31 Days of Halloween

Yeah, each book/movie is set in a different decade. Red Dragon, the book, takes place in 1979. And the two movies were set in the 1980's. Silence of the Lambs, the book, takes place in the mid-80's. And the move is set in 1989 or 1990. And, of course, both the Hannibal book and movie take place 10 years after Silence. 

I reviewed The Frighteners for this last year and yeah, it's pretty awful.

Nice.

Didn't they introduce the American Godzilla in Final Wars?

No, he's attacking Sydney and then gets killed by Japanese Godzilla in about 30 seconds

I don't know

19. War of the Worlds (2005)



I remember really liking War of the Worlds back in 2005, and have been meaning to revisit it to see if it still holds up. The things I like are indeed still pretty great. Ten years later and the visuals and special effects still look amazing. There is a great mix of practical work and sets that are integrated very well with the CGI. Occasionally there is a hiccup, but for the most part everything blends well. The design of the tripods is really memorable and the images of them mechanically zapping pedestrians into nothing or throwing them in cages to be "processed" is pretty horrific. Steven Spielberg also wisely doesn't revel in the destruction. Yes, a lot of things are blown up and people killed, but Spielberg always keeps enough focus on the story and character. In addition to the aliens, the film also plays on the fear of other people during times of crises. There's the scene where people attack the family car, the rushing to get on the ferry, and all of the scenes with Tim Robbins. There are also moments of human kindness too that feel appropriate. The final source of fear is the way the film is able to evoke a similar tone as the 9/11 attacks, with an enemy attacking for unknown reasons and the general sense of anxiety and panic. Spielberg is able to tap into this confusion in a way that is highly effective while still being tasteful. Finally, the set-pieces here are fantastic. The tripods coming out of the ground, the ferry attack, hiding in the basement; it's all so well-done. There are also great smaller moments like Rachel stumbling across the bodies floating through the lake, Roy walking through the desolation of a suburban neighbourhood, and a bunch of people being trapped in cages waiting to be processed. Spielberg has always been a master of crafting memorable and engaging scenes, and the best ones here stand among the best of his career.

Of course, while the stuff I liked does indeed hold up, the stuff everyone doesn't like reared its ugly head too. I really don't like the kids in this movie. Dakota Fanning is way too precocious in early scenes and doesn't feel like a normal little girl, while Justin Chatwin is thoroughly unlikeable and annoying as the son. To be fair, that character is horribly written, but Chatwin doesn't exactly bring anything to it either. The film is also a bit clunky in a lot of the dialogue and while I do love the 9/11 parallels, I could do without characters explicitly asking "Is this the terrorists" repeatedly. Where the film really runs into problems is its ending. I realize the aliens dying from bacteria is in the book and I actually really like it as a science-fiction idea, but as the ending of horror-thriller film, it's really disappointing. Spielberg tries to juice things up with a scene where a bunch of soldiers bring down a tripod, but it feels tacked on and is easily the most uninspired action scene of the film. Then there's the ridiculousness of Roy's wife having been at her grandparents house in Boston all along. Realistically she should either have been killed, or in her panic and confusion fled somewhere too. Throughout the movie Roy talks about taking the kids to Boston and you think of it as a fruitless and hopeless endeavour, something Roy only cling to because he didn't really know what to do and just wanted to make his kids feel safe. But then at the end, she really is there with her grandparents waiting, and not only that, but somehow Robbie got there too? What the fuck? What really makes grinds my gears about this ending is not even necessarily the details, but how counter it feels to the tone of the rest of the film. War of the Worlds is a dark and dreadful movie where many die and there is little hope, yet it inexplicably ends with a family reunited in the sun. I'm not saying an ending like this is impossible, but you need to earn it, and War of the Worlds doesn't.

So yeah, the last ten-fifteen minutes of War of the Worlds are very frustrating, but the rest of the movie is pretty damn effective. It's got some bumps even before we get to the end, but there are moments of brilliance from Spielberg and I'm comfortable calling this one of his most under-appreciated works, which is shame. It may be flawed as hell, but in it's best moments, War of the Worlds is amazing.

B+

Totally agree. It has a great visual aesthetic and a few solid performances. 

DELIVERANCE (1972)



I always find it amusing that Deliverance was nominated for Best Picture at the Academy Awards and in the same year as The Godfather. I always think of Deliverance as an exploitation film and not something that should be taken too seriously. Although, for 1972, it did break new ground so within context all the praise makes sense. But for contemporary times, I don't think it's anything special. It's basically about four guys who go on a canoeing trip and then run into two hillbillies that try to rape and kill them. Actually, one of them does get raped in an infamous scene. Anyway, the movie does try to be as realistic and dramatic as possible, and it does excel as a survival story and thriller. But it also comes across as silly and borderline insulting. The opening scene involves one of the guys getting into a banjo duel with a mentally handicapped kid and that sets the tone for the whole film. The characters are just too stereotypical to be taken seriously and hurts the overall movie.

B-

I can't possibly understand how that kid's eyes are so small.

This is that last of a series of “Yuppie Horror” films that I’ve watched, and I kind of assumed that this would be the nadir of the genre. While I wouldn’t call it a great movie by any means, I was actually surprised to find it a cut above some of its peers and overall I found it to probably be the strongest of the five movies I looked at. Why is that? Well, I think it’s mostly because of the performances. As the title implies, this is a younger, less domestic, and more urban variety of yuppie that we’re dealing with this time around. The main character (played by Bridget Fonda) is a computer programmer (an occupation which allows the film to use a very old-school version of the internet in a couple of scenes) who has just broken up with her live-in boyfriend (Steven Weber) after she discovers that he’s been unfaithful. To fill the void and help pay for her expensive New York apartment she puts out an ad for a new roommate which is answered by a somewhat awkward but occasionally charming woman (Jennifer Jason Leigh). Given that this is a Yuppie horror movie and all of those involve people getting their lives torn apart after they accidentally let an insane person into their homes… you can probably guess how well that works out.

Say what you will about yuppie horror movies, but for the most part they were generally able to get strong casts, and then squander them. Previous yuppie horror movies have had people like Nicole Kidman, Michael Keaton, Melanie Griffith, Matthew Modine, Michael Keaton, and Julianne Moore but they haven’t always been able to elicit the best out of these talented actors. On paper the cast here probably actually looks weaker than some of the other films, but I think they mostly do a better job than I expected. Jennifer Jason Leigh in particular really does some standout work here as the crazy roommate. They don’t actually say it in the script but her character is actually supposed to have a Borderline Personality Disorder rather than just some unspecified form of insanity, and the way that this escalates over the course of the film feels more natural than it usually does in these films. That isn’t to say that this is going to necessarily be a 100% authentic depiction of mental illness, and I’m sure a trained psychiatrist would say that the depiction isn’t really that much less silly than the ones in the other movies on paper, but Jennifer Jason Leigh sells it and makes it feel real. I don’t want to oversell her work, it isn’t Oscar-worthy or anything, but there is something to be said for weaving gold from straw like this.

Single White Female was directed by Barbet Schroeder and it was kind of an odd choice for him given that he’d just made the excellent film Reversal of Fortune. You’d think that a critical and awards success like that would give him the clout to make another prestige film, so why was he making a uber-mainstream thriller like this? I’m not really sure what the story is there, but I think he more or less did do the best with what he was given. Like most of these films, this does tap into a real life anxiety of middle-class life, specifically the awkwardness of sharing a space with a relative stranger, especially when they maybe start getting a little too close even when you maybe don’t want them to be. This isn’t a perfect movie either, it’s probably one of the less intense examples of the genre once it gets past the psychological cold war and gets into the cat fighting. Still, while I don’t want to oversell it too much, this is probably the yuppie horror film with the fewest problematic performances and the fewest odd cringe inducing moments.
*** out of Four

So what have I learned from watching all off these yuppie horror films? Not a whole lot really. I am a little curious about what was in the water during the late 80s and early 90s to make people so afraid of meeting people who turn out to be crazy. All five of the films had their pros and cons. The Stepfather had the most political subtext but a fairly trashy aura, Dead Calm had the best production values and the most creative concept but was also never really able to maintain psychological tension, Pacific Heights was probably the most realistic (relatively speaking) but had some of the most annoying protagonists, The Hand that Rocks the Cradle… has the best title I guess but was the most shamelessly calculated, and Single White Female has the best acting and the least ridiculous depiction of mental illness (again, relatively speaking) but was maybe less able to throw down once the gloves came off. I’ve already mentioned that Single White Female is probably my favorite of the three, but it might have benefited from expectations that had gotten pretty low at that point in the series. All five of these movies were fairly minor blips on the pop culture radar, they each had minor elements to make them stand out a little, but overall they don’t register to quickly on our collective memory. Still they were fun to watch together and compare and I’m glad I decided to check them out in this context.

20. Identity



Identity is a little horror/mystery film from the usually solid if rarely exceptional James Mangold. The film focuses on a bunch of strangers who end up stranded at a hotel. Then a string of murders start and tensions raise as people die and questions go unanswered. This is an intriguing little movie that does a good job hooking the audience early on. The quote/poem that opens the film is really cool and seeing the characters come together is neat. The cast is really strong too. None of them are doing amazing work or anything, but it's a fun collection of people all the same. Anyway, the mystery is pretty fun for the most part, though I have serious problems with the ending. This is the type of movie that you can tell will pull some twists and one they do...they're pretty stupid. Well, there's one twist that actually works pretty well, but the two major twists don't really work. Both are somewhat predictable, one is just disappointing and the other is laughable in its execution. I try not to get to hung up on endings, but the reveal of a mystery is very important, and this one underwhelms. Still, there's enough here to make Identity a fun watch.

B-