2017 Halloween Scary Movie Challenge

Have you ever read your child a scary night time story, don't!
Babadook

 

One of my favorites is Phantasm. Isn't it a shame how hard it is to find a really good horror movie that scares, but isn't a blood fest gross out, and keeps the wise cracks to a minimum or none at all and with just a little imagination is a believable tale.

My favorite oldie horror movies were from the 60s; Black Sunday about a vengeful witch, Pit and the Pendulum, Vincent Price can't go wrong there, and finally a vampire movie Black Sabbath with Boris Karloff. A light hearted but great vampire flick was The Fearless Vampire Killers with the beautiful Sharon Tate.

 

Friday the 13th Part VI: Jason Lives (1986)

Since yesterday was Friday October 13, I decided to watch one of the Jason movies before bed. I've seen all of them at one time or another, but they admittedly blend together in my memory with the exception of a couple. I couldn't recall much about Part VI when I looked at the DVD case, so I decided to go with that one so it'd be fresh for me.

Right off the bat, we're struck with some tongue-in-cheek dark humor including a James Bond-esque opening graphic with Jason's signature slash in place of Bond's gun shot. And this one is filled with little jokes like that to offset the horror.

While I prefer my horror movies dark, the humor and in-jokes work pretty well, and there are definitely some gruesome scenes and a couple of really tense moments to go along with them, so it's not a total Sceam-type affair. I'd compare the vibe more closely to one of the Freddy Krueger sequels humor-wise.

What's important about this one is that Jason is back after his Part V haitus, and he returns to Camp Crystal Lake to induce more terror into the counselors, and even the children this time, which adds some extra anxiety to the affair. There are horror homages galore, including a Frankenstein moment in the opening sequence that kicks the movie off by bringing Jason back to life.

It's one of the better Friday movies in the franchise and keeps a nice balance of horror and humor, and the fact that, for the most part, the victims are all generally likable characters adds to the tension. In many of these movies, there's at least a character or two that makes the audience cheer when Jason has his way with them. Well, that's not really the case this time. And there's enough genuine horror here that the occasional joke to lighten the mood, however briefly, is generally a welcome respite.

 

Um, Christopher Lee played Saruman, not Sauron. Sauron was just a big eyeball.



(Just teasing. )

 

Nerd alert!

 

"Cult of Chucky" (2017) - who'da thunk that the "Child's Play" series still had gas in the tank 20+ years later? Surprisingly good!

 

It's a fair cop!

 

I watched Friday The 13th VI and VII recently for the first time in ages and had a blast. I forgot how entertaining these films were. Tonight I watch Jason Takes Manhattan. I should have quit while I was ahead.

I saw this film only once back when it was released. The trailer seemed promising. People were laughing and clapping in the theater. I remember seeing the film and being disappoint, mostly because it took so damn long to actually get to New York. But I wanted to give it another shot as an adult to see if I like it better now.

You can tell in the first minute this thing is gonna suck. How hard it sucks is beyond belief. How this thing was released by a major studio I dont know. This is amateur hour. Horrendously bad filmmaking. And not even bad in a fun way. Just bad.

The resurrection of Jason is asinine. And this is coming from a person who was ok with the bolt of lightning in Part VI. They put no thought into it. Lazy. Then we have the actors, who make Anakin Skywalker look like Sir Laurence Olivier. Then some of the worst make up and special effects Ive ever seen. Jason's face, as a child and as he is seen at the end, is pathetic. Ive done a more convincing job at Halloween with some grease paint and creative lighting. It sucks. Not to mention there seems to be no good reason for Jason as a kid to be appearing to this girl on a cruise ship in the first place.

And then the lifeboat. You just know they filmed this is a bathtub with some dry ice.

Jason just stolls around in clear view. No build up. No tension. No suspense. And he seems way too slow and methodical with his killing this time.

They arrive in New York harbor. I'm more scared of street punks than Jason at this point. Some grotesque encounters take place. We've strayed into unfunny territory here. Bad taste.

And amazingly there only seems to be two or three other people in the entire city. Streets are empty, not because its the middle of the night, they just couldn't afford extras. The lead girl suddenly has a bizarre flashback for no good reason other than to make her Uncle into an unsympathetic character before he dies.

The ending is stupid. And the dog? What, did it jump off the burning cruise ship and swim all that way?

This film is an abomination and a disgrace to the franchise. No stars. Zilch.

 

I've been watching but not posting so time to catch up.

From TCM I watched Return Of Dracula and The Seventh Victim. The first film described by the TCM host as Leave It To Beaver meets Dracula and the second is a Val Lewton film about a girl looking for her sister who is hiding from a satanic cult. Both are fun and Lewton certainly deserves his reputation as a filmmaker who uses shadow and suggestion to create tension and horror.

Next up is the much less subtle Nude For Satan directed by Palo Solvay. Two strangers forced by a car wreck to spend time in an old mansion out in the country side encounter a bizarre series of events that get weirder and weirder as they go along. Hard to figure out what is going on until the end when we find out that Pitch himself is forcing the people to take a long hard look at the dark side of their nature and decide if they want to stay in the dark or come out into the light. Includes a scene with a horny spider that was lifted directly from the earlier Bloody Pit Of Horror and lots of nudity by the lovely Rita Calderoni.


This brings us to Vengeance Of The Zombies directed by Leon Kilmovsky. This one has two twin brothers one searching for spiritual enlightenment and the other abusing the power he gained from his voodoo religion to do whatever he wants which usually means leaving a pile of corpses everywhere and having them rise up and create havoc. Psychedelic, atmospheric and constantly entertaining this one is highly recommended as are most the of horror films Kilmovsky made. Contains a kind of happy bouncy jazz score, except it the horror bits, by Juan Carlos Calderon that I could listen to all by itself.


Finally we have The Witchmaker aka The Legend Of Witch Hollow from 1969. A scientist doing psychic research leads a group of young people out into the swamp where they come to the attention of the leader of a coven. Bad news for the kids as they are stranded until a boat comes back to pick them up five days later and the leader has developed a thing for one of the girls whom he wants to join the coven and bring its number back up to thirteen. I think you can see where this is going. If your in the mood for an old school witchcraft film this one should fit the bill nicely. Directed by William O. Brown.

 

I agree with your thoughts on it. They were looking to duplicate Scream's formula and went a little too hard into jokey territory with a couple of characters.

 

YES.

Good picks!

 

Catching up:
The Innocents Debra Kerr plays a sexually represented governess who takes care of two children who may or may not be haunted by spirits from the past.
The Other-I have a fondness for Richard Mulligan's film even if the evil twins the,e here was pretty easy to figure out.
The Haunting (1963) Robert Wise's classic horror film looks marvelous on Vlu-ray and still creepy as well.
Halloween-My wife had never seen this but she enjoyed it even if all,of,the tropes have been used by others.
The Thing -Carpenter's classic still holds up. Paranoia abounds in the arctic.
Horror Express-Cheap bit effective horror thriller with Lee,and Cushing.
Horror of Dracula-Lee and Cushing are still terrific. Wish we would get a bloody Blu-ray in the U.S.
Curse of the Demon- A surprisingly adult thriller (especially for the lady 50's).
The Hidden-great low budget horror-science fiction thriller with Kyle MacLaughlin pre-Twin Peaks.
Drag Me To Hell-Got to love Sam Raimi rollerocaster rides.
It -thought I would revisit the Tav version. Curry is great but it doesn't hold up quite that well.
Island of Terror-Cushing in an interesting horror thriller.
The Witch-I enjoyed this atmospheric horror,thriller from 2016.
Kill List- unusual horror film from Ben Wheatly
Frankenstein:The True Story-Another one that needs a blu-ray release and a full restoration. Hardly the scariest film but a fascinating adaption of Shelley's classic that inverts elements of the original novel.Stylish with great performances especially from James Mason.

 

More Day of The Dead stuff...


Macario (1960, Roberto Gavaldon)
This is another oldie (but goodie) that'll stay in your mind a while. After a poor young woodcutter shares his cherished meal with Death he accepts a gift to cure the ill. And, of course, he gets more than he bargained for. Check it out when you can. One for the whole family. In Spanish w/English subs.

 

One that often gets overlooked but scared the heebeejeebees out of me was The Fourth Kind.....

 

1. Halloween (original version)
2. Friday The 13th parts 1 and 2
3. Fright Night
4. House On Haunted Hill (original version)
5. Hotel Transylvania 2
6. The Ghost And Mr. Chicken

 

The Houses October Built (2014)

Are there extreme haunted houses? This group of annoying dudes and one hot chick want to find out. Good idea, poor execution. Watch at own risk.

 

Don't Breathe (2016)

And this, kiddies, is why you do not break into the houses of blind army vets with tragic family histories. Not really horror, though.

 

Howard Lovecraft and the Frozen Kingdom - some crazy fools used Lovecraft’s Cthulhu mythos and turned it into a children’s movie. My six year old loves the monsters but the film was so slow paced he lost interest.

2/5 The film is slow and dull, the animation is hardly Pixar quality

 

I remember that indie horror flick. The idea was good but all the shakey cam footage was poorly done. Someone needs to rip that idea off and improve on their script.

 

Continued the Kong trilogy (well its sort of a Kong trilogy) with Son of Kong and Mighty Joe Young.

Son of Kong (1933) - You know for a rushed film that actually has a ton of flaws, I had a lot of fun with tthis. For a short 69 minute film, it takes way too long for the characters to reach Skull Island (about 50 minutes) and get into the stop motion goodness, but it honestly didn't bother me much. I liked the characters a lot. They made Kong too goofy, but I still felt affection for him. The last 5 minutes and the finale is so abrupt, its the biggest indicator that this film was massively rushed, but I still love the effects they were able to pull off in the climax. I had low expectations for Son of Kong but I ended up really enjoying it.

Mighty Joe Young (1949) - Wow. Just wow. Ray Harryhausen (kinda) does Kong. Needless to say, amazing stop motion effects. I felt bad for the lions who were often real cats who probably didn't have the American Humane Society watching over the proceedings and you can tell they abused both them and the horses. I have to admit that bothered me because after certain effect shots, you can see the real animals were being tripped and thrown about.

At any rate, I also found the sudden 'orphanage on fire' scene extremely jarring as the film suddenly goes all sepia tone to increase the feel of "Fire!" The scene comes out of nowhere and feels rather hokey. But the effects save the day. Very enjoyable film, but lay off the animals Mr. Schoedsack.

 

It looks like a sequel was released. It has the same cast. I can't imagine how they expanded the story, with the same people, considering how the first movie ends. I'm not curious enough to find out either.

 

Evil Dead (2013)

I'd put off seeing this out of repect of the original but then decided to quit being stubborn and just watch it. I'm glad I did! The horror.... the horror....

 

Young Frankenstein (1974)

If you need a review, then it's time you watch it, already.

 

It’s not Halloween until Frankenstein and his monster sing a duet of Puttin’ on the Ritz