31 Days of Halloween - Day 30 - Movie

Dan Torrance (Ewan McGregor) haunted by his childhood experiences at the Overlook Hotel is a wreck of a man trying to put his life together. He takes a job at a hospice where he is able to to his his shining to help send the dying peacefully on their way.  He finds himself in psychic contact with Abra  (Kyliegh Curran)teenage girl also possessing the shining. The two seem destined to never meet until terrible events become known to Abra. A group calling itself The True Knot is crisscrossing the country feeding on children who shine, and now they have Abra in their sites.

Doctor Sleep (2019), based on the novel by Stephen King is a sequel to The Shining. I liked the book quite a lot, even though I went into it thinking The Shining didn't really require a sequel, and still skeptical when Dan Torrance ended up having his life impacted by yet another type of supernatural beings, but King really pulled it off. Mike Flanagan, who wrote and directed this film adaptation realized that more people would be familiar with the movie version of The Shining than the novel version, so chose to adapt this sequel to fit Kubrick's movie. Kubrick made some changes to King's story that made a straight up adaptation of King's sequel to his own book impossible, but Flanagan is to be commended for finding ways to incorporate scenes from King's sequel into this adaptation that remain true to the spirit of King's book and Kubrick's movie. Flanagan was also able to replicate authentically sets and costumes from the 1980 film and even threw in a number of Easter eggs to King's Dark Tower series of books, and a nod to Frankenstein (1931).

The heart of this film is its characters and the actors portraying them. This is an exceptional cast, and their performances in this completely engrossing and carefully paced film make this a must watch. I've seen this movie three times now, and it is one of my favorite genre films of recent years.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 27 - Movie

A group of friends enter the house of their friend Tyler. They find Tyler's mom, dead of an apparent overdose, and a paranoid Tyler hiding in a closetmwho then attacks and injures two of them with a knofe before being subdued. Some time later the group has a reuinion, and a wake for Tyler's mother, at her cabin in the woods. The rebonding between the group is a rough process. No one really trusts Tyler even though he's on medication and claims he's better. While scattering his mother's ashes, Tyler witnesses a shimmering, permeable wall surrounding him. He thinks it's a hallucination until later his friends all witness it too, only now it has expanded into a long corridor. This anomoly starts rewiring their brains. They can hear the pilots talking in a plane flying far overhead, then they start intercepting each others private inner thoughts. Paranoia grows as do violent acts, and everything begins to unravel. This corridor just wants to connect, but not simply between itself and the friends, but connect the friends as well, and this is something human brains just weren't meant to do without adverse consequences. QWhen Tyler figures out that the goal is much larger than simply the Corridor and the five of them he tries to stop it. The Corridor (2010) is an ambitious, low budget, well acted movie, that slipped under my radar. It is similar in nature to H.P. Lovecraft's "The Colour Out of Space" or Jeff VanderMeer's Southern Reach trilogy, with an alien phenomenon that begins to transform the life forms living within it's influence. The script, by Josh MacDonald, is well written, but I had some issues with the pacing. It has a nice slow build to it, letting the interrelationships between the characters breathe and isolating Tyler from the others. Once the violence sets in, it seems like everything begins to happen all at once and then the movie is over, taking away a lot of the satisfaction that viewing the first 2/3 brought. If you want a smart, though uneven, science fiction/horror film that doesn't spell everything out, you may want to give this a look. If you need something with more visceral chills and thrills, this probably is not for you.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 26 - Movie

While Diving, Matt Farrell (John Ashley) is abducted by a scientist (Charles Macauley) who wants to use him in one of his experiments combining humans with animals in order to create a super race of beastmen. The scientist's daughter (Pat Woodell) has a change of heart and helps Farrell and some of thye beast people escape. A sadistic henchman (Jan Merlin) and his team set out across the island to hunt them down. The Twilight People (1972) is a low budget Filipino-American film directed by Eddie Romero that is essentially The Island of Dr. Moreau combined with The Most Dangerous Game which is not necessarily a bad thing. This is the kind of movie that you used to kind on tv on Saturday afternoons, or late at night and is perfectly entertaining if not exceptional viewing. While the make-up on the animal people is crude, it's still pretty effective. The actors also try to give their animal characters defining characterustics, such as the antelope man who tends to defend himself with backward kicks. The creatures are also a ittle more ambitious than the straight-up adaptations of H.G. Wells' novel. Here we are even given a flying batman. This movie is probably best known for featuring Pam Grier as the panther woman.

31 Dyas of Halloween - Day 19 - Movie

A family in isolation during a devastating pandemic finds their safety and routine disrupted when a stranger breaks into their home. Inviting the man's family to come live with them with the idea of greater safety in numbers leads to paranoia and mistrust and violence.

It Comes At Night (2017) sounds like a monster movie, but it's not. The "it" of the title merely refers to bad dreams endured by the teenage son. There isn't a much tension, and introduced story points are often dropped without development. It's a well made film, but not much happens, and the tension it wants to ratchet up, never really appears. In our Covid-19 world a movie about a pandemic really should have hit home, but the characters in the film didn't really do much more than I did while quarantined at home, short of carrying guns like paranoid survivalists, and burning a couple of bodies. This was disappointing.

#1 Days of Halloween - Day 18 - Movie

After a woman and her daughter in law are brutally raped and murdered by a band of samurai, they return as onryo; avenging spirits, set out to kill all samurai.

Kuroneko (1968) directed by Kaneto Shindo does for bamboo, what his earlier film, Onibaba (1964) did for tall grass. Quite spooky, atmospheric and mesmerizing, this film is a real showcase for lighting, staging, composition, and cinematography. Shot in gorgeously luminescent black and white, it's like watching a dream, or nightmare unfold. At the heart of the film is a tragic human drama of these two wronged women, and then the tension of reuniting with the missing son/son-in-law who returns from battle only to be ordered to find and destroy the avenging spirits. This is a true classic.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 3 - Movie

A young boy, raised by wolves, is taken in by a traveling troupe of entertainers. As a young man he transforms into a werewolf, kills one of the performers and runs off. He ends up in Paris where he falls for a prostitute, unaware of what she does for a living, Once he finds out, he starts killing all lot the men who pay for her services. Peter Cushing plays a police scientist determined to stop him.

Legend of the Werewolf (1975) feels like a really cheap Hammer film, not surprisingly since, besides Cushing, the film also features Hammer regular Michael Ripper. The screenplay was by Anthony Hinds (as John Elder) writer of numerous Hammer productions, and directed by Freddie Francis, also a Hammer veteran. Despite the talent involved, the film comes across as a lackluster Curse of the Werewolf (1961), Hammer's only werewolf movie, right down to the look of the werewolf himself. The two films also feature some overlapping story similarities since both are loosely based on The Werewolf of Paris by Guy Endore. Watched at 1:00 in the morning, this movie might be passably entertaining, but overall it's more of a miss than a hit.






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31 Days of Halloween - Day 17 - Movie

In The Torture Chamber of Dr. Sadism (1967), Count Regula is quartered for murdering twelve young women (of thirteen intended victims) in a bid for immortality. He vows he will return for vengeance. Thirty-five years later Roger, a lawyer is invited to the castle of Count Regula where he will be given information about his past. Along with a thief posing as a monk, a baroness and her maid, Roger visits the castle to discover it is a death trap full of torture devices, and that the undead Count Regula plans to finish what he started 35 years ago.

Loosely based on Edgar Allan Poe's "The Pit and the Pendulum" this movie is full of atmosphere, and  more garish haunted castle decor than the entire run of Scooby-Doo, Where Are You?. It's an entertaining, minor, Christopher Lee starring film. Perfect for the middle of the night, or a rainy afternoon.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 30 - Movie

A family scavenges supplies, makes their own home and grows their own food, performing everything carefully and with a need to move as silently as possible. The consequences, as we learn quickly, for making any sound are terrible. There are monsters lurking in the spaces around them; incredibly fast moving, lethal,  monsters with outstanding hearing. The complicate things, the mother of this family is pregnant and will give birth any time now.

In a nutshell A Quiet Place (2018) is a family drama about surviving against incredible odds. Except for one element ( a nail that's existence and location is highly improbable and rings false), everything in the movie is presented with precision. The family involves a deaf teenage daughter which allows everyone to already have a means of communicating without verbally speaking. Their carefulness and ongoing emergency preparedness allows for a horror film that doesn't require its characters to make dumb, logic defying, decisions in order for the horror to work. Most of all the film, especially through its silence, really pulls you into the family so that you are fully engaged with them and care about their survival. The cast is outstanding, especially Millicent Simmonds, who is deaf in real life, who really commands the film. This is one of the best genre films of the year, and one of best of any kind of film this year.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 29 - Movie 2

A woman hires a naturalist to hunt down the wolves that she claim took away her son. When the naturalist begins his investigation her uncovers a much stranger and more sinister truth, and a bloodbath is unleashed upon the small Alaskan community caught up in the secrets uncovered.

Hold the Dark (2017), based on the novel by William Giraldi is a mersmerizing, intense, and not easily ingested thriller. Every thing is delivered in a very low key, matter of fact manner, and you leave the film with more questions than answers, which is something I really liked about it. It's the kind of film that invites further examination, and really makes you work for what you can extract from it. The cast is uniformly outstanding.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 29 - Movie 1

A girl unknowingly frees a devil imprisoned by a blacksmith hermit. The devil's recapture leads to more trouble as a mob of townspeople, led by a disguised devil, descend upon the blacksmith's fortress. The end result has the blacksmith crashing the gates of Hell in order to bring the little girl back to earth, and life.

Based on a Basque folktale, Errementari (2017) is a visually striking fairy tale much like Valerie and Her Week of Wonders (1970) and Viy (1967) where the story is presented in a non-naturalistic, heightened manner, which may not be everyone's cup of tea, but I found it, even with its really simple story to be a pretty rich viewing experience. The movie also boldly features a Hell populated by pointy talked devils armed with pitchforks which was a big plus for me.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 28 - Movie 2

To compliment my viewing of Creepshow (1982), I also watched Just Desserts (2007) a very solid documentary look into the making of Creepshow. Featuring interviews with cast and crew members (though Stephen King is conspicuously absent, and would have been a welcome addition) we are taken through all of the trials and tribulations (many very funny) of what it took to get this film conceived, cast, made, and distributed. There are some nice behind the scenes segments and outtakes presented among the interviews, and everything is covered from the difficulties in getting make-up appliances on Stephen King, to dealing with tens of thousands of cockroaches on set, to Ed Harris' dancing. There are also a great bundle of extras thrown in for good measure.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 28 - Movie 1

Creepshow (1982) directed by George Romero and written by Stephen King is a love letter to EC Comics. An anthology movie, is consists of five tales and a wraparound story which stars Tom Atkins and horror writer, Joe Hill. The tone of the film, like the comics that inspired it, is very tongue in cheek, even with the extensive amount of blood and grue. The star filled film is so skillfully production designed that it implies a grand budget, when in fact the budget was pretty tiny. Unlike most portmanteau films, the quality of the segments is pretty even here. Yes, some are better than others, but there are no clunkers. John Harrison's score is perfect. This was one of my favorite genre movies when it was new. When I last watched it in the late 90s, very early 2000s, it felt a little dated to me, which filled me with sadness, and kept me from revisiting it until now, and now it doesn't really feel dated at all. It's a very fun film and perfect for Halloween.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 27 - Movie 2

Carl Kolchak (Darren McGavin), now living in Seattle, finds himself investigating a new string of murders; women found strangled, their throats crushed, blood removed via a syringe, and decaying flesh found on their necks. The killer is described as corpse-like and incredibly strong. Research leads Kolchak to discover that the same kinds of murders, with an identically described murderer have been occurring in Seattle every 21 years since 1898.

The Night Strangler (1973) is a sequel to the successful The Night Stalker (1972), and as a follow-up I think this film works even better than the original. Mathewson, returning as screenwriter, obviously has a better handle on the characters, as does McGavin, and co-star Simon Oakland, their relationship shining even more than before. The mystery is interesting, with a decent payoff, and the setting of old Seattle lying beneath the ground that modern Seattle was built on gives it an otherworldly quality.  This time Carls seems to have developed an even worse relationship to the police in his new city, if that were possible, and this makes Kolchak seem more isolated as he goes it alone to, again, prove what no one is willing to believe.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 27 - Movie 1

Down on his luck Las Vegas reporter Carl Kolchak (Darren McGavin), investigates what becomes a series of young women found drained of blood by an incredibly strong man. Initially suspecting a man who thinks he's a vampire, Kolchak begins to believe he's stumbled on to the genuine article. Law enforcement, and Carl's editor, Tony Vincenzo aren't buying into it.

The Night Stalker (1972), is a made for tv movie, which would spawn a sequel, a short lived television series, The X-Files, and a second short lived television series, was popular, and influential. It also beat Stephen King's Salem's Lot to the punch of removing the vampire from its gothic, 19th century trappings, and loosing it upon the modern world by three years. Based on a then unsold story by Jeff Rice, most of Kolchak's success comes from the performance of McGavin and with the character's relationship with Vincenzo, as well as the way he perseveres despite the constant hostility directed towards him by the police and officials of all kinds. We believe and believe in Kolchak, and root for him to succeed. Credit must be given to Richard Matheson for taking Rice's characters and breathing life into them so successfully.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 26 - Movie 2

Without getting too spoilery, Shin Godzilla (2016) is a stand alone Godzilla movie from Toho Studios that is not a sequel to any other Godzilla movie. Here Japan has never been menaced by a giant monster before. Godzilla has also been given an entirely new origin story and biology. He's a self mutating creature generating four forms in this film, and hinting at a truly horrifying fifth. He also demonstrates some jaw dropping upgrades to some of his more familiar abilities.

A lot of people disliked the film because of the long monsterless scenes of government officials taking meetings and making decisions on how to deal with this new threat. Yes, there is a lot of this, but it's presented in such a fast paced manner, that I didn't find it boring. The procedural material was similar to what was presented in Gamera 2: Attack of the Legion (1996), showing the bureaucracy necessary to be able to deploy Japan's Defense Forces. The film doesn't waste any time getting started and is told in an almost documentary style putting the viewer right in the middle of events as they unfold. The Godzilla scenes are tremendous, from his unexpected, weird fish-eyed forms to his unstoppable fourth mutation. The creature, awesome as he is, always appears to be sickly and corrupt.

Toho was originally going to produce a sequel, which I would have liked to see, but have apparently shelved plans for that movie, instead planning to return to a shared universe that would feature a more traditional looking Godzilla pitted agains his familiar kaiju foes.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 26 - Movie 1

After the death of a member of their group, four men go for a long hike in northern Sweden in his honor. After one of the men is hurt, they decide to take a short cut through the forest, where unsettling events begin to accrue, especially after they take refuge in a seemingly abandoned house with a weird effigy in its upper floor. They now seem marked by some sort of immense creatures inhabiting the forest, and as they seek for a way out, their interpersonal relationships begin breaking down making the experience more fraught with danger, and more intense.

The Ritual (2017), based on the novel by Adam Nevill is a smart horror film that takes advantage of its sinister, claustrophobic setting to amplify the tension. The forest is so densely packed with trees that not only is visibility limited, but there are times when the mysterious creature is in view and you still can't really see it for the trees. The creature itself is pretty great in a weird design that suggests something both natural and majestic and something supernatural and impossible in its design.

The plot itself is a pretty familiar one, but while the characters often make decisions that are bad ones, it's not out of lazy writing. The decision to make the short cut in the first place is a rational one, as are decisions to abandon following a direct compass driven route through the forest in order to follow an obvious path. The cast is really strong playing their characters who may sit pretty close to being archetypes, are also well rounded and authentic.

I've watched this a couple of times already and am sure to revisit it more times in the future.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 25 - Movie 2

Ghosts Stories (2018) is also a portmanteau film with three stories surrounded by a wraparound tale that connects them. In this case the wraparound ends up being the most significant story and not simply something to link the other tales. Philip Goodman (Andy Nyman) is a man dedicated to exposing fraudulent psychics. The man who inspired him tasks him with solving three unsolved cases, which are the three tales making up the rest of the movie; a night watchman has a really bad night; a young man hits something unexplainable with his car; and a businessman finds his home plagued by inexplicable phenomena while his wife is going through a difficult childbirth at the hospital.

The film is based on the hit stage play by Andy Nyman and Jeremy Dyson (who also wrote and directed this adaptation), which I've only heard and read extraordinary things about. The film is really well done and knows when to hold back and when to let loose. It has it's share of jump scares, but the really unsettling bits come in the form of the nearly mundane. Like other portmanteau films, the short films within don't always come to an actual resolution, just building to a climax that leaves the rest of the story unresolved. In Ghost Stories we learn that those loose ends are intentional as the wrap around story has plenty more to say about the big picture that those short stories are simply parts of. Even so, the writer in my finds it frustrating when the stories in an anthology are incomplete in themselves. I do appreciate the effort to not only incorporate the shorts into the wraparound story, and the fact that the wraparound story was the story and not just some hastily and lazily conceived time filler that tries to convey to the viewer that they just watched a feature film and not simply a bunch of random short films one after another. Ghost Stories was not as great as I wanted to be, but it will definitely be rewatched by me, and I suspect that over time my fondness for it will grow.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 25 - Movie 1

Trapped Ashes (2006) is an anthology film featuring four stories and a wraparound story connecting them. In the first story, an actress who undergoes breast enlargement surgery finds her career also enhanced, but unexpected side effects in the form of vampiric breasts. The second story involves a wife being seduced and abducted by a Japanese demon. The third story is about Stanley Kubrick's girlfriend who he passes on to his best friend when he suspects that she is an immortal vampire. The final story is about a girl who as a developing baby, shared her mother's abdomen with a tape worm who becomes her secret, avenging, sister. The wraparound story, set in a haunted house set on a studio backlot, involves the trapped guests of a VIP tour, who also happen to be the characters in the four stories being told. If you've seen any other anthology horror movie involving a wraparound story, you know what connects them all.

This was a very disappointing movie. Most of the stories didn't really come to a satisfying conclusion, and there was an overall feeling that this was made for HBO or Cinemax, cable channels which require every production to feature bare breasts, and feel like they are soft core porn. I only kind of liked the Kubrick story, mostly because of the Tygh Runyan's performance as Stanley Kubrick. The premise for the final story had promise that was not delivered.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 24 - Movie 2

I actually saw Halloween (2018) on Sunday, but didn't want to interrupt the Phantasm posts in order to post my response to it. So now that the Phantasm series has been completed here we go.

Ignoring all of the sequels and serving as a sequel only to the original film, Halloween is set 40 years later. Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis) lives in a remote fortress where she has spent her entire life since her first encounter with Michael Myers (Nick Castle returning to the role, and James Jude Courtney providing the unmasked Michael's role) preparing for his eventual return. This has led to a sad and complicated life for her. She's twice divorced and mostly estranged from her daughter, but has a more positive relationship with her granddaughter. People think she's a bit of a nut, but when Michael escapes custody during a transfer to another hospital, she turns out to be the only person prepared to deal with him.

As I've stated previously here I'm not a huge fan of the original film. To me it's like a tv movie, and the "force of nature" that Carpenter claims he envisioned Michael Myers (or "The Shape" as he was being called back then) as "a force of nature," it's hard to take that seriously when the character is actually pretty inept, and about equal in fighting ability to Laurie Strode. The new film was enjoyable. There were nice homages to the original (and even Halloween III: Season of the Witch). It had some story issues, including one questionable plot point from the original film, which is Michael's ability to drive a car considering he's been institutionalized since he was a small boy. In this film, the scene's even more puzzling since he couldn't possibly have been sitting in the driver's seat either.

The filmmakers seem to have been a bit influenced by the Rob Zombie remake as well as the original movie. Carpenter's 1978 version was pretty bloodless. Zombie's was a bloodbath. This new film is pretty brutal, too. Myers also seems to be more in line with Zombie's hulking powerhouse more than Carpenter's Myers who struggled to get out of a closet. The characters seemed kind of sketched out versus being fully fleshed out, and unnecessary weight was put on characters who really didn't matter to the story as a whole, while more important characters didn't have much to do and vanished from the screen for long periods of time. Also, one character's motivation and actions almost derailed the movie for me being a bit hokey and far fetched for the non-campy nature of the rest of the film. Of course, also the way the movie ends was inevitable, but doesn't really take away from the experience. I don't regret seeing it, though I'm not really the audience this movie is catering too. In the end though, while there was plenty of blood, I would have liked a bit more meat.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 24 - Movie 1

Phantasm: Ravager (2016) is the fifth, and final, film in the series. The time-whimey dimension hopping aspect of the series comes front in center in this segment, which focuses on Reggie bouncing back and forth from several narratives. In one, we pick up shortly after the events of the previous film, with Reggie hunting for Mike and Jodie and the Tall Man while being pursued by a number of silver spheres. Following the pattern of previous episodes, Reggie picks up an unattainable woman and pulls her into the drama that he's involved in with supernatural forces.

There's also another time line, which is more in keeping with the nearly two decades that have transpired in the real world between this and the previous Phantasm world. In this one a discombobulated Reggie is rescues from a table where he's been lying for years, unconscious, with the top of his head thrust into one of the gateways to another dimension. Reggie is awakened by a group of freedom fighters, which includes Mike, Jody, and Rocky from the third film, in an Earth where the Tall Man has essentially won. Cities are now a burning wasteland occupied by the Tall Man's minions, and giant, Death Star sized spheres hover over the landscape. It is a bleak world, and one wonders if the freedom fighters can possibly win, and if they do, will there be anything left worth winning back.

The third narrative is the most interesting and completely colors the entire series. This one is set in the present day where Mike regularly visits Reggie at a nursing home where Reggie is being treated for dementia and nearing the end of his life. In this narrative, Mike has no experience with the Tall Man, other than Reggie's stories, which are taken as the product of his diminishing faculties. The worlds do all collide, and at the end, we're left with two bleak possibilities as to the true nature of the events in this series.

This is by no means a perfect film. It's obviously small budget is stretched with passable CGI which adds scope, and in terms of the weird fantasy established in earlier films, is not much of a detrimental element. The story would have benefitted with more scenes of the Tall Man, but Angus Scrimm was obviously in poor health during the filming and has limited, but memorable participation.