|
Let's go! I did 15 last year, but I'll try to do the full 31 this time around. I'll only be counting movies that I've never seen before, so no re-watches for me. Looking forward to discovering some new favs!
|
#
¿
Sep 27, 2019 18:22
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ Apr 28, 2024 17:03 |
|
|
Jumping right in with the horror movie that's been on my amazon watchlist for the longest. #1: Gozu (2003)  "Ya ain't from Nagoya, are ya?" Wow, okay! I'm honestly at a bit of a loss as to how to write up coherent thoughts for this because I definitely don't think I fully understand it, so I'm going to just start typing and see where it takes me. A yakuza member, Minami, is ordered to dispose of one of his (yakuza) brothers, Ozeki, whose erratic and unhinged behavior is deemed a liability. Agenda hidden from the victim, the two embark on a road trip to the future disposal site in Nagoya, and that's where everything starts to unwind. The road to Nagoya abruptly cuts off directly in front of a river, forcing Minami to slam on the breaks and causing Ozeki to smash his head into the dash and die on impact. What follows is, as far as I understand it, a journey into hell and back. Minami stops in the nearest town to gain his bearings, but while ducking into a cafe to use their phone, Ozeki's body disappears and the search is on. Minami passes in and out of several stories during his search for his brother. The townsfolk are all off; in some way boiled down to a core vice or personality trait. A man faking a major skin condition and possibly other injuries as well, an innkeeper bottling and distributing her own breastmilk, a cafe regular who can't stop talking about the weather... the movie doesn't focus on or wrap up any of these characters' stories, but it gives enough for it to feel like there's a lot more to everyone than we're shown. It's equally captivating and unnerving. It's also interesting that the town itself seems to be leading Minami to his goal. He's frequently confused but never lost. There's always a coincidental meeting or purposefully left behind scrap of paper to point him in the right direction. It's all creepy but never really directly hostile. Everyone is largely preoccupied with their own issues and kind of just wants him to move on. They may or may not be interested in helping Minami, but they don't really seem to wish him any harm. He's just passing through. He's not from Nagoya. In the end, Minami comes to find that Ozeki's body is gone. He'd ended up at the assigned location where he was skinned and dismantled. Directly following this revelation, however, a woman claiming to be Ozeki shows up and attaches herself to Minami's side. She knows things only Ozeki could know and he's forced to accept that she really is who she says. The two head back to the big city with plenty of sexual tension. There are hints earlier of interest between Ozeki and Minami, and now that Ozeki's body has changed, the taboo has lifted a bit. Minami rejects his own interest at first but finally gives in once jealousy hits a boiling point. The two hook up, resulting in Ozeki giving birth to his previous body, and the now trio are shown living on happily together. The movie's unnerving but it's also way funnier than I expected. It doesn't feel right to call it a comedy, but the more visceral or disturbing elements are nearly always played equally for laughs. The better way to explain it is probably to say that it's absurd. It clearly has something to say as well, though I don't feel completely confident in nailing down exactly what that is after just this one watch. There's something there about love and about taboo. About everyone being too wrapped up in their own weird poo poo to care about yours, and about it sometimes taking a literal journey to hell and back for you to admit to yourself what you find truly important. I'm not sure how to rate it, but I'd recommend this one. Watched (1/31): #1 Gozu (2003) blood_dot_biz fucked around with this message at 04:20 on Sep 28, 2019 |
|
#
¿
Sep 28, 2019 04:17
|
|
|
Random Stranger posted:
lmao, I'm so glad there's a gif of this part. I almost made one myself for the post. I feel similar. I'm fine recommending the movie in the context of this thread, but otherwise I'd have to have a pretty good lock on someone's tastes to feel comfortable pointing them to his weirder movies.
|
|
#
¿
Sep 28, 2019 17:49
|
|
|
Random Stranger posted:You might want to check out The Happiness of the Katakuris, then. It's a horror/comedy he directed that isn't quite as grotesque as Gozu, but goes in some pretty weird directions. Seen it and love it! Great recommendation though. I agree with the other poster who said this is a good watch for anyone who hasn't checked it out yet. It's free on prime right now! Anyways, next up! #2: Spider Baby or, the Maddest Story Ever Told (1967)  I don't have a ton to say about this one. It's a lot of fun. The basic idea is that there's this inbred disease that causes people to regress mentally to the mindset of primal instinct and savagery. A group of children with this syndrome live out in the country in an old mansion along with their caretaker. With their parents long gone, the children's extended family come to visit in an attempt to take over the house and its fortune, but end up having a bit more to deal with than they bargained for. What follows is a tight 1 hour and 21 minutes of creepy kids, inept adults, and lots of spiders. I'm more than a little unclear on most of the finer details of the conceit but that's kind of besides the point. The acting is appropriately hammy, the set and prop design is enjoyable, and it's just generally a good time to see everything play out. My main complaint is that I was hoping for more actual spider-driven creepiness; the spiders themselves aren't as menacing of a presence as I was expecting they'd be (they're often a bit cute), though that's maybe more a matter of expectation. This one's pretty easy to recommend if you're looking for something lighter, and the final 5-10 minutes are especially fun, so you'll be left enjoying yourself. Also, I've had the song "Santa Baby" running compulsively through my head all week only with the word "Spider" standing in for "Santa", so I'm hoping now that I've finally watched this one my brain will let me rest. Watched (2/31): #1 Gozu (2003), #2 Spider Baby or, the Maddest Story Ever Told (1967)
|
|
#
¿
Sep 29, 2019 03:54
|
|
|
deety posted:Just in case anyone wants a different Spider Baby earworm, a band from my area wrote a song about that movie. This is much better than what I'd been humming.  Challenge #1: The Best Month #3: Viy (1967)  Hell yeah, this movie's great! A young priest is forced to preside over the deceased body of a witch for 3 nights, where he's forced to try and survive her attempts to curse his soul. The premise itself isn't really what's interesting about this movie. The entire thing is overflowing with charm, and it all boils over in the last 10 minutes where you're left to bask in a cacophony of wonderfully clever techniques and spooky effects. Most of the horror elements are in the second half of the film, but it's funny and engaging all the way through and punctuated with cool camerawork, beautiful locations, and a surprising number of little animal gags. I really love movies like this where there are just a constant stream of neat details. When I describe my favorite movies to people, I usually end up just talking about little moments, effects, shots, or whatever else stood out to me and I'm willing to overlook a lot of bad if a movie does things I find cool. It'd be hard to do that here without just describing the whole thing, and although I made more gifs and took more screenshots, I'm gonna hold off from posting them because part of the fun is seeing them all for the first time. It's super good and I highly recommend it. Watched (3/31): #1 Gozu (2003), #2 Spider Baby or, the Maddest Story Ever Told (1967), #3 Viy (1967) Challenges (1/1): blood_dot_biz fucked around with this message at 00:14 on Oct 1, 2019 |
|
#
¿
Sep 29, 2019 21:00
|
|
|
#4: Mondo Cane (1962) Of all the movies I have queued up for this challenge, this is the one I'd been looking forward to checking out the least. Because of that, I figured I'd better watch it now before my motivation started to dwindle, and honestly, it was about what I expected. Mondo Cane is an important movie for the reason that it spawned an entire genre of exploitation documentaries, but that doesn't mean I have to like it. The entire movie is a loosely connected series of narrated clips from all over the world chronicling the various shocking and perverse acts going on every day. It was also apparently filmed in the exquisite corpse style by three separate directors, which I do think is one legitimately interesting thing about it. My issues with the movie started almost immediately. It opens with some footage of a dog on leash, barking and straining to get free. The narrator lets us know that everything in the movie is real and filmed as it naturally occurred and then the dog is released. All in all, a pretty clever little way to start things off, except that immediately following the dog's release is some obviously added in sound effects of yelping, as if to suggest the other dogs nearby are attacking the newly freed pup. Maybe that's what's actually going on, but it doesn't really look like it, and my trust in the narrator was off to shaky start. Fast forward a few minutes and we're treated to another very obviously staged scene with a bunch of ladies swarming a movie star and ripping off his shirt. From this point on I couldn't actually believe anything I saw. There's a lot of interesting footage but most of the more interesting or "shocking" stuff loses its impact if you don't trust that it's in any way accurate, especially combined with the narration. There's one particularly brutal scene of a dying, beached sea turtle, and while I know turtles do die this way I couldn't help but wonder if the filmmakers had maybe just turned this one on its back for the shot. And speaking of the narration, my god. A lot of stuff that would have been interesting by itself became extremely racist when coupled with the narration (and in other cases, the music and added sfx alone was enough to change the context). And for a movie that was supposed to be chronicling the darker aspects of humanity, it's a bit impressive how many voyeuristic shots of women they managed to fit in. There's a statement to be made there but I can almost guarantee you it wasn't what they intended. It's also worth noting that most of the legitimately disturbing stuff involved animal cruelty. That's sort of understandable, but also made it feel like they were taking the easier, less "political" way out, because there certainly is a lot of human on human horribleness out there as well. On top of all this, it's also kind of a slog to sit through. Many of the segments go on for way too long, and they're not usually the more interesting ones. Some of these were probably for shock value (we don't really need to see 5 different sharks being tortured to death, but it certainly is more disturbing than just seeing one), but other times it wasn't even particularly interesting or notable footage that stuck around. In the end, it's pretty hard to recommend this. Watch it if you're interested in the history behind it or if you really love Mondo cinema, but otherwise it's probably not worth your time. Watched (4/31): #1 Gozu (2003), #2 Spider Baby or, the Maddest Story Ever Told (1967), #3 Viy (1967), #4 Mondo Cane (1962)
|
|
#
¿
Sep 30, 2019 00:37
|
|
|
#5: Dark Water (2002) Dark Water is another ghost story directed by Hideo Nakata of Ringu fame. Both films are based on novels by author Koji Suzuki. I didn't know this going in, but there were a ton of similarities between the two stories and the common source is extremely felt. The movie follows a recently divorced mother, Yoshimi, and her 6 year old daughter, Ikuko, as they move into a new apartment and try to restart their life. It's probably obvious given the title, but water is quite the force in this movie. During the first half an hour or so there basically isn't a single shot that water isn't in some way a part of. When there's not rain, there are raincoats and umbrellas, leaky ceilings, puddles, or baths. This doesn't quite keep up throughout the entire thing, but I'd say you probably feel water's presence in about 3/4ths of the film's shot list at least. This movie is isolating. It's exhausting, and for a movie about divorce and child custody, that feels appropriate. Even when the characters are together and seemingly safe, there's still a looming threat of separation, and that's nearly always what drives the film's conflicts. There's obviously the high level threat of losing custody of Ikuko, but there's also the ever present moment to moment threat to Yoshimi of her little girl wandering off and getting lost or hurt. Bad things happen when the characters lose track of each other, no matter how brief that lapse, and as a result you never really feel comfortable even when superficially everything seems to be going just fine. All it takes is a turn of the head and the happy facade comes crashing down. I have mixed feelings about the actual ghost story part of the film. The ghost is creepy, and there are several extremely effective moments involving it, but I never quite felt like everything fit together in a satisfying way. I get the broad strokes, and I understand the spirit's motivation and story, but the individual actions didn't always quite tie in to it all as much as I wanted them too. Sometimes it just felt like the ghost was being spooky for spooky's sake, which isn't necessarily bad except that we're also presented with a very sad little mystery and corresponding backstory and the emotional impact of all that was lessened a little as a result, at least for me. It's hard for me to not just compare this to The Orphanage , which I think deals with some similar themes in a more affecting way. Despite all that, I did still really enjoy this, and I'd definitely still recommend it. It's a moody little ghost mystery with some legitimately creepy moments. The last 20 minutes or so particularly had me shivering several times, and I'm glad I finally checked this out! Watched (5/31): #1 Gozu (2003), #2 Spider Baby or, the Maddest Story Ever Told (1967), #3 Viy (1967), #4 Mondo Cane (1962), #5 Dark Water (2002) Challenges (1/1):
|
|
#
¿
Oct 1, 2019 06:34
|
|
|
TrixRabbi posted:
Oh, this's been on my radar for a little bit. Really glad to hear good things about it; I'll have to try and check it out soon.
|
|
#
¿
Oct 1, 2019 07:16
|
|
|
Windows 98 posted:
If you get excited about practical effects, have the patience for questionable storytelling/pacing, and can get ahold of it, I highly recommend The Cat (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0105796/). It's directed by Ngai Choi Lam of Riki-Oh fame and I personally think it's criminally under-seen. My quick pitch for it is that it's got a fully choreographed cat vs dog fight scene mixing live animals and puppets.
|
|
#
¿
Oct 2, 2019 01:20
|
|
|
Windows 98 posted:I have seen it! I also suggest others check this out because it is worth a watch. Oh, awesome! I try to evangelize this movie whenever I can. It fits my taste so perfectly and I'm really happy it exists. Class3KillStorm posted:#4. You're Next (2013) (Vudu) I'm glad you liked this! I saw it in theaters and not only did it not seem like anyone else got the dark humor, but I also heard a lot of people grumbling about how bad they thought it was as they were leaving. I haven't seen it since it came out so maybe I'd have a different opinion now, but I had a great time with it. #6: Blood and Black Lace (1964)  I was pretty busy today but managed to sneak this one in. Good poo poo! The entire movie is gorgeous. Incredible colors and lighting, cool camera movement and framing, great sets... it's a real treat to look at. The acting and dialogue is, well, about what you'd expect from this sort of movie. Lots of ill-hidden exposition and strange lines/deliveries, but at least to me that's part of the charm. One of my favorite things about the movie is how it takes advantage of its setting, a fashion house. Namely that it's an excuse to litter various shots with mannequins. When there's the constant threat of a killer hiding in the shadows, every human-like figure draws the eye and creeps you out a bit. It's great. I also enjoyed that some of the conflict comes from the fact that many of the characters are high society and have butlers and maids puttering around as potential or actual witnesses to the various goings-on. I tend to prefer the more supernatural Giallo, but this was a great time. Watched (6/31): #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) Challenges (1/1): blood_dot_biz fucked around with this message at 08:26 on Oct 2, 2019 |
|
#
¿
Oct 2, 2019 08:24
|
|
|
#7: Daughters of Darkness (1971) A moody little lesbian vampire love story revolving around the worst husband in the world, his brand new wife, and an immortal Hungarian Countess and her protege. This film is very nice to look at, and the entire thing has an eerie, dreamlike quality to it. It's also a very slowly paced movie. As someone who isn't particularly interested in vampires, the pacing did wear on me a bit, but I think in this case that's more my problem than the movie's problem. There are a lot of great shots of people's faces, and a huge amount of the storytelling is done visually rather than through dialogue. The story itself is very neat, the characters all have interesting dynamics with each other, and in general I just really loved the progression of the newlyweds' involvement with the Countess. I don't have a lot to write about this one but I'd recommend it if you're in the mood for some melancholy vampire seduction. Watched (7/31): #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) Challenges (1/1):
|
|
#
¿
Oct 4, 2019 05:47
|
|
|
#8: Sliders of Ghost Town: Origins (2016) A very light, fun little documentary about sliding, which if you didn't know, is when Halloween haunt actors put on special gear that lets them slide around while they scare people. The movie goes into detail about how it all started at Knotts Scary Farm and how it's continued to grow and spread ever since. One thing I thought was cool is that even though it's such a big part of official haunts like the one at Knotts, everyone has to make their own gear and they all approach it pretty differently. People will prioritize things like distance, speed, sound, or making sparks, and it seems like people really get into personalizing their approach to it. The doc is mostly talking heads but there are some good anecdotes and they do also show some fun/goofy footage of the actual sliding, including extremely dramatic shots of their off-season practice sessions.  It's a quick watch and it was neat to learn a little about this extremely niche hobby/career. I'm also just kind of delighted that this is as much of a thing as it is. Watched (8/31): #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) Challenges (1/1):
|
|
#
¿
Oct 5, 2019 06:07
|
|
|
Looking for recommendations for good horror movies from the past few years I could watch through prime or netflix (paid rental is fine). I've been particularly slacking on stuff that's come out since last Halloween. Midsommar and Us might be the only horror movies I've seen that've come out since then. Preferably something legit scary and not involving sexual assault!
|
|
#
¿
Oct 5, 2019 23:28
|
|
|
#9: One Cut of the Dead (2017) Everyone else was right, this is excellent. They're also all right that it's best to go into it without knowing much about it, so I'm hesitant to say too much. I'm gonna throw some spoiler tags below, but please don't read 'em unless you've already seen the movie! The bait and switch going into this was so fun and charming! I knew there was going to be some sort of "twist" because everyone was saying you should avoid too much info about it going in, but I legitimately wasn't able to guess where everything was heading, and I'm so glad that was the case. Once the in-movie credits rolled and things jumped back in time a month I "got" that it was going to be a making of, but I absolutely wasn't prepared for how charming and funny it would all be, or how it would all come together. I was laughing the entire last act. Seeing all the little oddities of the original short start to pay off and make sense was wonderful, and I loved the way the movie made me really get to love all the characters by the time it was over, even if I hated them just 15 minutes earlier. It's just super good. Also interesting that the film was inspired by a play. I was looking into it a bit and apparently there was minor controversy when this first came out because it didn't acknowledge that inspiration, and the play's director and the movie's director couldn't agree on whether or not this was actually an adaptation. I'd be willing to bet that there's significant differences between the two properties, but the concept itself is also pretty novel so I can absolutely get the play director's frustration. I'd be super curious to see the play but it seems like that'd probably be impossible given that it looks to have only put on by a single Japanese troupe for a short amount of time. Watched (9/31): #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) Challenges (1/1):
|
|
#
¿
Oct 6, 2019 17:59
|
|
|
#10: Possum (2018) I dug this. What a creepy, grimy little film. The movie's about a puppeteer, Philip (Sean Harris), who moves back home with his Uncle Maurice (Alun Armstrong). Philip's only belonging is a massive brown leather bag containing an enormously creepy spider puppet, which he lugs around everywhere. He continuously attempts to get rid of the puppet, but that never quite seems to stick. The two main actors do a fantastic job, and the movie itself has a great look to it - all the locations, sets, and props are top notch and nearly every shot manages to be unsettling in some way. My biggest complaint was that although there's a lot of creepy imagery and dreamlike shots, I don't think it's all pushed far enough. Basically, I wish things got weirder than they did. I hate to bring up the comparison, but a few moments of this movie felt like imitation Lynch. Sometimes I think that worked great, but other times stuff fell a bit short for me.  All in all though I enjoyed this. It sets a unique mood, is legitimately unsettling, has great performances, and at least for me the hits far outweighed the misses. Watched (10/31): #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) Challenges (1/1):
|
|
#
¿
Oct 7, 2019 05:16
|
|
|
#11: EGG. (2005) Haha, drat, okay. This movie is really its own thing. Since she was a child, our main character has seen the image of an egg every single time she closes her eyes. On her 20th birthday, however, that egg begins to hatch... It's such a good premise, my god. I'm really glad I watched this movie, but it's hard to put down too many concrete thoughts on it. The narrative itself is surprisingly straightforward for a movie like this but it's moved through at a fairly slow pace, even with the film's relatively short 73 minute runtime. That said there are lots of goofy characters and moments, the acting is often very exaggerated and caricatured in an enjoyable way, parts of it have a super fun y2k era aesthetic, and the main egg critter is this, quite frankly, incredible rubber suit monster that I love to look at.  Ultimately I think this would've worked a bit better as a short rather than a feature, but I'm just glad it exists at all. It's got some cool ideas and moments, and if you can seek it out then I think it's a unique and worthwhile watch.  Watched (11/31): #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) Challenges (1/2):
|
|
#
¿
Oct 8, 2019 06:30
|
|
|
Gotta get working on those challenges soon, but for now... #12: Adventures of Electric Rod Boy A.K.A. The Adventure of Denchu Kozo (1987)  A boy with an electricity pole growing out of his back goes forward in time to light the future and save everyone from the cyber-goth vampire menace. Written and directed by Shin'ya Tsukamoto, this came out 2 years prior to Tetsuo and if you've ever seen that then you probably have a fairly good idea of what to expect from this. Electric Rod Boy features many of the same sorts of effects, themes, and concepts from Tetsuo, though not quite as refined. There's heavy use of stop motion particularly, and it's just as cool as ever to see these massive, hulking, mechanical golems merge with our flesh and go sliding across the streets. This movie is very claustrophobic. I don't know my lenses, but it's filmed largely in close-up, and the subject of each shot usually takes up the entire screen or even spills out past the borders. There isn't much of a sense of space with the editing either. It's largely not clear where everyone is relative to each other, and characters often slip between locations in the blink of an eye. I don't really mean this as a criticism, though, because I think it contributes to the atmosphere and otherwordly feeling of the vampire-laden technofuture. It's worth noting that there's some psychosexual weirdness with an underage girl being hooked up to a super weapon, but thankfully the actress playing her seems much older than the story describes. If you liked Tetsuo (and I would hope you did), I think this is very much worth seeking out as well. It's rougher, but it's also a short watch and still has plenty of great stuff, particularly in the second half. Watched (12/31): #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) Challenges (1/3):
|
|
#
¿
Oct 9, 2019 18:15
|
|
|
Franchescanado posted:SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #2: Dead & Buried #13: House of 1000 Corpses (2003)  I coincidentally watched one of Sid Haig's movies (Spider Baby) earlier in the challenge, so I decided to take this as an opportunity to see him in a role where he actually speaks. I'd never seen any of Rob Zombie's movies before, so I decided to start with the one I've heard mentioned the most. Aw, I really liked this movie. It's so gleeful. It's filled to the brim with ideas, little images, lines, effects, editing techniques... and I love how excited it is about showing every single one of them off. This movie sort of makes me feel like I do when I'm riffing on something with a group of friends. There's so many specific little moments that project this sort of dumb excitement, like whenever the same short clip would replay a few times tinted red, or the way Dr. Satan's helper gets continuously beaned by an excessive stream of boulders. And then amidst all the goofy stuff are a few legitimately arresting scenes like the uncomfortably slow execution of Walton Goggins's character, and some seriously disturbing gore. It's having a ton of fun with the format, but still takes the horror seriously. Oh and of course, Sid Haig was a blast to watch. I'm not sure I'd agree that he's specifically the best part of the movie, but he absolutely steals every scene he's in and I definitely wouldn't have minded getting to see some more of his character. Watched (13/31): #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) Challenges (2/3):
|
|
#
¿
Oct 10, 2019 08:34
|
|
|
Predictably, life is starting to get in the way a bit and I've gone a few days without watching anything, but I'm still on track due to the early buffer I built up and I'm hoping to get one or two more in today as well. Still doing better than last year at least!Franchescanado posted:SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #3: Horror Noire #14: Ganja and Hess (1973)  This was good, and not something I think I would've been aware of if not for this challenge. I also want to check out the documentary at some point, though I'm not sure if I'll get to it this month specifically. Maybe I'm way off here, it's been a while since I last saw it, but this movie actually reminded me a fair bit of The Long Goodbye. It turns out they came out the same year, so maybe it's mostly that, but specifically the way the dialogue was delivered is what made me think of it. Everything is so conversational and low key. You feel like you're listening to real conversations (I'm assuming there was a lot of improvisation at work here). Characters stumble over words, mutter, and pause to consider their phrasing. It really works with the tone of the movie. You feel like you're watching the characters stumble through their messy lives. They're really hanging out with each other, they're really making mistakes, and they're really getting caught up in the moment to moment. The sound design in general was really cool, there are some very striking shots, and I'm starting to think I just have to stop saying I don't like vampires because here I am once again talking about a vampire movie I do actually like. This movie is very good and I think deserves to be more well known than it is (maybe it is well known, but I'd never heard it mentioned before and it has a pretty low number of ratings on imdb). Go check this out! Watched (14/31): #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) Challenges (3/3):
|
|
#
¿
Oct 13, 2019 18:37
|
|
|
I barely made it to 15 movies last year, but I think a big part of that was me slacking off since I knew my goal was fairly easy and I had more time than I needed. Going for the full 31 this time, I'm being more diligent about watching things and I'm very happy to have made it to the (nearly) halfway point. Seen some really great stuff this year and I'm excited for the next 16! #15: Q (1982)  A giant winged serpent terrorizes NYC. I'd previously seen and enjoyed The Stuff but this still caught me off guard with how fun it was. The serpent itself is fairly goofy but I kind of loved it. I have a big soft spot for those sorts of monster effects and it really hit for me. Getting brief glimpses of it as it flies around the first half of the movie eating swimmers and beheading window washers was good enough, but seeing it in all its stop motion glory at the very end was wonderful. I also love how casual the entire police force is about this thing existing. There's no mass panic as the creature soars the skyline (though there's some light fear at one point when blood rains down from the sky), and there's no pretense about trying to capture the thing alive to study like you might expect to see in a movie like this. The police really just want to go and kill it. It's just sort of another case, and they mostly just act like it's more trouble than it's worth. Also, Michael Moriarty is a blast to watch as he stumbles around the city, and I really enjoyed that the police department at one point tries to give his character a gun and bring him on as part of the strike team presumably because they're annoyed at him and are hoping he gets himself eaten. Good stuff. Watched (15/31): #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) Challenges (3/3):
|
|
#
¿
Oct 14, 2019 04:37
|
|
|
Franchescanado posted:SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #4: Inktober #16: Hungry Stones (1960)  I ended up watching this to fill prompt #22, "Ghost". Hungry Stones (Kshudhita Pashan), is an Indian ghost story about a young tax collector who moves into an old mansion fabled by the locals to be haunted and filled with ghosts who walk the building's halls come nightfall. The version I watched wasn't the best quality-wise, but despite that it's still clearly a gorgeous film. The blacks are deep and the whites will often glow in intentional contrast. Shadows leer across the screen and foreground elements are boldly used to cover large portions of the frame in an unnatural darkness.  The movie is only very lightly horror. It's more of a supernatural story of grief and love, though I do still think it's more than fair to count for this challenge. The mansion itself, with all its vast, empty halls and with its propensity towards driving those who reside within it to obsession, is a suitably spooky location, and as we learn more and more about the ghost's past, we also learn that the building's history is steeped in suffering. I've barely seen any Indian films, and I'm not sure I've ever watched an Indian horror movie or ghost story before, so I'm really glad I got to take the opportunity to check this one out. I'd recommend it if you can get your hands on it, though I wouldn't go in expecting to get scared.  Watched (16/31): #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) Challenges (4/4):
|
|
#
¿
Oct 15, 2019 08:12
|
|
|
#17: The Ruins (2008) I remember one of my friends telling me about this when it first came out, but that was back when I was too scared to watch horror movies so I never checked it out. Since so many people in this thread have been watching it, it seemed like a great excuse to go back and finally watch! This was pretty solid! I didn't love it, but I did enjoy it. I think my main issue with the movie is that I don't feel like the concept was used to full effect. I don't know anything about the book it was based on, so I won't comment on that, but the design for the plants themselves has a ton of potential and I wish they'd been able to take it further. I wanted ecology! I can forgive the movie not explaining too much because I do think it fits narratively that no one involved really understands the situation either, but I still really wanted more details. To some extent it's probably scarier to not have the plant's rules and functions fully explained, but the bits we got were barely enough to whet the palate. The focus is way more on body horror and the characters than the plant itself, which again I get given that this was a horror film aimed at general audiences, but I can't help but feel like the plant should've really been the main character. In addition to that, some aspects of the plant started to stray a bit too far into supernatural territory for my taste. It has the makings of a pretty terrifying, yet still grounded, creature, only it sort of ditches the groundedness a bit in favor of a few specific creepy situations that in my opinion didn't pay off enough to warrant losing that more naturalistic angle. Complaints aside, which I admit may largely come down to personal preference, the body horror was pretty good and the situation itself was suitably terrifying. It's the type of movie that leaves (pun) you to imagine how you'd handle things yourself if you were in that situation, and it's always fun when a movie directly leads you to that sort of thought process. It's a good time for what it is, and I had fun. Watched (17/31): #1 Gozu (2003), #2 Spider Baby or, the Maddest Story Ever Told (1967), #3 Viy (1967), #4 Mondo Cane (1962), #5 Dark Water (2002), #6 Blood and Black Lace (1964), #7 Daughters of Darkness (1971), #8 Sliders of Ghost Town: Origins (2016), #9 One Cut of the Dead (2017), #10 Possum (2018), #11 EGG. (2005), #12 Adventures of Electric Rod Boy (1987), #13 House of 1000 Corpses (2003), #14 Ganja and Hess (1973), #15 Q (1982), #16 Hungry Stones (1960), #17 The Ruins (2008) Challenges (4/5):
|
|
#
¿
Oct 18, 2019 05:15
|
|
|
Quick qualification question for the Tourist Trap challenge. Pulgasari should count for North Korea, right? I ask because of the movie's bizarre production situation, but it seems like it fits the spirit of the challenge at least. No worries if it doesn't, I can find something else, but it seemed like an interesting pull.
|
|
#
¿
Oct 18, 2019 05:46
|
|
|
#18 The Lighthouse (2019) I loved this movie. I'm not going to talk about the plot but I also think this is kind of one of those movies you can't really spoil. It's visually stunning, the music and sound design is overwhelming in the best way possible, the dialogue is poetic and had me hanging on every word, the actors are great, and it all comes together to create this beautifully haunting, gross, oppressive atmosphere that's a real treat to spend your time with. Absolutely the type of movie you want to see in theaters if possible. The more I love something, the more I usually have trouble talking about it in terms other than just lists of details I enjoyed, and this is similar. It takes me a while to put together concrete thoughts about things like this because I'm not thinking much when watching them, I'm just sort of letting the entire thing wash over me. I'll spare you too much of that sort of discussion, but I will say that the highlight of the movie for me was when Willem Dafoe's character delivers what I think was maybe a 5 minute monologue, cursing Robert Pattinson's character and describing in poetically horrific detail exactly how he's going to die in the sea. If this entire movie was just Willem Dafoe's character talking to the camera, I'd probably have been fine with it. Anyways, this movie is great and I highly recommend it. Watched (18/31): #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) Challenges (4/6): blood_dot_biz fucked around with this message at 03:32 on Oct 20, 2019 |
|
#
¿
Oct 20, 2019 03:29
|
|
|
Franchescanado posted:SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #5: Tourist Trap #19 Pulgasari (1985)  Went with North Korea for this one. A while ago I was reading about their history with movies and got super interested in it. I wrote down a bunch of things I wanted to check out but I never actually followed through, so this is both the first North Korean horror movie I've ever seen (not that I think they have any other ones) and also just the first North Korean movie in general I've ever seen. This was... fine. The story behind its production is, unfortunately, the most interesting thing about it. I won't get too deep into it because other sources can sum it up way better than me and also because I imagine a lot of you have heard about it before, but the short of it is that Kim Jong-il was a huge movie buff and ended up kidnapping this movie's director and forcing him to make it for him. It's a wild story that's absolutely worth reading about if you haven't already. As for the finished product, it's probably my least favorite of the month so far. There are much worse ways to spend an hour and a half, but the movie's sort of slow and took me a few goes to actually get through. The monster itself is super good. Baby Pulgasari is legitimately cute, and adult Pulgasari is perfectly goofy. The suit was made by Toho, so it's not that surprising, but it turned out great. Unfortunately, the monster is sort of barely on screen. When it's there, the movie is fun, but more often than that we just get people talking about the monster. I didn't care about any of the actual people in this movie but we sure do see a lot of them, and it makes this not all that long movie feel sort of bloated. Because of the context surrounding it I'm glad I finally watched it, but if you don't care about that and aren't otherwise a rubber suit fanatic, then I'd probably give this one a pass. Watched (19/31): #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) Challenges (5/6):
|
|
#
¿
Oct 20, 2019 04:16
|
|
|
 SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #6: Sometimes They Come Back#20 Halloween (2018)  I really enjoyed this! I went into the movie expecting it to be more serious than it was, so I had to adjust my expectations, but once I was able to accept the goofiness that permeates a lot of it I had a really great time. It really has a lot of fun playing with expectations in general. It sets up rules that it then later breaks, like how it establishes the first person POV as code for looking at something through Michael's eyes, then later on goes to use that as a fake out. It contrasts goofy characters and over the top saccharine scenes with legitimately brutal and disturbing kills (The gas station scene in particular, my god). It often holds shots and delays reveals longer than is comfortable. It doesn't even always grant you the tension breaking relief of a jump scar. Michael is just as likely to walk silently into frame from the shadows as he is to make a grand entrance. I could feel the movie playing around with me and I liked that about it. Nothing super groundbreaking but there was a lot of it and I thought it all worked. I was looking at a few other reviews on some other sites and it seemed like a lot of people had issues with some part of the movie, but most of those issues were with a different part. There wasn't an obvious consensus of where the problem really was. In particular there seemed to be a division of people who either didn't like the beginning or didn't like the end. I basically liked all of it, but I do think the different segments of the movie had fairly different tones and pacing, so I imagine a lot of the complaints are due to the movie switching from a direction people liked to a direction they didn't, or vice versa. I personally thought it all worked to pull together a super fun slasher that hit all the beats I would've hoped for. And then of course I thought "that one shot" was pretty great. Perfect little tribute. I can see how people might want to nitpick this movie but most of its dumber details felt like they were in service of making the movie more fun, so I don't really feel right complaining about them. Like sure, Laurie had some obvious security flaws in her mega fortress, but she still managed to come off as extremely capable, and those flaws made for some great shots and a dramatic sequence of events. Sad I missed this in theaters, because I think it would've been even better with an enthusiastic group. Watched (20/31): #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) Challenges (6/7):
|
|
#
¿
Oct 22, 2019 07:05
|
|
|
SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #7: Monster Mash-up #21 Freddy vs. Jason (2003)  This was the first thing to spring to mind when trying to think of a movie featuring two different monsters. I guess I should also preface this review by saying that I'm not really a massive fan of either franchise. I've only seen two of the Nightmare films and the original Friday the 13th. I didn't really like most of this, but I do also feel like I would've probably gotten some more out of it if I'd seen more of the other movies. What I did really like was the actual final fight between the two, and how it was essentially horror Loony Toons. Maybe other movies in the franchise paved the way for that, but regardless I thought it was well done and I had fun watching that last half hour of the movie. Unfortunately, I didn't really like the rest of it. I think the idea itself was really solid; the concept of Freddy needing Jason's help to get back his strength is a fun way of bringing the two together. That said, the humor didn't really land for me, I didn't really care about the characters, the kills largely didn't stand out to me, and there was a decent amount of distracting technical stuff throughout like the numerous fake slo-mo shots and some not great CGI. I could see some people liking this a lot more than me, but I personally would have a hard time recommending it beyond just telling someone to go watch the last half an hour. Watched (21/31): #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) Challenges (7/8):
|
|
#
¿
Oct 23, 2019 09:03
|
|
|
SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #8: Happy Holidays! #22 The Phantom Carriage (1921)  I'd been meaning to watch this for a few years now, so I'm thankful this challenge came around to give me a good reason. In case it's unclear, I chose this movie since it centers around New Years Eve. The version I watched was off of archive.org, and had a soundtrack by KTL. When it worked, the soundtrack hit really hard and I was very into it (unsure if it was particular to this soundtrack or not, but the title card theme especially was really great), but for a lot of the movie it was sort of a bit much. Its intensity was kind of exhausting to have hanging over me the entire time, and there were times when what was happening on the screen felt much lighter than the soundtrack implied. As far as the film itself goes, I thought it was a cool watch. Gorgeous shots with some really neat use of double exposure effects especially. Even the more innocuous scenes felt creepy because of how everything was presented, and I enjoyed the tone. Also, it was a fun surprise to see what was obviously the scene that inspired one of The Shining's more iconic moments. Watched (22/31): #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) Challenges (8/9):
|
|
#
¿
Oct 24, 2019 06:54
|
|
|
I'd love a wildcard rec from someone! Ideally something from netflix, prime, or a public streaming site, but I'm open to paying an amazon rental fee if it's super good. EDIT: I'm good now, thanks! Got a rec from COOL CORN. blood_dot_biz fucked around with this message at 20:11 on Oct 24, 2019 |
|
#
¿
Oct 24, 2019 18:32
|
|
|
COOL CORN posted:Legend of the Seven Golden Vampires Ooo, thanks! Looking forward to this one.
|
|
#
¿
Oct 24, 2019 20:12
|
|
|
T3hRen3gade posted:Try to watch the French horror "High Tension," it's on Shudder. I appolgise in advance. High Tension is on prime as well!
|
|
#
¿
Oct 24, 2019 21:10
|
|
|
STAC Goat posted:I've seen it anyway, but good rec. If you haven't seen it, I'll recommend The Lair of the White Worm on prime.
|
|
#
¿
Oct 24, 2019 21:32
|
|
|
STAC Goat posted:Also a good rec, sadly also seen. Haha, poo poo. How about Bug? Or if you've seen that then go check out Possum. Both are on prime (though Bug requires Starz).
|
|
#
¿
Oct 24, 2019 21:48
|
|
|
It's at this point in the challenge where I realize my watchlist has actually gotten bigger, not smaller, and I have to face the fact that I'm definitely not going to get through everything I have jotted down by the end of this month. Oh well! It's cool I still have so much out there to look forward to.SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #9: Hackers #23 Resident Evil (2002)  Not a great movie, but more enjoyable than I was expecting. For the most part this is pretty fun. The plot was the weakest point of it all for me. I haven't played the games much, so I hold zero attachment to the characters, world, or scenario, and I found myself sort of glazing over every time any plot details were revealed. I also didn't really care about the characters beyond watching them either kick rear end or get their own asses kicked. Things felt more complicated than they needed to be just because the movie had to make the requisite references and tie into an existing, very fleshed out world. The real reason this is a good time is because it's structured a bit like a video game. The characters basically move between action set pieces, and that's just fine. There are some fun little scenarios and locations, and although the movie isn't exactly non-stop action, there is a lot of it. I wasn't ever really bored, and getting to see Milla Jovovich spin-kick a dog out of the air was almost worth it by itself. The traps and enemies sort of do this thing where how threatening they are varies depending on what the plot requires at that exact moment, so it's hard to ever get an exact sense of the world's rules, but since it's in service of very specific story/scene beats it's hard to complain about it too much. I wouldn't necessarily recommend this to anyone, but it's not a bad time for what it is. Watched (23/31): #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) Challenges (9/10): blood_dot_biz fucked around with this message at 07:21 on Oct 25, 2019 |
|
#
¿
Oct 25, 2019 05:04
|
|
|
I think I'm gonna have to end up watching at least 32 movies, because I want to do the final challenge but also want to get 31 new-to-me watches in. I should be able to make it since I won't be working on Halloween and can marathon a few things to catch back up! I was having a tough time picking out a guilty pleasure, but after thinking for a bit I actually think I have a few options I'd be excited to revisit. Probably going to pick between Tokyo Gore Police, Martyrs, and Taxidermia. I really don't think they're bad movies but they are absolutely ones I'd feel weird talking about with or recommending to most people, so I think they fit the theme. Franchescanado posted:By the way: Thank you so much for running this! I love this season but I wouldn't be watching a fraction of the horror movies I currently am if this thread didn't exist.
|
|
#
¿
Oct 26, 2019 01:22
|
|
|
STAC Goat posted:Excellent recommendation, blood_dot_biz. This isn’t a movie that was on my list. Its one I’ve kind of passed over a ton over the years but I was never really sure what to make of it or if it was me. Thank you very much. Glad you liked it! After watching it for the first time I remember being surprised that it isn't talked about more, because I really enjoyed it. Maybe I just hadn't been paying attention but I kind of had to stumble onto it. Your write-up is making me want to go back and give it a re-watch.
|
|
#
¿
Oct 26, 2019 16:49
|
|
|
SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #10: Navel GazingCOOL CORN posted:Legend of the Seven Golden Vampires #24 The Legend of the Seven Golden Vampires (1974)  This is the type of movie where I'm into the concept enough that it'd have to try pretty hard to get me to not enjoy it. The combination of genres is really fun, the effects are goofy (the vampire designs in particular, but I also really really love all the the miscellaneous bats), the set design is cool, and Peter Cushing is really enjoyable to watch. I was a bit disappointed in the actual martial arts aspect though. None of the fight choreography really stood out to me, and it felt like a missed opportunity. The movie takes its time to set up lots of varied characters and even introduce some specifically as embodying a particular weapon, but that stuff doesn't really pay off. It's all perfectly fine, it's just nothing special. The final encounter with Dracula in particular felt lackluster, especially when compared to the action that came right before. Also, the way the movie treated women soured me to it a bit. They exist in the movie mostly as victims, and even the stronger characters are the direct targets of misogynist comments. I don't mean to just rag on the movie though, because I did legitimately have a good time watching it. As I said above, I think the idea behind everything is great and there was enough consistently enjoyable stuff thrown in throughout the movie's runtime that I was always engaged. Unexpectedly, I actually enjoyed the worldbuilding more than the action itself. I've seen a few other Hong Kong movies that combine martial arts with fantasy/horror, and it's a combo I really like. This particular movie wasn't really on my radar (I've barely seen any Hammer), so I appreciate the recommendation and I'm definitely glad I watched it! Watched (24/31): #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) Challenges (10/13):
|
|
#
¿
Oct 26, 2019 19:19
|
|
|
SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #11: All Hail The King #25 It (2017)  I almost watched In the Tall Grass since it was streaming for free, but I decided to go with It instead because I never got to it when it came out and I remember the internet going wild over the movie. I went in expecting good things, but I was kinda disappointed. The movie mostly felt like standard blockbuster horror stuff. It started off strong with the opening kill being among the best in the movie (not surprising given how iconic that part is), second maybe only to the projector scene. The first half of the movie in general I was pretty engaged with, but it lost me after that, partly due to the movie's long-ish runtime and partly because the tension sort of went out the window for me once the kids started persuing Pennywise instead of just being randomly terrorized by him. Speaking of Pennywise, I was never really that creeped out by him. Bill Skarsgard's portrayal of him was good in some ways (he looked the part, and I particularly loved how creepy it was the way they had him drooling in his scene with Georgie), but the voice he was doing came off as goofier than I think was intended and I had trouble taking it seriously. The humans in this movie are largely scarier than the actual monster, and while that's cool, I think it's more to do with some lackluster horror than because of how well those people were portrayed. I bought the other people as legitimate threats until the rock fight, at which point it became clear that everyone in the movie was invincible when the movie wanted them to be. I've read the book and seen the older made for TV adaptation, so I already knew who lived and died, but it's still pretty weird to see kids hurling fist-sized rocks at each other's heads without anyone really seeming to care too much about getting hit. That's cartoon territory, which can be fine, except that the first part of the movie spent time setting up some pretty brutally violent situations for its characters and it felt like this scene instantly erased the stakes those previous ones worked to set up. Also maybe I've just completely desensitized myself to them, but not one of the jumpscares even slightly got me, which was disappointing. Maybe if I'd seen it in theaters that would've been different, because those moments felt like they were relying on sound cues more than actual tension or imagery. Parts of this movie were legitimately very fun, but the horror aspect barely hit for me, and everything felt like it lost steam as it went along. It's a fine movie, and I think if you haven't dipped your toes into horror that much it'd probably scare you, but I was hoping for more. Watched (25/31): #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) Challenges (11/13): blood_dot_biz fucked around with this message at 21:25 on Oct 27, 2019 |
|
#
¿
Oct 27, 2019 21:20
|
|
|
SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #12: Cavalcade of Creepiness #26 Tales from the Hood (1995)  I was gonna watch this last year but at the last minute ended up picking something else. Glad this challenge came up to give me a good reason to come back to it, because this movie is really fun! I felt a bit like I was watching an alternate version of The Twilight Zone. Each of the stories is about standard TV show episode length, and they all have a pretty strong central message and core conceit. It's not subtle stuff, but it doesn't really need to be in this context. There's a good mixture of comedy and legitimately dark stuff, but things are largely wrapped up in pretty cathartic ways as a nice contrast to some of those more serious topics. This feels like the type of movie that's begging you to see it in a group; it feels made for vocal reactions. You could also almost say this is a movie about art. I don't think the theme QUITE permeates the entire movie, but the first three segments all feature art pretty prominently, and you can make an argument for it in the fourth segment as well with the Clockwork Orange style film. I was all set to speak more about this, but the wrapper segment doesn't really do anything to connect to the 4 other segments on that topic. Regardless, it's cool that it's a theme at all, and I definitely don't think it's an accident that self expression is consistently shown in such a positive light. Oh yeah, and Clarence Williams III does an awesome job as the funeral director. I enjoyed that framing device a lot, and watching him between each segment was a huge treat. I feel like a lot of people in this thread have ended up checking this out already, but if you haven't seen it it's a great pick for this challenge and a good time in general! Watched (26/31): #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) Challenges (12/13):
|
|
#
¿
Oct 28, 2019 02:33
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ Apr 28, 2024 17:03 |
|
|
SUPER SAMHAIN CHALLENGE #13: Maniac #26b Tokyo Gore Police (2008)  Decided to go with Tokyo Gore Police, though I'm not counting it as one of my 31 since my personal goal was no rewatches. I don't think this is a bad movie, but I'd consider it a guilty pleasure because it's not exactly the type of movie I'd feel comfortable going around and recommending to most people. I watched this movie for the first time pretty soon after it was released because a friend described it to me and I was very morbidly curious. I remember really loving it. I hadn't ever seen anything like it before and it kind of opened my eyes to the world of more extreme movies. Not that I'm an expert in that sort of stuff now, but in 2008 I had probably seen fewer than 10 horror movies total, and had definitely not watched any of its more niche entries. So more than anything, this movie is nostalgiac for me as one of my early horror stepping stones. I genuinely really like it, but I also like that it lead me to so many other great movies. This movie's title is extremely accurate. If you've seen a lot of horror movies, you've undoubtedly come across more than a few that make promises they absolutely fail to deliver on with regards to their content. I'm happy to say that Tokyo Gore Police is set in Tokyo, prominently features the city's new privatized police force, and keeps up a nearly constant stream of wildy over-the-top, mostly practical, gore. And not just gore, but creative gore. This movie isn't just trying to paint the town red, it's trying to do it in a way you've never seen before, and it's consistently a lot of fun. Tokyo Gore Police centers around Ruka, an employee of Tokyo's privatized police force, who specializes in hunting "Engineers", a group of people genetically mutated in such a way that their injuries turn into weapons. Essentially, if one of their arms gets chopped off, a weapon of some sort will re-grow in its place, like a gun made from flesh and gore. Don't worry about wasted potential, because this concept is explored to its full extent, along with the general theme of extreme body modification. It'd been so long since I last watched this that I'd forgotten how amazingly dumb the backstory for the Engineers was. I'm glad I watched this again so I could be reminded. The plot's main purpose is probably mostly to string together fun set pieces, effects, and fights, but it's also clear that it was thought up with care, and it's definitely not throwaway. The music on the other hand, is sort of a mixed bag. There are some really fun song choices, and then there's also what sounds essentially like a cheap stock music version of a battle theme that plays a few times during some very dramatic moments. I should also say that the pacing of the movie drags a bit, particularly in the first half. The movie's almost 2 hours long and there's a bunch of interspersed action to break up the overall pacing, so it's not a matter of the amount of exciting content, but a lot of the scenes themselves are fairly slowly paced, so things can sometimes feel a bit slow even if you're watching someone's severed hands erupt in a geyser of blood. This movie is super gross and sometimes sleazy or in bad taste, but it's also very creative, impressive, goofy, and fun. It's not for everyone, but if you like practical effects and over the top, conceptually wild gore, I think it's a really good watch. -- And that means I've knocked out all the challenges! I've still got 5 more movies left to go, but for those I can watch whatever I want and I definitely have more than 5 interesting options to choose from. Feeling good about hitting my target this year. Watched (26/31): #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) Challenges (13/13):
|
|
#
¿
Oct 28, 2019 06:25
|
|