2011 Horrorfest Pt. 11

Land of the Dead (2005)
This was so much better than Survival of the Dead. The story was much better, there was much more zombie action, and the use of CGI didn't stand out as badly as it did in Survival.  Plus it had Dennis Hopper!  I still have one more Romero zombie film to check out - the middle film of his second trilogy, Diary of the Dead - and I hope it leans more towards this one than Survival. 



Dead Men Walk (1943)
It wasn't until I was halfway through this movie that I realized I had already seen it. Oh well.  It is a nice little twist on a vampire story - an evil man is murdered by his twin brother, but, because of his involvement in the occult, he finds a way to be resurrected as a vampire-type creature to get his revenge.  The effects at the end when the twins are fighting are kind of bad, but the rest of the film was decent, if not anything outstanding.



Blood and Lace (1971)
Until the very end of this movie, there was nothing about good that even comes close to recommending it, other than the fact that it stars Uncle Leo from Seinfeld!  ("Jerry!  Hello!"). This was supposed to be a slasher-type flick, but honestly not a whole lot was going on.   HOWEVER, the last 5 minutes are so batshit crazy insane that I was laughing out loud at the utter ridiculousness of it.  Totally made the whole movie for me.



Mega Shark vs Giant Octopus (2009)
This is the ultimate bad movie for a "Bad Movie Night".  The acting by the cast, including the "Electric Youth" herself, Deborah Gibson, is terrible.  The sets are cheap.  The special effects are laughable.  Yet, I still enjoyed it.  It contains one of the most ludicrous scenes I have ever seen - the mega shark jumps out of the water and attacks an airliner.  It is fantastically bad.

(Instead of a trailer, I am posting that scene, as it is awesome...)


Hands of the Ripper (1971)
This is a Hammer film, one of the few that I have seen that didn't involve vampires, mummies, Frankenstein or werewolves.  I enjoyed this film a lot.   Its about Jack the Ripper's daughter who is possessed by his spirit after his death.  Whenever someone tries to kiss her, his possession of her is triggered and she kills.  The film was pretty gory for the seventies, and had a nicely tense climax.

2011 Horrorfest Pt. 10 (including the Thursday night shows from 10/27)

Since it is October 28 already, and I way behind on writing up these films (with plenty more films still to watch), I need to pick up the pace.  So, I am probably going to have to limit myself to a quick blurb on each of these films...


Thursday Night Shows
Three of the shows last night did Halloween episodes, so it is alright to save even more time by including my thoughts on them in this post.
Community - Another episode that told 7 different variations of the same type of story (just like last episode).  While not was funny as the multiple timeline craziness, it was pretty damn funny.  Grade: B+

Parks & Rec - I really enjoyed both storylines in this episode.  Tom's efforts to hijack Leslie's meeting were hilarious (I loved that he had his face plastered everywhere).  I will be sad to see "Entertainment 720" goingt away, as Tom and Jean Ralphio's extravagance were always a great source of comedy (like Tom's hot tub Hummer limo this week).  Andy and April's Halloween party was a blast as well.  Grade: B+

The Office - This episode was made by Robert California.  The way he creepily hovered around the whole party, then turned everyone's fears into a cohesive Halloween story was enjoyable.  I also liked Gabe's crazy video that they showed in order to make the party more adult.  Grade: B

Its Always Sunny - Not a Halloween episode unfortunately, but it would have been hard to top last season's (when the gang tried to figure out the father of Sweet Dee's baby).  What we did get last night, though, was HILARIOUS!  The "Chardee MacDennis " game was as ridiculous (and alcohol-fueled) as you would expect from the Gang.  Whenever the Paddy's crew is in a situation where they are in direct competition (as happens quite often because they are terrible people), the results are usually great, and this episode was no exception.  Grade: A-

Beavis & Butthead - OH MY GOD ITS FINALLY BACK!!!!!  After all the teasing, Beavis & Butthead are finally back on the air.  Since I had seen an extended trailer a few months ago and laughed my ass off at it, I was pretty sure that the new episodes would be able to stand up to the original run, but there was still a small part of me that was nervous.  Thankfully, I can say that I was worried for no reason.  The first episode was very funny.  Grade: B+

Ringu (1998)
I had seen the American remake when it was released, but had never seen the original until now.  Its been so long since I saw the remake, so I don't really remember a lot about it other than the fact that I liked it, making it hard to compare the two.  I really enjoyed the Japanese version.  It built the tension nicely all the way up until the incredibly creepy climax. 



The Blood Spattered Bride (1972)
This is a Spanish horror film that had a lot of things that I liked about it, but they didn't add up to a great film, merely a good one.  Its the story of a new bride, taken to her husband's ancestral home to live, where she falls under the sway of a female vampire (ultimately revealed to be an ancestor of the husband).  The setting is fantastic - I am not sure where exactly it was shot but the house and the surrounding area give a really nice atmosphere.  Its the plot, though, where the movie ultimately comes up short (the scene where they find the vampire buried in the sand and everything after that are particularly stupid).

(I couldn't find a trailer showing any of the actual film that I could use, but this trailer is FANTASTIC)



Who Saw Her Die? (1972)
This an Italian film revolving around a subject that even most horror films shy away from - child killing.  After 2 similar looking children are killed, the parents of the second victim begin their own investigation.  Unfortunately, each new suspect they turn up is then eliminated by the real killer.  This was a pretty good film - anyone who is a fan of 70's Italian horror should check it out.

2011 Horrorfest Pt. 9

Splinter (2008)
Splinter was a nice variation on the zombie film.  Instead of a virus, or radiation, or just some unknown cause, the driving force in this film is a living mold or fungus that kills people off by feeding on their blood after infection and reanimates their corpses to search for more blood.  This film has a small cast, and the action is confined to one location for the most part, so that allows the tension to build in a way that overcomes its lower budget.  What money they did have, they wisely spent on the creature effects, which I thought were pretty well done.  All in all, I really enjoyed this inventive twist on a movie type that is getting pretty played out these days.



Horror of Dracula (1958)
I had already seen this film before (and I am making an effort to stay away from Hammer Films this year because I watched so many of them last year), but my brother had never seen it, so I watched it again.  A classic - the best Christopher Lee Dracula performance. I will probably have to add this to the regular yearly rotation.



House on Haunted Hill (1959)
I had never seen this film before, but I had seen the terrible remake in the theater in 1999.  God, that movie stinks.

This is a good old-fashioned cheesy haunted haunted house movie.  The plot has been copied and parodied to death since this film was released - a disparate group of strangers are all invited to spend the night in a haunted house in order to earn a large sum of money.  Of course, at various points the characters are separated and subjected to various scares.  It goes without saying that the ghosts and spooks are all pretty fake looking, but that just adds to the fun of the film.  House is one of William Castle's famous films that had a gimmick in the theater - at a crucial scene near the end, a skeleton on a wire would fly around.  This film made so much money from its cheap thrills that Alfred Hitchcock was inspired to make his own low budget scarefest - Psycho. 



976-Evil (1989)
This film was only made 22 years ago, but how many young people that would watch this today would have no idea what a "976" number is?  SIGH - I am old.

I only somewhat remember this film from back in the late 80s, and what I do remember revolves around the fact that it stars the hyper kid from the original Fright Night (it is a shame that I had to make that qualifier, but that is a rant that I am tired of giving).  It turns out that it was directed by Freddy Krueger, himself, Robert England! And, not surprisingly, other than a few episodes of "Freddy's Nightmares" the following year, he didn't direct another film for 20 years.  This is not a very good movie - it has pretty low budget effects and the acting is awful.  However, add that with how campy it is, and you have a pretty good formula for a good "bad" movie.  It at least has an interesting plot - the phone number in the title is a "horror-scope" line that will eventually possess you as it makes your fortunes come true. I'd rather watch a movie with an original idea that at least appears to be trying than a boring film any day.

2011 Horrorfest Pt. 8

May (2002)
Other than the main character having a weird fixation with a doll, the first 3/4 of this film don't quite seem like a horror film.  You might think its just the story of a very awkward woman who is having trouble forming and keeping relationships with the people around her because of how weird she is.  THEN, that last 15-20 minutes of the movie kick in, and you realize that the entire film was just a slow build to the craziness at the end.  Taken as a whole, I thought this was a very well done film (one scene near the very end actually creeped me out, which doesn't happen very often in horror films, as I am usually impervious to that type of stuff). Angela Bettis gives a fantastic performance as the main character - she is so strange and unnerving. 



The Walking Dead
Last week was the season 2 premiere of the AMC show.  Most of the critics I read were high on the beginning and end of the 1st season, and not so happy with the middle episodes.  I, on the other hand, was pretty happy with the entire season.  I am not going to say much about the premiere, as I will probably write a post on the season as a whole at the end (much like I still plan on doing with Breaking Bad at some point).  However, since it is a zombie show, I felt I should include it.  The first episode was very well done, with the opening sequence being incredibly tense.  A good start to a show that had a lot of turmoil behind the scenes between the seasons.

Castle of the Walking Dead (1967)
After watching the premiere of The Walking Dead, I was looking for one more horror movie to watch before bed, and I thought that the title of this one was fitting.  I should have been a little more discerning in my choice.  It stars the fantastic Christopher Lee, so I thought I was in for a treat.  However, this film was fairly boring.  Lee plays a vampire type character who returns decades after being drawn and quartered (which I will admit was a way of killing villains you don't normally see in a horror film) to get his revenge.  In fact, I thought the entire opening sequence was pretty cool.  Too bad it was such a snoozer from there on out.
(The trailer is in German, and was the only one I could find...)



Halloween H20: 20 Years Later (1998)
I have stated many times that the original Halloween is not only my favorite horror film, it is also one of my favorite movies of all time.  I have seen sequels 4, 5, and 6 many times - not because they are good movies, but because it seems AMC shows them nonstop every year during their Fear Fest (and prior to that, USA Network used to show them all the time I think).  Somehow, though, I had never seen either of the later sequels that finally brought back Jamie Lee Curtis.  This is the 1st of those 2 sequels, and I thought it was a much better film than any of the previous sequels other than Halloween II.  The plot completely ignores the non-Curtis films (probably a good idea as, by the time they got to 6, the story was completely bogged down with elements of devil worship and cults and evil spirits that a clean slate was needed).

We pick things up 20 years after the events of the first 2 films.  Michael Myers hasn't been seen in all that time, but he eventually tracks his sister down in her new life (with a new identity) and the killings begin anew.  The film is a taut, exciting thrill ride (it only clocks in at 86 minutes, so there is not a lot of filler), packed with lots of little nods to the original (bits of dialog, repeated scenarios, etc.).  Its also helped along by having a few actors in early supporting roles that are really good at what they do - like Michelle Williams and Joseph Gordon-Levitt (unfortunately, Josh Hartnett in his first role is as wooden as ever).  This film even features an ending that would have been a great capper to the Halloween films and should have ended things on a high note.



Halloween: Resurrection (2002)
Unfortunately, they didn't end things with H2O.  UGH.  This film is terrible.  First, they knock-off Jamie Lee Curtis in the first 10 minutes of the film in order to shift focus to a whole new set of characters. As for the new characters: Busta Rhymes - YAY! Katie Sackhoff (from Battlestar Galactica) - SUPER YAY! That boring guy in American Pie who was Tara Reid's boyfriend - meh. Tyra Banks - BOOOOOOO!  The plot revolves around an Internet reality show based in the Myers house on Halloween night, which of course attracts Michael Myers, but who cares.  This film is not good and the less said about it the better.

2011 Horrorfest Pt. 7

Session 9 (2001)
I am not sure where I came across this movie, whether I read about it on Ain't It Cool or if I just stumbled upon it on Netflix.  At any rate, I am glad I did - I really enjoyed this film.  It is a nice psychological horror film about 5 men (including David Caruso just prior to taking on his starring role in CSI: Miami) working on removing the asbestos from an incredibly creepy old insane asylum.  The place begins to affect the workers in different ways leading to a very bloody and creepy finale.  The setting goes along way towards building the atmosphere of the film.  My advice is - no matter how good the money, maybe its not a good idea to work in an old asylum.



Subspecies (1991)
This is an incredibly bland vampire film that has nothing to recommend it other than that it was shot on location on Romania.  The sets are incredibly cool looking and give the film an authentic look and adds some creepiness to the film that might otherwise be lacking.  Unfortunately, the plot is pedestrian, the acting is not very good, and i found the voice of the main vampire, Radu, to be incredibly annoying.  There is nothing to really recommend this film. 



It! The Terror From Beyond Space (1958)
This is just a good old fashioned 50's rubber suit monster movie.  Its a pretty basic story - a mission to space accidentally picks up an alien creature that proceeds to pick off the crew 1 by 1 as all attempts to kill the creature prove futile.  Wikipedia says that this film was a big influence on Ridley Scott's Alien.  While you have to take any thing you read on Wikipedia with a grain of salt, I can definitely see a lot of similarities, right down to the way they actually dispatch with the alien at the end.  While definitely no where near being in Alien's class when it comes to terror, its still an enjoyable movie for fans of those old, slightly cheesy, creature films. 



Demonic Toys (1992)
This film is pretty much a ripoff of Puppet Master - it was even made by the same producer, so there isn't a whole lot to say about it.  The main difference is that in this film, the possessed toys are accidentally brought to life, rather than being controlled by someone else.  It's pretty bad.  It was enjoyable to watch in "OMG, this is SUCH a bad movie" fun kind of way, but it wasn't scary or suspenseful at all.  A good choice to check out if you are ever having a Bad Movie Night. 



The Uninvited (1944)
The Uninvited is a good old-fashioned tale of a ghost that won't leave the earthly plane that I liked, but didn't necessarily love.   I think I would have liked it a lot more if they didn't play up the romance part between Ray Milland and Gail Russell so much, as it wasn't very believable (there was WAY too much of an age difference between them).  Milland and his sister purchase a house possessed by spirits that have a terrible effect on Russell (the granddaughter of the man who previously owned the house).  The film does a nice job setting up a creepy atmosphere at the haunted beach house and there is a real sense of dread whenever Russell is being menaced. 

2011 Horrorfest Pt. 6

Time for another theme post.  This time I decided to go with all zombie films.  I picked a selection from many different eras to show the different ways zombies have been depicted  through the years.

White Zombie (1935)
This was the first full length zombie film.   The zombies in this film are created the way most zombies were in films before Night of the Living Dead - voodoo.  Bela Lugosi actually plays a roll other than a vampire this time.  Instead, he plays an evil plantation owner who is also the zombie master.  However, other than his mustache, he pretty much looks and acts like Dracula throughout.  He spends the entire film staring menacingly (especially on the scenes where they focus on his eyes to show he us controlling the zombies), but since he is so good at it, I enjoyed it.  The rest of the acting in the film was pretty bad, but the film is nice and creepy looking (its very atmospheric, and the use of sets from other Universal horror films give it a nice gothic look).



Doctor Blood's Coffin (1961)
Here the zombies are the result of medical experiments involving a South American poison.  However, the zombies don't do much of anything in this movie as most of the plot revolves around the doctor in the title trying to keep his experiments from being discovered.   Its actually kind of boring, and not scary or gross or suspenseful at all.  Definitely one that can be avoided. 




Sugar Hill (1974)
This is one of the few zombies released after Night of the Living Dead that still relied on voodoo for the zombies.  Fortunately, this film also has something that very few zombie films (or other horror films for that matter) have - BLAXPLOITATION!  That's right - this film is pretty much zombies + Shaft, which means a lot of use of "honky" and all the bad guys are racist. The main character, Sugar Hill, uses zombies raised by Baron Samedi himself to avenge the death of her boyfriend, which was ordered by the standard blaxploitation type white gangster/ ruthless businessman.  Its ridiculously over the top, and I enjoyed every crazy second of it. 



The Video Dead (1987)
This a low budget, direct to video stinker from the 80's.  Its trying for more of a horror-comedy vibe, but doesn't really pull it off.  Comedy bits really just come off as cheesy, and not really in an enjoyable way, either.  The zombies in this film are of the Romero type - slow, shambling, crawled out of their grave, mindless creatures.  The twist in this one is that they are unleashed from a haunted TV (yes, really).  Once unleashed, they go on their killing spree, but it is combined to an area around the houses of the main characters (most likely due to budget), so that takes some of the scare out of the zombie threat (one of the main things that is so terrifying about zombies is that they spread and are almost impossible to contain).  Extra points to this film for the novel idea on how the zombies are unleashed, but that's about it.



Survival of the Dead (2009)
This the third of George Romero's newer slate of zombie films.  I had yet to see any of them, but I had read very mixed reviews of them, and especially no good ones for this film.  The reviews were on.  This film isn't very good.  Like the other Romero films, there really is no explanation for the zombie outbreak - it just happens and the film deals with the fallout.  This time around, the action settles around an island of the coast of Delaware where the inhabitants have closed themselves off and have decided to try and rehabilitate the zombies by trying to teach them to not eat humans.  Its about as exciting as it sounds.  There isn't nearly enough zombie action in this film.  Also, there is way too much CGI used for the blood effects.  A big disappointment.  I also currently have Land of the Dead, Romero's 1st zombie film (as director) after his original trilogy.  Hopefully it is better than this one. 

2011 Horrorfest Pt. 5

As I mentioned in a previous post, I may decide to group some movies together with a common theme.  This group contains all "classic" horror films:

Freaks (1932)
If you boil this film down to the basic elements of its plot, it doesn't really sound like a horror film at all - a woman is attempting to marry a man that she doesn't love just to get his inheritance and his friends are the only ones that can see her plan.  It sounds more like a crime thriller or film noir.  However, if you make the setting a circus, the woman a trapeze artist, the man a dwarf, and most of their friends real life circus side show performers, the creepiness factor goes through the roof.

I know its not very nice to say this, because these were real people, but GOOD LORD were the sideshow people unnerving to look at.  Just having them as characters in the film sets up an uncomfortable atmosphere while you are watching the movie that really pays off in the climax.  After Hans (the dwarf) goes through with the marriage to Cleopatra (the trapeze artist), he eventually comes to realize that she is planning to kill him for his money.  Eventually, there is a confrontation involving the 2 of them, her real boyfriend (the circus strongman) and the rest of the freaks in a rain storm that is truly full of tension that builds fantastically to the end.  It is one of the great finales in horror history, and I don't think it would have been nearly as effective if regular actors had been used.    Apparently, the film was too much for people at the time and it bombed, effectively killing off the career of director Tod Browning, who had also directed Dracula.  A shame, as both of these films are about as good as it gets in classic horror.



Mark of the Vampire (1935)
This is another film directed by Tod Browning, but I did not like it as much as I liked Freaks or Dracula.  Once again, Bela Lugosi is playing a vampire, this time named Count Mora.  Lugosi spends the majority of his screen time standing around looking silently menacing, which he excels at.  However, the plot of this film is just way too outlandish to swallow.  The entire movie is spent making you believe that Count Mora and his daughter (a vampire too) have come back to claim the daughter of a man that was killed at the beginning of the film by having hos blood mysteriously drained.  However, it turns out the whole vampire thing is an elaborate hoax put on to flush out the real killer and to get him to confess how he committed the murder.  That plan is just way too ridiculous and involves way too many people to ever have been successful (I realize that I am saying that if Count Mora and his daughter actually were vampires that it would have been MORE believable than what actually happened - horror films get a suspension of belief from me that normal films don't get).  The film had a good look to it, but in the end, the big reveal was just too much for me. 




Werewolf of London (1935)
It goes without saying that the whole time I was watching this film, I had Warren Zevon's "Werewolves of London" stuck in my head (I kept waiting for the werewolf to get a  big dish of beef chow mein, but it never happened).

Apparently, this was the first mainstream Hollywood werewolf film, preceding Lon Chaney's The Wolf Man by 6 years.  It has the plot template that is pretty much the basis for every werewolf film next.  The main character is attacked at night by a strange, fur covered creature, and upon the next full moon, people are mysteriously attacked before the main guy realizes that he is the cause.  Eventually, his crimes are discovered, and the werewolf is killed, but he is grateful for the release of his curse.  I enjoyed this film, but it is not nearly as good as The Wolf Man.  Most of that is due to the fact that Lon Chaney, Jr. owns as the werewolf, where Henry Hull (this film's werewolf) is only passable.  I was glad that I watched this for its historical significance, but in the future, when I want to see a classic werewolf film, its Chaney all the way.



The Thing From Another World (1951)
I have seen John Carpenter's remake many times, but I have never seen the original before now (the only bits of it I have seen at all are the clips that Carpenter has playing on the TV in the background in a few scenes in Halloween.  While I definitely prefer the remake, it is very different type of film.  The Thing has a different type of tension as you don't have any idea in which character the monster is hiding.  Also, there is a much better use of the overbearing isolation of the surroundings (having less characters helps).  In The Thing From Another World, the main sense of tension for the characters (and the viewer) is driven by the fear that they won't be able to find some way to kill the monster before he kills them.  The remake has that too, but when added to the other driving forces of tension I just mentioned, it is a far scarier film than the original.