October Horror Movie a Day 2013

[Darth Geek]

Why can't I quote??

I thought Lords of Salem was okay, the middle dragged for me and the acting was patchy but it was probably the most 'fun' movie Zombie's ever made and felt very Hammer-esq to me at times.

In your settings, turn Quick Reply off.

[SJP]

Day 11: Halloween (1978)

I don't know, maybe it's the many times I'd seen this over the years, or maybe it's because of everything that has come out since, but Halloween feels like it's lost its power.  Don't get me wrong, it's still a well-made movie, and its simplicity and realism blow crap like The Collection out of the water (really?  Nobody noticed the threshing machine hanging in the middle of the nightclub?), but its thrills seem more quaint and charming as opposed to fright-filled.  Could really just be my familiarity with it, because it's still an enjoyable watch...just not frightening in the way I recall it being in my youth.

Michael Myers killed his sister in 1963.  He escaped his mental ward fifteen years later, and returned to his hometown, to set his sights on three young high schoolers who make the mistake of living nearby his old house.  In the meantime, his doctor Sam Loomis has followed him in the hopes of stopping him before he kills again.

If you haven't seen the movie before, this movie would probably make WAY more impact than it will on repeat viewing.  It is well-made in its build-up, cinematography, and a few good performances (OK, between the ADR and attitude, the one who plays Annie is really flat).  But unfortunately, the scenes have become such a staple of horror lore that, like Psycho, everyone knows it all too well and isn't really shocked by its various twists and turns, which undersells the impact it had when it debuted in 1978.  Still remains the model to follow.

RIFFABILITY: High.  Annie's performance is crappy enough to make fun of constantly, and I do believe there is an iRiff out there of it from awhile back.  So, yes, it has been done.

[Relaxing Dragon]

I actually feel the same way about Halloween. I've always found it to be rather dull, even. I recognize its base quality and the truly staggering amount of influence it's held over the genre, but as a movie it just does nothing for me (save perhaps for the score, which I could hear a thousand times and still think perfectly effective). I actually feel rather conflicted about saying this, seeing as I'm a hardcore Carpenter nut.

[Darth Geek]

RIFFABILITY: High.  Annie's performance is crappy enough to make fun of constantly, and I do believe there is an iRiff out there of it from awhile back.  So, yes, it has been done.

Rifftrax actually did riff this. It's an early one, and has Mike and Kevin.

[Compound]

RIFFABILITY: High.  Annie's performance is crappy enough to make fun of constantly, and I do believe there is an iRiff out there of it from awhile back.  So, yes, it has been done.

Rifftrax actually did riff this. It's an early one, and has Mike and Kevin.

It's quite enjoyable too.

[Raven]

Day 11.  Rifftrax Halloween 5/5- Looking at the last couple posts I wanted to watch this riff again. "Free Range Mental Patients" and "Rusty's driving the Truckster" are a couple of my favorite riffs.

[Compound]

Yongary: The Monster from the Deep

After a nuclear bomb caused earthquake, a giant monster appears to ravage Tok... er, Seoul.

A pretty bog standard Kaiju film, almost indistinguishable from any other, except for the fact that the Koreans made this one. Same basic plot beats. Precocious kid. Girl in love with one of the heroes. Stern faced scientists, military men and politicians sitting around tables. Guys in rubber suits destroying sets. And Korea somehow has a space program. Er, yeah. There's nothing that really distinguishes this as any better than, say, the Gamera films, other than the fact that Yongary's suit is a lot more derivative of the Godzilla one.

Yonggary/ Reptilicus:
Archeologists discover a giant dinosaur skeleton, which aliens then animate and attempt to use in a plan to destroy the Earth.

Okay, a Korean director made a more serious remake of the film in 1999 and then, nothing the Godzilla remake made a special edition of the film that tossed about 40% of the film out the window for the international market. This was a big mistake as the film bombed. Big time. Even in Korea.   However, I kinda liked this one.

Oh sure, it's goofy. The aliens sound like Zordon. There's an evil paleontologist who's evil because... well, apparently there's big money and fame in paleontology. The US has a squad of jetpack troopers. And there are no Koreans in a Korean made film. Except for some writing on some billboards. That are located in Southern California.

Er, yeah.

And the CGI is awful. I don't think that can be underplayed. My reaction when first seeing the monster was laughter because it was bad even by 1999 standards.

But the damn thing has some goofy charm that's hard to quantify. Plus, the script is actually fairly good. Heck, it's better than most of the SyFy monster of the week films. I'll also give props here for something. I'm not a big fan of the "We can't close the beach! It's the 4th of July!" plot device that shows up in practically every horror film. I like when folks in authority actually act a bit rationally. For example, in "Invaders from Mars", which I viewed a week ago, a kid and his teacher pops into a military base proclaiming that Martians are invading. The military reacts as follows: "Well, let's humor the kid and talk to the technicians to see if anything strange is really going on" followed by a "Okay, put the base on alert. arm everyone and start arresting everyone who's not in a uniform." It's an actual reaction and  a nice change from "Those kids just wandered into the police station covered in blood and talking about zombies. They must be pulling a prank, despite the fact that we're getting phone calls about it."

Well, in this film, the military actually shows some intelligence. "Huh. That guy who showed up out of nowhere is acting suspicious. Let's keep an eye on him and not take everything he says at face value."  Or "Hey, let's listen to the scientist guy that suspicious guy doesn't want us to talk to." It's a refreshingly fun bad movie, even as I'm rolling my eyes at the horrible CGI and jetpack troopers.

And as an odd bit of Kismet, a few hours after I watched both films, I see the movie poster pop up on another website along with the term "yonggari" which is putting a firecracker in your mouth to get that "breathing fire" effect. Yeah, don't do that.

[Darth Geek]

Yonggary/ Reptilicus:

Okay, a Korean director made a more serious remake of the film in 1999 and then, nothing the Godzilla remake made a special edition of the film that tossed about 40% of the film out the window for the international market. This was a big mistake as the film bombed. Big time. Even in Korea.   However, I kinda liked this one.

This was directed by the same guy who directed Dragon Wars.

[SJP]

Day 12: People Under the Stairs (1991)

It's been quite some time since I saw this.  I still remember seeing the trailer on TV and being completely blown away at how the movie turned out to be nothing like what I thought it would be.  I mean, by a long shot.  My brother and I thought this was going to be some sort of haunted house type thing, and what we get instead is...well, not.

Fool finds out that his family is about to be evicted, and his friend Ruby's boyfriend (Ving Rhames) has a plan to sneak into the landlord's house and steal a collection of coins rumored to be on the premises.  However, the landlords are a ruthless, nasty pair of psychotics who have a collection of 'children' living in the basement.  Pulled further into the house by a young girl and one of her 'brothers' who lives in the walls, Fool not only has to fight to save his neighborhood, but his life and the lives of the abused children.

This cartoonish mess is redeemed mostly by the Man and Woman (as they are called in the script) played by the crazy couple from Twin Peaks.  They know exactly what kind of movie they are in and play it at full tilt...mostly just laughably evil villains, but still creepy enough to cause some rather unsettling scenes (the bathtub scene is probably the most effective moment of the movie).  But the movie just falls under the weight of its own ludricrousness.  Add in that it ends with the traditional early 90s upbeat and out of place hiphop song and you have a recipe for a film that is not only a product of its time, but firmly stuck in it.

What's amusing though, is that I once wondered how Wes Craven sunk so low to make this goofy film filled with electric shock doors and nut punching?  And then I saw Cursed, Last House on the Left (or, at least, The Cinema Snob's review), and the end of A Nightmare on Elm Street.

Wes Craven really HAS been like this through his whole career, hasn't he?

RIFFABILITY: Somebody do this, please.  It needs it.

[SJP]

Day 13: Dead Alive (1992)

I said People Under the Stairs was cartoonish.  THIS is a cartoon done right.

Lionel is a shut-in who lives with his overbearing mother.  His life is turned upside down when he meets Paquita, a young woman who believes she and Lionel are fated to be together.  But his life gets turned upside down again when his mother, following them to the zoo in secret, is bitten by the Sumatran Rat Monkey, which turns her into a murderous zombie.  Lionel cannot bring himself to put his mother down for good, even as she continues to infect more and more people, until the zombies all escape during a big dinner party.  Exceptionally gory hijinks ensue.

Before he was Lord of the Rings, Peter Jackson was most famous for this little gem of a horror comedy, made under budget and containing enough gore to make it into the record books.  If you haven't seen it...well, you might need a strong stomach to get through it, but this just boatloads of fun.  But be sure to watch either the 97 minute Unrated U.S. Cut or the 103 minute International Cut.  The R-rated cut removes not just the gore, but a lot of stuff that helps the movie make sense, too.

[Darth Geek]

Day 13: Dead Alive (1992)

I said People Under the Stairs was cartoonish.  THIS is a cartoon done right.

Lionel is a shut-in who lives with his overbearing mother.  His life is turned upside down when he meets Paquita, a young woman who believes she and Lionel are fated to be together.  But his life gets turned upside down again when his mother, following them to the zoo in secret, is bitten by the Sumatran Rat Monkey, which turns her into a murderous zombie.  Lionel cannot bring himself to put his mother down for good, even as she continues to infect more and more people, until the zombies all escape during a big dinner party.  Exceptionally gory hijinks ensue.

Before he was Lord of the Rings, Peter Jackson was most famous for this little gem of a horror comedy, made under budget and containing enough gore to make it into the record books.  If you haven't seen it...well, you might need a strong stomach to get through it, but this just boatloads of fun.  But be sure to watch either the 97 minute Unrated U.S. Cut or the 103 minute International Cut.  The R-rated cut removes not just the gore, but a lot of stuff that helps the movie make sense, too.

One of my alltime favorite movies. When it comes to over the top gore movies, NOTHING tops this!

[Johnny Unusual]

Zombie

Boy is this not good.  I checked it out since it was on Bravo's 100 scariest movie moments list (admittedly, very low), but it's really dull and when the movie gets going, it's just not that interesting.  It also occurs to me that I really hate the way Lucio Fulci does gore.  If good gore is marinara sauce, then this is lukewarm pork.  Even the famous zombie vs shark scene isn't very good.  It's just impressive that they could do it at all.  It's not very fun, there's no message or statement, I'm not too scared at any time, none of the characters are likable and the gore effects look nasty, but unimpressive.  Also, the explanation that voodoo is making the zombies come back doesn't really pay off.  I know this movie has a following, but I really can't see the appeal.  There are lots of bad, dumb gory movies I love, but this one...

This trailer gives away the "surprise ending" but it's basically ludicrous: I think they are trying to sell those cars as people trying to get away, but it just looks like what it is: people are making a zombie movie while life goes on.

One interesting note, zombies are actually called zombies in Zombie.

Rifftrax - Birdemic: Shock and Terror

It's always interesting when people talk about the end of the b-movie.  When they say that, they are often excluding direct-to-video things since the great b-movies are sincere, while things like Asylum are lazy and cynical.  But somehow, there's always going to be movies where people are given just enough talent to hang themselves.  Yes, I'm sure a lot of people think of James Ngyen as talentless, but he has just a little: enough to make a movie where you can actually tell what's going on (no, seriously, there are a few cheap-os where the cinematography and is so bad that is incomprehensible).  Here's he had enough talent to capture everything that demonstrated his (and the other players') incompetence.  What's more, it is not only not cynical, but it is as sincere as it is incompetent.  It's a perfect storm of a so-bad-it's-good movie.

Shivers

This is an odd one.  It's also David Cronenberg's first movie, and probably his weakest.  However, things get a lot better in the final act with a memorably creepy finale.  Still, with the themes and style, it is unmistakably Cronenberg and while this is amateurish, he had certainly found his voice early.  The premise is that a mad genetic engineer claims to have been creating a parasite that can actually replace organs when they fail (which is actually a cool idea).  However, his partner discovered that his partner was mad and believed that mankind need to devolve back into their basic instincts and focus on sex.  Turns out that he created an army of parasites and let them lose in a high-tech apartment building in Montreal, but the parasites also turn people super-aggressive as well as lustful.  Now the building's residents are all turning into rapists, murderers and sex addicts.

For most of the movie, it's a bit ridiculous and not that good, but it gets better as it goes on.  I wouldn't recommend it, per se, but it is a really fascinating movie.  It's a movie all about sex, but for the most part, it doesn't try to be "sexy" and manages to make sexuality really creepy.  There are a few moments that are sexy, but usually in a way that serves the story and mood really well.  Heck, most of the sex zombies aren't really sexy.  The movie also has some very upsetting implied pedophilia, if that's hard to take.  It happens off screen, but it presents it in a way designed to unsettle since you get glimpses that give you an idea of what's going on, so it doesn't feel gratuitous (they actually include the most upsetting scene in the trailer, though out of context it doesn't show how upsetting it is).

This trailer really gives you no idea of what kind of movie this is.

[RoninFox]

Day 13: Dead Alive (1992)

I said People Under the Stairs was cartoonish.  THIS is a cartoon done right.

Lionel is a shut-in who lives with his overbearing mother.  His life is turned upside down when he meets Paquita, a young woman who believes she and Lionel are fated to be together.  But his life gets turned upside down again when his mother, following them to the zoo in secret, is bitten by the Sumatran Rat Monkey, which turns her into a murderous zombie.  Lionel cannot bring himself to put his mother down for good, even as she continues to infect more and more people, until the zombies all escape during a big dinner party.  Exceptionally gory hijinks ensue.

Before he was Lord of the Rings, Peter Jackson was most famous for this little gem of a horror comedy, made under budget and containing enough gore to make it into the record books.  If you haven't seen it...well, you might need a strong stomach to get through it, but this just boatloads of fun.  But be sure to watch either the 97 minute Unrated U.S. Cut or the 103 minute International Cut.  The R-rated cut removes not just the gore, but a lot of stuff that helps the movie make sense, too.

Got to see this at Alamo Drafthouse in a double feature with The Frighteners.  Already loved the movie, but seeing it with a packed house of horror fans was awesome.

[gojikranz]

Day of the Dead (I shouldn't have to point out that i mean the original)

well after dawn we had to move onto day and with the new blu ray it was nice to revisit my favorite zombie movie.  this one beats all the others in pretty much every category for me.  best gore effects i have seen, excellent underrated score, crazy performances that maybe are a bit over the top but it is a zombie movie after all, and a good social message i agree with.  doesn't get better than this and the new blu ray is very nice.



side not i would like to defend zombie (or zombi 2 as i know it).  the story may be bare but i think it is actually a pretty well done film.  I watched it soon after seeing dawn of the dead being as it is a ripoff sequel and it's darker feel was a nice contrast to dawn.  a strange sidenote on my life is that it is the first movie i ever watched with my now girlfriend,  definitely got her to grab me at the scary moments.  god knows how we ended up together.

[Johnny Unusual]

Cat People

Great movie, there are only a couple "scary" moments (that are rather effective), while for the most part it feels like a noirish fairy tale (the kind with unhappy endings) about an immigrant who falls for a man but fears that if she kisses him, she'll turn into a cat and murder him.  Simone Simon is amazing as the lead character, giving a very different kind of femme fatale.  She's the one you root for in this movie most, and she's very tragic.  She's beautiful, but she's not a sexpot character, but rather a girl of sweetness and kindness who fears her darker side.  Definitely worth checking out!