October Horror Movie Marathon

[Frankie Teardrop]

GHOST NURSING - HK (though Bangkok-set) horror from the black magic eighties heyday. If you've seen many of those, you'll kind of know the drill - backstory about a curse or an esoteric tradition, beleaguered protagonist enlists sorcerer / shaman, battle magic blow out with lots of cheap optical effects and at some point, someone will barf maggots. All I can say is, show me a skull with laser eyes and I'm yours. I like what 'Ghost Nursing' does with sound, taking various well known eighties horror film music snippets and loosely re-doing them over a blissed out synth score backdrop - I could hear little scraps of the la la-la-la la-la la bit from 'A Nightmare On Elm Street' and some breathy echo chamber electronics that could only have been nabbed from k-k-k-k- 'Friday The 13th'. And that's 'Ghost Nursing' all over really, a magpie potpourri of ghost house props and genre tropes livened up by patches of scalp-ripping silliness and inspired moments such as the one when an office fills with ghostly children. 'Wacky' is the word, though despite an occasional lightness, it does not dally much with the slapstick that can sometimes dull the edges of its ilk. Really liked.

[Demdike@Cult Labs]

Re-Animator (1985)

A combination of producer Brian Yuzna, director Stuart Gordon and unknown star Jeffrey Combs, effectively came along with this film loosely based on the 1922 H. P. Lovecraft story Herbert West - Reanimator, and basically er' re-animated the horror genre with a slice of exploitation which took hugely effective looking gore and Barbara Crampton's sexiness to new levels of depravity.

Often imitated, never bettered. A bona-fide classic.

Dead Scared (aka The Hazing) (2004)

Its Halloween night and five wannabe frat members (Including the likable duo of Tiffany Shepis and Perry Shen) are given the challenge of spending the night in a supposedly haunted house. Unfortunately for our young friends one of them becomes possessed by the evil spirit of a half dead professor played by Brad Dourif. A half dead professor who is trying to open portals to another dimension, and he doesn't care if a few teenagers are murdered along the way.

The films opening third consists of high school dares and pranks which maybe, surprisingly don't seem out of place and work well in the context of the movie whilst allowing us to get to know the characters as they attempt to fulfill every obligation so as to become members of the fraternity. Then we get into full on Night of the Demons mode and a loving concoction of scares, gore and sex as well as outright fun.

The special effects for a no-budget film are very good, ranging from the gooey (scary long tongue cunnilingus) to some fine bloody kills. In fact the production as a whole is quite good, always looking impressive despite its low cost.

One of my Halloween go-to films. I swore i wasn't going to rewatch it this year for a change. See how quickly that idea went out the window.

[MrBarlow]

The Collector. 2009.

Josh Stewart plays handyman Arkin who is also a cat burglar, when his wife goes into debt, Arkin finds a way to get the money, break into the house he is working on (as he knows they will be away) crack open the safe and steal whats in there and get out. Simple plan that doesn't go well when someone else is in the house and rigged it. From the two writers of Saw 4,5 and Six along with Feast, this is a very underrated movie. If you can get past the first 20 minutes then you are in for a good treat of gore and bloodshed.

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[Frankie Teardrop]

THE TOWN THAT DREADED SUNDOWN - Meta horror was nothing new when this remake decided it was going to star the movie it was based on, but it's a slightly unexpected choice and colours TTTDS as a little eccentric from the outset. It's set in TexArkansas, where the events that inspired the seventies grindhouse original supposedly happened, and every year the drive-ins swing into life with mass showings of the movie that delivered this little town to notoriety. A pleasant ritual to mark the passing seasons but hold on, the killings are back! Here, a straightforward set-up - small town amateur sleuthing meets post torture porn gore - is at odds with a weird approach. Said weirdness includes the convoluted meta angle, but more so a visual style that's so overblown as to seem misplaced, with the screen flooded at every turn with skewed lighting, Dutch angles and even, at one point, a bit of random animation. Such dedication to aesthetic overkill might seem questionable in the domain of formula horror, but look at it this way - what's the point in remaking anything unless you're either going to either perfect what's already there, or else shit all over it in a way that's at least interesting? What fascinates about 'The Town That Dreaded Sundown' is an attitude more frequently encountered in arthouse / experimental cinema. For those looking for callbacks, yes, that death by trombone is in there, it's my favourite bit too. The spate of remakes that hit in the noughts and twenty tens produced a couple of duds ('A Nightmare On Elm Street' being the most egregious rehash), but overall I look favourably on them - 'The Town That Dreaded Sundown' is one of the more interesting efforts from around that time.

[MrBarlow]

The Collection. 2012.

Sequel to The Collector, Arkin who survived the collector is now recruited by a rich man's body guard to lead them to where he was taken to find a missing girl, their objective is to rescue the girl and kill the man in the mask. Instead of being in a house, this time round it's in the abandoned Hotel Argento, nice little nod to Dario, where anything is possible with the entrapment's with some good kills and plenty of the blood splatter involved. May not be the best sequel but certainly entertains.

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Session 9. 2001.

A Asbestos cleaning company are hired to clear out a abandoned psychiatric hospital where things of the past begin to resurface.

film is a psychological thriller that, rather than being horror oriented with serial killers, focuses more on offering a slow and stealthy journey to a disturbed mind hidden among the protagonists. This is a independent film that did not require a large budget and its greatest strength is the story it offers. During the first days that the protagonists spend in the abandoned asylum, nothing interesting happens until the old recordings found begin to give hints of something disturbing that happened in the past. What actually makes this work is Peter Mullen and David Curosoe taking the leads and a some decent writing. I thought nothing much about this when I first saw it and now I actually enjoyed it more.

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[Frankie Teardrop]

TERROR AT TENKILLER - Explaining a preference for 'Terror At Tenkiller' is like trying to decode one of those dreams that sticks with you for days even though nothing happens. Outwardly a regional slasher, it's more realistically the tale of Janna and Leslie's lakeside vacation, where r&r seems based on long conversations about Leslie's abusive boyfriend. It's freakishly uneventful. Given a true piece of wretched sorcery like 'The Last Slumber Party', I'm pretty sure I could sit down and enumerate all the cinematic slurs that give it its power, but 'Terror At Tenkiller' is way more elusive for not being as egregiously bad. The magic hides somewhere behind / within loud eighties decor, cheapshit diner interiors, FM radio that seems weirdly invasive, the shivery synth soundtrack, the endless greenery, secluded and shimmery. The camerawork is not very dynamic, but a slight tendency towards long shots sometimes spirits up the feeling of a watching presence. A dream sequence does its usual work, but then a casual dismemberment seems even more unreal - if it'd packed more violence, 'Terror At Tenkiller' might've been the first chill-out gore movie. A melodramatic rock number plays over and over and feels slightly desperate, as if reaching out from its eighties hinterland in an effort to pull us back there; the world of 'Terror At Tenkiller' is lonely. Soporific narration edges in and out - "they've found another body, its parts washed up by the lake" - again, so deadpan, so languid, like notes to self from a dream. Opportunistic use of local legend feels more resonant than it is. At one point, someone just sits and stares at the rain - that kind of thing needs to happen more often in slasher flicks. Finally, what do you do when you're standing at the kitchen sink in nothing but your bikini, washing your hair in front of someone you don't actually know that well, and they start to play the harmonica? Again, as with virtually all of the questions this film poses, I have no answers. Whilst it seems fairly obvious that 'Terror At Tenkiller' is a misfire and that any enigmatic qualities it possesses are mostly accidental, there are enough self-conscious stabs at artiness and mood (shots of a lone boatmen in silhouette at sundown, a spiderweb superposed over a killer's face) to make me fantasise that it might've all been conceived of as a deliberate tone poem. Bela Tarr, hurry up and make that slasher! I think what I'm taking away from this bit of self-analysis is that I like movies which just don't have all that much going on. Well, there you go!

[Demdike@Cult Labs]

Picked up a new tea light holder from Poundland. Really like this one. Very effective.

Back to 17 of them again after one which was a glass jar face design cracked due to the heat.

[Demdike@Cult Labs]

Victor Crowley (2017)

The Hatchet films are loads of fun and not to be taken seriously despite them having tremendous gory murders that would terrify the BBFC back in the day.

This fourth installment is no different. A young couple are hacked to pieces in beautifully bloody fashion in the first five minutes to signal the start of the mayhem and away we go. We've got gratuitous nudity - a book signing by original film survivor Perry Shen is one of many laugh out loud funny scenes - ridiculous but genuinely funny dialogue, awful over acting, Tiffany Shepis. (Yay!), and of course Kane Hodder as Victor Crowley, back to slice up anyone he can by any (inventive) means he can.

If you like the other movies then you'll have a lot of fun with this. Second time round i had an absolute blast. Especially the opening half hour with Shen and his publicist attempting to flog his book on tv and in stores.

The Fog (1980)

John Carpenter's classic exercise in supernatural horror. A sinister mist coming in from the sea envelops the sleepy California coastal community of Antonio Bay. From out of the fog come decaying corpses of mariners, armed with hooks, pikes and other weapons to tear the flesh, seeking retribution and vengeance for past deeds steeped in greed and murder.

The Fog plays on our innermost fears of the dark and the unknown, delivering atmospheric shock after shock as the fog slowly consumes the town as foghorns coupled with Carpenter's ominous piano notes create a chilling atmosphere.

Thankfully we still have local Antonio Bay DJ Stevie Wayne (Adrienne Barbeau), possibly the sexiest, sultriest voice that's ever floated across the night time airwaves to comfort us as the fog rolls in.

Unrivaled evens 44 years on, The Fog is a masterpiece of horror cinema

[nicholasrope]

From Beyond

Jeffrey Combs is an Assistant to a mad scientist who was able to expand a part of the brain. However it brings creatures, heightens sexuality and kills. Combs is hospitalized but is released under the care of Barbara Crampton (Who looks amazing in S&M gear) and Ken Foree. Another yearly watch that looks amazing on the Second Sight Blu-Ray (If the 88 Films release has the original VHS cover in its reverse sleeve, I may get it.)

Not going to lie, seeing the cover in the middle of my local Video Shop magazine did scare the much younger me lol. Really good film though.

Ghoulies II

The Ghoulies are back and this time they become the unknowing special attractions of a failing carnival stand. Obviously they cause mayhem and chaos. Remember seeing the trailer on many EIV videos back in the day, it's an entertaining light hearted romp and worth a watch if you are looking for a less serious Horror Film.

[MrBarlow]

Creepshow. 1982.

A anthology of tales, a father returns from the grave on Father's day to get a cake he always wanted. A lonely farmer touches a meteorite and begins to change into something. A husband finds his wife's lover and buries him in the sand only for them to return from the sea. A janitor at a university finds a crate under the stairs and with a professor cracks it open. A bitter old miser living in a penthouse apartment has a slight problem with cockroaches. In between all that, young Billy plans to get revenge on his dad. Classic anthology flick from George Romero and Stephen King adding in their little touches of horror, the stories are good but Father's Day and The Crate are my favourite out of this bunch.
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Creepshow 2. 1987.

More tales of terror in this instalment, A statue of a old indian comes to life and goes on a revenge spree after the owners are killed. 4 teens decide to go swimming at a lake and end up being stalked by a black blob. A adulterous woman tries to race her husband home after being with her lover, ends up killing a hitch hiker who comes back to torment her.

Romero and King do return to this but as writers only and passed the direction to someone else who hyped up the movie with a Crypt Keeper played by Tom Savini in a comic book style. This time we only have 3 short stories which are good but i never been a fan of The Hitch-Hiker segment even though every time we see him, he is slowly decaying.

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