It's October baby....Horror flick time!

[Drunken Monk]

The Void - In my eyes, a true horror classic. Or at least it should be. It's like Silent Hill, Hellraiser and The Thing had a threesome and someone got pregnant. Gory as hell, riveting and just all-out awesome. I highly recommend it to those that like 80's throwback movies.

Cold Skin - Is this even a horror? For the sake of the thread, I'm going to say it is. A garbage, slow rolling tale of sea monsters and two guys that hate each other. It's redundant and meandering and culminates in a yawn-worthy ending. I'm not sure if its a victim of its own pretentiousness or just bad film making.

[Secret Executioner]

Amityville II: The Possession (USA, 1982)

A family moves in in a beautiful house in Amityville. Things go awry quickly after their arrival and the discovery of a mysterious hidden chamber in the basement as bizarre events start occuring and the family members to act strangely, resulting in constant arguments. The oldest of the children soon becomes oddly reclused and gets possessed by a mysterious entity.

 

I mentionned the Amityville movies in my Poltergeist review, and that's the entry we got the same year - a movie whose title implies sequel but that is really a prequel as the family is supposed to be the people who lived in the house before the people from the first movie. The film is overall slow, but I'd say it gets better in its last third or so when the demon possessing the son is more explored and there are attempts from the priest at exorcising. Before that, the film deals mainly with the family, and it's not too interesting - the father (played by Burt Young, known notably for playing Paulie in the Rocky movies) is a very harsh and hot-headed idiot, the youngest kids are brats... You understand immediately there'll be fallout and arguments. The mother and the older daughter are okay, though the latter  (Diane Franklin who played Princess Elizabeth in Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure) gets in a rather strange subplot. The oldest of the children (Jack Magner) is the central character, yet it seems we barely know him. He has conflicts with his jackass father, listens to music on his walkman (through which some evil voices talk to him, a pretty enjoyable addition IMO) and the possession scenes have him deformed when in devil mode with a lot of well crafted practical effects. His hands and head have the most notable deformations, with his head getting completely altered and layers of heads falling apart to reveal a new one in a pretty cool scene towards the end as the priest is trying to exorcise him. Other horrific imagery include the bizarre hidden chamber that's full of some mud and flies, some gore (blood appearing or on corpses) that's decent and a scene with a room whose wall bleed and that starts filling with blood - the flow of blood rushing kind of made me think of the elevator scene from Stanley Kubrick's The Shining but more because it feels like a poor man's version.

 

My call ? This prequel is an overall okay film, it's fairly slow and kind of annoying at first, but it gets betters past the hour mark. The tension and horror are fairly limited, but the movie offers some solid practical effects. 

Edited October 23, 2019 by Secret Executioner

[Drunken Monk]

The Mutilator - A horrendous 80’s slasher that’s more like Tommy Wiseau’s The Room than Friday the 13th. The film earns points by showcasing some very gory kill scenes (a hook ends up in a vagina at one point) but, for the most part, it’s a lame duck. Watch to laugh at rather than actually enjoy.

[AlbertV]

On 10/21/2019 at 6:25 PM, Secret Executioner said:

Our friend @AlbertV mentionned it earlier in this thread, my watch for tonight was Dick Maas' The Lift (original title: De Lift) (The Netherlands, 1983)

A state of the art elevator begins acting up and while nothing is wrong according to the technician from the lift company, the machine keeps malfunctionning and causing deaths. The technician decides to investigate the matter, receiving help from a plucky reporter.

My call ? A movie that's definitely worth watching. Highly recommended.

Maas also remade this very film, set in New York City, called Down (which temporarily Lionsgate released as The Shaft, but has since reverted back to its original name). James Marshall is in the Huub Stapel role, Naomi Watts is the reporter, Ron Perlman is Marshall's boss and Edward Herrmann is the building manager and the always great to watch Michael Ironside is the mad genius behind the power source of the elevators. Adds a bit of a terrorist twist...shot pre-9/11. 

 

Edited October 24, 2019 by AlbertV

[Secret Executioner]

21 hours ago, Drunken Monk said:

A horrendous 80’s slasher that’s more like Tommy Wiseau’s The Room than Friday the 13th.

Great, now I'm picturing a victim saying stuff like "Oh hai, Jason" before getting axed. 

 

Speaking of Tommy Wiseau's The Room, I too saw a movie that can be linked to this movie - Retro Puppet Master (USA, 1999).

In this prequel, Andre Toulon narrates his origin. He used to be a puppeteer in early 20th Century Paris (played by Greg Sestero, AKA Mark from The Room) until he met an old wizard from Egypt who stole the secret of life from the god Sutekh. As the wizard is dying, he decides to pass on the secret to Toulon who eventually uses it to bring his puppets to life to get revenge on the Sutekh minions who murdered his theater companions.

 

A decent DTV episode of the franchise also serving as an origin story. The movie feels low budget at points (especially some exterior shots), but overall looks nice. The theater where Toulon and his friends perform (and more or less live) is notably very intriguing and atmospheric, something likely reinforced by the red curtains and the kind of mystical speech Toulon delivers before the puppet show. The puppets themselves are very detailed and have expressive faces and gestures, they get some moments once brought to life - Toulon also comes up with names on the spot and they each have a very strong trademark trait while the human puppeteers were given very little time outside of a couple of lines here and there - but are overall very competent in helping their master fight Sutekh's minions.

These characters have a decent look, they're initially mummies who adopt a more normal (by human standards) appearance when in Paris. They have a strange repeating pattern whenever they speak and they make for tough opponents, being supernatural beings and all. The wizard feels more normal, he is kind of the wise old master stereotype but comes across as nice and kinda witty at times. Toulon himself is a solid lead, sympathetic and quite likeable. Sestero's accent is pretty much on mark for a French person speaking English, though it makes things a bit odd. Nevertheless, a solid performance IMO, though he gets a bit OTT at points (notably with strong emotions or when performing the ritual to bring puppets to life). The love interest seems like an after-thought though, as she is mainly here to be happy to see Toulon and eventually becomes a damsel in distress in the climax. She's the independent, self-asserted kind of girl who doesn't like authority and wants to do things on her own. Too bad she really lacks development and personality beyond that.

 

My call ? A decent movie, but like in yesterday's Amityville II things really get going when you reach the hour mark - that's when Toulon gets going with the puppets and the focus is fighting the minions of Sutekh.

 

Fun fact: while it wasn't mentionned in the movie version, this film was mentionned as one of Sestero's works in the book version of The Disaster Artist, a piece centered on Tommy Wiseau and how The Room came to be and would become a cult classic. The movie is pretty good nonetheless, a very enjoyable watch.

Edited October 24, 2019 by Secret Executioner

[Secret Executioner]

@AlbertV heard of the remake, haven't checked it out though.

 

Today's movie is a Christmasy DTV slasher called Jack Frost (USA, 1997)

A convicted murderer named Jack Frost is on his way to his execution when the vehicle transporting him gets in an accident with a truck transporting chemicals. Said chemicals eventually mutate Jack Frost and cause his DNA to bond with the snow. The mutant snowman then goes on a rampage in an isolated where the cop that arrested him works while the cop has to deal with an FBI agent and a lab worker who are also interested in Frost.

 

In case the premise and the naming of thekiller didn't give a hint, this movie is pretty silly. Lots of low-brow humor between the town folks and countless one-liners from the killer, some poor effects (or snow does look a lot like foam ?) and OTT characters make for a silly yet enjoyable movie. The tension and scares are barely here though the movie tries to have some, notably with some fakeouts and scenes feeling way more serious and dramatic than the rest. That said, the mere appearance of the killer snowman, his one-liners or simply side-characters tend to remind you (or make you think ?) it's more of a dark comedy than a tense slasher with a supernatural killer - sorta like some parts in the Nightmare on Elm Street sequels vs the original movie.

As a slasher, it of course contains kills and it's not necessarly the worst part. They aren't the goriest or most violent you'll see, but they are sometimes a bit OTT - a guy gets the handle of an axe shoved down his throat, a woman gets murdered with Christmas ornaments (including a sequence looking goofy due to how badly it's done), another guy gets stabbed with ice projectiles and a woman gets murdered in a bathtub following a rape. 

The end credits also contain various bad jokes (notably asking where the carrot went during the bathtub murder), though some of these jokes seem to imply the weather during filming was everything but snowy, hence the bad looking fake snow I guess.

 

My call ? Worth checking if you want something to have a good laugh at, otherwise there are much better and more serious (and scary) slashers out there.

 

Fun fact: the DVD cover showcases a snowman monster that has nothing to do with the movie.

[Secret Executioner]

Another slasher for today, but a more serious one... Friday the 13th Part VII: The new Blood (USA, 1988)

Following the events of previous movies, Jason lies chained up at the bottom of the lake. But when a girl with telekinetic abilities named Tina is taken to Crystal Lake by a greedy doctor who wants to exploit her powers, the undead killer gets loose and starts murdering a group of young people also spending the weekend there. Having made friends with the group and foreseeing murders thanks to her powers, can Tina save them and defeat Jason ?

 

After the goofy sixth film said "screw the continuity", we have a movie that again follows the original storyline from the first movies and its predecessor. It implies a 3 or 4-minute recap using a lot of stock footage from parts 2, 4 and 6 to explain about Jason before we get the movie properly started, and this footage may actually be gorier and more violent than what we get in the actual film as most of the gore is cut out, resulting in death often occuring offscreen or very quick shots of mutilated bodies.One notable instance of trimming is a scene where Jason gets a girl in a sleeping bag out of her tent and slams it against a tree - the scene should have run longer and the girl been hit several times before dying, but the movie has her die with one hit. Feels a bit weird, even if we take into account the fact Jason is a supernatural being that has superhuman strength. Other kills involve him stabbing people with a machete, punching through people's chests or using a motorized brush cutter to open someone's belly - sadly (in a way ?), it is mostly offscreen or implied. Too bad because this movie seemed to try and be slightly creative with the kills.

In terms of story and characters the movie is quite different than the previous entry, as the character are better-rounded and not as annoying. Of course you get some arguments and teenage stuff, but they are all around likeable, more along the lines of the characters you'd see in the first couple of movies. Tina is very well-explored - notably having a rather dark backstory regarding her powers - and is likeable, she also makes for a competent and creative opponent to Jason as the final third or so of the movie sees her putting her powers to use to stop or at least inconvenience Jason. The other teenagers are rather likeable, maybe a bit clichee but likeable enough to get you invested. An interesting trait I noticed was that a guy named Nick (who eventually flirts with Tina) seems fairly competent and tries to fight Jason and protect Tina, unlike people who usually scream and get murdered without putting much of a fight (whether it's against Jason, zombies or whatever creature/killer actually, as it seems fairly common in horror in general). Tina's doctor is - as mentionned - a greedy bastard who wants to exploit her, but he doesn't come across as transparently evil from the start. His advice on making Tina rest and avoiding her going out with the teens may come across as sound advice to avoid stress and/or impromptu manifestations of her powers, but he eventually gets framed by Tina's mom.

 

My call ? A solid entry in the series, close enough to parts 1 and 3 thanks to the likeable (and fairly interesting) characters and the creativity thrown in with a superpowered opponent to Jason that can put up a fight against him instead of having characters mainly serving as victims and a supernatural Jason being defeated by someone who's pretty much a regular human.

 

Fun fact: from what I recall, this movie was made following Paramount and New Line Cinema being unable to finalize a deal intended to put Jason and Freddy in a same movie. And even though New Line would get the rights to Jason a few years later (and hint at a Jason/Freddy crossover in their first Friday the 13th film Jason goes to Hell), it would take over a decade before Freddy vs. Jason happened.

[AlbertV]

Here's my weekend viewing...

Shrunken Heads (1994): Richard Elfman (brother of Danny) directed this Charles Band-produced film that meshes horror and superhero genre with a retro feel reminiscent of the old Archie comics. Three teens (Aeryk Egan, Bo Sharon, and Darris Love) dream of being heroes as they are comic book fans. When they witness a carjacking by bad boy Vinnie, who also bullies the teens, they find themselves first kidnapped by Vinnie and his boss Big Moe (played in a gender bending performance by Meg Foster). But then the kids escape, Big Moe orders them killed. Local newspaper stand owner/voodoo priest Mr. Sumatra turns the dead teens into shrunken heads, each with a different power (electricity, vampire, and switchblade), and one year later, its time for revenge. The trio of heroes exact revenge but adds a twist to the mix! Fun, wild ride from the Full Moon team. Danny Elfman came up with the theme music and even contributed one of his Oingo Boingo classic songs to the soundtrack and younger brother Bodhi Elfman plays Booger, Vinnie's right hand man in the film.

Little Shop of Horrors: The Director's Cut (1986): I always loved the Rick Moranis-led musical version of the classic Roger Corman horror film, based on the Off Broadway hit play. This version has the original 23-minute ending where it veers into the original stage play direction rather than the happy ending of the film.

Frankenstein (1931): The original Universal classic with excellent performances by Colin Clive as the titular creator and Boris Karloff as the monster.

Weedjies: Halloweed Night (2019): Charles Band came up with ten new horror films this past summer and finally, the 1st of the "Deadly Ten" was released last week. It's basically a modern update of his Ghoulies franchise with cannabis mixed in. At 75 minutes, it's fun and wild like most of the Full Moon movies with some comic relief and a great kill scene that's unexpected. 

[Drunken Monk]

Poltergeist - This may be committing horror movie treason but I don't get all the hoopla over this alleged classic. It's not a good film by any stretch of the imagination. It's all over the place, every single character reacts in the wrong way to what they're seeing and it all feels very mundane. Frightening for its time? Perhaps. But decades later it's a wildly scattered affair with only a few moments holding up (I stand by the chair stacking scene being great). Considering it's so oddly frantic in places, I found the film to be a bit boring. Entertaining in places but it just didn't tickle my fancy like I wanted it too.

The Witch - After being continually recommended this film since it came out, I decided to give it a go. I couldn't tell if I really enjoyed the film at first or just really respected it. It's certainly not a bad film. At all. It's engaging and interesting. A thinking man's horror, if you will.
I was along for the ride though and, upon thinking about it a little more, I think I did enjoy the ride. It's slow but that's a constant looming mystery about it all. "Is that goat the devil?" Oh and I think the penultimate scene with said goat is one of the best horror scenes in recent years. Really loved it.
I'd recommend this one to those that liked their horrors a little less trope-filled. It's definitely original and while it isn't littered with jump scares, it is very eerie and carries a lot of emotional weight.

[Koravec]

On October 23, 2019 at 12:37 PM, Drunken Monk said:

The Void - In my eyes, a true horror classic. Or at least it should be. It's like Silent Hill, Hellraiser and The Thing had a threesome and someone got pregnant. Gory as hell, riveting and just all-out awesome. I highly recommend it to those that like 80's throwback movies.

Cold Skin - Is this even a horror? For the sake of the thread, I'm going to say it is. A garbage, slow rolling tale of sea monsters and two guys that hate each other. It's redundant and meandering and culminates in a yawn-worthy ending. I'm not sure if its a victim of its own pretentiousness or just bad film making.

Void is a sort of cool flick, thrown together with a few cliches and visually appealing enough looking ending to sort of make the buildup worth it.

Cold Skin- I didnt find the way it played out very enticing either. Once I realized it was about mermaid monster things my interst waned and I turned it off. however I found the cinematography pretty enticing, enough so that I came back after many months later to give it another shot. Didnt mind watching now that I knew what it was about and more what to expect.

Pumpkinhead- watched a couple nights ago. Also wasnt terribly impressed by this one, aside from the fogged out atmosphere of several scenes. Very dissapointed that the monster didnt actually have a jackolantern as a head, opting for the resemblence to an alien type creature, not far off from the alien in the alien franchise. Coincidentally features a main actor from the alien series.

The Lighthouse- In a similar vein to Cold Skin this is lighthouse flick involves a keeper and new assistant hire. Workers are in opposition to the keeper in both. Nearly as much of a black comedy as the new Joker movie. Had some laugh out loud moments from me and my friends in the theater. Very dark, grim caged in feeling throughout. William Dafoe is phenomenal in this role, he must have taken a love for the sea after recently playing in Aquaman as well. Im a big Pattinson fan, but hes nowhere near the actor Dafoe is in this. 

[Secret Executioner]

@Drunken Monk I get your point regarding Poltergeist. Hype and praise may turn against a film and make it disappointing in the end - it's the case for me with stuff such as The Exorcist, Stanley Kubrick's The Shining, or (in the MA world) Ang Lee's Crouchng Tiger, Hidden Dragon.

 

Didn't watch any horror these past two days, I'm starting to feel kind of burnt out on the pretty much daily watching since the beginning of the month.  I may watch something on October 31st, unless I go with some TV specials - probably the Beavis and Butt-Head Halloween 2-parter and/or the Garfield's Halloween Adventure special.

[AlbertV]

I'm watching the new horror film Portal, which revolves around a ghost hunter, played by Final Destination 3's Ryan Merriman, who takes his crew to an abandoned house where years ago, a man killed both his wife and daughter before killing himself. He finds a box in a cemetery and reads an incantation, unleashing a portal that brings a demonic force that kills and possesses those it comes across. Very slow moving at first but things pick up within the last half hour. It is good to see the legendary Heather Langenkamp (Nightmare on Elm Street 1 & 3, New Nightmare) again on screen as a woman who knows of the box and its misgivings who may be able to stop it and help the ghost hunters. 

Langenkamp had taken a break from acting to work as a VFX artist. She worked on Dawn of the Dead (the Zack Snyder remake), Cabin in the Woods and Evan Almighty under her married name, Heather Anderson (her husband David LeRoy Anderson, is a veteran FX master). 

Edited October 29, 2019 by AlbertV

[Drunken Monk]

Tigers Are Not Afraid - A very Guillermo del Toro-like ghost story about a group of children trying to outrun Mexican cartel members. Really enjoyed this one. The surface-level plot isn't groundbreaking but the performances and the way the supernatural is injected into the reality is excellent. I will say one thing negative: they beat the audience over the head with the whole "tiger" thing.
For one I wasn't expecting much from, I got an awful lot. Don't go in expecting The Conjuring-like scares and you will be gifted a beautiful-yet-tragic modern ghost story.

[DragonClaws]

23 hours ago, Secret Executioner said:

Didn't watch any horror these past two days, I'm starting to feel kind of burnt out on the pretty much daily watching since the beginning of the month.  I may watch something on October 31st, unless I go with some TV specials - probably the Beavis and Butt-Head Halloween 2-parter and/or the Garfield's Halloween Adventure special.

 

Hats of to you for the huge effort, I would have burned out much earlier.

[Secret Executioner]

9 hours ago, AlbertV said:

It is good to see the legendary Heather Langenkamp (Nightmare on Elm Street 1 & 3, New Nightmare) again on screen as a woman who knows of the box and its misgivings who may be able to stop it and help the ghost hunters. 

Langenkamp had taken a break from acting to work as a VFX artist. She worked on Dawn of the Dead (the Zack Snyder remake), Cabin in the Woods and Evan Almighty under her married name, Heather Anderson (her husband David LeRoy Anderson, is a veteran FX master). 

Interesting trivia here. I mostly know of Heather Langenkamp for her roles in the NOES movies.

 

@DragonClaws Thanks mate.

[Drunken Monk]

As Above, So Below - A capable if muddled found-footage horror. The premise is interesting and executed nicely at times but it suffers from scatterbrained scares towards the end.

Because of this, it ends up being a mediocre affair. A perfectly fine watch but it’s not going to blow any socks off.

[Secret Executioner]

The Black Cat (original title: Black Cat (Gatto nero)) (Italy, 1981)

A small village in the English country side is hit by a wave of bizarre deaths. In the mean time a medium living nearby is attempting to communicate with the dead. Both are connected by the presence of a black cat. A photographer and a Scotland Yard inspector investigate.

 

One of many adaptations of Edgar Allan Poe's "The Black Cat", this loose adaptation set in modern times was helmed by Italian director Lucio Fulci. And it's far from one of his best. The movie is really slow, the suspension of disbelief gets broken by the constant repetition that a murderous cat is an absurd concept and I felt like the film as a whole made even less sense than the bizarre twist ending of Joe D'Amato's Buio Omega or than the weird conclusion of Fulci's The New York Ripper.There's however some decent gore (not that much though, kinda odd for a Fulci movie from this era) and I really liked the soundtrack. The sets are okay too, the medium's house is especially beautiful with an interior reminiscent of some old manor. The scenes involving the cat often reuse the same footage of a cat, especially close-ups on one or both its eyes. There are some bizarre sound effects that I felt didn't match what we saw - the cat seemed to be purring when agressive and the cat was supposed to be hissing when it was seen looking more curious or interested in something off-screen than really pissed. There is a 'cat camera" that's decent and helps the scenes be more suspensful though - that may seem random, but I found this to be one of the most interesting parts of the movie.

 

My call ? Not that great, probably one of the weakest movies I've seen this month. I mentionned NYR above, and it's a movie I feel is better because in spite of how gruesome and disturbing it can be, at least it made me feel something other than boredom (which is worse IMO). I'd probably still revisit it over the annoying Friday the 13th Part VI: Jason Lives though.

 

Fun fact: the medium is played by British actor Patrick Magee, notable for roles in classics like Chariots of Fire, A Clockwork Orange, Barry Lyndon or Zulu. Seems those terrible movies he made actually helped him finance some stage theatrical projects of his, but he still gives a really good performance - he is mysterious and unsettling, as well as very OTT in parts where his character has visions. The Scotland Yard inspector is played by David Warbeck, an actor from New Zealand whose resume is mostly made up of low-budget genre stuff, but who also played smaller parts in bigger productions like Hammer's Twins of Evil (starring horror icon Peter Cushing) or in Sergio Leone's A Fistful of Dynamite.

Edited October 30, 2019 by Secret Executioner

[AlbertV]

My final Halloween viewing this year goes to...Terrifier! Damien Leone brings back the sadistic Art the Clown from his anthology/short films All Hallows' Eve and gives the character an amped up version in the form of the awesome David Howard Thornton, replacing Mike Giannelli. Thorton's take on the character is terrifying, brutal, and maniacal in every manner possible. He keeps the smile for most of the film, especially when he's killing his victims in such grotesque fashion, including sawing a hanged-up upside down victim and I don't mean a chainsaw either...This is one of those films if you have a weak stomach or heart, you'll want to avoid.

And today, the crowdfunded sequel everyone has been waiting for, Terrifier 2, begins production with Thornton returning to the role of Art and also features Felissa Rose, the original Angela from the Sleepaway Camp franchise. 

[Drunken Monk]

@AlbertV I loved Terrifier. They’ve promised even more shocking gore sequences for the sequel so I’m super excited to see what they do.

Return of the Living Dead - This is technically right up my alley. 80’s cheese, full frontal nudity and zombies. And while I did enjoy it to an extent, it definitely fizzles out about halfway through. I actually expected way more gore in this one. Sadly, I didn’t get it. Not one I’ll revisit any time soon but I do want to watch Return of the Living Dead Part 2 now.

Last Shift -  A promising little film, it loses its way pretty badly. The scares are uneven and sometimes just bad. It’s a slog to make it to the end despite its brief runtime. The lead actress is EXTREMELY good but the film just doesn’t hit. It feels saggy and dare I say a bit boring?

Ouija: Origin of Evil - This one was fun. I wished they’d ramped up the amount of scares because, at times, this was super chilling. But they seem to give up partway through and go for story over horror. Most films need a nice balance and this one doesn’t quite pull it off. Still a fun watch though. Above average but doesn’t meet the standards of, say, The Conjuring.

And there we have it! Thirty-one horror movies in thirty-one days! I cannot wait to get back to regular films, as well as my beloved kung fu cinema.

 

[DragonClaws]

2 hours ago, Drunken Monk said:

Return of the Living Dead - This is technically right up my alley. 80’s cheese, full frontal nudity and zombies. And while I did enjoy it to an extent, it definitely fizzles out about halfway through. I actually expected way more gore in this one. Sadly, I didn’t get it. Not one I’ll revisit any time soon but I do want to watch Return of the Living Dead Part 2 now.

 

You might want to avoid Part 3, it really bad and takes the series in a whole different direction. A bit like comparing Fast & Furiouse 1 with one of the more recent sequels. Part 1&2 were a bit part of my teenage movie viewing. I still cant decide which I prefer Part 1 or 2, just both equally as good in my eyes.

 

Here's a great documentary about the first movie.

 

 

[Koravec]

Well these reviews have been really fun to read this season. I started to make a list of halloween/horror tinged flicks to check out and it became considerably large pretty quick. This month has flown by.

How about extending Its Horror Flick Time into November perhaps? I mean what else is that month for? Unless we all decide weve had enough at the beginning of October being gone. 

[Secret Executioner]

15 hours ago, Drunken Monk said:

And there we have it! Thirty-one horror movies in thirty-one days! I cannot wait to get back to regular films, as well as my beloved kung fu cinema.

Congrats man.  I couldn't make it through even though I love the genre - still watched 23 films (I'm excluding The Wasp Woman and the two It movies as I saw those in September) in 31 days, which I suppose is already a decent number- it's been quite a while since I watched that many movies in one month.

 

On a sidenote, my initial idea was to review one movie a day, eventually writing reviews - some if not all - in advance, but I decided to write on movies as I watched them instead. Seems more challenging this way, but it's really my inability to choose titles from my enormous collection that led to me being unable to make up my mind for 31 titles. Guess I still have titles I mentionned earlier - like Amityville 3D and H20 -  to review for next year... and  I'll have to find another 20+ films to cover the whole month. 

[Koravec]

Midsommar- I remember seeing the teasers for this one in theaters recently and thought it looked awful and a dread to watch. However after it came out I kept having people I knew recommending it to me. 

Actually watching it was maybe worse than I expected and nowhere near the expectations set up for me by the ones reccommending it. It has a messege in the sense that it may teach you something. Which is the ending gives you something to think about, and it did for me, and I feel some of the best art should teach. But I just disliked the movie so much still from watching it. Was told I should of waited for an ultra HD rendering, but I didnt feel I needed it. I just saw a bunch of people dressed in white jumping about on farmland in a cult sort of way. Classified as a horror, though barely that depending on how you look at it. I must admit, as with many things I initially dislike (such as the recent Joker flick) it may grow on me. 

monsters: dismembered dead bodies with sticks stuffed in their mouths, if that counts

Anna and The Apocalypse- I saw this title on the shelf at walmart and was tempted to grab it for ten bucks (spoiler: I hope to go back soon to pick it up). 

This movie has an R rating so I was expecting some sort of raunchy playthrough, however that really couldnt be further from the case. This movie plays like it was made for teenagers, and most likely was, the same sort of young audience that would of kept returning to watch Warm Bodies again, if not even younger. 

The film centers around a cast of highschoolers during the holiday season who become under the threat of zombies. The characters partake in several musical numbers throughout the movie. The songs are poppy, yet often enjoyable. I was laughing the first few tracks, not at but with the movie, thinking they were just an added element of satire. Though after they would playout Id become confused at the movies intentions. Either way Id say it actually works, the songs are catchy and enjoyable. 

Typical teenage drama, some funny jokes here and there, catchy songs, enjoyable actors, and entertaining zombie attacks make for a very fun watch. 

[Drunken Monk]

On 10/31/2019 at 4:58 PM, DragonClaws said:

You might want to avoid Part 3, it really bad and takes the series in a whole different direction. 

I actually love Part 3, haha! I'm not entirely sure why but I like that it's both cheesy and dark. Plus, I had a weird little crush on Melinda Clarke in zombie form.

[DrNgor]

I'm starting a little early just to get in the mood. I've recently watched:

The Black Room (2006) - Film about an amnesia victim who was found wandering around the countryside covered in blood. 15 years later, he's living in a mental institution. A doctor/pharmaceutical rep shows up at the hospital and offers him the opportunity to be a guinea pig for a memory-restoring drug. He takes it, but apparently there is no effect. But suddenly, he starts having vision of women being killed and a mud monster stalking him...

Absentia (2011) - Earlier effort from Mike Flanagan, who's gone on to Oculus, Ouija 2, and the Haunting of Hill House. A woman whose husband mysteriously disappeared is dealing with her demons as she prepares to declare him dead by absentia (re: missing for seven years or more). Her sister, a recovering smack addict, has shown up to help her through the difficult time. The story gradually (very gradually) becomes a Lovecraftian twist on "The Three Billy Goats Gruff".

Dragonwyck (1946) - This is the sort of film that Guillermo del Toro was homaging in Crimson Peak. It's got it all: poisonings! drug addiction! Murder! Ghosts! Family curses! Byronic A**holes! And it's set to the historical backdrop of the Hudson Valley Rent Wars, a little-known episode in American history in which Feudalism somehow survived up through the first half of the 1800s. Not a horror per se, but a Gothic Romance.

City of the Living Dead (1980) - A classic zombie film directed by sadistic gorehound Lucio Fulci. In the town of Dunwich, a priest hangs himself. That sort of sacrilege opens the door to hell, and the results are zombies, people puking up their entire digestive tracks, and all sorts of horrible things. Featuring a wonderfully eerie score by Fabio Frizzi.