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#2 The Devil's Doorway (2018) Two Irish priests are sent to a Magdalene asylum to investigate a miracle. Nothing special. It's found-footage-- slightly ludicrous, given that it's set in 1960, whatever-- but doesn't really use that aspect of itself very well. There's extra-diegetic music in some scenes, and horror-chords around some of the jump-scares, which really took me out of things. At times it felt a little overly-polished, e.g. a scene where you hear Father Thomas' private conversation with a nun while the screen plays creepy B-roll of ordinary asylum goings-on. There are a couple of neat moments, when the camera catches something the priests are oblivious to, but that's it. Anyway, the movie as a whole just never really comes together. There are a lot of creepy scenes, but they don't feel connected; it's like a bunch of mood-trailers that all happen to feature the same actors and sets. I guess it's worth a watch if you're a sucker for found-footage like I am. The set is fantastic, very memorable, and the central character of Thomas is great, a very emotional, human performance. I did enjoy the younger priest's gradual realisation that the ghosts are giving him good advice and he should really just listen to them. Connective tissue with movie #1, Saint Maud: kinda obvious, isn't it?
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Oct 2, 2022 06:40
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5. Crawl (2019) Watched On: Rented  What a fun creature feature. I personally have a lot of nightmares that mirror situations just like in this movie and maybe worked for me a little extra because of that (on top of living in an area with hurricanes and gators). It's always nice to see Barry Pepper and he was doing a pretty good job here for what the movie was. This movie knew what I wanted though, lots of people getting chomped on, and a cute dog. Hate that I sat on this one a while so I'm really looking forward to whatever they have planned for a sequel. 6. Sole Survivor (1984) Watched On: Shudder  Well this was a bit of a weird one. A bit of Final Destination, a bit of It Follows, and none of the things about either that were fun or good! It was generally just kinda dull? A big part of the premise exists solely to add some kind of bodycount and makes no sense and what kills there are just kinda suck. At the end I would have sworn up and down this was an Italian production from the 70s because some of the ADR work is so bad the characters looked dubbed over from a foreign language. The best part about this movie I'd have to say is the poster. I don't regret watching it but it was exactly a great time either. 7. Saloum (2021) Watched On: Shudder  For me I think this is gonna be hard for any other, "new to me" movie to top this marathon season, I just loved Saloum. It's stylish, cool, emotional at times, a bit of a western, a bit of From Dusk Til Dawn and it all came together and worked great for me. I won't spoil much about the movie because I think it's good to see it cold but I can't suggest it enough. I just got done so I don't have too much to say about the themes without some thinking but it'll be fun to ponder. Senegal looks so beautiful in Saloum, the arial shots on display rocked. I always consider getting rid of Shudder for a bit and then a gem like this hits and I remember why I keep the service year round. I'll be very excited to see more movies from Jean Luc Herbulot.
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Oct 2, 2022 07:14
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 4. Mystery of the Wax Museum (1933) I didn't know color could look this good all the way back in 1933! Mystery of the Wax Museum was the last hoorah of two-color Technicolor, which is why everything is some shade of pink or green. It looks tolerably good in mundane interior scenes and then looks fantastic in the waxworking lair of the sinister Ivan Eigor, which has the huge unhinged angular shapes of a German expressionist picture, all cast in malevolent emerald hues. I nearly thought this was a bust as a horror film until the climax pops off. Most of the runtime is Glenda Farrell doing a relentless sassy girl reporter routine (turns out another similar role of hers was a direct inspiration on Lois Lane) as she tries to fish out a scoop from why a murdered woman's body was stolen from the morgue. Farrell is really drat entertaining, it's good fun watching her lay down a whole screwball comedy's worth of savage banter, but her sparring with her newspaper editor just doesn't have any spook factor. That is, until her roommate Fay Wray gets lured into Eigor's wax museum alone. From the shot where Max Betz as a creepy mute lifts his head up from a row of wax faces, the horror factor drastically escalates, through a terrifying reveal that caught me totally off guard and a truly ghastly death that looms over Wray as a mob of policemen try to batter the doors open and save her! It's an hour's worth of classic horror packed into five minutes of action! Just don't even try to wrap your head around the insane romantic decisions of the epilogue.  / 5
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Oct 2, 2022 07:49
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Probably a good idea to bank these for a rainy day and definitely not just cause I wanted to watch more. A fearsome foe Last Shift (Anthony DiBlasi ; 2014) Yeah that hot streak didn't last so long. This got recommended to me as a solid B+ and oo-boy is that carefully using a grading system to obscure its quality. What this movie is, is dogshit done very, very well. The lighting, cinematography, sound, technical things were good to excellent. Whoever was framing the shots has a real good handle on how to point the camera so it builds tension, great use of negative space. And the acting is pretty dang good too, adjusting for the difficulty in selling the bullshit they're forced to say. But the things that are very well performed and lit and mic'd, etc. are just endless cold gruel. Every development in the story just seems to make it worse, and with a limited cast of characters and one setting that is really just a very stoutly-built office building... There's not a lot of things to go spookily dookily. We got messing with the lights, creepy singing, writing spookily on the wall, stuff moving and that lasted a whole 20 minutes. They're so desperate to have something to go ka-spook that there are not one but two, two swivel chair scares. As in there are two separate entire scenes that have our heroine menaced by some cheap office furniture. In one, the chair kicks her rear end. No poo poo. It's both very good and also astoundingly mediocre which is very frustrating and that's why I seem so harsh on it. It's a good watch no matter what, but the pieces were there to make something amazing if they'd had more ambition. 10/10 at being a 5/10 3 down, 28 to go.
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Oct 2, 2022 08:00
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I always love this challenge and reading everybody's posts. Props to everyone who partakes. I can't remember if I've done a proper challenge before but I'll be watching at least 31 movies and sharing thoughts. I have no rhyme or reason to what I'll be watching. Tonight was TCM night! The Texas Chainsaw Massacre What else can really be said? Decades later it still feels kinda wrong to watch this movie. Especially the last twenty minutes or so, it's just so uncomfortable and makes your skin crawl. Incredible use of sound and music, it constantly has you on edge. Having Leatherface appear so casually and without warning is so effective. Grandpa remains terrifying. The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 I typically love when movie sequels get weird and gonzo, but even after giving this a few chances I still find it an aggravating watch. First off - the music is really awful. Really terrible synthesizer garbage, not at all as good as the discordant music in the first movie. I think the sound in general in this movie really bothers me - there are way many people yelling "woo" in the first half (sounds weird, but it's true) and Bill Moseley, much as I love him, is just cackling and screaming far too much. I'm not sure why I focused so much on the sound in this movie but it really stood out. I don't really like the Leatherface look here either. In terms of good things - Dennis Hopper, obviously. The totally crazy underground lair rules, what an amazing set. Jim Siedow is fantastic. "But the saw...the saw is family." The ending with Stretch spinning around. There is fun stuff here but I find it an annoying movie despite my attempts to like it.
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Oct 2, 2022 08:21
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I watched a chillogy of films at work today! #2  Fear Street: 1994 Dir. Leigh Jainak 2021 United States 🇺🇸 What an interesting way to do a trilogy. And this is a true trilogy too with so many narrative and stylistic elements that get repeated throughout. For this specific one, it’s a brightly lit slasher with a good supernatural bend. It’s all wrapped around a tale of two rivaling towns, a rivalry that seems to have stemmed from decades or centuries before. One town, Sunnyvale, seems to be idyllic while the neighbors in Shadyside constantly fall prey to a series of killers. This rivalry extends to our characters too, which creates a lot of fun symmetry that this trilogy loves to use. It’s interesting that it feels like the end of a series when it’s just the start, though it’s also the end. The idea to start at the end and work back is weird but it totally works here. The characters are all very likable which makes it so much harder when terrible things happen to them. Don’t let the “based on the books by R.L. Stine” credit fool you into thinking these will be light thrills for everyone. This is a grisly and mean film, but it never lost it’s charm. It never felt heavy and depressing, the over the top style keeps it exciting. I did enjoy how this easily could have been a standalone film and been content. All you have to do is cut out the stinger. Even when it’s planned and shot as a trilogy, it’s a great singular story on it’s own. My biggest complaint is all the needle drops. They use really good songs, but it’s constant music towards the beginning and end. It’s like “I get it, it’s 1994”. I give it 4 heads in a deli slicer out of 5. #3  Fear Street: 1978 Dir. Leigh Jainak 2021 United States 🇺🇸 Back to Fear Street! This one is a pretty obvious pastiche of Friday the 13th and The Burning among other summer camp chillers. The plot switches over to a new character introduced in the stinger of 1994 and now we see how she survived and we start to unravel what’s actually happening in Shadyside. This one is a bit of a mixed bag. It’s a pretty strong solo film, going on a full origin story for a slasher villain, but it feels the least connected to the meta plot. I still enjoyed it a lot. It kept up with very likable characters and gruesome gore, but this time it swapped neon over saturation with a warm and shadowy look. That mid summer grit of dirt and dried scabs. It’s also fascinating that we already know a lot of what’s going to happen in this one due to it being a prequel. The end is spelled out to us from a scene last in 1994. That doesn’t ruin the tension though. I kept hoping that someone else survived. SPOILERS: they didn’t. With how disconnected it felt to the rest kinda dulled it for me. The most important details from this movie could have been an extra line or two of dialog in either of the other films. Minor complaint because it was still a fun ride. Still gonna harp on all the needle drops. Love the use of “Man Who Sold the World” bookending it though, at first the Nirvana cover and then the David Bowie version at the end. That was clever. I give it 4 skeleton witch hands out of 5. #4  Fear Street: 1666 Dir. Leigh Jainak 2021 United States 🇺🇸 One more trip to Fear Street! Now we get to see the origin of evil. Our main hero of 1994 touches a spooky skeleton and we are transported back to the founding of our two towns in 1666 (a very spooky year)! But maybe everything isn’t what it seems with our supposed witch… The most fun aspect of this movie is a lot of the cast coming back in new roles. It’s not made explicit if this is how those characters look or if this is an interpretation. It doesn’t really matter tbh. This film, despite being the oldest chronologically, is the one with the newest inspirations such as The VVitch and Midsommar. The mood is much more dreary and bleak. It’s definitely the most grim of all of the movies, but still very enjoyable. In contrast to 1978, this one has the most connective tissue to the rest. I mean the entire last act is a new final act for 1994. That kinda makes the 1666 story itself feel a little incomplete. It does have a full three acts, but they don’t end satisfyingly without the full context of the trilogy. This entire movie is dependent of the trilogy. So I criticized 1978 for being too disconnected and 1666 for being too connected. It’s a very tricky balancing act for this trilogy. They’re all good, but i just can’t give it full marks just for it being essentially a 6-hour film broken up. I give it 4 super soakers full of blood out of 5 Liar Lyre fucked around with this message at 08:49 on Oct 2, 2022 |
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Oct 2, 2022 08:28
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8. Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers (1988) Watched On: Shudder  Halloween 4 is a movie I can probably thank for making me a horror a fan to the degree I am today and sparking my interest in the Halloween series. It was a staple on AMC's Monsterfest, a tradition I sorely missed that go slowly watered down as the years went by. Yeah, it's the age of streaming but there was something cool about being able to pop on AMC for 31 days of the year and something spooky would be on without having to plan. Anyway... Halloween 4 is a rather poor attempt to copy Halloween but not actually understanding the things that made that movie great. It somehow feels toothless compared to a movie that has very little gore itself, there's just no tension and none of the main characters are likeable. The biggest crime of course is not making the drunk driving preacher a main character. The two best things about Halloween 4 though are that Doctor Loomis is on the path of being full bore crazy, the gun toting redneck lynch mob is easily bodied by Michael, and the Halloween setting feels more pronounced. Those must have been enough for little me. Sad thing is the bar just keeps getting lower for quite a while from here. Favorite Shot  The sit up and lightning flash is just neat looking. Favorite Kill   Holy poo poo, Michael.The Mask  Hoo boy. Michael is out here looking like chunky Data from Star Trek. 5/10.
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Oct 2, 2022 10:15
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3: Burke & Hare (2010) Burke and Hare are the most notorious serial killers in Edinburgh, where I live, so the subject matter interests me. In the early 19th century, Edinburgh was at the heart of the medical revolution. Cadavers were in high demand for medical demonstrations and teaching, but few bodies were available, mostly just executed criminals. Some doctors weren't too fussy about the providence of the bodies, so grave robbing became a lucrative industry. Burke and Hare decided to get some super fresh bodies by murdering sixteen people and selling the corpses to one Dr Knox. They were caught, Burke was executed, used for dissections, and a wallet and book bindings were made from his skin, which you can see in the Surgeon's Hall museum. It's a fascinatingly morbid subject for a film, and there's a great cast involved: Simon Pegg, Andy Sirkis, Tim Curry, Christopher Lee, Ronnie Corbett among others. Unfortunately I was disappointed. The horror aspects are too light and the humour is bland. It's sit-com like, and a large part is given to an invented plotline of Burke trying to impress a lady by making her all-female Shakespeare production company a success. The characters, especially Burke, are far too sympathetic. I thought of Kind Hearts and Coronets, where our protagonist is also a serial killer who's presented initially as sympathetic but it becomes apparent he's completely psychopathic and it's darkly hilarious. We don't have that here. Pegg's a likeable loser who just happened to murder lots of people for money. 4: Pet Semetary (1989)  There's a burial ground that brings back the dead. It's a great idea, but they way it's introduced could have been better. "Sorry your daughter's cat died. I know a way to bring it back, but evil!" "OK let's do that". I'd thought when the child died and was brought back there'd be some ambiguity to whether he was "wrong", at least enough that the father would make excuses for why bad things were happening when Gabe was about. Nope, none of that. Straight to evil zombaby. Fred Gwynn is warm and likeable. Rest of the cast was fine. The concept deserved a better execution. Total: 4 Scream 4; Scream 5; Burke & Hare; Pet Semetary (1989)
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Oct 2, 2022 11:48
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#3 Come True (2020) Semi-homeless teenager Sarah enlists in a sleep-study, if nothing else so she has somewhere to spend the night. The scientists cannot tell her the study's purpose. Oh man I LOVED this. It's the first movie this time around that fully gripped me, basically from the first minute. It's full of these incredible dream-sequences, which are horrifying in that distant way dreams often are, where something awful is happening but it doesn't fully reach you. There's sound, but it lacks texture. The whole dream-aesthetic is very Dark Souls, of all things. The waking-world has a very well-defined vibe, ambient synth and closeups of faces and scenes with a single dominant colour. And kind of a retrofuturist thing at the sleep clinic. The movie has this earnestness that really hit me just right. The ending is not good. In a movie which is nominally about dreams intruding into the real world, "it was all a dream" is at least a very funny copout, but it still undermines the rest of the movie. I dunno, it felt like the whole plot was leading somewhere, but then it didn't. Much of the movie is building up to nothing; it's that dream-logic where you care about things that don't matter or make sense, you just know that you care about them. There is a little originality to it, in that the protagonist is learning that she's in a dream and can't get out, so there's some emotional weight to the discovery itself, but it's still a bit disappointing. Still, the good far outweighs the bad, and props to forums user A True Jar Jar Fan to putting this on my list a while back. Also the soundtrack rules https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lOAu-GGzg_E Connective tissue with #2 The Devil's Doorway: bleeding eyes.
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Oct 2, 2022 12:18
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1. Dark Glasses (2022) First October watch was Shudder's "secret" screening of Dario Argento's new one, Dark Glasses. I watched it on my phone, not ideal but that's I think the first time I watched an entire movie on my phone. I can't recommend it unless you absolutely have to! On to the movie. This was a throw-back giallo, Argentos first in quite some time - it had bumbling police, incompetent protagonists, incredible coincidences that didn't make sense, a nest of water snakes out of nowhere; in other words, a classic giallo. I just wish it were better. It needed more oomph, and needed to kick the nonsense up a notch, either stylistically or in content. Outside of a few silly choices, Argento captured the feel of an OG Italian murder thriller, only missing a bottle of J&B sitting conspicuously on a table, but not the feel of one of his own latter-day giallos, and certainly not a modern neo-giallo, of which we've been gifted plenty of good examples of in recent years. This movie lacked pizazz, simply moving from plot point to plot point. It has some choice gory bits but those stood out in stark contrast to the rest of the movie, eliciting a laugh from me more than a gasp. That could be on me, though, so I won't lay that at the feet of the film. Overall a 2.5/5, fine silly giallo, I just wish Argento weren't as constrained with it. Outside of the bonkers snake scene.
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Oct 2, 2022 13:08
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2. Cannibal! The Musical Trey Parker and Matt Stone's first project, a comedy horror musical about Colorado cannibal Alferd Packer. This shows it's low budget but is still very well done for something they made while still in college and a lot of the humor they'd go on to be known for is present here. Its paced much better than I expected from a student film but the ending feels a little stretched once Packer actually gets back to civilization. The songs are entertaining and I was chuckling at most of the jokes, it's a good time overall and achieved exactly what it set out to do.
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Oct 2, 2022 13:33
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4. Final Destination If you were going to cast a movie specifically to invoke 2000, you'd be hardpressed to beat Seann William Scott, Ali Larter and Stan From The Eminem Video. Then Tony Todd shows up and does what Tony Todd does every time he's in anything and immediately becomes the best thing in the movie. Obviously the deaths in the series become more over-the-top as time goes on, but that final kill is a fantastic bit of Rube Goldberg Bullshit. I also appreciate that it saves it for the most unlikeable character, like every good slasher movie should. 3 out of 5! 4/31, watched: Scary Movie, Final Destination 4, Happy Death Day, Final Destination. Gyro Zeppeli fucked around with this message at 14:34 on Oct 2, 2022 |
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Oct 2, 2022 14:06
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 2) Dracula (1931) Trailer Seen on: Tubi In this classic adaptation of Bram Stoker's novel, Count Dracula travels from his castle in Transylvania to terrorize London, and only Professor Van Helsing can stop him. What more can I say? My daughter loves the Hotel Transylvania movies, so I figured it would be fun to start showing her the old Universal monster movies that started the tropes she's familiar with. I was a kid the last time I watched this one and I don't remember much of it; watching it again as an adult, I really appreciate the mood it creates through shadow, light and staging, even if a lot of it feels kind of staid and stuffy. Bela Lugosi is iconic as the big D and Edward van Sloane's Van Helsing plays a formidable foe, but the real standout for me is Dwight Frye as the mad Renfield, who swings for the fences whenever he's onscreen and actually freaked my daughter out more than Dracula with that laugh. She was also amused by how much they don't show ("Why don't they show him biting anyone?" etc.) and then you get to explain how movies from this period were just way different in what they were permitted to show or imply. My daughter's scary rating and thoughts:  out of 10 spooks - "Kinda slow and not too scary, but the spider guy was creepy! He should have had his own movie!"
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Oct 2, 2022 14:19
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5) The Lurking Fear (1994) I will always have a soft spot for 90s Full Moon movies, but this is not the best of those. (It’s far from the worst though.) The Lurking Fear is a loose Lovecraft adaptation that adds a goofy crime plot to the story of a thief who goes to his father’s hometown and learns he’s descended from monsters. The high points include the monster design, Vincent Schiavelli chewing scenery, and Jeffrey Combs as Dr. Too Good For This Movie. I also loved the running bit about the priest trying to sacrifice himself. The script was not great, but it might have come across better with a more charismatic lead because the thief guy felt flat and had no chemistry with Ashley Laurence’s vengeful townie. Laurence wasn’t at her best here either, which surprised me because I’ve always liked her Hellraiser performances. Granted, she wasn’t given a ton to work with. But her character was noticeably less interesting than the cold-blooded moll she kept clashing with. The Lurking Fear includes a lot of elements that worked well in other Full Moon movies of the era; the director just didn’t use them very effectively. I can’t recommend it, but I guess it did give me a greater appreciation for all the movies that have done more with a similar budget and set of limitations. 1. The Wind (1986) 2. Sole Survivor (1984) 3. Blair Witch (2016) 4. Horror in the High Desert (2021)
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Oct 2, 2022 14:28
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 #1 The Monster Club First-time Watch Starting things off on the goofy side! I was made aware of this via the famous monster genealogy chart, but with almost no idea of the context. The conventional wisdom seems to be that the wraparound at the titular club is the only good part of the movie, but I'd disagree with that. Yes, the middle segment is a bit lackluster, in spite of Donald Pleasence, but the third has some excellent moody black-and-white illustrations, and the first segment has some cool production design, a nice gore effect, and a surprisingly tender performance from James Laurenson as the Shadmock. Still, the club scenes with Price and Carradine are undeniably the highlight, with their unabashedly silly masks and big Oingo-Boingo energy. For me, the climax is 'Night' performing The Stripper; I spent half an hour looking for this track, only to discover it basically doesn't exist outside this movie. If I had seen this in elementary school, I would have fallen in love with it, and it still feels like it would make for a ghoulish but mostly gentle introduction to horror for young monster fans. Star Rating: 3/5 Spooky Rating:  #2 The Night House First-time Watch This really worked for me. I was surprised to see complaints online about 'falling apart at the end' etc., because it felt like a very fitting conclusion (if a bit open-ended) to the story. My wife and I had a lot of fun fitting together the puzzle pieces as they were revealed, without ever quite exactly predicting the climax we were headed for. Speaking of my wife, she got genuinely terrified by this, and eventually made a little blanket cocoon to hide in. The sound design here is AGGRESSIVE, and every little creak and whistle of the house is mined for a tension that erupts just infrequently enough to catch you off guard. There's also a couple of neat perspective tricks that - while I can't swear they're unique - I had never seen before. Rebecca Hall is predictably great, and as a 'Barry' fan, I was pleasantly surprised to see Sarah Goldberg show up in a large supporting role. One thing I would ding the movie for, though, is that it doesn't strike me as terribly re-watchable. I would recommend it, but so much of the enjoyment came from the various reveals of what's going on that I might be bored a second time around, at least for a long while. All-in-all, between this and 'The Ritual', I'm now genuinely excited for David Bruckner's 'Hellraiser' releasing later this month. Star Rating: 3.5/5 Spooky Rating:  #3 Lo First-time Watch Lo has been on my watchlist since that was just a word document sitting on my desktop, over a decade ago. Unfortunately, I think I'd have enjoyed it more if I'd watched it in 2009. First the good: the design, makeup and performance of Lo themself is top-notch, and definitely the #1 reason to watch. Travis Betz also makes a lot of very smart choices in staging to conceal or capitalize on the obvious low budget. Lo has a lot of elements that would probably make it a banger of a stage show at Edinburgh fringe or the like. Also, the characters other than Lo sometimes land a good line or delivery. Unfortunately, that's not nearly as often as it tries. A lot of jokes and bits fall flat here, partially due to the performers, and partially thanks to a script which feels downstream of Joss Whedon's oeuvre in a way that probably felt fresher a decade ago. Some of it's cringe-worthy, and some of it just seems much more banausic in an era where quirky morbidity has been pretty well mined-out by thousands of 'edgy' sketch videos and web comics. A last positive note: the ending, while predictable, is nicely done, and it lands in part thanks to an above-average score. Travis Betz hasn't directed since 2011, but it feels like he has a good skill suite, and would do a good job with a more solid, up-to-date script. Star Rating: 2.5/5 Spooky Rating:
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Oct 2, 2022 15:30
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 #2. Hocus Pocus 2 (Disney+) Almost 30 years after the events of the first film, the Sanderson Sisters are unwittingly resurrected by a pair of teenagers dabbling in witchcraft. The Sisters turn their sights to casting a forbidden spell that will make them all powerful, so they can avoid dying again at sunrise and take over modern day Salem. I watched the original Hocus Pocus last week to re-acquaint myself with the whole premise, after not seeing it for years. What struck me with that one was how perfunctory everything seemed in the script - interpersonal conflict among the heroes was always resolved within the same scene in a couple of sentences - but it did lend the thing a sort of propulsive energy; it had a good flow. This long-belated legacy-reboot-quel thing does a theoretically better job at having through-lines to keep you invested in characters and story, in that things aren't always resolved neatly within a single scene. However, the trade off is that it looks and feels like any other bland teen-focused Disney Channel Original Movie, coming across as so much smaller and insular than the original did. The Bette Midler/Kathy Najimy/Sarah Jessica Parker power trio from the original acquaints themselves well enough, though I think a lot of the retread material that they have to cover suffers in comparison to the original. While I appreciate the idea of giving the Sisters more of a backstory, I don't think it ultimately was necessary; they're a bunch of evil-ish goofball gently caress ups, they don't need us rooting for them. I also don't really buy the ending all that much, as Winifred never struck me as being super endeared to her sisters in the original, so the whole "oh my dear sisters I'll actually reverse myself on my two movie-long goal of living forever and gaining power to join you in exploding into glitter dust, after achieving said goal for all of two minutes and doing nothing with it" - even if I get that they tried so hard to establish this in the beginning. The less said about our new leads, the better; the actresses ultimately don't have enough charisma or interest to carry a film like this. Then again, the script is full of generic teen "witticisms" for them to be constantly spewing, so it's not like they had a ton to work with. Either way, the film threatens us with a follow up/spin off of our heroes becoming the New Salem Witches, which is the scariest thing that this is going to throw at you. The rest of it is just the best remembered beats from the first film, done worse by a trio of talents that are trying mightily but have largely lost that spark, and a studio that doesn't know or care what made the first one special (enough) and not deigning to throw the production enough money to compensate for that anyway. Not recommended.  /5Watched so far: The Empty Man, Hocus Pocus 2
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Oct 2, 2022 15:35
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 #4 The Blob (1958) Rewatch, technically I first saw the original blob when I was about 8 or 9, rented from Blockbuster after reading the orange-and-black Crestwood Monster Book about it, and I thought it was suitably terrifying. Nowadays, the '88 Blob is one of my favorite horror movies, and I thought I owed the original a return. Firstly, that opening theme is an all-time horror ear worm. Secondly, I did not remember how little time the eponymous Blob actually spends on screen. Much of this movie is people talking about where the Blob might be, or Steve McQueen looking vaguely embarrassed by the very idea of the Blob as he avoids telling anyone exactly what sort of monster he suspects is quietly devouring the town. But it's charming! Even as a 28-year-old teenager (named Steve), Steve McQueen reminds you why he's about to be a big star. The stop-motion effects hold up shockingly well. And there are a couple of fun characters at the center of this. One oddly prescient storyline predicts the inevitable failure of the American police force. A surprising amount of time is given over to a power struggle between two cops: a paranoid sergeant with PTSD, who views the town delinquents as his enemy and urges for a more militarized attitude to law enforcement, and his community-minded lieutenant. The two butt heads at every turn of the investigation, and the movie firmly sides with the lieutenant; guns, fire and explosions cannot defeat the Blob, and the sergeant's distrust of his constituents allows it to grow and kill. It's only when the community comes together: cops, firemen, high school principal, diner chef and neighborhood greasers, that the town is saved. Also, the ending implies that climate change is going to destroy the world, so it's got that going for it! Star Rating: 3.5/5 Spooky Rating:  #5 Dave Made a Maze First-time Watch Baaaaarely a horror movie, but it has decapitations, death-traps, and a monster, so sure! Compare and contrast with 'Lo' from my previous entry, here the quirkiness works a lot better. Part of that is doubtless down to being a more recent film, and part of that is down to the superior cast, particularly James Urbaniak as a single-minded documentarian unperturbed by the plight of his fellow prisoners. The centerpiece here is definitely the design, and the movie's undoubtedly worth the 80 minutes just for the maze itself. Particular standouts are a forced-perspective sequence and a segment featuring paper-bag puppets. Like most of the movie, they don't have any real reason for existing, other than that the director thought it would be cool, but he was right, it is, and that's basically the movie's whole thesis: art for art's sake. The weak point is probably our alleged protagonist, Dave, an underachieving manchild who just wanted to finally finish something. As a fellow artist, I should have been particularly receptive to Dave's frustration, but Thune never really sells the sympathy of this character, though that's a hard ask when he's off screen for at least a third of such a short runtime. Mileage may vary on how effective one finds the comedy, but the movie is well-served by a confidence which seemingly does not care if you find it funny or not. It knows it's delivering on its primary spectacle, and everything else is just a bonus. Also, shout out to wrestler/survivor contestant John Hennigan as the inevitable Minotaur! Star Rating: 3/5 Spooky Rating:  #6 Warlock First-time Watch gently caress yes. My first 'how did I miss this' of the month. Warlock rules so much harder than I expected. Richard E Grant and Julian Sands are great as the 17th century witch-hunter and witch respectively, but Lori Singer surprised the hell out of me as the excellent co-lead; a character which could so easily have been an eye-rolling annoyance is instead given a lot of humor and charisma. I first perked up when I realized the movie was going to let their nubile young romantic lead spend a big chunk of the movie in ratty old-age makeup. Most importantly though, the movie doesn't weigh itself down with needless twists and turns. Witch-hunter chases witch, battle ensues. I was particularly stoked to see more archaic elements of divination and black magic dredged up for this movie. When I realized the warlock was about to murder an unbaptized kid for his fat so he could make a flying potion I basically started fist-pumping on the couch. Yes, a lot of this is goofy, especially the 1989 green-screen, but who cares? Not me! The only truly dated part is a line early on splitting hairs between being 'a homosexual' and 'a queer' - a 'one-of-the-good-ones' take which was probably progressive at the time but hits a lot worse now. I also had a mind-blowing puzzle early on, trying to place a crazily familiar character who appears in the film's opening scene, until I finally realized it was Kay Kuter, who did voicework for a bunch of the Lucas Arts adventure games. Watch Warlock! Star Rating: 4.5/5 Spooky Rating:
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Oct 2, 2022 16:20
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Hell yes, the authentic weirdness of Warlock's witchfinding tools and potions and 1600s Christian occultism is really unique and wonderful
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Oct 2, 2022 16:38
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5. No One Gets Out Alive (2021) Thought I'd dip into the blind box that is Netflix Originals and...it averaged out to be fine! Tediously slow for the first hour, very paint-by-numbers, if you've seen any horror movie of the past 15 years you could call it beat-by-beat. But the third act finally stops dragging its rear end and gives us both a surprisingly really cool monster design and some dudes getting hacked up with a macuahuitl. And that's certainly a round-off cool enough to get me to pay attention. 2 out of 5! 5/31, watched: Scary Movie, Final Destination 4, Happy Death Day, Final Destination, No One Gets Out Alive.
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Oct 2, 2022 16:52
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3. Driller Killer A struggling artist works on what's supposed to be his masterpiece while his two roommates kind of have a relationship, but not really. After a post-punk band moves in above him, he has a schizophrenic break and starts killing hobos with a drill. Also there's what has to be the worst pizza I've ever seen. This movie gets hyped up a lot it seems, but I was pretty disappointed. Filming it in 70's New York is the most interesting thing about it, but there are other horror films that did that too and are much better. Maybe I'll like it more if I wait a while and rewatch it, but as of right now I'm not impressed. 2/5
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Oct 2, 2022 17:23
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Wait does Warlock secretly own and ALSO contain Richard E Grant? I knew it as vhs box art at the video store from when I was a kid and have always assumed it was like a Wishmaster knock-off or something. I was wrong and this movie secretly rules??? Hell yeah. Thank you, Leatherhead. Also, yeah, Dave Made a Maze is kind of amazing but also nothing really happens? It's really well done nothing and they're clearly having a lot fun, but they don't really have a goal and stakes for the audience to care about. But gently caress yeah, James Urbaniak please follow me around and narrate things in the Dr. Venture voice.
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Oct 2, 2022 17:29
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Warlock does indeed rule.
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Oct 2, 2022 17:31
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A True Jar Jar Fan posted:
If it's similar to over at my theater, those kids were probably refused tickets for Pearl/Barbarian/Smile/Bullet Train/Don't Worry Darling so they were still salty about it. I had three girls who one had an ID so she was okay, second one ID but too young and one no ID. I name off what they can go see and they ask about Moonage Daydream. I tell them it's the David Bowie film. They had no idea who David Bowie was. It's not often I'm that level of shocked these days.
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Oct 2, 2022 17:33
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5. Deep Red Where to watch https://www.justwatch.com/us/movie/deep-red  By director Dario Argento , one of his giallo films. Honestly this is pretty good with a concert pianist deciding its his job to figure out a murderer. Its well written the acting is pretty good. Its got some good gore and its got a fantastic soundtrack by Goblin: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UP7IpPEUy5o Probably one of the better giallos ever made. Although its got some problems in todays society with the killer but I don't want to spoil. However if you pay attention to the film , you'll be able to figure out who the killer is early on in the movie. Anyway its a really great film and there's a reason people list it high on their list of horror films. Its just really well made.
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Oct 2, 2022 18:10
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 5) The Orphan - 2009 - Prime Story follows a couple who adopt a Russian orphan who's more than she seems. As much as mention of this one brings to mind the real world cases of the nurse who adopted a child then abandoned them claiming they weren't a child, or cases where someone pretended to be a missing child as an adult, it does have older roots going back to the 90s when there was a rush of adopting children from Eastern Europe after the collapse of the USSR and the news showed the horrible conditions of the orphanages. Many of the children had severe mental and physical issues that the adoptive parents weren't ready to handle for a variety of reasons so they tried to send the children back, or rehome them elsewhere. In some cases the children were abused to death. There were allegations that the orphanages lied about the children's condition leading to the whispered commentary of you can never be sure how honest they're being over there. In the case of this film, Esther isn't a 9 year old child, but a grown woman with Hypopituitarism who's been pretending to be a child as well as being an escapee from a mental institution who's murdered several people. For anyone who's seen this subgenre of film, it hits all the beats. People who get close to the truth end up dying. The film did earn criticism from adoption groups for the obvious reasons, which did result in some tweaks to the trailer and the inclusion of a pro-adoption message on the DVD release. Overall, I found it okay. Did drag in parts, but not enough to have me start thinking of other things to do like check if the cat's litterbox needs a scooping. M_Sinistrari fucked around with this message at 20:24 on Oct 2, 2022 |
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Oct 2, 2022 18:11
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To everyone who was even lukewarm on the original Orphan, I beg you to watch the prequel, Orphan: First Kill, which is maybe in my top 3 movies from this year. It's loving wild.
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Oct 2, 2022 18:15
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Hollismason posted:its got a fantastic soundtrack by Goblin Yes, although when I saw them play it live I was surprised by how much of the film doesn’t have a score.
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Oct 2, 2022 18:15
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4. Orphan: First Blood USA, 2002. Dir. William Brent Bell  A little late to the party on this one, but wowee what a fun movie! Isabelle Fuhrman now an adult woman playing a child, who 13 years ago was a child playing an adult woman just shouldn't work as well as it does. There were a few stylistic choices to complain about; a soft focus to the cinematography I really didn't care for, though at some point it either disappeared or stopped being as noticeable, and some of the music choices were really jarring and threw me out of the movie temporarily. Small nitpicks. And that twist? Mwah! This is what horror prequels should aspire to be, by making your original antagonist, for lack of a better word, a "sympathetic" character. She's obviously still a monster but you're sympathies have shifted and you start rooting for her. The devil you know, and all that. This was also a very well-paced movie, never felt like it was dragging. I checked fairly early on to see how far I'd gotten into the movie only to discover I was already halfway through. Practically breezed by. 7/10. Scattered thoughts (heavy spoilers throughout): The first 10 minutes were very enjoyable, watching Leena (pre-Esther) hyper-competently manipulate everyone around her like puppets on a string. It did a good job showing the audience what an absolute monster she was, so that later when she puts on the Esther act we still know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, she will manipulate anyone, kill anyone, to get what she wants. Speaking of those first 10 minutes, the part where she seduces the pedophile-leaning guard into her cell and murders him to begin her escape wouldn't be half as disturbing if Shirley Temple audio from her little television wasn't playing in the background. Yeesh. The second she decides to take on the identity of Esther, my brain instantly started making parallels to the documentary The Imposter (2012). Julia Stiles knocks it out of the park once again. A tremendous performance. There are a few scenes where Esther is walking side-by-side with a much taller person that unfortunately gave me serious Tiptoes (2003) vibes. For those not in the know, Tiptoes stars Gary Oldman as a man with dwarfism. Now I'll be the first one to say that Gary Oldman is a veritable chameleon when it comes to disappearing into roles, but walking around on his knees, literally on his goddamn knees, for an entire movie is a BAD look. First shot inside Esthers parents' house make me instantly think of the house in Hereditary (2018). The very next shot being tiny furniture inside a dollhouse all but set it in stone for me. Father has a theme of duality in his artwork. His painting looking normal in the light, but with a hidden face under black-light was a nice touch. That twist. That goddamned twist. Not only was original Esther dead all along, but the mother knew all along because she covered up the fact that her son loving murdered her! This family is so hosed up! The change of focus in the 3rd act to having everyone except the husband be in on the game and constantly cat-and-mousing one another was an amazing direction to take the film. Feel real bad for the dad though. Esther does her only friend, the mouse, hella dirty by putting it in that smoothie. Not exclusive to this movie in particular, but am I the only one who deeply resents the concept of the post-credit scene? Every mainstream movie I watch that came out in the last 10 years I am forced to fastidiously search through the credits to make sure they aren't hiding a stinger scene in there. Yes, I know there are websites to check first. Yes, I know I'm being obstinate and petty. Edit: vvv Sure thing! MrGreenShirt fucked around with this message at 19:43 on Oct 2, 2022 |
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Oct 2, 2022 18:18
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MrGreenShirt posted:4. Orphan: First Blood You should spoiler tag that plot twist.
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Oct 2, 2022 18:25
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 #3: Hatching / Pahanhautoja (2022) Saw this while scrolling on Hulu and took a chance on it going in pretty much blind, and ended up really liking it. A Finnish fairy-tale styled changeling horror, it's a bit too subdued and pastel to have many outright scares, but it's unsettling, has a very strong child actor in the lead and also manages to hit some nicely goopy body horror that contrasts well with the film's cleaned up, pretty exterior. Tinja is a 12 year old aspiring gymnast whose mother is obsessed with presenting the image of the perfect family even as she tears them apart. When a bit of raw nature unexpectedly, even innocuously bursts into their suburban life one day, Tinja finds herself the caretaker of a strange egg, one that grows and grows until it hatches into a bird monster done in gnarly practical effects. Not hostile to Tinja at all, the bird-thing loves her deeply and even grows to be connected to her on an supernatural, empathic level. Soon, it knows exactly what she feels in her deepest heart, and begins to act, and beings to change. The movie isn't especially subtle with it's coming of age themes, nor especially ambitious in scope, but it isn't really trying to be, either. Coming in at a trim 90 minute run time, the film is paced well and keeps it's energy and style up through the ending while really nailing a balancing act of letting it's characters be three dimensional and have their own inner lives but keeping the focus on Tinja's inner struggle, as her own hidden violence and hidden desires mirror the adult world she is increasingly thrust into. Definitely worth a watch!
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Oct 2, 2022 18:34
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deety posted:5) The Lurking Fear (1994) Right on! Any favs? I get a kick out of Dollman, Bad Channels, and Demonic Toys. For 80s, Trancers is so good, and I enjoyed 2 and 3 respectably.
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Oct 2, 2022 18:42
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Gyro Zeppeli posted:To everyone who was even lukewarm on the original Orphan, I beg you to watch the prequel, Orphan: First Kill, which is maybe in my top 3 movies from this year. It's loving wild. That's coming up next for me.
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Oct 2, 2022 18:47
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 2. Extraordinary Tales (2013) (dir. Raúl García) Shudder An animated anthology of five Edgar Allan Poe stories. It’s mostly the usuals - The Fall of the House of Usher, The Tell-Tale Heart, The Pit and the Pendulum, and The Masque of the Red Death - but it does include an adaptation of The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar, which is a great Poe story that I haven’t seen many versions of. Each segment features a different narrator, and it’s an excellent list of names - Christopher Lee, Julian Sands, Guillermo del Toro, and even an old recording of Bela Lugosi. The Masque of the Red Death has no narration, but it does have one line of dialogue spoken by Roger Corman. The wraparound segment was probably the weakest part - it’s Poe (in the form of a Raven) in conversation with Death, and while it has its moments, the animation and voice on the bird is pretty janky. Each segment is done in a different animation style, from high contrast black and white to the look of a vintage comic book. They’re all CGI though and it’s sometimes a little distracting - you could take a freeze frame of any scene and it would look gorgeous, but in motion it sometimes looks a little cheap and reminds me of TV animation like The Clone Wars. If only these were hand-drawn animation this could’ve been incredible. I enjoyed this quite a bit! There isn’t a whole lot of animated horror out there, so even if it wasn’t always perfect I greatly appreciate what it was going for. All of the segments are pretty solid adaptations too and really captured Poe’s macabre style. If you like anthologies and/or Poe stories I definitely recommend checking this one out. 3.5 pits out of 5 pendulums Total: 2 Watched: The Little Girl Who Lives Down the Lane | Extraordinary Tales
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Oct 2, 2022 18:54
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#5 Innocent Blood Dir. John Landis 1992 United States🇺🇸 I won’t lie, I mostly watched this because it takes place in and is primarily shot in Pittsburgh. It’s always fun watching a movie from your town or city and trying to figure out where they’re at or what doesn’t line up. For example, there’s a shot of someone driving out of the Liberty Tunnel but the reverse is Fort Pitt Bridge. I drive that every day and I know that view of the city from that bridge. You’re not fooling me, Mr. Landis. Anyway, this was an amusing combination of vampire tale and cops vs gangsters with a nice splash of comedy. Marie is a lonely vampire that’s usually careful of who she chows down on. One night, she bites into the wrong mafioso and doesn’t finish her meal before he turns into a full blooded Italian-American vampire. I couldn’t help but think that the undercover cop role was originally written for De Niro, but they got Anthony LaPaglia when he passed on it. He looks like a dollar store De Niro! He still did great, and so did Anne Parillaud even though it was obvious English wasn’t her first language. The real star tho is Robert Loggia being the biggest hunk of prosciutto in this movie. Absolutely worth it just for vampire Loggia and vampire Don Rickles. Big thumbs down to the effects tho. There’s an amazing stunt at the end and a great sunlight dusting of a vampire, but they keep using these colored contacts for spooky vampire eyes and it never looks right. Most of the time one or both lenses are crooked so it looks like everyone has a lazy eye. I know its supposed to be a little funny, but I don’t think this was an intended gag. Another negative is how sleazy this feels sometimes. Just a little too much gratuitous nudity. Kinda felt like Landis stuck it in for himself instead of the movie. Gross. Overall, pretty good. I’m def a little biased for the location though. I give it 3.5 vampire Don Rickles out of 5.
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Oct 2, 2022 18:56
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Heavy Metal posted:Right on! Any favs? I get a kick out of Dollman, Bad Channels, and Demonic Toys. For 80s, Trancers is so good, and I enjoyed 2 and 3 respectably. I love the Subspecies movies. The first one is a throwback gothic horror about a pretty boy vampire vs. his more monstrous brother, and while it's shot pretty well, I think the heavy romance plot and the fact that it's really straightforward put people off the rest of the series. But the second movie starts with the mean brother staking the honorable one and kidnapping his newly turned girlfriend, and it just gets wilder from there. If you try those and end up liking them, don't miss Vampire Journals, which is a tie-in. The early Puppet Masters are all pretty fun, and Stuart Gordon did some movies for them that range from great to at least worth watching. (The highlight of those is probably Castle Freak, but it's nastier than the stuff you mentioned.) If you like Trancers 3, then Lurking Fear might be a better fit for you than it was for me, it's by the same writer & director. You might know this already, but some of the movies Full Moon now distributes are from Charles Band's earlier company, Empire Entertainment, which put out stuff like Dolls and TerrorVision. So if you're looking for stuff with a similar feel, take a look at some of what they did.
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Oct 2, 2022 19:15
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Movie 1: Nope (2022) Nope. Until now, I would have characterised Jordan Peele's movie career as literally a game of two halves. Get Out was excellent and left me so god drat eager to see what he'd do next. What he did next was Us, a movie that had an insanely good first half and then completely squandered an amazing setup with its second half. Well, I'm glad to report that with Nope, he now has two and a half excellent horror movies under his belt. I won't delve too much into plot details, because like Peele's other movies, Nope is probably best seen with as little information as possible. Not because there are any huge Shyamalan-esque twists in the movie, but because it takes a long time to set things up and ratchet up the tension, and a lot of the fun was in not knowing what was going on, and I wouldn't want to deprive anyone of that. It's awesome that Nope has an almost entirely PoC cast, and features really good performances from all its main characters. Daniel Kaluuya and Keke Palmer are excellent in the leading roles, which wasn't a big surprise on Kaluuya's part seeing as he was also excellent in Get Out, but I don't think I'd ever seen Palmer in anything before, at least so that I'd remember. But I drat well remember her now. Nope is also one of those movies that I'd love to read in-depth commentaries on, because it's bursting at the seams with stuff to say. Some of the messages are very on the nose, like the monster attacking only people who look at it, in a pretty obvious commentary on 'stop looking at horrible poo poo all the time if you want to live', except in our case it's more "live well" and "live at all" in the case of the movie's characters. The message being on the nose isn't a bad thing, by the way. It's a good reminder to everyone in this day and age. All in all a very cool, extremely pretty and very well acted movie. It's dripping with atmosphere and tension. Now I'm back in the "can't wait to see what Peele does next" camp. / 5
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Oct 2, 2022 19:20
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poo poo I wrote a whole thing about the Purge but then my phones internet got weird and I lost most of the post. I’ll explain later but you’re wrong about The Purge.
Gripweed fucked around with this message at 19:25 on Oct 2, 2022 |
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Oct 2, 2022 19:23
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#2 Incantation 2022 Netflix It is a found footage movie and it might be the first found footage movie I have seen (I am sure I am forgetting other movies) that also has flashbacks that are found footage too. The concept is a group of 'paranormal investigators' break a religious taboo and by doing so they end up cursed. The current found footage portion is one of them dealing with the curse and her young daughter. The flashback footage is from 6 years ago and how they broke the taboo. While I enjoyed the movie, I think it suffered from jumping time as a found footage movie. Instead of staying with a situation in the flashback as it builds, it jumps to the current time and into something not as interesting. Also, while I can forgive found footage being somewhat unbelieve that they are truly found footage, this goes a little too far for me. The main reason they did found footage I believe was it does break the 4th wall. That does work well in found footage in this case. Finally, the movie really felt long despite being under 2 hours. Still, I did like it due to the story and atmosphere (especially in the flashbacks). I know I focused a lot on the negative, but this seems to have pretty positive reviews. Not only that it is the highest grossing Taiwanese horror movie. 3 out of 5 On my takes I am trying to avoid spoilers and too many story details as much as possible. I hope that is ok. nate fisher fucked around with this message at 19:32 on Oct 2, 2022 |
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Oct 2, 2022 19:26
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deety posted:I love the Subspecies movies. The first one is a throwback gothic horror about a pretty boy vampire vs. his more monstrous brother, and while it's shot pretty well, I think the heavy romance plot and the fact that it's really straightforward put people off the rest of the series. But the second movie starts with the mean brother staking the honorable one and kidnapping his newly turned girlfriend, and it just gets wilder from there. If you try those and end up liking them, don't miss Vampire Journals, which is a tie-in. The early Puppet Masters are all pretty fun, and Stuart Gordon did some movies for them that range from great to at least worth watching. (The highlight of those is probably Castle Freak, but it's nastier than the stuff you mentioned.) Right on thanks, I've never checked out Subspecies, I'll have to pop those on sometime.
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Oct 2, 2022 19:34
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 5. The Blob (1958) I can't recommend The Blob as a feature but you owe it to yourself to watch the opening titles and enjoy the groovy Burt Bacharach theme music. It even charted, #33 on Billboard! It creeps, and leaps! The Blob flirts in places with more campy delight of that kind, and I wish it was willing to plunge all-in into the ridiculous. A slow red jiggling goop ball is inherently a funny threat. The film understands the comic potential of a dumbass poking it with a stick, or a great cut from "We've got to get him to the doctor! Hope the doc's in!" to the doctor announcing "Time for my trip, hope no one needs me for the next few days!" But most of the film is a 28-year old Steve McQueen playing an inarticulate teenager and failing to convince any grown-ups that the town is in danger. That's a lot of snoresville and not a lot of wrecking poo poo. If you enjoy the twit cop in Killer Klowns from Outer Space, you'll smirk at his equally skeptical pappy here. There's also a genuinely sweet moment where the high-strung high school principal jumps in a teen hot rodder's car, finally bridging the generation gap to help out. But that's about it for interesting character moments or dialogue. Aneta Corsaut's character in particular gets absolutely gently caress all to do besides stand next to McQueen and look concerned. The Blob did leave me with a huge smile due to its ending, which wasn't intended as a joke but now in 2022 comes off as the funniest long-game sequel hook of all time: "At least we've got it stopped." "Yeah... as long as the Arctic stays cold!" THE END...???  / 5
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Oct 2, 2022 19:38
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