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TheBizzness
Oct 5, 2004

Reign on me.
14. Lords of Salem

This completes all the non-animated Rob Zombie movies for me. I do need to watch Halloween 2 again, but I've seen it within the last 15 years so it does not fit the parameters of my challenge.

I really really enjoyed this. I can totally see where the poster was coming from, who said this movie seemed like a maturation of Zombie's film making (nary a chainsaw nor stabbing!) before going back to the well for 31 and 3 From Hell. Sherri Moon Zombie gives what was at the time her best performance (I thought she was great in 3 From Hell even though I enjoyed the movie less) and I thought the storytelling was tight from beginning to end. Makes an interesting Double Feature with Suspiria even if they don't seen like natural mates.

15. Suspiria (1977) Samhain Super Challenge 4

This was my 3rd Argento film along with Deep Red and Phenomena. I would slot this one right in the middle with it being not nearly as good as Deep Red (imo, of course) and probably tied with Phenomena if not for the legendary use of color which in some spots was more interesting than the plot, and incredibly dream like setting at times. I enjoyed the yellow bathroom but missed screaming Nic Cage. The last 10 minutes were my favorite and really left me on a high note when it was over. I'm interested to check out the remake since I did think the Ballet School barely played a role and I'm interested to see if they expand on that since its nearly an hour longer.

16. Marrowbone

This is an incredibly slow burn but with a solid payoff at the end. Feels like a first cousin of The Others and they would probably make a nice double feature together. I do have to say it was incredibly light on the spooks. While I understand they were trying to play it somewhat close to the vest to support the "twist", I wish they would have tried a little harder to add some extra scary moments because the few they did try were pretty effective.

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T3hRen3gade
Jun 7, 2007

Look in my eye,
what do you see?
#23: Wyrmwood: Road of the Dead (2014)



"This morning I shot my wife and child with a nail gun. I don't know how to make that into a story."

There are a lot of things about this movie that I want to complain about. It's internally inconsistent, tonally incoherent, and just flat-out makes no sense in SO many ways. But you know what? It's also entertaining and metal as hell. :black101:

A meteorite shower hits Earth and all of a sudden people start turning into zombies. This happens right up front and the movie doesn't waste any time; people start turning and gore starts flying right from the jump. And it doesn't stop. It feels like Sam Raimi directed a Mad Max movie and decided to make it about zombies for the hell of it, it's that crazy. They even add some pretty radical ideas that I've never seen in a zombie movie before gasoline and fuel is no longer flammable, but zombie blood and the gas they belch is for some reason, so now cars are powered by burping zombies. Yeah. I mean, this movie is insane. I can't help but laugh at how ridiculous it gets.

My biggest beef is that it has some weird moments where it stops being a balls-to-the-wall zombie action extravaganza and tries to inject some serious drama for no reason whatsoever. While stuck in a zombie-covered car overnight, one of the characters remarks that this situation isn't the most horrible thing he's ever experienced. He then tells a story about how his 7-year-old son was diagnosed with brain cancer and died in his arms. Meanwhile, zombies are swarming their car, and the man sitting next to him literally shot his wife and child in the head with a nail gun earlier that day. It just felt like an odd point to make in a movie like this. That being said, the action is fun and there is enough gore to satisfy most zombie fans. It does some weird stuff that you've never seen before, and has a frenetic energy that keeps things in constant motion. Overall I liked it, but I feel like it didn't know what kind of movie it was trying to be at times, and it had the potential to be an absolute genre-changing classic. Instead it seems content to be a loud, fun, bloody Australian mash-up of other, better movies. It still kicked rear end, though.

"Never, ever ever, grab a man's balls in a fistfight. It shows low character."

3/5

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; Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon; Wyrmwood: Road of the Dead
Total: 23

T3hRen3gade fucked around with this message at 02:49 on Oct 17, 2019

Count Thrashula
Jun 1, 2003

Death is nothing compared to vindication.
Buglord
#18) Gerald's Game (2017)



I think that this film has a lot of interesting things to say about the nature of trauma and growing to conquer it (see also: IT Chapter 2). So on that front, I think it stuck the landing pretty well for a Stephen King adaptation. However, it also stuck the landing pretty well as a Stephen King adaptation by having a pretty lackluster ending. Without spoiling anything, I will say I can see what they were going for, but I'm not sure that that plot thread even needed to be in this story. It's like Stephen King had a cool spooky thought that he wanted to turn into a story, but didn't know where to put it so he just thought, "ah, Gerald's Game needs an extra 80 pages! I'll tack it on at the end!" Seriously, I just found out the 10 minute ending to this movie is 80 pages in the book. Yikes. But, I will say the first hour or so of the movie was very competently done and very tense. Worth watching once, especially since it's on Netflix. Also, she had an iPhone, couldn't she just tell Siri to call the police? Immersion ruined.

:spooky: 3/5

Shankel Magnus
Jul 4, 2007

Goodness no, now that wouldn't do at all!
:zombie: SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #3: Horror Noire :zombie:

9. Us


Believe it or not, I’ve managed to completely miss out on Jordan Peele’s horror movies. I was overseas when Get Out was released and I was in the hospital earlier this year when Us came out. I decided to start with Us since Get Out was so widely praised that I’ve already had most of the story accidentally spoiled.
When I first started watching this I was worried that it was just going to be merely a home invasion movie. I liked it a lot more when I realized the scope was much larger then it originally appeared to be. Being in the military, I’m already familiar with the “hands across America” concept when cleaning up an area to pickup any loose pieces of trash. When I first saw the tethered in a line it gave me a great “oh! hands across America haha…oh crap!” moment of realization of what they were doing.

Winston Duke as the Dad was easily my favorite character in the movie, both before and after the tethered arrived. I got some great (unintentional?) laughs when he had his low speed limping chase with his doppelganger. I also loved the looks and eye rolls his daughter would give him.

One thing that held me back from liking this movie even more was that I really didn’t seem to understand the rules that it operated under. Young Adelaide was able to come to the surface through the house of mirrors, so why didn’t surface Adelaide do the same thing after she was kidnapped? What kept the rest of the tethered from coming to the surface earlier? I could see surface Adelaide’s reason for seeking revenge on her clone, but why did she want to take it out on everyone else? Where did they get the supplies for their scissors and red jumpsuits?

Random Stranger
Nov 27, 2009



Shankel Magnus posted:

:zombie: SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #3: Horror Noire :zombie:

9. Us


One thing that held me back from liking this movie even more was that I really didn’t seem to understand the rules that it operated under. Young Adelaide was able to come to the surface through the house of mirrors, so why didn’t surface Adelaide do the same thing after she was kidnapped? What kept the rest of the tethered from coming to the surface earlier? I could see surface Adelaide’s reason for seeking revenge on her clone, but why did she want to take it out on everyone else? Where did they get the supplies for their scissors and red jumpsuits?


That's a totally fair complaint about Us since the underlying concept doesn't make a lick of sense, especially in the context of the statements in the movie. Supporting an entire second population of the US under the earth would require enormous resources and infrastructure which just doesn't exist. And as you noted, there didn't seem to be anything stopping them from just going to the surface.

My feeling is that the movie needs to be read as allegorical. How they eat and breathe and other science facts doesn't really matter for the purpose of the film. If the movie wasn't so conceptual, I would probably be more bothered by those things since it's a pretty big concept to ask the audience to buy into.

Mokelumne Trekka
Nov 22, 2015

Soon.

# 17 THE EXORCIST III (1990)



For me, this will likely be the biggest shock of the year’s challenge: The Exorcist III is more than good, it’s bordering on great.

Engaging dialogue, excellent performances by George C. Scott and Brad Dourif, creepy shots not only of supernatural things but of natural things (seriously though how did the director do it?), a dreadful atmosphere… I love the tracking shots of the wet streets at night. There are lots of great touches like that.

I think the movie did start wobbling a little bit in the last act, particularly the old lady attacking the family and the climatic exorcism with lightning bolts coming down in a jail cell. These scenes were odd, somewhere in between comical and tonally off. But the movie did not lose its foundation.

To my astonishment, I’m giving this a fairly high score. If you've ever had a supernatural experience that is unsettling and disturbs you to the core, this movie captures that feeling.

SCORE: 7.8 / 10

***

# 18 GHOST OF MARS (2001)



Franchescanado posted:

SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #4: Inktober

I select prompt 23, "ancient", as in the ancient Martian spirits unleashed in this movie.

This is John Carpenter’s next-to-last directorial effort, and it is a miss. In my opinion, however, it is not as awful as people claim it is. But still, it’s very close.

The movie does successfully build momentum on occasion, but somehow squanders it each time. By the end, a brawl-fest and shoot em’ up takes over the narrative, which results in the same kind of fatigue that Man of Steel (2013) gave to viewers.

Our lead characters, played by the gal from Species (1995) and Ice Cube, team up and duke it out with a swarm of miners infected with a nasty alien virus. They’re a fun duo. Too bad for their teammates – they were all murdered by sharp objects. Even Pam Grier’s head ends up on a stick.

In Ghosts of Mars, all human beings, infected or not, are disposable hunks of meat for our enjoyment, and it is rather vile and dehumanizing in a sense. Contributing to this problem are the one-dimensional characters. Ice Cube is a one-liner badass. We also know little about the leader of the miners, a potential villain I guess, other than that he screams, chants, and gets his troops in order.

John Carpenter defended this movie, claiming it was misunderstood. It was supposed to be schlock. Too bad a movie with such a wild, schlocky premise didn’t end up more fun.

SCORE: 5.3 / 10

***

#19 THE STUFF (1985)



Franchescanado posted:

SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #2: Dead & Buried

R.I.P. Larry Cohen.

One day, you come across unidentified white goo gurgling out of the earth. You:
A. Take a step back, puzzled.
B. Lean down and taste some.

Larry Cohen’s horror-comedy chooses “B”, and we know this in the first thirty seconds - a fair warning of what’s to come.

I enjoyed the first half of The Stuff more than the second half. In the first half, we get a mystery to solve from the eyes of an industrial saboteur who is hired to uncover the secret behind a sensational new yogurt-like product flying off the shelves in Reagan’s America. This man is a colorful, arrogant character and it is fun to see him embark on this investigation.

A subplot involves a boy witnessing The Stuff move around in the refrigerator. Berated by his father for such tall tales, the boy avoids the product like the plague but his family insists he enjoy it much like they do. This blue-eyed family glows with joy from The Stuff – why not he join in?

The second half is where poo poo hits the fan, and whenever ambitious special effects become necessary, the low budget hinders them. I can’t blame anyone for enjoying the second half as well, but it gets goofy and goes a little overboard and I don’t think it landed. Overall, it’s a noteworthy piece of schlock and even has commentary on topics like the FDA, shadowy corporations, and mass consumerism.

SCORE: 6.1 / 10

Mokelumne Trekka fucked around with this message at 04:33 on Oct 17, 2019

Five Eyes
Oct 26, 2017

Franchescanado posted:

SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #5: Tourist Trap
Thanks to FreudianSlippers for designing this torture device
I was going to watch Troll Hunter to do this challenge, but a check on Wikipedia reminded me that I've seen Cold Prey, which (as Darthemed notes) is also from scenic Norway. And let's not get started on Belgian co-productions.

So, here's a movie set and filmed in Thailand.

20.) P

2005, first watch, Netflix

P is the story of Aaw (Jaturaphut), a young girl from a remote village raised by her magically-adept but sickly grandmother. Poverty and social isolation draws Aaw to Bangkok, where she is exploited, and eventually turns to her occult talents to get by and seek revenge on others. As she breaks more and more of her grandmother's injunctions, Aaw becomes overwhelmed by dark forces and begins to prey on those around her. This is one of those movies that gets much less tense and stressful once the supernatural evil starts showing up, and the material immediately following Aaw's arrival at Bangkok is not an enjoyable watch at all. As an aside, Suangporn Jaturaphut's bio claims this was her first outing as an actress. If that's true, it makes me curious as to whether the scenes were shot in screenplay order - Aaw becomes more lively and vocal as the movie goes on, and while this is presumably intended to model her becoming more independent and opinionated, it may also be that the actress is becoming less stiff over time.

Compositionally, it's helpful to think of P as being, rather than a story about a supernatural evil force, a story in which a supernatural being of naive character is ensnared, harmed, and eventually corrupted by human evil. Aaw starts off owing a local grocer $10. It ends up costing her name (She must adopt a stage name more "friendly" to the foreign clientele of the "bar" she and the other girls work at), her dignity, her only friend, and her control of her own body. An innocent at first, she must learn spite and jealousy. P proposes that these acts "invite evil" into Aaw, and her eventual possession/transformation is not an external intrusion but rather the natural consequence of her change in inner state.

It is not only ghosts who will try and harm you in this life.

Watched: 1.) Cabinet of Dr. Caligari [Classics], 2.) Occult [J- and K-horror], 3.) Son of Frankenstein [Threequels, Samhain Challenge #1], 4.) Game Over [India] 5.) Candyman [Clive Barker], 6.) Knife + Heart [New Releases], 7.) Butterfly Murders, 8.) The Phantom of the Opera (1925) [Classics], 9.) One Cut of the Dead [J- and K-Horror], 10.) Hatchet III [Threequels, Samhain Challenge #2], 11.) Neighbours: They Are Vampires [India], 12.) Midnight Meat Train [Clive Barker], 13.) Us [New Releases, Samhain Challenge #3], 14.) The Taking of Deborah Logan, 15.) People Under the Stairs, 16.) L'Inferno [Classics], 17.) The Host [J- and K-horror], 18.) Hell House LLC 3 [Threequels], 19.) Stree [India, Samhain Challenge #4], 20.) P [Samhain Challenge #5: Thailand]

K. Waste
Feb 27, 2014

MORAL:
To the vector belong the spoils.
https://twitter.com/KennethJWaste2/status/1184676984066056192?s=20

Darthemed
Oct 28, 2007

"A data unit?
For me?
"




College Slice

Gripweed posted:

Clive Barker is the guy who wrote the Abarat books, right?
Yeah, but he very much made his name outside of the YA arena. Just struck me as funny, like calling Dickens a children's author because he wrote A Christmas Carol, to use an extremely rough analogy.


#101) Scooby-Doo! Abracadabra-Doo! (2010)
Ooh, I like the animation for this one. Paul Dini contributed to the script, Matthew Lillard takes over from Casey Kasem, Brian Posehn and Jeffrey Tambor contribute voice-work, we meet Velma's sister, and the gang learns magic tricks. Oh, and Fred finally bought a GPS for the Mystery Machine. The plot is almost irrelevant, with a griffin threatening the magic school, an ice cream man who wants to buy them out, and a long-dead magician's staff being the key MacGuffin, but there's some very nice foggy nights and shadowy corridors to be had. Kudos to the design and animation teams on this. If the story were stronger, this would be up there with the top Scooby movies.

:spooky: rating: 6/10

"What's all the ruckus?"

Irony.or.Death
Apr 1, 2009


Lumbermouth posted:

That and the creepy dude lasciviously hand cranking the movie projector with a brandy in his hand. It told me exactly what kind of movie this was going to be.

WeedlordGoku69
Feb 12, 2015

by Cyrano4747
#5 - Deadbeat at Dawn (1988)



:stare:

Holy loving poo poo, this movie. It's a meth-soaked odyssey of blood following one member of a Milwaukee street gang, a long-haired guy named Goose, as he deals with the brutal murder of his girlfriend and just generally how awful his life is; if you want to see the movie that Mandy, Drive and Hobo with a Shotgun are all to varying extents copying their homework from, here's it.

There's some stunts in this movie that I'm genuinely amazed by, because I know drat well they didn't have the budget to do them safely and doing them unsafely is in "batshit crazy" territory.

I need to check out more of Jim van Bebber's stuff. God drat, this movie.

deety
Aug 2, 2004

zombies + sharks = fun



17. Girls With Balls (2018)

My last six movies have all been either film festival stuff or challenge picks, so for tonight I chose something random from Netflix. Girls With Balls is a French horror comedy directed by Olivier Afonso, who’s the special effects/makeup artist that did the gore in Raw. So as you’d expect, the effects in this one are solid.

The story’s about a semi-professional (?) volleyball team whose members are trapped in the woods and hunted down by whatever you’d call rednecks in France. And sometimes a guitar guy pops up to sing about all the deadly danger they’re in. It’s got a decent mix of gags and story, and some of the actors are fun to watch, especially the head French redneck. Unfortunately it also includes a couple of tropes that I'm not a huge fan of.

Girls With Balls flirts with the idea of being a sleazy exploitation flick, but then it doesn’t actually push any boundaries. And its swipes at being a girl-power story are hampered by all the lingering butt shots and arguments over boys. If the movie had picked either of those styles to commit to, I'd be pushing it at everyone I know. Instead we got something that's entertaining enough in the moment but also pretty forgettable.

If you’re interested in this one, I’d recommend watching the French language version with subtitles. Netflix US often starts foreign movies with the English dub for me, but as usual, it’s worth switching over.


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); 16. Color Me Blood Red (1965) - Challenge #4; 17. Girls With Balls (2018)

Butch Cassidy
Jul 28, 2010



28. Wake in Fright (1971)
Shudder

That was batshit and I will be getting a hardcopy.

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), 27. Deathwatch (2002), 28. Wake in Fright (1971)

Decade - 1920s, 1930s, 1940s (III), 1950s (II), 1960s (IV), 1970s (IV), 1980s (I), 1990s (II), 2000s (III), 2010s (IX)

Black & White:Color:Hybrid - 9:18:1

By Country - Australia (I), Britain/Gremany (I), Canada (II), Japan (III), Mexico (I), 'Murica (XVII), New Zealand (I), Spain (II)

New:Rewatch - 23:5

Super Samhain Challenge - 1. Westworld (1973), 2. Creature from the Black Lagoon (1954), 3. N/A, 4. N/A, 5. N/A

Hot Dog Day #89
Mar 17, 2004
[img]https://forumimages.somethingawful.com/images/newbie.gif[/img]

Morbid Hound

The Wolfman, 2010

The Wolfman is a sort of remake of The Wolf Man from 1941. It got the same basic plot and names of the characters, but this is a very different film all together. Instead of a modern setting, we get Victorian England. Most it takes place in an small English village like in the original, but we also get to see the the horrors of an mental asylum of that time and old London. The story is much deeper and well done instead of the bare bones plot of guy in makeup stumbling around like in the 40s version. The setting is perfect for classic horror. Foggy nights, an old spooky mansion, the old village, the already mentioned asylum. Just everything just hits right when it comes to setting and costumes. I'm also surprised how much brutal, great kills there is with blood, guts and dismemberment in a mainstream big studio movie. You feel that this was made with care and love rather than something shat out to make as much money as possible. The downside are the outdated and less than great CGI. It's not that bad for the most part, but oof, that bear in the gypsy camp looks so poo poo. I get a bit angry each time I watch that scene. That's how poo poo it is. I had games on my old PS2 with better rendered animals. Besides that, this movie is very underrated. It didn't do that good in box office and critics didn't like it. I've only watched the director's cut, so maybe the theatrical version is poo poo. Not unusual for studios to gently caress films over.

Watching this, I remembered Universal Picture's many attempts to reboot their classic horror properties into the "dark universe" or something to rival the Marvel Cinematic Universe. All of them poo poo as far as I know. Why couldn't they have just done this? Made a good adaptation of their old stuff. The Wolfman 2010 is very underrated and I strongly recommend seeing the director's cut.

Maxwell Lord
Dec 12, 2008

I am drowning.
There is no sign of land.
You are coming down with me, hand in unlovable hand.

And I hope you die.

I hope we both die.


:smith:

Grimey Drawer
17. Under the Skin

I'd been meaning to see this one for a long time. The story's simple enough- Scarlett Johansson is an alien who lures lonely men to their deaths- but it's mostly distinguished by its very minimalist, unsensational storytelling. It avoids being lurid, for the most part, or even particularly horrific; it's almost all from the protagonist's perspective, and she regards humanity with an odd curiosity. Something I really like about the film is that it makes it clear that while the main character is convincingly human when "on the hunt", outside of this context she's almost completely lost; Johansson's performance is excellent and she captures a lot of subtle things. My one issue with the film is that the very slow pacing is sometimes excessive; it's not always clear if the story is actually going anywhere, so it's easy for it to seem stalled. Still, it's an engaging experience.

bitterandtwisted
Sep 4, 2006




26) Jason X 2001

Jason goes to space.

I had really low expectations for this, but it was actually not bad at all.
I mean, it is bad and stupid and silly, but it's an enjoyable bad and stupid and silly.

It's cartoonish and mostly bright and colourful like it's set on the USS Voyager.
We learn almost nothing about the future setting except Earth 1 is dead and there's no reason for it to be set in space except the novelty.

The space marine section felt like an Aliens parody. The kung-fu robot scene gets a bit too wacky. The holodeck bit with the sleeping bags did get a laugh from me.

There are a couple creative kills, but it could have done with more because it's not like there's any tension to be had from caring about these characters.
I was surprised to see David Cronenberg play a character in this. Made me wonder what a Cronenberg Jason movie would be like

BioTech
Feb 5, 2007
...drinking myself to sleep again...


#19. Body Bags
:spooky::spooky::spooky: SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #4: Inktober :spooky::spooky::spooky:
I went with Overgrown, anyone who has seen Body Bags will understand.


I love horror anthologies. They often give directors a chance to get the best part of their ideas on the screen, without any filler, a required runtime or similar concerns getting in the way. When the short isn't that good at least I didn't waste 90 minutes on it. I disliked nearly every short in ABCs of Death, but I still watched the second one (which was a lot better), because it never felt like I lost more than a handful of minutes, a few times in a row. I enjoyed Minutes Past Midnight and Galaxy of Horror in the last few threads and while they have plenty of bad parts, there is just so much in there to like. I mean, just look at this haunted house carnival ride. Yes, those are mechanical arms and yes, it moves. That thing kicks rear end.



Aaaanyway, Body Bags.
I didn't care much for it.
What I enjoy about anthologies are how they don't waste too much time getting to the good bits and the shorts in Body Bags definitely do. The ideas are there, but they get dragged out and each short has just a few minutes worth of fun material, but you have to fight through generic, uninteresting scene after scene to get there. The first shortone had some things going on, the second short just kept repeating "I don't like going bald" for way too long. The third one was oddly subdued, as if it didn't want to be a horror movie.

At least I got to see Carpenter ham it up, that was definitely the best part of it all.


#20. Critters 3


The plan was to watch all Critters movies last year, but I only got around to the first two. While I didn't care too much for them because they didn't live up to what my 8-year old self thought the movies were like based solely on the ever-present VHS covers at the video store (how could they!), I still want to see the last two. One down, one to go.

Someone else wrote about Harbinger Down that its cardinal sin was being boring and this was the same for me.
Critters 3 isn't particularly bad, it is just not entertaining. It failed to keep me engaged, the characters don't work and I kept looking at my watch, which is a bad thing for an 85 minute movie.
I am definitely gonna watch something else before, if, I watch Critters 4

Franchescanado
Feb 23, 2013

If it wasn't for disappointment
I wouldn't have any appointment

Grimey Drawer
21. The Neon Slime Mix-Tape
2019 | American Genre Film Archive | letterboxd | in theaters

Preview

quote:

IT’S EXACTLY WHAT YOU THINK IT IS.

Neon and slime are more important in life than sleep and hamburgers. So it’s only natural for AGFA and Bleeding Skull! to team up with life’s most essential ingredients to deliver a mixtape that’s more essential than life itself. THE NEON SLIME MIXTAPE is a hallucinogenic compilation that celebrates gore-soaked, gloop-drenched, direct-to-video genre anarchy from the 1980s and 90s. Coked-out demons! Extraterrestrial aerobics! Barbie dolls that kill!! Featuring digest versions of our favorite DIY slimers, ultra-rare trailers, and unseen clips from beyond the otherverse, THE NEON SLIME MIXTAPE will rip off your head and blast your spirit through the cosmos – and that’s only the first fifteen minutes.

Features footage from:

-BOARDINGHOUSE
-EVIL ISLAND
-DEMON QUEEN
-MUTANT HUNT
-REDNECK ZOMBIES
-THE PSYCHOTIC ODDYSSEY OF RICHARD CHASE
-HORROR BRUNCH
-SCIENCE CRAZED
-EVIL SPAWN
-DAWN OF AN EVIL MILLENIUM
-some movie about a male stripper who sings in a band (w/ MAX HEADROOM BROADCAST INTRUSION CUT IN)
-THINGS
-BEYOND DREAM’S DOOR
-PREMUTOS



In the same vein as Everything Is Terrible!, this is a video mash-up/mix-tape of schlocky horror films ripped from worn out VHS tapes. The sources vary from the incredibly earnest "Demon Queen" to the DIY cheap satire of Horror Brunch!!. This is an excellent mash-up, in that it manages to pick the most absurd moments from obscure relics from 80's and 90's horror that still offer things that are otherwise charming or interesting. Some of the special effects are actually really impressive (and gross!), some of the films are incredibly ambitious (Premutos looks like an attempt at Evil Dead 2 or Dead Alive mixed with Highlander), and all of them are misguided. I don't know who decided to tell the true story of serial killer Richard Chase (the Vampire of Sacramento) as an art film with Barbie dolls, but the concept is in such bad taste that I still don't believe it.

There's something weirdly comforting about VHS-quality DIY b-movies that think they're the next The Evil Dead. At 76 minutes, this is pretty much a guaranteed good time, especially in theaters.

There's definitely a few films I'll be watching from this.

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 | The Neon Slime Mixtape
Rewatches: 4
Total: 21

Edgar Wright's 100 Favorite Horror: 5/20
Super Samhain Challenge: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13

gey muckle mowser
Aug 5, 2003

Do you know anything about...
witches?



Buglord

Shankel Magnus posted:


Winston Duke as the Dad was easily my favorite character in the movie, both before and after the tethered arrived. I got some great (unintentional?) laughs when he had his low speed limping chase with his doppelganger. I also loved the looks and eye rolls his daughter would give him.


that sequence is definitely intentionally funny, and it got a ton of laughs when I saw it opening weekend

Basebf555
Feb 29, 2008

The greatest sensual pleasure there is is to know the desires of another!

Fun Shoe
SAMHAIN CHALLENGE: INKTOBER(#12 DRAGON)

Crawl

This is a very very straightforward movie about people trapped in a house with some hungry alligators. And that's probably why I enjoyed it. Nothing complicated, just a terrifying scenario backed up by some very well done cgi effects. For the Inktober prompt it would've also been easy to use "injured", because both of the main characters in the movie take a LOT of punishment.

I wish the cast was bigger. Maybe throw in a neighbor or maybe Barry Pepper's character has a girlfriend or something. I guess what it boils down to is I wanted more victims for the alligators to gobble up because that stuff was really well done. But outside of a few cops and rescue people showing up to act as convenient snacks, you're really just dealing with the two main characters who I had a hard time getting to worried about. It seemed obvious to me they'd both survive. And for an Aja film the limited number of victims meant that this was a fairly low score on the gore meter.

Still, I'd recommend it for anyone who enjoys killer animal movies or creature features. The gators are very effective threats and Aja does a great job of creating little individual nightmare scenarios, like the scene in the bathroom with the shower. There are much worse ways to spend 90 minutes.

Watched: 1. Child's Play(1988) 2. Child's Play(2019) 3. VHS: Viral 4. Tales From the Crypt 5. (SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #1)Viy 6. House of Frankenstein 7. Van Helsing 8. The Shining 9. Salem's Lot 10. Poltergeist 2: The Other Side 11. Pumpkinhead 2: Blood Wings 12. The Ravenous 13. Alucarda 14. Horror of Dracula 15. Dracula: Prince of Darkness 16. Midsommar 17. Candyman 18. Hellraiser 19. An American Werewolf in London 20. Bad Moon 21. Prince of Darkness 22. The Fog 23. (SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #2)House of 1000 Corpses 24. The Devil's Rejects 25. 3 From Hell 26. (SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #4)Crawl

That Dang Dad
Apr 23, 2003

Well I am
over-fucking-whelmed...
Young Orc



16. Demon Wind - Shudder - Joe Bob Briggs

A man and his NINE friends explore his grandparent's old farm where, long ago, ~OCCULT CRIMES~ were committed.

This was a ton of fun. It reminded me a lot of Evil Dead 2. It's not quite as good as ED2, but it has hilarious practical effects, baffling line delivery, stranger character choices (one guy is a karate magician) and gruesome kills. It plods a little too much occasionally (if it was 90 minutes, it'd be a perfect horror schlockfest) but I was entertained through most of the film.

I saw the Joe Bob Briggs version on Shudder which adds to the experience. A great pick for a horror movie night with friends.

4 out of 5 exploding cultists


17. Intruder

Fun little slasher in which workers at a supermarket closing up one night start getting picked off one by one.

This is pretty much a cast party for people involved with Evil Dead 2. It's a goofy single-location movie with some good kills and the length is appropriate at like 88 minutes. I more or less cared about the characters and was entertained for the duration. It wasn't mind blowing but it was something fun for the night (probably wouldn't watch it again unless it was at a party or something).

Big time CW for intimate partner abuse at the beginning.

3 out of 5 dead Raimis


18. Body Bags - Amazon Prime Rental

I looove anthology horror. This is a collection of three twisted tales: a woman's first shift at an all-night gas station encounters some... sharp challenges, a balding man goes to great lengths for great locks, and Luke Skywalker's eye surgery has unfortunate consequences.

This is just a fun-rear end film. The shorts vary in quality, but they are short enough that they're over quickly even if you don't vibe on them. The John Carpenter wraparound segments are silly, gross fun.

This is a perfect Halloween party film

4 out of 5 pierced eyeballs

That Dang Dad fucked around with this message at 15:03 on Oct 17, 2019

graventy
Jul 28, 2006

Fun Shoe
SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #3: Horror Noire
20. Horror Noire

A really great love letter to black directors and actors in horror films. It features a lot of films I have already watched for previous challenges, and several I've added to my list for the future. Plus a pretty fun story about Snoop blushing.
:spooky::spooky::spooky::spooky::spooky:/5

21. Next of Kin

A young woman (Linda) returns home after her mother dies to...take over (?) the nursing home she owned. This is small-town Australia, so Linda knows everyone, but she's a terrible host because she doesn't introduce *us* to anyone. Is Barney her brother? Boyfriend? Former boyfriend? Random townie? Who the gently caress is Carol? The movie is slow, and gives you a lot of time to contemplate these questions, but by the time it begins to giallo it up it already had lost me.

Unlike Quentin Tarantino, I did not feel like the atmosphere and pacing compared to The Shining.
:spooky::spooky:/5

22. Zombie/Zombi 2

I haven't seen a lot of Fulci, but what I have seen is filled with great effects and direction, and not so great acting and dialogue. But, I mean, does that matter? A zombie fights a shark! Like holy poo poo. I need to read an interview with that zombie.
:spooky::spooky::spooky::spooky:/5

feedmyleg
Dec 25, 2004
Wasn't sure if this one would qualify as a proper thriller until after I saw it, but afterwards, well...


Parasite

Bong Joon Ho has definitely been hit-and-miss for me. I've typically liked his stuff more than not, but everything up until this point has been a mixed bag. Parasite, however, is terrific.

I went in expecting a film that was more or less “eat the rich” but ended up getting a much more thoughtful and nuanced film about the cycles of poverty and the ways in which the severe class divide forced the poor to perpetuate societal abuse upon themselves and others.

The film starts out as a very funny, dark con-artist comedy but partway through veers steeply into thriller territory. It’s incredibly effective, as the first half gets you to like and care about all of the characters involved, and then the second half puts them into a pretty harrowing situation.

Brilliant film, not going to say anything more. Listen to everyone who’s seen it and go check it out.

Rating: 9/10

Beetlejuice: 10/10 (rewatch), Sleepy Hollow: 10/10 (rewatch), Ghoulies II: 9/10, Hobo with a Shotgun: 9/10, Parasite: 9/10, Demons: 9/10, The Fog: 8/10, Critters 2: 8/10, Captain Kronos: Vampire Hunter: 8/10, Demons II: 7/10, Ghoulies: 6.5/10, Slugs: 6/10, The Changeling: 4/10, Critters: 2/10

feedmyleg fucked around with this message at 15:51 on Oct 17, 2019

Dr.Caligari
May 5, 2005

"Here's a big, beautiful avatar for someone"
I'm behind, but have several days off so it's time to dive into the challenges.

:siren:SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #3: Horror Noire:siren:



Blade

Oh boy. I've avoided this movie for 20 years and I tried to give it a fair chance, but it managed to capture everything I didn't like about the 90s while foreshadowing everything I didn't like about the 00s.

-Part of (Cornerstone of?) The vampires-are-just-cool-emo-guys wave
-Comic Book movie
-Bad CGI
-Bad Science
-Bad shave designed hair
-Wesley Snipes
-Tribal tattoos
-Long black trenchcoat = cool, yet troubled cool-guy
-Nothing is faster than old muscle cars
-Slow-mo bullets flying
-Generic techno over karate
-Mortal Kombat gore explosions

Kris Kristofferson is cool though.

:spooky:/5



Hell House 3

Hell House 2 was so bad that when I saw this pop up on Shudder, and was filled with dread. Maybe out of a sense of duty I felt like I needed to watch it, and am I glad I did! While not the 'lighting in a bottle' the first was, this movie does return to more of the natural feel of the first. In addition to the main storyline, we get the treat of seeing additional footage from the first two movies. Not a masterpiece, but worth your time if you're a fan of the first

:spooky::spooky::spooky:/5



10 Cloverfield Lane

I have not seen the first movie, but fortunately this movie works fine as a stand alone. We start off with a familiar scenario of a female being held captive and a lot of questions which twist and turn until the end. I was fully invested with John Goodman's performance and trying to figure his character out. The first 2/3 of the movie could have led to several different endings, and I'm not sure if the one they went with and what ties it to the original Cloverfield was the best choice, but it's a solid entertaining movie.

:spooky::spooky: and a half pumpkin / 5

Seen; Stepfather 2, Scary Stories To Tell In The Dark, House Of Dracula, Murder Mansion, Curse Of The Mummy's Tomb, Your Sweet Body To Kill, Legend of 7 Golden Vampires, Bloodsuckers From Outer Space, Viy, A Dark Song, Blade, Hell House 3, 10 Cloverfield Lane

Super Samhain Challenge Completed; #3 (Blade)

Dr.Caligari fucked around with this message at 15:54 on Oct 17, 2019

Darthemed
Oct 28, 2007

"A data unit?
For me?
"




College Slice

#102) Horror House (1969), a.k.a., The Haunted House of Horror, a.k.a., Abominator
Very British, very mod. A group of hep cats get bored and decide to go hang out at a haunted house, and amid some under-cooked relationship drama, decide to have a seance. Instead of ghosts, we get a slasher, for some reason.

The unusual part is that it starts with just one person getting killed off, then the rest of the crew goes off to be anxious for a quarter of the movie or so, then return to the horror house. The parts I most enjoyed were the arguments over what to do, as the friends took sides and turned on each other. That soon devolved into empty squabbling, unfortunately, but at the outset, it was effective. Good sets and lighting (so many candle-cast shadows!), clean-cut dialogue, fun fashion, but knowing how slashers are 'supposed' to go after so much time for them to evolve made it difficult to approach this rough implementation. No knocks on any of the performers, though some of the hysterical screaming did wear thin, it's just kind of lacking in dramatic impact and shock value. I also feel that the twist was telegraphed too early and clearly, but that's a minor fault. And Frankie Avalon plays one of the young partiers, looking very much like he's in his thirties, at the least. Eh, aside from some nice visuals, I can't say there's much going for this one.

:spooky: rating: 6/10

"Aren't we supposed to touch finger-tips?"

Class3KillStorm
Feb 17, 2011




#23. Zombieland (iTunes)

A group of weirdos - the shy loner, a Twinkie-obsessed redneck badass, and a pair of sister con artists headed for a zombie-less amusement park - trek across America, which has become filled with zombies.

I figured I should get refreshed on this movie since the sequel is coming out this weekend. I hadn't seen this since it was first released in theaters, when a bad experience colored my views on it, probably a bit unfairly. (For some reason, the audio was hosed up and so any music heavy scenes were relegated to the back channels only, so scenes like the destruction of the Indian Casino gift store came across as incredibly muted and stilted).

Watching it back, 10 years later and with proper audio mixing, the film is... fine. I'm not a super big fan of Jesse Eisenberg or Emma Stone, and that was a hurdle that the movie new totally overcame. (Neither was terrible, mind, but neither was also that terribly endearing to me, so I was always at an emotional distance from large chunks of the movie.) Woody Harrelson is great, though, and seems to be the only non-Bill Murrary actor totally on the wavelength of the humor.

I know this was an adaptation of a tv project, but it still feels incredibly scattershot at times, like there's no real overriding story and we're just traipsing through random non-connected vignettes with these characters. That's what makes something like "Zombie Kill of the Week" stick out in a weird way - it's funny, I'm always a sucker for a well-timed piano flattening gag, but I forgot that it was only shown the one time. They mention it in dialogue once or twice, but that's it. So in a movie like this, why include the gag only once? Why not set it up for some other random one-off gags? That's what this film feels like to me - a lot of forcing for jokes that end up disappointing in their execution.

:ghost::ghost::ghost:/5


Watched 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, The Invisible Man (1933), Zombieland

M_Sinistrari
Sep 5, 2008

Do you like scary movies?




82) Amityville: Vanishing Point - 2016 - Youtube

First time watch, and I wish I could vanish at this point.

I think this one has the lowest budget ever, and that's including student films paid in beer and pizza. There's a possession happening, but anything else, I have trouble finding with how bad the pacing and editing is.

I think I regret watching this one more than the last one.


83) The Amityville Legacy - 2016 - Prime

First time watch.

At least we're back to the cursed item from the house bringing the haunting. In this case it's a toy monkey.

It's not a good film, but it's nowhere near as bad as the last four I sat through.


84) The Amityville Terror - 2016 - TubiTV

First time watch

Apparently the house has upgraded to killing off all families who move in and the town's in on things with feeding the house families so the evil stays in the house.

The real terror here is I still have a handful or so movies in the franchise to sit through.

smitster
Apr 9, 2004


Oven Wrangler
23. Hobo With A Shotgun (2011) - New To Me #11



What a wild ride. This was very fun to watch. Over-saturated and ultra-violent, it reminded me of a more intense horror version of something like Six String Samurai. If I didn’t already do the Dead & Buried challenge this would have been it, watched in tribute to the late great Rutger Hauer.

Movies So Far - 23:
Rewatches: 6 - Deep Red, One Cut Of The Dead, The Endless, Train To Busan, TCM 2, Zombi 2
New To Me: 11 - 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, Hobo With A Shotgun
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

Gripweed
Nov 8, 2018

#33: Silent Houst



That third Olson sister, she's a good actress. It's a shame this movie is mostly just her being scared in a house.

Silent House pretends to be a movie shot in one take, and I'm not sure why. There were enough places where they could've easily hidden a cut that I looked it up after I watched it and yeah it was filmed in multiple takes. So it's not technically impressive the way actual one take movies are. And they never do anything real interesting like the long take from Children of Men, or even anything impressive like the chair stacking from Poltergeist. At first I thought maybe they were trying to create some sort of naturalness, like, make the audience forget they were watching a movie. But they make generous use of horror movie sound effects. So the end result is the one take gimmick is just a weird, limiting choice they made for no apparent gain.

Silent House does get good in the last quarter of so, after the "twist". The problem is it's not so much a twist as it the movie just finally deciding to be about what it's about. The whole first hour it's pretending it's not what it is, and it doesn't even work. The home invader angle doesn't make any sense, and the first scene with the dad he calls his daughter princess and says her boyfriend isn't good enough for her so I immediately assumed he was a creeper. When the movie finally gives up the pretense and admits what it's about it gets weird in an interesting way, it gets compelling, Olson has something to do other than be scared, it's good. But it makes the entire first hour such a waste of time, and also the stuff the movie did to make the home invader angle seem plausible becomes baffling. Who the gently caress is Sofia? After the twist I have no idea who that character is or why she's in the movie at all. And since they spent that first hour pretending to be something else, the actual story doesn't get half the amount of set up it needs.

I don't want to write the whole thing off because the last like 25 minutes is actually a pretty solid psychological horror thing, but overall I'd call Silent House frustrating and, for the bulk of it's runtime, boring.

gey muckle mowser
Aug 5, 2003

Do you know anything about...
witches?



Buglord

Gripweed posted:

use.

Silent House pretends to be a movie shot in one take, and I'm not sure why.

it's a remake of a Spanish-language film that was shot the same way, which I haven't seen but from what I've read uses it to better effect

Lumbermouth
Mar 6, 2008

GREG IS BIG NOW


M_Sinistrari, I don't know why you're doing this to yourself but your tolerance for shittiness is impressive.

Gripweed
Nov 8, 2018

gey muckle mowser posted:

it's a remake of a Spanish-language film that was shot the same way, which I haven't seen but from what I've read uses it to better effect

Just reading the synopsis of the original makes it sound like a much better executed movie.

Butch Cassidy
Jul 28, 2010

Franchescanado posted:

SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #4: Inktober



An example: "I have never seen Cronenberg's The Dead Zone, so I'm going to watch that for '11. Snow' " or "I have never seen Ringu, so I will watch that for '1. Ring' ". You get the jist.



29. The Mummy's Ghost (1944)
DVD

Only two reasons to watch this. Either you want to see Ramsay Ames or feel like listening to three hours of dog yapping in a one hour runtime.

10. Pattern: These movies follow one.
22. Ghost: Self-explanatory
28. Ride: Riding the cash train for all the franchise is worth.

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), 27. Deathwatch (2002), 28. Wake in Fright (1971), 29. The Mummy's Ghost (1944)

Decade - 1920s, 1930s, 1940s (III), 1950s (II), 1960s (IV), 1970s (IV), 1980s (I), 1990s (II), 2000s (III), 2010s (IX)

Black & White:Color:Hybrid - 10:18:1

By Country - Australia (I), Britain/Gremany (I), Canada (II), Japan (III), Mexico (I), 'Murica (XVIII), New Zealand (I), Spain (II)

New:Rewatch - 24:5

Super Samhain Challenge - 1. Westworld (1973), 2. Creature from the Black Lagoon (1954), 3. N/A, 4. The Mummy's Ghost (1944), 5. N/A

Darthemed
Oct 28, 2007

"A data unit?
For me?
"




College Slice

#103) Horror of the Hungry Humongous Hungan (1991), a.k.a., The Hungan
Watched on Tubi. Narrated by Jack Palance, released by Troma. Looks almost SOV, but the numerous film grain blips suggest otherwise. There's a cursed serum that can bring corpses back to life, but only if they're made up of multiple other corpses. Some dude starts work to make a suitable corpse. People get scared. Then it turns into a camping in the woods movie. And people get scared.

This was boring. There was a band called Cry Wolf that played in a couple of party scenes. They're okay. I guess. There's also a buzz-cut mullet in that scene, which was more exciting. And a decent Pee-Wee Herman imitator. The slow-motion chases with feedback synth scoring were my favorite part, and they almost felt like they'd been cut in from a different movie. The kaleidoscope shot of the plaster gravestones was alright. Don't waste your time on this unless you're a Troma completionist. Weirdo. I did like it more than Camp Blood, though.

:spooky: rating: 3/10

"I don't wanna dream anymore."

ReapersTouch
Nov 25, 2004

Goodness no, now that wouldn't do at all!


Bad Moon- This actually wasnt half bad. Special effects were great in some spot, funny in others. 3.5/5



Dog Soldiers- Lol, goofy near the end and I liked it. 3.5/5



SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #4: Inktober
Suspiria- Wow, I need to watch the original. Last 15 min were wild. 4.5/5

MacheteZombie
Feb 4, 2007
8. Mountaintop Motel Massacre - 1983 Vinegar Syndrome Release

This was a pretty fun surprise, some good looking shots and a plot that's a bit different than the usual slasher. A crazy lady that runs a motel kills her daughter in a fit of psychosis that police decide was accidental. Not long after some road weary travelers show up needing rooms and you get the rest. She starts off with putting snakes, rats, and roaches in their rooms but escalates to murder soon after. The acting isn't superb but Bill Thurman, Anna Chappell and Major Brock (the latter two only appear in this) are having a good time in the movie.

2.5/5

9. Evil Town - 1977 VS Release

Two films stitched together into a boring mess for the sake of nudity. The kidnap subplot is awful and gross. The hippies with old people stuff was much better.

Wasn't very enjoyable

1.5/5


(My letterboxd list: Currently at 16 films total. 1 Samhain Challenge film)

Opopanax
Aug 8, 2007

I HEX YE!!!


I really liked Hell house but skipped part 2 because of this thread. It sounds like 3 is worth checking out but will it be worth it without watching 2 or is there a bunch of stuff I won't follow?

Also are we counting the new Are You Afraid of the Dark? It's a 3 parter but it's technically just one movie split into parts and total runtime will like be a bit over 2 hours. I'm watching it with my son either way but want to know if I should count it or not

Opopanax fucked around with this message at 20:04 on Oct 17, 2019

graventy
Jul 28, 2006

Fun Shoe

Retro Futurist posted:

I really liked Hell house but skipped part 2 because of this thread. It sounds like 3 is worth checking out but will it be worth it without watching 2 or is there a bunch of stuff I won't follow?

Don't watch 2. If you enjoyed 1, 3 is pretty fun, but there is nothing redeeming about 2.

vv That's fair. Just avoid any talk show portions.

graventy fucked around with this message at 20:35 on Oct 17, 2019

MacheteZombie
Feb 4, 2007

graventy posted:

Don't watch 2. If you enjoyed 1, 3 is pretty fun, but there is nothing redeeming about 2.

The first part of 2 is fine. Just turn it off when the spooky youtubes stop

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Five Eyes
Oct 26, 2017
HHLLC3 is fine, but if you've seen the first one recently, I'd hold off - its strongest bits are retreads of beats from the original, so there's not much point in back-to-back showings.

21.) Lord of Illusions

1995, rewatch, Amazon Prime
Doing this Clive Barker a little late (the next one, too) to share the movie with my partner.

I love this movie, warts and all, for being basically unadulterated Barker.

Lord of Illusions throws you into the deep end with its climax-of-some-other-movie opening, and then pulls back for you to get some context during Bakula's investigation. This is one of my favorite films about the occult, and the rapturous and intimate way that mystical achievement is presented here is both distinctively Barker and far more compelling than other approaches. Enlightenment is a physical, sensuous process, and Nix's desire to have a companion along the way is clearly as sexual as it is spiritual. Every material concern, even the adoration of his cult, is secondary to this. D'Amour and Dorothea are just bit players in the fight over Swann's soul, which is probably why their scenes together are where the film loses its intensity.

The computer effects work hasn't aged very gracefully, but I can overlook that in light of some great decisions for costuming and set dressing.

You must see flesh with a god's eyes

Watched: 1.) Cabinet of Dr. Caligari [Classics], 2.) Occult [J- and K-horror], 3.) Son of Frankenstein [Threequels, Samhain Challenge #1], 4.) Game Over [India] 5.) Candyman [Clive Barker], 6.) Knife + Heart [New Releases], 7.) Butterfly Murders, 8.) The Phantom of the Opera (1925) [Classics], 9.) One Cut of the Dead [J- and K-Horror], 10.) Hatchet III [Threequels, Samhain Challenge #2], 11.) Neighbours: They Are Vampires [India], 12.) Midnight Meat Train [Clive Barker], 13.) Us [New Releases, Samhain Challenge #3], 14.) The Taking of Deborah Logan, 15.) People Under the Stairs, 16.) L'Inferno [Classics], 17.) The Host [J- and K-horror], 18.) Hell House LLC 3 [Threequels], 19.) Stree [India, Samhain Challenge #4], 20.) P [Samhain Challenge #5: Thailand], 21.) Lord of Illusiosn [Clive Barker]

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