31 Days of Halloween - Day 15 - Movie 2

As the zombie apocalypse spreads across the earth, a group of people hole up in a local shopping mall in order to survive. This basic premise is really all that connects Dawn of the Dead (2004) with the superior George Romero film that it "reinvents." I remember first seeing this and being really impressed with how intense the pre-credits opening of this film was. Few zombie films start with the outbreak just taking place. Most of them already have civilization essentially collapsed by the time the story starts. Unfortunately, all of that tension dissipates by the time the characters get to the mall and never really comes back.

In the mall, the characters don't really have to go through the process of clearing out the undead and shoring it up as a safe house. Here, the mall is essentially empty except for a trio of redneck security guards, who don't take long to stop being a threat themselves. This whole crew goes through the rest of the movie almost completely safe from the zombies until they decide to leave and head for a boat and then an island. With many of these films, it's really a commentary on how humans are their own worst enemies, especially in times of crisis. I've seen that movie before and this Dawn of the Dead remake, while being fairly entertaining, doesn't bring anything new to the subgenre.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 15 - Movie 1

When a nightclub owner is murdered for not selling to a local criminal, his girlfriend, Sugar (Marki Bey) turns to an old voodoo queen for help. Summoning Baron Samedi, Sugar makes a pact with him for revenge using Samedi's army of the undead.

Sugar Hill (1974) is a perfectly entertaining supernatural revenge thriller. The plot structure is pretty much by the numbers for this type of story.  It does have its tongue too far in cheek to ever really be effective as a horror movie. The bad guys, led by Robert Quarry,  are vile and racist, so their offing one by one is something to cheer. Baron Samedi is a little too much the clown to be effective as an intimidating supernatural power, but the stylized zombies, with their grease paint emaciation and bulging silver eyes are great. Covered in webs, and when they emerge from the ground, leaves and pine needles, they really do convey the idea of genuinely rising up from their graves.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 15

The Ymir from 20 Million Miles to Earth (1957). Cut paper.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 14 - Movie 2

Two bumbling American cops (Bud Abbott, Lou Costello) training with the London police find themselves tracking down the murderous Mr. Hyde, unleashed by his alter ego, Dr. Jekyll (Boris Karloff) to murder colleagues who have scoffed at his ideas.

Somehow I've managed to go my entire life until now never having seen Abbott and Costello Meet Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1953). While not the masterpiece that Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein was, this film does it right in the same way by keeping the horror elements horrific and playing them mostly straight. Amplified by some nice photography, sets, and atmosphere, these scenes fit right in with the Universal horror classics of the 1930s and 1940s. There's even a nice nod to Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein in the wax museum scenes. The comedy elements work well for the most part, only fumbling with the reuse of some familiar gags.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 14 - Movie 1

When a series of murders take place at a remote hotel, the bellboy (Lou Costello) becomes the prime suspect, but the hotel detective (Bud Abbott) and a police detective (James Flavin) try to determine the identity of the real killer amongst a pool of suspects.

Abbott and Costello Meet the Killer, Boris Karloff (1949) is something of an old dark house mystery set in a hotel, and with a bunch of shenanigans from the comedy duo. The solution to the mystery is unnecessarily convoluted, but is really not terribly important when the real concerns of this movie is to supply laughs, of which there are many. Karloff is great as one of the key suspects who tries to hypnotize Costello into killing himself. It makes you wish that Karloff had participated in more comedies.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 14

Igor (Marty Feldman) in Young Frankenstein (1974). Cut paper.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 13 - Movie 2

When a family movies into a new house and finds itself assaulted by unexplained phenomena, they turn to Ed and Lorraine Warren (Patrick Wilson, Vera Farmiga) for help. The paranormal investigators determine that their house is possessed by an inhuman spirit and set about doing what ever it takes to rid the house of it's unwelcome occupant and save the family.

This is probably James Wan's best realized movie. I admit to not being drawn to much of his work, but this was right up my alley. Based on a real case investigated by real life paranormal investigators Ed and Lorraine Warren, the film shows some restraint, relying more on a general sense of dread and foreboding, which makes the scares when they come more effective. You are invested in the people in this film, and their predicament.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 13 - Movie 1

A family (Oliver Reed, Karen Black, Lee Montgomery, and Bette Davis) move into a run down mansion for the summer. As the summer progresses, not only does the house start to look restored beyond what a bit of elbow grease and furniture can accomplish, but the family members begin to act peculiar, until Oliver Reed begins to sense that the cause is the house and that they should leave right away. The house, however, has other plans.


Burnt Offerings (1976) is a standout malevolent objects movie. It's a slow burn film that never gets tiresome as it gradually ratchets up the tension and mystery happening to the characters on screen. More concerned with the psychological toll on the family than jolts, the film only really features one special effects moment, letting the atmosphere and performances do the rest.

FYI, the house is the same one that served as the mortuary in Phantasm (1979).

31 Days of Halloween - Day 13

A morlock from The Time Machine (1960). Cut paper.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 12 - Movie 2

A blind veteran (Nick Damici) moves into a gated retirement community and on his first night there his next door neighbor, and his seeing eye dog are both viciously killed. He does a little digging and figures out that someone in his community is a werewolf, and begins planning to confront that person on the next full moon.

Late Phases (2014) was a real breath of fresh air in the werewolf subgenre. It has a good cast, well done characters, and even the basic premise of having the hero someone who can't see what's threatening him, really work to keep this movie intriguing. The werewolves are also really cool looking practical effects creatures and not cgi. This one gets a strong recommendation from me.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 12 - Movie 1

See this photo up above? Good. Now you have absolutely no reason to watch The Bat People (1974), an atrociously slow film about a man who turns into a werebat while on a desert honeymoon with his wife. There's a lot of repetition from badly acted seizures, police cars stuck in the sand, uninteresting murders, suspicious behavior, concern from the wet blanket wife, and no view of the werebat (by Stanley Winston) until the very end. You may notice that the movie is called The Bat People, but seems like it should more honestly be called The Bat Person. Surprisingly, it's a barely honest title, as one of the other characters is clearly going to be transforming into a bat at the end of the movie. Only once the behavior change in this person become obvious, does the movie almost get interesting, which is sad since there's only about five minutes left before the end.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 12

Wioslea, who buys Luke Skywalker's landspeeder in Star Wars - Episode IV: A New Hope (1977). Cut paper.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 11 - Movie 2

People are mysteriously dying near a new military base, their brains and spines sucks out of them. Of course the locals suspect the military, but the base commander searches for another cause. He discovers a local scientist whose experiments with telekinesis have given form to invisible brain creatures, their power increased by the base's nuclear power plant.

I was surprised to discover that I had not covered Fiend Without a Face (1958) in a previous countdown. This movie is a gem. The creatures, invisible for most of the movie are made threatening by the sounds that accompany their presence just before their violent attacks. The attacks themselves are pretty potent, too, especially the one that fails to kill a local constable who returns a gibbering idiot in the film's most unsettling moment. Once the brain creatures finally can be seen in their stop motion glory, they are not in any way a let down. The creatures look like brain's with snail-like stalks and nerve tendrils who scoot around using their spines, and launch themselves through the air onto their victims like the face huggers from Alien (1979). They launch a massive attack against the humans leading to a grisly climax.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 11 - Movie 1

Dr. Blakely (David Gale) uses his Psychiatric Research Institute and a cable self-help show to help a giant brain take over the minds of viewers with the goal of taking over the entire planet. Only a smart high school trouble maker seems to be immune to the Brain's hypnotic control, and he and his girlfriend set out to kill the brain and free the populace.

The Brain (1988) is one of those weird films which is not very good for many reasons, yet remains compellingly watchable. It's goofy, with long boring stretches interrupted by repetitive action, such as characters chasing each other down and up the same staircase three times in a row. It tries to be satirical in it's notion of controlling the masses through television, but isn'y clever enough, or subtle enough to make that satire rise beyond the obvious. It's not the right kind of so bad it's entertainingly bad either. It's just one of a number of rubber monster movies from the 1980s that's serviceable, without being more than that, but features a pretty great looking monster.

31 Days 0f Halloween - Day 11

Barbara Steele in Black Sunday (1960). Cut paper.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 10 - Movie 2

While a theater group rehearses late into the night, they discover themselves locked inside the theater with an escaped maniac who hunts them down one by one while wearing an owl mask. Not the most original premise, but this bare bones plot serves Stage Fright (1987) pretty well. Part giallo, part 80s slasher flick, logic has less of a place here than the striking visuals.

The characters are pretty much disposable, which is how they are treated, and are given very broad defining characteristics; the lecherous investor, the cruel director, the bitchy gay guy, the ingenue, etc. Some are given slightly more defining characteristics which don't do anything to aid the plot, or make them more relatable. While the silent killer in the owl mask is a spooky visual, he doesn't really exude any real menace. His best moment, and one of the best in the film, comes when the killer, mistaken for the actor he replaces, kills one of the other characters on stage while everyone looks on, unaware that they are witnessing a real murder. That scene seems to be the one true moment in the film in which the witnesses go from being unknowing participants, to shocked and horrified, caring, and ultimately self interested, all in the span of a few minutes.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 10 - Movie 1

In a story that probably anyone in a creative field can relate to, Vincent Price plays the creator of elaborate magic tricks, who hopes to break out as a stage magician with his newest creation. Sadly, his debut is halted by his employer who reminds Price that anything he creates belongs to him, whether it was created on his own time, or not. His boss also stole his wife previously. Price, understandably gets upset and does away with his boss. Then, in an intricate scheme to insure that suspicion never falls on him, Price's character keeps finding himself cornered and has to escalate the body count as well as his cover story, which is threatened by a detective and a mystery writer.

The Mad Magician (1954) is a pretty compelling film. It moves along briskly. The inventive magic tricks on display, and the villain's maneuvering to stay ahead of the law maintain interest, and there are even a few moments of genuine suspense. Price also gets to stretch his range a bit as his character impersonates other characters throughout.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 10

A sleestak from Land of the Lost (1974-1977). Cut paper.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 9 - Movie 2

A group of grad students studying climate change effects on Beluga whales, hitches a ride aboard an arctic crab boat. The boat hauls aboard a frozen extraterrestrial creature able to shape shift and infect the crew members, replicating them in the process. This leads to a lot of paranoia during the intense hunt for the creature, complicated by the presence of a Russian spy whose objective was to obtain this organism all along.


If Harbinger Down (2015) sounds like a combination of Alien and The Thing on a boat, it should. The film is the brain child of special effects men Alec Gillis and Tom Woodruff, Jr., who worked on all of the Alien films, except the first one, and who were disappointed to learn that much of the practical creature effects they created for The Thing (2011) wound up being replaced by digital effects.

After sharing their effects reel from The Thing online, they were encouraged to create their own practical effects oriented film, and with kickstarter funding and additional money, Harbinger Down was the result.

The film clearly doesn't have anywhere near the same budget as either franchise it pays homage to (with a number of references), but looks more expensive than it is. It also takes itself seriously enough that the viewer can, too. The script is decent, and so are the characters and cast. Harbinger Down doesn't break any new ground, but demonstrates a genuine fondness for the era of practical transformation and creature effects, from the days where inventive make-up artists wowed audiences and made anything seem possible, before any computer could even come close.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 9 - Movie 1

When biological samples are taken from Antarctica and to be transported to America, an unknown life form comes to life aboard the plane just before it's about to land at an island Naval base in order to refuel. The sailors stationed on the island begin disappearing. Some are found with terrible burns, others are not found at all. The nature of the killer is unknown, but is determined to be a specimen that came in on the plane. As the hunt for the mysterious organism continues, so does the body count.

The Navy vs the Night Monsters (1966) is actually a much better movie than I would have guessed. While the vast amount of humor undermines what could have been a pretty intense situation, it succeeds in giving the cast of characters distinctive personalities so that as they are picked off one by one they aren't merely cannon fodder. Yes, some of the dialogue is cringeworthy, and some situations defy credibility, but you get the sense that there was an earnest effort to make something that rose above similar fare at the time.




 

31 Days of Halloween - Day 9

Xenomorph from It Came From Outer Space (1953)

31 Days of Halloween - Day 8 - Movie 2

A journalist investigates a series of murders. Women who have been kidnapped are being found dead, drained of blood. The trail leads him to a scientist who is using the blood to help a duchess retain her youth and beauty.

I Vampiri (The Vampires) (1957) goes all out to imbue its scenario with gothic atmosphere. An old castle filled with secret passages, candles, and skeletons; a veiled figure who wanders its halls, giving commands; a mad scientist's laboratory. Contrasted with a modern European backdrop, this makes for a dynamic contrast as the world of the mysterious intersects with one of the normal.

Gianna Maria Canale as Giselle du Grand is a cold beauty, and almost otherworldly lending her role a strange credibility. The entire film is mesmerizing to watch, and is one of the better films I've watched this season.







 

31 Days of Halloween - Day 8 - Movie 1

Catherine Deneuve and David Bowie are Miriam and John Blaylock, husband and wife vampires who have been together for centuries, but not forever as John finds himself rapidly aging. In desperation he turns to a researcher working to reverse Progeria, but instead of saving himself, he may have instead doomed himself to be replaced as Miriam's immortal companion.


I didn't like The Hunger (1983) when I first saw it on the big screen way back when. I liked John's arc, but found Tony Scott's direction to be more concerned with flash and visual style and less with story. My memories of the film consisted mostly of crumbling corpses, white pigeons, and diaphanous curtains blowing in the wind. Seeing it again for the first time since the mid 80s, those elements are here in plentitude, and some of my earlier assessments remain true, but the style, dated as it is serves the story more than it impairs it, lending it a modern gothic flair which turns this story of doomed romance into more of a fairy tale than an outright tragedy. There's also a great satire on the interminable waiting required in sitting in the waiting room at a doctor's office.  If only the characters had a bit more depth to them, it would be possibly be one of the classic vampire movies instead of just a very good one.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 8

The Crimson Ghost (1946). Cut paper.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 7 - Movie 2

In the cautionary ecological horror film, The Giant Behemoth (1959) a radiation spawned dinosaur rises up from the sea to wreak havoc on real estate through brute physical means, and human beings, by cooking them with projected radiation. Killing the rampaging monster seems feasible, but the trick is to find a way that will kill it without scattering bits of its radioactive corpse across the countryside.

The middle film in director, Eugene Lourie's unofficial giant monster trilogy, The Giant Behemoth is not in the same league as either The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms (1953) or Gorgo (1961). The film is uneven overall. There is some nice cinematography in places and the stop motion animation by King Kong's Willis O'Brien and Pete Peterson, does have some really nice moments, but overall seems stiff and clunky, with obvious damage to the stop motion puppet Behemoth readily apparent on screen. The special effects are not done any favors by the inclusion of a puppet Behemoth shown diving beneath the waves in repetitive shots, which does not match the stop motion animated dinosaur.

The cast is all able, but don't really have much to do beyond ponder and demonstrate scientific procedures for long periods of the film.

It's more of a curiosity than a must see, but, if like me, you are a fan of stop-motion and dinosaurs (even made up ones), then you should view it at least once.





 

31 Days of Halloween - Day 7 - Movie 1

King Kong (1933) is a classic, if I need to go into why, then you need to stop reading this and go watch it now. It's a movie I rewatch on a fairly regular basis. It does not fail to amaze me on each viewing. I'd love to watch this with an audience in 1933. Movies were still a fairly new narrative medium, and sound was even newer when King Kong debuted, dominating the medium with its sophisticated use of music and sound design, and its still stunning special effects which impress even more when you realize that they were inventing how to do these shots as they went and completely pulling them off in the process. The scene in Kong's lair for example is a miniature set occupied by two stop motion animated characters, along with flying birds. There is also a live actor in the scene, behind the stop motion characters, a live actor in front of them, and live steam, and bubbling liquid incorporated into the scene. This is cinematic magic in its purest form, setting the bar for every fantasy film to follow, and inspiring innumerable careers.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 7

Boris Karloff as Hjalmar Poelzig in The Black Cat (1934). Cut paper.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 6 - Movie 2

A group of people find themselves stranded on an island surrounded by water inhabited by flesh eating microbes. Also on the island with them is a suspicious scientist who doesn't seem to be in a hurry to leave, or to help the castaways leave either.

The Flesh Eaters (1964) stands out from other genre movies of this period with its particular quirky attention to character and dialogue (written by Arnold Drake) as well as its, at the time, rather graphic gore sequences as people's flesh is devoured from their bodies in rapid, unsettling ways. The primitive special effects are rather effective, and the flesh eating creatures, when enlarged, are pretty nifty monsters. This movie has some really good energy driving it and is worth a look.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 6 - Movie 1

Today I decided to revisit 28 Days Later (2002), Danny Boyle's post apocalyptic tale of civilization being brought to its knees by a highly infectious virus which fills the infected person with lethal rage, making them akin to super aggressive zombies without the restriction of actually being reanimated dead. At the time of its release, 28 Days Later, well regarded for it's intensity and novel presence of fast moving "zombies."

While these aspects are admirable, the film has staying power because it's really about survival and maintaining your humanity while doing so while others throw it aside in order to get by and take what they want. The real monsters here aren't the infected, which while being an ambient presence aren't physically in much of the movie, but fellow human beings who see the collapse of civilization as license to do whatever they want to whomever they want. Most impressive is the haunting desolation of empty London and the countryside of England.



 

31 Days of Halloween - Day 6

Giant cyclops from the Lost in Space episode "There Were Giants in the Earth" (October 6, 1965). Cut paper.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 5 - Movie 2

A small town in Idaho is besieged by some sort of gooey monster spawned from radioactive waste. The monster can dissolve itself into liquid and then back into a humanoid form, or something in between, based on what I was able to make sense of. It also left pools of Palm Olive or piles of lime Jello in its wake. It also kills a lot of people and is pretty hard to kill itself.

If I told you how long I've been wanting to see The Being (1983) you'd feel pity for me. Ever since seeing the tiny ad in the New York Times for it back in the Fall of 1984, when it was playing somewhere on 42nd street, I have been intrigued. Was it the tag line - "Half Man, Half Monster...Soul of an Unearthly Thing," or the fact that it "starred" Ruth Buzzi and Martin Landau (along with Jose Ferrer and Dorothy Malone)? All of the above to be honest. Why my then roommate, Steve Peros, and I never ventured out to see it remains a bewildering mystery to this day.

Well, I've now seen it and the mind boggles at the quality of talented actors convinced to be a part of this inelegantly directed nonsense, made more confounding by the sloppy editing and half-assed screenplay. The Being also has one of the most uncharismatic leading men you can find. The movie also plods along even though someone seems to get killed about every four minutes, or so.

It also has some genuinely funny moments, some of which are even intentional, such as the stoner at the drive-in being questioned by the police. I have to say that I liked the monster in this once it's finally shown in detail. For most of the movie you mostly get to see an arm, but it's freakishly long, gooey, asymmetric, one-eyed head full of needle like teeth was a welcome change from the usual men in monster suits that movies of this quality often display. It's behavior and abilities seemed to consist of whatever the filmmakers decided would be good for a scene, or whatever they had on hand, which kept you interested, simply from trying to figure out what was happening half the time.

This is one of those movies best appreciated with a group of friends and a large amount of liquor.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 5 - Movie 1

What happens when you combine writing and direction by the man who wrote the screenplays for Creature from the Black Lagoon, and It Came from Outer Space with the stars of The 7th Voyage of Sinbad and This Island Earth? You get crap in the form of Octaman (1971) in which vague science and made up folklore come together to deliver a monstrous humanoid octopus set upon killing off the entire cast.

Did I think this movie was going to be a gem? No. I'd caught enough of it on television years ago to know that it was going to be a turd. The screenplay, including the dialogue was earnest, yet dreadful, a problem enhanced by the film being shot mostly silent with the dialogue dubbed in later. The special effects consisting of a mutant baby octopus being pulled acrid the ground with string and an obvious man in a monster suit designed and built by Rick Baker and Doug Beswick did not impress, though Octaman himself had a bit of charm as far as obvious, inexpressive rubber suit monsters go. Sadly, the suit performer was no Doug Jones, simply walking slowly enough so as not to trip, and flapping his arms on occasion.

That said, where other movies of this budget would have done their best to show as little of the monster as possible, until the end, here you get a good look at it before the opening credits and it shows up quite often grabbing quite a bit of screen time away from the dull interactions between the generic character types.

As bad as it was, Octaman was still fairly entertaining and would be perfect on a drive-in screen, or really late at night, or on a rainy Saturday afternoon.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 5

They Live (1988). Cut paper.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 4 - Movie 2

Seymour Krelboyne (Jonathan Haze) crossbreeds a new plant in order to impress a girl (Jackie Joseph), and his boss (Mel Welles). only to discover that what keeps it growing and thriving is blood, and the bigger it gets the more it wants.

It's been a long time since I've watched The Little Shop of Horrors (1960), Roger Corman's comedy-horror famously shot in two days, featuring Jack Nicholson in a small role, and later turned into a successful off-Broadway musical, and movie version of the musical. The film is still very enjoyable, and some of the comedy still genuinely clever and funny. My daughter also found the voice of the plant (screenwriter Charles B. Griffith) to be more effective, funnier, and creepier, than the voice in the musical remake.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 4 - Movie 1

In Bluebeard (1944), John Carradine is suave and sinister as a puppeteer and painter who strangles to death the women who model for him. Edgar G. Ulmer brings some style and atmosphere to this poverty row horror-mystery, elevating it to a decent viewing experience. The featured scenes with the marionettes are pretty impressive and made me wish that this type of street entertainment was still common.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 4

The Suparplum Fairy in Cabin in the Woods (2012). Cut paper.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 3 - Movie 2

Spread across the length of Manhattan and between the rich and the poor, a series of grisly murders begin to look connected by the presence of wolf hairs on the corpses of the victims. More of a thriller than an outright horror movie, Wolfen (1981) is intelligently played out, well directed, and well cast.

Like jaws, the titular creatures here, don't have a physical presence until the final minutes of the film, but haunt the film through the use of effects enhanced point of view and strong sound effects and music by James Horner representing them as they make their way through their urban hunting grounds.

There's a lot going on in this movie from political intrigue, fringe terrorist groups, Native American activism, environmentalism, the encroachment of man onto the wild, and even the use of high tech lie detection tests which mirror the vision of the wolfen.

I loved this movie when it first came out, and still find it to be a really strong, underrated movie.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 3 - Movie 1

I've never played the video game that Silent Hill (2006) was based on, so didn't know any of the established elements going into the movie. The plot is essentially a mother (Radha Mitchell) searching for her adopted daughter (Jodelle Ferland) in the ghost town, Silent Hill. Silent Hill,  evacuated because of a still burning coal fire seems to be anything but deserted. The mysterious town is gloomy with an ever falling snow of ash, periodically disrupted by a siren announcing unnatural periods of darkness which seem to invite all manner of disfigured human monstrosity to manifest. These aren't the only monsters as there is also a group of apocalyptic religious zealots who are convinced that the outside world has been destroyed, and still more secrets.

The plot is thin, essentially, like a video game in which a character explores a strange landscape and tries to make sense of all they encounter. This didn't really detract from the movie, as much as help build the weird atmosphere by not feeling compelled to explain everything. The visuals ranged from beautifully creepy to Hellraiser inspired haunted attraction. It would have been much stronger relying on more of the former and less of the latter. I found myself less involved with the characters and their fates than with what they might find around the next corner, and didn't really mind this, or find it off-putting, since I found myself intrigued enough by the world they inhabited.

Silent Hill is not a great, or particularly memorable,  movie, nor will it please everybody, but it's worth a look.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 3

Dr. Zaius (Maurice Evans) in Planet of the Apes (1968). Cut paper.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 2 - Movie 2

The Natural History Museum in Chicago receives a group of crates from one of their scientists in South America, little suspecting that one of them contains a chimera grown together from the DNA of a number of animals, representing a mythical monster named Kothoga. Kothoga likes to behead its victims in order to eat the pituitary gland and hypothalamus. The creature hides in the maze of halls and tunnels beneath the museum, striking periodically, while evading the police. The monster is not enough of a threat apparently to keep a high ticket fundraiser from taking place much to the regret of the attendees.


The Relic (1997) is a polished monster movie, with a pretty neat looking monster, a strong cast, and absolutely no soul. The story is a completely by the book formula monster movie, and most of that formula comes from Jaws, only with a tedious amount of repetitious exposition that doesn't really do anything besides take up a vast amount of screen time to suggest that these elements are what make Kothoga different from all the other monsters that star in movies exactly like this one. As I mentioned, the movie features a strong cast, and seems to simply rely on their presence to suggest that the characters are more substantial than they are.

I saw this movie when it first came out and immediately forgot it. It was only after seeing it referenced in positive terms again and again that I decided to give it a second shot. I can safely say I won't be doing that a third time.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 2 - Movie 1

A scientific expedition to northern Sweden leads to the discovery of a spaceship, a giant monster, and a lot of tedium in Terror in the Midnight Sun (1958). For the first 45 minutes of this seventy minute film we are subjected to scientists talking about the meteor, traveling to a town near the meteor, flying out to locate the meteor, planning to visit the meteor, traveling to the site of the meteor, examining the meteor for about thirty seconds before heading back to camp, sure that it's not a meteor, but a spaceship. These scenes are interspersed with a young geologist flirting with the elder scientist's olympic gold medalist niece, and chasing her around on skis, then telling her several times she can't accompany the expedition only to have her, several times, stow away with the expedition. She's very fetching and spirited, but even though she's athletic, she's the one who wrenches her knee, requiring the young geologist to take care of her, then spends the rest of the film reduced to screaming every time the slow moving monster appears. which really isn't until the 49 minute mark. 

The monster is pretty cool, but would not look out of place in the first season of Lost in Space. The effects showing it interacting with habits and airplanes are well done. We aren't really sure what the aliens inside the spaceship have to do with it exactly, but it doesn't seem to be too bad a fellow, not that anyone cares as they attack it. 

I can't really say I recommend this movie even half heartedly, but it's on youtube if you are curious.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 2

King Kong (1933) Cut paper

31 Days of Halloween - Day 1 - Movie 2

Strange goings on plague a family living in a house with a troubled past. Apparitions appear, warnings are given, and terrible consequences are brought upon the family members. It's difficult to give a proper synopsis to La casa del fin de los tiempos/The House at the End of Time (2013) without entering spoiler territory, though I was able to figure out what was going on from the first depiction of apparitions shaking the door handles to be let in. 

I found the film really frustrating. On the one hand, it's really good, with some nice atmosphere, nice structure that leaps back and forth from the present to a time 30 years ago. and solid performances. Every time I felt sure that the movie was really good, something subtle would happen and I'd feel like I was watching a play, or an after school special. There seemed to be a bit of a disconnect between scenes filled with tension and the possibility of a threat, and those that didn't. Even the score would become distractingly playful while the two boys in the family were out playing with their friends. Also, for me, the solution to what was happening was too apparent, and while it wasn't badly conceived, my awareness of it kept me from being pulled into the mindset of the characters who didn't know what was happening. 

For me, it was a mixed bag, but there is enough positive material going on in La casa del fin de los tiempos, that I think you should view it yourself and draw your own conclusions. 

31 Days of Halloween - Day 1 - Movie 1

To launch this month's viewing, I decided to revisit a highly anticipated movie from last year that did not disappoint. The Babadook (2014) centers on Amelia (Essie Davis), a single mom, still morning her husband and trying to handle her increasing anxious and aggressively behaved young son, Samuel (Noah Wiseman). Samuel leaves her physically and emotionally drained, and causes her to become further and further isolated from the outside world, including her own sister.

If this weren't enough to cope with, Samuel's problems increase after the mysterious appearance of a disturbing pop-up book entitled, Mister Babadook. The book centers on a frightening bogey man figure determined to terrify the other characters in the story who go beyond simply representing Amelia and Samuel.

There is no slow burn with this movie. It assaults the viewer with Amelia's situation and Samuel's behavior issues right from the get go and never lets up, and would be as equally successful a horror film even if Mister Babadook never reared his frightening head. The Babadook himself, is a terrifying figure that never really shows itself in the film except in fleeting glimpses, and as a character in a silent movie as well as the creepy illustrations in the book. His voice is enough to supply all of the dread implied by his nearly invisible presence.

I highly recommend this film. The performances by the two leads are almost too convincing, and the film is filled with plenty of atmosphere and anxiety producing sequences that continually tighten the screws of the film's dreadful build up towards it's climax.