Horrorthon Review #31 - Trick r Treat (2007)

I made it!  Thirty one movies in 31 days!  Well, technically, I reviewed 32 movies, so, you got a bonus, but it still took me 31 days to do them all.  As it does every year.  I suppose I could just review a bunch of movies beforehand, and post 31 reviews on Halloween day, but where's the fun in that?  Besides, If I watched 31 horror movies front to back, it would take approximately sixty hours, give or take, and that's one damn full 3-day weekend.  Maybe I'll try it someday, when I want to watch so much TV that my eyes bleed.  heh

Trick R Treat (2007) is technically speaking, an anthology.  Okay, I know I said I hate anthology movies, but calling Trick R Treat an "anthology" is like calling an orchestra a "collection of instruments played by musicians."  Singly, they each do their own parts, but together, they make up a musical symphony of surpassing beauty.  It's the same thing with Trick R Treat.  I can't even really tell you how many different stories are interwoven in this mess of intertwined short stories.  I've seen it half a dozen times since I got it on DVD, and I still find something new every time I view it.  I wouldn't be surprised if I was drinking heavily one night, and watching this on Halloween (it's a bit of a tradition for me, now), and I saw myself in the Halloween parade in this movie.  Suffice it to say that, in the town of Warren Valley, Ohio (where the movie is set, I have no idea if the town is real or not), there's a HELL of a lot of weird shit happening on the night of October 31st.

You really can't take in all of this movie in one viewing.  In fact, I would recommend watching it back to back, just to see some of what you missed the first time you saw it.  Or, like me, you could watch it every year on October 31st if you get tired of seeing Halloween parts 1 through 6.  Trick R Treat, as a movie, doesn't focus on one particular killer, but there's a whole bunch of them running amok in Warren Valley on this particular Halloween night.  There's the nicely-dressed vampire guy who goes around biting women's necks with very sharp teeth.  There's the crotchety old geezer who lives next to the vampire guy.  There's the little hooded kid with the pumpkin-head sucker who visits them both.  There's Little Bo Peep, who's having a party in Sheeps Meadow, and of course, there's Little Red Riding Hood, who drives down the street where the vampire guy and the old geezer live.  And that's only part of the story.

You might be surprised to learn just how much of this movie interacts with the other parts.  See a kid running across the street in the first scene?  That's not an extra.  That's part of another story, that happened 20 minutes before the movie starts.  Hear a wolf howl?  That's not just a lonely dog, but part of another story that happens later.  See a smashed pumpkin on the ground?  One of the other actors in the movie did that two scenes ago.  This movie is like a roller coaster of horror.  Sure, you go up and down and loop the loop and zip around the curves in a big circuitous route, but when you come back to the beginning, it's just as thrilling going on the ride all over again.

The only real side story in this movie, and I'm going to spoil things a little a bit here (not too much, because there's no way to spoil this movie), is the flashback of what happened on the Halloween Bus, oh-so-many years before this movie is set.  Because most of the movie is set on Halloween night, you don't get to see a lot of daytime scenery, but this flashback gives a little treat to those who like a good background in a movie.  For instance, in The Shining, if you liked the long drive up to the Overlook Hotel that showed a lot of fall scenery (I loved it, best way to show the opening credits I have ever seen in a movie), then you'll probably like the flashback in this movie.  It's a short enough episode, and it's basically just a scary story told by one of the other characters in the movie, but it has fall foliage, and every single person in the story shows up elsewhere, in another story, or in another part of the movie.  Like I said, every part of the movie is interwoven with every other part, like a tapestry of horror, where you are admiring the artwork and you come to realize the threads that make up the tapestry are actually made of human hair, attached to bloody scalps.  Okay, I imagine that's never actually happened to anyone, so it's a horrible, scary analogy.  I've never been good with analogies.

I tried to do a Hellgate double feature today, since there's two movies on Netflix that are called hellgate, but one turned out to be an anthology (which was bad enough), and a very badly done one at that, so i skipped it.  The other Hellgate movie had pretty bad reviews, and didn't really sound like a horror movie, either.  I wanted to do a hellgate double feature because, as often happens in horror movies, there's some event or gateway, and once you reach it, (say it with me) ALL HELL BREAKS LOOSE.  Which, would make sense when you are talking about an actual gateway to hell.  Alas, neither of the movies called Hellgate seemed to feature an actual gate to Hell, so I gave up on them.  Movie titles are so misleading, usually.  Luckily that's not the case with Trick r Treat, as most everyone in the movie is in the midst of a trick, a treat, or actually trick or treating.

I hope you guys like Trick R Treat as much as I do; however, good luck finding it to watch.  I have it on DVD, but it was filmed in Canada, and I haven't seen it on HBO or anything for some years now.  :-(  Most of you probably won't even read this review, anyways.  You're either getting ready to go Trick or Treating yourselves, watching horror movies all day and night (as I will be returning to shortly), or already so blazed from partying all week that you're dreaming you're in a horror movie.  However you spend your day, I hope you all have a Happy Halloween, and remember the rules!  Always check your candy!  Especially if that's your date's name and she happens to be passed out drunk in front of your car.  :-/

In other news, my blog posts will return to once every weekend or so after tonight.  This review a movie a day thing can be very taxing on your free time, as most of you can guess.  You guys have fun out there, and try not to kill anyone who might come back from the dead for vengeance.  :-o  Until next time!

Horrorthon Review #30 - VHS (2012) and VHS 2 (2013)

Surprise Double feature!  Okay, I kind of knew it was coming, but you guys didn't.  So.  It's a surprise for you.  I had planned on more double features throughout the month, but as always, there's just never enough time to watch ALL the horror movies I want to watch.  You'd think being unemployed and all, I'd have tons of time to kill watching horror movies, but, no.  No.    heh.  "Kill watching horror movies..."   Sometimes, I am just unintentionally funny.  One has to pick and choose what one watches, doesn't one?  And why the fuck am I talking about myself in the third person?  Meh.  Anthologies always did kind of ruin my brain.  I think I'm stupider for having watched them.

VHS (2012) is a horror found-footage anthology.  Basically, a bunch of morons are filming themselves breaking shit (as morons will do) and they decide they need more money to pay for breaking shit, so they go into this house to rob a VHS tape.  Apparently, someone will pay big money for this tape.  What tape?  What's on the tape?  It's never discussed.  The morons break into a house with an old man in it, and find him dead in front of a bunch of TV's and a few VCR's.  I didn't think VCR's even still existed, but what do I know.  So they start playing the VCR tapes to find the right one (which is just dumb considering they have no idea what they are looking for, but since I've been referring to them as morons, well, there you go), and that's where you get your stories from.  The wraparound story about the morns breaking into the house just doesn't go anywhere.  Apparently the dead guy isn't dead, or he is, but he's a zombie?  It's never really discussed, but the morons start disappearing one at a time.

VHS 2 (2013) doesn't exactly continue the story, but picks up with what appears to be a private investigator and his assistant, looking for a missing college kid.  They don't really find him, exactly, but what they do find in his house is a stack of VHS tapes and a laptop recording images of the college kid they are looking for.  The investigator begins searching the house, and sets his assistant to watching the VHS tapes to look for clues.

Okay, remember when I said I hate found footage?  Yea. I hate it worse now.  I also hate anthologies.  So basically, what's going on here is this.  A bunch of really cheap film-makers decide to keep their stories short, to save on filming costs, and THEN, decide to go with found-footage technique, to save on special effects costs.  So what you end up with are really short flicks, with poor acting, ridiculously (and purposely) bad camera work, and the cheapest, most off-screen special effects you've ever (not) seen.  After watching both VHS, and its sequel, VHS 2, I think I've gone blind from the shaky camera work and blurry visuals.  I just have one question.  You've got a button-cam.  You're wearing it.  How the HELL does the camera keep going in and out of focus while you're standing there?  It's not like there's a telephoto lens attached to it that you're trying to focus!  Jesus.

Let me just give a little recap of the anthology stories involved here.  There's a zombie outbreak in a state park.  There's a Philippine religious cult.  There's an alien invasion.  There's a vampire attack in a hotel room.  There's a murder/robbery.  There's a ... well, a thing caught on film in the woods.  Honestly, you know what questions I would be asking myself, if I actually saw any of these tapes in anyone's collection and even thought they might be real recordings?  How the hell do you have an alien invasion, a zombie apocalypse, and a demon brought to earth, and not have anyone else find out about any of it?  What, it just shows up on some VHS tape in a college guy's room, and that's the first anyone' ever heard of it?  Yea, right.  Another thing I found myself asking is, it's obvious these recordings were made on a variety of media.  Digital cams, phones, cameras, just about anything.  So...  why are all the recordings transferred to VHS tapes?  Isn't that just a little ridiculous?  Sure, I think I might have an old copy of The Terminator on VHS tape somewhere in my house, but I threw out my VCR some years ago.  Who would bother transferring what is obviously a digital computer recording onto a VHS tape so someone, who might still be using a VCR, could play the tape?

Okay, what did I like about these two films.  Lots of nudity?  I can't really say anyone was particularly hot, but there was a fair amount of nudity.  The two girls in the segment set in the forest weren't bad, but the rest weren't exactly Zoe Saldana, you know what I mean?  There was one segment about a guy who gets an electronic eye installed to replace a real eye, and starts seeing dead people.  The segment was pretty dumb, but the house it was set in was pretty awesome.  Hmmmm, I think that was it?  Meh.

Okay, no more anthologies for me, and I'm going to try and stay away from found footage from now on.  Sure, it's probably the wave of the future, in that it saves a tremendous amount of money on, you know, actual cameramen, special effects, and acting (since the camera isn't really on the actors much, who needs acting skills?) and since the production companies are all money-grubbing, greedy slobs who don't give a rat's ass about quality, only cash, I guess we're going to see more and more found footage crap popping up.  Why do you think we don't even have VHS tapes anymore, or use writable DVD's to record movies?  Because someone can make a buck selling movie DVD's, and the cable companies wanted to charge you an extra fee for digitally recording what they broadcast, even though they're already charging you for broadcasting it to your house, anyways.  Maybe broadcasting isn't the right word when you've got cable, but, whatever.  Well, I'm not watching found footage anymore.  I'm just not.  Screw it.

You like found footage?  Watch VHS 1 and 2 and be cured of your liking for it.  All praise to the inventor of the Steadi-cam used in real movies.  Amen, hallejulah.

One more night!  I have an idea for another double feature tomorrow, but I don't know if it's going to work out.  Maybe I can try and get it done earlier in the day, so if the movies suck balls, I can review something else for Halloween.  We shall see how things go.

That's all for tonight!  And it's one minute before midnight.  Go me!  :-)

Horrorthon Review #29 - Psycho (1960)

Having recently reviewed John Carpenter's Halloween and Halloween 2, and having stated that they are my personal favorite scariest movies of all time (considering it's really one four-hour long horror movie), I felt it was only fair to give The Exorcist and Psycho a fair chance.  I reviewed the Exorcist last October, so tonight, it was time to review Psycho.

Psycho (1960) is Alfred Hitchcock's classic thriller starring Janet Leigh as Marion Crane and Anthony Perkins as Norman Bates.  Marion is a bored office worker who is given $40,000 in cash to deposit into a bank.  Instead, she takes the money and hotfoots it out of town.  She might have got away with it, too, if it wasn't for those meddling kids!  Actually, there's no kids in this movie, and it's just bad luck that she doesn't get away clean.  As Janet is on her way out of town, her boss crosses the street right in front of her car, and recognizes her.  Since she had told him she was spending the weekend in bed, her boss seems to wonder, then continues on his way.  Marion begins to worry immediately, and it's not long before she suspects the authorities may be after her.  Getting clear of the major highway, she happens on the Bates Motel, and checks in for the night.  Unfortunately, the proprietor of the Bates Motel, one Norman Bates, isn't exactly in his right mind.

I am sure most everyone has seen this movie, but I won't give away any further details.  Sure, I could discuss a good monster movie all day long, but this isn't really a monster movie.  Sure, it's a classic thriller from Alfred Hitchcock, and yes, it's freakin Janet Leigh and Anthony Perkins in their most famous film roles, but there's no real monster.  Sure, this movie was voted most thrilling horror movie of all time by some important magazine, and yea, usually on lists of the best horror movies ever, this one is usually right behind the number one spot, the Exorcist.  Sure, I could go on and on about how famous and popular this movie was back in the day.

However, I guess this movie hasn't really aged well.  One, nowadays, psychiatrists don't even think there is such a thing as multiple personalities.  I'm not really sure how they can just erase some 50 years of psychiatry.  They used lots of white-out, I guess.  Personally, it seems to me that if you're going to deny something you've been trying to prove for the last 50 years, then wouldn't that kind of shatter whatever credibility you've managed to gather thus far?  (shrugs)  Second thing, Psycho is in black and white, which just kind of bugs me.  Thirdly, transvestites were pretty shocking back in the 60's.  Nowadays, I could be wearing a dress and stockings right now, and nobody would really care.  Norman Bates rushing out of a darkened doorway in a wig, a dress, and wielding a knife would just make me laugh.  Sure, he'd probably still get me, but I'd be laughing the whole time anyway.  Fifth, I guess I'm just a little too jaded to be startled by a desiccated corpse in a fruit cellar at this point in my life.

All that having been said, this isn't one of the most famous thrillers of all time for no reason.  Hitchcock was a master film-maker in his day, and I think Janet Leigh got an oscar nomination for her role in this movie, which is almost unheard of for a horror film.  Between 1983 and 1990, Anthony Perkins even starred in 3 sequels, Psycho 2 through 4, before his death in 1992.  The sequels were actually pretty decent, too, if you ever get the chance to view them.  There's no nudity, but there is one hell of a famous shower scene, in which Janet Leigh gets brutally stabbed to death.  Pretty sure everyone is familiar with that one.  Having just watched it, and having watched it before, I can say with all honesty that it is worth more than one viewing, and watching it over again doesn't hurt it at all.  Norman Bates is already batshit crazy by the time this movie starts, so you can't really catalog his descent into madness, but it's still damn creepy to hear him talking to himself in his mother's voice.  Not that we don't all talk to ourselves in our mother's voice from time to time...   or maybe, that's just me...  but it's still creepy.  Even when I do it.

So, to sum up, excellent thriller, pretty frightening if you're scared of guys in drag with long knives, or, you know, Psychos (heh, see what I did there?).  No nudity, famous shower scene, Janet Leigh, Anthony Perkins (a fine actor).  Rewatchable, but a bit dated, also, in black and white.

In other news, I carved my first Jack-O-Lantern in several years today!  :-D  I used to do it every year, but I gave it up for about a half-dozen years.  Too stressed out, I guess?  Hard to say.  I used to be pretty decent at it, but I'm a little rusty.  Sure, today's Lantern is creepy, and scary, and I almost shit myself when I finished and took a look at it, but it's just not my best work.  Meh.  Practice makes perfect.  Next year's will be better.  :-)

Two more reviews to go!  Catch you guys tomorrow night.

Horrorthon Review #28 - The Ninth Gate (1999)

I know, I talk about this movie a lot, but that's only because I like it so much.  But I did check my blog from last year, and I didn't review it then.  I chose it this year because, sadly, Netflix is pulling it from the instant streaming lineup at the end of this week.  So, if you want to watch this movie on Netflix, you have til Halloween.  :-/

The Ninth Gate (1999) is probably the only time you'll ever see Johnny Depp without a weird looking wig or a funny hat and costume on.  This movie begins with the death of a book-owner, and the sale of his book to a rather malicious collector of, shall we say, books of a certain devilish nature.  Enter Corso (Johnny Depp), a mercenary acquirer of rare books, with rather loose morals.  Corso is only in it for the money, and his greed leads him to work with the lowest underbelly of the literary world.  However, his skill at acquiring rare books brings him to the attention of one Boris Balkan (Frank Langella), who has just acquired a copy of the 'Nine Gates' (there's more to the title that I forget), by Aristide de Torchia, a celebrated devil-worshipper who was burned at the stake in 1667, a year after he wrote the book.  According to legend, Aristide de Torchia acquired a book written directly by Lucifer himself, and with Lucifer's assistance, interpreted the book into his own work, the Nine Gates.  According to legend, the book is designed to summon Satan himself.  Boris Balkan hires Corso because, as he puts it, there is something 'wrong' with his recently acquired copy of the book.  Corso is offered a great deal of money to take the case, and investigate the authenticity of not only Balkan's copy of the Nine Gates, but the other two surviving copies, as well...

Come on say it with me!  "And then... ALL HELL BROKE LOOSE!"  :-D  Because...  the book is designed to summon the devil... geddit?  All hell tends to break loose a lot in horror movies, you ever notice that?  Well, I have.

Right.  Well, I really liked this movie for several reasons.  One, Johnny Depp isn't totally over-acting in this movie, like he is in most of his movies.  He's just your average, geeky agent who deals in rather shadily-acquired rare books.  Two, Frank Langella is an awesome actor who DOES totally overact in this movie.  He plays a great bad guy, and he does it with gusto.  Lena Olin also has a role as a bad girl, as it were, and she even has a nude scene, which really should have garnered her an Oscar for this performance, but it was a very short nude scene, in my opinion.  Emanuelle Seigner (who I have never heard of, before or since) plays an extremely mysterious girl who seems to shadow Corso in his travels.  Everyone seemed to do a good job acting in this movie, and the effects are minimal but used to good effect.

I call this one a "thinking man's horror movie," mostly because it's more of a slow build, there's a lot of atmosphere, suspense, and general tension, and you really have to know what's going on to appreciate the horror.  There's only a few bodies, very little gunplay, and a little violence.  One of the reviewers on Netflix mentioned something about some jewish mysticism involved in the engravings pictured in the Nine Gates, but you don't need to know that to understand the movie.  There's some brief nudity in a couple places, and well, let's face it, the book they're trying to piece together is designed to summon the devil.  Sure, along the way, it's more of a mystery, basically a detective story with Corso playing the part of the investigator, but there's satanic cults, mysterious assassins, and any magic or witchery involved is all very discrete and disguised.

Just in case you have trouble figuring it out (and I'm not underestimating my audience, I am sure all of you guys can follow the movie, but just in case you have to pee during an important part), I'm going to simplify the end of the movie for you.  Spoilers to follow.  Each of the images in the engraving of the book are scenes that Corso himself runs across.  The hanged man, etc.  Balkan may have set Corso on the task, but it was Corso who walked the path, uncovered the deception, and figured out the key, and when Balkan takes credit for Corso's work, and assumes that he alone is the one to reach the ultimate goal, just because he has all the engravings, he soon finds out he's sadly mistaken.  As it turns out, the story itself, the journey Corso has taken, decides his fate, and Balkan never walked that path, so he can't share Corso's ultimate fate.  End spoilers, and really, I was so vague about it, that you shouldn't be able to figure out the ending from that.  But, if you've watched the end, it should all make sense for you.

I guess what the movie is trying to say is, we each choose our own fate by the path we walk, by the decisions we make.  The little decisions, the ones we make every day, and how we live our lives, that's what decides our fate.  I personally agree with that assessment.  For some of us, taking a long look at what we are, and the decisions we've made, is too much of a horror story as it is.  I can't really blame those people for not looking too closely at their own lives.  :-/

Well, aren't I just the creepy philosopher tonight?  heh  As usual, I am a tad late with my review this evening.  I had stuff to do.  It happens.  Only a few more days!  Might even get a couple new movies in there before the end.  For those who care, the peanuts Halloween special is on thursday night at 8 pm, not sure what channel.  I watch it every year.  The Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown!  I've been a fan of Snoopy for years.  Coolest dog, ever.  Also, AMC is doing Halloween marathons.  All the Halloween movies, One through 4 or 5, I guess.  Even 3!  Yes, even three.  Season of the Witch, indeed.

Hope everyone is having a Happy Halloween season.  :-)  Catch you guys tomorrow night for more horror!

Horrothon Review #27 - Halloween (1978) and Halloween 2 (1981)

It's double feature Monday here at Scrolls of Wisdom!  :-D

And yes, I know these films have been around for years, but look, I absolutely love discussing horror films, and as long as I'm not giving anything away, I can really talk about the entire film, and not just the beginning!  :-D  Maybe some day I'll be a guest host on Turner Classic Movies or something, discussing films with Robert Osborne, or Drew Barrymore, or whoever the hell else they have hosting that channel.

As a quick aside, having a host introduce movies is an awesome idea, and I think more channels should do it.  It's not like it's copy-written by Turner Classic Movies, for crying out loud.  Joe-Bob Briggs used to do it on the Movie Channel back in the early 90's, and Walt Disney used to do it way way back for a long long time, to introduce almost all of the Disney films.  Svengoolie continues the proud tradition of introducing horror films on Saturday nights at 10 pm, or at least, he does where I live.  It's a nice set-up for the movie, and introduces us to a lot of little details we might otherwise have missed.  Now, on to the review!

Halloween (1978) begins telling the story of one Michael Myers, quite possibly one of the scariest characters in film history.  Michael's story begins one Halloween in 1963, when, as a 6-year-old boy, he brutally murders his older sister and her boyfriend, for no apparent reason.  This movie begins with Dr. Loomis (Donald Pleasance), Michael's psychiatrist, heading up to the Smith's Grove medical facility where Michael has been kept for the 15 years since the murder, on the night of October 30th.  Dr. Loomis is there to oversee the transfer of Michael Myers to a court-ordered judicial hearing.  It's a typical dark and stormy night, but when Dr. Loomis notices the patients running around loose, he knows immediately what has happened.  Michael has escaped, and in short order, he steals the very car Dr. Loomis approached the facility in.  What follows is a slowly-building, intensely suspenseful and creepy manhunt for the escaped lunatic that is Michael Myers.

First, let me just say, the whole escaped lunatic thing is a basic staple of horror films from years back.  Even the Night of the Creeps, which I reviewed a few nights ago, started with an escaped lunatic.  Hell, pretty much every ghost story, told around every campfire, in every horror film involving a bunch of slaughtered campers, involves an escaped lunatic.  There's nothing scarier than someone who's just completely apeshit, wielding an axe and running around hacking people apart, because usually there's no rhyme or reason to who or when he kills.  Serial killers all have a pattern, and sometimes, so do escaped lunatics, but in the case of a nutcase, it's usually a pattern no one else can decipher.  John Carpenter tapped into this fear of lunacy to write Halloween all those years ago, and he also made some of the creepiest damn music ever heard in a horror film.

Once Myers escapes the mental facility, we really have no idea where he's going, at first.  Dr. Loomis knows he's heading home, back to his house in Haddonfield, where he took a knife and stabbed his teenage sister and her boyfriend to death 15 years earlier, on Halloween night.  Dr. Loomis tracks the stolen car, and arrives in Haddonfield during the day on Halloween, immediately notifying the police of the escaped mental patient.  We, as the viewer of the movie, have already seen Michael Myers several times, driving around town in the stolen vehicle, tracking one Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis), who turns out to be Michael's baby sister, who escaped his killing spree some 15 years previous.  Once his quarry is located, Michael abandons the car, and begins following Laurie on foot, creeping the shit out of her, because she keeps thinking she sees someone, and then Michael vanishes back into the shadows before Laurie can verify what she saw.

Laurie Strode, a geeky high school teenager, was having a fairly normal Halloween.  With absolutely no idea that she is Michael Myers' long-lost sister, she meets her friends after school, walks home while the little kids are trick or treating, and tries to make plans around her babysitting duties later that evening (interestingly enough, the original title of this film was the Babysitter Murders).  All the while, Michael follows her, and Laurie gets more and more nervous as the night wears on.  Finally, in the midst of her babysitting, Michael Myers finally begins his killing spree, taking out Laurie's friends in the neighboring house, then heading over to kill her, all while Dr. Loomis and the police are out searching the streets for Myers.

One of the best parts about this film is how much it actually revolves around Halloween.  Older folks head out to party, teen girls settle in to babysit or hook up with their boyfriends, and little kids settle in to a night of watching scary movies.  At several points during the movie, scenes are shown on TV of old horror films, everything from Night of the Living Dead to The Thing and Forbidden Planet.    Jack-o-lanterns are frequently seen, and trick-or-treaters are heading from house to house, looking for candy.  You get the feeling that if Michael wasn't out killing everybody he could get his hands on, then this would just be a normal Halloween night for everyone concerned, including the viewer.  But this is certainly anything but your normal Halloween night.

Halloween 2 (1981) picks up where Halloween left off, with literally no time elapsed in between.  I think this is quite possibly one of the only series of movies I have ever seen that did this, making Halloween and Halloween 2 basically one long 4-hour horror film, encompassing a roughly 24-hour period in the life of Michael Myers and Laurie Strode.  Halloween 2 begins as Dr. Loomis sees Laurie Strode's young charges flee the house where she was babysitting them, and heads into the house just in time to fire six shots into the body of Michael Myers, saving Laurie's life, which we saw at the end of the first Halloween movie.  Michael falls over a balcony railing, landing in a bloody heap on the front lawn.  Dr. Loomis checks on Laurie, but when he returns to check the corpse of Michael, he realizes that Michael has gone.  After taking six bullets fired from short range, Michael has simply gotten up, and walked away.  The manhunt for Michael begins anew as Laurie Strode is taken to the Haddonfield Memorial Hospital, suffering from numerous injuries, none of which are particularly life-threatening.

At this point in the 4-hour marathon of blood, it's getting late in Haddonfield, and the news media have clued in to the deaths of the 3 teenagers that Michael has slaughtered so far.  As news reports begins to interrupt the horror films and the little kiddies get to bed, the older kids are still out causing trouble and the police and adults in Haddonfield are starting to freak out a bit.  Michael Myers, that little boy who stabbed his sister to death 15 years ago, is back in Haddonfield, and he's pissed.  Further complicating matters, a teen boy wearing a mask similar to Michael Myers has been killed, and police are convinced that Michael Myers is dead.  Dr. Loomis, feeling that Michael is not dispatched so easily, has the medical examiner inspect the burned corpse, and Dr. Loomis informs the authorities that the teeth don't seem to match that of Michael.  After searching the entire town of Haddonfield, and supposedly finding their killer, the manhunt must begin all over again.

It's the very early hours of the morning at this point, and after being treated for her injuries, Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis reprises her role here) is sleeping it off in Haddonfield memorial.  While parties are still going on and police are still searching the nighttime streets, Dr. Loomis is recalled by the governor, and learns that Laurie Strode is secretly Michael Myers' little sister.  In the meantime, bodies are starting to pile up in Haddonfield memorial, as Michael locates Laurie Strode, and goes about taking out every single living thing in his way, including the nurses, doctors and hospital staff.  Only one of the two EMT's (Lance Guest and Leo Rossi) who transported Laurie manages to survive, by sheer accidental luck, as Dr. Loomis heads to the hospital to save Laurie's life and end Michael's murderous rampage.

Interesting side note here, both Lance Guest and Leo Rossi went on to minor stardom.  Lance Guest was almost as big a star as Jamie Lee Curtis back in the 80's, starring in Jaws 4 and the Last Starfighter, as Leo Rossi went on to become a staple in a number of B-movies.  Nowadays, Lance Guest and Leo Rossi are all but forgotten, and Jamie Lee Curtis is doing yogurt commercials.  Another interesting little tidbit, john Carpenter was paid merely $10,000 to write the script and the music for Halloween, and awarded with 10% of the movie's profits.  I wonder if he still gets royalty checks every Halloween?  There is just no escaping this movie in October.  It's probably on more often than the Peanuts Halloween special with Snoopy and Charlie Brown.

Final note, Laurie Strode is one hell of a shot.  At the end of Halloween 2, doped up and in pain, after a long day and night of horror, she manages to put two bullets into Michael's head, one into each eye, and blinds him.  I'm not sure which is scarier, the fact that this barely slows Michael down, or that Laurie is suddenly a deadly shot with a revolver when she's never touched a gun before in her life.  Certainly the Myers family seems to have a knack for killing.

What possessed Michael to become a killing machine in 1963, when he was but 6 years old?  When most kids think of Halloween, they think of candy, not grabbing up a butcher knife and stabbing their sister to death.  For 15 years after the murder in 1963, Michael sits complacent in a psychiatric hospital, patiently waiting for Laurie's 17th birthday, and then he's out and killing his way to Laurie and Haddonfield.  Our only clue to Michael's behavior comes in Halloween 2, as Michael (or someone) mysteriously writes the word "Samhain" in blood on a school blackboard.  As we already know from reading my blog, Samhain was the festival of the dead, marking the end of the growing season and the harvest of the crops.  This is quite simply, our only clue to Michael's behavior, and the only one we need.  Not only does it link the Halloween of today with the possibly-sacrificial traditions of the bloody past, but it bodes ill for the future, giving some hint to Michael's intentions.  Adding to the mystery, how does Michael even know of Samhain, when he's been in a mental hospital since the age of 6?

These questions seemed poised to be answered in Halloween 3, but alas, Hollywood machinations resulted in the Halloween 3 title being absconded by another film-maker, and Halloween 3: Season of the Wtich was made.  Although a fairly decent and creepy standalone movie in its own right, it doesn't take up the tale of Michael Myers at all, instead focusing on a mask-making company, ancient druids and magical stone monoliths.  We don't get to learn more of Michael Myers til Halloween 4 and 5, which were both pretty good movies, but which probably weren't written by John Carpenter, and while Donald Pleasance returned to his role of Dr. Loomis, no one else came back.  Jamie Lee Curtis wouldn't return to the series until Halloween H20, a full twenty years after the original movie.  However, Halloween 4 and 5 did introduce us to the adorable Danielle Harris, who recently completed the "Hatchet" series of horror films.

While most people may focus on the Exorcist and Psycho as the scariest movies of all time, I much prefer Halloween and Halloween 2.  I mean, let's face it, Linda Blair might have been as frightening as the devil himself, but how many people did she kill?  One priest?  Another guy or two at most?  And Anthony Perkins in a dress and a wig, talking to himself in a high pitched voice?  That's more laughable than scary, if you ask me.  Michael Myers is supposedly a living human, but from the age of 6 onwards, not only acts in a very inhuman manner, but becomes an unstoppable killing machine that neither bullets nor fire can slow down.  We have no rhyme nor reason for Michael's onslaught, only the fact that Michael targets his own bloodline, and anyone else who happens to be nearby at the time.  Even Jason Voorhees is a zombie by now, giving him an excuse for his unending killing spree, but Michael, as Dr. Loomis puts it, is just pure evil.  Evil itself keeps Michael alive and killing, and isn't that creepier than an explanation, no matter how graphic that explanation is?

To sum up, lots of bodies over the two movies, mostly teen girls, and obviously some nudity here and there.  Lots of blood, no real gore, some gunplay and an explosion.  Suspense and creepiness run amok.  Excellent acting by Donald Pleasance and Jamie Lee Curtis.  Gratuitous scenery of Haddonfield at Halloween, with trick-or-treaters running about, and leaves blowing off of trees.  Interesting thing to note, none of the trees in the background seem to actually have anything but green leaves, yet there are plenty of brown leaves strewn about on the ground and supposedly falling from the trees in certain scenes.  Makes me think it was summer during filming, and some brown leaves were just repeatedly tossed around, but it doesn't really detract from the movie in any way.  What I do wonder about is, Laurie's friend picks her up in what is, I guess, late afternoon, then has possibly the longest car ride in movie history as she heads to her babysitting gig.  Halfway through, the sun is going down, and by the time they get there, it's full dark.  What is that, in elapsed time?  Forty five minutes to an hour of travel time?  How are they still even in Haddonfield at this point?  Oh well.  It's barely noticeable unless you're looking for it.

Final fun fact:  The mask Michael Myers wears throughout the Halloween movies is a white, unpainted mask of Captain Kirk, otherwise known as actor William Shatner.  Star Trek, originally airing in the late 60's, was experiencing a fan-induced comeback in the late 70's when this movie was made, and Captain Kirk masks would have been popular items.  Which means, one of the scariest killers in movie history, to make himself even more frightening, dons a mask of William Shatner.  I wonder how Mr. Shatner feels about that?  Do you think he's flattered, or insulted?  ;-)

That's all for tonight!  Catch you guys tomorrow with more reviews!

Horrorthon Review #26 - The Taking of Deborah Logan (2014)

Yes, I know.  I'm extremely late with my post again.  I had out of town company, we went to dinner, and it's been a busy night!  Sheesh!  Nag.

The Taking of Deborah Logan (2014) starts out innocently enough.  A film crew is trying to do a documentary on Alzheimer's, so they choose an older woman named Deborah Logan who has been diagnosed as being in the early stages of the disease, to try and document not only the progression of the disease, but the effects on the caregivers, as well.  Her daughter, Sarah Logan, has contacted the documentary crew, and the crew has graciously offered to pay Sarah some money to help Deborah retain her house, and the foundation the camera crew works for has offered to help pay for part of Deborah's care.  At first, Deborah changes her mind when the crew arrives, but since Sarah is financially strapped, she convinces her mother to accept the presence of the film crew.  However, as the film crew settles in, Deborah begins to deteriorate rapidly.  The film crew, and Sarah, begin to wonder if she just has Alzheimer's, or if something more sinister is going on.

This is another sort of found footage film, but I think I'm just getting used to them  or maybe they are getting better as time goes on.  Nah, probably not.  This actually wasn't a bad film.  The only recognizable actress was Sarah, played by Anne Ramsey.  I've never actually heard of Anne Ramsey before, but the actress was instantly recognizable, so I guess she's one of those background character actors/actresses that do a lot of good work but never have any starring roles so you never find out who they are.  The acting was decent enough, and Sarah pretty much takes the lead throughout the entire film, aside from the title character, of course.  Special effects were minimal, as with most found footage films, and done decently enough, I suppose, except for one particular episode early on where there's obviously just a camera trick done to simulate what would otherwise be done with special effects.  It's kind of obvious when it happens, and seemed kind of cheaply done for the amount of time they spent focussing on it in the film.

Spoiler:  This is pretty much your bog-standard, found-footage possession film.  End spoiler.  People have been trying to remake the Exorcist since the movie came out, and this isn't the Exorcist Mark 2.  It's not bad, and there's even a little nudity, if you like naked old women, you pervert.  I wouldn't say this is something I wouldn't watch over again, because it was reasonably exciting, slightly scary, and a fair enough way to spend a couple hours, but still nothing that was so enjoyable that I'd want to watch it all over again right away.  This movie is available on Netflix, and since it came out this same year, you might be correct in assuming it wasn't particularly great.  Or, you might not, depending on how much you like the movie.  It's probably worth at least one viewing, if I had to guess.

That's all for tonight.  It's late, been kind of a long day (not in a bad way), and I'm not only getting sleepy, but I think all this horror might be getting to me.  Kind of feel like I am being watched, right now.  Damn creepy, considering it's after 1 am.  :-/  Probably not the first Peeping Tom I've had, but ew.  Just, ew.  Who the hell wants to see an overweight, slightly balding, middle-aged man undress?  Honestly, if you're looking for that, you're damned desperate, that's all I got to say.   Hmmm, desperate....   if it's female, that's my kinda woman!  heh  Catch you guys tomorrow night.

Horrorthon Review #25 - The Skeptic (2009)

You know, I think I'm starting to realize something.  I keep lucking on to these pretty decent movies, and I come to realize that there are good movies out there, you just have to look for them!  Sure, some of them turn out to be stinkers, but if it wasn't for the bad ones, what would we have to compare the good ones to, right?  Exactly!

The Skeptic (2009) stars Tim Daly as Bryan Becket, a mainly unemotional lawyer whose Aunt dies and leaves him a house.  Bryan's wife (Andrea Roth) was considering a brief separation from him, so he moves into the old house in hopes of quickly selling it and anything else of value in the home, only to find out that his Aunt had left the house to a foundation for Psychic research.  As it turns out, the Aunt had thought the house haunted in the last year of her life, and the longer Becket remains in the home, the more haunted the place begins to seem...

For a basically low budget ghost story, this movie has all the star power and polish of a Hollywood blockbuster.  Tom Arnold co-stars as Sully, Becket's partner in his law firm, Zoe Saldana stars as a psychic that decides to investigate Becket's house, Edward Herrmann stars as Becket's psychologist and Robert Prosky (in his final performance) is the local Priest.  That's a pretty star-studded cast right there.  I wouldn't say they acted the shit out of this movie, but these are all professionals.  Every performance was acceptably done.  Some of the Netflix reviews cast a negative light on Tom Arnold as Becket's partner, but I personally think the man's a fine actor, and looks like he'd be fun to have a drink with.  I was pleased to see Edward Herrmann again, playing the psychologist, who is an absolutely excellent but highly underrated actor.  I think I was too distracted by how hot Zoe Saldana was to really rate her acting performance.  :-)  I'm only human.

This was a good story, I thought.  I didn't really know where it was going, and I had my theories here and there, all of which turned out to be completely wrong.  This movie was a bit of a surprise, but nothing needed to be explained at the end.  The ending pretty much wrapped every little thing up, and between the psychiatrist and the priest, we (and Becket) find out everything else we needed to know.  I enjoyed this movie.  I wouldn't watch it again, but I didn't have to, much as one watching the Sixth Sense, once you've seen it, you know how it ends (and thus you know the twist) and don't need to watch it again.  Of course, there's nothing stopping one from watching it again, just to see how hot Zoe Saldana looks in her few scenes.  Sadly, there's no nudity in this movie.  Special effects were absolutely minimal, but a lot of effects weren't necessary to tell the story.  Oh, also interesting to note, this movie is set around Halloween, so it's kind of a holiday movie as well.

This movie is only available on Netflix until the end of the week, so if you want to watch it, better catch it before then!

That's all for tonight.  A whole bunch of channels, including Turner Classic Movies, have joined the Halloween bandwagon, and are finally showing horror movies.  I have much to watch!  :-D

Horrorthon Review #24 - Witching and Bitching (2013)

You don't see too many spanish horror movies.  I saw a french one last year sometime, about a monster in a museum, which made sense.  There's lots of museums in france, I guess.  But witches in spain?  Well, it's a new one on me, but what the hey.  I'm easy.  Ask anyone.  Witching and Bitching is popular on Netflix, where I found it.

Witching and Bitching (2013) is about a dad who robs a jewelry store to pay for a new life for himself and his son.  Things go a little haywire during the otherwise seemingly well-planned robbery, and the dad and his son, along with one of his surviving partners in crime, make their getaway in a Taxi that already had a passenger in it.  The boy's mother finds out that her ex kidnapped her son, and goes after them.  The dad and his son flee through the backroads on their way to france, but have to pass through a town famed for being the birthplace of witchcraft...

I'm not sure what to make of this movie.  Sure, it's spanish, and there's like, one or maybe two hot chicks, tops.  No nudity, despite this being a movie about witches which, is odd.  Usually any witch movie is an excuse for tons of nudity.  Well, except 'The Craft.'  Witching and Bitching was almost two hours long, which is unusual for a movie about witches, as well.  So, it's basically a high-quality, good-special-effects production of a horror movie.  Except, it's not completely horror, and there's some comedy in it, and it's completely misogynistic.  In other words, it's anti-women.  Basically, every single woman in this movie is either a witch, a bitch, or both at the same time, which is just impressive.  And there's not really any secret about it, so it's not like I'm giving away spoilers.  Whoever wrote this really doesn't like women much.  :-D

This movie was a fun watch, I guess.  I sort of knew where it was going when it started, but it was kind of a roller-coaster ride to get where it was going.  No actual dead bodies in this movie, or at least, none of the main characters died that I can remember, so it's almost like a Disney movie of horror films, or at least the Harry Potter version.  The constant depiction of women as evil, conniving witches (and bitches) was funny, and the men complaining about it (the bitching part, I guess) was even funnier, but it's ALL TRUE.  At least, in this movie, it is.

Minor spoiler, and one of the parts I really liked about this movie, was that this may be the only time I've ever seen the 'Mother' depicted on film.  I don't suppose it matters whether you call her Gaia or Mother nature or Mom or what, but she was worshipped way, way back before anyone ever considered worshipping a man, mostly because men were shocked and awed by the seeming miraculous ability of women to create life from their bodies.  Sure, science pretty much has a handle on what's going on in a woman's womb during the nine months of pregnancy now, but back then, to be able to create another human being from your nether region was probably pretty friggin amazing.  So, it's no wonder we thought women were gods, and the ultimate embodiment of the miraculous woman was a big, fatty old faceless mother-figure with enormous boobs and thighs.  Since most of our mothers eventually end up looking like that, it's no wonder we worshipped some goddess who looked just like her.  Whether we based our worship off of a single wise old woman who looked like that, or the 'Mother' figure was just an embodiment of all our crotchety old moms, who can say?  But either way, this film does depict an actual avatar of 'The mother' figure.  I guess she's still worshipped in some, many or all wicca practices (I have no idea, I'm not wiccan), and probably the only reason I'm familar with her is because of watching other horror movies, notably Rawhead Rex, where a small figurine of the Mother was enough to drive away a rampaging demon.  Rawhead Rex, if you ever get the chance to watch it, was actually a pretty good movie, too.  End spoilers!

(Oh, and Google spell-check?  It's "worshipped."  With TWO P's, not one.  I checked the internet, and the internet KNOWS ALL.  So stop marking my spelling with red underlines, biatch.  I know my shit.)

So, to sum up, kind of a weird foreign horror movie, but a funny one.  I don't think I'm watching it again, not because it was bad, but there weren't really any 'monsters,' nor was the action all that outstanding.  So, a fun watch, but nothing exceptional, to be enjoyed time and again.  Give it a viewing for the misogynistic humor alone (if you enjoy that sort of thing) or maybe the mob of spanish witches in the flick, then move on.

In other news, I watched the premieres of Grimm and Constantine earlier this evening.  The Grimm (Nick) is still missing his Grimm-powers, which is probably going to become a major goal this season.  Captain Renaud seems to have passed away from the bullet wounds inflicted on him at the end of last season, and there seems to be a new breed of Wesen operating in the seattle area.

Constantine, sadly, has a british guy playing the title role.  Look, I got nothing against british guys, and I'm part English and part irish myself, but does every British guy have to be that same whiny, smarmy little geeky guy?  Really?  Look, I'm sure Doctor Who is a huge success over in England, and every guy who played Doctor Who over the last 50 years is probably the equivalent of a rock-star-turned-god over there, but I really don't see the draw.  Does every british fellow have to be skinny, and geeky, with bad hair, look suicidal, and be completely Emo about everything?  Are all british guys actually Japanese?  Because I'm really seeing a strong resemblance to the average vampire/manga/cartoon character/schoolboy samurai archetype that's huge over in Japan right now.  Sure, maybe Keanu Reeves wasn't exactly the best Constantine, and maybe the DC comics character is actually british (I don't know, I never read the comic), but I really can't see someone who looks like they just dropped out of high school, and has the same mental attitude, playing a guy who routinely deports demons back to hell, goes home and has a beer at the end of the day.  If we absolutely had to have Constantine played by a british guy, could we have had Jason Statham, Pierce Brosnan, or maybe even Sean Connery?  At least those guys look like they know how to kick ass, and don't look like they're faking it, and badly.

Also, why does every single new show, movie, or whatever, have to try and rewrite the origin story?  I was fine with the Constantine movie.  Sure, Keanu Reeves was maybe not the best choice, but the movie was made, and replayed a LOT.  So, what we had was a guy who offed himself, found redemption, and decided to get back into the world of demon-hunting.  Why not just continue from there?  Nope!  Got to rewrite it!  Look, I'm no expert on the hard and fast rules of Christianity, but this series' story of Constantine summoning a greater demon to try and wrest the soul of a little girl away from a lesser demon, and failing, thereby damning the little girl to hell?  Wasn't he trying to help?  Wasn't her soul pretty much in jeopardy to begin with?  Isn't it impossible for an innocent soul to be forced into hell?  How exactly did Constantine 'damn' her soul to hell by trying to help free her from possession?  Sure, he screwed up, but his heart was in the right place, wasn't it?  He certainly didn't intend for the girl's soul to be carried off by the greater demon, so how is it his fault?  Meh, I've always thought the christian/catholic mythology system was totally messed up, and that was even when I was a faithfully hardcore, church-going Catholic schoolboy.  I'm not sure a series that relies on exploiting every little pickaninny rule in the Catholic belief system is going to work, especially with someone who doesn't look like he could kick an injured Imp's ass, let alone a major demon.  (shrug)  I'll give it a few episodes to see how it goes, I guess.

What else have I got to do on friday nights?  Not like us geniuses have an easy time getting dates, right?  Maybe I should stop trolling ice cream shops looking for lonely girls.  Hmmmm.  On that note, has anyone else out there ever had a pumpkin- flavored ice cream milkshake?  I had my first one ever today!  Pumpkin-y, with just a hint of cinnamon in it.  Good stuff!  I mean, sure, I could have gone with the maple-syrup-soft-serve ice cream, and maybe I should have, but I like to try new things.  Come to think of it, the maple-syrup-flavored ice cream was new, too.  Maybe I'll get that next time.  The attractive (and probably underage) girl behind the counter seemed to enjoy giving me free samples.  I'd like to think she was flirting with me (if only to stroke my own ego a bit), but I probably just look like a fat guy who loves ice cream.  Which, I can't really argue with.  :-D

That's all for tonight.  Catch you guys tomorrow night with another review.  Seven more movies left to review this month!  Can I do it?  OR WILL I FAIL?  :-o  Who can say?  Keep checking back for more ranting monologues, whining bitch-sessions, and general perversion disguised as a witty movie review!  :-)

Horrothon Review #23 - Rigor Mortis (2013)

While October 2013 seemed to be werewolf month, this October seems to be focused around Asian Horror.  With only a week left to go in the month, I'm pretty much stretching my movie searches to the limit, trying to find movies that I haven't watched yet, or at least, something that will be enjoyable to watch.  I lucked out with tonight's movie, because I didn't even realize it was Asian Horror until after I started watching it.

Rigor Mortis (2013) is also known as Geung si, although I have no idea what language that is.  Chinese, I'm guessing?  Probably not Japanese, as I do have a little familiarity with that language, but I could be completely wrong about that.  Anyway, Rigor Mortis starts out with a voice-over by a man who claims he was an actor, who is moving into a high-rise apartment building.  Carrying what appears to be his only possessions, he moves into apartment 2442, which has a bit of a history.  The security guard lets him in, and the place is dusty.  Apparently, it hasn't been occupied in a long time.  At least, not by anything alive...

As many of you know, Asian Horror is sometimes a hit-or-miss sort of thing.  While most times, the production quality, acting and overall polish of the movie are better than most American horror films (probably because asian countries are willing to take more of a risk in their film-making), there's no way for me to know how well he movie will translate into my ideal version of horror.  Since I grew up on cool monsters and lots of nudity in my horror flicks, that's what I like to see, but nudity is pretty rare in asian horror, and cool monsters don't pop up that often.

Rigor Mortis is essentially a story about chinese vampires, and one of the reviews on Netflix said I should be familiar with Chinese mythology, the idea of chinese vampires, or at least have seen the Mr. Vampire movies.  Since I haven't seen those, have no idea what they are, and I am pretty unfamiliar with chinese vampires, I went into this movie rather uneducated.  Still, the story was kind of dark (as many asian horror films are), the mood was pretty bleak (reminded me of the Jesse Stone movies with Tom Selleck), and the mythological and supernatural aspects of it were new to me, so it was pretty interesting.

This was a good movie, I thought.  It was a little light on building interpersonal relationships between the characters, and focused more on the dead and the dying than the living, but it was a fun watch.  The acting was decent, the production quality was on the better side of asian horror, the special effects were pretty good, and the story was entertaining.  There didn't seem to be any nudity that I recall, but since the entire movie was pretty much about fighting the supernatural, they didn't have time to focus on the benefits of viewing the nude female physique.  Still, it was a fun watch and I'd probably watch it again, just to try and figure out the mythological aspects of the character belief system that's obviously in play here.  Also, there's literally no humor.  At all.

Minor spoiler here, and this shouldn't give away any of the plot, but skip this paragraph if you'd rather watch the movie.  I mentioned last night that I hate movies that are just dream sequences, and I'm not sure if that's what happened at the end of the movie, but it looks like maybe it was, which is kind of disappointing.  Funny that I mention that just last night, and then happen to watch a film today that features exactly what I said I wouldn't enjoy watching.  Huh.  Weird.  Still, I guess some dream sequences aren't bad to watch.  I guess maybe it depends what sort of dream it is.  End spoilers.

I read an article a few months back that mentioned something about an experiment on mice.  Apparently, when a mouse dies, his brain undergoes a short but vigorous period of mental activity that resembles dreaming at the moment of death.  I found that very interesting.  I don't know what mad scientist decided on killing mice and recording their brain activity as they died, but I guess it's better then doing it on humans.  Come to think of it, that'll probably be the next Asian Horror movie coming out, that some mad doctor decides to record brain activity in human beings as they die, and... say it with me... ALL HELL BREAKS LOOSE!  heh  Come to think of it, maybe they've done that movie already.  I've seen a lot of weird horror films.

That's all for tonight.  Looking forward to the season premiere of Grimm tomorrow night, and the series premiere of Constantine.  I will probably review those on saturday, along with my usual horror movie review, in case you are interested.  Halloween is only a week away!  I still have to come up with a costume, too, which I haven't done in recent years, but I actually have a Halloween party to attend this year.   Hmmm.  Well, I'll figure it out.  Catch you guys tomorrow night.

Horrorthon Review #22 - Mine Games (2012)

Okay, there's two kinds of movies that I really hate.

The first kind is an entire movie where it's just a dream sequence.  Some character in the movie has a bad dream, and they show the entire thing for an hour and a half, and then, the character wakes up and it's just a bad dream and nothing in the movie ever really happened.  If I wanted to see dream sequences, I can just shut my eyes and lay my head on a pillow.

The second kind of movie I hate is one where the film-maker is just fucking with you.  Saw (2004) is a good example, and I'm going to spoil the shit out of that movie for you if you haven't seen it yet.  It starts out good enough, and you think it might be a decent, but gory sort of torture-porn thriller, and what's really going on is, the director is fucking with your head.  You think the killer has to be there somewhere, and it has to be one of the characters in the movie, and you watch the whole movie, looking for clues, and it points everywhere but at the corpse on the floor in the first scene, which actually turns out to be the killer.  I groaned in disappointment when I realized that the killer had supposedly drugged himself, and left himself laying on the floor of the room, unconscious, while two guys were there with a gun, and hacksaws.  There's no freakin way a control-freak psychopathic killer, who's supposedly planned every last detail, is going to drug himself and lay down on the floor where two men are chained up.  What if one of them just fired the gun to see if it worked and ended up shooting the supposedly dead guy on the floor?  There goes the jigsaw killer and all half-dozen of the Saw sequels.  So, what that movie was doing was simultaneously adhering to the most ridiculous tenet of many murder mysteries (that the least likely suspect is always the killer), and also fucking with your head at the same time, because there's absolutely no indication that the bloody body on the floor that isn't even breathing, is the real killer in the movie.  It's just ridiculous.  I haven't watched any of the Saw sequels since seeing the first one, just because I found the movie so ridiculous, and because it was basically just torture-porn, which I don't like.  Give me a real monster and a good plot, not just people severing their own body parts.

Mine Games (2012) was a new addition to the Netflix lineup, and was supposedly popular, but it's one of those mind-fuck movies.  Typical plot, a bunch of drunken kids head off to the boondocks to meet up with their friends and party after graduating college.  Near their vacation home they find an abandoned mine and go investigating, and then the bodies start turning up.

I've had to leave the synopsis purposely vague, but I'm going to spoil the shit out of this movie because I can't make a lick of sense out of the damned thing.  And yes, spoilers to follow.  First off, who the hell goes out to camp, in the woods, with a guy who's clearly not taking his anti-psychotic medication?  And lets him freakin drive the damned vehicle out there so that nobody except the crazy guy knows where the hell they are?  Second, some guy is picking on the girl who brought a suitcase with wheels to go camping with, and yet, they are all going to a huge goddamned mansion in the middle of the woods to hang out and drink.  Why do they all think they are going camping when clearly they are going to a huge mansion in the middle of the woods?  Three, how the FUCK do you buy enough gas to run a gigantic goddamned mansion in the middle of the woods with a gas-powered electrical generator?  It's ridiculous.  Even the food in the fridge would be spoiled when you ran out of gas, and they didn't even bring food.  Fourth, if there's no power, where are they getting the fresh water from?  Fifth, why the hell do you go into an abandoned mine that's clearly marked with a MINE CLOSED sign when you KNOW your cell phones don't work?  I mean, you're just begging for an accident, and with no cell reception (and no vehicle at that point), whoever gets hurt is surely going to end up in a bad way before you can get near any help.  Seven, who the hell goes for gas in the middle of the night?  Eight, how the hell do these people see in the middle of the night when the generator goes out?  Look, I've had my power go out just in my tiny house, and in the dead of night, you can't see SHIT.  Fuck that moonlight business.  I don't care if the goddamned moon is big and bright (deep in the heart of Texas!), when you're inside, moonlight just doesn't get in there, you know what I'm saying?  Yet the minute the lights go out in the woodland mansion these kids are all "Come on, we better go see if we can find some more gas for the generator" and have absolutely no difficulty wandering around in the dark.  And what about the psycho running around the mineshafts, because you KNOW there's no goddamned moonlight shining down underground?  Does he need a light to see by?  NAH!  Just run along full-tilt with drop-offs and barrels and boxes and crates and mining equipment and rock walls all around you, and not bump into or trip over a thing!  You're fine!  Bullshit.

I'm not even going to discuss the time-travel aspect of this movie, because there's absolutely no explanation for why it's happening, what's going on, or why the medium (who channels the dead) should be clue-ing in to some weird time-travel warp-loop-thing, because none of that makes any sense, either.  Suffice it to say, there's no monsters, precious little nudity, and fuck-all of a story line.  Nuff said.  Not watching this one again, not even to try and figure out wtf is going on, because it's not worth it.  The film-maker is just dicking you around, like all those guys who watched Lost for 7 or eight years and found out it was all just a bunch of Bullshit at the end.  Me, I got bored of Lost after the first episode, and I'm bored with movies that just want to fuck with you because they can.  Of course the movies can fuck with you.  When you control everything that the viewer and the characters in the movie see, hear, and feel, you're going to be able to fuck with some people's heads.  I mean, DUH.  Don't fuck with my head.  Just fucking entertain me with a good story and a cool monster and don't leave me trying to figure the fuck out what the hell was going on and if I just imagined the whole movie, because that's just goddamned annoying.  End spoilers!

Sure, the acting was meh, and at least it wasn't found footage, but wtf, guys.  At least have the damned movie make some sense.  I feel so ripped off, and somehow, sexually violated.  Maybe someone slipped a roofie into my supper.  Wait.  I made my own dinner.  Can you unknowingly roofie yourself?  I wonder if I'll remember what I did to myself in the morning?  Should I hope I enjoyed myself, or is that just weird?

In other news, having another rough few days.  Got a headache, a cold, and a sore throat.  Blech.  Probably mildly depressed at the moment, as well.  Woohoo time to wallow in my own misery for a day or two before I get better.  I don't get many chances to wallow.  Normally I'm pretty goddamned chipper.   Might as well enjoy it while it lasts, even if it does come with a sore throat and a headache.  Like I mentioned in my review of Vampire in Brooklyn a couple nights back, that sermon the Vampire made, the one that reminded us that you can't have light without the darkness to compare it to?  I'm going to enjoy my few dark days so that when I get well and the depression goes away, my happiness seems all the sweeter!  And yes, enjoying my own misery does kind of defeat the purpose of the misery, but at least it cures my depression, if not the headache and sore throat.  So, it's all good.

We do live in a world of opposites, don't we?  Sometimes, I just wish there was a bit of shining sanity to compare all the dark insanity to, because it seems we've precious little sanity around the world in this day and age.  And now I've depressed myself again.  :-(

That's all for tonight.  Going to drown my misery in cough drops, tylenol and computer games.  Catch you guys tomorrow night.

Horrorthon Review #21 - Frankenstein's Army (2013)

Aha!  Two good movies in a row!  It's so hard to tell whether a movie is good or not from the Netflix reviews.  The first three reviews are always like 4 or 5 stars, and the next three reviews are all one or two stars.  It's so weird.  I picked this film because it mentioned that it had the best monsters one reviewer had ever seen.  That's good enough for me!

Frankenstein's Army (2013) is about a group of Russian scouts making their way into German territory during World War 2.  A couple of the newer recruits have been designated as cameramen, making some sort of propaganda film / documentary or something.  The radio operator can't seem to get through to headquarters, but they do pick up a distress call from another group of russian scouts.  Heading to the coordinates on the distress call, they come to a village with a church that has been damaged by artillery fire.  Outside the church is a pile of burnt nuns, one of whom is still alive.  The soldiers take mercy on the crispy nun, and kill her.  Entering the church, they find a staircase leading downwards, and a bunch of electrical machinery.  Restarting the generator leads to them finding a sort of half-woman, half-machine nun, with a drill bit where her right arm used to be, laying apparently dead on the floor...

This was a decent movie, for a found-footage type of flick.  The cameramen aren't your normal, whiny scaredy-cats who drop the camera at the first sign of trouble, and all you get to see is the side of a wall for hours until someone picks up the camera again.  These are Russian soldiers, who take showers outside in the middle of winter, and pick up weapons as they find them, because they emptied their previous weapon into the body of the last enemy they fought.

As one of the reviewers put it, there's a lot of cool monsters in this movie.  I don't want to give away any details, but the acting was decent, the found-footage style of camera work wasn't hardly annoying at all, and most of the time, was barely noticeable.  I don't really recall any nudity in this flick, either, which is mildly disappointing, but how many hot chicks are you going to find in a deserted German village in the middle of winter?  Exactly.  Not many.

Personally, I think there was a little too much build-up to get to the good parts, with an unnecessary amount of footage spent filming the scouts walking through woods and scouting the countryside.  But once you get to the action parts, it's pretty much non-stop after that.  The ending was kind of weird, but not entirely unexpected, and not a disappointment at all.  Pretty sure I haven't given away anything that would ruin the movie here, so go ahead and watch it on Netflix if you want to.  It's definitely something I could watch over again, just for the view of all the cool monsters.  Also, it's kind of a war film, so if you like those types of movies, this is nice for you.  I happen to like war movies (preferably with monsters), so that was a bonus for me.

So, to sum up, good movie, rewatchable, no nudity, cool monsters.  Decent plot, good acting.  Drawbacks are found footage style filming, and slow buildup.  Watch and enjoy!  :-D

I have a little time and some space tonight, so a quick recap of the different series I am watching this season.  Gotham and Scorpion are still decently watchable on monday nights.  Sleepy Hollow hasn't managed to capture my interest enough to switch the channel away from Scorpion so far this season.  Still watching Flash to see where it goes, but not entirely thrilled so far.  Agents of SHIELD is still one of my favorites.  Gave up on Forever (too lame and mushy), American Horror Story (too many clowns, and I don't just mean the clown), and Gracepoint (too boring).  Z Nation was getting interesting until they killed off my favorite character.  See, if there's one thing I like in a character, it's the ability to kick some ass.  The big bearded sargeant, for instance, I think his name was Garrett?  Anyway, he could kick some serious zombie ass, with or without a weapon.  And, he's dead now.  Which does take some of the fun out of the show.  Looking forward to Grimm and Constantine this friday.  I am hoping Constantine is as good as advertised, but I'm not holding my breath.

That's all for tonight.  Catch you guys tomorrow night with another review!  :-)

Horrorthon Review #20 - Odd Thomas (2013)

Bingo!  Finally found a good, new movie.  I didn't know what to review tonight, and I was short on time, so I picked something I just added to my list today.

Odd Thomas (2013) is about a guy who sees dead people.  Unlike most psychics, however, he does something about it.  Having learned to handle himself, Odd Thomas (Anton Yelchin) goes after the slayers of the dead, once they point their killers out for him.  Odd has a detective friend (Willem Dafoe) who understands Odd's link with the dead, and knows Odd has never been wrong about a suspect.  Unfortunately for Odd, his link with the world of the dead is telling him there's some bad shit going down, and Odd finds out he has but one day to figure out what kind of bad shit, and how to stop it.

I remember Anton Yelchin from the Fright Night remake a few years back.  That remake actually wasn't bad (although I still prefer the original with Roddy McDowell), and he wasn't bad in it.  He's actually pretty decent in this one as the title character, Odd Thomas.  This movie starts out very well, and just proceeds from starting out very well, to a continuous stream of action and adventure right to the very end.  Not sure if it entirely qualifies as horror, but, there's a psychic, the dead, a satanic cult, and Bodaks, which I guess qualify as Demons (supposedly they come out of hell) or something similar, sooooo, I guess that's pretty close to a horror movie?  I mean, I don't know where else you'd categorize something that has all those elements in it.  Horror movie, then.

The only drawbacks to this movie, and I'm going to devote an entire paragraph to her, is I didn't get to see enough of Addison Timlin.  She plays Stormy, Odd Thomas' girlfriend, and she's so ridiculously hot that if I were Odd Thomas, I certainly wouldn't have been able to focus on stopping the bad thing from going down.  There's a scene about 52 minutes in or thereabouts (but please do not fast-forward, because the rest of the movie is almost as ridiculously good as her briefs scene), where she's hanging out in a pair of rather tight sheer panties and a shirt, and the panties just look like they are painted on.  Maybe they were painted on.  I've never wanted to be a pair of panties so much in my life.  And believe me when I say, what's under the panties looked quite awesome.  I rewound, mid-movie, and took another peek.  Awesome.  Thanks, Addison.  Please, at some point in your career, if you haven't done one already, a nude scene would earn my eternal gratitude.  Note, there is no nudity in this movie, as far as I recall.  Sad to say.  Addison also looks smoking hot in every other damn outfit she has on in the entire movie.  She's probably a lesbian, not that there's anything wrong with that, and I think Mr. Tiny just snapped to attention.  Nobody that looks that good could possibly be straight.  Sweet, she did six episodes of Californication.  She was probably nude in there, if I had to guess.  Looks like I am going back to check out those episodes.  heh

Moving on.  Anyway, awesome movie, action, excitement, explosions, sort-of-demons, gunfights, dead people, murder mystery, multiple dead bodies, ghosts, no boobs.  I saw this on netflix, and urge anyone with access to the movie to enjoy it as often as possible.  Willem Dafoe, of course, always adds a bunch of class to a movie, which I thought probably could go without saying, but I thought I'd say it anyway.  Everyone else in the movie seemed to act just fine.  I would love to see a sequel, a prequel, a series, or even a remake.  Would definitely watch this one again.  It just flowed so well from beginning to end, everything else just seemed to disappear, and I got sucked into the story.  Sort of predictable ending, but that's not too much of a detraction when the story just moves along so well.

As I understand it, Dean Koontz wrote the book that this movie was based off of.  I used to read Dean Koontz back in the 80's (or maybe it was the 90's) and I didn't think he was that good.  Maybe this is one of those instances where the movie was actually better than the book, or maybe Dean Koontz has been getting better since I last checked out his work.  (shrugs)  Maybe I'll pick up some Dean Koontz for xmas and see if he's improved any.

That's all for tonight.  I had out of town company arrive unexpectedly today, so I'm late again with my review.  It happens, especially this time of year.  Families get together, and so on.  :-)  Catch you guys tomorrow night with another review.

Horrorthon Review #19 - American Mary (2012)

I'm kind of an old-school horror lover.  Hammer films from the 60's, bad B-Horror from the 80's, even sci-fi horror from the 50's, it's all good.  I prefer atmosphere, suspense and mental scares over the graphic.  Oh, I'm not against a little blood and gore here and there, I mean, my favorite horror movie series is probably Friday the 13th, but my point is, it shouldn't be the focus of the tale.  Blood and gore should only be there to illustrate the story, and I'm all for a little overindulgence in these matters.  If a guy's head is chopped off, there should be lots of blood.  If a werewolf disebowels a guy, well, there should be bowels hanging out.  I mean, that's what disemboweling means.  But if there's no good reason to overdo it, then don't.  Which basically means I haven't ever seen movies like Hostel and the Saw sequels, frankly because there wasn't really a monster of any kind.

Sure, people make that argument that humans are the only real monsters, and that's true.  You are much, much more likely to run into a serial killer, random rapist, or an extremely rude guy at the checkout line at Walmart than a vampire, werewolf or mummy, but seriously, why would you want to?  Nobody wants to run into a real killer or rapist, or even an extremely rude guy.  They generally don't play well with others.  Fake monsters on the other hand, are completely safe.  Which is why I like them.  They're on the screen, where I can view them safely.  Kind of like seeing polar bears at the zoo.  Very few of us want to see them in the wild.  Sure, it's nice to see them in their natural environment, but let's be honest, when they're in a movie, they're always IN their natural environment.  Creepy castles, abandoned lakes, forgotten pyramids, or Elm street, the monsters are generally never hanging out at the Starbucks on the street corner.  You follow so far?  Maybe things will be easier to explain after I set up the movie.

American Mary (2012) is a story about a medical student who has completed her schooling and begun her residency.  At least, I think that's what it's called.  She basically has a good idea of what she's doing, but she doesn't have the experience yet, in other words.  Mary has been having trouble paying her way through medical school, and by this point, Mary is in a rather precarious financial position.  Also, Mary has this rather overbearing professor who she obviously has a thing for, and she's invited to a party at his place!  Things are beginning to look up for Mary!  But then, this is a horror movie, isn't it?

Katherine Isabelle plays Mary, and she's really the only actress I recognize.  I'm going to be blunt, I didn't like this movie.  There were no monsters, and besides Katherine pretty much nailing down the scary mad-doctor role (good acting skills, at least), there's not a lot of real horror in this movie.  The majority of this movie is pretty much about Mary's career as an illegal doctor in the world of body alterations.  And, all of her clients are actually pleased with her modifications, so it's not even like The Dentist, where Corbin Bernsen just randomly destroys your teeth and might kill you if you resist. It took me ten years to go back to a dentist after seeing that movie.  Still scared of them.  I like my teeth.  :-/

Err, anyway, American Mary is really a very short story about revenge and random domestic violence.  The only horror really comes in the form of the freakishly horrific body alterations the extras decide to subject themselves to, and Mary's little side project (I'm being as circumspect as I can be, here, so I don't give away the plot) really only takes up maybe 5 or 10 minutes of screen time, and they never show anything.  Essentially, what you watch is an hour and a half of Mary doing surgery.  Hey, if that's horror for you, by all means, go for it.  While I found it generally repulsive, I wasn't particularly scared, since almost all the surgery in the movie was voluntary.  So how is this horror?  There's not even really any good nudity.

Well, Netflix lists this under the horror section, which I don't get, but Katherine Isabelle is usually a horror actress (she starred in the Ginger Snaps series of werewolf movies), so I guess maybe they didn't know where else to put this one.  I'd toss this into the same category as the Saw movies, the Hostel flicks, and anything that basically involves a lot of torture porn, which is what this movie is.  I don't like torture porn, and I've never seen Hostel or anything besides the first Saw movie.  I guess torture porn doesn't have its own category, so they toss it into the horror file?  Bleh.  Definitely wouldn't watch this movie again.  No offense, Katherine.  Don't cut me.  heh

That's all for tonight.  Going to find something else horror-y to get the taste of torture porn out of my mouth.  Catch you guys tomorrow night.

Horrorthon Review #18 - Vampire in Brooklyn (1995)

Yea, I like to mix it up a little with my movie choices.  Although I love seeing new horror flicks, it's rare nowadays that I find a good one, so I toss in a few oldies but goodies here and there.  There was so much on TV today, it was hard to pick a choice of what to watch.  I was going to review a flick on Syfy, but I was busy having pizza, so I missed the whole beginning.  And, as you guys probably know by now, I won't review a movie I haven't just watched.  Just to let you know, both Syfy and AMC are getting into the horror movie feel of things, so between now and Halloween, you're probably going to see a lot of horror on those channels.  I'd spend all my spare time watching Chiller, but those movies aren't the best horror movies you've ever seen, and there's commercials, and they cut out all the nudey bits.  :-(  Of course, there's always Netflix, which has its own horror section.  That's where I found Vampire in Brooklyn.

Vampire in Brooklyn (1995) is about a Vampire.  In Brooklyn.  In case that wasn't clear from the title.  Detectives Justice (Allen Payne) and Veder (Angela Bassett) are called to a murder scene down at the docks.  It appears an old cargo ship has come in, loaded with bodies, but no crew.  All the bodies seem drained of blood, and have horrible throat wounds.  Detective Veder is exploring the cargo hold when she runs into an old, bejeweled coffin, a coffin that suddenly disappears.  The night watchman down at the docks reports seeing a big black wolf leave the ship, and then seeing it turn into a man.  Two bodies are found a few blocks away, one with his heart missing from his chest...

Sounds good, doesn't it?  Well, it is.  Eddie Murphy stars as a Bermudan Vampire named Maximillian who makes his way to Brooklyn.  The last of his kind, he is searching for a half-vampire known to have ended up there, to end his loneliness and replenish his dying race.  Angela Bassett is the unknowing half-vampire, who paints her nightmares, nightmares that haven't happened yet.  Kadeem Hardison is Julius Jones, Maximillian's ghoul, who begins rotting the minute Maximiliian finds him.  Zakes Mokae is Dr. Zeko, a refugee from Bermuda who has faced the vampires before.

I may be considered odd for saying this, but I think Eddie Murphy is an excellent actor.  He started out as a comedian, went into acting, and not only did a fair number of entertaining action movies, but has starred with some of the hottest actors and actresses in Hollywood.  His career has taken a downturn lately, but I think that's because he has been trying to make a mainly unsuccessful foray into children's movies, and I don't think they really suit him very well.

I like this movie.  Eddie Murphy acts the shit out of it, Angela Bassett is hot, and there's some humor in it.  Of course there's humor.  It's Eddie Murphy.  I don't think there's any nudity in it, but a little gore, and some decent special effects.  There's also some good horror in it, and some genuine scary parts, and some sad ones.  Maximillian is the last of his kind, after all.  Sure, maybe that's good for humans, but bad for vampires, and aren't vampires people too?  Or at least, sort of?

There's a part in this movie where Maximillian assumes the form of the local preacher, preacher Pauley.  He's trying to sway Detective Veder to go ahead and break away from her old life, and go over to the dark side, as it were, but he gets roped into doing a sermon for the congregation before he can get away.  Since he can't actually go into the church (he is a vampire, after all) he does the sermon outside, and the sermon is one of the most delightfully zen, interesting and funny sermons I have ever heard in my life.  I think it goes something like...

"Necessary Evil.  Those words don't even go together, do they?  Like plaids and stripes.  But evil, is necessary.  Like light and dark, you can't have one, without the other.  If every day is a sunny day.... then what's a sunny day?  Evil... is necessary.  And if it's necessary, then Evil...  must be good.  That's what I think.  Evil... is good.  Say it with me.  Evil is good."

 See, now if my priests had ever done sermons like that, I'd probably still be going to church.  Makes perfect sense to me.  Sure, we're all supposed to be good and all, but how do we know what's good, if we don't have something to compare it to?  If there weren't criminals and serial killers and whatnot, to demonstrate for us one end of the spectrum of human behavior, then how would we know where the other end was?  How would we know where we fall in the spectrum?  How would we know what not to do?  Exactly.

Sigh.  My review has gone past midnight again, and I haven't managed to post on time.  Oh well.  Much like the vampires in this movie, I have often preferred the quiet of nightfall, if only as a good contrast to the sunny daytime.  :-)  The midnight hour.  Time to watch another horror movie...

That's all for tonight.  Catch you guys tomorrow night!

Horrorthon Review #17 - John Dies at the End (2012)

Okay, I tried to watch this once last year, and couldn't get through the first few minutes.  After reading through the reviews and seeing people say it's a lot like Tucker and Dale vs Evil, and Army of Darkness, I thought I'd give it a fair chance, and forced myself to get through the goofy beginning.

John Dies at the End (2012) isn't about John Dying at the End.  John actually dies just short of the middle of the movie, maybe about 1/3rd of the way through, but this doesn't seem to slow him down much.  This movie is actually about a drug called Soy Sauce that gets invented by a rastafarian chemist.  Soy Sauce makes you able to see things, do things, see the future, and predict the past.  Or maybe it's see the past, and predict the future.  Yea, that makes more sense.  In any case, John, and his friend Dave, get sucked into a crazy world of drug-addled visions and inter-dimensional entities trying to cross over into our reality, and, well, we just can't have that, now can we?

Let me just say, this movie is not in the same class as Army of Darkness, nor Tucker and Dale vs Evil.  It tries to manufacture a friendship between two guys, who don't seem to have any real friendship (at least to me), and cast them into a zany mash-up of ESP and psycho-Babylonian nonsense.  I just made up the phrase Psycho-Babylonian!  Awesome, innit?  I think it means a mix of psychotic and ancient and just plain crazy.  Suffice it to say that this movie needed the viewers to be as drug-addled as the people who wrote it to really be amused by it, and there were very few redeeming qualities.  I may be crazy, but I don't think I'm drug-addled.  Or, maybe I'm secretly a patient at a mental facility, who only THINKS he's a blogger who reviews movies, and I didn't actually SEE John Dies at the End, but I had a new drug and it gave me a crazy vision of the movie, and I'm actually just sitting in padded room, in a strait jacket, and drooling on myself.  But, like the zombies wearing cashmere sweaters once asked, "What differenth doth it make?"

Doesn't ring a bell?  They made a movie once, where anyone who was bitten by a zombie, died, and was reanimated wearing a cashmere sweater and constantly asking "What differenth doth it make? over and over.  I can't recall the name of the movie, but it was obviously a comedy.  At one point in the movie, this boy and girl are trying to warn the town about the growing zombie menace.  They pass by the Sheriff's office, and peek in his window to see if he's still human.  He's sitting at a desk, doing paperwork.  They duck down below the window, and begin discussing what to tell the Sheriff so he believes them about the zombies.  Through the window, you can clearly see the sheriff get attacked by a zombie, then the zombie wander off, and the sheriff get up a minute later and sit down at his desk.  The kids take a final peek at him before running into his office, and telling their story.  Everything they say, the Sheriff asks them "What differenth doth it make?"  Not being all Shakespearean about it, he's just talking with a lisp.  And wearing a chasmere sweater.  Eventually the two genius kids figure out that they're actually talking to a zombie, and not just a sheriff who doesn't give a rat's ass, and get the hell out of there before he gets tired of asking "What difference does it make?" and starts getting all bite-y.

Why am I telling you all this, you ask?  Because I think the cashmere-sweater-zombie movie was better than John Dies at The End, and I can't even remember the name of it.  However, in John Dies at the End, there are the likes of Clancy Brown and Paul Giamatti, skilled veteran actors who can brighten up an otherwise forgettable feature, and they do their best.  The parts involving these two gentlemen are otherwise interesting bits in an uninteresting work of varied flashbacks, flash-forwards, and flash-sidewayses.  Way too much time travel gobbledygook for my taste, and there's never actually any time travel going on, so I'm just ending up confusing myself.  This movie just gives me a headache, like I'd get after a night of drinking straight vodka by the beer-stein-full.  Which, I've done.

Okay, so, I can't recommend this movie.  I don't even think watching it once is worth it, unless you're a diehard Clancy Brown or Paul Giamatti fan, and even then, neither of them are on-screen much.  Not much nudity, and what there is of it, isn't very good.  I guess that's about it.  Can't think what else I might have missed.  I'll probably forget I've seen this movie, unless I remember that I didn't like it.  The reviews on Netflix play this up as an instant cult classic.  Instant cult classic, my ass.

In other news, Z Nation actually getting better.  The zombie-bit guy is actually going half-zombie, as far as I can tell, mimicking (or perhaps this series is based on) that long-ago webcomic I read a while back where one of the characters was actually half-zombie.  So, things might get pretty entertaining on this show.  I may keep watching it as long as it doesn't interfere with me watching Grimm or Constatine, assuming those shows are still good this season.  heh

That's all for tonight.  Catch you guys tomorrow with a hopefully better movie.  :-)

Horrothon Review #16 - Night of the Creeps (1986)

Yea, I know, you guys love this one almost as much as I do.  :-D  I decided to forego the usual disappointing search for something good to watch and review, only to be horribly disappointed by the end result, so I went ahead and queued up Night of the Creeps on Netflix.  Apparently, the one on Netflix has an alternate ending to the one released theatrically, so technically, I hadn't seen this particular movie before.  Although, that's kind of a lie since I've seen the theatrical release at least a dozen times.  Plus one, if you count tonight's viewing.  :-D  I also have it on DVD.  Hey, what can I say, this movie is good!

Night of the Creeps (1986) starts out with some cheesy-looking 80's style aliens, but don't let them fool you.  They may look childlike and retarded, but the Zombie one has this terrifying blank look of doom on his face as he carries a long black cylinder through the bowels of the alien spacecraft.  He somehow manages to escape his pursuers long enough to load the cylinder into a waste disposal hatch.  In the meantime, we find out that the black tube is an alien experiment of some kind, and the two aliens, armed with some sort of energy weapons, blow the door open to get the zombie-alien before he can escape the ship.  Is there a twitch of a smile on the zombie-alien's face as he pulls the ejection lever, launching the black cylinder into the void of space?  We'll never know.  The black cylinder flies out of the alien spacecraft, hurtling through space...  Where's it going?  Earth, of course.  Earth, sometime around 1959...

Okay, first off, forget the whole cheesy aliens thing at the beginning.  It's only important to explain, very quickly, where the cylinder full of black slugs came from, and give you an idea how it got there.  Sure, it might have been creepier to just forget that whole part of the movie, and to let you wonder where and how the black slugs came from, but it doesn't matter.  It's short, and it explains the whole movie, and once it's over it has nothing to do with the story in general.  If you look, though, you'll notice a few important things.  The look of blank evil on the alien's face is not funny.  This isn't a comedy.  This is pure horror.  The ship he's running through is not shiny, it's not new, and it's not bringing Killer Klowns from Outer Space.  It's a wet, drippy, rusty shithole of a spacecraft, and it looks creepy enough just by itself.  Sure, the aliens look kind of comical, until you see the zombie alien.  He isn't funny looking.  He's scary.  It's like seeing the face of a child, warped by pure, murderous evil.

So, like your average baby having a temper tantrum.

Then we come to the real story, which basically the life and times of one Detective Ray Cameron (Tom Atkins), and his newfound friends, Chris (Jason Lively) and JC, also known as "Spanky" and "Alfalfa."  No, they aren't really from the little rascals, but Detective Cameron starts calling them that because of their respective hairstyles.  There's also a little sidebar relationship developing between Chris and one Cynthia Cronenberg (the smoking hot Jill Whitlow).  Also appearing alongside Detective Cameron is the Coroner (Vic Polizos), who really enjoys his job way too much.

I love everything about this movie.  It's got aliens, zombies, alien brain parasites, sorority babes, boobs, undead pets, cryogenics, axe murderers...  Did I mention boobs?  Yea, I did.  I love how the part of the movie set back in 1959 is all done in black and white, like it's an old sci-fi slasher flick or something you'd see at a drive in.  Then we cut to the nowadays (ok, 1986, when the movie was made, anyway), and everything is back to color.  This is classic, perfect 80's horror.  Teens in college, hot co-eds, slow-moving zombies, aliens, and freakin Tom Atkins!  You can't go wrong with this movie.  It's absolutely one of my favorite horror movies of all time, and it's also lead character actor Tom Atkin's favorite, of all the horror movies he's done.  Well, he has great taste, that's all I can say.

You should definitely watch this movie.  Many times.  I have probably seen it at least once a year since the year it came out.  It's a classic horror flick, the story flows along really well, and whenever you think it's starting to slow down a little they kick it up a notch with zombie-in-your-face brain parasite action.  It's regrettably short, only an hour and a half (including the credits), but it's fun, and horror, and scary, and action, and full of one liners.  Detective Cameron's favorite is "Thrill me." and I went around for about a decade after this movie came out, saying "Thrill me" to friends, women, children, small mammals, and family members.  Sure, they had no idea wtf I was talking about, but that's not the point.  I sounded COOL, at least to myself, and honestly, who else do I really care about?  I'm kind of self-centered that way.

Of particular note, this movie is NOT a comedy.  There's some humorous one-liners, and really, the only ridiculously amusing part was played by Mr. Miner, the night janitor at the college medical facility.  See, Chris and JC break into the building to steal a cadaver and drop it on the steps of a rival fraternity, trying to pull off a pledge prank so the Betas will allow them to join their fraternity, in the hopes of impressing Cynthia.  So Chris and JC find the Cryogenics lab, somehow manage to thaw out Detective Cameron's ex-girlfriend's ex-boyfriend from 1959, and, you can say it with me, ALL HELL BREAKS LOOSE.  So the frozen cadaver twitches, wakes up, and Chris and JC run like hell, out of the medical building, past Mr. Miner, screaming like banshees.  Or, as Mr. Miner puts it in the interview room later in the movie with detective Cameron, "screaming rike banshee." Which is repeated in a very humorous fashion several times, mostly by Mr. Miner, who gets a kick out of it.  I honestly thought that part was quite funny, but not at all enough to earn this horror flick a comedy classification.  Sure, that part was funny, but there's funny bits in all our lives.

Look at Evil Dead 2.  That part with Ash, where he's alone in the cabin after cutting his zombie ex-girlfriend up with a chainsaw, and having to cut off his own hand, and the deer head on the wall starts laughing at him, and he starts laughing, and the lamp starts laughing, and the books start laughing, and soon everything in the cabin is laughing hysterically, and I start laughing every time I watch it, because you know Ash has fucking lost his goddamn mind by that point, and frankly, watching that movie, feeling what that poor guy was feeling, I lost my mind, too.  I haven't quite found it yet, but let me know if you step on something soft and squishy and brain-shaped.

See, not all humor is funny.  Some of it is pure insanity.  Laughing because your mind has snapped.  Think of batman's arch nemesis, the Joker.  Ever wonder why he laughs so much?  His mind is gone.  After that, when the world doesn't make sense anymore, and everything seems ridiculous, well, that's when you laugh.  That's why Ash laughs.  Sometimes, that's why I laugh.  Not Mr. Miner, in night of the creeps.  He's sane.  He's just laughing because he saw two college geeks running away, screaming rike banshees.  The rest of this movie is pretty horrific.  And there's boobs.  So go fucking watch it already, before I start laughing insanely.  It's really very creepy when I do it.  I scare myself.  Usually wet myself, too.

The alternate ending, by the way, wasn't much different.  They just replaced the ending twist with some aliens searching the cemetery for their long-lost cylinder of black slugs, which makes little sense, considering the cylinder was lost back in 1959.  It took the aliens until 1986 to track down the cylinder?  Or did the release of the black slugs trigger some sort of alien alarm?  Who knows.  Stick with the zombie dog ending, it was good enough.  Also, Night of the Creeps is just BEGGING for a sequel to be made.  :-D  Anyone?  I'm not asking for a remake, I want a SEQUEL!  Get jason Lively back to star as a police detective, perhaps just as suicidal, wandering around 2014, going "Thrill Me" to everyone he meets.  I would castrate myself, I'd laugh so hard.  Go on, make it and see me castrate myself!  I DARE YOU!

In other news, I made a weather prediction back in June, saying the summer would be hot, and we'd have lots of hurricanes.  Here, where I live, the rest of the summer was cool, and chilly, and I didn't hear about any hurricanes.  So I announced that I was mistaken, and I should stick to reviewing movies.  As it turns out, it looks like Mother Nature, and NASA, have got my back.  NASA announced that May, August and September of this year have been the warmest ever, and there's like a category 4 hurricane headed towards bermuda (I think it was bermuda?) as I type this.  So.  Maybe I was right after all?  I guess we'll see.  (shrugs)  Go NASA!  Go Mother Nature!  You guys kick ass!  :-D

One week to go for the premieres of Grimm and Constantine on friday nights, two weeks to go til All Hallows Eve!  Hallow is a word meaning Holy, so what I wonder is, how did we get Halloween, a night of goblins, ghouls, and tricks and treats, out of what should be, according to its name, the most holy of nights?  As I understand it, the druidic festival of Samhain was probably based on the farmer's annual slaughtering of the herds, to store away the meat through the winter.  Samhain is pronounced "sow-in," so if you take the phonetic sounds and make a literal translation, it means to take the sows in and slaughter them for meat.  So let's say the Night of All Hallows Eve is based on a night of pure bloodshed, not of people, but of the animals, so that the people will survive the long winter ahead.  Maybe back in those days, to get the kids to stay away from the barn, you had to keep them inside and make them pray, or something.  Which would explain the whole "most holy night" thing.  I'm just supposing, here.  And maybe, some nights, the kids would sneak out, see the bloodshed, and cause a little mayhem as their favorite barnyard pets were slaughtered for meat.  Maybe that's where Trick-or-Treating comes from?  Just wild brainstorming, but I suppose it makes as much sense as anything else.  Clue me in if I've made a major break in my logical suppositions.  And be gentle, remember, I'm already a little twitchy.

Here's a little factual Halloween tidbit.  Bobbing for apples is based on a mix of roman and pagan halloween traditions.  Bobbing for apples is usually played by children.  However, its origins are thought to be based off of a pagan fertility rite, where the first girl who manages to grab an apple (which the romans introduced to the pagans, as a symbol of their fertility goddess) in her mouth, was usually the next one allowed to marry.  So, every year on the most holy of nights (All Hallows Eve), children are playing an ancient pagan fertility rite that determines if they will be allowed to marry soon.  Hey, sounds legit to me.  As long as the kids have fun, and no one loses an eye, who cares?

That's all for tonight.  Who knows what movie I will pick tomorrow night?  Come back and find out!  Same bat-time, same bat-channel, same bat-shit-crazy!  :-D