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I'm excited to do this again! My goal is 31 movies, mostly ones that I haven't seen but also some that my girlfriend hasn't seen (ie. I just want an excuse to watch Mandy and Trick r' Treat again). Looking forward to diving into Carpenter's lesser known films, a bunch of lesser known giallo on Amazon Prime and some classic 20s-50s horror! Also, if your local library has access to Kanopy, there are a lot of cool horror selections that you can watch for free! I think you can check out 4 per month, but there's a lot of Bava, some Argento and Fulci, Criterion/Kino stuff like Caligari and M, as well as Knife + Heart and Let The Corpses Tan.
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Sep 28, 2019 00:49
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1. Black Sunday (1960) Watched On: Kanopy I wanted to start my challenge out with a classic that I’ve never seen before and Kanopy has a bunch of Mario Bava movies available. Black Sunday is a gorgeous movie: its set and lighting design, and the makeup effects are incredible even today. The bubbling and crawling of Asa the witch’s face reforming was nicely gross now and I can’t imagine how audiences in the 60s reacted to it. However, I think it’s a movie that I could throw on in the background of a party and still get the same amount of enjoyment out of it. The slow pace and static action would be more palatable if you were observing it while conversing. The dialogue also suffers from the Italian tendency to overdub every line later and there are some real weird line readings in the version I watched. All in all, it’s a movie I respect, even if I’m not sure I like it.
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Sep 29, 2019 01:26
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2. Blood and Black Lace (1968) Watched On: Amazon Prime I thought I didn’t like giallo, but I think I might just not like Argento because this movie was loving amazing. It’s a dramatic technicolor parlor mystery with absolutely beautiful shot composition (the scene around the purse with the diary in it at the fashion show in particular is incredible) and a Christie-like framework that gives a more believable rationale to the killings than a lot of the slashers/giallo I’ve seen. The deaths are sensational, but not pornographic. Mainly, I just love how messy it is. Every character is a soap opera stereotype acting their asses off in a vibrantly colored world of secrets and fashion. Even the eventual reveal and denouement were really satisfying. I am absolutely going to watch more Bava giallo and I highly recommend this one.
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Sep 29, 2019 02:46
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married but discreet posted:I love the Evil Dead remake. It manages the rare feat where a movie is so mean it turns into comedy and the otherwise unpleasant cruelty sort of evaporates for me. Even though there is a lot of over-the-top gore in this movie, the poo poo that really makes me shiver are all the little cuts and defensive wounds. Just that immediate reaction of "gently caress I know EXACTLY what that would feel like."
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Sep 30, 2019 17:17
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3. Night of the Comet Watched On: Amazon I watched this one because it was recommended to me as a fan of Night of the Demons, but man is it more than that. There’s a lot of craft and a surprising amount of heart to this movie, in between bowl-cut kid zombies and goofy one-liners. There’s a lot of production effort put into the little details, from piles of fake nails in the red dust to the radio station’s etched in neon contours. But the best part of the movie is the two lead performances of the Belmont sisters. They’re funny, they’re emotional and the whole movie works because these two siblings believably care about each other. The other performances are solid, don’t get me wrong, but the irrepressible sense of fun comes straight from Catherine Mary Stewart and Kelli Maroney. My girlfriend was yelling “this is my new favorite movie!” during the climax and eventual hilarious ending and I can’t say I disagree.
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Oct 1, 2019 00:48
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4. Chopping Mall (1986) Watched On: Amazon This movie is 75 minutes of Grade B 80s teen schlock and I was here for it. The whole premise is absurd, the robots look like fancy mobility scooters and everyone spends the movie doing a whole lot of nothing (horny nothing pre-robot and ineffective nothing post-robot) It was also interesting watching this directly after Night of the Comet, because Kelli Maroney is in this too, but she has absolutely nothing to do. Everyone makes the best with a bad script and makes big broad dumb choices, particularly of the gum chewing variety. All in all, a fine bad movie. Some memorable lines (“but babe, I LIKE pepperoni”) and it didn’t overstay its welcome.
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Oct 1, 2019 04:09
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5. Five Dolls For An August Moon (1970) Watched On: Kanopy I started Bay of Blood on Kanopy and wasn’t really feeling it so I started up this other Bava giallo instead, mostly because it starred classic spaghetti western dirtbag William Berger. It’s an Italian as gently caress murder mystery revolving around a very important and completely nondescript “formula” and a bunch of horrible men and beautiful women trying to get it. The plot is absolute nonsense and way too complicated for its own good, with a really dumb final twist, but the performers are still enjoyably over the top. The camerawork is straight out of the Kevin Dunn playbook, with insane crash zooms and nauseating swirls. The real standout is the music. The movie is scored by the guy who wrote Ma Nah Ma Nah and its like he’s getting paid by the instrument. It’s full of soaring organs, toy pianos, disco flute, spaghetti western guitar stings and rapid-fire bongos. It’s the funkiest goddamned soundtrack to multiple murders I’ve ever heard and absolutely worth watching the movie solely to experience it.
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Oct 2, 2019 01:49
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I think if they cut like a solid 30 minutes out of it, people would remember Van Helsing a lot more fondly than they do now. I always love the first third of it when I've rewatched it and then it starts dragging and you remember that it's two hours long.
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Oct 2, 2019 15:43
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6. The Case of the Bloody Iris Watched On: Amazon I have a soft spot for Giuliano Carnimeo’s incredibly stupid spy action spaghetti westerns, so I thought I’d try his one giallo film. Like Carnimeo’s Sartana films, it’s definitely an imitation of a better known movie, but it’s not without its charms. It stars brooding beauty Edwige Fenech from Five Dolls for an August Moon along with Carnimeo featured player George Hilton and has a fun jazzy score by Bruno Nicolai, the hardest working composer in Italian cinema. I don’t know if it’s solely the work of the English dub or the script itself, but the movie has a lot of hilarious performances in it. The best friend, the undercover police officer and the fashion photographer all help make this a more comedic affair than most other giallo I’ve seen. Despite a flower child sex cult subplot, it doesn’t quite reach the ridiculous heights of Carnimeo’s “secret machine gun sewing machine” spaghetti westerns. It’s fine, but not worth going out of your way for.
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Oct 2, 2019 20:18
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7. In The Mouth of Madness (1994) Watched On: Vudu As we were watching this, my girlfriend reminded me of the old Coco Chanel adage, “before you leave the house, look in the mirror and take one thing off.” This movie has a LOT going on in it and I think that works to its detriment. The metafictional elements are where this movie really shines: the works of Sutter Cane and how the real world is being shaped by writing that even he can’t understand. All the best parts of the movie come from that. But there’s a lot of other stuff in the film that I don’t think bolsters that central theme. The zombie kids and townsfolk are totally unnecessary. Sam Neil’s continued insistence that this is all a scam in the front half of the movie is too. Even the involvement of the Great Old Ones being the impetus for all of Cane’s writing seems a little too much for one movie. I think it would have been stronger if it just focused on Neill going crazier as Cane’s reality begins to overwrite his own. Definitely a strong end to the film, I just wish it was as strong in the middle.
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Oct 3, 2019 00:32
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8. Videodrome (1983) Watched On: Criterion Blu Ray For: Super Samhain Challenge #1 “We're entering savage new times, and we're going to have to be pure... and direct... and strong... if we're gonna survive them.” This is a profoundly upsetting movie, not just in its imagery but in its ideas. In the age of social media, 8chan radicalization, mass shootings and the blending of physical and digital, private and public, it’s all too prescient and all too real. There’s not much more I want to say about it. It’s an incredible movie on all levels. If you haven’t watched it recently, see it again. But be prepared for the themes to hit a lot harder than they would have even a decade ago. Lumbermouth fucked around with this message at 00:24 on Oct 5, 2019 |
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Oct 3, 2019 19:58
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9. Happy Death Day (2017) Watched On: HBO Now After how hard Videodrome hit me, I wanted a fun horror comedy to cleanse my palate. I started Deathgasm, but quit after an hour or so because I didn't like any of the characters and I didn't anticipate that changing. I remembered that Happy Death Day was surprisingly well-received for a PG-13 Groundhog Day horror movie, so I checked it out. It's barely scary, but holy hell is this movie funny. The script is sharp and the assorted montages of Tree reliving her birthday over and over are all really well done (the one where she's trying to rule out suspects in her murder being the particular highlight). Speaking of our goofily named protagonist, I don't think the movie would work as well as it does without the performance of Jessica Rothe. She sells all the aspects of her character: her initial terribleness, coming apart at the seams after continually waking up on the same day and eventually wanting to be better. Although a little formulaic, it had some fun twists and turns and I'm VERY interested to see how they make a sequel to this work.
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Oct 4, 2019 00:57
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10. One Cut Of The Dead (2017) Watched On: Shudder Broke down and got Shudder for the month. I'll echo pretty much exactly what everyone else has said about this movie. It's amazing. Go into it knowing absolutely nothing about it. One of the best movie experiences I've had all year.
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Oct 4, 2019 03:01
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11. You're Next (2011) Watched On: Blu Ray Bought this used from a library sale like a year ago and never watched it until now. I have no idea why. This movie has a hell of a lot of moving pieces and every single one of them hits at the exact right time. Everything starts simple (family drama, home invasion, bickering siblings) and then gradually gets more complicated in increasingly satisfying ways. Usually when a movie puts this much stuff into motion, some of the threads end up loose but Simon Barrett's script is tight and tense. The cinematography is also top notch, making the tight spaces feel tighter and the dangerous situations more dangerous. There's not really much else I can say. I really liked it.
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Oct 5, 2019 02:21
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12. Green Room (2015) Watched On: Netflix I thought this would be a good companion piece to You're Next. What the previous films wrings uncomfortable laughter out of, Green Room goes for sheer visceral horror. This is the second time I've seen it and the first for my girlfriend and it was just as affecting, mostly thanks to the performances. The film is still beautifully shot and lit and the script is tight, but without the acting ability of Yelchin, Stewart et al, the whole thing would be the sum of its parts and not more. The violence is incredibly upsetting both because of its suddenness and the reactions of the characters. Pat screams so horribly when he's hurt, the whole band reacts with stunned horror as a Nazi's stomach gets opened up with a boxcutter and you can almost see the survival instinct in their eyes as the situation keeps getting worse and worse. This movie is a lot, but gently caress it's really worth it.
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Oct 5, 2019 04:34
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13. The Ritual (2017) Watched On: Netflix This movie has unbelievable atmosphere. Everything, from cinematography to sound design to the absolutely beautiful Scandinavian locations create this overwhelming sense of dread that permeates everything. Not only did I love its atmosphere, I also loved its restraint. You spend so much time with our four leads, being freaked out and panicking in the never ending woods that it starts to rub off. I would find myself watching the background of scenes, waiting for a slow movement of the creature in amidst hallucinations or closeups. Everyone involved in the making of this movie knocked it out of the park, especially whoever was responsible for the creepy as gently caress creature design. I highly recommend this one.
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Oct 6, 2019 03:17
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gey muckle mowser posted:
Yo this movie seems awesome and I definitely want to watch it.
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Oct 7, 2019 01:30
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Jedit posted:If anyone's needing a leg-up on this one, you can include The Creature From The Black Lagoon, The Fly (1958) or The Satanic Rites of Dracula. And of course you can always watch Evil Bong! I'm either going Night of the Creeps for Dick Miller or All The Colors of the Dark for George Hilton.
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Oct 7, 2019 19:02
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14. Mandy (2018) Watched On: Blu Ray I saw this movie in theaters last year because it was only screening in my area for one day and I felt that it had to be something I experienced in all its cinematic glory. Upon rewatch, I was definitely right. Make no mistake, this movie is still beautiful. The production and lighting design are still some of the most insane things I've seen put to screen and the score gives the whole film this pervasive sense of both dread and wonder. Cage is one of the few actors in Hollywood today that I think could pull off the film's combination of manic insanity and emotional devastation. But the first time I saw it was lightning in a bottle and, for better or worse, I can't recapture that on a second viewing. If you haven't seen it, absolutely do so. Crank the goddamned subwoofer, turn off your phone and just let it wash over you.
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Oct 8, 2019 17:39
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15. Hell House LLC (2015) Watched On: Shudder I can definitely see why the thread was so high on this film. My only previous experience with found footage was watching V/H/S for last year's October Challenge and the premise of this one intrigued me. The acting is a little rough and the handheld nature of the film can be a little much on the senses, but there's a lot of good stuff in here. I liked the framing device of a documentary, complete with talking heads, about the opening night at the Hotel Abaddon and trying to get to the bottom of what happened there. Once we delve into the box of footage recovered from the crew, poo poo slowly starts getting weird. The ramp-up of things being wrong with the hotel is gradual but effective and the cast really sells the horror of something as simple as a mannequin moving around or a phone suddenly bursting with static. The climax was genuinely unsettling: claustrophobic and, for a lack of a better word, real. I wish they didn't use as much of the cutesy video artifacting as they did, as I think it took away from the actual imagery they were presenting, but overall I really liked it. Now I will accept it as a single movie and not seek out any of the sequels.
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Oct 9, 2019 03:01
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16. Prince of Darkness (1987) Watched On: AMC, Then A Reluctant Amazon Rental SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #2: Dead & Buried (Jessie Lawrence Ferguson 1942-2019) Now this is the kind of poo poo I was looking for by exploring Carpenter's back catalog. Where In The Mouth Of Madness dips in the middle, this one stays strong the whole way through. This movie reminded me of a classic Call of Cthulhu scenario: a broad group of curious investigators brought into an environment where the inexplicable is occurring. Donald Pleasance is in Serious Mode in this movie as the priest and, as a huge fan of Big Trouble In Little China, it was great to see Victor Wong and Dennis Dun in prominent roles here. Special credit has to go to Jessie Lawrence Ferguson for his strong portrayal of Calder, the seminary student in over his head. I won't be forgetting him walking up the stairs belting out Amazing Grace, then slicing open his own throat in front of his colleagues for a while. Though I expected some horror, I definitely wasn't expecting the existential dread with which Prince of Darkness really makes its mark. There's a lot about the nature of evil at the center of this movie, whether it's innate in the human soul or something put there by outside forces. I loved the simple ways that the giant swirling mass of evil manifested itself in simple, but effective ways. Insects crawling through electronics, crucified pigeons, worms sticking to walls and the green ooze dripping upwards out of its tank to form pools on the ceiling all got to me. But the creepiest thing was the photonic dream broadcast from the future, especially how it played out after the film's climax. All in all, I highly recommend this one.
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Oct 10, 2019 00:27
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It was also a great pairing with Hell House LLC because both of those movies nail the “something is intensely wrong here” mood.
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Oct 10, 2019 01:33
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Class3KillStorm posted:Are the other Purge movies as fun as this one was? If so, I may have to check out the remaining films or the show. Definitely check out The Purge: Anarchy. It’s where the series starts to get blatant about “no this is literally class warfare.”
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Oct 10, 2019 18:08
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17. Halloween 3: Season of the Witch Watched On: HBO Now This movie has had a late-career renaissance after the critical drubbing it was given upon its release. As someone with no nostalgia for Michael Myers outside of enjoying the first Halloween movie last year, it's definitely an undeserved reputation. However, this movie is REALLY dumb, like down to its core conceit. Cochran's plan relies on so many insane moving parts and is seemingly executed for no real reason that the whole thing becomes laughable. There are moments of genuine horror in this, mostly having to do with the robotic employees of Silver Shamrock, but it is all wrapped up in dumb nonsense. Tom Atkins is the perviest character I've ever seen in an 80s horror movie (WHICH IS SAYING SOMETHING) and all of these flirtations are fruitful. He misses relevant plot because he's having sex with a college student! He's the worst. It was definitely a fun watch and I can why it was so polarizing upon release. Definitely recommended if you want to watch a real dumb horror movie this October.
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Oct 10, 2019 18:37
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Man Bites Dog is still one of the most unpleasant movies I’ve ever seen. It’s really well made, but I can never get that image of the guy from the camera crew gleefully raping that woman out of my mind.
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Oct 11, 2019 02:26
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18. Tales From The Crypt Presents: Demon Knight Watched On: Vudu Rental SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #3: Watch a film mentioned in Horror Noire that you haven't seen before Yes, this movie is goofy. Yes, it's shot like a high-budget episode of a basic cable show (but then again so was Scream, so maybe it's a 90s thing?). Yes, it is bookended by a boobtastic TFTC episode directed by the Cryptkeeper and a guillotining at the big premiere. But holy poo poo did I love this movie. The thing that impressed me the most was how easily this movie got an entire backstory/mythos across in its relatively short run-time. It's lean and compact, never revealing more than it needs to. The cast is full of classic "oh hey, them!" character actors, including Dick Miller and CCH Pounder, plus a particularly badass William Sadler and Jada Pinkett. But none of that is the real reason to watch this movie. You should watch this movie because this is the Most Billy Zane movie ever made. Think of every wide-eyed, over the top and overly dramatic performance you've seen out of Mr. Zane. Now crank that up to 150% and just watch him go. Whether he's trapping Jada Pinkett in a Sade video in her own mind or angrily kicking up dirt in a fake hillbilly accent outside a hotel, it's his movie. Does that intrigue you? Then check this out. If not, why doesn't it? Billy Zane loving rules.
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Oct 12, 2019 02:11
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19. The Babysitter (2017) Watched On: Netflix This was another frustrating one like In The Mouth of Madness. The cast is so damned good, the script is quippy and fun, it's excessively gory and everything turns out how you'd want it to. But it's a movie that gets in its own way over and over again. The direction, cinematography and... like weird graphical overlays all take away from what should be a much tighter overall experience. I don't need Scott Pilgrim overlays over every action or the hits of the 80s and 90s blaring over every montage. It's too much. But it's still worth a watch, if solely for the performances. Samara Weaving is both charming and over the top, Andrew Bachelor (the Vine guy!) gets a lot out of a pretty limited role and Robbie Amell totally steals the movie as the overly enthusiastic shirtless murder junkie. It's a movie that I like which I think I could have loved if it was handled better.
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Oct 13, 2019 02:18
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20. Phantasm Watched On: Shudder I haven't watched any of these movies since I was about 18, pulling them off of a DirectConnect server in college. This is a testament to Coscarelli's ability to make a pretty decent movie with limited resources. It has a very "let's put on a show" mentality to it: someone had a sweet 'Cuda so it goes in the movie, Reggie and Jody can both play the guitar so it goes in the movie, we can use exteriors of this amazing-looking funeral home so it becomes the central location. The whole movie is a pretty slow burn, as are most 70s horror movies, but there are still some real standout moments once the action gets going. The first sphere attack is really gnarly, both visual and audio-wise and I love the glowing white room where the finale of the film takes place. The soundtrack is also very creepy in that 70s Italosynth style and my girlfriend caught me grooving on some of the drum work being laid down on more than one occasion. The acting is serviceable save for Angus Scrimm, whose physicality as The Tall Man is still creepy as hell. You can see how he made an entire career off of this performance. I wish there was an easier way to watch Phantasm 2 because that's the one I remember liking the most, so I might just keep this challenge to one Phantasm movie
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Oct 13, 2019 15:06
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21. Lord of Illusions (1995) Watched On: Blu Ray I think this is still my favorite Barker film. The acting isn't great, it has a bit of a Skinemax quality to its plotting and there's some ill-advised early CGI in it for seemingly no reason. But what it does have is imagery. Shots and sets and ideas by the goddamned bucket. The opening scene of this movie, with Swann and the rest of the reformed cultists driving out to the compound to rescue Dorothea from Nix, is one of my favorite opening scenes of any movie. It sets the stakes, it shows off the insane production design of the cultist's house and lets you know how far gone these folks are. Even if the rest of what follows doesn't hold up narratively, the locations definitely do. Framing what follows as a detective story is an easy way into my heart. I love a good mystery and though this isn't a great one, it's a great device to go from one amazing image to another, all tied together with a creepy and subtle mythology that never quiiiite lets you in on the secret. I've never watched the original theatrical cut, solely because it takes out my favorite scene in the whole movie (the eerie montage of Nix's cultists being reactivated) so if you want to watch this, seek out the fantastic Director's Cut Blu Ray that Shout Factory put out.
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Oct 13, 2019 21:10
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22. The Exorcist III (1990) Watched On: Tubi Whoo man, this movie. It is definitely a film that you can tell was written by a novelist. It almost feels closer to a filmed play than a traditional screenplay. However, it makes you focus that much more on the dialogue and that dialogue is what disturbed the hell out of me. This is a relatively gore-less film, but the description of crimes lay heavy over the characters. The clinical police report stylings of horrific murders and the muted reactions by the characters around them only enhance that horror. When there are supernatural moments in the film, they're sudden and jarring, as 95% of the whole movie is visually mundane. But I don't think the movie would work without the performances. George C Scott is barely holding his rage and fear together as a police lieutenant brought face to face with the nemesis he thought was dead and Brad Dourif... man, Brad Dourif is an incredible loving actor. He holds the entire movie together with sheer mocking venom and it's incredible. The only thing I didn't like about it was apparently something that William Blatty shared, which was the tacked-on supernatural showdown at the end of the movie. I would definitely like to see his original ending on the screen.
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Oct 14, 2019 01:05
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Franchescanado posted:SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #4: Inktober Would ballet count as art in this context or would it just be physical medium? I've been looking for an excuse to finally watch Suspiria.
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Oct 14, 2019 14:52
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Watch a horror film you've never seen that heavily features art or artists, or the main character is an artist.
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23. The Phantom of the Paradise (1974) Watched On: Shudder on Amazon Prime SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #4: Inktober I have no idea how this movie isn't a bigger deal. Like Rocky Horror big. It seems to have come from a time before critics understood intentional camp. From the imagery to the music to the melodrama, this whole production is balls to the wall and completely sincere. Every emotion is on high: love, despair, anger and every sin under the sun cranked to full volume. It has the feel of a live action cartoon and a pop version of The Holy Mountain all at the same time. It's a movie that feels very ahead of its time and it makes me sad that DePalma never really attempted anything like it again. I had no idea that Paul Williams was even involved in this film when I began it, let alone the central villain of the piece. The man wrote some of the best songs of the 70s and his influence is all over this thing. The piano ballads tug at the heartstrings, the stage rockers rock, it's all amazing. There's one striking image out of countless beautiful pieces of art and production design that stuck with me. The scene of our Phantom, Winslow Leach, surrounded by old school analog synthesizers that his destroyed vocal chords are plugged into. He's playing the song he played when he was introduced, but his voice is all harsh distortion and static until that villainous Swan turns a few knobs and adds a few filters and gives him back what he stole in the first place. All he wants is for you to sign a little contract.
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Oct 15, 2019 01:31
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24. The Abomidable Dr. Phibes (1971) Watched On: YouTube This was a great companion piece to Phantom of the Paradise. More ridiculous murders, more glowing lucite props and 100% more Vincent Price acting real hard without moving his lips. It almost has the energy of a 70s sketch show, with this rhythm of "Dr Phibes does a murder, followed by a vignette back at his lair, followed by the detectives investigating the scene." The whole movie deadpans how ridiculous each escalating scenario is, which makes it all the funnier. I got some very strong Graham Chapman As An Authority Figure vibes from the police chief and his blustering. The rest of the performances also have that sketch character style to them, but it's ultimately not a bad thing as this film is more of a comedy than I had anticipated. My girlfriend said early on that the scariest thing in the movie are the creepy looking mechanical band in Phibes's lair and that's absolutely true. Watch this one if you want a night off from scary horror and just want to see some doctors get killed in increasingly elaborate ways.
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Oct 16, 2019 15:08
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Zwabu posted:The film is great but the mechanical band totally makes it. Sold me right from the opening scene. That and the creepy dude lasciviously hand cranking the movie projector with a brandy in his hand. It told me exactly what kind of movie this was going to be.
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Oct 16, 2019 15:20
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M_Sinistrari, I don't know why you're doing this to yourself but your tolerance for shittiness is impressive.
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Oct 17, 2019 18:42
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I feel like the only giallo that I’ve unequivocally liked was Blood and Black Lace. Still haven’t seen Suspiria yet and am making my way through Stage Fright and enjoying it thus far though.
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Oct 18, 2019 04:34
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25. Stage Fright (1987) Watched On: Shudder Whoo boy, this one was a clunker. It has a fine opening act and a novel premise (sleazy theatrical production is beset by murderer, uses murder to try and hype performance) but once the slashing goes into full effect, the whole thing just falls apart. I haven't seen a whole lot of horror movies, but the characters in Stage Fright might be the single stupidest cast in horror. My girlfriend and I were laughing at first about how they continued to split up, make plans and then abandon them immediately. But after the group has been so focused on escape this whole time, they decide to all run up into the rafters of the theater to chase the killer down and it all went downhill from there. I'm not usually one to nitpick these kinds of movies, but it kept getting worse and worse. Our film climaxes with the main character, while holding a gun and with the killer fully out in the open, deciding instead to climb under the stage and use a nail to retrieve a key from underneath his feet. Instead of, you know, shooting him and then doing that. Not to mention the complete waste of time that is the return to the crime scene and the genuinely insulting killer getting shot in the head, then turning to the camera and smiling at the audience. A total waste of time.
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Oct 19, 2019 02:19
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gey muckle mowser posted:aw man, I think StageFright is great! I think it's pretty well liked around here too. It's been a while since I last saw it, but it may be one of those Italian films where you kind of have to throw logic out the window to enjoy it though. It was very much colored by the ending. I could have dealt with the "killer hiding out among the mannequins final scare, then gets shot by the old maintenance man" ending. But when the final shot of the movie was our killer, with a bullet in his head covered in blood, opening his eyes and smiling directly at the camera, it felt like the whole movie was giving me the finger. Anyway, here's more of me not liking giallo touchstones. I'm really glad I found Blood and Black Lace this challenge. It definitely feels like the movie I've wanted all the other giallo to be. 26. Suspiria (1977) Watched On: Tubi This is the third Argento film I've seen, his most highly regarded and definitely the best of the three I've seen, but it still left me cold. All the things you hear about it are true: the film is beautifully shot and lit, the production design is fantastic and the Goblin score is creepy and effective. But I still didn't really like it. I've seen a lot of images and clips of the movie in horror documentaries and the like and all of them either come from the beginning or the end of the movie. Which is accurate because just about dick all happens in the middle. There's a lot of atmosphere but such little structure that the atmosphere slowly began to become annoying. My girlfriend said something along the lines of "the soundtrack is trying to prime me to be scared and then nothing happens." A second pass at the script specifically aimed at the "dreamlike fugue peppered with 10 minute chunks of pure exposition" pacing could have definitely helped. I don't think I would have been nearly as frustrated if the protagonist wasn't so passive. This is an issue I had with Opera and it seems to be a running Argento theme. Jessica Harper spends most of the movie either too drugged up to react or just observing the tableaus around her. I need characters to care about in horror movies and this doesn't really have any. I've tried my damnedest to like Argento and I appreciate the good things in this movie, but I think he's not for me.
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Oct 19, 2019 19:17
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27. Happy Death Day 2U (2019) Watched On: HBO Go SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #6: Watch a horror sequel you haven't seen. A fun little sequel to the fun little original. I appreciated that this movie was simultaneously a retread of the initial concept, while expanding the themes of personal morality outside of just self-improvement. Jessica Rothe carries the whole movie once again, showcasing both the frustration of having to relive the same day again AGAIN and the heartbreak of eventually having to choose between love and family. Even if it wasn't as immediately engaging as the original, the sci-fi and parallel dimension elements definitely kept me on my toes. It's a lot more schticky than the original, but I kind of appreciated that. It gave some of the less developed characters in the first movie (mostly Lori and Danielle) a little more time to shine. If you liked the first one, check it out. If you didn't, I don't think this will change your mind.
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Oct 20, 2019 01:46
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Random Stranger posted:
Thank you for taking the bullet for me on this. I was gonna watch this for Tourist Trap and it sounds 100% not my bag.
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Oct 20, 2019 20:51
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SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE 5
TOURIST TRAP