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 #104) Dracula's Daughter (1936), a.k.a., Daughter of Dracula Sticking with the alliterative titles, this first sequel in the Universal Dracula series (not counting Drácula) picks up right after the conclusive staking of the Count, with Subtext out the wazoo, and a great performance from Gloria Holden in the lead. The attempts at comedy fall a bit flat, but the drama more than makes up for that. Not as easy to ameliorate is the abrupt and pat ending, which fails to capitalize in any meaningful way on the accumulated tension and moodiness. Probably most notable for being such an early lesbian vampire film, though its showing in that regard is very much an implicit one. Strong enough that at least one newspaper of the time wrote an article condemning the perversion, though, according to Wikipedia.  rating: 7/10"The strength of the vampire, Sir Basil, lies in the fact that he is unbelievable."
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Oct 17, 2019 20:46
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 10: Bone Tomahawk - Challenge #2 for Sid Haig - It was on Prime and was decently well rated, so decided to check it out. It's just kinda a gritty western about some extra savage cave-dwelling natives. Didn't really feel this one. Good production values and well done, but it there just wasn't anything to make it particularly interesting or memorable - no moral ambiguity, no particularly interesting fights, nothing weird. Overall I can't really say anything bad about it, but it's not interesting enough to recommend. 2.5/5Goals - 7/13 - 1: K-12 2: Gozu 3: The Wailing 4: Phantom of the Paradise5:Viy 6: One Cut of the Dead 7: Happiness of the Katakuris 8: Little Monsters 9: Shadow of the Vampire 10: Bone Tomahawk Rewatches - Event Horizon
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Oct 17, 2019 21:12
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SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #4 - INKTOBERquote:Watch a horror film you've never seen that heavily features art or artists, or the main character is an artist.  23. Color Me Blood Red (1965) Dir: Hershell Gordon Lewis (Criterion Channel) My first time with Hershell Gordon Lewis! As an artist myself, I'm always fascinated by the ways films try to depict artists. It usually gets pretty off the mark because it turns out the creative process is way too internalized for a lot of folks to depict. And whenever films try to critique the contemporary art world, it almost always feels either surface-level (like Velvet Buzzsaw) or completely unrelated to what the contemporary art world is actually like (like The Devil's Candy). Turns out this film gets around the problems with depicting the creative process by basically ignoring them. It doesn't have a whole lot to say about the art world, but it never really pretends to. The art stuff is more or less window dressing for the schlocky premise. The film itself feels very amateurish and industrial, holding on to shots with nothing in them for WAY too long, but there's still something kind of charming about this film. It feels like Lewis starts from a creative way to show gore (a painter paints with other people's blood) and then reverse engineers his films from there. The Cannibal Corpse of cinema.  24. A Bay of Blood (1972) Dir: Mario Bava (Plex) Bava's one of those directors I will always make time for every October. One of the missing links between giallos and slasher movies, this feels like a film that's more notable for its historical significance than for its actual quality. It's definitely not a bad film by any means, but it kind of pales in comparison to the other Bava films I've seen. It spends way too much time obsessed with the minute details of the deed to a property and has one of the biggest asspull endings I've seen in a while. It has some GNARLY gore effects, though. Not my favorite of his, but hey, it's still Bava. Watched: 1. Candyman 2. The Wailing 3. Spookies 4. One Cut of the Dead 5. Viy 6. The Driller Killer 7. Tammy and the T-Rex 8. Friday the 13th Pt VI: Jason Lives 9. Scary Movie 10. Ice Cream Man 11. Freaks 12.The Hills Have Eyes 13. Spider Baby 14. Lady Terminator 15. All The Colors of the Dark 16.Tales From The Hood 17. Man Bites Dog 18. Prime Evil 19. Bride of Re-Animator 20. The Phantom Carriage 21. Thinner 22. Robot Monster 23. Color Me Blood Red 24. A Bay of Blood Friends Are Evil fucked around with this message at 21:27 on Oct 17, 2019 |
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Oct 17, 2019 21:24
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 #105) The Spiral Staircase (1946) A serial killer film set in 1916? Color me curious. Our protagonist is a mute young woman, Helen, working as a live-in caretaker for a bitter and bed-ridden older woman. Murders are taking place in the surrounding town, all of them targeting women with disabilities of one form or another. Add to that a rivalry between the established old country doctor and a young one who's recently come to the region, and there's quite a few things boiling over. Turns out the killer is also a peeping tom, rather daring for the time. Even more anachronistically, we get some shots from his POV, something I didn't pick up on until it had already happened a couple of times, thanks to how smoothly it was slipped in. There's a cool little meta bit in the opening when we focus on the piano player providing live scoring for a silent film, with our mute protagonist (not yet revealed as such) watching in fascination. There's a beautifully-done fantasy scene tucked away, with Helen imagining herself unable to be married because she physically can't say "I do," and we get insights into her character through a number of other wonderfully understated ways. Lots of dark mansion vibes, with flickering gas-lamps and odd-angled architecture. Fantastic shivery atmosphere, once we get deep into the night. So glad I put this on, though it probably would have benefited from being watched after dark. rating: 8/10"Surely you don't take the ramblings of a sick woman seriously." "I take most things seriously."
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Oct 17, 2019 22:24
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Franchescanado posted:SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #4: Inktober The “prompts” feel like a cheat to me. I could basically connect any movie to them. I look at my list (which is now up over 100 even without the 100 Years stuff) and I feel like I can link a least half of them without much effort. If I watch It Paints the Sand Red because of “catch” or “ride” or Climax because of “enchanted” or “wild” or Cronos because of “ornament” or “ancient” then I don’t feel like I’m doing any kind of challenge beyond a really easy word game. Or like, any movie with a “ghost.” So way I figure there’s two ways to really respect the spirit of Inktober and the challenge and the first one is to go with the “heavily features art” idea.  24 (30). Velvet Buzzsaw (2018) A Netflix release. A struggling art dealer stumbles on a treasure trove of undiscovered pieces in her deceased neighbor’s apartment, but the ill gotten art carries something deeper from its mysterious and damaged creator and brings tragedy on those seeking to profit from it. What did I think of this movie? I don’t really know. The cast is loaded, probably too loaded because no one really has any room to work. I mean its a movie with John Malkovich and Toni Collette and they do absolutely nothing. Jake Gyllenhaal, Rene Russo, and Zawe Ashton are the stars but they all kind of divide up their time in solo or pairings scenes and I don’t think anyone really gets enough room to really make the film their own. Although in the big cast I did get a kick out of Natalia Dyer’s gag role of the unlucky sap who keeps stumbling on bodies with every new job. The payoff for that made me laugh very much. I think the other thing that hurts it is that there’s no real antagonist. Deese is just an idea and his art is never given enough characterization or rules to really become the monster. Conceptually it kind of reminded me of something Wes Craven would do or Nightmare on Elm Street but the movie just never really invests in the premise deep enough or fleshes it out enough to make it feel fully formed. Even when everyone kind of figures out what’s going on they only kind of figure out a vague “uh… bad stuff is happening and its connected to the art… so get rid of it?” The horror premise almost feels secondary to someone just wanting to tell us that the art world is filled with lovely, shallow, assholes. There’s some decent effects with the art but it never really does anything new or exciting. I didn’t hate it or anything, but I don’t think I’d really recommend it. Gyllenhaal is good and I wish the movie had just kind of committed to making him the protagonist digging up the details of the antagonist. It kind of just makes me want to go finally watch Nightcrawler. The other way of honoring the Inktober challenger I had was to… well draw something. Once upon a time i drew a lot and some would have called me an artist. I wasn’t one of those people. I could copy or sketch something but I couldn’t create something original. That always bothered me and between that and the fact that I was never satisfied with my work I just stopped drawing. Its been probably a decade since I drew something but I figured I’d pick up my old sketch pads and pencils and give it a whirl to honor my 31st film. Be kind. I’m rusty. And yeah, I know its Inktober but I’ve never drawn with ink, don’t have any decent pens, and haven’t gotten a chance to go out and see if I could find some decent cheap ones. So whatever. Here’s my mediocre, quick, pencil drawing I'm incredibly unsatisfied by.  - (31). Frankenstein (1931) Watched on DVD Dr. Frankenstein has a beautiful young bride, a bright future, and castle in his future but he’s obsessed with unlocking the secrets of life and death and does so by collecting the body parts of cadavers and piecing them together to create life. But is he creating man or monster? I’ve seen this twice before but it didn’t seem right to skip it while watching all the Universal films, and I always like to make #31 a little special. Each time I watch it I think I appreciate and enjoy it a little more. This is the first time I’m watching it since seeing Karloff in anything besides the Monster role so I think I appreciated his performance all the more now having something to contrast him with. I think maybe the Lon Chaney movies helped a bit too since I saw how remarkably Chaney worked in makeup and these over the top characters and transformed from role to role. So I watched Karloff more closely this time and really appreciated him more and the things he was doing and putting into the role that were now more recognizable as that since I had context for “Karloff”. If that makes sense. Its also the first time since watching The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari this month so it was interesting seeing some of the inspiration Whale seemed to take from Morneau with his monster. There’s just more contrasting and comparing I can do now with the roles, with the sets, with the characters. Its also the first time since I’ve seen Bride of Frankenstein or Dracula. Hell, I paid more attention to Fritz this time around now knowing that the “hunchbacks” and assistants play a larger role in the Universal world than I realized back then. Just more context gives me more appreciation in a lot of ways. Also, I never really thought about it but Dr. Frankenstein gave his monster a blazer. I wonder if he thought he might be cold or if he just thought he should dress fancy. I mean, what can I say? Its a good movie that the more I watch the more I appreciate the good and less the little bads I might have nitpicked before (again, seeing more contemporary films also downplays a lot of that as I’m more fairly judging the film by its peers and standards of the time). Its Frankenstein. Don’t be a fool like me and wait so long to see it. September Pre-Game Tally - New (Total) 1. NOS4A2 (2019); - (2). Splice (2009); - (3). Drive Angry (2011); 2 (4). The Twilight Zone (2019); - (5). Event Horizon (1997); - (6). BrainDead (2016); 3 (7). The Dark Tower (2017); 4 (8). The Collector (2009); 5 (9). The Bad Batch (2016); - (10). Rose Red (2002); - (11). Salem’s Lot (1979) October Tally - New (Total) 1. The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920); 2. Nightmare Cinema (2018); 3. Dead of Night (1945); The Queen of Spades (1949); 5. Tragedy Girls (2017); 6. House of Wax (1953); SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #1: The Best Month: 7. The Autopsy of Jane Doe (2016); 8. In the Tall Grass (2019); 9. The Night of the Hunter (1955); 10. The Thing (1951); - (11). The Thing (1982); 11 (12). The Thing (2011); - (13). Halloween (1978); 12 (14). Dracula (1931); SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #2: Dead & Buried: 13 (15). Q (1982); 14 (16). The Black Cat (1934); 15 (17). The Unknown (1927); - (18). Halloween II (1981); 16 (19). The Seventh Victim (1943); 17 (20). The Beast With Five Fingers (1946); 18 (21). The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1923); 19 (22). The Curse of the Cat People (1944); - (23). George A. Romero's Land of the Dead (2005); SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #3: Horror Noire: 20 (24). Ganja & Hess (1973); 21 (25). Drácula (1931); 22 (26). Universal Horror (1998); - (27). Happy Death Day (2017); 23 (28). The Phantom of the Opera (1925); - (29). Halloween III: Season of the Witch (1982); SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #4: Inktober: 24 (30). Velvet Buzzsaw (2018); - (31). Frankenstein (1931)
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Oct 17, 2019 23:55
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 #106) Daughter of Dracula (1972), a.k.a., Dracula's Daughter One of the sunniest vampire films I've ever seen. Being a Jess Franco film, this takes the lesbian undertones of Dracula's Daughter and runs them through Doc Brown's mega-amp. A family gathers as their matriarch nears death, and she shares some family secrets with them, including details about how an ancestral count, who ruled long ago, happened to be a vampire. Dreamlike detachment from traditional timing crops up numerous times, with small-detail shots held for long times and wider-scope events passing by quickly. There are also a number of beautiful, slow-pan shots just walking through parks or running across beaches, and they lend the film a lush feel of indulgence, one which arguably supersedes the nude scenes (and by quite a wide mark, at that). The count's crypt is both austere and worn-down, and the intrusion of our hero, Luisa, on its cobwebbed and stony interior is set apart all the more by that preceding appreciation of nature. Much of the movie runs on the strength of tone, and Franco's consistency in that regard is admirable. It's rarely high-energy, rolling along instead on significant looks, terse exchanges, sensuality, and the jazzy score. Oddly, the camera-work seems to be at its most clinical when it comes to the sexual scenes, but everywhere else, there's a strong sense of emotion to its movements and focus. And it ends with a zoom into the flames of a burning coffin. Hell yeah. Not gonna be to everyone's tastes, but for my first Franco of the month, I had a better time than I really expected. rating: 7/10"You will never belong to someone else. You hear me, Karine? You will never betray me."
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Oct 17, 2019 23:56
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STAC Goat posted:The other way of honoring the Inktober challenger I had was to… well draw something. Once upon a time i drew a lot and some would have called me an artist. I wasn’t one of those people. I could copy or sketch something but I couldn’t create something original. That always bothered me and between that and the fact that I was never satisfied with my work I just stopped drawing. Its been probably a decade since I drew something but I figured I’d pick up my old sketch pads and pencils and give it a whirl to honor my 31st film. Be kind. I’m rusty. This is awesome. In hindsight the challenge probably could have included an intro picture poster where you have to draw something, even if its a cheap MS Paint thing. The cheesier the better actually, I'm sure the entries would have been hilariously bad. I kind of tried to honor the idea of the artistic part of the challenge by choosing a "Suspiria" movie poster that looked hand-drawn instead of a promotional poster, but you did it right my friend. Great job! T3hRen3gade fucked around with this message at 00:09 on Oct 18, 2019 |
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Oct 18, 2019 00:05
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#34: The Mummy She's not even a mummy. She was just tied up in bandages and buried alive. They talk at length about how the burial process she went through was completely different and had none of the things involved in a mummification. There is literally not a single mummy in The Mummy. I thought that maybe ow that all the bad press had died down I would be able to take The Mummy on it's own terms, and maybe even enjoy it as a dumb action movie. Without being distracted by the hilarious trailer mishap or the whole concept of the Dark Universe. That was my mind set going in; low expectations but generally ready and willing to enjoy seeing Tom Cruise run away from a mummy. The Mummy isn't just bad, The Mummy is fractally bad. An kaleidoscope of bad that continues on infinitely the more you look. We are introduced to Tom Cruise, who is a military recon specialist who uses his job as a cover to loot archaeological sites and have the fighting cover up evidence of his looting. Like, in his first scene he 100 miles away from where he was ordered to be, preparing to find a hidden burial site and then call in an airstrike to cover it up. He's at this specific site because he slept with an archaeologist just to steal her notes and figure out good places to loot. So right off the bat he is a complete and utter scumbag, but the movie is 100% convinced he's just a lovable rogue. The distance between the movie's perception of Tom Cruise and an ordinary's view of the character is psychotic. The movie claims he has a redemption arc, but since the movie is also completely on his side, it's absurdly, laughably weak. The actual "sacrifice" he makes which causes the other characters to declare him redeemed, we'll get. We'll loving get to that. Also, after that first scene the fact that Tom Cruise is a troop is literally never brought up again. He just goes full AWOL and nobody cares. The sexy mummy, who is not a mummy, doesn't have a character. At first she does, she's this princess who whatever, but then she makes a deal with Set, who in this movie is basically Egyptian Satan, and all of her previous motivation is gone and she's just evil, her goal is to gently caress a guy and stab him with a dagger during so his body will become a vessel for Set. Her whole deal is so complicated! She was an Egyptian princess, buried in Iraq, then grave robbed by Templars, who stole her dagger but apparently nothing else, and then split it into two pieces for reasons never explained, and then hid them both in London. The non-Mummy can control the dead, and also she can mind control living people if they're bitten by any bug(people controlled like this can come back as ghosts after they die. That is never explained), and also she can vaguely suggest things psychically to people she's had no contact with. The limits of that power are 100% determined by the plot, and she only does it to Tom Cruise. Because she has decided that he will be the vessel for Set because he has such an amazing body. Which is pretty funny considering that Tom Cruise was 62 years old at the time of filming and all his shirtless scenes were full CGI like the The Hulk. There is a blonde woman. She's the one Tom Cruise screws over at the beginning. She's mad at him, but not mad enough to actually be very mad or refuse to tag along on all his adventures, and also she pretty quickly falls in love with him. And that's her whole deal. And finally there's Dr. Jekyll. How evil Dr. Jekyll is supposed to be when he isn't Hyde isn't clear. But that doesn't matter because the fact that he's Dr. Jekyll doesn't matter at all to the plot. He has a little Dr.Strangelove thing going with Mr. Hyde. I swear to god, he wears a black leather glove on his left hand and when he's going a bit Hyde the hand starts to tremble and he grabs it with his right hand until he calms down. I don't know why they did that! I don't know why that's in the movie! I really can not stress enough how every single thing in this movie doesn't work, every single decision made was bad. None of the humor works. None of the jokes land. The banter is god-awful, and mainly serves to make the characters even less likable. The action is mind-numbing. There are so many action scenes, all of them way over the top, none of them in a fun way. Especially since I think Tom Cruise becomes immortal once he's targeted to be the vessel for Set? He survives an airplane crashing straight into the ground. Which makes the action pretty loving dull. Oh no, Tom Cruise is in mortal peril! Wait, can't he literally not be killed or injured at all? Oh no he's gonna be hit by a bus but jumps through the broken windshield, and there's his ghost friend with some banter, waka waka! We finally get to the end, which is a fight between Tom Cruise and The Mummy who isn't a mummy in a crypt fighting over whether or not she's gonna stab him and turn him into a vessel for Set, and also blonde woman drowned and is floating around. Tom Cruise gets his hands on the dagger, by which I mean he just takes it out of her hand, apparently she doesn't notice, and is going to smash it. Which will prevent Egyptian Satan from gaining a mortal body and killing everyone. That's the specific peril that Dr. Jekyll laid out, Set wants to come to our world so he can get his revenge on the living. The non-Mummy is like, "You will become a god! You will have power over life and death!" Tom Cruise looks at dead blonde woman, the woman he met I think literally two days before and slept with so he could rob her. And stabs himself. He gets super mummy powers, kills The Mummy, and brings blonde lady back to life. Because apparently he is able to fight Set for control and win? The idea that the vessel for Set would be able to fight back was not set up at all, it's not like pre-evil Mummy lady ever fought the mummy in her. But whatever. That's his redemption, by the way. Which characters literally say proves he's good. That he stabbed himself to become a living god with power over life and death. The whole point, the whole movie, is just so Tom Cruise can become The Mummy. Cue sequel tease, roll credits. The Mummy is bad.
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Oct 18, 2019 00:31
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 10. As Above, So Below I thought this was a good movie, not amazing, but its premise worked for me. The opening scene established the mystery behind the plot and gave me a key bit about Scarlett’s character. She's not afraid of breaking the rules and comes away mostly unscathed and all the better for the risks that she takes. So of course she won’t bat an eye at getting herself into the trouble that makes up the rest of the movie. I appreciate when a movie gives me a reason why someone won't just give up or leave when the average person would have noped out of the situation. I think most people posting here are already aware that the movie was shot on location in the real catacombs of Paris. The found footage here did the trick of making me as the viewer feel like I’m truly along for the ride. The close shots did a great job of conveying the claustrophobia of the situation each minute that the group was underground. I also liked how the Indiana Jones-esque mystery made me want to go deeper into the catacombs with the characters to see what exacting was down there. The happy ending was a nice surprise for a change. I was fully expecting to see the characters all die and get stuck in hell. It subverted my expectations and actually rewarded the characters for being brave, which is something I would like to see more horror movies do. Modern horror movie fans are smart these days and we can all pat ourselves on the back by saying “I wouldn’t get in that trouble, because I wouldn’t be stupid enough to keep going deeper.” In this case, the risk adverse viewer would have remained trapped, and at least some of the group who took the risk would survive. I also like that the ending had a second subtle nod to Dante’s Inferno as Dante managed to escape hell by climbing downward.
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Oct 18, 2019 01:20
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 #107) The Cat and the Canary (1927) Holy smokes, this moves fast. Some outstanding technical tricks pulled, too. That POV stroll through the empty hallway literally sent chills up my spine. An "eccentric millionaire" living in a "grotesque mansion" dies and becomes a ghost haunting it, and his greedy relatives gather for the reading of the will. That's all within the first five minutes. The relatives arrive in pretty much the same style as the guests in Clue, minus the smell, and there's a wonderful sense of back-and-forth with repeatedly interrupted dialogue, something I can't recall from any of the other silent films I've seen. The writing is sharp, and it got more than a few laughs out of me. Unlike the version of the '25 Phantom of the Opera I watched, the music (composed and performed by Dionysis Boukouvalas) shifted to fit the dynamics of the scenes (even striking some sort of bells when the clock chimed), which made a colossal difference. There's a few other things that stand as likely influences on Clue, and on The Old Dark House as well; this kind of struck me as being a version of that film, but both grimmer and funnier in its telling. Special shout-out to the sunken-eyed, iron-jawed Mammy Pleasant. She tends to steal scenes, but virtually everyone puts in a great performance, full of wide eyes and exaggerated reactions, and the occasional huge and quavering lettering on the text cards for their screams cracked me up. What a fabulous film. I highly, highly recommend this one. rating: 9/10"It isn't time to be catty -- wait till we see who gets the money."
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Oct 18, 2019 01:51
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 CHALLENGE COMPLETEI did it, I did it for the second year in a row. 31 movies watched. I’ll probably do an overrun given how there are still Samhain challenges to be announced. 30. Overlord (2018)  Oh man, almost there. Just one more film and I’m done my challenge and might do an overrun because there are still Samhain challenges to be done. Overlord is a WW2 horror movie about Nazi experiments which right there alone sold me. This is a fun film. It starts off with some story and character development and by the end it is just an insane violence fest of blood/gore. If you are in the mood for some shlocky action fun with Nazi zombies (or whatever they were) with a Hollywood budget this is for you. /5SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #5: Tourist Trap Watch a horror film you've never seen before that was made by / filmed in a country you've never watched a movie from.31. Train to Busan (2016) Country: Korea  I’m probably the only person on CD that hasn’t seen a Korean horror film. I went to a few different horror sites looking at lists of Korean horror to be sure and, nope, haven’t seen one. Train to Busan is a zombie action-horror movie with fast zombies breaking out across Korea. The film focuses on a group of train passengers that are caught in the middle of the outbreak which spreads onto their train. This is a fantastic zombie movie with great set-pieces, real tension and an emotional story that only gets better as the film goes on. It's kind of like World War Z in that its all fast zombies almost acting in a literal surge which I admit I enjoy. /5Total: 1. One Cut of the Dead (2017), 2. Chopping Mall (1986), 3. All the Creatures Were Stirring (2018), 4. Creepshow 2 (1987), 5. Black Christmas (1974), 6. Dracula (1931), 7. Frankenstein (1931), 8. The Monster Squad (1987), 9. All Hallow’s Eve (2013), 10. The Addams Family (1991), 11. Grizzly (1976), 12. The Mummy (1932), 13. See No Evil (2006), 14. The Invisible Man (1933), 15. Why Horror? (2014), 16. Bad Moon (1996), 17. Head Count (2018), 18. The Bride of Frankenstein (1935), 19. House of 1000 Corpses, 20. The Wolfman (1941), 21. Body Bags (1993). 22. Us (2019), 23. The Craft (1996), 24. Thankskilling (2008), 25. Beetlejuice (1988), 26. Psycho (1960), 27. Gacy (2003), 28. Malevolent (2018), 29, Day of the Animals (1977), 30. Overlord (2018), 31. Train to Busan (2016) Super Samhain Challenges: Justin Godscock fucked around with this message at 06:39 on Oct 24, 2019 |
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Oct 18, 2019 02:22
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#20) Casper (1995) After nearly 3 weeks of very intense spooky movies, it was nice to have a change of pace to something more... silly. I was honestly surprised by how well this movie holds up. The CGI looks very dated, admittedly, but it works fine for the main ghosts. Once human characters start becoming ghosts, the CGI starts looking really cheesy, but it's still acceptable. Casper is a very wholesome, very heartwarming story that made my fiancee cry. I'd say that means the movie still holds up. 3/5
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Oct 18, 2019 03:07
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 #108) Hillbillys in a Haunted House (1967) Youtube (JustWatch says it's on Tubi, but that's the RiffTrax version). Detoured by a shoot-out on their way to Nashville, three country/western singers spend the night in an abandoned mansion, eventually uncovering an espionage plot. Yeah, it's cornball, but it has a good spirit, Lon Chaney, Jr. goofin' and grinnin' while dancing with a man in a gorilla suit, a 30-year-old Merle Haggard, Basil Rathbone and John Carradine as spies, endearingly flimsy justifications for country musicians to show up and play a song or three (like being told to play at gun-point), and the set-dressers made that house look drat dilapidated. The music takes up a big chunk of the run-time, which could make things go by faster or slower, depending on your tastes. For me, it was the former, since it registered as spots to which I didn't have to pay much attention. The spy ring plot is flimsy, but over-done to the point of being amusing (in addition to the gorilla, they keep an iron maiden in the basement), and the happenstance resolution fits well enough with how the movie got there. Not great, but also not deserving of the hyperbolic trashing it's received over the years. rating: 5/10"What are you doing down there?" "Well, I ain't lookin' for new talent!"
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Oct 18, 2019 03:21
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SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #5: Tourist Trap  18. Tarot (2009) Looking over the options for this challenge made me realize that even though I’ve seen plenty of exploitation movies that were shot in the Philippines, they were all made by American directors and companies that filmed there in the 70s or 80s. This seemed like a good opportunity to change that. Tarot is about Cara, a young girl who inherits her grandmother’s affinity for reading the tarot. Her first few experiments with the cards prove to be accurate, and her fearful mother makes her promise to stop fortune telling. Fifteen years later, Cara decides to use her gift to find her missing fiancé. Her mother warns her that the cards may help, but that there will also be a price. I spent the first half hour of this one worried that it would be more supernatural drama than horror, but then the good stuff kicked in. The tarot scenes involve a small amount of iffy CGI, but those shots aren’t as much of a focus as the better looking veiled ghosts that crop up whenever things get spooky. The story involves some interesting twists, and I also liked that while Cara’s fortunes were always accurate, she often misinterpreted them until their meanings became clear. The movie was a little heavy on the relationship drama though. I would have minded that less if the characters were more developed, but Cara’s fiancé, Manuel, was so bland that I kept wondering why he was worth all this trouble in the first place. The ending had me steeling myself against an unpleasant outcome and then gave me something else, which was a nice surprise. 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); 18. Tarot (2009) - Challenge #5
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Oct 18, 2019 03:40
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October 17 - The Hatchet Murders, a.k.a. Deep Red https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=apdrNHcLUd8 So I go through this every October Challenge, but I really don't like giallo. I mean I really don't like it. Last time, I swore off even giving the genre another chance because I had given it enough chances and yet here I am, watching another Argento giallo and not liking it. At least this time I can blame my stupid box sets challenge for making me watch it. And yet it's very likely I'm watching another Argento movie in a couple of days (the one that I suspect I have the best chance of enjoying). A psychic has been murdered in Rome, and the man who witnessed it from the street is being hunted by the same killer. Bodies pile up as he tries to find the killer first. For a movie retitled "The Hatchet Murders" on its initial US release, there's a distinct lack of hatchet murders in it. There is one death that stands out for its brutality, but the rest are just kind of boring. There's a moment toward the end of the movie where I'm going, "The plot didn't make much sense before, but now it really doesn't make sense. This contradicts things we've seen in the movie!" That turns out to be a plot point, it was just that it took the main character a few hours to realize that it didn't make any sense. And that's kind of how the plotting goes here, it's built like a mystery but it's one that doesn't hold together. It's a series of events rather than a story. The other aspects of the movie just felt blandly average to me; well other than the dubbing which is the quality you'd expect from a mid-70's low budget dub. I can't even work up hate for The Hatchet Murders, it was just kind of there.
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Oct 18, 2019 04:06
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I watched Deep Red in January and had kind of similar complaints and I was basically told that if I watched a dubbed version then I watched a version that cut out huge parts of the story. In your version did the female lead just disappear for half the film? She did in mine and that's apparently not supposed to happen.
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Oct 18, 2019 04:17
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I feel like the only giallo that I’ve unequivocally liked was Blood and Black Lace. Still haven’t seen Suspiria yet and am making my way through Stage Fright and enjoying it thus far though.
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Oct 18, 2019 04:34
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STAC Goat posted:I watched Deep Red in January and had kind of similar complaints and I was basically told that if I watched a dubbed version then I watched a version that cut out huge parts of the story. In your version did the female lead just disappear for half the film? She did in mine and that's apparently not supposed to happen. Yeah, she was kind of notable in her absence. I'm willing to believe that a lot of the plot weakness was due to watching The Hatchet Murders version, but unlike the hacked up Bava film I watched last week, I didn't see any promise that there would be a better movie if there there was more of it here. I'm willing to put that down to just my general dislike of the genre, but if I watch one of them I've got talk about how I responded to it.
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Oct 18, 2019 04:37
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 #109) The Cat and the Canary (1939) Youtube. Ohhhh noooo. Take the '27 version, drain all the visual style out of it, and give all the jokes to Bob Hope; now you've got this remake. Practically all of the gags based on sets and props are gone, replaced by Hope's old bachelor jokes, and the thriller/mystery flavors are significantly reduced as well. Hope has to be top banana in all of his scenes; it's only when he's off-screen that the other actors get a chance to make their mark. Even then, they don't measure up to the players in the previous version. I knew I was setting myself up for disappointment, but I didn't think it would be this hard of a drop. Very thankful that as many of the jokes landed as they did, to soften the blow. rating: 6/10"Do you believe in reincarnation? You know, when dead people come back to life?" "What, like the Republicans?"
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Oct 18, 2019 04:37
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Random Stranger posted:Yeah, she was kind of notable in her absence. I'm willing to believe that a lot of the plot weakness was due to watching The Hatchet Murders version, but unlike the hacked up Bava film I watched last week, I didn't see any promise that there would be a better movie if there there was more of it here. I'm willing to put that down to just my general dislike of the genre, but if I watch one of them I've got talk about how I responded to it. Yeah, I mean I'm in a similar place. I don't really like giallo in general. But Deep Red was a big "ok, everyone loves this and holds it up as a classic of the genre/Argento's catalogue so I'll give it a try". So the fact that I watched a hacked up version does kind of make feel like I gotta throw an asterisk on it.
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Oct 18, 2019 04:43
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https://twitter.com/KennethJWaste2/status/1185031740806651904?s=20
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Oct 18, 2019 04:47
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The Most Powerful Witch 1&2 (2019?, YouTube)Samhain Challenge: TouristTrap I decided if I’m going to do this challenge I’m going to go all out and watch some Nollywood. I found this by searching for Nigerian horror movies on YouTube and selected this as it was only 64 minutes. I had a hard time figuring out what was going on because the sound mixing was terrible! Some characters were clear but in the same scene there would be characters that sounded whisper quiet and characters who spoke so loud that it sounded distorted. As far as I could tell there is an evil witch named Krashka who is jealous of a girl named Amalinda who is secretly the granddaughter of a powerful witch, although she doesn’t know it. There’s also some male character named Harris who looks like he’s supposed to be a student who meets a tiger but the good witch stops it. And then a talking dragon shows up and strikes him down. Then the good witch shows up and they proclaim themselves to be friends now. Then they lead some group of warriors through the jungle and encounter all sorts of strange creatures and dangerous animals. Look I’m going to be honest I really wasn’t sure what was happening here. The exposition scenes were so quiet. A lot of scenes inexplicably go into slow motion for no reason and so often that even Zack Snyder would consider it overkill. Seriously, this movie would easily be 10 minutes shorter if they didn’t switch to slow motion so often. The special effects are low budget as well and it is clear that they are just in steering creatures and animals from other movies or video games into the movie. There is a charming aspect to this type of movie. Even though it’s terribly edited and low budget the actors are all enthusiastic and the set design is kind of good. But overall this movie isn’t exactly enjoyable and I honestly couldn’t recommend it. There is probably better Nollywood out there but I don’t think this is my thing. Still, I’m glad I expanded my horizons! Watched (22): Brightburn, Tales from the Hood, Pet Semetary 2, Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer, One Cut of the Dead, Leatherface (1990), Summer of 84, Viy, Mandy, In the Tall Grass, Street Trash, See No Evil, Haunt, Idle Hands, Horror Noire, Hello Mary Lou: Prom Night 2, Doom Asylum, Eaten Alive, The Craft, The Wolfman (2010), 3 from hell, The Most Powerful Witch 1&2 Samhain Challenges: 1. The Best Month - Viy 2. Dead and Buried - 3 from Hell 3. Horror Noire - Horror Noire 4. Inktober (legend) - The Wolfman (2010) 5. Tourist Trap - The Most Powerful Witch 1&2
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Oct 18, 2019 05:09
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#17: The Ruins (2008) I remember one of my friends telling me about this when it first came out, but that was back when I was too scared to watch horror movies so I never checked it out. Since so many people in this thread have been watching it, it seemed like a great excuse to go back and finally watch! This was pretty solid! I didn't love it, but I did enjoy it. I think my main issue with the movie is that I don't feel like the concept was used to full effect. I don't know anything about the book it was based on, so I won't comment on that, but the design for the plants themselves has a ton of potential and I wish they'd been able to take it further. I wanted ecology! I can forgive the movie not explaining too much because I do think it fits narratively that no one involved really understands the situation either, but I still really wanted more details. To some extent it's probably scarier to not have the plant's rules and functions fully explained, but the bits we got were barely enough to whet the palate. The focus is way more on body horror and the characters than the plant itself, which again I get given that this was a horror film aimed at general audiences, but I can't help but feel like the plant should've really been the main character. In addition to that, some aspects of the plant started to stray a bit too far into supernatural territory for my taste. It has the makings of a pretty terrifying, yet still grounded, creature, only it sort of ditches the groundedness a bit in favor of a few specific creepy situations that in my opinion didn't pay off enough to warrant losing that more naturalistic angle. Complaints aside, which I admit may largely come down to personal preference, the body horror was pretty good and the situation itself was suitably terrifying. It's the type of movie that leaves (pun) you to imagine how you'd handle things yourself if you were in that situation, and it's always fun when a movie directly leads you to that sort of thought process. It's a good time for what it is, and I had fun. Watched (17/31): #1 Gozu (2003), #2 Spider Baby or, the Maddest Story Ever Told (1967), #3 Viy (1967), #4 Mondo Cane (1962), #5 Dark Water (2002), #6 Blood and Black Lace (1964), #7 Daughters of Darkness (1971), #8 Sliders of Ghost Town: Origins (2016), #9 One Cut of the Dead (2017), #10 Possum (2018), #11 EGG. (2005), #12 Adventures of Electric Rod Boy (1987), #13 House of 1000 Corpses (2003), #14 Ganja and Hess (1973), #15 Q (1982), #16 Hungry Stones (1960), #17 The Ruins (2008) Challenges (4/5):
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Oct 18, 2019 05:15
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 SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #5 Tourist Trap #19 Juan of the Dead 2010 Amazon (Paid) This was a tricky challenge for me. As it turns out, I’ve seen at least one movie from most countries in the world. Now I can add Cuba to that list! Juan of the Dead is a zombie movie that follows the general schema and conventions of its genre. What sets it apart is that it applies these conventions- making cultural critique, interrogating the role of individual in society, etc- in a Cuban context. The movie stars a gang of petty criminals who feel stuck between Cuba and the outside world, the security of socialism and the opportunity of capitalism, beset by foreign enemies but alienated by their own state, with family members already gone abroad. When the dead begin to rise, these antagonisms sharpen and are borne out in miniature in a day to day struggle to survive a period of chaos. This movie’s alright. Some of the comedy is black enough that it makes it difficult to empathize with the protagonists. The biggest flaw is that the movie lacks drive, it feels a little languid, despite its short runtime. Now, a zombie picture can get away with a slower pace- Dawn of the Dead is exemplary for this- but you still have to feel a sense of threat and menace, and that’s not really present here. I’d be interested to learn more about the production of this. It was a joint venture partially financed by the Spanish government, and I think you can see that in its politics, but it never goes full gusano, either. 3/5
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Oct 18, 2019 05:18
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18. Transylvania 6-5000 Jeff Goldblum and Ed Begley, Jr. are reporters for a tabloid, sent to Transylvania to track down the Frankenstein monster. On paper it's sort of an homage to vintage comedies, Hope/Crosby etc., complete with a title that's a pun on an old song. (Though true to 1985, there's also a cheesy as gently caress pop theme.) Roger Ebert's Little Movie Glossary contains the term "Godot Movie", where a bunch of comic actors are put in a wacky situation and the audience waits for laughs that never come. That's pretty much this. I went into this with low expectations and was still kinda dumbfounded by how unfunny it was. Begley and Goldblum really don't have any chemistry, and the supporting cast (including Carol Kane and Michael Richards) try to make the most of a thin script by just being as wacky as all get-out. For every joke that lands (and to be fair I counted a few) there's a lot of business that I can't even describe as attempted jokes, just people lurching around and being nutty. Geena Davis does show up as a scantily clad horny vampire, which is the part anyone who saw this when they were younger remembers, but even she is not worth the trip. Look, I'm not that demanding, especially when it comes to a horror comedy around Halloween. It should be easy to throw Frankenstein and Dracula and the Wolfman in a spooky castle and make old jokes, the cornier the better, but drat this is bad.
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Oct 18, 2019 05:38
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Quick qualification question for the Tourist Trap challenge. Pulgasari should count for North Korea, right? I ask because of the movie's bizarre production situation, but it seems like it fits the spirit of the challenge at least. No worries if it doesn't, I can find something else, but it seemed like an interesting pull.
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Oct 18, 2019 05:46
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 #110) Scooby-Doo! Camp Scare (2010) Pretty good, by Scooby movie standards. The gang visits Fred's childhood summer camp, only to find that it's being besieged by the creatures of campfire legend. The movie did a good job of introducing the monsters one at a time and establishing their gimmick, and also with splitting up the characters into groups, threading them each on their own mini-adventure, and then reuniting them. The pre-rendered backgrounds looked good, but also made it obvious when an element was just being dropped into it, e.g., a Jeep skidding across dirt without leaving tire tracks. Also had another very cute opening credits sequence, like the last movie. There were some weird script choices, like when kids were throwing food at Shag and Scoob, and they chose to run away instead of seizing the opportunity to scarf down the thrown food. This was Matthew Lillard's second time up to bat as Shaggy in an animated film since replacing Casey Kasem, and he did a darn good job of it, with just a couple of line deliveries sounding off-pitch. Could have done without the fat asthma kid cliche, even if it did get flipped towards the end. Nice designs on the monsters, clear explanations for the plot motivators, and a funny little twist. The problem was that it all felt so inconsequential, aside from a genuinely tense scuba fight scene, but it also had the most zip-line action of any movie I've seen. Better than a lot of Scoobs, not as good as others. rating: 6/10"Fishman!" "Fishman? Fishman!"
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Oct 18, 2019 06:04
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SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #5: Tourist Trap Watch a horror film you've never seen before that was made by / filmed in a country you've never watched a movie from. #24: Troll Hunter aka Trollhunter (2010) - Norwegian  This is how you do a found footage movie. I thought there wasn't anything left worth watching in the genre years ago, and then I saw "Lake Mungo" earlier this month and now this. Granted, both of these movies are fairly old entries at this point, but I think I (along with anyone else burned out on found footage movies) got frustrated with the endless "Paranormal Activity" sequels and the original "Cloverfield," but it turns out that found footage can be done if you do it right. This movie does it right. A documentary film crew drives into the Norwegian wilderness to film a story about what they think is a man who is killing bears illegally, which has been pissing off the local hunting community. What they find is a mysterious man who isn't hunting bears, he's hunting goddamn trolls. The ridiculousness of that premise is addressed by the filmmakers and then turned upside down really loving fast as the monsters start actually appearing, and they follow the troll hunter into the wild. This movie owes a lot to the original "Blair Witch," because it evokes a lot of the same "running through the woods in the dark" shots in a way that no other found footage movie has been able to accurately replicate with actual sincerity. I saw the original "Blair Witch" in a theater when it came out, and this is the first movie to make me feel that same kind of genuine "oh poo poo" tension. The CG monster effects are okay, not perfect but still used well in this kind of "realistic" setting. I genuinely laughed at the bridge scene where a huge troll fucks up a bunch of goats and fights the troll hunter in a very fun nod to the Three Billy Goats Gruff. The titular troll hunter himself is awesome, and is easily the most interesting and fun character in the entire movie. I highly recommend this as a good entry in the found footage genre, and the fact that it tackles a mostly neglected monster in contemporary horror (trolls) and does it in a way that takes itself seriously and is still fun and interesting is a pretty awesome feat. 4/5 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; Troll Hunter aka Trollhunter (Challenge #5) Total: 24 T3hRen3gade fucked around with this message at 07:50 on Oct 18, 2019 |
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Oct 18, 2019 07:10
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 11: Ichi the Killer - Have been aware of this movie for a while but kinda kept skipping it due to it's reputation. However, I've already seen two other Miike films this month and kinda feel Miike's pace now, so finally went for it (it really isn't that bad compared to modern movies that have kept ramping the gore/violence up and up, but it definitely has a sort of edge to it). There's really a lot going on, yazuka action scenes with a lot of funk, random animeish power reveals, lots of abuse/rape themes. It's super weird, over the top violent and gory, and has super hosed up characters; but somehow that's never the point, it's like a normal yakuza crime drama is being played out except with a few absurdly over-the-top characters in play that completely warp the story around them. It's funky and often fun (and sometimes horrible), and extremely unique the whole time. There's probably an order you should watch Miike movies in, and I don't think this should be the first, but it's definitely something interesting. 3.5/5 Also rewatched In the Mouth of Madness - This movie owns. I love all the special mechanics going on, (e.g. small looping dimensions, power scaling with consumers). There are a ton of memorable scenes, fun performances, great dialog, great setting, and a unique theme. Definitely expect to rewatch this many more times. 4/5Goals - 11/13 - 1: K-12 2: Gozu 3: The Wailing 4: Phantom of the Paradise5:Viy 6: One Cut of the Dead 7: Happiness of the Katakuris 8: Little Monsters 9: Shadow of the Vampire 10: Bone Tomahawk 11:Ichi the Killer Rewatches - Event Horizon, In the Mouth of Madness Lhet fucked around with this message at 07:38 on Oct 18, 2019 |
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Oct 18, 2019 07:17
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 The War of the Worlds, 1953 The big great granddaddy of 50s sci-fi horror about killer aliens. Based on one of the first science fiction novels from way back in 1897, War of the Worlds by H. G. Wells, this movie helped spawn the whole sci-fi craze that took over horror almost completely through the 50s. Everything about this movie gets it right. The whole great 50s feel and look. poo poo blowing up, death rays, mass destruction, military people standing around talking strategy and scientists standing around saying science jargon. It's all there. And it's greatly done to show how bleak and dark the whole alien invasion is. There's no hope as no weapons work on them. Every time they got a hope, it's taken away as humanity is killed by the millions and cities are wiped out. It's very brutal stuff next to so many other films like these. And I love the design of the alien ships. It got feel of something from another world, yet have that good ol' time sci-fi feel too. A big bonus is that this one of the few films of this time in color, and it looks amazing as an result with all the strange glowing things and death rays. This one won an Oscar for special effects and it's easy to see why. They are outdated effects these days, sure, but they give the alien war that iconic look. If you are new to 50s sci-fi and horror, then this is one of the best introductions as it never gets boring and never feel cheesy like so many other titles. An absolute classic.
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Oct 18, 2019 07:47
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#21. A Christmas Horror Story SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #5: Tourist Trap I have never been to Canada EDIT: Derp, I misread this. Definitely seen a Canadian movie before.  An anthology, hooray! However......it makes the mindboggling decision to cut up all four shorts and present you only with the first quarter of one story, then the first part of the next one, and so on. The result is no repetition of that enjoyable build up and release, no sine wave of story after story, but instead you feel jerked around. Different stories, different vibes, different kinds of tension, it all gets mashed together and when you get in the right mood or start to be interested it just goes to something else. Very frustrating. I think if the shorts were shown as a whole it still probably wouldn't have been more than a decent movie, but the way it is presented really doesn't work. The wraparound of DJ Shatner getting drunk while increasingly panicky phone calls come in. Santa fighting zombie Elves was funny with a decent twist. Married couple's son replaced by a changeling went for some decent creepy vibes. Family haunted by an evil Christmas demon was a bit bland, but cool creature design. Ghost in a high school was a standard ghost story. They are all very different and it just doesn't work to move from building up dread over your child acting unnatural to Santa braining an Elf with a fireaxe. BioTech fucked around with this message at 12:11 on Oct 18, 2019 |
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Oct 18, 2019 08:22
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Family stuff has kept me from really sitting down and logging things so I'm gonna try and get what I've missed in. 30. Alucarda (1977) Watched On: Scream Streamer  That quote ain't kidding. But seriously, how had I never heard about this until that night of streaming? I'd love to go back and watch it when my attention isn't divided by work. 31. What We Do In The Shadows (2014) Watched On: Scream Stream  I had actually binge watched the series prior to ever seeing the movie but I was left with the same impression, it's funny as hell and I want there to be more. The Real World: Vampires is just brilliant. I'm also a fan of how nothing is explained too much and there is obviously a greater supernatural world on the outskirts of what the documentary crew and audience gets to see. 32. Viy (1967) Watched On: Scream Stream  Not at all what I would have imagined from a film made in the Soviet Union. I felt like I was watching scenes from a storybook play out and I mean that in a good way. I personally found the scenes in the chapel pretty intense. 33. Mystics In Bali (1981) Watched On: Scream Stream  Easily has one of my favorite witches of all time. God she's just a cacklin' and carrying on and having a good time. I love it. I had heard of Mystics In Bali before but I wasn't ready for the direction it decided to go, with a vampiric floating head and turning into animals. I can certainly say I've seen way worse Indonesian films, none even approaching as entertaining. 34. Child's Play 2 (1990) Watched On: Hulu  I think last month or so in the thread I made the claim the original Child's Play was the best and now I have to say that I was so wrong, this was far better than I remembered, forgive me Chris Sarandon. Chucky is SCARY AS gently caress, mean faces and crazy hair everywhere. I didn't even think it was absurd when the teacher gets a taste of yard stick. Child's Play 2 has now made it to the very top of my Child's Play\Chucky Power Rankings.
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Oct 18, 2019 09:01
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Franchescanado posted:SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #5: Tourist Trap 27) Troll Hunter 2010  This is a found footage movie of a group of students following a troll hunter. Hans the troll hunter is a great character. He's a crypto-conservationist, not out to eliminate the trolls as a species, just cull the ones that approach populated areas and make sure their population is healthy. The troll designs are oldschool and rather comical, with big noses and a waddling gait (at least for the smaller ones). I liked that, they had character. I expected something very generic and seldom on screen. I liked the nods to traditional tales especially the three billy goats scene which was great as well as traditional lore: trolls can smell Christian blood, but most Norwegians are atheist so there's a whole 'hey, who's secretly a Christian?  subplot and later Hans just shrugs when asked if being Muslim counts because it's not in the old tales.The whole government coverup thing was a bit weak. The trolls are just considered animals, they're not magic or intelligent so what's the point? It does lead to some funny bits though, like buying the wrong kind of bear from a zoo to blame for troll damage. This is of the better found footage films I've seen. Norway is so beautiful. I went there once, but it was for work and all I got to see was the airport and an office. What a waste.
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Oct 18, 2019 11:15
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 13 Nightmare in a Damaged Brain (1981) [Florida, New York, South Carolina] youtube This movie has somewhat of a reputation for being not just a video nasty, but the only video nasty for which the distributor was procecuted and jailed. However, I did not realize this going in, picking it for my US-state challenge because it was partly being set in South Carolina. I was clued in quickly though (the above gif occurs a minute or so in) since this movie is nasty, grim and shockingly gory. Following a psychologically disturbed murderer who its haunted by visions from his past it bears similarity to Maniac, and while Baird Stafford is no Joe Spinell his performance is appropriately disturbing. It does not hold back on the gore at all (done by Tom Savini although he denies it himself), which is some of the most extreme you'll see, throw in some child-murder, and it is obvious why this got the controversy it received.  14 Deathdream aka Dead of Night (1974) [Florida] youtube Shortly after a family is told their son has been killed in Vietnam, they get a big surprise when he turns up in the middle of the night. However, quickly it becomes apparent that he is not the same man as he was before he left. His family (and he himself, literally) rapidly starts falling apart when they are unable to deal with the situation. The conflict between the dad unable to accept that his son has changed and the mom refusing to acknowledge he has is very interesting. The PTSD-as-a-monster angle, from the drug addiction metaphor, older generations of soldiers of previous war not being understanding, and the always simmering tension waiting to come to boil is done really well.  15 Deathmoon (1978) [Hawaii] youtube An overstressed man takes a vacation to Hawaii to relax, only to find himself unable to remember large portions of the night. Could it be related to the full moon? Ofcourse it is, but the movie takes it sweet time to get there spending way to much time on a romance plot, and when the werewolf action does happen it is brief and dissapointing. Even though Hawaii has its own werewolf-like creature (the Kaupe), this movie only uses some made up Hawaiian folklore that ultimately is mostly irrelevant to how everything plays out. Horror movies set in Hawaii are in short supply for some reason, and it´s a shame this movie wastes the setting for a bog standard werewolf story.
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Oct 18, 2019 11:32
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blood_dot_biz posted:Quick qualification question for the Tourist Trap challenge. It's a film produced by and made in North Korea for a North Korean audience. The director's nationality isn't typically considered when you talk about what country a movie is from.
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Oct 18, 2019 12:42
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 19. THE RANGER - Shudder 5 punk teens on the run from a crime hide out in a cabin in a national park. Unfortunately, the local park ranger is just crazy about following the rules... I really enjoyed this film. Think GREEN ROOM if it took place in the EVIL DEAD cabin, or maybe crossed with CREEP a little. The characters are mostly assholes, but the lead is likable enough that you feel the tension as they are stalked but also enjoy seeing harm befall some of them. The film has a fairly appropriate pace; I didn't find myself checking my phone or anything. The violence is extreme at points, including one scene that made me recoil. Bravo! I found the ending of the film pretty interesting and I'm still deciding how I feel about it. In a weird way, that fact it was written and directed by a woman adds something special to the film's "punchline" and I'm eager to read some analysis of it. 4 out of 5 dead cops That Dang Dad fucked around with this message at 13:41 on Oct 18, 2019 |
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Oct 18, 2019 13:38
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Lets keep the  25 (32). The Mummy (1932) Watched on DVD Archaeologists unearth the coffin of Imhotep and ignore the clearly marked warnings of death curses and raise the ancient Egyptian priest who sets out to reincarnating his lost love into the young woman who is so conveniently connected to those dudes who ignored the warning labels. Imhotep really ain’t that bad a guy. I mean, he’s not running around killing people, they’re just all dying of shock and fright. Ok, he killed that old dude but that was kind of self defense. The slaves aren’t great but its not like those English dudes sun bathing at the top of the hill while they do all the back breaking digging are exactly treating them like equals either. And you gotta admit Imhotep got a raw deal. Dude just wanted his girlfriend back and he got buried alive for it. By his own dad. Who then killed everyone involved. Daddy Imhotep was a dick. Ok, he gets rapey there with the whole enchant the reincarnated version of your girlfriend and try and kill her and make her an undead mummy thing. I mean, she would get cool wizard powers but it should still be her choice, dude. Not cool. Joke aside, I guess I liked the film. Imhotep ends up being the most sympathetic of the 3 monsters so far and Karloff looks amazing both in his mummy makeup and in his evil wizard getup. Of course I would have preferred to see more Mummy Karloff but I did really like the minimalist scene in the little we got. It was a strong opening. Unfortunately the story kind of dries up for awhile when its just some pretentious English dudes talking curses and what the woman folk should do. I can see there why so many say its basically just a Dracula redo. I wouldn’t go that far. I mean, I see the skeleton of the story there and the whole dynamic of the worried dad, douchey love interest, and believing professor is definitely familiar. But the wider story isn’t that similar. I guess the problem is that it feels like they had like a 45 minute story and then padded it out by improving scenes from Dracula. So yeah, I get the comparison. There’s kind of a lot of iffy stuff going on with the all the “Nubian slaves” and backbreaking Egyptian diggers and “eww, modern Cairo” and just the general English colonial bullshit. But I guess that’s mostly to be expected for the time and topic. Still wasn’t the best. Like I said, I think there’s a really good story in here with Imhotep and Helen/Ankh-es-en-Amon. If you pull out like 75% of the scenes of english dudes talking in a study its probably a really tight little movie. As is its solid fun but not up to the previous Universal monsters. KARLOFF, KARLOFF, KARLOFF!  26 (33). The Raven (1935) Available on DailyMotion. Bela Lugosi is a brilliant surgeon obsessed with Edgar Allen Poe and KARLOFF is a violent criminal seeking Lugosi’s brilliance to change his face and start a new life. But Lugosi uses KARLOFF to trap him in his insane games of torture and obsession. This is a movie that has absolutely no wasted time. Like, it moves so fast that 30 seconds in I thought I might have missed something. Its just a mad dash from scene to scene, and the film is all the better for it. Its not really a great story or anything but its just this constant driving pace of growing madness driven by Lugosi’s absolutely delightful scene chewing madness. KARLOFF (as he’s credited, hence the running gag) is good and portrays yet another sympathetic ugly monster with the same balance of humanity and terror, but he’s there to be a foil to Lugosi’s totally bonkers nutcase in what’s basically a flip on their dynamic in The Black Cat. I’m guessing this is a pattern. Take Lugosi and Karloff, make them both madmen, and let them play off each other with one being the more evil of the two and the other the antihero. If it ain’t broke. Apparently the film’s torture and Lugosi’s sadism were too risqué for a 1935 audience and the film not only tanked but contributed both to England temporarily banning horror and Universal turning away from it and this golden age once the company would be bought from the Laemmie family a year later. This was apparently devastating financiallyy for Lugosi as I guess he was being type cast at this point, but from all this turmoil also came Lugosi and Karloff working to help get the Screen Actors Guild going with Lugosi using this production to sign up numerous actors as one of their top recruiters while Karloff was one of the SAG’s first board of directors/officers. Who would have thought? Two of Hollywood’s greatest villains are actually two of Hollywoods greatest heroes. I would very much recommend this if you haven’t seen it. Its fun, its fast, its only an hour long, and its up free on DailyMotion. I see why its so loved and was a very good essential for me to catch during this challenge. September Pre-Game Tally - New (Total) 1. NOS4A2 (2019); - (2). Splice (2009); - (3). Drive Angry (2011); 2 (4). The Twilight Zone (2019); - (5). Event Horizon (1997); - (6). BrainDead (2016); 3 (7). The Dark Tower (2017); 4 (8). The Collector (2009); 5 (9). The Bad Batch (2016); - (10). Rose Red (2002); - (11). Salem’s Lot (1979) October Tally - New (Total) 1. The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920); 2. Nightmare Cinema (2018); 3. Dead of Night (1945); The Queen of Spades (1949); 5. Tragedy Girls (2017); 6. House of Wax (1953); SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #1: The Best Month: 7. The Autopsy of Jane Doe (2016); 8. In the Tall Grass (2019); 9. The Night of the Hunter (1955); 10. The Thing (1951); - (11). The Thing (1982); 11 (12). The Thing (2011); - (13). Halloween (1978); 12 (14). Dracula (1931); SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #2: Dead & Buried: 13 (15). Q (1982); 14 (16). The Black Cat (1934); 15 (17). The Unknown (1927); - (18). Halloween II (1981); 16 (19). The Seventh Victim (1943); 17 (20). The Beast With Five Fingers (1946); 18 (21). The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1923); 19 (22). The Curse of the Cat People (1944); - (23). George A. Romero's Land of the Dead (2005); SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #3: Horror Noire: 20 (24). Ganja & Hess (1973); 21 (25). Drácula (1931); 22 (26). Universal Horror (1998); - (27). Happy Death Day (2017); 23 (28). The Phantom of the Opera (1925); - (29). Halloween III: Season of the Witch (1982); SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #4: Inktober: 24 (30). Velvet Buzzsaw (2018); - (31). Frankenstein (1931); 25 (32). The Mummy (1932); 26 (33). The Raven (1935) STAC Goat fucked around with this message at 13:51 on Oct 18, 2019 |
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Oct 18, 2019 13:47
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13. House of 1000 Corpses INKTOBER PROMPT: RIDE  I've held out on watching this movie ever since it came out, but still memories of it go way back for me. For any kids reading this (Kvlt?), if you're in high school and need a smooth way of rejecting someone who just asked you out on a date, suggest seeing House of 1000 Corpses in the theatre. If they change your mind about asking you out, great, mission accomplished! If they accept, either they're way into you or they're actually cool! Anyways, over the years the CineD horror thread has slowly Turns out that (as usual) the CineD horror hivemind is infallible, and I can't even hate the movie even though it has all the trappings of things that I dislike. You can feel the love oozing out of every nook and cranny of this movie, everyone involved is having a blast! Even though the stuff shown on the screen is overtly quite cruel and mean (cutting to a happy family christmas scene as a dad is murdered in front of his daughter, yikes), there is an extremely wholesome undercurrent running through the movie, and I dig it! I could feel the same energy in Lords of Salem, everyone is just happy to be making this goofy movie! That aside, it's definitely not a great horror movie to me, but perhaps the world's greatest Texas Chainsaw Massacre II fanfilm, and a very impressive first movie for anyone really. 14. Spider Baby  Here's an image of young Sid Haig eating a cat, I took many great screenshots of him for H1000C and didn't use them for my review, so here he is! Ok Spider Baby! I didn't know what to expect going into this one, perhaps more something in line with Night of the Living Dead? Instead I got an odd hybrid between old Hollywood horror comedy, with a light hearted theme song and cartoon credits at the start, and some much darker notes sprinkled inbetween. Is disturbingly sexy an inappropriate term to describe it? Probably. Watching it right after H1000C was a good move as there is certainly a lot of shared DNA between those movies. Seen: 1. Children of the Corn, 2. Night of the Comet, 3. The Ruins, 4. Butterfly Murders, 5. Boxer's Omen, 6. Corpse Mania, 7. Lair of the White Worm, 8. Gothic, 9. All The Colours of the Dark, 10. One Cut of the Dead, 11. A Blade in the Dark, 12. Tales from the Darkside,13. House of 1000 Corpses, 14. Spider Baby married but discreet fucked around with this message at 14:48 on Oct 18, 2019 |
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Oct 18, 2019 14:45
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SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #4 - Inktober I randomly chose an Inktober prompt, and the dice came up with 11 - “snow”. That’s a little disappointing, because I’ve certainly seen a lot of movies set in snow, but then again, I found out there was a sequel to Cold Prey which I watched way back when it came out, so what the hell. 24. Cold Prey 2 (2008) - New To Me #12  I don’t really remember much of the original - IIRC I felt like it was a pretty good but wholly by-the-numbers slasher, except “Snow”. Many of the reviews for this one basically say the same, and that this is the Halloween 2 to the originals Halloween, and that seems about right. Hospital, bad guy wakes up, starts to slash once again. A very simple and formulaic premise. But it delivered on that premise pretty well! And in the spirit of STAC Goat and T3hRen3gade’s suggestions, here’s a 45 second drawing I did on the sly at work in GIMP commemorating the point in the movie where the killer is weighing his options between two pick-axes.  25. Eyes WIthout A Face (1960) - Owned #7  What a gorgeous movie. It has a beautiful, almost noirish feel to it, with stark beauty and a very eeries mask. It was also more visceral than I thought it would be - showing things I assumed the camera would look/cut away from. Disturbing premise, a solid showcase of what guilt can drive people to. I’m sad I waited this long to see it and will definitely be revisiting it. But now I know what Billy Idol was on about! Movies So Far - 25: Rewatches: 6 - Deep Red, One Cut Of The Dead, The Endless, Train To Busan, TCM 2, Zombi 2 New To Me: 12 - 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: 7 - Werewolf Of London, She-Wolf Of London, Isle Of The Snake People, Creature From The Black Lagoon, Revenge Of The Creature, Paranormal Activity, Eyes Without A Face smitster fucked around with this message at 15:27 on Oct 18, 2019 |
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Oct 18, 2019 15:21
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 #111) Satan's Storybook (1989) Tubi. Uh, Satan's queen gets kidnapped by white ninja, he sends his minions to find her, and his jester keeps him entertained while the search goes on, by telling two stories about evil humans. The first covers a Richard Ramirez-type serial killer named Zeke, who packs a six-shooter in his denim vest and acid-washed jeans and invades the home (at 6969 Skeleton Place) of an aspiring witch (who has a Howling IV poster on her bedroom door). The second is about a Hell-clown. This movie had powerful '80s metal vibes. Fog machines, red light drenching, drum machine beats for the score, tiny skulls set on the stereo, headbands and medallions, demonic voice filters, suburban slaughter, leather bikinis, and so on. This was another SOV-looking movie, but it was clearly filmed by people who knew what they were doing. The masks were good, the make-up was good, the lighting was good... it was just the quality of the recording that brought things down. That, and, to a lesser degree, the corniness. The writing was delightful, I was spoiled for choice when picking dialogue for my quote. What a way to start the day! rating: 6/10"You know what I do to people who have balls?!"
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Oct 18, 2019 16:53
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