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Just wanna say I've really been enjoying your screenshot picks, Wet Tie Affair. e: Whoops, sniped. Have some seasonal pastries. 
Darthemed fucked around with this message at 00:59 on Oct 31, 2019 |
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Oct 31, 2019 00:57
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 # 31 THE LAWNMOWER MAN: DIRECTOR’S CUT (1992) Franchescanado posted:SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #9: Hackers And here we have the 141 minute cut of a movie I hadn’t previously seen. Since the most interesting part of the movie is the lawnmower man going from dimwit to genius to psychotic utopian CyberGod, I would guess the director’s cut is an improvement on the presumably rushed 108 minute cut. [Cyber]God forbid this transition occur without character development! It felt nice watching the story unfold. We even get a 20th century American philosophy lesson as Pierce Brosman’s character recites John Stuart Mill’s (philosophy people may want to call me out if I got the wrong guy here) warnings about the pace of technological advancement not being in sync with the wisdom of the human race. We can have the most powerful tech, but it will explode in our faces without foresight and caution. Too bad these concepts are chucked aside for goofy simulated reality special effects. Some are embarrassing, like the giant head of the lawnmower man attacking guards. It doesn’t help that this came out around T2. This movie got dumb when the lawnmower man got smart. Crazy idea: What if Billy Bob Thornton saw this movie and got inspired to make Sling Blade (1996)? Hear me out: we’ve got the intellectually handicapped man in a shed, and an abusive father getting his comeuppance. Eh, eh? SCORE: 6.2 / 10 *** # 32 SLUGS (1988)  Franchescanado posted:SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #10: Navel Gazing This is one of the few movies I could remember off the top of my head and positively identify as a thread-specific thing I discovered. I endured this to complete all challenges. Evidently, this movie is a foreign production (Spanish?) that pretends to be in the Midwestern United States during the Halloween season. So the whole time there is a very peculiar vibe going on. It’s not clear to me if it was actually filmed in the U.S. or what, I didn’t research further. Sometimes when a director is bad, the actors seem confused and almost come across alien-like. That’s the case for this movie and adds to the peculiarity. The dialogue is also…. odd. As for the monsters, well, they are big ugly slugs that devour flesh. This movie is very fleshy and gross. If you enjoy being grossed out instead of being scared, I say check this out. Otherwise, I can’t even recommend this to the hardcore creature feature fans – go check out some other Mother Nature revenge movie like Food of the Gods or Frogs!. Still - this movie is not bad enough to pour salt on this year’s challenge, as I’ve seen far worse! SCORE: 4.5 / 10
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Oct 31, 2019 01:05
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 46. Popcorn (1991) Dir: Mark Herrier (Blu-ray rental from Beyond Video) I wouldn't really call this a good film, but it's great if you want to watch a goofy horror film made by folks who clearly know a thing or two about film. The movies within the movies are honestly pretty neat parodies of folks like William Castle. Up there with Demons as one of the best horror movies set in a theater. The second half is way more interesting than the first, but this is still a fun time. Fair warning, the film has four (!!) scene-setting reggae songs. This would make a pretty great double feature with Scary Movie (1991) if you're looking for some trashy-but-fun Halloween-set films for next year. God bless Synapse for giving films like these gorgeous blu-ray restorations. 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 25. Errementari: The Devil and the Blacksmith 26. The Lighthouse 27. TerrorVision 28. Phantom of the Opera (1925) 29. Stay Alive 30. Hobgoblins 31. Knife + Heart 32. Rats: Night of Terror 33. Dog Soldiers 34. A Nightmare on Elm Street (2010) 35. Neon Maniacs 36. Hagazussa 37. Aenigma 38. Cure 39. The Lawnmower Man 40. The Last Wave 41. Body Bags 42. Blood Rage 43. Hellraiser III: Hell on Earth 44. Carnival of Sinners 45. Dagon 46. Popcorn Friends Are Evil fucked around with this message at 01:47 on Oct 31, 2019 |
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Oct 31, 2019 01:42
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Youtube Movie Marathon Part 9! #72: Stephen King's Quicksilver Highway  Cristopher Lloyd in a sexy goth outfit and Matt Frewer tragically not in a sexy goth outfit. This was super obviously meant to be a backdoor pilot. Two stories, each forty five minutes, with Christopher Lloyd as the only link. Just cut in half and you got two episodes of the Quicksilver Highway TV series. Presumably a combination of the movie not burning up the charts and how expensive the show would've been to make nixed that. So all we're left with is a two story anthology. The first story I would've liked if not for the magic teeth. That felt like an unnecessary spooky addition to a perfectly decent guy vs hitchhiker story. The second story is pretty great. A dude's hands go rogue! It's weird and fun, and commits 100% to the concept. And the cop from Sister Act is in it. Stephen King's Quicksilver Highway is worth it just for the second story. Plus Christopher Lloyd going hog wild, and who doesn't love some Frewer?
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Oct 31, 2019 01:47
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Holy poo poo, a Stephen King adaption I've never heard of!
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Oct 31, 2019 01:49
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Darthemed posted:Just wanna say I've really been enjoying your screenshot picks, Wet Tie Affair. Thanks. I feel like sometimes I lack the words to say what I want about a movie but can pick out the visuals that stood out for me and at least share those. And let me say that I am impressed by the sheer amount of movies you watch during these challenges! 15. Creepshow (1982) - Rewatch (DVD)    "Where's my cake, Bedelia?" - Nathan Grantham I can't name many (any?) anthologies as fun as Creepshow. When I was a kid the EC comics (Tales From the Crypt, etc.) were getting reprinted and this a great homage to those. "The Lonesome Death of Jordy Verrill" has maybe the best Stephen King role and is fun while also being creepy. "Something to Tide You Over" and "They're Creeping Up on You" are strong. My favorite segment is "The Crate," based on King's story. My first time watching this as a young child I was scared of the monster, but as I watch it now I appreciate the long-shot scheme by the professor to get rid of his wife. If there is a weak point it's in the first segment "Father's Day." It drags on a bit too long and there's not much to it. Although I find myself asking "Where's my cake?" sometimes when I can't find something. 4.5/5 16. The House That Jack Built (2018) (Showtime)  Super Samhain Challenge #2 - Dead and Buried (Bruno Ganz)    "When I was ten years old I discovered that, through the negative, you could see the real, inner demonic quality of the light. The dark light." - Jack This was only the second Von Trier movie I've seen (the other was Antichrist, which I liked). The movie concerns Jack, a serial killer who is having a discussion with Verge (who is actually the poet Virgil) about his life and philosophy. There's a lot going on here, and I feel like I would need to watch this again to get a really good sense things. On my surface reading Jack appears to be kind of a Patrick Bateman character in that he puts so much weight behind his work as Mr. Sophistication but ultimately he's just a killer with a bunch of corpses in a freezer. I think this is emphasized in the scene (in Incident 2) where Jack goes back to the motel room to take more pictures. He thinks he is creating works of art but they're just photos of dead bodies thrown on the bed and floor. I did have a laugh when there's some conversation about "true art" and then it's just clips of other Von Trier movies. Matt Dillon did a great job in this, and I'll be watching it again at some point, maybe after visiting some earlier Von Trier movies I've missed.
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Oct 31, 2019 01:58
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October 30 - Get Out https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sRfnevzM9kQ In September I said, "I am absolutely, positively watching Get Out this year. It's been too long and I need to see it." That led me to the Blumhouse DVD set which set me down this year's theme of watching box sets. Well here we are with one last disk in the set so it's time to pop it in and finally check out this movie. An African-American man goes with his white girlfriend to her parents' house in the country for the weekend. They're having a party with their affluent friends who all seem determined to prove how normal they all are. Of course, they're anything but normal. The reason I had to watch it this year was because I had heard that Get Out was potentially one of the greatest horror films of all time. After watching it, I'm not sure I'd go with that. That's only because I need some time to process it before I put it in a lofty position. A movie needs some time to percolate for me to start thinking of it in those terms. But Get Out was exceptional and significant and even if I don't I don't think I've ever seen a horror movie that used racial themes so well. There's so many magnificent touches in this film that they build on each other. Jordan Peele was definitely trying to hit those notes as hard as he could and it still worked because they were so skillfully done. As I'm writing this up the credit "Filmed in Alabama" scrolled past and that just adds another layer to things. The DVD has an alternate ending on disk and it's the exact ending that I was anticipating. So I'm kind of glad that it was changed out because positive endings in modern horror are so rare that I appreciated this one ending on a positive note with the horrible rich white people getting slaughtered by a black man who they tried to enslave. So much has already been said about Get Out that I feel like I don't have anything to add to the conversation. I liked it better than Us, but that's not a slight on Us which I thought was also a very good allegorical horror movie. If Jordan Peele wants to keep making horror movies with strong themes that he leans into, I'm definitely going to keep going to see them. That's two box sets down and one movie left to go. Unfortunately it's from the cheapie "Cult Horror" box so I don't have a lot of hope for it. But I've come this far... Random Stranger fucked around with this message at 02:41 on Oct 31, 2019 |
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Oct 31, 2019 02:36
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I'm actually gonna go ahead and call Stephen King's Quicksilver Highway the end of my Youtube Movie Marathon. Sorry the Fatal Frame movie, I hope I remember you exist next year.
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Oct 31, 2019 02:43
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 #169) The Shining (1980) DVD, partner's pick. Last time I saw this was a theater screening, and it's pretty hard to measure up to that, unfortunately. Thanks to the rain outside, good popcorn, and good beer, though, this was still a great time. What can I say about this? Great atmosphere, superb performances, amazing sets, sound design, tension, blocking, music, costuming, dialogue, and on and on. The very first issue of Fangoria I owned, long before I'd seen The Shining, alluded to it in terms that made it out to be a bench-mark for all other horror films. Not too far from the truth, really. I hate to go into list mode, as I know that doesn't make for enjoyable reading, but there's just so many excellent things in the film. There's the starkness of those interstitial cards, Mr. Halloran's visibly growing apprehension in the conversation about Room 237, the claustrophobia of the hallways and hedge maze, that hypnotic descending shot on the maze, the near-silence of the Big Wheel on carpet, Wendy doing all of the actual work, and the hotel driving isolation and distrust between Wendy and Jack when he's at his most vulnerable. Not to mention all the samples bands have lifted to creep up their songs. My favorite acting roles for all of the actors involved (I kept catching myself wondering how Nicholson's role in As Good as It Gets was influenced by his role as an author in this, though). I do wish Shelley Duvall hadn't had such an absolutely lovely experience making it, though. Read all the metaphor into it you can bear, or take it as a straight ghost/disintegration film. Amazing either way. rating: 10/10"I just want to finish my work." And that brings me to 13² movies for the month, which seems like a good stopping point. I hope everyone's had a good time with the movies they picked, and that the rest of the year goes as smoothly as it can for everyone who had some life issues arise. I'll be dropping the breakdown of my watches for this in a day or two. Have a great Halloween!
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Oct 31, 2019 03:09
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 31. A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night (2014): This is pretty good, but I don’t think I was in the right headspace for it. This is a slow, moody, stylish film. It’s got some great individual scenes (the first meeting between the girl and Arash is wonderful), but I didn’t have the focus to devote to it. The black and white cinematography looks great.
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Oct 31, 2019 03:17
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30. Predator I’m sure this isn’t going to be news to most of you, but drat what a good movie! Non-stop action front to back. Within the first 5 minutes I discovered a meme reference (Arnie and Carl Weathers bro shaking with giant biceps)! The side characters all got some good lines with Bill Duke threatening Carl Weathers multiple times and Poncho trying to get Billy to laugh with bad pussy jokes, finally succeeding. I never realized young Arnold was such a hunk (and a final girl). The entire movie is pretty awesome but the highlight is the predator removing all his gear to go one on one with what he realizes is the alpha to end all alphas culminating in Arnold winning and the Predator mimicking Billy’s laugh (from the bad pussy joke) before self destructing. So loving cool. 31. House on Haunted Hill (1959) Vincent Price doing his absolute best impression of Bill Hader doing a Vincent Price impression. Seriously though Price steals the show as always. I was pretty unimpressed to start but by the time it ended I really appreciate how long they kept it ambiguous if there was really even anything super natural going on. And then the twist. And then the twist on the twist. And then the twist on the twist’s twist! A fun ride that even has a decent jump scare for a 60 year old film.
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Oct 31, 2019 03:52
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 #22. Blood Feast (1963) (First Watch) A caterer kills women in perperation for resurrecting an Egyptian goddess. It's a gore flick. Plan and simple. Hershell Gordon Lewis is the godfather of gore with good reason. For '63 this is pretty grotesque, but tame by todays standards. The blood looks like red paint. All in all its neat.
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Oct 31, 2019 04:15
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Yikes I really let this get away from me since I was on vacation. Anyways heres a huge dump of em. 15. Dude Bro Party Massacre III (2015) - SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #4 Inktober Mindless I chose mindless for this because due bros are mindless. Duh of course. This was a rollercoaster for me between enjoying it and thinking the joke was dead. Ups and downs. In the end it was dumb fun so lets just say I enjoyed it. 4/5 16. Pet Sematary (2019) SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE # 11 Hail to the King This felt like nothing to me. It just kind of happens and feels like everything thats extra from the book was just removed to keep it going. What was the deal weird kid procession? Theyre just dropped and never really mentioned again other than it was creepy. And then really didnt add anything either being the only new part to the story really. 2/5 17. Xtro (1982) I watched this one after seeing Red Letter Media's Best of the Worst go on about it, I think I had to high expectations. Yes theres some nuts crazy effects that go on but theres really not much else to this. 2.5/5 18. Doom Annihilation (2019) SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #9 Hackers On the opposite end I went in with super low expectations of this one and enjoyed it. It was dumb but had enough game references/lore to keep me going. I'd say its on the level of a good SyFy Channel original film. 3.5/5 19. Predators (2010) This wasn't too bad either. Everyone is an action movie stereotype and it almost feels like a parody done serious because it's dialed up so high, they make good fodder though. 3.5/5 20. Rogue (2007) This never bit into me, I just kind of tuned out instantly. Something something big croc terrorizes people for a bit over an hour and a half. 2/5 21. The House at the End of Time (2013) SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #5 TOURIST TRAPS This movie is Venezuela, I don't think I can name another film from Venezuela. It's hard to talk about this one without out spoiling anything. The whole time travel thing works perfectly. Every bit of the movie feels like a gear that make another part work it's way to end In the end I liked this a lot. 4/5 22. April Fools Day (1986) SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #8 HAPPY HOLIDAYS Slasher movies live and die by how fun their kills are and none of the kills are on screen [spoiler]due them not happening.[/b] 2.5/5 23. Halloween 4 (1988) SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #6 SOMETIMES THEY COME BACK This felt a lot more like the original than 2 did. Mike Myers is a hulking force of nature and less of a slasher here. 3.5/5 24. Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark (2019) SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #12 CAVALCADE OF CREEPINESS Ack. This onehad an awful overarching plot did added nothing to the movie; it was just Final Destination Lite. Also VIETNAM ITS THE 60s GUYS. All your favorite weird drawings show up from the book. 2.5/5 25. The Hunger (1983) SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #10 NAVAL GAZING I had never heard of this one before seeing it posted in the thread, David Bowie and vampires sounded cool, too bad he disappears after awhile and thats it for him. Man I wanted to like this one sooooo much, but it just hurt to watch after awhile. I would have loved it if there was a little more of Susan Saradon's character actually doing some investigation and maybe having some agency before succumbing. And what was the deal with the cop he just kind of shows up twice. 3/5 26. Godzilla Vs Mechagodzilla II (1993) SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #7 MONSTER MASH Hey human defense force having a robot godzilla sounds awesome lets bog down the whole middle with kid godzilla that the scientist want to protect. gently caress that. At least MechaGodzilla was pretty cool when it actually got to fight at the beginning and end. 2.5/5 Watched: 1. Halloween 2 (1981) 3/5 2. Belladonna of Sadness (1973) 3/5 3. Boar (2018) 3.5/5 4. The Texas Chain Saw Massacre Part 2 (1986)2/5 5. Dead Snow(2009) 3/5 6. Ghost Stories (2018)3/5 7. SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #1: The Best Month:Evilspeak (1981) 1/5 8. One Cut of the Dead (2017)4/5 9. The Grudge (2004) 3.5/5 10. Joker (2019) 3.5/5 11. Annabelle: Creation (2017) 3/5 12. SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #2: Dead and Buried: House of 1000 Corpses (2003) 3.5/5 13. The Devil's Rejects (2005)2.5/5 SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #3. Horror Noire : 14. The People Under The Stairs (1991) 4/5 BONUS: Halloween (1978) SUPER SAMHAINS DONE: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12
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Oct 31, 2019 04:26
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Assimilate (2019, Netflix) This is a body snatchers movie for the social media age. It starts out promising and looks like itll be semi found-footage/mic lime tart style but it turns into standard Netflix house-style direction pretty quickly. There’s a good story in here but it looks like it belongs on the CW. Watched (33): 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, Zombieland 2, Eli, Return of the Living Dead 3, Psycho (1998), Monster Mash: The Movie, Evil Ed, Countdown, Prom Night (2008), The Dead Zone, The Willies, Assimilate 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 6. Sometimes they come back - Psycho (1998) 7. Monster Mash - Monster Mash: The Movie 8. Happy Holidays! - Prom Night (2008) 9. Hackers - Countdown 10. Navel Gazing - Evil Ed 11. All Hail the King - The Dead Zone 12. Cavalcade of Creepiness - The Willies 13. Maniac - Hocus Pocus
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Oct 31, 2019 04:38
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 38) From a Whisper to a Scream (1987) - watched on YouTube Trailer SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #12: Cavalcade of Creepiness Watch an anthology film you haven’t seen.In the town of Oldfield, Tenn., a place with a "long history of violence," a woman is executed by lethal injection after being convicted of murder. A reporter (Susan Tyrell!) goes to visit the woman's uncle (Vincent Price!!), the town historian, and he proceeds to relate four stories - all taking place from the modern day to the Civil War - to show how the town's evil has manifested over the years. 1) Clu Gulager plays a meek but intensely perverted guy who lives with his sister in a possibly incestuous relationship; he has the hots for his boss, gets her out on a date, tries to sexually assault her and accidentally kills her. And then he shows up at the funeral home to consummate the relationship!  Fortunately, nine months later, the situation resolves itself in the most ridiculous way possible. One long icky segment of  2) Terry Kiser plays a man doublecrossed by his girlfriend and wounded by mobsters; he flees to the swamp and is nursed back to health by a mysterious man who possesses voodoo magic and what appears to be immortality. He later tries to take his secret by force and, uh, it really doesn't end well for him. I saw the ending coming a mile away but it delivered - this was the best segment. 3) At a traveling circus, the local glass-eating freak falls in love with another woman - but in doing so he inflames the anger of the voodoo priestess (Rosalind Cash) running the circus and who gave him his power. When the lovers flee, things get messy. This one was just okay, and man, what a messy ending. 4) At the end of the Civil War, a group of Union soldiers led by Cameron Mitchell (!!!) end up in a small town in the deep South that is populated only by kids. Things get "Children of the Corn" very quickly when the kids imprison the soldiers and begin torturing them...and worse. Not much to this one, just more gore. Wow, so this sure was something. A low-budget anthology by a novice director and a writer who would later go on to make Tales From the Hood, the first thing you notice is the cast (who the filmmakers got by friend connections or asking nicely, per reports onlinle). Apparently not all of them (Price especially) knew what they were signing on for, because this is some mean-spirited, gory -inducing stuff.And the final film of the challenge for me...  39) The First Power (1990) - watched on YouTube Trailer SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #13: Maniac - Watch your “guilty pleasure” horror film.Detective Russell Logan (Lou Diamond Phillips) has finally tracked down and captured the "Pentagram Killer," Patrick Channing, who has been murdering people as part of a series of Satanic rituals. When Channing is put to death for his crimes, Satan resurrects him as an immortal spirit - the titular First Power (one of three powers that can be bestowed by God or Satan). Logan and a psychic (Tracy Griffith) try to track Channing down, but he's growing more powerful - exhibiting the ability to possess others, exhibiting inhuman strength and resilience and the ability to appear nearly anywhere without warning. See you around, buddy boy... I remember seeing this on VHS in the early '90s and it freaked me out; critics pretty much panned it, but it did well enough at the box office. The previous year, Wes Craven released Shocker which had a very similar plotline (killer is executed and given powers by an evil force to come back from beyond the grave), but I liked this one better because it does the whole gritty stuck-in-a-nightmare feeling better. So let's talk about the film's strengths. Jeff Kober is the film's MVP as Channing. The guy is charismatic and unnerving as hell as the supernatural killer, and it's unfortunate that the whole possession angle means that it's mostly other people playing "as" him. When he's on screen he's menacing as gently caress. The movie builds a lot of tension and dread by throwing in dreams and other "psychic" visions experienced by the characters, so you're never sure if what you're seeing is real or not - unfortunately this, and most of the other good stuff about the film, is dropped in the last act. The sound design is great too - the music is creepy, and whenever Channing is around, ambient demonic noise follows him. It's a very action-oriented film as well, so we get a lot of great stuntwork throughout (people jumping off buildings) and an awesome car crash. So what's disappointing about it? There's a whole lot here that looks cool but they don't really follow up on it. Even though the film explains what the three sacred powers are, the rules aren't really held to and Channing just does whatever he needs to do to make the scene scary or cool. There's a great sequence midway through where our heroes are hunting Channing in an apartment building, and the dude rips a fan off the ceiling and turns it into an impromptu weapon, but nothing really happens with it. The film sort of peters out by the last act because we've established that nothing can hurt Channing and everyone around the heroes can be him, and the last fight isn't as exciting as anything that came before. Even with those flaws, this one is still pretty effective. ***** And that's it! Final summary to come later! Holy crap I beat my record of movies watched from last year!
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Oct 31, 2019 04:43
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35. Haunt (2019) The "extreme haunt" environment has been the setting place for a lot of horror lately and it's easy to see why: you get an automatic great environment that you can build on the cheap, a number of twists you can fake towards, and the ability to throw a scary clown in there when the audience gets bored. I was dreading this a little when this hit two hack signifiers in the first five minutes (public domain Night of the Living Dead on tv plus a meek character covering a bruise with makeup) and the characters make the cast of something like Night of the Demons feel Shakespearean. But the beginning scenes, where you're not sure how far they're gonna go with this premise is genuinely pretty tense, with lots of blindly reaching into things and crawling through enclosed spaces. Unfortunately, the longer the slash and stab part goes, the further this goes into generic territory, but there are enough booby traps and clever setpieces to keep me engaged to the end. Not the best thing I've watched this month, but a nifty lil Halloween pregame. The choice of end credits song made me choke laughing. 2.5/5 
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Oct 31, 2019 04:51
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#29 Cremator (1969) Well this sure is a horror movie, and not really in the way that I expected. I didn't know anything about this movie going in, so even though it was foreshadowed early, I was very surprised when it really started to reveal its hand. I said "holy poo poo" out loud a few times while watching. It's extremely impressive how this movie manages to be simultaneously both subtle and glaringly obvious. It's also great to look at. It's got cool editing and shots, really neat scene transitions, and it's filled to the brim with visual metaphors and jokes. Oh yeah, this movie is also a comedy (albeit a dark one for sure). The line between what's creepy and what's funny is all over the place, which I mean as a compliment. Sometimes things are obviously intended as jokes, sometimes they're obviously intended as horror, and sometimes things make you laugh and shudder simultaneously. Highly recommend this one if you've never seen it. Maybe not the most "Halloween"-y horror movie out there, but chilling for sure.  Watched (29/31): #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), #18 The Lighthouse (2019), #19 Pulgasari (1985), #20 Halloween (2018), #21 Freddy vs. Jason (2003), #22 The Phantom Carriage (1921), #23 Resident Evil (2002), #24 The Legend of the Seven Golden Vampires (1974), #25 It (2017), #26 Tales from the Hood (1995), #26b Tokyo Gore Police (2008), #27 The Oily Maniac (1976), #28 The Boxer's Omen (1983), #29 Cremator (1969) Challenges (13/13):
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Oct 31, 2019 04:53
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And tonight's field trip to the theater makes #75. Lets see if I can find something to do tomorrow besides watch a horror movie. I'll probably go back to the theater and watch The Lighthouse instead. 72. Bloodrayne (2005) THE SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #13: Maniac  A half vampire-half human escapes from the freak show holding her captive and goes after Ben Kingsley, the vampire lord that is her father. She ends up joining Michael Madsen and Michelle Rodriguez and their band of vampire hunters to get to him. A betrayal and a weapon forging scene later and they all have a big fight. Not being the biggest fan of horror, I don’t really have a film for a guilty pleasure, but I sure do love lovely video game adaptations. I’ve never played the game this is based on but as a vampire movie it’s mostly ok but never actually good. 73. Mayhem (2017)  Some time in the future there is a virus not called Rage on the loose that causes people to have no sense of morals and go all crazy. Thanks to some clever lawyers, people infected with this virus aren’t legally responsible for what they do so things tend to get Purge-y. Steven Yeun is a lawyer who gets fired for his boss’s mistake right after telling Samara Weaving that she is going to have her home foreclosed. Before they both can be removed from the building the virus is detected and the building is quarantined for eight hours until the virus is worked out of everyone’s system. They decide to team up and take revenge on everyone in the building. Clearly just a mashup of 28 Days Later and The Purge but really fun. 74. The Nude Vampire (1970)  A man discovers a scantily clad woman escaping from her father’s mansion and demands to know more. His father says she’s a vampire and he’s looking for others like her. A mysterious group of people tell him his father is lying and that he needs to rescue the woman. This was part of Alamo Drafthouse’s horror preroll so I figured it must be somewhat interesting of a watch. I was wrong, it seems like they had included it just for the couple nude scenes. It felt like they kept setting up interesting scenes only to ignore it all and do something boring instead. 75. Doctor Sleep (Theater) (2019)  It’s several decades after the events of The Shining and Danny is having a rough go of life. It has been awhile since I last saw The Shining and this movie made me want to rewatch it. As a sequel, I’m not sure it could ever live up to what people would want. None the less I enjoyed the first watch of it. When it gets a home video release I’ll do a double header and then I’ll find out how I really feel about it. 1. Killer Workout (1987) 2. Ænigma (1987) 3. Killer Fish (1979) 4. Rear Window (Theater) (1954) 5. House on Haunted Hill (1959) 6. Nail Gun Massacre (1985) 7. Paranorman (2012) 8. Night of the Comet (1984) 9. Corpse Bride (2005) 10. 13 Ghosts (1960) 11. Vampyr (German) (1932) #1 12. Amuck (Italian) (1972) 13. Abbott and Costello Meet the Invisible Man (1951) 14. Fascination (French) (1979) 15. Lake of Dracula (Japanese) (1971) 16. Sorority House Massacre (1986) 17. Prophecy (1979) 18. Sorority Massacre 2 (1990) 19. Leviathan (1989) 20. Night of the Lepus (1972) 21. Puppet Master (1989) 22. Ice Cream Man (1995) 23. Return of the Living Dead 2 (1988) 24. The Giant Claw (1957) 25. One Cut of the Dead (Japanese) (Theater) (2017) 26. Return of the Living Dead 3 (1993) 27. Return of the Living Dead: Necropolis (2005) 28. Spider Baby (1967) #2 29. Dollman (1991) 30. The Two Faces of Dr. Jekyll (1960) 31. The Addams Family (Theater) (2019) 32. Return of the Living Dead: Rave to the Grave (2005) 33. Ganja & Hess (1973) #3 34. Arcade (1993) 35. Terrorvision (1986) 36. I, Frankenstein (2014) 37. Drácula (Spanish) (Theater) (1931) 38. The Snake Woman (1961) 39. The Bat (1959) 40. Witchfinder General (1968) 41. Homicidal (1961) 42. In the Mouth of Madness (1994) 43. Caltiki, the Immortal Monster (Italian) (1959) 44. House of Wax (1953) #4 45. Q: The Winged Serpent (1982) 46. Killer Klowns from Outer Space (1988) 47. Mr. Sardonicus (1961) 48. Prince of Darkness (1987) 49. The Fog (1980) 50. Piranha 3DD (2012) 51. Rawhead Rex (1986) 52. Viy (1967) #5 53. Psycho Shark (2009) 54. Return to Nuke ‘Em High Volume 1 #6 55. Phantom of the Paradise (1974) 56. Return of the Killer Tomatoes (1988) 57. Memory: The Origins of Alien (Theater) (2019) 58. Monster Squad (1987) #7 59. Black Christmas (1974) #8 60. The Hunger (Theater) (1984) 61. Mind Warp (1992) 62. Brainscan (1994) #9 63. Vampyros Lesbos (German) (1971) 64. Re-Animator (1985) #11 65. It Came from The Desert (2017) #10 66. Virgin Witch (1972) 67. Blood and Black Lace (1964) 68. Night of the Hunted (1980) 69. The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993) 70. Twilight Zone: The Movie (1983) #12 71. Dead & Buried (1981) 72. Bloodrayne (2005) #13 73. Mayhem (2017) 74. The Nude Vampire (1970) 75. Doctor Sleep (Theater) (2019)
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Oct 31, 2019 05:01
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33. SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #11: All Hail The King - Doctor Sleep (2019) Apologies for the giant black block, but I didn't even know early screenings were happening until a friend told me he had tickets yesterday and most of my words are about the finale so I'm just gonna err on the side of hiding everything. I haven't seen The Shining in at least a decade and a half, so I can't really comment on how effective this is as a sequel, but taken on its own merits it's...pretty okay. All of the leads do a solid job, but the antagonists feel paper thin - there are like a dozen of them and only a few have names. One of the earliest scenes establishes that there specialized flavors of Shining, only one of which gets named and explored. The pacing is satisfying, but there's no mystery or anything to explore; the story is simple and straightforward and nothing particularly wild or King-y happens at any point. The climax seems like a really cool setup, but was tremendously disappointing in practice. I really wanted to see either Rose tearing the place apart or the place tearing Rose apart, but after the pretty cool walkthrough with Danny waking the hotel up there's no sense of the place for the actual confrontation; there's nothing in the movie to tell us why he didn't just open up all those boxes back on the coast. I'm absolutely prepared to believe this was a problem with the source material, but just having a bunch of ghosts from The Shining pop out to kill her felt like the only really eye-rolling callback in the movie and also undercut everything that had come up previously about the place itself being the thing that was hungry. And then they just burn the hotel down, which I hate because what's even the point of having one villain that's a person and one that's a place if you can just kill both of them. Everything after Rose dies is terrible and makes me think we're stuck with Ouija Flanagan for the long haul. We would have been better off with Absentia Flanagan. All that said, it was an acceptable movie. I just wish it had been more adventurous.
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Oct 31, 2019 05:41
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blood_dot_biz posted:#29 Cremator (1969) Cremator is legit fantastic but it's obscure enough that I think it's only ever come up three times in these threads. It's definitely a movie more people should be aware of. duz posted:74. The Nude Vampire (1970) Jean Rollin seemed to almost specialize in that style of vampire film and had a good eye for visuals which is probably why the drafthouse included it. I haven't seen all of his movies (and I don't know if I'd want to admit it if I had), but you might want to take a look at a different film from him. He's kind of the definitive erotic vampire guy.
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Oct 31, 2019 05:47
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drat IT! Disney+ stole my guilty pleasure movie Bride of Boogedy! All my perfect plans dashed in the 11th hour! I have to scramble now!
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Oct 31, 2019 07:42
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When I got off work tonight I felt like watching something new that takes place on or around Halloween while the clock ticked over into good ol' All Hallows. Shudder had me covered... #43: Haunt (2019)  Didn't know anything about this movie, had never even heard of it, I just read the description and saw it takes place on Halloween and figured why not. I'm a big fan of haunted house attractions, my dad started taking me to them at an extremely young age, and it's become a sacred yearly tradition to do at least one. Going to one of these puts me in the Halloween spirit like nothing else, and while most of them are cheap and cheesy, there are some drat good ones out there that get really creative. This movie goes insanely over the top in that department (I mean, people actually get murdered) but some of the spooky setups in certain rooms I've seen used before in actual haunts, so that was neat. Oh right, the plot. A bunch of twenty-something friends go out on Halloween, have some fun at a Halloween party at some bar, and then stumble upon an off-the-map extreme"haunt," or haunted house walk-through attraction, that makes them sign waivers before entering because it's extreme yadda yadda. While walking through the maze, their friends start disappearing and people start getting hurt. Then people start getting killed for real. It's the first I've seen a movie tackle an idea that I've had since I was a kid walking through these things with my dad, which was "What would happen if some psycho started actually killing people in one of these things? That's an interesting idea for a horror movie." Welp, this is that horror movie. It's pretty predictable (at least until the very last scene which was a dumb-but-fun subversion of expectations) and the characters and acting are passable, but nothing here that reinvents the wheel. It's just a dumb, fun haunted house slasher movie with a good premise and some good kills. My one gripe is why did they even include the abusive boyfriend plotline? Why was he even a character? The entire domestic abuse backstory seemed to exist solely to get the final girl under the bed at the end, which seemed unnecessary. The rear end in a top hat boyfriend doesn't even share a scene with any of our main characters, he's just a plot device that goes nowhere and is promptly murdered when he finally shows up. Whatever. There is also an interesting twist with the villains that I won't spoil, but it was a fun bit of body horror that made this somewhat memorable. It's good but not great, and it definitely got me in the spooky spirit.  3/5 Watched: Midsommar; One Cut of the Dead; Apostle; Wolf Creek; Lake Mungo; Viy (Challenge #1); Demon Knight; Witchfinder General; Razorback; Joker; A Quiet Place; Spider Baby, or the Maddest Story Ever Told (Challenge #2); Hereditary; The First Purge (Challenge #3); Killer Condom; Road Games; Next of Kin; Zombie aka Zombi 2; Suspiria (1977) (Challenge #4); Phantom of the Paradise; In Her Skin; Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon; Wyrmwood: Road of the Dead; Troll Hunter aka Trollhunter (Challenge #5); The Tunnel; Profondo Rossa aka Deep Red; Body Melt; Suspiria (2018) (Challenge #6); Sadako vs. Kayako (Challenge #7); Black Christmas (Challenge #8); Unfriended (Challenge #9); Unfriended: Dark Web; Triangle; The Wailing (Challenge #10); Gerald's Game (Challenge #11); The Lighthouse; Body Bags (Challenge #12); Dr. Giggles (Challenge #13); Lake of the Dead; Possession; Killer Klowns from Outer Space; Halloween II: Director's Cut (2009); Haunt Total: 43
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Oct 31, 2019 07:59
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Super Samhain Challenge #1: The Best Month 33. Viy The Soviet Union's first horror movie, apparently! Shudder's presentation of this is a bit odd, it's dubbed, but the credits are still untranslated, and there's one brief part where the dubbing drops out and you hear the main character speaking Russian. Weird. Anyway, this film is about a young seminarian who, while out in the country, encounters an old woman who is also a witch, he attacks her and she transforms into a young girl. Later he is summoned back to the girl's bedside as she is dying and wants him to read the last rites, but he dallies and drinks and arrives too late, so has to stay up with her corpse for three nights to perform the necessary ceremonies. But, being a witch, the girl has plans. This has a real fairy tale structure, it's all about the witch trying to scare the man and get past his faith, which is aided by his being a total coward and hypocrite. (A portrayal of the clergy the Soviet government no doubt approved of.) It has a strange semi-comic tone, and is aided by great visuals with some interesting techniques being deployed. I decided this was a good movie about the time the witch goes coffin-surfing through the air, but the finale is the best part, full of weird ghouls and monsters. It's an amusing tale, and I'm glad to have it brought to my attention. 34. Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Meyers Ten years after his rampage, a comatose Michael Meyers awakens during an ill-advised prisoner transfer and makes his way back to Haddonfield. Laurie Strode has died offscreen but she had a daughter (Danielle Harris) who's living with a foster family and she's his target now. I'll say this, they tried. This movie starts well enough and does some interesting things with the setting, trying to make Haddonfield look a bit more like an actual Midwestern town without completely losing the look and feel of the original film. In fact, as this was 10 years after the original's release, this has sort of an "anniversary" feel with lots of nods to the original in terms of style and shots. Sadly it kinda falls apart in the final act, it actually gets sloppier and less focused as the tension should be mounting. (The number of writers credited is a warning sign, apparently this was affected by the strike?) I do like the twist at the end, even if the next film kinda ruins it. Overall it just goes to show that it's hard to keep getting more from this story. And yet- I am tempted to press on.
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Oct 31, 2019 08:31
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34. SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #13: Maniac - Halloween III: Season of the Witch (1982) Like many posters this was a hard one for me because I don't really feel guilty about any of the movies I love and Happiness of the Katakuris is objectively better than the favorite movie of anyone who isn't into horror. That left me fishing through my minority opinions (Lake Mungo is mostly just boring, Hellraiser III was at least kind of fun when I saw it as a teenager), which combined with what I most want to watch to wrap up the challenge left me with the clearly best Halloween movie, Season of the Witch. This is not to say I don't appreciate Carpenter's original or Rob's H2, but at the end of the day I'm part of the Videodrome generation: I want you to show me something new. Incomprehensible Evil in the shape of a man is just called a man. That's my lunch meeting. That's not really scary or interesting, conceptually. That can still make a cool movie, and Carpenter certainly was in the habit of making cool movies, but it's never ever going to be as cool as robots and stonehenge laser transmogrification. Additional things from this viewing: The company town makes for an excellent counterpoint to the original Halloween, as we've got characters running through basically the same homes and neighborhoods but with protagonist as the intruder. I have no idea why company towns don't show up more often in horror since they're intrinsically creepy and depressing. You get some of the same kind of thing in your creepy insular small town movies and your cult movies, but without the corporate feel it's just not the same. Like, how much of this town was robots? Does it even matter when everyone belongs to the company either way? The Silver Shamrock jingle is criminally underused. Tom Atkins is just completely doomed from the outset, mostly because his relationship with his ex-wife is so bad. I love his fluctuation between determination and complete abandonment of hope; we get this in slow form throughout the movie, and occasional high frequency versions like his fight in the factory. I really appreciate the triple attack-breather-attack sequence with robo-Ellie more than on first viewing. It killed me when he closed the door with her arm still attached. The last we see of Cochran is more ambiguous than I remembered. Maybe stonehenge short-circuited and disintegrated him, maybe whatever magic was attached to the sacrifice got triggered early in small form and he used it to head off to somewhere with a better view of the big giveaway, maybe sacrificing robots caused things to go haywire. I still want to see the prequel about the theft of stonehenge. That would have been a way cooler Halloween 4 than the one we got.
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Oct 31, 2019 09:45
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 Curse of the Fly, 1965 If you are a horror fan, you've watched The Fly. You've watched The Fly from 1958 starring horror icon Vincent Price. A bit slow and tame movie by today's standards, but still a great watch. And you've watched The Fly from 1986 starring Jeff Goldblum and directed by horror legend David Cronenberg. A true classic in body horror that's very deep and well written despite being a gross out monster flick. And you probably know both of these got some lovely sequels. The 80s one got The Fly II from 1989, stupid, but fun b-movie, and the original 50s one got Return of the Fly from 1959, an insultingly bad shitfest. But the 50s one got a second sequel that no one talks about. A good one in fact. Curse of the Fly from 1965 is an underrated, close to a masterpiece of horror. It briefly acknowledges the two first films, but there's no lovely and embarrassing scenes of some idiot stumbling around with a fly mask like in Return of the Fly. Instead, Curse of the Fly is surprisingly closer to the body horror of the 80s one (which isn't a remake in my book, but rather a completely new story based on the same basic idea). It opens with a girl running away from a mental asylum in her underwear, so that's a classy way to get thing started. She is picked by a scientist and they fall in love. It also turns out the scientist got some strange medical issues, and so does his father. They are of the Delambre family, descendants of the scientist of the first movie, and they too have been experimenting with teleportation. poo poo hasn't gone too well for them when it comes to health and there might some failed experiments in the past. There's things in this move that's surprisingly grotesque and morbid for a 60s film and stuff gets pretty dark towards the end. This movie deserves so much more attention from horror fan. If you love The Fly movies and older horror, then treat your self with Curse of the Fly. Hot Dog Day #89 fucked around with this message at 09:53 on Oct 31, 2019 |
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Oct 31, 2019 09:47
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#33. Night of the CreepsSUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #13: Maniac  I know this movie is well-liked around these parts, but I still count it as a guilty pleasure. Most of that is based on a post earlier in this thread, explaining how it is hard to find something people don't like on here, since nearly everything has people defending it. One thing that I like about the main thread is how there is no hive mind and divisive movies like Neon Demon (which rocks) and Rob Zombie's Halloween movies (which also rock) get plenty of love and hate at the same time. I know I'm in the minority for not liking The Witch, but more than a few agreed with that as well. That being said....try telling a non-horror fan about Night of the Creeps. Aliens. Brain slugs. Zombie axe-murderer. Completely unnecessary nudity. It sounds like a cheap 80s sleaze fest and.....it kinda is. Everything works and I love it, but this isn't the kind of movie I would discuss meeting someone for the first time, or with my in-laws. So, that tiny bit of shame, makes it a guilty pleasure for me. Been a few years since I last saw this and it wasn't as great as I remembered. It is good, it is fun, but it takes a while to get going and sometimes feels like a collection of ideas and moments instead of one cohesive feature. I was susprised at how sincere JC's goodbye recording was, didn't expect that. The finale is still great, it has zombies, guns and flamethrowers. What more could I ask for? "...thrill me..." And with that my October is done. I pledged 31 movies and watched 33 I also did all 13 challenges, though it felt like I was continuously juggling movies to fit the challenges. Midsommar was the best of the bunch, though I don't count I Saw the Devil since it was a rewatch. One Cut of the Dead was my number 2, guess I would finish my top 5 with The Devil's Rejects, Tragedy Girls and Tone Deaf, though not necessarily in that order.
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Oct 31, 2019 09:55
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Well my night was free since I just have 3 challenges to finish Halloween night and even though I gotta scramble to replace one of them I think I should still pull that off ok. And most of my night went to a fun World Series Game 7. But I can never sleep anyway and it is technically Halloween so why not get in a couple until I pass out?  - (73). House of 1000 Corpses (2003) Watched on Hoopla, available on Vudu, Tubi, Pluto, and Cinemax’s Amazon channel. Rob Zombie’s directorial debut and love letter to the grimy, violent, exploitation movies he loves saw him introduce the world to Captain Spaulding and the Firefly Clan as a bunch of teens driving cross country in search of roadside attractions in ‘70s rural Texas stumble on something more than they were hoping for with Spaulding, the Fireflys, and Dr. Satan. I was wanting to rewatch this all month with the sad passing of Sid Haig and release of 3 From Hell. I love The Devil’s Rejects but I’ve only seen this once (in the theaters) and was pretty cold to it, dismissing it as a fan film from an amateur. But my opinion of Zombie had changed a lot since then and I’ve always kind of felt like I owed it a rewatch. Like so many other films I just never got the time and I never got to see the third film in the theater so I eventually put it out of mind. But then I watched Zombie’s Halloween films and was so blown away by 2 that it just resparked my interest in this one. Plus, I’m still sad about Haig and I don’t think I watched anything with him in it this month. So I wanted to get to know Captain Spaulding again. I am, incidentally, a huge Animal Crackers fan. A lot’s changed since I saw this back in ’03. I’ve changed, obviously and my tastes have. I’m way more familiar with Zombie now as well as his cast of regulars including Haig. I have Devil’s Rejects and the Fireflys context. Hell, I didn’t realize that Dwight from the Office’s douchebag buddy in the film is Chris Hardwick. That’s both a surprise and not one. But probably most importantly I’m just a much fuller, more well rounded horror fan now then I was then. I mean, 16 years of horror watching since then and probably most importantly the last few years and just this last month. Zombie is obviously deeply inspired by his own horror fandom and 1000 Corpses is obviously deeply a homage to the movies he loves. I picked up on the broad stuff at the time but there’s a lot of little stuff like just the opening shot of Karloff in Old Dark House which I didn’t even know existed a year ago but now is probably one of my favorite horror images. Apparently Zombie’s too. So I think we’re probably more on the same page and I’m in a better place to appreciate what he was doing now. All that said… it’s still not a good movie. I mean… its still probably a fan film from an amateur. Zombie has obviously become a very skilled director and you can see plenty of what he loves and does here, but its obviously a very raw and unpolished form. And Zombie’s generally pretty raw and unpolished so this is like, a little more. Which honestly, probably has its appeal to fans of his film. I consider myself a fan of his films and there’s definitely a perfectly good little horror watch here. Like its not a movie I’d ever show to anyone or watch as a special feature night but its actually a very fitting random Halloween watch. Its the sort of love for horror and Halloween thing that helps set the mood. Maybe the sort of thing you’d even turn on in the background of a party. When I call 2003 Zombie an “amateur” that’s probably not totally fair since he obviously had experience in his music videos. And like, this is very much kind of a transition between the music video director and the feature film director. There’s a lot of stuff to look at and things happening. There’s not much of a story and things don’t exactly make sense. But I don’t want to make that sound bad. It is what it is. A serviceable first time for a guy who turned into a good director and showcase of horror imagery and ideas. More style than substance, but Zombie has a lot of style. Good Halloween viewing. And of course the start of something else much bigger and better.  - (74). The House of the Devil (2009) Watched on Hoopla, available on Shudder’s Amazon channel. A college student hard up for cash takes a sketchy babysitting job in an isolated home that has no kid. Being alone in a strange house can be spooky on its own but as the night progresses some fears turn out to be more than paranoia. Funny enough I actually borrowed this with one of my September borrows curious how it held up on a second go but I ran out of time before it “returned.” I ended up watching it with 30 minutes left wondering if I could steal the extra time or if it would just cut off. The answer is it just cuts off. But I got the borrows for October so why not finish it up? Anyway, I saw Joceline Donahue in the Father’s Day segment of Holidays and was absolutely blown away. Its the one really worthwhile segment of that movie and you really should watch it. You don’t even have to bother watching the movie or FFing to that segment. It’s right here. Its 12 minutes. It’s real good. Watch it. https://vimeo.com/136944197 Anyway, so I’m blown away by that and look up the actress and realize its the same girl from House of the Devil! Well now I just have to finish that rewatch I started early in the month, don’t I? It ends up being a really good accidental double feature with 1000 Corpses. Like that one a lot of style and clearly a homage to the “satanic panic” and haunted house films of the 70s and 80s. That’s probably where the similarities between Rob Zombie and Ti West end, though. West and Zombie clearly both grew up loving horror, just different kinds of horror. Zombie’s all about shocking you and West is really about slowly setting the mood to spook you. Zombie arguably shows you too much in his House and West arguably shows you too little in his. Anyway, I actually enjoyed this more than I remembered. My memory was that West sets a good mood and Donahue puts in a strong performance, but that they spent too much time in the setup and not enough time in the climax. That general take held in this viewing but in truth I didn’t remember the ending AT ALL. Like, not even a little bit right. Maybe like 10% of it I remembered. If I’m generous with myself. But a whole lot more happens than I remembered and was a MUCH better payoff than I thought it was. I really did like the payoff and while I still think the pacing might have been a bit off in the middle it delivered in a way I weirdly just completely forgot from my first viewing. Again, Donahue does a great job shifting from worried to carefree to genuinely scared to out of her mind. Its a shame there doesn’t seem to be more stuff of hers out there although I’ve put a couple of movies on my list and I guess she has a part in Doctor Sleep. Weirdly while Donahue hasn’t done a lot of note since this film and Ti West seems to have ditched horror films for TV the pretty small part of the best friend in this movie is played by Greta Gerwig who I guess is a kinda big deal now. She’s got bunch of acclaim for movies I’ve honestly never heard of and made her directorial debut with a film I have heard of and have been meaning to get around to seeing in Lady Bird. She’s also set to direct both a Little Women adaption and a Barbie live action film. Which is… well this is like a whole world I’m unfamiliar with and it just struck me while reading about the film. I digress. I quite enjoyed this. And while its not set on Halloween it still has a really solid Halloweeny/Autumn vibe to it. And like I said, the two Houses kind of happened by chance and felt cute with the names but actually ended up being a sort of solid double feature of two different styles I enjoy, both not quite done perfectly but with promise, and setting that Halloween mood.
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Oct 31, 2019 11:03
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Random Stranger posted:Jean Rollin seemed to almost specialize in that style of vampire film and had a good eye for visuals which is probably why the drafthouse included it. I haven't seen all of his movies (and I don't know if I'd want to admit it if I had), but you might want to take a look at a different film from him. He's kind of the definitive erotic vampire guy. Yeah, I saw Fascination earlier this month and loved it. Going over reviews, I think I just happened to pick one where he focused more on the visuals than the story which as you say is a good reason to include it in preroll entertainment. I will be watching more of his work so I might end up rewatching this one in a different frame of mind. duz fucked around with this message at 13:10 on Oct 31, 2019 |
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Oct 31, 2019 13:06
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Ahhhh I'm super behind again 27) Dr Phibes Strikes Again (1972) Not as good as the first one but still a ton of fun. Dr. Phibes elaborate killing machines make the Saw dude look like a complete hack. 3/5 28) My Bloody Valentine 3D (2009) SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #8: Happy Holidays! Garbage. Some of the gore is pretty decent but the characters are extremely unlikable and all obvious 3D effect shots are distracting as hell. 1.5 / 5 29) Extracurricular (2018) Not a fan. The main characters are pretty much just annoying teenagers with lovely ideas without any interesting qualities. Characters like Patrick Bateman are at least fun/intriguing to watch, can't say that for any of the leads in this one, which is not the actors fault I should add, they all do a pretty decent job. The movie is also shot very competently and Ray Xue might have a pretty good career ahead of him. I think my main problem with the movie was just how mean spirited it was. 2 /5 30) Gerald's Game (2017) SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #11: All Hail The King I liked this a lot! I'm not sure why I skipped it when it came out but I'm glad this challenge finally got me to watch it. Carla Guccino does a great job and the way her visions/inner voices are visualized works really well. 3.5/5 31) Creepshow (1982)  SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #12: Cavalcade of Creepiness First time I actually finished the movie, I tried to watch it a few times but I always checked out during the first segment for some reason. This time I powered through it (still not a fan) and I was rewarded with a collection of great little horror stories. My favorites were Leslie Nielson's beach adventures and the one with the bugs. 4/5 32) The Void (2016) SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #7: Monster Mash-up I hope the monsters in this one are different enough from each other to count  . The movie lays on the 80s aesthetic preyy thick but I didn't mind too much in this case because they actually made the effort to build a ton of very impressive practical monster/gore effects as well. I really appreciated how fast the story got going even if that meant that they would only have very limited time to introduce the characters. Didn't quiet come together in the end but still worth a watch.3.5/5 33) 47 Meters Down: Uncaged (2019 I like shark movies and this one, while not being nearly as good as Jaws or something like The Shallows, manages to scratch that itch well enough. The characters do a ton of dumb stuff but they still managed to make them sympathetic enough to make me care if they got eaten or not. The shark(s) look pretty decent and the underwater tunnel setting works well enough. 3/5 34) The Mutilator (1984) SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #10: Navel Gazing I saw that a bunch of people here watched The Mutilator this year and they seemed to like it so here we are. The movie is pretty slow for a slasher but I didn't really mind, the characters were interesting enough too fill the time when nobody was getting sliced up. The kills are nice and juicy, Chekov's fishing tools were used well and I really appreciated that they weren't relying on the characters making dumb decisions too much. 3/5 34.5) Possibly in Michigan (1983) I think shorts don't count but I watched this yesterday and I want to mention it. Possibly in Michigan is a 12 minute experimental horror-opera about two women who get stalked by in a mall by a cannibal who realizes that actually they were hunting him when he follows them home. The songs are dope as hell and most of the rest has that certain "just loving around with a vhs camcorder and some props from the Halloween store" charme. Definitely worth a watch, you can find it on Youtube. 3.5/5 35) Kill List (2011) (rewatch) I had completely forgotten how good this movie is. The slow buildup of weirdness during the movie works really, really well, culminating in an amazing knife fight against a hunchback at the end. I'm so glad that I decided to rewatch this because I didn't remember most of it, only that a cult was involved at the end. I completely forgot about the hunchback so that was a nice surprise. 4/5 36) The Lawnmower Man (1992)  SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #9: Hackers I liked this a lot more than I expected. It's way too long (I watched the 140 min version) but it stays entertaining throughout thanks to a ton of 90s cheesy technobable and the best worst cgi I have seen in a long time. 3/5 37) The Lazarus Effect (2015)  SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #13: Maniac (rewatch)I never really understood why a ton of people seem to hate this one. I really enjoy how this movie tackles the "bringing something back from the dead will have unexpected consequences" story, including Olivia Wilde's character backstory. It has some great actors who all give good performances, it is directed and shot well enough and at a runtime of 83 minutes it never gets boring for a second. It's not a lost masterpiece but I think the 2.1 on Letterboxd is WAY to harsh for this movie. 3/5 or maybe even 3.5 on a good day. And that concludes my Shocktober list for this year. Later today I'll rewatch Halloween 3 for the billionth time to end the month in style. Don't forget kids: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W7-uC0LDllM
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Oct 31, 2019 13:46
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32. The Evil Dead (new 4k restoration with new score) 1981 | dir. Sam Raimi in theaters  This review is specifically about the new 4k restoration of The Evil Dead, with a new score composed by Joseph LoDuca and new 5.1 surround sound mix by the award-winning duo Marti Humphrey and Jussi Tegelman.  The 4k Restoration My biggest worry with a 4k restoration of The Evil Dead is the possibility of the seams of a DIY low-budget indie film production being exposed, killing the magic. Thankfully, that wasn't an issue at all. Some effects that looked a little wonky on certain releases (the footage splicing to make the moon vanish in dark clouds, Cheryl's hands) actually look better with this release. It still has that wonderful 16mm fuzziness that helps give the film it's otherworldly look. There are new details to notice. Certain moments that have confused audiences are less confusing with a clearer image. For instance, Scott gets a thick stick lodged in his gut, which is later removed, leaving a wound that pours out blood like a spigot. In earlier releases, people assume that this is, for some reason, Scott's penis being yanked off. With this new restoration, the stick is clearer in earlier scenes, and when it is removed. All of the foggy outdoor scenes and outdoor night scenes are mostly improved. There's a few moments where it's easy to see the lighting scheme, but I think that's more of a problem for a viewer who's seen the movie many times.  The Sound Design Ab. So. Lute. Ly. Stunning. This is, for me, the big reason to experience this new version of the film. All of the sounds sound amazing. There's so much more depth and complexity with the soundscapes going on in this. The haunting howls of The Woods that start the film are articulated into a tapestry of shifting voices and sounds. The noises of the Candarian demons are scarier and more powerful. The mixing is also wonderful. The screams are loud, but not overpowering, and quieter moments have been made easier to hear. There are so many moments improved by the sound design. There is a scene where Ash steps into an ankle-deep pool of blood, and the new sound design made the people sitting beside me cringe and shudder in disgust. There is a scene where Ash drags Linda through the cabin, over Scott's body, past Cheryl, into the woods outside, in one tracking shot. You can now hear Scott's quiet death rattles as his struggled breathing is made more difficult with the weight of Linda's body, until he stops breathing. The improvements are impressive and numerous, and highlight some of the excellent details of this labor of love.  The New Score The Evil Dead's new score is almost a complete improvement. It's more cinematic than the original, with sharp strings, swells and crescendos during major moments, and pleasantly disorienting arrangements (the big tree scene is a great example). The changes were, at some points, distracting. I've seen the original too many times to count, so hearing new music at moments drew attention to itself. I don't hold that against the film, though.  Final Thoughts This might be my favorite way to experience The Evil Dead. I'm excited that future generations of viewers who've heard about this crazy disturbing horror movie Evil Dead getting to see this version as their first encounter with this classic. As of now, this is a theater-only experience. Hopefully this makes it to physical release, because I want to buy it day one. A Must Watch Movies Watched: Salò, or the 120 Days of Sodom | Annihilation | Evil Bong 2 | Overlord | Dead of Night | The Ruins | Under Wraps | Attack The Block | Don't Go In The Woods | Body Snatchers | Island of Lost Souls | Village of the Damned (1960) | Wrinkles the Clown | The Dead Zone | The Fog | One Cut of the Dead | Ma | The Devil Rides Out | Halloweentown | 3 From Hell | The Neon Slime Mixtape | Frenzy | Bride of Frankenstein | Halloween | The Skin I Live In | The Little Vampire | The House That Screamed | Hell Night | Hocus Pocus | The Lighthouse | Prevenge | The Evil Dead 4k restoration Rewatches: 10 Total: 32 Edgar Wright's 100 Favorite Horror: 7/20 Super Samhain Challenge: 1
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Oct 31, 2019 14:11
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Ending my challenge on a double downer, because my final films happen to be extremely bleak stuff.  47. The Addiction (1995) Dir: Abel Ferrara (blu-ray rental from Beyond Video) Another Abel Ferrara joint, and boy, it's a dark one. It could be interesting to try drawing comparisons to his earlier film, Driller Killer (which I watched earlier this month), given how they both take place in New York and feature an artist (philosopher in this case) breaking down. They both feature a great sense of desperation, though as you'd expect, this is absolutely a more complex and well-observed film which still has this pumping black heart behind it. The Christopher Walken scene is an absolute powerhouse and it's kind of weird seeing him actually act. I'm used to seeing Walken do a caricature of himself, because that seems to be all he does these days.  48. The Vanishing (1988) Dir: George Sluzier (blu-ray in my physical collection) I got this as a blind buy in the Barnes and Noble Criterion sale months ago based on folks I know hyping this up and I haven't touched it until now, so... here we go. The actual ending is just about as messed up as everyone says it is, but it's maybe worth remarking on how expertly the film builds on the information you glean. The journey is what's important. You make certain assumptions early on and they're not wrong, but things keep escalating from there. If you can go in blind, do so. Final ranking/overview coming later today. 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 25. Errementari: The Devil and the Blacksmith 26. The Lighthouse 27. TerrorVision 28. Phantom of the Opera (1925) 29. Stay Alive 30. Hobgoblins 31. Knife + Heart 32. Rats: Night of Terror 33. Dog Soldiers 34. A Nightmare on Elm Street (2010) 35. Neon Maniacs 36. Hagazussa 37. Aenigma 38. Cure 39. The Lawnmower Man 40. The Last Wave 41. Body Bags 42. Blood Rage 43. Hellraiser III: Hell on Earth 44. Carnival of Sinners 45. Dagon 46. Popcorn 47. The Addiction 48. The Vanishing
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Oct 31, 2019 14:38
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9) Bram Stoker's Dracula (1992) I'd only ever seen small parts of this before and have always meant to watch the whole thing. It's by no means perfect but the inventive visual effects and costuming make it very much worth watching. Oldman bounces between being a romantic figure to a monster very well and Hopkins' Van Helsing is a very weird but fun take on the character. Considering his character is supposed to be a guy who's kind of dumb and out of his element, I actually think Reeves would have been ok if he hadn't tried to do any kind of accent. It really drags down his performance but the movie has so much else going for it I never felt like it tanked the whole thing. I really enjoyed the portrayal of the inside of Dracula's Castle as well. Reality itself doesn't work right while inside and seems to bend itself around Dracula himself. Considering we have a bunch of snow here this Halloween, watching this did a lot to keep me in a spooky mood.
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Oct 31, 2019 15:06
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So yesterday I did something a little different instead of getting on with my state-challenge. Being a metalhead and there being many obvious connections between metal and horror I thought it would be fun to do a big metal-horror theme day, starting off with 48 Alice Cooper: The Nightmare (1975) Super Samhain Challenge #7 Monster Mash-up (Yes, I know Alice Cooper isn’t really metal, especially not this album, but he had a big impact on the genre so it only felt right to start here.) Ok this might need some explanation. This is a 66 minute tv-special made to accompany Alice Cooper’s first solo-album Welcome to My Nightmare, a concept album about the nightmares of a boy (“Steven” played by Cooper). It consists of videoclips of all the albums songs (plus one from an earlier album) connected by short interludes to create a continuous story. The clips are fairly basic, with little more than some props and costumed dancers accompanying Alice Cooper. Most are horror-themed, with witches, spiders and a cyclops turning up. Overall the clips for “The Black Widow”, featuring Cooper tussling with giant spiders, and “Steven” which has a bunch of dancers wearing Alice Cooper masks and a bunch of overlays are the most interesting of the bunch. However, what really makes this thing interesting for the casual horror viewer is that Vincent Price (who also does some narration on the album) shows up between the songs as the “Spirit of the Nightmare” that guides Cooper through his horrible dreams. In good Price fashion he is hamming it up, monologuing or simply cackling like a maniac and obviously having a blast. An interesting curiosity that it well worth seeking out.  NA Horror Metal Playlist #1 There are few things I love more than 80s heavy metal so I followed that up with this playlist of 16 kickass horror related 80s heavy metal videos (obviously starting with Alice Cooper’s Man Behind the Mask). It includes a bunch of horror movie theme songs (Dokken, Motorhead, W.A.S.P.), music videos by among others King Diamond, Helloween, Halloween and Candlemass, and some clips from movies that feature heavy metal like Trick or Treat and the motorcycle scene from Demons. Annoyingly, my favorite of the bunch Ozzy Osbourne’s Bark at the Moon was copyright-struck off youtube recently for some bizarre reason so here’s a dailymotion link. Now, for the final Super Samhain Challenge (guilty pleasure) I was in a bit of a bind, since I’ve committed to only watching new-to-me movies, and with my 50-state-challenge nearing completion, I have everything so fully planned that I simply couldn’t find the time to include a rewatch even if I wanted to. Now while I unabashedly like 80s metal, I must admit that some of it is very cheesy (Manowar anyone?). So I figured that a low budget movie written, produced and with the lead role played by Canadian Manowar-reject and ex-bodybuilder Jon Mikl Thor, frontman of the band Thor would almost certainly qualify.  49 Rock 'n' Roll Nightmare (1987) Super Samhain Challenge #13 Maniac Boy, did this deliver. Jon Mikl Thor (who plays himself) and his bandmates, wives/girlfriends & manager move to a house in the Canadian countryside to record a new album. This was terrible is all the right ways. Nobody can act, several full song performances, the worst Australian accent I’ve ever heard, copious amounts of sex scenes and cheap puppet monsters make this pure low budget trash. But the highlight comes during the finale which contains what may be the stupidest twist I have ever seen followed by a fight in which our heavy metal He-Man (now wearing nothing but a metal speedo) tussles with a completely static puppet. The fact that it all is played straight, and the fact that Thor quit his band to focus on his acting career gives it a true feeling of sincerity making the awfulness even more hilarious. I don’t think I’ve laughed harder all year. Absolutely ended up fulfilling the challenge.  NA Horror Metal Playlist #2 Moving on with another music video playlist, this time of 21 modern heavy/power/prog/thrash metal songs. I only picked videos with actual horror visuals, not videos of horror themed songs that were just the band playing. Ranging from Ghost to GWAR, videos were comical (Grave Digger) and spooky (The Bloody Hammers) to disturbing (Pain of Salvation) and gory (Iron Reagan). Highlights include Municipal Waste’s ‘Slime and Punishment’ with some cool visuals (see above), a cute stop-motion Hansel & Gretel vid by The Vision Bleak and the giallo-esque speed metal romp ‘Beyond the Blade’ by Vulture. But the best, and one of my favorite music videos in general, was Evergrey’s ‘The Masterplan’, an excellent, creepy vid that just works perfectly as a short film. That the song kicks rear end is just a bonus. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jHwbNXo1hyA  50 Deathgasm (2015) I finished things of with this New Zealand horror comedy in which a couple of metalheads unleash hell on earth when they play a demonic song they found. This was pretty entertaining, a little too much dick joke humor, but the over the top gore made up for it. I wasn’t too fond on the character of Zakk, making him an rear end in a top hat for no real reason made it hard to root for him. Initially I thought I maybe continue with another playlist of death/black metal songs, but since those are genres that I’m less familiar with, and there are a lot of gory extreme metal videos around I figured I save that for next year.  51 The Beyond (1981) [Louisiana] I did however have some time for another movie that could fit towards my personal challenge, and a Lucio Fulci movie seemed like an appropriate choice to cap off the day. A woman inherits a hotel, when during renovation a plumber breaks though some walls in the cellar a portal to hell is opened. There is also a blind lady but I’m not sure how she really fits into the plot. However, you don’t watch a Fulci movie for the plot, the real draw here is the gore. And goddamn, there is some good gore here, that spider scene! Also fun to see the origin of two clips I saw earlier tonight in Iron Reagan’s Eyeball Gore music vid. The finale however was a bit disappointing; the hospital setting was a bit bland, the zombies moved so slow that they barely were a threat and the gore was not as ridiculous as I had hoped (apart from the little girl’s head being blown apart). It was also really frustrating that after a scene where the doctor shoots a zombie in the gut and heart to no effect followed by an effective headshot, keeps shooting their torsos, come on dude. While this was a fun diversion, it leaves me with 5 more states/movies to watch today to complete all 50 states (including a few I still have to write-up). Busy day ahead!
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Oct 31, 2019 15:12
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 120) Halloween - 2018 - Prime An interesting entry in that it retcons out all the films save the original and Halloween III. This is very much a Laurie's story as after the events of the first film, she's withdrawn and become a survivalist of sorts in preparation for the eventual return of Michael she's convinced will happen at some point. It's wrecked her life to the point she's lost custody of her daughter Karen and has a rough relationship with her, though her relationship with her granddaughter Allyson's better. I really liked this one in that it drops the Laurie is Michael's sister so he's got to kill her angle, and any film that drops the Cult of Thorn crap is definitely a few steps up in my eyes. Overall, it has me looking quite forward to the next two films in the works at the time of this post, Halloween Kills and Halloween Ends. Final Thoughts: It's interesting to see how the franchise for this one turned out in comparison to Friday the 13th. This one branched out into a variety of timelines, a video game, novelizations and books. There's a 'blood' globe too if you snagged the anniversary collector's edition way back when. Michael broke off the base on mine and I need to get it repaired one of these days. It's like the Halloween franchise spent most of it's energy branching the films while Friday the 13th spent it's energy everywhere else. Should be interesting where the franchise goes from here, and I present an easy to follow infographic to keep track of the various timelines so you can better organize a Halloween marathon.  Franchescanado posted:SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #12: Cavalcade of Creepiness  121) George A. Romero Presents Deadtime Stories Vol. 1 - 2009 - Prime I'm not sure what's sadder, Romero lending his name to this willingly or hurting for money so bad he lent his name to this. Usually anthology films have fared pretty well with me on average. I can forgive a crappy wrap around story if the individual stories are good, and I can forgive if a story or two is a clunker if the wrap around along with a story or two are good. In this case it was a mass dropping the ball across the board. The wrap around is Romero on TVs acting as a sort of Crypt Keeper, saying a line or two in between stories. The stories themselves for the most part are bad, really bad. First one, Valley of the Shadow is a woman goes off into some jungle looking for her missing husband with everyone coming to a bad end. Second story, Wet involves mermaids and biting off a penis. Third story, Housecall is probably the better of the stories. Savini directed this one, and the plot is a doctor makes a housecall to see a boy who insists he was bitten by something that's turned him into a monster. I wish I could say this was worth sitting through just for the last story but not even Savini can save this anthology. It's not worth a watch, even when drunk or buzzed. Franchescanado posted:SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #13: Maniac When I came up with the challenge, I was curious to see how people defined 'guilty pleasure' as well as to see what films they chose. Naturally I wasn't thinking at all what I'd go with. I swear I'm my own worst enemy with challenges.  122) Vampire in Brooklyn - 1995 - DVD While it's a fairly standard vampire plotline, it's the little things that made me love this one. The concept of an island in the Carribbean where vampires have a home reminded me of the old stories I'd hear as a kid of similar on an island near Sicily. The distinctive carvings on Maximillian's coffin. The relationship between ghoul servant and vampire. All that made me want to know more about these Carribbean vampires especially since we're shown so little of their culture. The chemistry between Eddie Murphy and Angela Bassett completely sold me on the growing connection between them, while other vampire films with a similar plot just doesn't pull it off. While the humor's a bit of a mixed bag, I feel the rest of the film's pretty solid. After watching this, I heard John Witherspoon passed away. He'll be missed, I loved everything I'd seen him in.
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Oct 31, 2019 15:22
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Friends Are Evil posted:Ending my challenge on a double downer, because my final films happen to be extremely bleak stuff. I watched these two during the May horror challenge, and I absolutely loved them. They're downers, but they're amazing downers!
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Oct 31, 2019 15:25
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36. Dagon (2001) Watched On: Tubi SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #5: Watch a horror film you've never seen before that was made by / filmed in a country you've never watched a movie from (Spain) This was a strange one compared to the other Stuart Gordon films that I’ve watched over the course of the challenge. No laughs, no camp, just a pretty straightforward horrifying adaptation of The Shadow Over Innsmouth. The lack of the lighter bits made the gory parts a lot harsher. Dagon also falls victim to the “early 2000s CGI” problem, which is a shame as all of the practical and makeup effects are very good. I think there’s a version of this movie where they only used CGI for the bare minimum (undersea hole, Dagon itself) that would have aged a lot better. All in all, an interesting movie. I didn’t enjoy it as much as From Beyond, but it definitely scared me more. And with that, I’m done with all the Super Samhain Challenges! I got past my goal a week ago, so I may just stop here. Got a night of house decorating and child spooking ahead of me.
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Oct 31, 2019 15:43
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19. Lake Mungo I wanted to like this, the thread hyped it up for me and hasn't steered me wrong yet. There were some nice twists and turns, but I couldn't figure out why it was boring the hell out of me. After thinking on the movie after it was over, I realized what it was: no one shows enough emotion in their voices, even when describing things that should elicit a lot of emotion. They all talk like they're being interviewed on a true crime reality show, but this is their daughter or sister they're talking about, and some crazy stuff happened. It reminded me a lot of The Haunting of Hill House on Netflix, because it had the same plot element of a girl seeing a ghost that turned out to be her ghost from the future. I get why people like this one, I just found it dull.
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Oct 31, 2019 16:32
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SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #13: Maniac I had a hard time picking something for this - there are some films that I'd call "guilty pleasures", but they are mostly old comedies I saw when I was young that are super dumb or haven't aged well that I like anyway (Ace Venture 2: When Nature Calls comes to mind). I couldn't really think of any horror films that fit this criteria though, so I went with something from the same era, where my love of it may have been colored by nostalgia. However it really is an excellent horror movie, so... I'm sticking with it anyway because I'm getting burnt out on movies this month.  36. The Faculty (1998) (re-watch) (digital) The teachers at Herrington High are slowly being taken over by alien parasites, and a group of students are the only thing standing between them and world domination. This movie has a pretty stacked cast of '90s actors - Josh Hartnett, Elijah Wood (who looks like he is 12 here), Famke Janssen, Salma Hayek, Usher, Robert Patrick, and Jon Stewart, among others. Directed by Robert Rodriguez and written by Kevin Williamson, this is a really fun film that I think often gets overlooked. The first half of this film is a riff on Invasion of the Body Snatchers, but by the end it is basically The Thing set in a high school. It mimics one of the best scenes of Carpenter's film, where all the characters take turns testing themselves to prove they aren't aliens, and later on even has a severed head grow limbs and scuttle away. A lot of the effects are CGI, but the ones that are practical look really great. As you might expect from Rodriguez, this film has a great sense of humor and pretty much all of it holds up really well, which is more than I can say about the jokes in many '90s comedies. If you haven't seen it, I highly recommend it. It's a ton of fun and one of the best horror films of the late '90s. 4.5/5 Total: 36 Watched: Dead of Night | Child's Play (2019) | Escape Room | Hell Night | The Wind | Evil Dead (2013) | Cure (Challenge #1) | Tigers Are Not Afraid | The Craft | Tower of London | In Fabric | Popcorn | Cube | Uninvited | Galaxy of Terror (Challenge #2) | Brightburn | Body Bags | The Tingler | The Wax Mask | Cube 2: Hypercube | Dark Water (2002) | The Ruins (Challenge #4) | Viy | The Haunting | Bones (Challenge #3) | A Nightmare on Elm Street (2010) (Challenge #6) | November (Challenge #5) | The Monster Squad (Challenge #7) | April Fool's Day (Challenge #8) | Fido (Challenge #10) | In the Tall Grass (Challenge #11) | Trilogy of Terror (Challenge #12) | The Lighthouse | Resident Evil (Challenge #9) | Halloween (2007) | The Faculty (Challenge #13) Samhain Challenges: gey muckle mowser fucked around with this message at 22:49 on Oct 31, 2019 |
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Oct 31, 2019 16:35
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32. Trollhunter Another Basebf555 joint. Another good one too. I don’t really feel any type of way about found footage but for those who don’t like it, you might still enjoy this. More than half of it looks like it was shot in UHD and is crystal clear and beautiful. There are some shaky cam in the dark moments but they’re pretty few and far between. I loved the Trollhunter himself and his general attitude towards everything. The trolls all looked awesome and were pretty impressive CGI. My only complaint would be that it’s a little long for what it is, but I understand they wanted to show off lore trolls. 33. Pulse (2006) Super Samhain Challenge 9 I know this isn’t the one I’m supposed to watch but we are running out of time and if Kristen Bell is in it, my wife will watch it. Too bad it sucks. Good cast and even was written by Wes Craven? But it’s very bad. You don’t have any clue what’s going on until the movie has been on for an hour, and once you find out your first thought is “wow, that’s stupid”. It’s also so 2006 it hurts. It then makes you realize how long ago 2006 was and that also hurts. The only good thing about Pulse (2006) is that Brad Dourif got a pay day.
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Oct 31, 2019 16:37
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gey muckle mowser posted:
I watched this a few months back for the first time since I was a kid and it absolutely holds up despite (or possibly because of) how unbelievably 90s it is.
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Oct 31, 2019 16:50
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