiTV It's a cursed mirror in this one, and now there's mention of a Thanksgiving murder in the Amityville house. I think it was around the time this one was released on video that I first gave up on the franchise. Even my tolerance has limits for what dreck I'll sit through, though I get the feeling I'm going to be running roughshod over those limits as I progress through this second chance on the franchise.  74) Amityville Dollhouse - 1996 - DVD First time watch. At least the title's on point, the dollhouse looks like the Amityville house and is of course, evil. As far as evil dollhouse films go, this is okay. It's still fairly cliche with what happens in the dollhouse impacts on the outside house. I think this one would've done fine as it's own film, though there is a mouse death. It's an okay entry to a creepy toys marathon.
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Oct 15, 2019 03:38
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14. Green Room (2015)Challenge #4: Inktober (punk rock is an art form and so is violence) Just don't look at it. Raw, uncompromising, and real-feeling even as it goes into full on action movie mode. One worst-case scenario piles up on top of another, and each one is presented in the most unflinching, matter-of-fact way. Loved how much of this was a genuine battle of wits, with both parties strategizing, miscalculating, and improvising on the fly. I think this loses a little steam towards the end and would have liked to have seen the tight setting kept up throughout the entirety of the film, but I still loved this. Great overdue first watch. gently caress nazis and ban boxcutters imo 4.5/5  15. Blood and Black Lace  As a work of cinematography, this looks great. As a murder mystery...this looks great. Not a lot to say about this one I'm afraid, just my typical reaction to Italian horrror where I love the dreaminess and style and zone out during the dubbing. I will say I do love how the murder sequences alternate between brutality and oafish clumsiness on the part of the killer, sort of reminds me of Scream. 3/5 
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Oct 15, 2019 04:05
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Another weekend, another catching up on reviews. 29. Dollman (1991)  An alien cop who doesn’t play by the rules chases a criminal into a wormhole which deposits the both of them on earth. Due to a miscalculation in scale, they are both a foot tall. Luckily their weapons still work so they can still can fight each other with the help of the humans they team up with. The mismatched scale effects still look pretty good and the fights are amusing enough with them being a gang vs a doll sized man. 30. The Two Faces of Dr. Jekyll (1960)  The old, bearded Dr. Jekyll has been experimenting with formulas to bring out alternate personalities when he decides to start testing on himself. This results in a suave, beardless Mr. Hyde personality taking over. Mr. Hyde goes out partying and discovers his wife out with her boyfriend and decides to scheme a revenge. A pretty decent Hammer Horror film. Also nice seeing a Mr. Hyde that isn’t some sort of literal monster. 31. The Addams Family (Theater) (2019)  A colorful planned community has been built on the swamp surrounding the Addams estate leading to Wednesday wanting to explore and the villagers wanting to drive them out. A good adaption of the Addams Family. There’s no way they can top the 1991 version so they go in a more cartoony direction and it works well. 32. Return of the Living Dead: Rave to the Grave (2005)  A college student finds a barrel of Tioxin in his dead uncle’s house. He demands his science friend leave the party he’s at and investigate what it is. When he’s unable to figure it out, the stoner friend decides to take a hit of it and calls it a wonderful high. So they decide to put it in pills and sell it. Just as stupid and poorly made as Necropolis, which it filmed back to back with. This one is only slightly “better” because it has topless women and outdoor locations. 33. Ganja & Hess (1973) SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #3: HORROR NOIRE  A doctor is stabbed by his crazed assistant which turns him into a vampire. After the assistant commits suicide, his wife comes to the doctor looking for him. Love and vampirism ensues. A very nicely shot movie. Wish I had seen it on the big screen when the remaster came out. 34. Arcade (1993)  John de Lancie is selling a state of the art VR arcade game that uses an AI containing cells from a dead boy. This means the game learns from the kids who play it and also that it sucks them into the game when they lose. So naturally the kids have to go into the game and rescue everyone. It’s basically Albert Pyun remaking Tron and not that well. 35. Terrorvision (1986)  Gerrit Graham and Mary Woronov play a pair of hopefully swingers who get a new TV satellite dish. While trying to get it working, it accidentally receives an alien that eats everything and can reproduce human heads it has eaten. Their daughter Princess Elizabeth from Bill & Ted and her boyfriend Uncle Rico from Napoleon Dynamite along with her younger brother try to fight it and befriend it. Really campy and really fun. 36. I, Frankenstein (2014)  Aaron Eckhart plays Frankenstein’s monster who sides with angelic gargoyles in trying to defeat Bill Nighy who leads an army of demons. Was planned to be part of the Underworld universe and that would’ve improved it as then it might have actually felt like large, real world. Not a terrible movie, just kind of empty and some really shoddy for 2014 CG. 37. Drácula (Spanish) (Theater) (1931)  While filming Bela Lugosi’s Dracula during the day, a Spanish version was shot at night with a different cast. Pretty much the same script as Lugosi’s Dracula, just slightly different. Sometimes in a good way, sometimes not. The packed theater might not have always reacted the “right way” to some of the 1930s acting, but it certainly made it a more enjoyable experience. 1. Killer Workout (1987) 2. Ænigma (1987) 3. Killer Fish (1979) 4. Rear Window (Theater) (1954) 5. House on Haunted Hill (1959) 6. Nail Gun Massacre (1985) 7. Paranorman (2012) 8. Night of the Comet (1984) 9. Corpse Bride (2005) 10. 13 Ghosts (1960) 11. Vampyr (German) #1 (1932) 12. Amuck (Italian) (1972) 13. Abbott and Costello Meet the Invisible Man (1951) 14. Fascination (French) (1979) 15. Lake of Dracula (Japanese) (1971) 16. Sorority House Massacre (1986) 17. Prophecy (1979) 18. Sorority Massacre 2 (1990) 19. Leviathan (1989) 20. Night of the Lepus (1972) 21. Puppet Master (1989) 22. Ice Cream Man (1995) 23. Return of the Living Dead 2 (1988) 24. The Giant Claw (1957) 25. One Cut of the Dead (Theater) (2017) 26. Return of the Living Dead 3 (1993) 27. Return of the Living Dead: Necropolis (2005) 28. Spider Baby (1967) #2 29. Dollman (1991) 30. The Two Faces of Dr. Jekyll (1960) 31. The Addams Family (Theater) (2019) 32. Return of the Living Dead: Rave to the Grave (2005) 33. Ganja & Hess (1973) #3 34. Arcade (1993) 35. Terrorvision (1986) 36. I, Frankenstein (2014) 37. Drácula (Spanish) (Theater) (1931)
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Oct 15, 2019 04:15
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 14. The Dorm That Dripped Blood (1982) Another film festival screening. The version that we saw was actually titled Death Dorm and included a few minutes’ worth of gore that got cut from the movie’s original theatrical release. The movie is mostly about Joanne, a college student who plans to spend her winter break clearing out an old dorm building that’s about to be torn down. A few other students stay behind to help, and then some murders happen. This one is bad y’all. It’s bad even by low-budget, basically-a-student-film standards. About eighty percent of the movie is walking around in dorm hallways while they do not drip any blood. The effects are actually fine for a cheap 80s movie, and the overall idea of the story isn’t terrible. But the script just doesn’t have enough to fill 88 minutes. There’s a subplot about Joanne not knowing if she’s ready to move in with her boyfriend, but while it’s the focus of the first part of the movie, that part of the story is totally pointless and doesn’t go anywhere. Then there’s the early victim, the socially awkward guy that likes Joanne but doesn’t have the guts to make a move, the girl with the crush on the class clown, and the spooky lurker who spies on the others. And sure, those all sound like plot elements, but they’re only explored just enough to give all these people reasons to walk around the dorm and tut about what they should do. One sleazy side character’s scenes are clearly just there to slot him into place for the ending, which takes too drat long but does at least manage an interesting conclusion. Not interesting enough to justify the 80+ dreary minutes of garbage that it took to get to that point though. I guess you should watch it if you really dig people running around empty buildings or would like to see the first movie with that chick that played Princess Vespa in Spaceballs.  15. Phenomena (1985) This is another one of those dreamy Argento movies that are so engaging that it doesn’t quite matter if they entirely make sense. It’s about Jennifer (played by Jennifer Connelly just before she did Labyrinth), who arrives at a Swiss boarding school while there’s a killer on the loose nearby. While sleepwalking, Jennifer witnesses a murder and has a few other nightmarish encounters that leave her in the woods, where she’s found by a chimpanzee. (No, really.) Inga the chimp takes her home to Donald Pleasence, whose character is an entomologist that realizes Jennifer’s unusual affinity for insects might help find the murderer. Phenomena has a great sense of atmosphere, but the overall style of it isn’t striking as Suspiria or Deep Red. Some of the music doesn’t mesh well, and I’ve never understood the decision to pay for Flash of the Blade when you could have Goblin write something that actually fits those scenes. And while she’s great in her role, Daria Nicolodi’s presence may blunt the ending a bit for folks who’ve seen enough Argento to pick her out. Despite some quibbles, this is probably in my top 5 Argento movies because it’s just so bonkers. Watched: 1. Burn, Witch, Burn (1962); 2. TerrorVision (1986); 3. Evilspeak (1981) - Challenge #1; 4. Blood on Satan’s Claw (1971); 5. The City of the Dead (1960); 6. The Witches (1966); 7. The Crimson Cult (1968); 8. A Return to Salem’s Lot (1987) - Challenge #2; 9. Next of Kin (1982); 10. The Ritual (2017); 11. Def by Temptation (1990) - Challenge #3; 12. Halloween III (1982); 13. House by the Cemetery (1981); 14. The Dorm That Dripped Blood (1982); 15. Phenomena (1985)
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Oct 15, 2019 04:18
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12. Eyes Without a Face A film I probably never would have seen if not for the scream stream. The movie has some truly horrific body horror and its themes are simple, but effective. A nice, tidy little film that is worth at least one watch.  13. Alien  Another horror classic I was able to catch in the theater (I don't know who at Cinemark decided to do these showings, but I am clearly their target audience). Seeing it on the big screen I was struck by how much the film uses empty space, especially scenes where an actor is on the far left side of the screen doing something and the other 2/3rds of the screen is just background. Really hammers home a sense of unease and isolation which is magnified by the dark theater. I also was reminded of how patient the film is, something missing from far too many modern horror films. The movie's not quite two hours long, but you never feel its length even when it gets to a slow, methodical scene. 14. The Ruins  What a delightful film, I can't believe I'd not seen it earlier! Making a plant monster truly scary and not just cartoonish is a tall order, but the film pulls it off with some excellent body horror and an even better sense of hopeless dread and creepiness. It reminds me of Splinter, but even better. Do yourself a favor if you've not seen it yet. quote:1. The Shining [5/5 Spooks]
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Oct 15, 2019 05:02
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https://twitter.com/KennethJWaste2/status/1183959522752258048?s=20
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Oct 15, 2019 05:17
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 #16 The Void 2017 Shudder Not a whole lot to say about this one. This is a movie about a group of people who find themselves trapped in a hospital, surrounded by members of an eldritch cult. It starts out with a lot of great, striking imagery, intense pacing, and a gripping mood of paranoia. You really don’t know what side people are on, or what the sides even are, but the stakes are immediate and severe. That is the makings of a great horror movie! But from there, it seems to me like there’s two ways you can go: slow down and flesh out the ideas presented in your bombastic opening to develop the plot you’ve established in a way that ups the emotional resonance, or barrel forward, refusing to explain anything and making a break-neck splatterhouse picture. But unfortunately, The Void sort of putters around in the middle ground. While there is some great effects work in play in the second act, and a fair amount happens in the plot, it really doesn’t feel like it goes anywhere. The mystery is explored but it’s all stock genre stuff, and they really only give it a surface treatment that feels like even the filmmakers don’t care about it. The feeling I get from this picture is that everything is referential to another work, without much thought as to why. It feels written by committee. This one had a lot of promise, but it just didn’t do anything for me. I didn’t care about the characters and there’s not much craft to the filmmaking. 2/5
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Oct 15, 2019 05:44
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#20 Phantom of the Paradise (1974) This has been a weird day for me. I watched the original "Suspiria" for the first time yesterday afternoon (still technically today for me since I haven't slept), which introduced me to an actress named Jessica Hopper. Eight hours ago I thought she looked like a young Karen Allen (from the first Indiana Jones movie) and enjoyed the hell out of it. Then, completely independently, "Phantom of the Paradise" started getting talked about over and over, and my music-loving brain just couldn't resist. I love Rocky Horror, I literally celebrated my 16th birthday seeing it in a theater for the first time (and I'm 35, this was a while ago) and I loved it then and every single time I've seen it since. That being said, how the gently caress did I not know about this movie? So Jessica Hopper plays what is essentially what turned out to be the real life inspiration that brought Andrew Lloyd Webber and Sarah Brightman together? If not, it's a funny coincidence. But once Paul Williams actually appeared as Swan and started speaking, it triggered something in me. When I was a young kid, we had a VHS tape that my grandparents recorded off TV with a movie called "The Night They Saved Christmas." It's about a family that lives up "north," and the father works for a drilling company that is blasting its way through ice so they can find oil. Turns out they are blasting their way into the actual North Pole, and Paul Williams plays Santa's Helper who shows up to try and convince the mom and her kids that he needs to stop trying to kill Santa. Also Santa is played by Art Carney. It's loving awesome, and is one of those movies that goes way back for me. I'm not making this up: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IqU9-IfRQp8 Finding out that the dude who I've always associated as Santa's Best Helper is also the man who wrote the song "Rainbow Connection" and before any of that starred in THIS. loving. MOVIE?! Holy poo poo. It's a lot to process. All of these things are colliding at once for me, and it made watching this movie really weird, but also amazing. I mean, this is absolutely Phantom of the Opera with a weird twist. But is the music actually better than Rocky Horror? On a technical level, yes. It's more like "Les Miserables" where the music is intrinsic and part of the story as opposed to Rocky Horror, where they are set pieces designed to entertain. I honestly loved this though, and I will need to watch it and listen to the music more to really get a good idea of where it sits in my brain alongside its "rock opera" contemporaries, which absolutely includes "Hedwig and the Angry Inch." Honestly I think the music in Hedwig beats both this movie and Rocky Horror, but I've had years to sit with that and only a few hours to sit with this, so time will tell I guess. Still, this loving rocks. I already want to watch it again in all its goofy rock-loving glory. 4.5/5 Watched: Midsommar; One Cut of the Dead; Apostle; Wolf Creek; Lake Mungo; Viy (Challenge #1); Demon Knight; Witchfinder General; Razorback; Joker; A Quiet Place; Spider Baby, or the Maddest Story Ever Told (Challenge #2); Hereditary; The First Purge (Challenge #3); Killer Condom; Road Games; Next of Kin; Zombie, aka Zombi 2; Suspiria (1977) (Challenge #4); Phantom of the Paradise Total: 20 T3hRen3gade fucked around with this message at 08:09 on Oct 15, 2019 |
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Oct 15, 2019 07:33
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15. Children Shouldn't Play With Dead Things Samhain Challenge #4: Inktober- Because it's about theater people A hippy-dippy theater troupe traipses onto an island graveyard, because the leader (played by the co-writer) wants to do a ritual with a corpse, and so he does, and inevitably, the dead rise. I say inevitably because it takes an hour for it to happen, and the lead up is just the troupe leader being a tyrannical pretentious jerk, and also there's a lot of very snippy dialogue that wouldn't be out of place in an episode of, like, 2 Broke Girls. Thing is, once the zombies finally do get going, it's quite fun, even genuinely spooky at times. Bob Clark directed this, and you can tell he was still learning the ropes but he manages some cool shots. The zombie makeup is crude but effective, and since this was made only a few years after Night of the Living Dead, you can see the filmmakers trying to work with the conventions of a relatively fresh subgenre, putting a little spin on it here and there. The performances are enthusiastic and it actually does kinda capture the dynamic of a troupe where one rich rear end in a top hat is in charge because he's writing the checks. A weird, fun flick overall.
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Oct 15, 2019 08:12
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Franchescanado posted:SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #4: Inktober #16: Hungry Stones (1960)  I ended up watching this to fill prompt #22, "Ghost". Hungry Stones (Kshudhita Pashan), is an Indian ghost story about a young tax collector who moves into an old mansion fabled by the locals to be haunted and filled with ghosts who walk the building's halls come nightfall. The version I watched wasn't the best quality-wise, but despite that it's still clearly a gorgeous film. The blacks are deep and the whites will often glow in intentional contrast. Shadows leer across the screen and foreground elements are boldly used to cover large portions of the frame in an unnatural darkness.  The movie is only very lightly horror. It's more of a supernatural story of grief and love, though I do still think it's more than fair to count for this challenge. The mansion itself, with all its vast, empty halls and with its propensity towards driving those who reside within it to obsession, is a suitably spooky location, and as we learn more and more about the ghost's past, we also learn that the building's history is steeped in suffering. I've barely seen any Indian films, and I'm not sure I've ever watched an Indian horror movie or ghost story before, so I'm really glad I got to take the opportunity to check this one out. I'd recommend it if you can get your hands on it, though I wouldn't go in expecting to get scared.  Watched (16/31): #1 Gozu (2003), #2 Spider Baby or, the Maddest Story Ever Told (1967), #3 Viy (1967), #4 Mondo Cane (1962), #5 Dark Water (2002), #6 Blood and Black Lace (1964), #7 Daughters of Darkness (1971), #8 Sliders of Ghost Town: Origins (2016), #9 One Cut of the Dead (2017), #10 Possum (2018), #11 EGG. (2005), #12 Adventures of Electric Rod Boy (1987), #13 House of 1000 Corpses (2003), #14 Ganja and Hess (1973), #15 Q (1982), #16 Hungry Stones (1960) Challenges (4/4):
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Oct 15, 2019 08:12
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 Suspiria, 2018 Suspiria from 1977 is one of the most iconic and perhaps best horror movies ever made. Its use of color lightning, the witches coven, the music, the gore, the everything. It just hits hard with its dream like story telling and logic. It's pure horror atmosphere. It will always be one of my top films in any genre due to its 70s magic. So how can anyone even dare to remake such a classic? How can you even make it nearly as good as the original? Suspiria from 2018 is how. The plot starts the same. An American girl joins a German ballet academy and the whole witches coven that runs it slowly gets revealed out through the movie as in the original. But that's where it stops being a remake and goes in its own direction. This is a new and amazing new movie based on the original's idea. It takes place in Berlin during the 70s, and the city is its own world in the movie just as much as the dance school is. You got the RAF terrorist and hostage situation going on in the background of the news. The look of everything with the boarder between east and west. It's just so well made. And I haven't gotten to the horror part apart from the witches. It's grim stuff. It isn't as dreamlike as the original, but there's no doubt dark supernatural forces is at bay. What it lacks in straight up wet blood and gore spilling everywhere, it makes up with in equal brutally and disturbing violence, disfigurement and death. Suspiria 2018 is one of the best movies, not just horror, I've seen all year. Hot Dog Day #89 fucked around with this message at 09:28 on Oct 15, 2019 |
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Oct 15, 2019 09:24
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20. Kwaidan (1960) I finally got around to watching this mostly because I started Over Your Dead body the other night, and when it came out that the play they're working on is called Yotsuya Kaidan I decided I wanted to know the stories before giving it a full watch. I have of course since done the relevant wikipedia reading and discovered that this is not at all the same story as any of the ones covered in Kwaidan so oops but it got me to watch Kwaidan so I'll call it a victory. There's no getting around it, the first segment is straight up bad. The story is like three sentences long and the characters barely exist, but somehow it was still deemed necessary to include a ton of narration explaining extremely obvious things. The finale is a man wrestling a wig. All I can say in its favor is that it's beautifully shot on wonderful sets, but the remaining three segments have that and much much more so it's pretty faint praise. The second is my favorite visually and I want all of those sky paintings. It does drag a bit though since even if you have no familiarity with any version of the story it's going to be obvious where things are heading. It swerves a little bit by virtue of being about the only ghost story/folktale I've encountered where someone fucks up and gets a second chance, and manages to be pretty sad despite that. I mean, guy had a good thing going with his ice vampire/unknowable horror wife and his mistake was just telling her about herself, on top of which he had never promised anything in the first place - just sat there numb and scared while she told him what was up. And he's obviously remorseful anyway. I am a big dumb sap and wish they could have worked it out. Alas, I guess that's just life when you're dealing with ice vampires and sky eyes. Everything about Hoichi the earless is perfect. Probably the best anthology segment I've ever seen. It also features what I think is going to be the single funniest line of the month. Bless you, stoic & dutiful ghost samurai. The last segment is the weirdest and probably a lot of peoples' least favorite, but I adore it and it's the one I would have been most excited about seeing different takes on in that alternate world I was imagining where this collection has as many film adaptations as Yotsuya. 21. Creepy (2016)  This is a really weird one and I can see people who are into genre debates getting some mileage out of whether it's a thriller or horror. For my money, the only way the movie works at all is if you accept that the villain is an evil wizard. A very subdued evil wizard who would be laughed out of a Shaw Brothers production, but still. This makes it horror since there are no thrillers with evil wizards. What muddles this is that literally everything about the way the film presents itself is an attempt to convince you that you're watching a thriller with a strange mystery at its core. The sooner you can break away from this misdirection, I think, the more likely you are to enjoy what's being offered. Which is a little bit frustrating, honestly. This is sitting directly adjacent to an incredibly hosed up Requiem for a Dream but a serial killer movie that could only work in Japan or maybe Singapore, and I would even believe the script was that at some point. I think that movie would have had a lot more impact and could have lodged itself into all-time classic status. This just isn't that movie, though, and the evil wizard movie is still sort of cool. The pacing is fantastic for at least first half, there are some really beautiful shots (I particularly enjoyed the post-cooking lesson dinner framing), etc. The creepy neighbor does a fantastic job weaving together "poor social skills but basically ok" and "something is really off here" up to the point where the movie flatly tells you what's up. So I dunno. I was never bored and once I accepted the movie was going to be what it is I mostly enjoyed my time with it, but it's hard not to focus on what could have been.
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Oct 15, 2019 09:59
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24) It Comes at Night 2017 This seems to be a polarising film. Rotten Tomatoes gives it 87% from the critics, but 44% from the audience. I liked it a lot. Tension and paranoia runs near constantly. It's one of the bleakest films I've seen in recent years and you definitely need to be in the right mindset for it. It's a small cast mostly confined to one location. Good performances all round. The negative audience reviews are all the same: nothing comes at night. I've heard the marketing for this was terribly misleading, trailers cutting up the dream scenes to make the movie look like it was full of action scenes with monsters. I guess audiences went in expecting spooky grampa to jump out and go boo.
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Oct 15, 2019 10:32
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20. 3 From Hell 2019 | dir. Rob Zombie  Franchescanado posted:SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #2: Dead & Buried RIP Sid Haig Man. I really liked this film. Rob Zombie manages to bring back the Fireflys for one more tale, and it works. It's surprisingly faithful to both House of 1,000 Corpses and The Devils Rejects, as it takes the best elements of both for this film. The story and tone is closer to The Devil's Rejects, but many aesthetic choices come straight from the original film: the footage shifts into various levels of distortion, where a crisp HD look switches to a grainy 16mm look, to a distorted CRT image. It gives the whole thing a classic 70's exploitation feel, which Zombie's been playing with his whole career. I think it culminates here as the best use of it. It worked for me. While this film goes to gruesome and disturbing places, it has more of the fun-house feel of Ho1kC than the bitter nihilism of TDR. There is plenty of dark comedy that had me and my audience laughing consistently. The Fireflys are still audacious, but there's a tiredness to them. Baby has gone full nutso. Otis is exhausted and doesn't really have plans anymore. Spaulding seems ready for death. It's Richard Brake's Foxy that tries to liven things up. He's just a chill guy that wants to rampage and have fun. This feeling is reflected in the film's aimless nature. The Fireflys seem to live on borrowed time, and are content to live within the moment, wherever that takes them. There's certainly a structure; the story follows the locations, really. There's no real goal besides getting free and staying free. But that's fine with me. There's something fascinating about going on a road trip with terrible murderous people. It maintains a momentum. That said, this movie is pretty much designed to be polarizing. For me? Probably my 2nd favorite Rob Zombie movie, after Lords of Salem. The Devil's Rejects is arguably his best film, I'll concede that point, but it has a bite to it that makes it hard to return to. 3 From Hell? It's the same dog, but it's lost some teeth and doesn't startle as easy. Recommended Movies Watched: Salò, or the 120 Days of Sodom | Annihilation | Evil Bong 2 | Overlord | Dead of Night | The Ruins | Under Wraps | Attack The Block | Don't Go In The Woods | Body Snatchers | Island of Lost Souls | Village of the Damned (1960) | Wrinkles the Clown | The Dead Zone | The Fog | One Cut of the Dead | Ma | The Devil Rides Out | Halloweentown | 3 From Hell Rewatches: 4 Total: 20 Edgar Wright's 100 Favorite Horror: 5/20 Super Samhain Challenge: 1
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Oct 15, 2019 12:34
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Irony.or.Death posted:20. Kwaidan (1960) Yotsuya Kaidan is a story that has been filmed many times. I've seen three or four versions of it and my favorite version is Nobuo Nakagawa's version from 1957.
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Oct 15, 2019 12:41
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21. Revenge Of The Creature (1955) - Owned #5 Another in the Universal Monster Blu collection. Overall this seemed more flat than the original. Only a portion takes place in the Black Lagoon - it’s a King Kong kind of story where they take the Creature to a Sea World type of place. So the locale is less exotic, for one. The music is all over the place and doesn’t quite gel with the on-screen action. It did have a dog to show the difference in how they are treated (the dog came to Helen on its own accord, is treated lovingly like a companion, while the Creature was forcibly removed from his environment and trained using cattle prods). The dog also helped set the pace of stake-raises, being the first victim of the Creature. Altogether, it was *alright* but not anywhere near great, and wasn’t as good as the first. It *did* have a *very* young Clint Eastwood in an uncredited appearance, though! 22. Paranormal Activity (2007) - Owned #6  I've had this for a while, but somehow, I never came around to seeing this until now. This was probably a somewhat different experience 12 years ago, after having seen so many FF movies that have come out since. However, it was still very effective for such a minimal budget. I had just recently started listening to the Post Mortem podcast backlog and recently listened to the episode with Oren Peli, so hearing how the miniscule budget was used and how the casting of Katie and Micah worked and then seeing that on-screen was cool. Very effective for no actual entity footage. Micah succeeded at being one of the more unlikeable people in a FF movie. Movies So Far - 22: Rewatches: 6 - Deep Red, One Cut Of The Dead, The Endless, Train To Busan, TCM 2, Zombi 2 New To Me: 10 - Dolls, Borderlands, Child’s Play (2019), Memory: Origins Of Alien, Who Can Kill A Child?, The Seventh Curse, Dr. Jeckyll & Mr. Hyde, Hell House LLC 2, The Red Queen Kills Seven Times, Bones Finally Watching Owned Movies: 6 - Werewolf Of London, She-Wolf Of London, Isle Of The Snake People, Creature From The Black Lagoon, Revenge Of The Creature, Paranormal Activity
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Oct 15, 2019 15:30
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I thought I was finishing the series here but then it turns out I completely skipped a movie. Wikipedia makes the one I missed sound pretty awful, so maybe that's ok? 11. The Curse of Chucky  Fiona Dourif stars as Nica, a paraplegic woman who lives with her mother. Mom receives a package containing Chucky, and so the killing begins. The double Dourifs are great, and Fiona is a fun character. The rest of the human characters are, charitably, awful people and mediocre actors, so it's fun to watch them get got. Generally I like it when horror franchises get a little up their own asses with lore, but this... I dunno. It doesn't really go fully overboard until - /512. Cult of Chucky  Picks up a year or so after the last one left off, with Fiona in an asylum for doing all those killings and trying to blame a children's toy. A full set of cuckoos are introduced and then almost as quickly offed. We are lead to believe that the surviving little girl from the previous film has been Alien 3'd, but who knows? I was disappointed that the Cult of Chucky wasn't a big group of followers, but instead was just a bunch of Chuckys. It was a convoluted but entertaining ride. /513. Who Can Kill a Child?  Everyone. We're all guilty of killing children. WCKaC opens with ten minutes of newsreel style footage of mankind's inhumanity to children. Not, perhaps, the classiest way to open your movie about killer kids, but hey you have to establish a motive, right? RIGHT? A young husband and his pregnant wife are on vacation, headed to this remote island that he remembers from his past. Alas, the island has gone full Dagon, only with creepy children instead of fish people. Husband here remains blissfully optimistic about the complete emptiness of the island and weirdness of the children, right up until the kids start getting violent. Some interesting stuff happens but so slowly that it just did a poor job of keeping my attention. .5/5
graventy fucked around with this message at 16:02 on Oct 15, 2019 |
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Oct 15, 2019 15:59
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Franchescanado posted:SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #4: Inktober  #20. It Stains the Sands Red (Shudder) After a zombie outbreak hits Las Vegas, a woman finds herself trapped in the desert with a lone zombie pursuing her. While she can easily outrun it, it will never tire or lose focus. And that's not the only danger she will encounter out there... So I picked this movie from the list for prompt #30, "Catch," since that was the primary threat as described - that, eventually, the zombie would catch up to this poor woman or she'd finally stop being able to run and that would be that. And I was prepared for that to be an ending when this first started. But something strange ends up happening during the course of this whole thing... they end up becoming almost friends. It turns out this was actually a stealth horror remake of "Black Beauty" or something, just with a zombie instead of a horse. Of course, that turn feels like it happens on a dime, and is predicated by a fairly graphic and gratuitous rape scene. To this point, Molly, our lone female protagonist, has been suffering through some particular feminine obstacles in the desert, but I didn't feel like this needed to be an avenue explored in this high concept low stakes zombie thriller. I'm also not a fan of the idea that she would start to completely 180 her opinion on a brain-dead shambling monster that really wants nothing more than to eat her due to coincidental gallantry. Putting that aside, I also think the film overstays its welcome by going past what feels like a natural conclusion. After Smalls the Zombie has to be put down, in a moment that feels sadder than you'd expect, the film feels like it should end with Molly watching the plane she'd been heading for take off without her, and the implication that she was going to go back for her son. I feel like the setup for this film, with a single zombie pursuing someone, was super unique and the films' most defining feature, so expanding that worldview to encompass other zombies feels like a mistake. I can appreciate the thought process behind this turn - the film is about Molly's past metaphorically following her before she can make some kind of amends and move forward - but I also don't think we needed to see that character turn. Implication could have been enough here, and the turn from lone survivor to badass zombie killer could still be seen in implication, too. Questionable plot beats aside, there's still a lot to like here - the desert cinematography is beautiful, the script is cannier than it initially appears, and star Brittany Allen turns in a hell of a performance. She really seemed like she had been put through the wringer by the end of the film. (Smalls actor Juan Riedinger is good, and so is the rest of the incidental cast, but this is really a one woman show.) I'm torn on it, though - the last 15 minutes or so I feel really pull it down, and that rape scene is difficult to ignore. I feel like this is still worth seeing, if you can push past those elements, but my recommendation has to come with more caveats than I normally like to give out. /5Watched so far: The Curse of Frankenstein, Villains, Horror of Dracula, You're Next, House on Haunted Hill (1959), Halloween 4, Army of Darkness, A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984), The Fly (1986), Joker, The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms, The Creature from the Black Lagoon, Beyond the Gates, The First Purge, Rodan, Killer Klowns from Outer Space, Halloween II (1981), The Addams Family (2019), The Mummy (1932), Jason X, It Stains the Sands Red
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Oct 15, 2019 16:03
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 26. Drag Me to Hell (2009) DVD Good ole Raimi comfort film. Watched - 1. Get My Gun (2017), 2. The Last Man on Earth (1964), 3. It Stains the Sands Red (2016), 4. The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974), 5. Errementari: The Blacksmith and the Devil (2017) *Tied for Current Favorite*, 6. Halloween (1978), 7. One Cut of the Dead (2017), 8. Phamtasm II (1988), 9. Ramekin (2018), 10. Les Affamés (2017), 11. Braindead (1992), 12. Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man (1943), 13. The Haunting (1963) *Tied for Current Favorite*, 14. House of Wax (1953), 15. Shock (1946), 16. Annihilation (2018), 17. Westworld (1973), 18. Kuroneko, 19. In the Tall Grass (2019), 20. Sound of Horror (1966), 21. Rubber's Lover (1996), 22. Bubba Ho-Tep (2002), 23. The Similars (2015), 24. Creatur from the Black Lagoon (1954), 25. The Mummy's Tomb (1942), 26. Drag Me to Hell (2009) Decade - 1920s, 1930s, 1940s (III), 1950s (II), 1960s (IV), 1970s (III), 1980s (I), 1990s (II), 2000s (II), 2010s (IX) Black & White:Color:Hybrid - 9:16:1 By Country - Canada (II), Japan (III), Mexico (I), 'Murica (XVII), New Zealand (I), Spain (II) New:Rewatch - 21:5 Super Samhain Challenge - 1. Westworld (1973), 2. Creature from the Black Lagoon (1954), 3. N/A, 4. N/A
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Oct 15, 2019 16:13
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 75) The Amityville Horror - 2005 - Hulu First time watch As far as remakes go, this one's better than the usual. It does borrow from each of the Amityville books, but does go off the rails on its own. George Lutz again got sue happy over wanting his input considered in making the film, but he passed away before a verdict. Overall, it's pretty meh. Franchescanado posted:SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #4: Inktober Prompts: 2) Mindless, 15) Legend, and 22) Ghost. While the films I've sat through so far keep it fuzzy as to what sort of spirit activity's going on, this one's pretty clear that it is ghosts rather than demons/devils. I'd further venture the acting's pretty mindless even for an Asylum film, and there is the legend of the the events of the house.  76) The Amityville Haunting - 2011 - TubiTV First time watch. It was inevitable that the folks at The Asylum would cough up an entry. Essentially a family moves into the house and ends up dying to ghosts. Done in a found footage style, it's pretty bad even for an Asylum film. Ghost just stands there looking forlorn for the most part. Definitely skippable for anything better.
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Oct 15, 2019 17:13
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SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #2: Dead & Buried #30: The Devil's Rejects  Typically horror movies featuring a family on a road trip who fall afoul of a group of serial killers treat the serial killers as some kind of aberration. The normal family has stumbled into a strange, nightmare situation. Think The Hills Have Eyes or Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Not so with The Devil's Reject. The Devil's Rejects is a cohesive world. The serial killer family, the roadtrip family, the cops, the bikers, the brothel, everything has the same greasy 70s vibe. I gotta talk about the cast. It's fantastic. Every single actor swings for the fences and knocks it out of the park. I was not expecting Brian Posehn to show up but was very happy he did. But I started losing interest at the halfway point. First there was a scene that was odd to me; the movie review guy. At the time that felt really indulgent and out of line with what I thought the movie was doing. But then that woman got hit by the truck. it didn't just feel like an unnecessarily mean-spirited death, but at that point I realized that if the movie wasn't about the conflict between the two families, that meant it was just about this serial killer family on an adventure. The Devil's Reject was a movie made not just to entertain an audience, but also with an eye towards entertaining the people making it. If this movie had never gotten a distribution deal and ended up just being a really expensive home movie for the Zombie family, I don't think they would've been all that upset. The Devil's Reject is 100% unapologetically what it is, but unfortunately what it is is not my bag. Gripweed fucked around with this message at 01:01 on Oct 17, 2019 |
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Oct 15, 2019 18:08
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9. Tales from the Hood 2 I knew this was going to be good when a company credited in the opening was "40 Acres and a Mule" and said credits were over dancing skeletons straight out of da share z0ne. And then Keith David appeared! Who cares if the dialog sucks, it's Keith David overacting his heart into it. Lots of different types of horror, from corny slasher horror to full on Twilight Zone (but somehow less subtle). I didn't enjoy any of the endings, but despite that the main part of each got its message across even if it was muddled by the final part.
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Oct 15, 2019 19:01
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 77) My Amityville Horror - 2012 - Prime This is the documentary featuring Daniel Lutz about what happened when his family lived in the house and how it's effected his life since. It's a rough watch, especially if you've taken any psych classes. Daniel is majorly messed up from this to the point everyone speaking to him is treading carefully. His hate on for George puts the Sith to shame. Keep in mind the reporter handling the interviews was one selected by Lorraine Warren and the Lutz's, so you know there's going to be bias there. This is worth a watch to hear what it was like as a child through this bullshit.
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Oct 15, 2019 19:04
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#21: In Her Skin (2009) This one really bummed me out.  I didn't even realize this was based on a true story until about halfway through, when I started feeling like it was telling that kind of story, so I paused the movie and googled it. Sure enough, it all really happened, which made what was already hard to watch even harder. It's the story of the disappearance of Rachel Barber, an attractive teenage girl who loved to dance and had no earthly reason to just run away from home. It's a powerful exploration of mental illness, depression, and grief. Guy Pierce and Miranda Otto play Rachel's distraught parents, and their performances are utterly heartbreaking. But the most stirring performance belongs to Ruth Bradley, who plays the mentally unstable Caroline Reid Robertson to a chilling and unsettling degree of authenticity. Also of note is Sam Neil, who plays Caroline's father. It's a fantastic cast top to bottom, and you can tell that everyone involved brought their A game to give this story the telling it deserves. It's hard to even talk about this movie in terms of enjoyment now that I know it's based on a true story. It's a great movie that deserves to be seen. It made me feel a little bit like I did after watching the documentary "Dear Zachary," and for that reason I'll probably never watch it again, but it was absolutely worth seeing. Rest in peace, Rachel. 5/5 Watched: Midsommar; One Cut of the Dead; Apostle; Wolf Creek; Lake Mungo; Viy (Challenge #1); Demon Knight; Witchfinder General; Razorback; Joker; A Quiet Place; Spider Baby, or the Maddest Story Ever Told (Challenge #2); Hereditary; The First Purge (Challenge #3); Killer Condom; Road Games; Next of Kin; Zombie, aka Zombi 2; Suspiria (1977) (Challenge #4); Phantom of the Paradise; In Her Skin Total: 21
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Oct 15, 2019 20:18
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 21 (25). Drácula (1931) Watched on DVD The Universal classic tale of Bram Stoker’s tale of the Transylvanian So the story goes that while Tod Browning was filming Bela Lugosi as Dracula during the day in 1931 there was a second crew helmed by George Melford that came in at night to film Carlos Villarias in the bloodsucker role with the same script on the same sets for a spanish speaking audience, a weird artifact of the time between when “talkies” started and before they figured out concepts like “subtitles” or “dubbing”. The result was that Melford and his crew were able to see everything Browning was doing and could build off that and try different things, resulting in a movie that is storywise the same as the classic english version also slightly different in approach, something which many people consider superior technically. I’m not sure I’d go that far. Melford definitely tries some stuff with the cameras and filming that Browning doesn’t. He really likes dollies and panning shots for one, and maybe that was revolutionary in 1931. There definitely is more art in the camera work in this version although in a lot of ways that was as clumsy and awkward as all this early stuff. He also likes to show more that Browning left to the imagination. For the most part I preferred Browning’s approach such as when Renfeld distracts the men only to reveal that he’s been doing it all as a diversion so that Dracula could prey on Mina. Melford undermines that surprise by showing you Dråcula get to Eva mid scene and I think it plays less interesting as a result. On the other hand there’s moments where it works. Eva is given much more character and a larger role and the ending played a lot better and clearer to me in the spanish version than it did in the english. There’s also a nice shot of a graveyard as Van Helsing and Harker kill Lucia that I don’t recall being in the english version. Actor/character wise is where I think the english version blows the spanish one away. The standout performances of the Browning version are Dracula, Van Helsing, and Renfield. Carlos Villarîas honestly comes off goofy to me in the role and a bit like a cosplayer, which isn’t fair since he’s Lugosi’s contemporary in the truest sense but it is what it is. I just don’t buy him in the role and his snarl just kind of made me giggle. Eduardo Arozamena’s Van Helsing feels like a completely different character to Edward Van Sloan’s. Van Sloan’s feels like a hardened, grizzled half mad man who has devoted his life to pursuing an evil he’s only now found evidence of it existing while Arozamena’s feels like a guy in over his head and just kind of wandering into this mess. And while Pablo Alvarez Rubio’s Renfield has a hell of a maniacal laugh in every other way Dwight Frye just overshadowed him and stole the movie. Also Martin is funnier than Martîn. The one real improvement is Lupita Tovar’s Eva who not only outshines Helen Chandler but who’s Eva seems to get so much more character and presence than Mina. I’m not sure how much of that is the actresses themselves or the directing. I think its a bit of both. It felt like Eva had more lines and time, but its also very much seemed like Tovar had more life and did more with the same lines and scenes I remember Chandler having. Some of that probably just comes down to how Browning directed her and the story but I don’t think you can take away from Tovar’s just really scene stealing performance.  All in all I think I definitely preferred the Browning/Lugosi version but I am glad I watched it for Tovar and at the very least the superior ending. It probably wasn’t totally fair to watch this so soon after the english version since it guaranteed the direct comparison. I’ll definitely revisit it another time and see how it stands all on its own.  22 (26). Universal Horror (1998) Watched on DVD. A TV special narrated by Kenneth Branagh chronicling the history of Universal’s classic horror films of the ‘20s, ‘30s, and ’40s and how they helped raise a family run b film studio into one of the largest movie studios still filming on their original lots and hosting tourists to original sets of films like Phantom of the Opera. This was on the same DVD as Dråcula so I turned it on the background while I finished up my Halloween decorations. Considering what I’m doing it felt like a good retrospective to watch and it definitely was for giving me some more context (and elevating a couple of movies on my list). It gave some interesting context like how the popularity of movies about disfigured and maimed sympathetic “monsters” played by Lon Chaney and others might have had a connection to the number of disfigured and maimed WW1 vets. Trivia like how Lon Chaney was supposed to be Dracula but production difficulties delayed the film’s production until after Chaney’s death. How Bela Lugosi made less for Dracula than freaking Harker’s actor. Etc. It doesn’t limit itself to just Universal. It touches on other studios doing similar things like RKO’s King Kong or Paramount’s Jekyl and Hide but brings it back to Universal being the heart of things. Its a lot of good context for me as I dive deep into this period and studio to just get context about how The Raven was a tipping point for censorship, how the Laaemie’s lost control of Universal around the time of Dracula’s Daughter resulting in the end of that era and a hiatus in Universal horrors until a “revival” with the campy revivals starting with Son of Frankenstein. Its nothing amazing but a nice little documentary that was well fitting for my challenge and pretty well timed as I’ve gotten a taste of Universal with Hunchback and Dracula but have a LOT left to go and plan to dive in deep as soon as tonight. September Pre-Game Tally - New (Total) 1. NOS4A2 (2019); - (2). Splice (2009); - (3). Drive Angry (2011); 2 (4). The Twilight Zone (2019); - (5). Event Horizon (1997); - (6). BrainDead (2016); 3 (7). The Dark Tower (2017); 4 (8). The Collector (2009); 5 (9). The Bad Batch (2016); - (10). Rose Red (2002); - (11). Salem’s Lot (1979) October Tally - New (Total) 1. The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920); 2. Nightmare Cinema (2018); 3. Dead of Night (1945); The Queen of Spades (1949); 5. Tragedy Girls (2017); 6. House of Wax (1953); SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #1: The Best Month: 7. The Autopsy of Jane Doe (2016); 8. In the Tall Grass (2019); 9. The Night of the Hunter (1955); 10. The Thing (1951); - (11). The Thing (1982); 11 (12). The Thing (2011); - (13). Halloween (1978); 12 (14). Dracula (1931); SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #2: Dead & Buried: 13 (15). Q (1982); 14 (16). The Black Cat (1934); 15 (17). The Unknown (1927); - (18). Halloween II (1981); 16 (19). The Seventh Victim (1943); 17 (20). The Beast With Five Fingers (1946); 18 (21). The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1923); 19 (22). The Curse of the Cat People (1944); - (23). George A. Romero's Land of the Dead (2005); SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #3: Horror Noire: 20 (24). Ganja & Hess (1973); 21 (25). Drácula (1931); 22 (26). Universal Horror (1998)
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Oct 15, 2019 20:35
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 #92) Remote Control (1988), a.k.a., Videokiller Another movie near and dear to my heart. Watched my autographed Blu-ray copy with my partner, who'd never seen it before. She started out a bit disinterested, but eventually curled up under a blanket and gave it her full attention.. Doesn't have quite the same impact as watching a rental tape copy, given that the plot of this movie centers on a rental movie that mind controls its viewers, but the restoration looked fantastic, aside from a couple of lingering reel holes. The actual movie gets a lot of mileage out of the intersection between the '80s and '50s. The in-movie movie Remote Control is from '57, implicitly recovered for release to the home video market. The city in which the actual movie is set seems to be in the middle of a retro-futurism fashion boom or something; an '80s-born conception of how people in the '50s might have thought people in the '80s would be dressing, by way of Flash Gordon. Our heroes are two video rental store employees, Georgie and Cosmo, whose fashion senses lean more towards traditional '50s retro (Hawaiian shirts and greaser look, respectively), and who eventually commandeer a Pepto-Bismol-colored Cadillac with whitewall tires to complete the look. Once they fall into the reality of the in-movie Remote Control, they change outfits to match the people around them, and stay like that until the end. While there's a couple of banter scenes to establish the background of their friendship, the two actors do a great job of communicating it through simple interactions. I don't want to spoil much of the plot, since so much of this movie's appeal (personally speaking) is sinking into the experience of a movie about a movie that affects people who watch that movie. That, and seeing how ingrained (both realistically and in the fictional exaggeration) video rental was in American culture of the time. Jennifer Tilly gets a role that's brief but memorable, stuntman legend Dick Warlock pops up as her dad, Christopher Wynne is utterly charming as the good-hearted but ineffectual Georgie, Kevin Dillon kicks rear end as Cosmo (despite his creepy sense of romance), and Deborah Goodrich (April Fool's Day) puts in a good turn as the shell-shocked lead woman. With a funky retro electronic score, and some stellar sound editing for the hypnosis scenes, Jeff Lieberman (director of Squirm and Blue Sunshine) turned out a movie that I'll never stop loving. Special note: This was one of only three movies the production company made before going under. rating: 8/10"Nobody fucks with this planet! You got that?! Nobody!"
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Oct 15, 2019 21:28
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13. What We Do in the Shadows (2014) This is a “Documentary” about four vampires who live together, and their everyday lives. Directed and starring Taika Waititi, this movie is hilarious. They are making a documentary to prove that they are just like regular people. They argue over who does the dishes. They have complicated love lives. They make jokes when having guests over for dinner (Whom they eat after, but after a good chuckle is had by all). This isn’t one of the best horror comedies in years, it’s one of the best comedies in years. It’s legitimately funny, all the jokes land, and the vampires are very likable. Sure being a vampire might suck at points, but this movie has me team vampire. 9/10 Orange Kit Kats SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #2: Dead & Buried 14. House of 1000 Corpses (2003) A bunch of unlikable friends are on a road trip and stop by a weird gas market, where they learn of the legend of Dr. Satan. While they go to investigate it like idiots, their car breaks down, and take shelter with a crazy family. This goes bad when the family is actually crazy. This is the 3rd Rob Zombie movie I’ve seen, and I still have no idea if I like his movies. There are some very good shots, some great gore, and the directing is excellent. The story however drags. But this is a movie, and a well made one. 5/10??? Orange Kit Kats 15. Anna of the Apocalypse (2017) Anna is just trying to go through a high school musical coming of age story, and the first act of the movie it’s just this. And then the Zombie Apocalypse happens and things go from bad to worse. I really like the first two acts of this movie, but the final act is pretty tonally different from the first two. It starts as a comedy, and turns very dark very quickly. It’s not bad per se, just jarring. I enjoyed watching it, but I don’t love it. 6/10 Orange Kit Kats SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #1: The Best Month 16. Viy (1967) Khoma is a philosopher in seminary school, when one day he comes across a witch, and accidentally kills her. He is then asked to hold vigil for the girl for three nights, reading prayers to save her soul. He is of course, terrified of witches, and does not want to, but is forced to, with promises of gold. Of course, the witch comes backs every night to haunt him, with the haunts getting worse and worse... I’m not a big fan of haunting movies, but I really liked this movie. It was short, to the point, with some great effects for 1967. It’s a slow burn, but never not interesting. If you only watch one Soviet Union horror film this year, pick this one. 8/10 Orange Kit Kats 17. Mystics in Bali Cathy is an American who goes to Bali to learn black magic and voodoo for a book she is writing. She hears of an ancient Leak magic, and decided to learn it from the Queen of the Leák, an old crone who is the master of dark magic. Mahendra, her boyfriend, starts to think that maybe this is a bad idea. It is. This movie is insane, with an awful dub are horrible dialogue that makes the movie hilarious. The characters upon seeing dark magic think “That’s unsettling. Oh well, we need to write a book I guess.” The ending is nice and set up, with Mahendra learning a chant and given a dagger that can destroy black magic, and then the third act is not that at all. Overall a fun movie, but is it good? Yes? 6/10 Orange Kit Kats SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #3: Horror Noire 18. The First Purge (2018) The New Founding Fathers of America have an idea, a night where all crime including murder, is legal. They pick Staten Island as the experiment site, to see how it goes. They pay people to stay there, to get involvement. The audience follows Dimitri, a Drug dealer turned community vigilante, Nya, an anti NFFA activist, and Isaiah, a young and disillusioned kid trying to get out of poverty. This movie doesn’t try to pretend it’s not about class warfare, and is much stronger for it. It’s weird, because while I love the themes and what it’s doing, the movie itself is kind of dull. The characters outside of Dimitri don’t have much depth. It is however a nice look at the human condition, and how we’re one political party away from destruction. What makes this scary isn’t that something this extreme is likely, it’s that you see politicians like the ones in this movie all over the world today. 7/10 Orange Kit Kats 19. Bubba Ho-Tep (2002) Bruce Campell plays an elderly Elvis Presley, living out his final years in a nursing home. He left all the fame, money, girls, behind years ago, switching places with an elvis impersonator. In his old age he has nothing left, except the few friends he has there, including a man claiming to be JFK. Things get worse when a mummy wakes from the dead, and preys on the small souls of the old, knowing that they will not be missed. It’s up to The King and JFK to stop this monster. Don Coscarelli threw everything into the script, as he does. A deep look at mortality, at the possibility that life is meaningless, and of course Elvis in a wheelchair fighting a mummy. Bruce Campell really nails an introspective Elvis, clearly getting into it. There’s not a ton of action, as it takes place in a nursing home, and our heroes are barley mobile. That said, it works in the movies favor, as there are not a lot of horror movies that deal with the subject of old age and mortality this explicitly. Plus is has Elvis and JFK. Highly recommend. 9/10 Orange Kit Kats
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Oct 15, 2019 22:35
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 #93) The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974) Come on, it's TCM. If you're posting in this thread, you know this. And if you don't, you should fix that ASAP. Primary driver for watching it this year was that my partner had only seen it once, in college, and described that experience as her group of friends laughing at it. She remembered the shot of the chicken as lasting like two full minutes. I wanted her to have a chance to see it in a drier setting, sans riffing, so that she could get a better impression of the movie. She was knitting for most of it, but I don't think that's nearly as much of an immersion breaker as being on the phone or computer is. And while I started it with the intent not to do this, I did end up dropping trivia bits on her throughout the film, though I did try to keep it to a minimum once I started. There's just too many cool and interesting factoids about the making of it to not share a few. I feel like I always gloss over the Sawyers' house being next door to the Franklin house, and that Kirk and Pam just wander over to the Sawyers of their own accord. The wetness of that sound when the hammer hits Kirk really jolted me this time, I guess I haven't watched this with good speakers before. I can't believe this is one of only six acting credits for Jim Siedow, his mannerisms are so good. A bloody handprint curse on all the lovely horror-movie-makers who watch this and take away the impression that having their characters scream a lot is all it takes to build and maintain tension. The control of energy, not just for the overall arc of the film, but individual shots like the truck backing up into the view of the open doorway, is amazing. I can't help but wonder what they did with props like the skeleton bench after the filming was done. TCM, what a hell of a thing. rating: 9/10"Hey, I got us some barbecue."
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Oct 15, 2019 23:03
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16) Samhain Challenge: Spooktober - A movie about an artist: Bliss 2019 This movie was made for the Inktober challenge. A young painter is suffering from severe painter's block so she hits an old connection up for a drug called Bliss. He hooks her up with a new, very powerful variant and it does indeed help her to start painting again. It also awakens an insatiable desire for blood. This movie loving owns. It has amazing colorful lighting, great gore, really cool lighting, the camera and the editing feels a lot like Mandy and it has some really, really cool lighting. Also I guess the actors do a good job. As I said, it feels a lot like Mandy thanks to the cinematography and the score/soundtrack but it moves pretty fast, clocking in under 90 minutes. 4/5 17) Body Bags 1993 John Carpenter as the crypt keeper? Sign me up! That alone would make a fun enough movie but in Body Bags we also get a pretty dope first segment that keeps you guessing for quiet a while, Stacey Keach with gorgeous hair and a killer Mark Hamill. Dope little movie, must watch if you like anthologies. 3.5/5 18) Scary Stories to tell in the Dark 2019 This one really takes some time to set up the characters and I think this really works in its favor. The monsters are really cool but the stories loses a lot of steam in the middle third but I didn't mind too much because I was invested in the characters. Definitely worth a watch! 3 /5
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Oct 16, 2019 00:22
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SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #2: Dead & Buried 7. The Stuff - Larry Cohen It seems like my ulcerative colitis is starting to flare up, so over the next few days I get to experience real life body horror while I’m watching movies about body horror! Um yay?  On the surface level it’s a movie about evil yogurt, but just a little bit deeper and you realize that it’s  the horror movie. It was insane in all the right ways: body horror, some comedy, some political commentary without being overbearing. Just don’t think too hard about the plot, because sometimes the script meanders and things just kind of happen. I would love to see someone do an updated version of this concept after the invention of Social Media. It also turned out that picking Larry Cohen and this movie was perfect for the challenge due to the pretty blatant self-insert of the main character, Moe Rutherford. He’s sorta suave, gets the girl, always does the right thing, and punches all the bad guys in the face. In a parallel universe I imagine an entire series of Moe Rutherford mysteries as he goes around punching people, sleeping with women, and investigating the paranormal. Favorite Fashion: Swimsuits and Fur Coats...sure why not.
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Oct 16, 2019 00:58
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14) Leviathan: The Making of Hellraiser (2015) I'm not a huge fan, but the original movie is one of the modern classics. It was interesting to hear about some of the design decisions that went into it and the changes that were made, and a lot of the anecdotes were amusing. I felt, though, that to truly succeed as an analysis of the movie it needed to have more direct input from Clive Barker. The movie is his creation from inside to out and his absence from anything other than a bit of archive footage is a gaping hole.
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Oct 16, 2019 01:02
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my october has mostly been spent playing pathologic 2 and devil may cry! I've only watched three movies! 1.  probably the horniest movie i've ever seen, and i've seen 3/4ths of salo. cultist Hugh Hefner becomes a sex cthulu and Stuart Gordon has to stop him.you've never seen higher budget dicks. it shares a lot of crew with the re-animator, but thankfully the rapiness is toned down a lot. maybe the only good sex-horror other than Hellraiser I/II? 2.  a pretty direct riff on Tales from the Crypt. Only one of the shorts is really noteworthy, but the framing segments are great. John Carpenter hosts, channeling a powerful John Waters impression and carrying pretty much the entire movie. The Gas Station[i/]  A solid slasher short, and it doesn't really aspire to be much more. Far from the lamest thing Carpenter has ever made, but nothing notable. Hair  I think this qualifies as a shitpost? [i]The Eye or whatever Lame. Felt like a long episode of Beyond Belief. 3.  My first non-Argento giallo. It was quaint, but also surprisingly brutal and its cultural impact is immediately obvious. It's a brisk film, and it's old enough now that it's fashion house trappings have wrapped around from dated to ａｅｓｔｈｅｔｉｃ. An easy recommend to any normie slasher fan.
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Oct 16, 2019 01:23
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October 15 - Nightmare https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Aimfi7_zeOk Back on the Hammer train with a film I knew next to nothing about. The one sentence blurb from the box set makes it sound like a low-rent Gaslight. But maybe it'll rise about that? Janet's eleventh birthday party was ruined by her mother going mad and stabbing her father. Six years later she's returning to her house from school which might not be a good idea since it's just down the road from the madhouse her mother is confined in. Janet begins seeing a strange, scarred woman roaming the halls of the house which no one else encounters. Does madness run in the family? If you like seeing hysterical women being slapped, this is the movie for you! As we are told, "Hundreds of people are highly strung!" and many of them are women in this movie. So at the halfway mark I was thinking, "Yeah, weak version of Gaslight." Then the craziest twist happens as Janet grabs a knife and stabs her lawyer's wife over and over again and suddenly it becomes a very different film. That twist makes Nightmare a movie where anything could happen from that point on. It takes a humdrum movie and makes it pretty cool. The twist actually makes it hard for me to say a lot because it changes the movie so much. There's a stand out performance in the movie that I can't really talk about because it's in the back half. The plot developments in the second half are a lot of fun, even when it becomes clear what's happening. Nightmare isn't a bad looking movie, either. Freddie Francis directed it and he went on to be cinematographer for many visually striking movies of the 80's and 90's. There's a lot of direction choices that lean into the gaslighting like long shots where the eerie figure being followed just vanishes. It's not very developed cinematography of madness, but for a movie made in 1964 it feels about years ahead of its time. For a movie that I was fully expecting to give a "Eh, it's fine, I guess" review, Nightmare really turned itself around. The very ending is a bit too pat on a few points (I guess Janet making a full recovery exonerates her of that murder she did), but it made for quite a ride. Way better than I was expecting.
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Oct 16, 2019 01:30
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29. Oct 15, 2019 Body Snatchers (1993, Abel Ferrara) Warner Archive Blu-ray It's rare that I'd even consider a remake superior to the original, but this is easily the scariest and most tense. While it's been a while since I've seen the '78 Phillip Kaufman film, the '56 Don Siegel film is a lot of fun. But Ferrara and his team (with writers like Stuart Gordon and Larry Cohen!) swap the anti-communist witch hunts of the 50s for a depiction of the military industrial complex. Brillianty shot, tense from the first scene. Some of the scenes are just disturbing like the preschool painting class - at first, I didn't really notice what the deal was, but when I did, it creeped me out. This is only the second Ferrara movie I've seen and while I suspect he might have been a hired gun, this had the same sort of visual spark and surreal dread The Addiction had. 4.5/5 Bonus: Herschell Gordon Lewis: The Godfather of Gore (2009, Frank Henenlotter/Jimmy Maslon) Criterion Channel I've only seen Blood Feast so far, but I really want to see the rest of his films. This documentary has lots of clips from his work, including industrial films and nudie-cuties he made. He's such a fun speaker, talking about his life like he's in the same room as you. Also worth seeing if you want to hear John Waters say "cumshot"
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Oct 16, 2019 01:58
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