Dracula
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Post by Dracula on Oct 6, 2024 15:51:28 GMT -5
Film Six: Let the Right One In (2008)  I haven’t watched this movie since it was relatively new and in the years since it came out it’s pretty much been solidified as a classic of the vampire genre… and really it was pretty much being talked about in those terms from the beginning. Personally I was a bit more reserved in my praise of the film back in the day and while I do still have a couple of reservations (that scene with the CGI cats is awful, and the bullies the kid has to contend with are almost cartoonishly evil and persistent) I think my slow-peddling of the movie was not really warranted and that the film does so much right as to really be something special. Tomas Alfredson, who’s currently in “director jail” because of the troubled production around The Snowman, really introduced himself as a strong cinematic voice with this movie and displayed a really canny ability to give the film a restrained tone while not keeping the pace too slow and not failing to deliver on the vampire imagery people came for. He also managed to cast two kids here who really pull off what they needed to in the main roles. The movie is pretty much the definitive statement on the “child vampire” concept and it also manages stick with the basic rules and lore most people associate with vampires while finding fresh ways to depict them. **** out of Five
Bonus Film: Grave of the Vampire (1972)  First of all, public service announcement: this movie has fallen into the public domain, so a lot of the versions of it out on the internet look like shit. The version on Amazon Prime Video looks horrible for instance and the copy unofficially posted on Youtube looks a lot better. Anyway, this vampire movie from the 70s has a screenplay written by David Chase. Yes, that David Chase, the creator of The Sopranos. I discovered that this existed while reading Chase’s Wikipedia page a couple years ago and have been curious enough to seek it out even though I’ve otherwise never heard of it. I was kind of expecting it to be a nondescript B-movie, and in terms of filmmaking and production values it’s actually probably less than that (total shoestring production), but the screenplay is actually kind of insane. The movie starts in the 50s with a teenage couple going to a graveyard to make out when they get attacked by a vampire who kills the guy and rapes the woman. She then turns out to have been impregnated by a vampire baby from this encounter. Were I making an exploitation movie with such a concept I’d want to focus a lot on the weirdness around raising a half-vampire baby, but the film instead cuts to twenty years later when this half-vampire has grown into a reasonably well adjusted young man out to find his vampire father to kill him out of revenge. From there it kind of just becomes a sort of shoddy vampire movie starring the dude who went on to play Conan the Barbarian’s father. It’s kind of an interesting spectacle with its ballsy concept and the fact that it just comes from kind of strange era for these sorts of vampire movie but the filmmaking is just really unimpressive and the movie doesn’t really work.
** out of Five
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Post by Neverending on Oct 6, 2024 17:43:58 GMT -5
Film Thirty: The Raven (1935)  The “Universal Horror Canon” is not an entirely fixed thing. If you’re looking strictly at their “monsters” then the pantheon is a bit more clear but they put out a number of other horror movies in the 30s that sometimes get included in the batch and sometimes don’t, most notably a handful of Edgar Alan Poe adaptations they put out featuring some of the signature stars. The most famous of these is probably The Black Cat, but they also followed that up with this adaptation of The Raven featuring Karloff and Lugosi which was pretty clearly an attempt to recapture the magic of that earlier movie and sort of lives in its shadow but there are some aspects of it that are still notable. The film has exceedingly little to do with Poe’s poem, especially after the first ten minutes or so when it gets quoted some and Poe himself becomes something of a theme as one character is homicidally obsessed with the writer. The film’s story is some messy nonsense and there’s no real “monster” at the center of it but it does have the same basic look and feel of the other Universal Horror films of the era and that does make it an at least somewhat worthy film to know about. ** out of FiveThe Raven (1935) Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi's attempt to follow up on The Black Cat with yet another loose Edgar Alan Poe adaption doesn't quite capture the same magic, but it comes pretty close. The film feels even more thrown together than The Black Cat and doesn't have the precise hand Edgar G. Ulmer behind the camera but The Raven still benefits from a diabolical mad man and elaborate torture chambers. The film also switches up the moral alignment of The Black Cat, with Lugosi playing a very twisted villain and Karloff as the sympathetic figure. That's probably the more natural alignment and I did have fun watching them clash, even if the film around them is pretty flawed. B- And now, Doomsday continues his ongoing series of watching horror movies he's never seen before for Halloween......
The Raven (1935)
 For my last entry this year, I decided to take one more stroll down the lane of the Karloff/Lugosi team-ups. I kicked off this month with The Black Cat, a silly movie but with enough fun stuff in it to make it worthwhile. The same can easily be said for The Raven, another second tier Universal horror film from the classic era. Released the same year as the titan Bride of Frankenstein, The Raven features Bela Lugosi who is a) a brilliant doctor, b) obsessed with Edgar Allen Poe, c) is also insane and has a torture chamber full of devices ripped straight from Poe's works and d) agrees to help a criminal on the run (Karloff) if the criminal helps him bag the girl he has his eye on. The script for this movie is bananas and all over the place but Lugosi here really shines. You can tell he's having a blast as he chews each and every scene and every word he speaks in order to completely sell you on his character's sinister motives. Karloff is kind of a waste here as he isn't given much to do except hide behind some uninspired makeup but Lugosi's delightful and fiendish performance helps make up for the shoddy script. Not great, not essential viewing but a fun way to spend 61 minutes if you're looking to expand your horror horizons. That's it for me and this thread for the year. Happy Halloween everyone! Y’all are so dismissive of this movie. I think it’s really good. The plot sees Bela Lugosi blackmail Boris Karloff into killing on his behalf, so he can romance a lovely young lady. Silly stuff, but Lugosi and Karloff ham up the screen and are loads of fun to watch. |
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IanTheCool
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Post by IanTheCool on Oct 6, 2024 18:48:09 GMT -5
THE GATE (1987)Here is further proof that PG Cooper and IanTheCool have never watched a Canadian film in their whole existence. Canadians ignore their own film industry. Its just part of being Canadian. |
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Post by IanTheCool on Oct 6, 2024 20:23:57 GMT -5
Oct 6 My Bloody Valentine 1981
A slasher movie that is both set at Valentine's Day and set in a mine. Pick a lane! Actually, I ended up liking this one quite a bit. Its pretty standard kill-off-the-teenagers fare, but its engaging, and once the action moves into the actual mines themselves, it really gets good. The killer has some interesting backstory, the rebel youth making their own party works, and it even has a pretty good song over the credits! Its a good one.
I realize I'm posting this not long after making fun of the Canadian film industry. But we did pretty good with this one. And promoted Moosehead beer for kicks.
7/10
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PG Cooper
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Post by PG Cooper on Oct 6, 2024 22:28:16 GMT -5
Day Six: Thrifted Blu-Rays Part OneI stumbled across a small stack of B-horror blu-rays from various boutique labels while thrift shopping and bought all four despite having never seen (or even heard of) any of the films. Given how expensive these Blus go new, it seemed downright stupid to pass them up at five bucks a pop. If any will actually stick around the collection will depend on how my viewings go. Mansion of the Living Dead We're starting with Mansion of the Living Dead, from notable B-horror director Jesús Franco. The film follows four waitresses on vacation at an abandoned hotel who are accosted by strange supernatural goings on. The charitable way to describe Mansion of the Living Dead is a film motivated by dream logic, the women moving through the hotel in an unreal haze, the action driven more by mood than plot. The less charitable way to describe Mansion of the Living Dead is a film motivated by porno logic, the women constantly naked, leered at by the camera, and in the mood for sex no matter the scenario or the participant. And even in the context of a film driven by mood and vibes, the assembly of Mansion of the Living Dead is pretty sloppy, a collection of half-baked ideas and visuals which never amount to more than what is immediately on-screen. What makes all this worse is the general lack of real horror. There are a couple of spooky visuals here and there but the film is never committed to really generating suspense or scares. It just feels so half-hearted. Franco does show some visual flair and it's not surprising to learn he has a dedicated cult audience across dozens of horror films, but Mansion strikes me as a very minor entry in his cannon. Then again, I'm probably in no position to make that call. At any rate, Mansion of the Living Dead shows glimmers of intrigue but is too scattered and disinterested to compel me. D+Mardi Gras Massacre Thrifted boutique Blu-Ray number two is Mardi Gras Massacre, a similarly sleazy but far less artful horror film which borders on softcore porno brought to you by the fine people at Severin Films. I will give Mardi Gras Massacre this, the soundtrack of original disco tunes does kinda slap. Just booted up the disc's menu is a good time. The movie itself is largely awful, extremely repetitive and staged in the most boring and plain ways imaginable. Three times the killer picks up a girl from the bar to sacrifice in his apartment, each scene plays out the exact same way with the exact same shot types, possibly with reused inserts at points. I am not immune to the charms of trashy horror peddling in boobs and bloodshed but there's no energy or passion found here. It's entirely cynical and lifeless. D-
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Post by Neverending on Oct 7, 2024 0:26:21 GMT -5
Canadians ignore their own film industry. It’s just part of being Canadian. I am still hopeful that Doctor PG Cooper will use his powers for good. Who else is gonna tell Doomsday that his neighbors up north are infringing on Steven Spielberg’s I.P.? |
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Post by PhantomKnight on Oct 7, 2024 9:11:04 GMT -5
Day Seven: Insidious: Chapter 3 (2015)
The first two Insidious movies are already solid examples of haunted house movies executed with assured skill, with the bonus of a fun and pretty interesting mythology with The Further thrown in, and I quite enjoy those movies. Public opinion on the next two in the series, though, seems to have been not as strong...but, I gotta say, while not quite on the level of the first two, Insidious: Chapter 3 (dumb title, by the way, since this is a prequel set quite some time before the first) is surprisingly enjoyable in its own right. The basic structure remains intact -- malevolent forces/demons prey upon characters in one location and like to jump scare the crap out of said characters -- but this movie is kept afloat by two main factors. One, is that new director and returning writer Leigh Whannell is able to successfully channel James Wan's style of dread, anticipation and atmosphere without feeling like he's outright aping it, which leads to some good sequences and setpieces. And two, the script creates a refreshing new plot device to add into the mix by way of having its main character (played well by Stefanie Scott) have her legs broken for most of the movie, and thus confined to a bed/wheelchair/singular location. And Whannell is able to mostly take advantage of that by staging some solid sequences that ratchet up the tension reasonably well. But credit is also due to Stefanie Scott and Lin Shaye, too. Scott's character may lean more toward the typical besieged teen, but she sells it nicely. And then there's Lin Shaye as Elise Rainier, a character who honestly gets more interesting the more I see of her, and it helps that Shaye is more than up to the task of being the franchise's anchor of sorts at this point. All in all, this is a solid addition to the franchise that effectively finds a new angle to exploit, even if it may not leave as big an impression as the first two.
**1/2 /****
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Post by Neverending on Oct 7, 2024 9:38:24 GMT -5
 The Addams Family (1991)The 1991 film adaptation of The Addams Family was written by Caroline Thompson (Edward Scissorhands) and Larry Wilson (Beetlejuice), so if it feels like a Tim Burton movie, now you know why. And it’s directed by Barry Sonnenfeld, who began his career as a cinematographer for the Coen bros. So if it feels like a Sam Raimi film, now you know why. Since that has now been clarified, let’s move on. The movie begins with Gomez Addams, played by the beloved Raul Julia, as he griefs for the loss of his older brother who disappeared 25 years earlier after a major argument. Meanwhile, his lawyer, played by Dan Hedaya, is trying to scam money out of him because the Addams family is somehow filthy rich. So after a few failed attempts, he comes up with a scheme where a man named Gordon, who is played delightfully by Christopher Lloyd, will pretend to be Fester, Gomez’ long lost brother, and inherit the fortune. All of this is fine and dandy, but Sonnenfeld and his screenwriters are more interested in the hijinks of the family. The plot is just there to hold a series of comedic set-pieces together. This is definitely a flawed approach but not a major one. The Addams Family is genuinely funny and features a spectacular cast. Besides Julia and Lloya, there’s Anjelica Huston as Morticia and Christina Ricci as Wednesday. And they are all fun to watch. So, I can’t complain too much. It’s a very entertaining movie despite the very weak script. Addams Family Values (1993)Most people seem to prefer the sequel because it has a stronger script and is a lot funnier in most cases. This time, the film begins with the birth of Gomez and Morticia’s third child. It is followed by a series of morbidly hilarious scenes where Wednesday and her brother try to murder their new sibling. This causes too much stress for their parents so they hire a nanny, played by Joan Cusack, to help out. But unfortunately, she’s a gold-digger that wants to steal Fester’s money. Again, the Addams family is filthy rich for unknown reasons. So anyway, she romances Fester and they get married almost immediately. The family protest, of course, but they’re no match for the nanny’s vagina. And yes, despite this being a kid’s movie, it is explicitly implied that she keeps Fester in line by offering sex. Anyway, as all this drama is unfolding, we get a sub-plot involving Wednesday and her brother being sent to summer camp. And this is where the film truly shines. As you can imagine, Wednesday does not fit in AT ALL and she makes numerous attempts to escape. When all those fail, she resorts to violence. It’s great dark comedy and Christina Ricci is phenomenal. Then, at the end, the family is reunited when the nanny tries to kill all of them and run off with their fortune. For a moment, it seems like she might succeed but then the baby saves the day by murdering the nanny. I kid you not. So, Addams Family Values is definitely very outlandish and politically incorrect. That’s why it has such a large fanbase. And as much as I enjoy it, I’m going to be in the minority and say that the original is better. Why? Well, for starters, Raul Julia and Anjelica Huston are reduced to supporting actors. That’s messed up because they delivered incredible performances and should have been given the same amount of screen time as Christina Ricci and Christopher Lloyd. This should have been an ensemble. Secondly, there is a lack of Gothic settings. This is the Addams family not the Brady bunch. I can understand the Wednesday sub-plot being more contemporary looking but the rest of the film has no excuse. And lastly, Marc Shaiman wrote a beautiful score for the first movie which ended up being one of the highlights. But here, he isn’t given much opportunity to shine. So, basically, the original Addams Family had a great combination of visuals, music, and performances that made it stand-out. Meanwhile, the sequel is very funny but that’s all it has to offer. |
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Post by Neverending on Oct 7, 2024 9:52:07 GMT -5
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PhantomKnight
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Post by PhantomKnight on Oct 7, 2024 10:05:02 GMT -5
I've since rescinded that three-star Miss Peregrine review:
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Doomsday
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Post by Doomsday on Oct 7, 2024 10:06:37 GMT -5
Sorry PK, you must wear that rating like a brand.
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PhantomKnight
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Post by PhantomKnight on Oct 7, 2024 10:20:54 GMT -5
Sorry PK, you must wear that rating like a brand.  |
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Post by Neverending on Oct 7, 2024 12:48:58 GMT -5
Sorry PK, you must wear that rating like a brand. He only removed a star because the movie isn’t faithful to the book. *rolls eyes* The 3-stars remain. |
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PhantomKnight
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Post by PhantomKnight on Oct 7, 2024 12:54:48 GMT -5
Sorry PK, you must wear that rating like a brand. He only removed a star because the movie isn’t faithful to the book. *rolls eyes* The 3-stars remain. And because the movie's, in fact, crap. But sure, misread the review.
And it's really 1 1/2 out of 4.
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Post by Neverending on Oct 7, 2024 13:36:25 GMT -5
He only removed a star because the movie isn’t faithful to the book. *rolls eyes* The 3-stars remain. And because the movie's, in fact, crap. But sure, misread the review.
And it's really 1 1/2 out of 4.
I’ll check back next Halloween for the latest rating. |
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Post by Neverending on Oct 7, 2024 13:50:50 GMT -5
THE DEVIL'S ADVOCATE (1997) The Devil's Advocate is one of those movies that leave you asking yourself, "what the hell did I just watch?" It's about a Northern Florida lawyer, played by Keanu Reeves, who is so obsessed with winning every case that he'll defend child molesters and murderers. And he's so darn good at his job that a major New York law firm hires him and that's when things get supernatural. It turns out that the head of the firm, played beautifully by Al Pacino, is the devil and the father of this hot shot lawyer. And together, they're gonna launch the 21st century and the new millennium with a bang. To say the movie is stupid is an understatement. It's just flat out laughable. But man, Al Pacino goes all out and is a joy to watch. Everyone should watch this movie just to see the man at the peak of his over-acting. I don’t know if I trust the devil. |
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Post by Neverending on Oct 7, 2024 15:35:06 GMT -5
For context, this was a teen show that aired in 1988, sandwiched on the lineup with reruns of Dennis the Menace and You Can’t Do That On Television. The series was called Don’t Just Sit There. 80’s Nickelodeon was very different than the one younger Millennials and Zoomers grew up on. Practically a different channel. Doomsday, thebtskink & I caught the tail end of this era. Double Dare. Make the Grade. Get the Picture. Nick Arcade. Eureka’s Castle. David the Gnome. Salute Your Shorts. Clarissa. Reruns of Inspector Gadget and Gumby. That’s the context for this. |
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Post by Neverending on Oct 7, 2024 17:58:52 GMT -5
Day Three: Eaten Alive (1976) Eaten Alive is most notable for being director Tobe Hooper’s follow-up to The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, though if you’d told me that it was actually the movie he made before that I’d have believed you because it feels like a regression. I don't know what you're smoking and/or drinking. Eaten Alive is a transitional film for Tobe Hooper. It follows the gritty Texas Chainsaw Massacre but precedes his mainstream debut Salem's Lot. It's about a demented hotel owner who feeds his guests to his pet alligator. Why anyone would stay at a hotel next to a swamp is beyond comprehension. The script is as thin as the paper it was typed on, but it has good production value. Hooper is a capable director, in a technical sense, and this movie showed Hollywood he was someone they could hire. He just had to clean up his act since Eaten Alive is very mean-spirited. Texas Chainsaw Massacre isn't as "hardcore" as its reputation would have you believe, but Eaten Alive is pretty nasty. If Hooper hadn't gone on to have a somewhat respectable career, I'd suspect he hated women, based on what I saw in Eaten Alive. The Funhouse (1981)Before Tobe Hooper got to ride on the backseat of Steven Spielberg's Poltergeist, he gifted cinema with the screen debut of Elizabeth Berridge, who would go on to play Amadeus' wife and then disappear off the face of the Earth. Some say she was replaced by Justine Bateman, but she too went missing. Berridge stars as some chick who goes on a double date to the fair and comes across a deformed carnie who goes on a murderous rampage cause he prematurely ejaculated. I ain't kidding, folks. That's the plot of the movie. We all ejaculated to Elizabeth Berridge in Amadeus, but we didn't kill anyone over it. Well -- I haven't killed anyone. Have you? Have people died as a result of Elizabeth Berridge? Is this why she vanished? Someone should investigate. Anyhoo, Hooper does a fine job directing this schlockfest. In the hands of anyone else, this would have just been another Friday the 13th clone, but Hooper made a very cinematic film. Well shot. Well edited. Great music. Effects by Rick Baker. The movie is very competently made. I can see why Spielberg hired Hooper for Poltergeist. Well -- I think he just wanted Elizabeth Berridge's phone number. But hey, if pretending that Tobe Hooper directed Poltergeist is the price to pay, then so be it.   |
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Dracula
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Post by Dracula on Oct 7, 2024 18:36:03 GMT -5
Film Seven: Exhuma (2024)  Exhuma is the biggest horror movie to come out of South Korea this year and was a pretty big hit in its home country and it’s gotten at least some play abroad, likely because of the presence of Choi Min-sik in the cast, but I will say I think some stuff got a bit lost in translation with this one. The film looks at a sort of haunting or possession that the characters try to rectify by re-locating a grave, which actually ends up unleashing further evil upon a family. The film is heavily rooted in Buddhism, feng shui, and also pre-Buddhist Korean folk superstitions, particularly a kind of Korean ghost called a “Gwisin,” and the film (perhaps understandably) assumes its audience is going to be reasonably familiar with this tradition and doesn’t always stop to explain it. There also seems to be some references to historical ripples about Japanese imperialism and the Korean partition that probably requires some cultural context to fully get. So I was a bit on the outside looking in with this one. It would be like watching an exorcism movie while knowing next to nothing about Christianity. I don’t want to hold this too much against the movie as I realize this is primarily a “me problem” but I also need to honestly reflect on my experience watching it because I was kind of lost with its various twists and tropes. There are some neat visuals here though, including a late film development where characters start covering themselves in Buddhist calligraphy like in that one segment from Kwaidan and that was pretty cool, but as a whole I thought this was long and convoluted and didn’t do much for me. **1/2 out of Five |
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PG Cooper
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Post by PG Cooper on Oct 7, 2024 19:06:39 GMT -5
Day Seven: Thrifted Blu-Rays Part TwoSatan's Cheerleaders Film number three in my pile of thrifted boutique blu-rays and probably the worst film yet. Mansion of the Living Dead at least showed some hints of craft, Mardi Gras Massacre at least had some gore and a groovin' disco soundtrack. Satan's Cheerleaders on the other hand is just so half-assed. Most of the film just consists of the ill-defined cheerleading troupe (who helpfully have their names on their shirts, not that it really helps distinguish their characters) goofing around doing nothing in particular as Greydon Clark passively observes. There's maybe some campy charm here but it's extremely thin. When horror elements start to intrude, it's in the form of over-the-hill C-listers from Old Hollywood wearing cheap Halloween costumes. The movie does at least get a little more interesting in the third act when things start to happen and the ending is at least conceptually interesting but so much of Satan's Cheerleaders is meandering downtime. It's cheap, lazy, and boring, the kind of movie that only exists to fill a drive-in lineup. D-Chosen Survivors Final film of my thrifted boutique blu-rays and blow me down, we finally have a real movie. Chosen Survivors begins as a science-fiction film, with a collection of drugged strangers being pushed my soldiers into an underground military base. There, the group learn nuclear war has broken out and they have been chosen as the survivors who will wait out the radioactive fallout underground before re-emerging when it's safe. That probably would have been enough of a high concept but we later learn that the base has been infiltrated by vampire bats from a neighboring cave, and the film becomes a horror movie inspired by The Birds. The film spots a fun 70s sci-fi set and while a lot of the effects involving the bats have aged somewhat poorly I still enjoyed the set-pieces and violence. What I didn't love are the characters, who are either bland and indistinct or just abjectly horrible. There's a whole sexual assault scene here that isn't just unpleasant but completely pointless. Ultimately though, this works decently well as a genre piece. It's not good enough to stay in my collection but I am happy to get one solid watch from my thrifted finds. C+
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Doomsday
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Post by Doomsday on Oct 7, 2024 19:18:35 GMT -5
I’m seeing a lot of less than stellar grades for these movies. Are your picks mainly first time watches for you guys?
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Dracula
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Post by Dracula on Oct 7, 2024 19:31:18 GMT -5
I’m seeing a lot of less than stellar grades for these movies. Are your picks mainly first time watches for you guys? Let the Right One In was my only rewatch so far. Loosening standards is part of the Halloween watching fun. |
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Post by Doomsday on Oct 7, 2024 19:35:18 GMT -5
For sure, my watches haven’t been exactly home runs either. They’re fun though.
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Post by PhantomKnight on Oct 7, 2024 20:07:07 GMT -5
I’m seeing a lot of less than stellar grades for these movies. Are your picks mainly first time watches for you guys? So far, mainly yes. I'm just over half an hour into Elm Street 4 currently, and...yeah, not a winner so far.
On the plus side, though, I watched The First Omen the other night, and that's honestly one of the biggest surprises of the year so far for me. And before that, the most recent Insidious movie was surprisingly good, too. More on those soon.
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Post by IanTheCool on Oct 7, 2024 22:18:47 GMT -5
Oct 7 Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers 1988
Who knew that the 4th entry in a slasher franchise was going to end up being really solid? Halloween 4 manages to feel quite similar to the classic original, while somehow not feeling like a complete retread. (That said, I could also understand if anyone had the criticism that it does feel that way). It feels like they set out to make a quality thriller without settling for a cheesy, run-of-the-mill horror sequel fare that littered the 80s.
The movie does a lot to establish its characters, including re-establishing both Michael and Loomis. The set pieces are both familiar yet different, with new ideas like barricading inside the house. I was quite pleasantly surprised. I'm not sure how I feel about the end, but I do enjoy that they went with a bold twist. So far this franchise is certainly holding up the best out of the main 3, and by quite a margin.
8/10
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