Tag: Horror

Green Room (2015)

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Tonight’s October Challenge movie is Jeremy Saulnier’s Horror Thriller “Green Room” from 2015. The second A24 movie of this October’s viewing (The last being the unimpressive “X”). This one was born out of Saulnier’s obsession with creating a horror movie set in a green room. Initially he created a short movie that was totally unrelated to this in plot, but wanted to return to the idea and make a full blown movie. It’s a strange obsession, but this movie is quite well regarded so maybe he was on to something. Let’s find out.

Life On The Road.

The movie stars some horror veterans in Anton Yelchin (Odd Thomas), Imogen Poots (28 Weeks Later), Alia Shawkat (Final Girls) and Patrick Stewart (Lifeforce… I mean it’s not what he’s famous for, but I’m listing Horror Movies here). Saulnier wrote and directed. This is basically a “Wrong place, wrong time”, where a struggling rock band accidentally stumble upon a murder scene and end up trapped in a green room and battling for survival.

The plot here is pretty straight forward and largely covered in the previous paragraph. The band are barely making enough money to pay for their travel between venues and have to siphon fuel from other cars. After being ripped off for payment on the previous gig they are offered a decent paying gig at a remote venue and so they jump at the chance. On arrival they realize this is a Neo-Nazi bar and they are support for a National Socialist Black Metal band “Cowcatcher”. Despite this they play anyway since they need that cash.

Pass The Handgun.

The set goes okay (Despite a few bottles being thrown at them), but after the gig they stumble upon a murder scene (A girl has been stabbed by a member of Cowcatcher) and attempt to call the police but are shepherded at gunpoint back to the green room with the dead girls friend “Amber” (Posts). The bar it turns out is a front for a heroin lab run by the lead Skinhead “Darcy” (Stuart), whose main concern is protecting his operation. This leads to a stand off between the band and Darcy’s crew as they try to eliminate them without risking drawing attention.

So this requires a fair bit of suspension of disbelief. The Skinheads largely cripple themselves with their tactics, doing things like having everyone leave the building and then send in just one or two at a time. The insistence right up until they end on not using firearms (To make it easier to create a fake death scene later) gives the band a fighting chance. But the band isn’t terrible clever either. There’s almost a comical amount of losing firearms going on in this. To be fair, the band’s side of things is pretty understandable, but it can still be frustrating to watch (A bit like people in Horror films going to the basement to investigate a noise).

Assault on Skinhead 13

Once things kick off however, the movie is edge of the seat stuff and pretty satisfying in where it goes. The odd tactics of the villains basically are a mechanism to turn this in a siege and this naturally gives it an Assault on Precinct 13 vibe and since I’m a huge John Carpenter fan I was quite happy with that. The violence is portrayed as savage and realistic but doesn’t try and gross you out with it. This is not a gore flick, but it doesn’t pull punches either.

I also have to praise the acting here, especially Anton Yelchin. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a bad performance by Yechin and it was a great loss to cinema when his life was cut short by a car accident in 2016. He gives the full range here and really comes across as desperate and terrified but still determined to survive. Patrick Stuart puts on the kind of performance you’d expect from the veteran Shakespearean Actor and the rest of the cast puts on an above average performances throughout.

The Final Note.

Overall, this is a very good movie that just falls short of a seven out of ten rating from me due to the amount of plot contrivances that are needed to set up the majority of the movie. If those kind of things don’t bother you consider the rating higher. But for me it is a very strong 6.5/10.

Rating: 6.5 out of 10.

Ghoulies (1984)

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For the second Charles Band produced horror of this October’s viewings (With at least one more to come) I’m checking out “Ghoulies” from 1984. This was a well known low budget horror back in the day that I was always aware of, but never got around to checking out. That is likely because it seemed obviously inferior to “Gremlins” (1984) and “Critters” (1986) while covering much the same ground. As a fan of the kind of imaginative low budget horror that Band usually producers though I think it’s time I gave it a chance. So let’s see if these little monsters can stand tall or not.

Dark Past.

Ghoulies is directed by Luca Bercovici in his directorial debut. Originally Band was going to direct this himself but back out when he was unable to secure Stan Winston to do the effects. It was written by Bercovici and Jefery Levy. The film had a difficult journey in it’s production. Warner Bros sued the production company to stop them using the name since they were at the same time developing Gremlins, though this was unsuccessful the production also ran out of funding which delayed release until after Gremlins had come out. Thus regardless of the truth, Ghoulies would always be seen as a Gremlins rip off.

The movie stars Peter Liapis as “Jonathan Graves” a young man unaware that he was meant to be a human sacrifice as a baby. He was saved from that fate by his father and raised away from his evil father. Obvious to all this, 25 years later he has inherited his fathers estate and moves in. On investigating the old mansion he finds various occult relics and is drawn to use them, eventually summoning the little demons known as Ghoulies. However, this was all an evil trap by his now dead father, the return from the grave and steal his son’s youth. Jonathan is joined by his girlfriend “Rebecca” (Lisa Pelikan) and a group of somewhat goofy friends. The friends are actually quite amusing to watch, though it’s probably a good job none of their roles asked a lot of them.

Black Magic.

The first act sets up the characters and the second shows Jonathan turning to the dark side. It’s not until the third act though that the Ghoulies really come into play. Before this they are just sort of hanging around. This puts it in line with a lot of low budget direct to VHS horrors that promised a lot on the cover and then delivered something barely related to it. In that regard, it’s not the worst I’ve seen, but it doesn’t contrast it well with Gremlins or Critters.

This is really an Evil Warlock story that happens to have Ghoulies on the side. This should be obvious by the lack of Ghoulies in these screenshots. A lot of that is probably due to the low budget, when the Ghoulies do get involved they are pretty much just launched at victims to bite them. Given the budget though, the creatures didn’t actually look too bad. I especially liked the variety (Back in the day I thought they’d all be the toilet Ghoulies from the poster). I’ve seen far worse in movies that cost more so credit for that. One creature that actually bursts out of a clown doll looked particularly cool.

On a side note: The scene from the poster with the slime Ghoulie popping out of the toilet was actually added later after the poster was made. That’s B-Movies for you! It’s almost blink and you miss it. It’s actually quite impressive that they did go back and add the scene given the budget issues they had. It doesn’t really add anything to the movie, but it was a cool visual. You can see the entire scene at the end of the trailer below.

Down The Pan.

Ghoulies has a reasonable amount of charm and is ultimately not terrible unless you actually put it up against the very good Critters or a masterpiece like Gremlins. While it doesn’t hold a candle to either of those it provides adequate entertainment for its (fairly short) run time. Fans of ambitious low budget horror will find something here to entertain them. This is a 5/10

Rating: 5 out of 10.

Nightmare Detective (2006)

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Tonight’s October Horror review is the Japanese horror “Akumu tantei”. In English the title is “NIghtmare Detective”. This is directed by Shin’ya Tsukamoto who is most famous for giving the world the bizarre cyberpunk body horror classic “Tetsuo: The Iron Man”. Staring Ryûhei Matsuda as the titular Nightmare Detective “Kyoichi Kagenuma” and Hitomi Furuya as Lieutenant Keiko Kirishima. Tsukamoto often stars in his own movies and in this instance he takes a smaller but pivotal role of the movies unnamed villain.

Perchance To Dream.

We start with a brief introduction to our reluctant Dream Detective. Kyoichi it seems is constantly traumatized by his abilities. Following this we dive right into the main plot. A string of strangely violent suicides have been linked together by having all phoned the same number prior to their deaths. The person contacted, known as “0” has been using their dreams to murder them.

Keiko is a young gifted detective, bored with her office job and recently transferred to the homicide department. This is her first case and she faces some resentment from others in her team. She is the first to suspect something is not right with these apparent suicides. Once it is clear something strange is going on she is asked to work with Kagenuma.

As the story progresses she eventually puts herself in harms way by contacting “0” and this puts her and Kagenuma on a collision course with the dream killer. Despite the dream angle though, this movie is really about suicide and suicidal thoughts. Both Kyochi and Keiko are interesting characters with depth, both of which harbor suicidal thoughts though only Kyochi has acted on them. Keiko didn’t even realize she was suicidal, which was the only thing that gave the killer any power over her.

In That Sleep of Death.

In regard to the visuals, this is a pretty solid horror. Mostly the villain is only scene in disturbing forms, often with his head hanging off or extended on a snake like neck. When he attacks it is usually in a flurry of knife blows, almost machine like in it’s relentlessness and movement. The scenes of the victims stabbing themselves are brutal and the dream settings are atmospheric. The Dream Detective himself often has visual hallucinations presentably brought on by his abilities where the people around him have their faces twisted up into what looked to me like anuses. Perhaps reflecting his view of the world, where his ability to see into others minds mostly leaves him only seeing darkness.

The story doesn’t spend a lot of time playing on the dream aspect itself (Probably the most notable of which is the opening scene in which we are introduced to Kagenuma). This is something that some people may find disappointing. Plus you shouldn’t go into this expecting something as extremely mental as Tetsuo, it’s not. The story is actually a very coherent character driven. Not that it completely lacks strangeness, but not any more than one would expect from a typical Japanese ghost story. Indeed, this really feels like a ghost story, despite the fact the killer is not a dead.

As you would expect with such themes, this movie is definitely on the melancholy side. Eventually though it brings a bit of hope and optimism to the table, but this is only achieved through the protagonists finding some hidden strength within themselves. It’s quite profound really. This is also an examination of the difference between suicidal thoughts and what it takes to actually commit to the act.

What Dreams May Come.

Whenever I watch a film like this I can’t help but recognize how shallow and two dimensional a lot of American Horror has become. Horror gives a great opportunity to examine the darker side of human nature and Nightmare Detective dives right into this. It reminds me a lot of a movie I watched for last October’s challenge: “Pulse“, on the surface an apocalyptic ghost story, but really about loneliness. Both movies are ultimately very sad, so perhaps not for everyone, but personally I think they are both worth your time. Despite only being rated around 6/10 on IMDB, for me this was a strong 7/10 (Which is also where I scored “Pulse“)

Rating: 7 out of 10.

12 Hour Shift (2020)

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For tonight’s October Challenge Horror review I’m checking out the Black Comedy Horror “12 Hour Shift” from Brea Grant. This stars long time Horror pro Angela Bettis, who I’ve been a fan of ever since watching Lucky McGhee’s “May” (2002). A talented actress that seems to struggle to find quality films to be in but has been in a few decent horrors over the years. Usually seen in McGhee’s movies, but this is a director I’m unfamiliar with so wasn’t sure what to expect.

Missing Organs.

The plot of the movie is basically a calamity of errors with added violence. Angela plays “Mandy” an overworked drug addicted nurse. Not only does she steal patients drugs she also runs an organ harvesting ring, knocking off the occasional patient so that a colleague can harvest the organs later and then sending them off to a local criminal boss “Nicholas” played by none other than former WWE champion Mick Foley.

Delivering these organs is her cousin (by marriage) “Regina” played by Chloe Farnworth, a complete plank of a woman with the IQ of a part of shoes and the morality of a psychopath. Most of the plot revolves around her antics. The rest of the cast is made up of a variety of eccentric characters (Because this is a black comedy so everyone has to be eccentric apparently) including former WCW champion David Arquette (Yes, that happened) as a cop hating psychopath. Regina having lost her delivery ends up on a bit of a killing spree in an attempt to replace the organ, but naturally messes it up every time. Since this was Mandy’s scheme she is left trying to fix it all.

Calamity of Errors.

The movie is set in 1999, but this really doesn’t impact anything at all in the plot. The soundtrack is far more modern and avante garde. If I’m not mistaken it is trying to imitate the style of “The Big Lebowski”, which may also explain the 90’s setting. I’ll say this up front though, if that was the intent it fails miserably. The soundtrack doesn’t really add anything or enhance the scenes and while Mandy is taking drugs, it’s not like in The Big Lebowski where he’s constantly being knocked out. Instead it just draws too much attention to itself.

There are several major problems with the movie. First of all, it’s a mess. Obviously a good part of that is by design, but most of the pieces in this mess are irrelevant, pop up to push the next calamity and then seep back into irrelevance. Perhaps part of the problem is the movie only ever focuses on Mandy and Regina and really makes the other characters feel two dimensional, overly goofy and downright incompetent. The level of incompetence is so high that it damages verisimilitude.

Wrestling With Demons.

David Arquette is completely wasted and his character could largely be removed from the film without that much impact. Mostly he he just pops up, waves a knife around and then the plot basically ignores him until it wants to pop him up again. When he eventually does something it’s dismissed easily and quickly forgotten. Similarly Mick Foley is horrendously underused. He’s actually pretty convincing in his role, but it’s kept so short it’s barely a cameo.

On the other hand Angela does a great job as lead and while Chloe overdoes her role somewhat, I think that is probably more direction/script than the actresses performance. I think she did remarkably well with what she had to work with. Her stupid and murderous antics are pretty entertaining in places. The big problem though is these are both terrible people. Chloe is effectively the villain of the story, but she’s so stupid that she doesn’t really drive any tension. It’s more just “What random stuff will happen next”.

Competence and Paramedics.

While we can sympathize with Mandy being overworked, living in her car between shifts and having to deal with all this craziness, we are constantly reminded that this organ harvesting ring is her idea and she is constantly stealing patients drugs. The plot hints at reasons why she may be so messed up, but does little else and because she is required to be the competent one, this largely conflicts with her constant drug taking and addiction. It seems she only gets away with what she does because everyone around her is completely incompetent. Perhaps the most incompetent is the cop that is called in after the first murder.

Overall, the movie has some amusing moments and there is some nice scene editing in places. However, it fails on most other levels. I never actually laughed at any of it or really felt any real tension. I didn’t care about or even like any of the characters and most importantly it didn’t draw me in enough to ignore how nonsensical most of the plot was. This movie is a 5/10. Not a total waste of time, but I wouldn’t go out of your way for it.

Rating: 5 out of 10.

Something Wicked This Way Comes (1983)

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Tonight’s movie review comes courtesy of Walt Disney and Ray Bradbury in the dark carnival story “Something Wicked This Way Comes” from 1983. A movie with a complex and troubled production, at one point it was to star Kirk Douglas and at another it was going to be directed by Sam Pekinpah. It is based off of Ray Bradbury’s book by the same name, though that book was originally intended to be a screenplay (But the movie fell through, so it became a novel and was only later adapted back to a screenplay).

Other names attached to this at various times included Steven Spielberg directing and Christopher Lee or Peter O’Toole as the villain. The movie ended up with Jack Clayton directing… mostly. After a dispute with Disney over the movies tone and the bad performance of the test screening he was effectively replaced and the studio spent six months and $15m on reshoots. He wasn’t the only person sent packing though as they also scrapped the entire score written by Georges Delerue, which they had decided was too dark in tone. Delerue was replaced by James Horner who provided a score that emphasized the small town America feel a bit more and the terror a bit less. The film also dumped it’s editor Argyle Nelson Jr. and had assistant editor Barry Gordon take his place instead.

Beware The Autumn People.

With Kirk Douglas no longer available and O’Toole and Lee too expensive the casting settled on Jason Robards as the heroic father “Charles Holloway” and Jonathan Price as the sinister “Mr. Dark”. For the child leads Vidal Peterson was cast as “Will Holloway” and Shawn Carson as “Jim Nightshade”. Strangely enough Vidal was dark haired and Shawn blonde, but they had their hair dyed the opposite to play their respective roles. This was basically on Bradbury’s insistence that Carson was perfect for the Jim Nightshade role. Because of the reshoots there is at least one scene where the kids are noticeably older. The cast is capped off with Diane Ladd and Pam Grier (As the mysterious “Dust Witch”).

This is a story about regrets, pining for days gone by, the bond between a father and son and of course evil beings that feed on misery. In this story said evil beings materialize in the form of a carnival and set their sights on a small sleepy American town in Illinois called “Green Town”. We see the story unfold through the eyes of the two boys Will and Jim a mischievous pair that see more than they should have and threaten the evil Mr. Dark’s plans. The hero of the piece though is Will’s father Charles who must overcome his own doubts, regrets and weariness to rise to the battle ahead.

Then Rang The Bells Both Loud And Deep.

So this is a Disney movie and that is apparent on screen. Though this is in their more adult period and several years after they broke into that market with “The Black Hole” (1979), it is still geared to be family entertainment and of course focusing on the kids as protagonists places this into a fairly safe category of child friendly horror.That’s not to say that it doesn’t manage to achieve some menace and creepiness. There’s only really one notable horror scene outside of straight character interaction and your mileage may vary with it depending on how well you get on with spiders. Overall though I’d say it’s quite well balanced and I suspect Disney made the right move in toning things down.

I have listened to the original soundtrack from Delerue and it’s actually a superb soundtrack, but it does come across as some kind of epic horror. James Horner however was clearly aiming for something more specific in his version and bring out a bit of the quaintness of the small town setting and a bit of quirkiness where the carnival is involved while maintaining a sense of wonder and mystery. The horror elements are still there but like the film itself it is finely balanced. You can tell Horner was given specific direction here because this really doesn’t sound like his other work of the period. As I mentioned with my “Wolfen” review, as talented as Horner is a lot of his soundtracks sound very similar. Not this one! This could be a Danny Elfman score.

No Man’s a Hero To Himself.

The focus on the relationship between a father and son is nice to see and gives a heartwarming conclusion. While Disney rarely does such things these days, it was pretty common in the 80’s to have this kind of traditional family tale. But it’s a timeless thing as there will always be fathers and sons. The focus on regrets and missing the past is another timeless theme and the evil that comes to take advantage of that… well it sort of reminds me of modern studios rebooting all our beloved franchises of the past. In a way the villain is symbolic of modern Disney!

Speaking of the villain, Jonathan Price who wasn’t especially well known at this point, is very good. While Pam Grier’s Dust Witch is certainly creepy, she rarely interacts with the heroes, while Mr. Dark gets a lot of dialogue and delivers it with both mystery and menace. On some occasions I thought perhaps he was talking a bit too much, but overall he was the highlight of the movie. Not that there are any weak links here really. Even the creepy side characters with their blank expressions manage to be menacing without having to do much but stare blankly and occasionally smile.

By The Pricking Of My Thumbs.

So in conclusion, this is a solid movie and I wish Disney still made them like this. It’s not too adult for kids or too childish for adults, it has enough elements to it to just about call it a horror, but manages to be a heartwarming family tale on top of that. It’s reasonably well acted and we actually got two great soundtracks out of it. What leaves me a little bit torn is I’m just not sure if a darker version could have been more interesting, at least for me personally. Plus had they been able to pull off the planned CGI (Yes, in the 80’s!) it could have been quite visually spectacular too.

This is a high 6.5/10 that I will definitely be rounding up to a 7 for my IMDB score. For me though I felt it was a little lacking in places where they could have pushed elements a bit further and so falls just short of a straight 7. That doesn’t mean I don’t recommend it though (6.5 is still high from me). If you want a Halloween movie you can play for the whole family (Including kids) this would be an excellent choice.

Rating: 6.5 out of 10.

Invaders From Mars (1953)

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Tonight’s movie is a classic B-Movie Science Fiction Horror from the fifties. “Invaders from Mars” hit the theaters in 1953 and was the first movie to hit the big screen about alien body snatchers. This is far more Sci-Fi than Horror but it’s close enough to make my October viewing. It was also remade in the 1980’s by Tobe Hooper, so it was enough of a Horror to attract one of the genre’s masters to the remake. This version was written by Richard Blake and directed by William Cameron Menzies. It was an independent production based on an original script.

Body Snatchers!

Viewing Invaders From Mars for the first time seventy years after it came out requires us to have a little perspective on things. Obviously it has a lot of similarities to the Body Snatchers story, which is much more famous and manages a remake about once every couple of decades. However it’s worth noting that the first Body Snatchers movie came out three years after this one and even the novel on which it is based came out a year after this. However, while there may have been some influence it’s worth noting that Robert Heinlein’s story “The Puppet Masters” pre-dates both of these as it was released in 1951.

So why was this trope so common in the 50’s? Well, the Red Menace of course. I’m sure you already knew that since you can’t read anything about 50’s science fiction and horror without pages of someone talking about communism. So I’m not going to waste much of your time on that. That said, an insidious presence trying to take over a community from the inside for nefarious reasons is just as valid today as it was then (Perhaps more so), so it’s a great example of how timeless a movie can be when it’s message is kept as subtext and metaphor and isn’t too on the nose.

The Insidious Presence

This is very much a movie of two halves. The first part is Body Snatchers light. As mentioned above, not a knock off due to the timing of releases, but it doesn’t drive the concept anywhere near as hard as “Invasion of the Body Snatchers”. The other key difference is this movie has a child protagonist (“David”) who we follow from start to finish. David is played by Jimmy Hunt, who largely retired from acting not long after this movie but did return to take on the small role of the police chief in the 80’s remake. For what it’s worth he does a pretty good job here. Not the best performance I’ve seen from a child actor but perfectly serviceable.

The first half of the movie kicks off when David spots what appears to be a UFO landing in a Sandpit area near his house. After his father goes to check it out, he comes back changed. David starts to notice several other people have been changed including his mother, a girl neighbor of his and the Chief of Police. He eventually is listened to by a friendly police office and a Doctor that meet up with a local Astronomer that knows the boy and his father who confirms the boy isn’t prone to making stuff up. This is where the story shifts and the Martians deception becomes a lot less of an issue.

Turning The Tables

The second half of the movie is instead about the army trying to find a way to defeat these martians. At this point it becomes a fairly standard Sci-Fi affair but with a slight twist at the end of the story maybe being a dream (Or not, it’s unclear form the ending). This second half is pretty reasonable for a B-Movie Sci-Fi of the 1950’s, but doesn’t feature much of note outside of a pretty cool design for the Martian “Intelligence”, who was basically the Meekon with tentacles. Considering the effects limitations and budget this is surprisingly well executed. That said, there is a great deal of repeat footage in this section (Both of military convoys

The first half though is where most of the horror aspects lay and it’s done pretty well. Victims being sucked down into the sand by martians, the changed people’s cold aggressive attitude (Including a hard slap to David from his “Father” fairly early on) and the mystery of what they are up to all play out rather well. The only issue with once we reach that halfway point most of this impact is lost and honestly by that point the kid largely just gets in the way of the narrative.

Conclusion

All told though this is a pretty solid B-Movie. It shows a great deal of imagination and it’s a shame this film is mostly forgotten due to the large shadow cast by Don Siegel’s 1956 masterpiece “Invasion of the Body Snatchers”. Next year I will try and fit Hooper’s remake into my October viewing. That said, the second half is notably weaker than the first, the ending is an anti-climax and frankly the movie hasn’t aged that well. This is worth viewing if you are into 1950’s B-Movies or are a movie buff in general, but otherwise probably not worth the effort tracking down. I’m scoring this (In the context of the modern day) at a high 5.5/10.

Rating: 5.5 out of 10.

Lords of Chaos (2018)

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Tonight I’m reviewing “Lords of Chaos” from 2018. This is based on a true story and while changes have been made for dramatic effect I cannot emphasize enough that the reality may be stranger than fiction. This is also a story of additional interest to me as someone that has spent most of their life studying and working around music and musicians, so getting a fly on the wall view of one of the most messed up music scenes in history is fascinating.

Black Metal.

This is the story of the Norwegian Black Metal scene of the early 90’s. It’s focus is Mahem (Band), Helvete (Record Store) and Deathlike Silence Productions (Label) founder Øystein Aarseth, a.k.a. “Euronymous”. The movie is directed by Jonas Åkerlund, with a screenplay by Akerlund and Dennis Magnusson. It is based off the book by the same name by Michael Moynihan and Didrik Søderlind. It’s worth noting though Åkerlund is mostly known for music videos, he does have ties to the Black Metal scene as a former drummer of the band “Bathory”. While not part of this particular scene, they were a big influence on it.

Before moving on, I should add that since this is based on a fairly well know true story, most of this review is full of spoilers. So I won’t be pointing each one out, it’s just too hard to talk about this movie without mentioning the events. You have been warned!

Voice Of A Tortured Skull.

The star of the movie is Rory Culkin (Macaulay’s brother) as the notorious Euonymous. In many ways the film is also a bit of a Neo-Noir since it gives the doomed character the role of narrator alongside being the protagonist. In the film, Euronymous is portrayed as having a role in the scene lands some way between the role John Lydon and Malcom MacClaren had in the Punk Scene of the 1970’s. He thrives on being deliberately controversial and antagonistic, but there is a big question of how much of it is genuine and how much is just marketing. The truth of that is something that has been debated since the 90’s, but this movie definitely pushes the idea that he was only ever about the hype and never really believed in any of it.

The secondary character of our story Kristian ‘Varg’ Vikernes (Played by Emory Cohen) is portrayed as a bit of a Sid Vicious character. A fan and scene member that is determined to turn all of the hype into reality. I would call him a true believer, but as pointed out by some journalists that interview him during one scene his beliefs are actually very broad and vague. He’s vaguely a Satanist but also supports the Norse Gods and is vaguely a Nazi. When we meet him, he is embarrassed by having a “Scorpions” patch on his jacket, which he goes home and removes shortly after. He’s basically portrayed as obsessed with what people think of him and determined to be the most Black Metal of the Black Circle (The group of friends within the scene).

Funeral Fog.

If not clear yet, the movie doesn’t have much respect for these characters. The rest of the group is portrayed as mostly stupid and easily lead. There are the occasional exception where someone walks away from the craziness, starting after the suicide of Mahem’s original front-man “Dead” (played by Jack Kilmer). Euonymous’ reaction to the suicide is to immediately turn it into a hype/publicity exercise, taking a series of photos , and creating necklaces with skull fragments, which he would give to circle members. This causes band member “Necrobutcher” to quit in disgust. But for better or worse the incident helped really kick off the scene both in reality and in this story.

When Vikernes joins the group, after some initial mocking (For not drinking or eating meat) he ends up the one that takes things to the next level by going out and burning down a nearby Church. Euonymous attempts to take credit for, for “Inspiring” him. This clearly plants the first seeds of doubt into Vikernes that the scene founder may not be the man he thought he was. The stunt increases the hype surrounding the scene and leads to the circle becoming competitive. From then on each member sets out to try and be the most outrageous on the scene.

From The Dark Past.

Several more Churches are burned down, but things escalate further when one of the members “Faust” commits a murder. Between all this we see Culkin doing a great job of showing a character torn between a desire to stay on top of the scene as the main guy while also realizing he’s way over his head and may not be able to stop what he has unleashed. After Varg Vikernes foolishly goes to the media the rift between him and Euonymous grows to a boiling point. This leads Vikernes to commits the final black act of the movie, killing our narrator and protagonist.

What we are looking at here is how a community can become toxic, where the need to fit in and peer pressure can drive people to do outrageous acts. It also shows how buying into ones own hype can lead to self destruction. In the end, the most infamous act of the scene is the murder of it’s founding member. There is definite poetry to this since in the movie he is portrayed as being obsessed with creating a legacy through infamy. Whether that reflects the real Euonymous or not is something we will probably never know.

Cursed in Eternity.

In regards to the violence in the movie, we’re only really talking about two murders but they are portrayed as realistically and brutally as possible. The scenes are actually quite disturbing and that seems fitting consider we are seeing fictional depictions of real murders.

This is a cautionary tale for sure, warning of the dangers of hype, nihilism, peer pressure and the desire to fit in. This isn’t the only music scene that lead to extreme self destruction from those that couldn’t tell the difference between reality and hype, though it may have become the most messed up generally. Usually the true believers only end up destroying themselves, but sometimes they ruin other lives. If you want to understand how people become extremists and terrorists examining the psychology behind the Early Norwegian Black Metal scene wouldn’t be a bad place to start.

Buried by Time and Dust.

This is a movie both fascinating and disturbing, but also occasionally funny. It’s well performed and has a powerful message. To think this could only happen in one scene would be foolish. Young people, easily influenced and determined to fit in can be very dangerous. If we build a world that encourages narcissism and nihilism how do we expect it to end up? I’m not sure if that is all deliberate commentary by the director but it’s what I took from the movie. Anyway, I’m giving this a 7/10.

Rating: 7 out of 10.

Wolfen (1981)

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Tonight’s horror movie is cult 80’s Werewolf movie “Wolfen”. I came across this via a cult movie facebook group and being a fan of Werewolves it was a no brainer to check out as part of my October Challenge for this year. The movie is based on the Whitley Strieber novel “The Wolfen” from 1978 (Strieber also wrote “Communion” and “The Hunger”, both becoming cult movies in their own right. If you know about “Communion” you will be aware that Strieber claims to have been a victim of Alien abduction himself, though that abduction is alleged to have happened several years after writing “The Wolfen”.

Huff and Puff

The movie is directed by Michael Wadleigh, who is mostly famous as a cinematographer for live music documentaries. Most notably he directed the Oscar winning Woodstock documentary. This however is his only feature film which makes him a peculiar choice. Similarly the screenwriter David Eyre had only penned one previous movie, the Western “Cattle Annie and Little Britches” (1980). No lack of experience for the movies star though, Albert Finney who had a very high profile career in the 70’s.

The main support comes from Diane Venora, though there is a smaller supporting role for Edward James Olmos, who plays a Native American suspected of knowing something about the attacks. Omost was always able to shine even in small roles and he does once again here.

One of the first things of note is the James Horner soundtrack. The thing with Horner in this period is his soundtracks largely were interchangeable. This movie is in between “Battle Beyond the Stars” (1980) and “The Wrath of Khan” (1982) and the soundtrack is incredibly similar to both, despite this being a Horror and those Sci-Fi Space Operas. However, even if similar it’s still good and even the more grandiose themes actually fit with this particular horror, so I’ll give the similarities a pass.

Wolf-Vision™

In regards to effects and gore, this movie has become quite dated. The visual effects to show the “Wolf Vision” are reminiscent of Predator and given this movie is from several years earlier it’s entirely possible Wolfen influenced the later more famous movie. However in Predator those effects actually mean something (The Predator seeing heat), while here it’s literally just to let us know we are seeing the monster’s point of view. It’s not like the visuals reflect how a wolf would see things (Which would mostly be smells).

The gore meanwhile is somewhat lacking for an 80’s movie, but advancements in that department were fairly new and this movie was probably in production before those techniques had really spread through the industry. The movie features a lot of dismemberment, but each time it is done by showing the victim about to be hit, then showing some nearby pavement and someone off camera obviously throws the fake limb to the floor. It’s actually sort of funny. Still, despite that, the film mostly practices a “What you don’t see” approach and that part works very well for it.

Wolfen Down Your Senators

Despite being from 1981, this is a movie that definitely belongs among 70’s horror and the backdrops, filming style and especially the “Technology” has 1970’s written all over. Really everything outside of the Soundtrack fits better in the Seventies. Not that this is a problem, since the tone of the story is more in line with movies from that decade anyway. It actually feels more like a Drama or Science Fiction Film for the most part. Reminding me a lot of the Quatermass movies/shows and I think Finney would have made a great Quatermass has the opportunity came up.

It’s important to note thishis isn’t your standard Werewolf story. The Wolfen aren’t technically Werewolves, they are an entirely different species of intelligent, supernatural wolves that have lived secretly among mankind for centuries. This is actually a “Man shouldn’t mess with Nature” story, with strong ties to the Native American community.. These it’s worth noting are changes from the book, Wadleigh is an environmental activist so it’s not a big surprise to see him rework the story in this manner.

Bark At The Moon

Really for a first time director, Wadleigh did a pretty good job and his inexperience likely lead to some of the more creative choices, including the Wolf-Vision™. But is this a great Werewolf(ish) movie? Not really. It’s hard not to compare this to “American Werewolf in London” and “The Howling”, both of which also came out the same year. But while those were ground breaking and have been heavily imitated since, Wolfen’s paws are firmly in the past. This is a 70’s movie at heart for good or ill.

However as I mentioned this isn’t really a Werewolf movie, so it deserves some slack in that regard. The movie definitely has a lot of charm to it too and I can see why it became a cult favourite. The performances and music are above average, the visuals are mixed bag of good and bad and the plot is unique but not especially compelling. This just about hits a 6/10.

Rating: 6 out of 10.

Mirrors (2008)

Posted on by fenrisfil

For tonight’s October horror review I’m watching the Kiefer Sutherland horror “Mirrors” from 2008. As the name suggests this is a horror revolving around mirrors. It’s not the most original concept as many horrors have made use of mirrors. The mirror scare is a well know trope and going further films like John Carpenter’s Prince of Darkness had the devil try and enter our world through a mirror (And this was a two way portal too). Similarly the movie Legend has The Lord of Darkness able to use mirrors as portals and the end of Phantasm has The Tall man attack from within a Mirror.

ediS rehtO ehT

This movie itself is loosely based on a Korean horror called “Into the Mirror” (2003). Quite often with these Americanized versions they lose the depth and subtext of the originals and instead offer up fairly dry by the numbers interpretations. This version was directed by Alexandre Aja, with a screenplay from Aja and Gregory Levasseur. Looking into it (As I’ve not seen the Korean movie), it appears Aja threw away the original scripts that were a direct remake and went in his own direction only utilizing a few aspect (And hence why the movie is not called “Into the Mirror”). A bold strategy for sure. I’m not sure it paid off however.

What this version does have going for it is Keither Sutherland, a solid veteran actor with several decent horrors to his name. He plays ex-cop turned security guard “Ben Carson”. He is joined by Paula Patton as his wife and Amy Smart as his sister. The focus is very much on Sutherland though and that is for the best. In brief he was a detective but is on suspension (For reasons that factor into nothing) and has taken a job as a night security guard at an old shut down department store (Which had been gutted by a fire several years previously). While there he begins seeing things in the mirrors and realities something very evil resides behind them. I’ll be hitting spoilers now, so skip to the end if you don’t want spoilers.

rirroM rirroM

Ben has a lot of elements to his backstory that never really factor in that much to his story. His suspension is talked about briefly and moved on from. His alcoholism is talked about briefly, thrown in as a reason why people don’t believe what he tells them and then forgotten. When he discovers his sister has been murdered Sutherland does his best with the scene, but the plot seems barely bothered by it following this. Indeed the police having found a woman with her jaw physically torn off her while she lay in the bath seem fairly unconcerned.

But that’s far from the only thing that shows the lazy writing behind this. The evil itself is a demon that passed from the woman it had possessed into the mirror world. That demon can kill anyone, anywhere there is a reflective surface and we are told it then feeds on the souls of that person. Yet despite that it is obsessed with returning to the body of the woman it possessed, thereby losing those powers and being vulnerable to being killed. This is especially silly given the woman is very old at this point and you can’t imagine her body would last that long. But the demon really wants out for some reason and the good guys want to give it what it wants apparently just assuming that will be a better situation.

noisulcnoC

So nonsensical plot and poor character writing aside, was there anything to this movie? Well there are a few scenes with some cool mirror horror in it. We have some creative visuals, though none of it is really anything truly original (As I mentioned, mirror tropes are common in Horror). The most original elements were when the characters reflections appear, do harm to themselves and that harm impacts the viewer. The problem is the mirror monster is only as powerful as the plot needs it to be at that point. It’s unclear if it likes messing with people first. When Ben has brought the vessel the monster seeks to the building, it continues to vaguely try and murder his family, but in ways that suggest it doesn’t really want to kill them (Especially given what happened to Ben’s sister).

So overall, between the visuals and having Sutherland as lead there was enough to entertain me for the duration. It helps the plot doesn’t drag, it just rarely makes sense and often feels lazy and generic. The truth is it probably could have done with a few more character moments which could have been traded for a few less plot hoops to jump through before we find out what it’s actually all about. Given that conclusion was a disappointment, the journey feels somewhat pointless. This movie just about scrapes a 5/10.

Rating: 5 out of 10.

Tourist Trap (1979)

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At the crossroads between the gory slashers of the 1980’s and the gritty, anything goes horrors of the 1970’s sits this David Schmoeller directed classic supernatural pro-slasher from 1979. Produced for Charlie Band’s production company and considered one of the better movies he produced (Which given he’s made over 300, that’s a good accolade). Originally this was intended to be directed by John Carpenter, but the deal fell through on terms (It’s unclear if this was on pay, Carpenter getting final cut or something else) and Schmoeller was asked to direct his own pitch.

The Trap

Written by Schmoeller and J. Larry Carroll, the movie features Chuck Connors (Who would later play the main villain in the 80’s “Werewolf” series) as Slauson, a psychotic with supernatural powers including the ability to animate mannequins. The main support come from Jocelyn Jones and Jon Van Ness. In the timeline of horror this sits between Halloween and Friday the 13th and while it is mostly supernatural it definitely has slasher elements. So let’s see if it still holds up 44 years later.

The set up is fairly standard horror stuff (It wasn’t as cliché in 1979, but it wasn’t exactly original either), a group of young adults travelling through the California desert get a flat tire and end up taking refuge in an old tourist trap (That has been shut down since they built the highway through the area). They meet old man Slauson who appears to live there alone after his wife died and his brother went to Hollywood to build animatronics. Naturally they start getting picked off one by one until we’re left with a final girl (It wasn’t always a girl, but is here).

Psionic Psycho

But this isn’t a standard slasher. It actually seems to draw influence from a variety of 70’s horrors. Not just the gritty proto-slashers like “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre” (1974), “The Town That Dreaded Sundown” (1976), “The Hills Have Eyes” (1977) and of course “Halloween” (1978), but also supernatural films like “Carrie” (1976), and “The Omen” (1976). Slauson’s abilities are never explained (And didn’t need to be). He is unnaturally strong, can move objects with his mind and cause mannequins to act like they are alive. Even on occasion giving them the appearance of being human. He can also do this in reverse: Turning people into mannequins. It seems the destiny of his victims is to end up as mannequins for his macabre collection.

These abilities are paired with a playful sadism where he seems to enjoy toying with his victims to elicit the maximum amount of terror. Even at one point deliberately causing a victim to die of fright. Though it’s clear Slauson is mad, it’s never quite clear how mad. For a while he pretends to be his brother Davey and acts like he is even saying he wants to kill Slauson, but once the ploy is revealed his brother is forgotten. More confusing perhaps is how he talks to his mannequins. Given his powers, this perhaps isn’t as crazy as it first appears.

Death, Dolls and Doctor Phibes

Cast wise, the youngsters were all fine. Nothing special, even for the final girl, but nothing bad either. But this is Connors’ movie and he puts in a solid and believable performance. Especially effective was his monotone voice when he is in psycho mode that really increased the creepiness. The music matches the movies tone of quirky and creepy in equal measures. I would have preferred it a little less quirky, but it’s still a good score that does it’s job well. Well enough that I actually found myself listening while I write this review.

While a lot of the set up, chase and cat and mouse games between Slauson and his victims feel quite dated by today’s standards, the movie excels with the creepiness of the murder scenes and the variety it manages while maintaining the overall theme. We have death by telekinesis, death by animatronics, a torture murder that could have come straight out of a Doctor Phibes’ film (Another clear influence) and a death by… <SPOILER> … randomly turning into a mannequin. <END SPOILER> I also liked the general grittiness of it, simple touches like having a victim’s teeth bleed as he desperately tries to bite through the ropes binding him to save a woman from being killed. It all helps the feel.

The Ending (SPOILERS)

The ending of the movie is an interesting one and leaves it a little open to interpretation. As I mentioned one murder involves a character going from about to attack Slauson with an axe to turning into a mannequin and having their arm and then head pulled off. After this all the mannequin’s become life like with the mannequin of Slauson’s wife taking on a human form. The final girl kills Slauson and then drives off with the mannequin versions of her friends in her car…. Yes it’s a very strange ending.

I can’t help but wonder if we are meant to conclude that all the characters other than Slauson, including the final girl were mannequins all along. That theory could go as far as saying the whole thing is just a crazy guy playing with his dolls. Perhaps. Alternatively maybe Molly has just gone mad herself now (Seems to be Wikipedia’s view) or maybe she’s not mad (But still obviously traumatized) and just didn’t want to leave her friends remains, even in doll form, in the Tourist Trap.

Yes, this 1979 movie has Trollface in it decades before it became a meme.

Conclusion

This is a bit of a hidden gem and likely a lot of fun for fans of 70’s horror. The movie is gritty, smart and ridiculous in equal measures. It does feel notably cheap though and shares a flaw in common with a lot of modern horrors in that I didn’t really care about any of the victims. However this is a 40+ year old film in a very saturated Horror genre that still manages to feel original. That pushes my score up to a narrow 6.5/10. This deserves it’s status as a cult classic.

Rating: 6.5 out of 10.