October HorrorDays 2014

[Brian Fowler]

To be fair, the last scene is probably the scariest in The Wicker Man.

 

 

But the cumulative effect of the whole movie is mesmerizing.  And there just aren't many pagan horror folk-musicals in existence.

 

 

(I bought The Wicker Tree on dvd a year or two ago, and still haven't watched it, though.  I've heard it's really disappointing.)

[Curt McGirt]

"OH GOD, NO! OH JESUS CHRIST, NO!" is one of the most memorable and horrifying lines (taken in context) of any film ever. Every time I think of it I get the chills. I seriously don't understand how anyone can walk away from the end of The Wicker Man and not feel like they were hit with a brick. 

[Jiji]

"OH GOD, NO! OH JESUS CHRIST, NO!" is one of the most memorable and horrifying lines (taken in context) of any film ever. Every time I think of it I get the chills. I seriously don't understand how anyone can walk away from the end of The Wicker Man and not feel like they were hit with a brick. 

 

It took me way too long to realize what's going on here.

[Jingus]

Stunt double or not, I don't know, but Cushing's physical acting is remarkable for his ilk. I'm used to the wooden, awkward Richard Burtons ("don't touch me!"), but Cushing kicks ass, even in his older, gaunt days. Going back to his work as a widower, he said this in an interview shortly after his wife's death: "Since Helen passed on I can't find anything; the heart, quite simply, has gone out of everything. Time is interminable, the loneliness is almost unbearable and the only thing that keeps me going is the knowledge that my dear Helen and I will be reunited again some day. To join Helen is my only ambition. You have my permission to publish that ... really, you know, dear boy, it's all just killing time. Please say that." Jeeeeeeeesus. 

In fact, I think Christopher Lee tried to get him out of his funk by dragging him into costarring in Horror Express, which is a damn fine movie that often gets overlooked in the bargain-bin section.  We actually get to see Lee and Cushing working together as cast-against-type babyfaces, with Lee being a proper Englishman and Cushing being a devil-may-care rogue.  Damn fun flick, highly recommended, also has a great Telly Salvalas "extended cameo steals the movie" drop-in as a Cossack badass.  

 

 

Imagine getting to see something like Ben Hur or Lawrence of Arabia on the big screen -- that's what it felt like. Total immersion. 

 

Watched Blood and Black Lace again last night. Bava's cinematography is just stunning. The primary colors he uses here are practically blinding. The plot is incredibly convoluted but it's best to ignore all those red herrings and the hostile cop and just enjoy the visuals and the quite sadistic murders. Argento wouldn't exist without this movie.

Done that.  It ruled.  Recommend it to everyone.  

 

I need to get around to Blood & Black Lace, dammit.  I've checked it out of the Media Library at my college at least two or three times, but never watched the fucking thing.  I love Bava, he's my favorite Italian horror director.  

 

Is that a "Choose your own adventure" book with a Slender Man theme?  And it's real?  Hey, RL Stine might've finally written something new that I might actually read.

[piranesi]

DVR tells me I need to watch 1985's Halloween episode of NIGHT COURT.

 

Oh God.  I am now realizing how young Harry Anderon looks in this.  When I was a kid, these were all adults and I was, you know, a kid.  And it was as simple as that.  There was no gradation.  Just adult and kid.  It never occurred to me how unrealistic this show is in that regard...that, like, that was the whole joke...and I never got it. 

Quick note: This is a Florence Halop episode.  It would have aired just a few months after Selma Diamond died and in turn a few months before Florence Halop would die.  A rough year for old ladies is the worst kind of year.

But in the midst of all that tragedy we get a Halloween episode of a show  that is almost specifically designed to be a vehicle for Halloween episodes.  A prank-playing judge right at the moment in the mid 80s that the Halloween industry began to take off and stores dedicated to rubber hands and bags full of spiders and that one smoke machine in the already ripped box in the corner started showing up every September.  It was a new and marvelous world and Harry Stone would be its first idiot savant.  It should be amazing, right?

First, I just got caught up in cataloging the outdated references.  
For the record, these included: 

 

-Mary Lou Retton

-Bloopers with Dick Clark and Ed McMahon

-"the moral majority,"

-Smurfs

-Pia Zadora,

And a predictably great guest cast including

- Anne Ramsey!!! right in between GOONIES and THROW MAMA FROM THE TRAIN.  Prime Ramsey!   

- BARNEY MILLER alum George Murdock!

Not this George Murdoch:
And not this George Murdoch, first mayor of Calgary, Alberta


The George Murdock with 190 IMDB credits. 190!!!!


You know him for EVERY TV SHOW YOU'VE EVER SEEN FROM THE TWILIGHT ZONE STRAIGHT THROUGH TO TORCHWOOD!!!!

It also included Dawson Creek's mom:

She's right there next to GEORGE FREAKING MURDOCK!!!

But this sucked.  It was shockingly small-minded.  Harry starts dating the girl (Dawson's mom) who later shows up in court under arrest for starting a bonfire and declares herself to be a witch.  Now, if you're thinking that means she's Wiccan, this show isn't going to tread that lightly.  She's a witch who shoots fire out of her fingers and makes chandeliers appear and disappear...so, like an actual Hogwart's-style actual magic witch.

But Harry is appalled by this...like as if she had declared herself to be a Sandinista or something.  So the story is still that he can't date her because 1) it would mean he would lose his job, and 2) because it's abnormal and he's suddenly a goddamn Eisenhower book club ninny.  Like...fuck your stupid job, asshole. This woman is offering to introduce you into a world of magic that is invisible to other mortals, to expand the universe as you understand it into entire new dimensions...to multiply time and bend space...to suggest immortality, to open a book of history that stretches back thousands of years in parallel to the one you already know. 

 

But he's all, "this is weird and as wacky as I may be, I'm still a moralistic mainstream bigot fucktwat with no vision or inspiration when it comes right down to it." So despite the fact that she's clearly doing real magic and his whole fucking life is defined by magic and whimsy, he chooses to shun the abnormal because it's 8:30 on NBC in 1985.

I guarantee you Barney Miller would have at least sat in his office and considered the possibilities and experienced a genuine crisis of faith and we probably would have had a cutaway to Wojciehowicz devoting himself to Anton LaVey.

I mean, nevermind even the magic stuff...look at Dawson's fucking mom!!!


 

 

There was no upside to this with the possible exception of Markie Post being made to wear this:

note: That horrible pun is not mine...it is embedded in the image. 

And it's the same one they made on this asshole of a show.

Goddammit, 1985, I vouched for you!

 

Special note:  The season 2 Halloween episode of CHILDREN'S HOSPITAL is glorious.  Find and watch it!

[Jingus]

I love the sheer amount of effort that piranesi obviously puts into his posts.  That is BRINGIN' DA CONTENT in a big bad way.  
 
 

Special note:  The season 2 Halloween episode of CHILDREN'S HOSPITAL is glorious.  Find and watch it!

I've got a mental note to check out that show sometime, having just fallen in love with Lake Bell upon watching In a World...

[Curt McGirt]

Children's Hospital is hilarious. I was shocked to find it and Robot Chicken playing on TBS yesterday at like 3 in the afternoon. I mean, I knew they were syndicating Family Guy and American Dad but Children's Hospital?! 

 

That photo of Markie Post is gonna make DEAN's day. Hell, it made my night. I used to love Night Court when I was a kid... best theme song ever.

 

Horror Express is the best! I seriously need to rent that again cause I haven't seen it in years. Kojak is indeed a total scene-stealer. I always remember seeing that at Walmart in the VHS section with a cruddy cover featuring him with blood dripping down his face, didn't see it until I was out of high school.

[S.K.o.S.]

 

Is that a "Choose your own adventure" book with a Slender Man theme?  And it's real?

 

 

No, I think someone just decided to have some fun with Photoshop.

 

[S.K.o.S.]

I watched The Babadook last night.  It was sold to me as being super duper scary, and it's scary, but not THAAAAT scary.  I had more trouble with The Descent, to name just one.

 

But, it's really good!  It has no jump scares and virtually no gore, but I was still curled up into a ball in my theatre seat, but I had a huge smile on my face the whole time.  For a movie where the big scenes are "monster in a dark house," it's a real feast of sight and sound.  I would almost recommend seeing it in a theatre if at all possible just to get the full impact of the sound effects.  There are a lot of little touches that I think would be lost on a tv.  And it uses LOUD NOISES too, but not to startle.

 

There's a message about single parenting too... being a single parent is (I assume) really difficult, and I think the idea is that the Babadook is meant to represent the impulse to just give up on the whole thing.

[jaedmc]

more fun Goosebump titles can be found here: http://ifitwerestine.tumblr.com/

 

Rewatched Carrie for the first time in yeeeeeears. It's so much better than I remembered. One of the scariest moments for me is when Carrie's mom drags her into the closet for the first time. De Palama does a tracking shot that really made me uneasy in that moment. Speaking of tracking shots, he lays an ace one down at the prom that starts with the henchmen moving through the prom to drop off the bogus ballots. Goes across the hall to the stage, up the rope to the bucket, and I didn't realize it was happening until it got to the rope, and if I wasn't the type of person to look for such things, I probably wouldn't have noticed it at all, because it's so smooth and ubiquitous. 

 

And enjoy this horrible fucking image:

 

[Curt McGirt]

I remember watching Carrie on TV for the first time. I was already grown and for some reason I never watched it. Broad daylight out. The sequence at the end happens... I had the same reaction just about everyone in the theater had when they first saw it. What a delicious shock. And yeah that prom shot is one of the great De Palma shots, up there with the end shot of Blow Up or the end of Scarface or the end of Carlito's Way. He sure does like to go full-bore at the end of his movies with the cinematography, doesn't he?

[jaedmc]

For those who don't follow my twitter machine: Netflix stopped to buffer/load at the EXACT moment the final scare happened. Like the music peaked, the hand came out annnnnnnnnnnnnnd NETFLIX IS LOADING.

 

BUT NET NEUTRALITY YOU GUYS. 

 

This is why I buy DVDs and Blurays. I can't make myself more dependent on telecommunication companies.

[piranesi]

Having hated, hated HATED V/H/S (I think I posted a long review here but it may have been lost to the IPS Driver), I hesitated to check out the sequel.  But...I was pleasantly surprised and it turned out to be a pretty good movie that has a consistent and fairly intense point to make.  

First off, V/H/S 2 avoids the primary mistakes of Part 1 which means

1) It went beyond the simplest found-footage cliches that made up the first one into stories that seemed a little more complex and thought out (with the exception of the Alien one at the end which kind of sucked)

2) it didn't pad the stories with endless banter by unlikable characters (again with the exception of the last one)

3) it wasn't a sequence of "Okay, bunch of douche bros go out partying...and...MONSTER!...Okay, bunch of douche bros go to a house and....MONSTERS!...okay, bunch of douche bros go camping...and...MONSTER!!!" (again, skip the last one...dammit)

I saw a review of V/H/S 2 that said something like "this time it felt like they actually went through a few drafts of each story instead of just filming the first thing they came up with"  it feels more polished.  This is very true.

But it's also a lot different in tone.  It was a bit more of a comedy that was much more gleeful about the gore.  The first one tried really hard to scare you with supernatural stuff sneaking up on you.  To make you feel uneasy about your own little world.  To do, in other words, the same thing the first PARANORMAL ACTIVITY movies did so well...to make you shiver because something might even sneak up on you the next time you're alone.  In other words, it was just a scary found-footage movie.  You were supposed to recoil at what happens to the characters because it you don't want it to happen to you.

This time, all the writers/directors are fully aware that we are fully aware that EVERYONE IS FULLY AWARE what's going to happen in all of these shorts.  So they wink at us a lot, and it's kind of fun.  The basic premise that separates Part 2 from Part 1 is that we are the same audience and we are not as clueless as the characters we are watching...and so we kind of laugh at them rather than relating to them.  Nothing is going to surprise us.  I mean, if a giant goat demon slowly rising out of a woman's uterus as what's left of her abdomen flaps against the camera and you're thinking "Yeah, that's what I figured" then nothing is going to surprise you.  It's sort of a turning point for found-footage and they are acknowledging that it can't work the way it used to by giving us something almost like a parody of it.  This movie is to found-footage movies what SEINFELD was to the sitcom.

And so we get this gleeful kind of exercise in showing us hapless, hopeless goofballs who we know have no chance of surviving, and in fact who we know are going to meet the most gruesome ends possible, and just letting us all enjoy them stumbling and bumbling into worse and worse pain and deeper rivers of guts.  But it's not really cruel the way HOSTEL style torture porn, or THEM-style "people are really just fucking horrible" is.  Yes, we, the viewers, are totally not invested these characters and not "at risk" of relating to them or even being scared for them or particularly wanting them to live.  And yes, we're often just straight up laughing at them or cringing at them, but never really "there with them" or being scared for them.  Honestly, there was no difference in my emotional investment when a human person was wearing a camera and getting stalked by something and when the dumb dog in the final "Alien abduction" short was wearing a camera running around like a dumb dog.  All the characters were basically dumb dogs running around with cameras on their heads until Itchy or Scratchy hits them with a giant hammer.  This movie is essentially a found-footage ITCHY AND SCRATCHY.  Or and ITCHY AND SCRATCHY: THE FPS.  And it is as hilarious as you might think that would be.

You might argue that's a flaw, bad film-making, that apart from a few good creepy moments in the Cult story, it's never really scary at all...and that it's questionable, like, philosophically...a pr0duct of the jaded Xbox generation that doesn't see people but instead avatars and gimmicks and youtube fails.  The death of empathy or whatever.  

Maybe, but I don't think it's a flaw but a choice.  They are tapping into that and letting us slip maybe just a little too far into it sometimes...just enough that we might catch ourselves laughing at something that, if you step back and think about it, we probably shouldn't be laughing at.  

It really hit home with the Zombie GoPro.  As that poor dumb sap was first tumbling down a hill and vomiting up his own guts I was laughing out loud and thinking "How many of these stupid GoPro videos have I watched of nimrods showing me their skilz...it seems kind of inevitable that eventually we're going to have one of some guy tumbling to his death, right?  or boogieboarding right into a shark's mouth?  Or parachuting right into a volcano?  Why am I laughing at this?  Am I a bad person?  How many steps is it from laughing at some kid's skateboard FAIL to laughing at some dude terminally eating it by snowboarding off a mountain or something?"

Isn't that one of the things horror has always done?  Letting us safely touch those dark waters without it being real?  Just dip a toe into our worst impulses...forcing us to confront that little streak of glee that comes from watching your fellow humans melt into one or another kind of hell?  I was kind of surprised how profound this goofy found-footage movie was suddenly seeming to me.

The Indonesian cult one was the only one that was genuinely scary, but even that one loaded things down with so much absurd gore and smirking violence that it started to test just how numb you can get.  The fact that the cult leader was so hilarious only enhanced the effect of luring me into being less "worried about who will make it" and more "man, I can't wait to see this poor dumb idiot open that door!  I bet he pees his pants!!!"  I was watching this the way I imagine Peter Griffin would watch a ROBOT CHICKEN version of SCHINDLER'S LIST. 

 

I was rooting for the villain, here, just because he was so funny.  He couldn't have been funnier if they'd just hired Ken Jeong to run around naked, covered in blood, slicing people up with a box cutter.  This movie was just THE HANGOVER with way more gore.  Which kind of makes me realize this isn't so much a "horror" thing as a "comedy" thing.  Comedy has always been about watching people suffer in a way.  So is horror.  What's the difference?  In horror you are supposed worry about them and in comedy you are supposed to enjoy their misery, maybe?

There are moments in this movie that are every bit as disturbingly gory as anything Rob Zombie has ever done, heads blown off, throats cut, faces shattered, abdomens exploded.  But somehow, I was unapologetically giggling the whole time.

It is telling that the framing story ended up being almost exactly a kind of "Hey everyone, we're all monsters now" kind of thing...I mean, it ends with a dude wagging his giant tongue out of what's left of his face into the camera at us as if to say "WAZZZZUP, MAH NIGGAZ!!!  I'M A MONSTER NOW TOO!!! CHECK IT!!"  He's nodding to whoever the group of "collectors" are that he assumes will be watching his tape down the road...but he's really nodding to us.  Because...we're them I guess.  And the guy missing his face?  He's fine with it.  In fact, he's pretty stoked.  So, in the end there's nothing to be afraid of.

 

That's a pretty nihilistic message too.  Like, "Look, bro, we're all in the shit, so you might as well put on some shades, blow off half your head, turn into a zombie, cut your own eye out, and just jam with it!  You can either be a monster or a prey...but it's all just a big gory ride!! WHoooooooo!!"

I think I'm fine with that.  Am I a bad person?

Either way I don't think I've ever seen a series change so much from Part 1 to Part 2 and get better in the process.

[nate]

I'd watch a Robot Chicken'd Schindler's List. Even if it was played straight.

[Brian Fowler]

Got together with a couple friends for a night of drinking and horror movies last night.

 

1.) The Conjuring - Yeah, I really don't need to tell anyone about this, right?  As much as the real-life Warrens are con artists and as much bullshit as the whole "true story" angle is, just a beautifully and expertly made possession movie.

 

2.) The Curse of Chucky - This is so much better and tighter than you think it is.  Seriously, I'm fairly certain that's not just the alcohol talking.  It's a slasher, obviously, but it's really built more like a haunted house movie.  Watch this motherfucker.

 

3.)  Stoker - Only caught part of this on HBO something or another.  Not really horror per se, but a really interestingly shot, highly stylized but utterly empty thriller.  Some of the more violent elements definitely cross over into horror.

 

There was also a #4, but since it's coming up in Halloween Havoc, I'll save my comments until after the review.

 

 

All told, a damn good night.

[Curt McGirt]

In keeping with the theme, I was nicely toasted last night and ended up watching Friday VII: The New Blood with friends. Kane Hodder really stood out as bringing such enthusiasm to Jason. That's all I remember; the rest was us babbling. LATE NIGHT!

 

We also got through a couple good Misfits sets and a couple good Ramones sets (my friends anyway, with me on backing vox) so at least something got done before I fell out. 

[piranesi]

For Fowler and anyone who jumped on the HALLOWEEN box set, if you haven't gotten to Part 4 yet, Anchor Bay is issueing replacement discs due to audio sync issues.  You just have to email them.  We were just watching and it was kind of annoying, like Youtube video out-of-sync.

 

http://halloweenmovies.com/2014/10/10/halloween-4-audio-sync-issue/

[Brian Fowler]

Interesting. I had actually been keeping with the previous bluray on 4 because of the missing panel discussion, but maybe I'll need both discs if they have the audio fully fixed now.

[piranesi]

My inner 90-year-old just did a backflip and...because my DVR now has something called "Lawrence Welk 1978 Halloween Party"  The only thing that could possibly compete would be if there was something next to it that said "Nia Peeples 1990 Halloween Party MACHINE"

The band is dressed in orange suits and the first thing they do is play "That old black magic" with the trombones taking the lead.


Yep...If I'm being totally honest, this is what the inside of my heart looks like

It is 1978 and not a single person in the audience was born after World War I.  


After they finish the song, Lawrence declares "Sounds like We're off to a very good start on this Halloween show!"  You see, the elderly like these sorts of updates and so do I.  If things are starting to tilt the wrong way you need someone to let you know well enough in advance to button your trousers and slowly tilt forward without bending your knees too much.  Then there's finding a cough drop before you start moving too fast.  So, Lawrence will keep us appraised of the show's status.

So Far: ALL IS WELL.  STOP. OFF TO A GOOD START. STOP.

Tom Netherton then sings "Shadow of your smile."  The word "Shadow" seems to be the only connection to Halloween.  It's enough to agitate many in the key demographic.  This is going to have to be a very subtle theme if everyone is going to make it out of here alive...for once. 


Tom's open collar is a grudging compromise with "the youth movement" which started in 1955 but which Lawrence Welk is just now willing to allow for.  Rumblings in the audience indicate that this betrayal will not be forgotten.  Until a few seconds from now because, you know, short term memory...HOLYSHITLOOKATTHIS

"The Phantom of the Organ" Bob Ralston is dressed 100% like the Count from Sesame Street and two dancers dressed as skeletons accompany him with a soft shoe.  This is the best part of the show and reminds us of how scary low-tech basic imagery can be, especially when it's happening on a show that is essentially a ghost-ship preserved in ice for all eternity on which these same old souls will dance their dance of death for ever and ever and ever and ever...


The clacking of bones we hear is not actually a foley effect, but the collective sound of the audience gingerly waving their hands like they just don't care and then immediately remembering that they do care because that motion aggravates their bone spurs.

Ava Barber (country gal) "joins the party" to sing "the wayward wind" followed by the band clarinetist playing "Misty."  There is no thematic connection here, but after that previous shocking display of pagan occultism, these two numbers are needed to calm everyone down.  At least one person in the third row has already tried to send a telegram to J. Edgar Hoover only to be reminded to his horror that a democrat is president.  Thanks, Gerald Ford!

Now we're back on theme as Mexican hottie Anacani shows up dressed like Dusty Rhodes (WWF polka dot version) and Medusa (Clash of the Titans version).  


She's singing in Mexican, so there's no conceivable scientific way for right-minded folk to know if her song has anything to do with Halloween, but her very being on American soil is already pretty scary for all of us in Lawrence's target audience. Hell, we never really adjusted to his accent and that's a European one.  Whiter than Polish but not as white as German.  Somewhere in the middle, you know.  To compensate, there will be complementary "Bebola" testing and Roy Rogers chicken marrow infusions in the lobby for those who feel themselves enjoying too much the tempting sway of the conga drums and those damnable Mexican hips!  We'll make it through this, old people.  Just think about Branch Rickey.  

She then meets Merlin (Ken Delo)  Note: If you recognized any of these names you would not be using the internet and if you are using the internet there is 0% chance you recognize any of these names.  In fact, if you don't think electric razors are a conspiracy to inject Russian microphones into our necks or that a watch that doesn't need to be wound is a trick by the Kaiser, then you do not recognize any of these names...so I don't know why I'm including them).  Aaaanyway...

Lawrence tells us "Like all of you folks, I have some of my favorite songs."  In this case it is a song Jerome Kern wrote before there were talkies and is sung by people dressed like Lord and lady Macbeth...which is kind of a cheap way for "theater folk" to play Halloween dress up, no? The joke here is that they set their candle down next to a guard's foot and he's not allowed to move, but his foot is getting hot!  Candle humor was pretty big when many of this show's viewers were in that hot 25-45 demographic, and then Edison fucked everything up. 

 

NOTE: the guard is Arthur Duncan, the only black person on the show and he ends up tap dancing...I'll just leave that there. (double note: Arthur Duncan if pretty fucking awesome so I don't know why I'm being all racist-paranoid about him tap-dancing for an audience of white people to whom the word "Antebellum" reminds them of their honeymoon...this show is getting complicated.)

Now we get a crucifixion scene, Jesus, Welk!!!  Oh, oh, wait, they're scarecrows, not Jesuses...thank Christ.  They chase some kids off the lawn and sing that song about how horrible Kids are from BYE BYE BIRDIE.


 That pretty much makes this the money shot for this show. This is fanservice for octogenarians.  We retreat into another soft shoe number comforted in the knowledge that for at least the next 20 minutes or so the very sound of Lawrence Welk on our t.v. will repel those little fuckers out of our living room like some kind of bugspray for "youths" so we can soak our dentures in peace.

Now the saxophones play us into a slow dance.  This was the great thing about being (sort of) alive back then.  Every holiday was the same so you didn't really need to remember what day it was.  What do you do on New Years?  Slow dance to Benny Goodman.  What do you do on Halloween? Slow dance to Benny Goodman.  What do you do on Flag day?  Slow dance to Benny Goodman.  What do you do on Veteran's day?  Scream about the armistice and explain how Franco has some good ideas.

But the scariest thing on the show by far is the bass trombonist playing a solo on "Me and my Shadow" dressed like the monkey-bars guy from those terrorist training videos.


It's like "Karl Rove: The Musical"

Lawrence tells us: "The Otwell twins and the Aldridge Sisters are winning new fans every week"  I assume he means "winning the deadpool for who has the most fans interred each week"  But they sing "Ghost riders in the sky" and that's pretty cool.  However, one of them is playing an electric bass, so this is another attempt to appeal to the rapidly growing "under 75" demo that Sonny and Cher and the Hee Haw guys keep bragging about.  Not cool, "daddio!"

SHOW STATUS UPDATE: "Wonderful Wonderful.  The show is going Wonderful."  Dozens of couples turn to each other and gently touch hands as if to say "Whew...almost bedtime and no race riots yet!"

Wait.  The scariest thing on the show is Joe Feeney who sings an Irish lullabye but looks like he's here to tell George Burns that he can't really be God.

Look at this fucking guy!  I swear I have a bunch of channels called like "Enlighten" and "HisWord" where clones of this man are still singing this same song with that same hair...FOREVER.  That is scary.


Do you know what will fix all of this? A POLKA, MOTHErFUCKAS!!!!

But before that, Lawrence updates us again: "This is all very, very nice."  Hmmm. That seems like a downgrade from "Wonderful."  I don't know about you but I'm wondering if I can use a shoehorn as a hippie-stake and reminding myself to write to Paul Harvey to tell him that anyone who doesn't own a shoehorn is probably in the Manson family.

But we end with a MOTHER FUCKING LAWRENCE WELK HALLOWEEN POLKA BITCHES:

Which means that the world is safe for another Halloween week, when the barriers are weakened between the living and the dead...and let's face it, for this audience the barriers are barely more than, like, a beaded curtain even in June.   For, to us, you see, the Lawrence Welk Halloween Party was a way of controlling our environment. It's not so different now... it's time again. In the end... we don't decide these things, you know... the planets do. They're in alignment, and it's time again. The world's going to change tonight and I'm glad you'll be able to watch it.

And... happy Halloween.

[assfax]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M9DDNujxgEg

[Travis Sheldon]

In an effort to relive some of the classic horror stuff from the 70's and 80's, I have been watching  various films with my wife who is not a horror fan. Unless you count Silence of the Lambs as horror. Which I don't, but I digress. Recently I picked up the A Nightmare on Elm Street Collection Blu-ray. Having not seen the original ANoES since 1985 or 1986, I was wondering how it would hold up for me. Being honest, I can't really count myself as a big fan of the film series but I do recognize it's iconic status in the horror lexicon. After viewing the film I felt pretty much felt the same way I did back in the 80's, i.e. ANoES serves it's purpose as a fantastical horror show, but the fuck ending is better left to Phantasm.

Since my wife didn't react negatively towards the original ANoES, I figured I'd be safe to bust out the re-make/re-model ANoES (2010).

I was not safe. Seeing Michael Bay's name as a producer was the first sign that trouble was afoot. His cinematic acumen is the equivalent to the nutritional value of a McDonald's hamburger.From bad CGI to emo kid acting, I can not think of a worse redo of a classic property in recent times. Even Texas Chainsaw (2013) was a more enjoyable film to me. They took a handful of the imagery that worked from the original and was somehow able to fuck up those scenes. The scene where Freddy appears in the wall above Nancy's bed was ruined by horrible 90's quality CGI. The bathtub scene ruined by being too short, with an indoor snowjob as the payoff. There were plenty of jump scares, though. And plenty of Freddy scraping his glove along pipes for a screeching, spark throwing effect. Couldn't get enough of that. And why didn't any of the kids remember what happened to them years earlier? Mass amnesia? Were they all taken to the same hypnotist? This film basically had everything I hate about modern remakes. Too much trying to give backstory to the villains, mystery is one of the main reasons the original films work. Recreating scenes or set pieces and totally missing why they were effective in the first place. Making everything hyper-realistic. Real kids talk like this, real burn victims look like this, real shit smells like this. My opinion of the original A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984) went up tenfold after viewing this garbage.

[Brian Fowler]

To be fair to Michael Bay (oh god did I really just type that) the Platinum Dunes produced remake/reboots of Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Friday the 13th were both perfectly acceptable.

 

 

I personally give all the credit to Marcus Nispel and Daniel Pearl, not Bay.

 

Although Pearl is also responsible for the cinematography on AvP:R which is the worst lit major studio film ever, so I guess I just give it all to Marcus Nispel.

 

Man, why didn't Nispel do the ANoES remake? 

 

Anyway, the Nightmare films are best served if you only watch the odd numbered films (except 5 is pretty bad)  1, 3, and 7 (New Nightmare) are the good ones.

[caley]

19. Ichabod Crane: This is the animated Disney one and my mom has been trying to track it down FOREVER and finally found it recently, so on a family get-together we all watched it.  It actually takes a lot longer to get to the headless horseman than I'd remembered but once it does, it's so amazingly creepy.  The horseman's laugh is amazing.

 

20. Hocus Pocus: My Mom and Sister have been watching this Disney movie starring Bette Midler, Kathy Najimy and Sarah Jessica Parker annually for about twenty years now and I always found a way to not be there when they did.  But I gave in this year and watched it with them.  It's not bad for a Disney kids halloween movie.  It's kinda crazy how Sarah Jessica Parker doesn't look so bad here and then looked so bad a few years later.  I liked that a lot of the crises could have been averted if the talking cat had just explained stuff sooner but, in keeping with being a cat, he makes things more difficult.

 

21. Scream, Blacula, Scream: I liked this better than the first one.  Some scary vampire kills.  My favourite part of the movie is Blacula walking down the street, getting hassled by punks and back-handing them around.  I'd love to see a reboot of Blacula which is just a bad-ass vampire beating up street trash.

[Curt McGirt]

The bubbles... the bubbles...

[J.T.]

Having hated, hated HATED V/H/S (I think I posted a long review here but it may have been lost to the IPS Driver), I hesitated to check out the sequel.  But...I was pleasantly surprised and it turned out to be a pretty good movie that has a consistent and fairly intense point to make. 

 

I thought V/H/S was okay.  V/H/S 2 was far better but it had a lower hurdle to vault over.    Zombie Go-Pro was my favorite short.

 

I admire the philosophy of the directors and producers where if the short seems to be going south, that is the point of the story where some random girl takes her top off.  That is so 80's Horror that it is astonishing.