my first two novellas are available on kindle! These are probably pretty amateur because I wrote them years ago, and they're both very angsty and very gay, but I love them, and they're here! Yay!
Check this out! https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BN7G79QR?ref_=cm_sw_r_mwn_ts_80R1P377VX6ZH4KYNCMP
Check this out! https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BN7KGC1T?ref_=cm_sw_r_mwn_ts_6MPPPGAW24CN8TDQ6C59
In 2021, a woman has a psychotic break. She goes to bed one night in her apartment and awakens the next morning in a holding cell at her local jail with no idea of what happened or how she got there. She fights for five and a half months to have her mental health evaluated before she is finally released. Over those five and a half months she learns what it's like to be in jail, the crime she committed that she doesn't remember, what the other women in jail are like, and what life is like on the other side of the world she never knew existed. Through it all she finds her way back to her faith in God even as she loses everything else in her life (her job, her apartment, her identity). She learns what a "dark night of the soul" truly is, and how to make it throguh when you think you can't make it through anymore. Her poems, journal entries, and cartoons drawn on scraps of paper from her cell make up the pages of this irreverant and unconventional memoir.
EDIT:
I've heard from a reliable source that the synopsis of the book should only be one sentence long, so here's my attempt at that, does it sound ok?
Culled from poems, cartoons, and journal entries written on scraps of paper in her cell, this irreverent memoir tells the story of a woman who went to bed one night and woke up the next morning in jail, with no memory of how she got there.
When this movie came out, it caused quite a stir. First of all, there's the graphic violence and gore people keep saying is in this movie. Now I watch a lot of horror, and some of it is very graphic and sadistic, but I found that out myself by watching it. When people start warning me about the gore and violence in a particular movie, I start to get worried about how graphic it got before they felt the need to issue a warning. The second thing people commented on for this movie was that it was heartwrenching and depressing. I have to be careful with that, too, because my depression can be triggered if a movie is too bleak and depressing. So basically what I'm saying is that this movie is dangerous and I have no idea how it will effect me! Let's roll!
In this movie, as Taiwan succumbs to a viral pandemic that transforms peaceful citizens into sadistic, bloodthirsty maniacs, a young couple must battle to be reunited before they too become infected. That's the description of this movie, and it doesn't sound too shocking, just because I've seen similar things happen in movies before, like 28 Days Later, so I'm wondering what it is about this movie that goes so far that people felt the need to issue strong warnings about this movie before I even watched it.
When they say bloodthirsty, boy they mean bloodthirsty. People in this movie who catch the virus turn into bloodthirsty maniacs, and they just start stabbing and gutting and biting people and licking up their blood and it's really gross and icky and sticky. The gore in the movie is well done too, the bites look real and they're just taking chunks out of people's ankles and necks and faces. One guy grabs an axe and starts using it and the camera cut away and I'm just like WHY?! It's already disturbing as hell, cutting away now won't help!
I don't know why this movie is called The Sadness. Yes, it's sad that all these people are doing all these horrible things to other people, but the people who catch this sickness seem very happy indeed to be doing all these depraved things, and when they pass it onto othere people those people become happy too while they're sawing away at other people and eating their skin. There's one really rapey guy who just seems impossible to kill. Oh wait, never mind, he just died finally. This movie is messed up. Oh hey, we've reached the part where a doctor or scientist explains what's going on with the virus. Oh hey, this doctor guy is messed up. Damn, everyone's infected (except for one person, and that person better make tracks before they get dead). Oh here we go, that's messed up. And now it's over. I still think The Sadness is a weird name for this movie. The Plague would be better and more accurate, but perhaps not as likely to get people talking, so that's probably at least one of the reasons why they named it The Sadness. Well that was a good little movie, and it didn't poke my depression too badly, either. Bonus!
I tried watching this earlier in the challenge, but that was the day I decided to film my own horror movie called "The Burning Oven" and I started a fire in my oven when I turned it on, which was a bad time (the whole cabin filled with black smoke and I had to use the fire extinguisher to put out the fire and open the door to air out the black smoke, so it was a big bunch of drama and I never got back around to watching "Summer of 84," so this is round 2 with this movie, and I'll try not to set anything on fire this time.
In this movie, a teenager named Davey Armstrong is a conspiracy theorist who begins to suspect that a neighbouring police officer is a serial killer. With help from three friends, Davey launches a daring investigation that soon turns dangerous.This movie rings true for me because when I was a kid my friends and I were always trying to solve mysteries we were sure were going on around us. This would have been about 10 years after this film is set, in 1994, but the spirit of camaraderie and friendship between these boys rings true to what I remember.
It's a good thing there was no mystery actually going on in my hometown when I was a kid, like the very real murders going on in "Summer of 84," because my friends and I would definitely have gotten ourselves into real trouble, probably worse than the boys in this movie did, if I'm being honest. Everything in this movie is nostalgia of the 80s, but one of the biggest for me is that huge video camera the characters use to try and record evidence. I just watched a movie called "Deadstream" where the main character is livestreaming himself and the handheld cameras he uses are so small compared to the one in this movie. My how time flies and technology marches on.
The friendship between the five boys in this movie rings true, like I said earlier, but it also serves to push the action in the movie along because the characters spar back and forth and spur each other on to keep the action in the movie going. There's not much gore in this movie, but there is one memorable jump scare with some gore and an accurate twist to the movie that feels real at least to me. once you've passed a certain point in this movie, there's some almost unbearable tension that comes from just knowing what's going to happen next, and I almost had a heart attack when a certain point in the movie hit (jump scares like that will always be my kryptonite). Overall this is a solid little period piece and it definitely ratchets up the tension at the end. Give it a shot. You won't be disappointed.
I heard a little bit about this movie when it came out. I usually try to avoid spoilers, but I ascertained that this is a movie where parents kill their kids, and that kind of stuff is a big trigger for me with my twisted family history. I think i mentioned before that I used to love Nicholas Cage when I was younger, and I used to love Selma Blair too (and I feel so old that I'm now at an age where I have to talk about Selma Blair as an actress I "used to love when I was younger," because she doesn't seem that old to me) so I was excited to see them together in this movie. Let's do this thing!
In this movie, a young teenage girl and her little brother try to survive a wild 24 hours during which a mass hysteria of unknown origins causes parents to turn violently on their own children. It starts quietly, with a news report on the radio about a mom who reportedly attacked her own kid, mostly ignored by the family as they have dinner and argue about regular family things like boys and dates and visits with grandparents. The tension slowly builds as little things hint that something is wrong, A school day is interrupted a few times by phone calls, a few parents appear to become irrationally angry about some things, there's a bomb scare at the school, something is rotten in the state of Denmark, then suddenly everything starts to happen all at once.
I've been through bomb scares at school, and though chaotic, none that were as bad as this one, thankfully. And then the movie really starts, parents want to kill their kids. They're like violent killing machines who won't stop untill their kids are dead. The hysteria, or whatever it is that makes the parents go against their natural urges to protect their kids and suddenly want to kill them, makes them like little terminators bent on distruction and nothing will stop them until they've completed their task and killed their kids. This is supposed to be a black comedy, but I don't see the comedy here in parents wanting to kill their kids. There's one scene where grandma and grandpa show up that made me laugh, so I'm guessing a lot of this is supposed to be funny and I didn't get it on account of being the most humorless person in all the land. There's plenty of biting social commentary here though, and there's sufficient gore and violence going on to keep most horror fans happy. This is a nasty little flick and I'm glad I checked it out.
I'm still in the mood for a social-media themed horror movie. Maybe this one will be everything I dreamed the other movie would be. It sounds like this movie is focused on social media in general and Facebook in particular, since it's about a girl who sends a friend request to a classmate that winds up with some deadly consuquences. Ever since I saw the movie Unfriended and really liked it, I've been a fan of these types of horror movies that take the social media we use every day and explore the possibilities for horror in them. I'm hoping this movie is a good one.
In this movie, Laura, a popular college student, graciously accepts a friend request from Marina, a young social outcast. To everyone's shock, Marina decides to committ suicide after Laura decides to unfriend her. Soon, a disturbing and mysterious video appears on Laura's profile and her contacts slowly dwindle. When her friends suddenly begin to die one by one, the frightened young woman must find a way to stop the carnage before it's too late.
This movie is ringing serious bells in my head. I swear I've seen it before. I watch so many movies that it's bound to happen from time to time when I repeat a movie I've been before. I can't find it in my archives of reviews, but it definitely reminds me of a movie I've seen before. I've definitely seen this one in the last six years that it's been out. I'm calling it now. I recognize character names and even lines they say to each other, and the creepy things a certain character is doing are familiar to me, too. This is definitely a repeat watch.
It's not a bad little movie, though. Laura, the main character, is likeable enough, even though she makes some boneheaded moves that never end well in horror movies. I kinda wanted to yell at her right from the beginning when she befriends the strange, lonely girl named Marina in her class. I get that she felt sorry for the girl but then she lied to keep the girl away from her birthday party, then posted pictures of the party all over Facebook where the girl was sure to see, which is a stupid thing to do. Then she unfriends the girl and starts off a chain reaction of horrible things that bounce off each other. Soon bodies start to pile up and there seems to be no way to stop it. One of the friends actually comes to a pretty smart (albeit twisted) solution and thinks he's figured out what he has to do. Bonus points for creativity, minus a million points for craziness. There are some bad CGI bugs that were more effective when it was just one bug crawling out of a guy's ear, so i don't know why they ordered a whole swarm and it looks pretty silly whenever they show up. This movie has a lot of jump scares, those are its favorite kind of scares. There's a cool turnaround at the end of the movie. All in all this is a cool little movie. Could have been better, could have been worse. Obviously worth watching twice.
As much as I love horror movies, I don't like watching those "real crew tries to catch ghosts on camera" shows. They bore me, because I'm sure it's scary for you to be in a house and the curtain moves when no one touched it, because it was a ghost (gasp!) but it's boring as hell for me sitting at home to watch a curtain move. That's why I don't watch those shows, they really bore me. When I was in jail, one of the ladies would watch those "real life" ghost hunter shows and they always bored me to tears. I've seen hundreds of these movies where people try to catch real ghosts on camera and end up accidentally capturing real ghosts and pretty much dooming themselves to death. Most recently I watched "Found Footage 3D," which was actually pretty good, and I've heard good things about this one as well, so let's check it out.
In this movie, A disgraced internet personality tries to win back his followers by livestreaming himself in one of the most haunted locations in America. Unfortunately, he happens to release a real vengeful spirit, and his comeback event becomes a fight for his life (autocorrect tried to change this to "fight for his LIKE" and I almost kept it, because that's really what he's fighting for, the "likes" he's trying to get on social media. That's kinda like me writing this blog for the likes and comments I get, but as much as I love you folks, I'm not gonna livestream myself in a haunted house for you guys. Nope. I've seen that movie too many times and it never ends well.
This dude is an idiot. what kind of tool says "red rover, red rover, send dead babies right over"? I can see why this guy got canceled from the internet before this movie happened. Supposedly he does something bad, gets canceled, apologizes, and this livestream is his comeback vidso. For someone who makes edgy comments about dead babies, he sure is scared by every little noise he hears in the haunted house. He's seriously screaming every time he hears anything weird. It's hard to build tension if your main character keeps freaking out before tension can be built.
There are a bunch of jump scares in this movie. That seems to be its stock in trade, be quiet for awhile then get really loud and make everyone jump. Plus this guy is a big wimp about getting hurt. And he takes forever to figure out something that we figured out pretty much as soon as it happens. Get it together dude. Plus I think this movie is supposed to be "funny" because I noticed lots of moments of "humor" and instead of being funny it's just tiresome. I know, I know, I'm the most humorless person in all the land, but I just don't find it a laugh riot when a little ghost girl bites the main character in the dick, it's just annoying. Typing that makes it even sound funnier than it is. Trust me, it's stupid. Because I didn't like the main character, I didn't want to root for him, so when everything is coming together at the end I just wanted to look at my watch and count the minutes until the movie was over. There's too many of them. I'm fading fast. I'm not going to make it. Oh no I can't take it I...zzzzzzzzzz.
Haha, I'm so funny. Actually I wish I could have fallen asleep, it would make this easier. It just occurred to me when I was watching a bunch more stupid stuff happen onscreen that this is how people who don't like horror movies see all horror movies, they think they're all this dumb. I don't know who recommended this movie to me, but I want to find them and give them a stern look, let me tell you. This movie stumbled through a few more predictable twists, then it finally ended. Rest assured, I hate doing this. I was hoping to like this movie and now I'm just irritated. Poo poo.
I mentioned in my review for Aenigma that I used to be lowkey obsessed with the films of Lucio Fulci. It started when I picked up a trashy copy of "Seven Doors of Death," which is an edited version of his film "The Beyond," and it continued with "Don't Torture a Duckling" and "House by the Cemetery" and "Zombie," "City of the Living Dead," and several others. I just couldn't get enough of Fulci's blend of gore and splatter and high melodrama. When I heard there was a movie about Fulci's life and work, I vowed to watch it for the challenge this year, and here we are.
In this movie, filmmaker Simone Scafidi examines the life and career of horror filmmaker Lucio Fulci. Fulci is so well known for embellishing his own life in his stories, so the star of this film was told that he could "pick which Fulci he wanted to be." From these interviews, he sounds like a fascinating man, part evil genius, part workhorse churning out successful films, part hard-driving director who was known for being hard on his actors.
This is a fascinating look at Fulci's life and his work. There's not much more I can say about this movie, but I recommend you check it out if you're a fan of Italian horror in general and Lucio Fulci in particular.
I used to love every Lucio Fulci movie I saw. I swear I was obsessed with the guy, because every time I watched one of his movies, I loved it, even if it was one that often got bad reviews, like House by the Cemetery, so I decided that he could do no wrong and he became one of my favorite directors. Actually, for awhile there, I liked every Italian horror movie I saw, so I became a huge fan and I inhaled every Italian horror movie I could find until I watched a string of bad ones in a row and that soured me on the experience. Now I'm back to my pre-fanatical liking level of Italian horror movies, but Fulci is still a favorite of mine. I've never seen this movie of his, though, so let's see how I like it.
In this movie, the spirit of a comatose teen girl possesses the body of a newcomer at her school in order to enact bloody revenge on the lingerie-clad coeds who are responsible for her injuries. In the first few minutes of this movie, a college prank goes horribly wrong, and the mean girls responsible for the prank wind up relatively unscathed while the victim of the prank ends up in a coma, because life isn't fair in horror movies (or in real life) but in horror movies, the filmmakers have a way of restoring the right/fair nature of things by enacting swift vengeance against those responsible. Take that, bitches.
I heard that this movie featured a "death by snails," and I was thinking "wha... huh?" But now that I've seen this movie, I totally understand what they were saying, and all I can say is "eeeeewww." Also why is this the second movie I've watched for this challenge where a comatose person gets revenge on the people who put them there? Also why are there long stretches of time in this movie where nothing is happening so it's boring and I want to fall asleep? There's not enough gore in the world to sustain the long periods of nothing that happen far too often in this movie. It's a shame too, because there are some good moments in the movie, but overall it gets bogged down too much by the boring nothingness. Maybe I should have watched this back when I fawned over Fulci and I liked everything he did, may be I would have enjoyed it more. As is, it just falls flat. Poo.
The first V/H/S movie was released in 2012, so 10 years ago now, at a time when found footage horror films were still all the rage, and V/H/S was one of the best, at least as far as I'm concerned. It featured 5 mini found footage horror films and some were more successful than the rest, but they were all pretty cool. V/H/S 2 was good too, and then V/H/S Viral was pretty terrible, so I wasn't sure how this sequel would be, but I decided to give it a chance anyway because I heard good things, so let's see how this movie is.
This is a 2022 American found footage horror film with 5 installments by 5 different filmmakers. "Shredding," "Suicide Bid," "Ozzy's Dungeon," "The Gawkers," and "To Hell and Back."
The movie has installments that work and those that don't, and we probably won't agree on which are which for sure. For my money, "Shredding" and "Suicide Bid" are the two best stories in this movie, but all of them except the last one are pretty good. I think the last one requires a different sense of humor than I have, because I think it was supposed to be funny, but I didn't laugh. I know I'm the most humorless person in all the land, but it seriously just annoyed me. I would say this movie is a lot better than V/H/S Viral, though, for what that's worth.
I remember reading about this movie right after it came out. It sounded very depressing with its themes of suicide, depression, and family secrets, or at least that's what I could gather from the movie's trailer and articles about the movie. I knew that the forest in the film's title referenced a forest in Japan where people go to commit suicide, and that is dark and depressing enough on it's own without even adding in any family drama like this movie does. I waited 6 years to watch this movie, avoiding spoilers as best I could, so let's see what I finally think of this movie.
in this movie, when her twin sister disappears in Japan, a young American named Sara (Natalie Dormer) becomes determined to find out what happened to her. Sara's investigation leads her to the legendary Aokigahara Forest, located at the base of Mount Fuji. Accompanied by expatriate Aiden, she enters the mysterious wilderness after being warned to "stay on the path." Her investigation plunges her into a dark world where the angry and tormented souls of the dead prey on those who dare to explore the forest.
My friend Danielle told me that she couldn't believe the twist at the end of this movie, so I knew there was going to be a twist, and I spent the whole movie trying to guess what it would be. It would have been better for me not to worry about a twist and just enjoy the movie as it plays out, because there's seriously not much of a twist anyway, at least not anything I didn't already guess by the time it happened, and the movie is dark and twisted enough on ownit's own, it's not like there's a big "M. Night Shyamalan " kind of twist at bvb the end, so if you're expecting that, you're going to be disappointed. It's mostly just a sad little story about a woman trying to find her sister, and it's got enough jump scares to keep most viewers on their toes, so if that sounds like your jam, check this movie out.
After I took a turn as the Halloween grinch when I didn't like the first Halloweentown movie, my friend recommended that I watch the second movie because she thought I would like that one better, so I waited to check it out until today. Let's see what I think of it. In this sequel, a warlock has stolen Marnie's grandma's spellbook and cast a spell called the Greyspell that reverses all the magic in Halloweentown and turns everything magical normal. The spell will also turn all the humans into whatever costume they're wearing at midnight on Halloween. Suddenly Marnie and her magical friend find themselves in a race against time to get the spellbook back and save all the humans from permanent Halloween horror.
My friend was right, I like this movie much better than the first. It's actually fun like the first one was supposed to be. I like the magic spells and their funny results were actually funny to me instead of being ridiculous like I found the first one. There's not much more I can say about this movie, but it's a fun little Halloween movie to watch with kids and get them interested in horror the way we are. I had a lot of fun with it, and I hope you will too.
When this movie came out over the summer, I was intrigued because it features some teenagers at an LGBTQ conversion camp, and given my experience with conversion therapy, I was interested in seeing what would happen in the movie and how they would portray gay conversion therapy and how much they get right (or wrong) about the therapy. I can tell right from the beginning that this is a different kind of therapy from the one I attended. They're a lot nicer, for one thing, and they say it's a safe space, and the place I went to didn't care about being safe for anyone, but that was back in 1999, so I guess things have changed a lot since then. Let's see how much else is different about this movie. Here goes nothing.
So this movie is about a group of teens at an LGBTQ conversion therapy camp, as I've mentioned before. The teens come from different backgrounds and walks of life, but all of them are there because they're not happy, whether that be not happy with who they are or not happy with parents who want to change them, so all of them are searching for something, if only a way to survive for the next week so they can get home and emancipate themselves. In the midst of therapy, they endure some disturbing psychological tactics while also finding themselves stalked by a mysterious masked killer.
I feel bad for the kids right from the beginning having to put up with the psychological tactics they have to endure. Isolation is a big one. The camp says they don't believe in isolating people, but taking these kids out into the woods and removing them from their friends and family is isolating them, sorry to break it to you. Kevin Bacon is in this movie, and he plays the leader and the head of the camp. I have to say I'm impressed with the casting decision, because he's great as always, but I really hated him in this movie, which I guess means he's doing his job, it's just unsettling. I'm not used to hating him.
At first I thought this movie was going to say that conversion therapy works or is harmless as long as you do it right and create a safe space like this movie says in the beginning. I thought it was going to show a masked killer going after the hapless campers and staff and they were going to portray the staff of the camp as helpless against the killer, but the staff gets some time to show their true colors before the killer starts slicing and dicing everyone in sight. That's when this becomes primarily a slasher movie with some biting social commentary. I appreciated that because I like slashers, and this is a good one.
Check out that tagline! Eight legs, two fangs, and an attitude is right. This movie is not for the faint of heart who are afraid of spiders. I've seen this movie before years ago, but since I'm genuinely terrified of spiders it freaked me out royally. It's cheesy and very 90s (which is nostalgic for me since I was a teenager in the 90s). I haven't seen the movie since I originally saw it years ago, so I'm not sure what to expect, but I'm hoping for some creepy crawly spooky fun. This is one of those family friendly horror flicks that would be fun to watch with kids to help introduce them to this horror loving hobby of ours. Let's see what I think of this one.
In this movie, a nature photographer played by Mark L. Taylor dies while on assignment in Venezuela and an exotic poisonous spider hitches a ride in his coffin to his hometown in rural California, where a new doctor has recently moved into town. Aracnophobe doctor Ross Jennings, played by Jeff Daniels, has just moved in with his wife Molly, played by Harley Jane Kozac, and their two young kids. As the town's residents start turning up dead, Jennings begins to suspect spiders, and he must learn to face his fears as he and a no-nonsense exterminator, played by John Goodman, fight to stop a deadly spider infestation. Way to move to spiderville USA, you dipwit.
There are plenty of shots of creepy-crawly spiders in this movie that sent chills down my spine. There's a shower scene with a spider that's pretty terrifying, and one scene where a spider crawls out of a dead guy's nostril that's pretty gruesome. I've gotta tell you, if spiders were swarming my bathroom, I'd want to run, not hit them with a towel while yelling at them. That never leads to anything good (and in this case, it almost leads to death, you idiot) so I would be much more cautious than the geniuses in this movie. I mean, they know at this point that deadly spiders are attacking, so it's not like we can use the excuse that they didn't know. The big scary scene that is the tour de force of the movie takes place in a cellar, and there's enough foreshadowing that we know it's about to happen, so it's effectively terrifying, especially if you're afraid of spiders. If spiders freak you out, this movie might be for you, I for one liked it, cheesy 90s themes and all.
I've managed to avoid seeing this movie over the years. I've seen most of Hitchcock's work over the years, my mom made sure I saw some of his movies when I was younger because she considered them classics, but this one and Psycho were too much like horror movies for her, so she wouldn't let us watch them, and I just never got around to watching this one. It seemed really ridiculous as an idea for a movie. Suddenly all the birds in the world start attacking the people, mass chaos ensues? I don't know about this movie, but I guess we'll find out when I watch it today. Let's see what I think.
In this movie, Melanie Daniels, played by Tippi Hedren, meets Mitch Brenner, played by Rod Taylor, in a San Francisco pet store and decides to follow him home. She brings with her a gift for Mitch: two lovebirds, and the two strike up an unlikely romance. One day, Mitch's sister decides to throw a party, and for some reason birds start attacking children at the party. Soon a huge assault starts on the town by attacking birds. Will Mitch and Melanie be able to survive the onslaught of mysterious bird attacks?
Boy, when Hitchcock wanted to he could create for himself some unlikable characters. Melanie is a prissy stuck-up jerk, and Mitch is an arrogant twat. I'm officially rooting for the birds in this movie. It also takes a long time for things to get going. it's over an hour before anything concrete actually happens in this movie, which reminds me of Psycho, but it doesn't take a whole hour for everything to finally start happening in that movie. I can see why people would get sick of waiting for something to happen and give up on this movie.
it takes an hour and 52 minutes before the first death happens in this movie, and it happens off camera, though it's gruesome enough with someone's eyes pecked out by birds. Honestly, my mom may have thought this was too much of a horror movie, but if she really wanted to keep us from watching this movie it would be more accurate to say this movie is too boring for your kids to watch rather than saying it's too horrifying. At least Melanie gets a little better at this point of the movie and she isn't so selfish anymore, but actually starts doing things to help the other characters, so I can see why someone would want to be in a relationship with her. Mitch isn't in the movie much at this point, so he doesn't have a chance to redeem himself here, but with the birds finally attacking in force there's enough going on to distract me from worrying about what a jerk he is.
The action is still choppy at this point, there will be a scary bird attack, then a bunch of people talking, then another bird attack, then a lot of talking again, and during the talking parts it gets pretty frustrating waiting for something to happen. There's one scene in particular that takes place in a diner with all the adults arguing whether it makes sense for birds to be attacking humans, and this goes on for ten minutes before anything happens again, and it's very frustrating hearing people speculating whether birds would really attack people when we know that the birds are attacking people because we've seen it happen. Arguing isn't going to help, but that's what people do, they argue. If this movie happened today people would be arguing on facebook about the bird attacks while everything burned down around them. While the bird attacks are happening, the movie is interesting enough, but the long periods of down time between attacks can get really boring. I guess that's just the nature of a movie like this. There's a scene where Melanie is pausing outside a door to a room, deciding to see whether the birds are inside, that has some genuinely good tension (though why would you go in that room? You can HEAR the birds, you know they're in there). Then someone comes up with the brilliant idea to go outside and see if there's any news on the car radio (I would veto that idea, since I don't want to die, but the characters in this movie seem to court death for some reason). All in all, this movie would probably be better with some more likeable characters, and if the characters didn't do stupid things like bringing their pet birds along on a road trip when all the birds in the world have started to go crazy) and if it had an actual ending and didn't just stop almost in midsentence and call that an ending. I would love to see this movie remade to see what they could do with this idea today, but this movie just falls flat for me.
Since I watched "Scream, Queen: My Nightmare on Elm Street" earlier in this challenge, I was in the mood to watch "A Nightmare on Elm Street II: Freddy's Revenge," so I decided to give it a watch tonight. I haven't watched this one since the day I watched it when I was in jail, so it's been about a year, and in that time I've gained a new appreciation for this movie, so it will be interesting watching this with my new perspective. I started counting all the overtly "gay" references in the movie, so that will be interesting to note. Let's do this thing!
In this movie, Jesse Walsh (Mark Patton) moves with his family into the home of the lone survivor from a series of attacks by dream-stalking monster Freddy Krueger (Robert Englund). There, Jesse is bedeviled by nightmares and inexplicably violent impulses. It turns out Freddy needs a host body to carry out his gruesome vendetta against the youth of Springwood, Ohio. While Freddy gains influence, Jesse and his girlfriend, Lisa (Kim Myers), race against the clock trying to figure out what's going on and if they can stop it before it's too late.
Overtly Gay References In this Movie
Jesse's friend said the coach is into gay S and M clubs and pretty boys like Jesse.
Phallic snake around jesse's neck
Gay dance in room, closing drawer with ass
Scene in gay S and M club
Coach looking gay and telling Jesse to hit the shower
Room full of falling balls
Tying coach up naked and whipping his ass with towels
Freddy is this thing inside him that he's afraid to tell anyone about that he is scared will come out of him
Leaves make out session with girlfriend to go to his boy friend's house (who says "she's in the cabana waiting for you and you wanna sleep with me!")
He's inside me and he wants to take me again
The "blow job" scene with Freddy's glove
I might be stretching it with some of these, but I think they fit, at least to me. Of course overtly gay scenes aren't the only things this movie has to offer, there are some cool scenes to be had here.
It's cool how they find Nancy's diary in Jesse's closet, I forgot about that part, but it adds some pathos to the movie. I also forgot how much stuff catches on fire, like the pet birds and the toaster. Freddy died by fire so it makes sense that he can harness fire to make himself appear. And the scene where Freddy tries to make Jesse kill his little sister is a nice nod to how Freddy was a child murderer, so he's up to his old tricks there. Also the scene where Freddy bursts out of Jesse's skin to kill his friend is really cool. If Freddy Kruger is coming after you, don't throw a curtain at him, it won't help. Get it together, Lisa. You're gonna have to do better than that if you're gonna fight Freddy Kruger. "You are all my children now" is still an awesome line. Lisa is pretty badass going to that boiler room to get Freddy after the scene at the pool. All in all this movie definitely isn't the worst movie in the series like I used to say it is, and I like it more every time I watch it.
I'll be the first to admit that I don't know what this movie is even about. When it came out, people were arguing about it in Twitter, and I had to run away screaming in order to avoid spoilers, but I caught some of the bickering secondhand, and caught a few comments about this movie being "feminist" and "woke," though I ran away before I could catch whether people were saying it was a GOOD thing or a BAD thing that the movie was "woke" and "feminist," so I don't know how to take those comments. I guess we'll find out when I watch the movie, now won't I? Here goes nothing.
Let's see if I can write a description of what happens in this movie without giving too much away, shall we? So in this movie, recently divorced woman Harper retreats to the countryside in the wake of tragic events that threaten to change her life forever. Unfortunately, her unease grows at the town's leering and eerily similar men. Right old descendants from the planet caveman, they are. It seems that Harper's arrival in the villiage has awakened something primal, something evil, and something possibly deadly. Will Harper be able to keep her waits about her and survive?
One of the posters for this movie says that "what haunts you will find you," and if that's not cryptic I don't know what is, but I suppose it's true enough. This movie is absolutely beautiful with lush landscapes that make me want to move there immediately, though I'm sure once scary things start happening I'll change my mind. As you can see from the movie posters above, the movie is gorgeous, a real feast for the eyes. I don't think I've seen a movie as beautiful as this one since "Midsommar." People said that movie had feminist undertones as well. Lord save me from beautiful feminist horror.
I don't know whether I'd call this movie "Feminist," but the men in this movie are very annoying. They seem to wander around being creepy and argumentative. It doesn't help that the main character, Harper, isn't the most reliable narrator in the world. I don't know if I trust a single thing she sees, which makes watching the movie a very frustrating experience because I'm not sure if anything's real or not. I think I knew before the movie was halfway over with that this movie would turn out like this. There seems to be a faction of filmmakers that think the less sense a movie makes, the better it is. The problem is, very few filmmakers can churn out one of these arthouse movies and make it still be likeable. "Mother!" managed it. And "Midsommar" left some confusing questions in the end, but at least it felt like it took place on earth. I don't know what planet "Men" is from, but it's not a place I ever want to visit. I don't know what I was hoping for, but it wasn't this. What a letdown.
Why in sam hell am I watching this movie? I'm terrified of heights. like TERRIFIED of them, like I'm freaking out right now just THINKING about the premise of this movie. When I first heard about this movie, I vowed never to watch it because it just sounded too nerve wracking to me. One of my friends watched this movie, and she mentioned how it unnerved her and she isn't even scared of heights the way I am, and she made me promise not to watch this movie (sorry Michelle!) but here I am, watching the movie I'm sure is going to freak me out. Here goes nothing.
So this movie is about best friends Becky and Hunter, who are all about pushing limits and living life to the fullest by living life dangerously and conquering their fears. However, after they climb 2000 feet to the top of an abandoned radio tower, they find themselves stranded with no way down. Now, their expert climbing skills are put to the ultimate test as they desperately fight to survive the elements, a lack of supplies, and vertigo-inducing heights. Basically the worst nightmare for someone who's afraid of heights, so I should NOT be watching this movie, and yet here we are.
There's a movie called "Frozen" that is about three friends who wind up stranded at the top of a ski lift, which is frighteningly high up but not nearly as high as the tower in this movie. I can't imagine climbing anything like this, especially not after witnessing my boyfriend die on a mountain climb like the main character in this movie, Becky, just did. I have to say, if I'd just climbed to the top of the tower like these two had, that would be enough for me, and I wouldn't need to hang off the edge of the tower like they do. My palms are sweating just watching this movie and I haven't even climbed anything.
I knew that in order for this movie to happen the ladder was going to have to fall apart, so intellectually I was ready, but emotionally I wasn't ready because my stomach dropped out my spleen when it happened onscreen. I'm sure that some people will say this isn't a horror movie, but in the course of this film I felt more sheer terror than I did throughout the rest of this challenge with all of the other movies I've watched for this challenge, I swear. in this movie, the wind and the vultures are bigger, scarier monsters than Freddy or Jason or Michael Myers could ever be. Even the sun is an enemy, drying their skin and dehydrating them while they fight the elements trying to survive. The two female leads, Virginia Gardiner and Grace Caroline Currey, do an amazing job, and Jeffrey Dean Morgan even has a small but important role as Becky's father. I'm impressed that with basically two people and a metal pole this movie held my attention for an hour and 47 minutes without me getting bored once. Bravo.
I remember reading this short story when I was 13. It reminded me of a story I read in a Twilight Zone comic book in the 80s about a man going back to the town he left as a kid and encountering some less than friendly spirits from his past. That story made a big impact on me because it was one of the first horror stories I read, and it cemented my obsession with horror stories that deal with unfinished business and unhappy spirits and buried secrets from the past that come back to haunt you in the present. I always meant to watch this movie adaptation of the story when it first came out in the 90s, but I never got around to it, and now there are like, two or three sequels floating around in movie land. Let's see what I think about this movie.
This movie is about a high school teacher named Jim, played by Tim Matheson, who reluctantly returns to his hometown with his wife Sally played by Brooke Adams, so that he can take a job teaching at the local high school. Jim is haunted by the childhood memory of his brother Wayne being murdered by a group of teenage thugs who were hit by a train before they had a chance to kill him, too. The death takes place in the 60s in this movie, though it would have been the 50s in the original story. This memory is understandably haunting for Jim, but soon he begins to be haunted in a much more literal way by malevolent spirits. Will Jim be able to rid himself of the spirits before it's too late?
This movie originally came out on TV in 1991. The 90s were an interesting time for made-for-tv horror flicks, and we saw some like "Trilogy of Terror II" as well as other Stephen King adaptations like "The Tommyknockers" and "The Langoliers." This being a made for TV movie, there's not much gore, so the scares are more important than the gross-out as far as the plot is concerned. I feel bad for Jim trying to teach a class of high school deviants who obviously don't respect him, and he doesn't get much support from his boss the principal of the school. It's gotta be hard doing a job like that with no support, it's a thankless job. And it definitely makes his character more sympathetic.
This is another one of those movies where the main character is obviously haunted before anything supernatural even happens. You can't really blame him either, after everything he went through with his brother when he was just a kid. At least his wife finally believes him and actually helps him out when it's time to get rid of the ghosts once and for all. If I'm being honest, this movie is overlong and it could have stood being chopped down some. it would have made an excellent hour long episode of Masters of Horror, but at an hour and 38 minutes it just rambles too much and takes too long to get to the point. It's a shame, too, because there are some genuinely good moments in here that would have made for a great story. I do love Stephen King, but the man has a tendency to ramble on a little too much, which is the great thing about reading his short stories, because he doesn't have time to ramble when his format is going to be shorter. What this movie does is takes a short story and makes it longer again by adding too much padding and too much rambling for my taste, so I can't recommend this movie. Sometimes they come back and they refuse to shut up.
I tell people that this is my Exorcist movie, because it's my favorite exorcist movie by far. I've never liked The Exorcist no matter how many times I've watched it over the years, but I loved this one from the first time I saw it. I don't know what it is about this movie that I love so much, but every time I watch it I find something new to scare me. This time around I noticed how the priest who dies near the beginning of the movie is such good friends with the cop in the movie, and the cop is obviously mourning his friend while he investigates the murders in the movie, and how that affects the way he acts throughout the movie. I also noticed how many staircases appear throughout the movie and how they help build the suspense in so many scenes. The movie is pretty brilliant and it gives me something new to appreciate every time I watch it.
This movie is about a police lieutenant played by George C. Scott who notices similarities between his recent case and the murders committed by the "Gemini killer" who died by electric chair 15 years ago. He soon discovers a hospitalized mental patient who claims to be the Gemini killer, but who resembles a priest the lieutenant once knew who died during an exorcism. Soon more bodies are piling up, and the lieutenant looks for more similarities between the two supposedly dead men.
The atmosphere in this movie is ridiculous because it's so tense that even when nothing is happening it has me on the edge of my seat waiting for something to happen, so every loud noise is a jump scare because it has me jumping out of my skin. I've seen this movie so many times that there's not much more I can say about it. It has the best jump scare ever in it, and the best movie decapitation of all time too. If you haven't seen this movie, you need to see it.
I watched the first Descent movie in theaters with a friend right after it came out, and she and I both loved it. I remember getting into an argument with another fan about the movie, and his snotty attitude left a bad taste in my mouth and I haven't watched the movie since then, but I remember it being good and it's a shame to let one douchey fanboy ruin the whole experience for me, so I'm going into this with an open mind and I'll see if I like this movie on its own merits.
In this movie, Sarah is an amnesiac who doesn't remember anything about the nightmare spelunking trip that resulted in the deaths of her friends. As the inky survivor found, the police and rescuers turn to Sarah to help guide them to the rest of the women, so she is forced to return to the caves that housed the cannibalistic creatures from the first movie. Will Sarah make it out alive this time around, or will she find herself at the mercy of the monsters she escaped during the first movie?
I don't know what it is about mortal peril that brings out the worst in people, but this movie definitely shows that. I'm getting ahead of myself though. First let me say that the gore in this movie is pretty awesome. The monsters from the first movie that loved to chow down on human flesh are up to their old tricks again, and they have a new cast of characters to snack on in this movie. There's a search party looking for the women who went missing in the first movie, when suddenly they come upon a bedraggled Sarah, who has survived the events of the first movie but doesn't remember anything. The cops are desperate for clues, though, so they force Sarah to join the search party and head back into the caves, which puts her on a collision course with the monsters from the first movie.
I wonder why they call creatures "cannibalistic" when they eat human flesh? That's these guys though, and they have zero chill when they're hungry, eating up half the cast before the movie is half over. That's when we get to see a huge example of mortal peril bringing out the worst in people. One of the cops is determined to find the women from the first movie, and he doesn't care who he has to sacrifice in order to do it (which never ends well). The creatures aren't the only ones to fear underground (or even above ground in this movie). I must admit, I don't totally understand what happened at the end of this movie, but suffice it to say that the good guys don't always win, and by the end of this movie there weren't really any good guys left. This is a decent little creature feature, and it's a worthy successor to the original (no matter what douchey fanboys say) so I'm glad I checked it out.
The first Cloverfield movie was a big mess to me. it was a bunch of people who openly didn't like each other making a video supposedly as a gift for one of their friends where they talked about how they didn't like the guy on video, then all of a sudden the end of the world starts to happen and they decide to keep filming, and we get to see what happens as creatures take over the world and it was a cool idea that just didn't feel like it worked for me in the end, so when this movie was announced as a pseudo sequel, I was curious to see what they would do with the story, but time got away from me so I never managed to check it out until tonight. Let's see what I finally think of this movie after all this time.
In this movie, a woman suffers a car accident and wakes up in an underground bunker with a mysterious, controlling man named Howard who insists that there was a massive chemical attack above ground, well, he's actually not sure if it's chemical or biological, but the air is contaminated from the attack and so the only safe place is underground with him. She is disoriented at first, and she's not sure who to trust. There is another man in the bunker with them named Emmett who believes the story about the world ending and their only means of survival being to stay inside the bunker, but the woman (named Michelle) isn't sure if she believes everything Howard says. Despite the bunker having all the comforts of home, Howard's controlling nature makes her want to leave the bunker and take her chances outside, in spite of seeing evidence of the horrible things that can happen if you're exposed to the air outside. As tensions rise, Michelle has to take matters into her own hands in order to save herself.
It would be just my luck that the world would be ending and I would be stuck with a controlling guy who didn't let me go outside because the air was supposedly contaminated. I said similar things when I saw the movie "The Mist," like that it would be just my luck to be stuck at the end of the world with people like that. This movie is like a lot of post-apocalyptic movies, with the survivors barely holding it together, though given the controlling and paranoid nature of Howard, the people in this movie held it together for longer than I would have expected them to do (probably longer than I could have, with my big mouth).
This movie seems to be picking up where the original Cloverfield left off, and taking place sometime around the events of the first movie, though we don't know how long the people are in the bunker, I'm going to say two months or so? Which is a long time to survive with circumstances like these, a paranoid control freak holed up with two people he barely trusts in an underground bunker like this. Once things get going the movie flows pretty quickly, and that's a testament to the performances of the leads, Mary Elizabeth Winstead as Michelle, John Goodman as Howard, and John Gallagher Jr. as Emmett. The three of them give great performances (John Goodman is particularly menacing in his role, and he really creeped me out). Overall I would say I definitely enjoyed this movie more than the first one, and I'm glad I finally decided to check it out.
I heard a few things about this movie before I saw it, but I managed to mostly avoid spoilers as much as I could. I knew it had something to do with a woman who finds herself mysteriously able to travel through time to the 1960s. I also knew that the cast included Anya Taylor Joy, who has become something of a scream queen in recent years, with roles in movies like The Witch and Split, and I really like her so I was excited to see her in this movie and see what she does with the role.
In this movie, Eloise (Ellie) is a young woman who dreams of becoming a fashion designer. She is in love with the swinging fashion and music of the 60s. Her mother, who was also a designer, committed suicide when Ellie was a child. Ellie sometimes seems to see her mother's ghost in mirrors. When she first moves to London, she finds herself living among some classic mean girls, so she moves into a studio apartment where she can live by herself. One day, she finds herself mysteriously able to enter the 1960s, where she encounters a dazzling, larger than life wannabe singer. Be careful what you wish for however, because the glamour begins to crack and splinter into something much darker than she could have ever imagined.
I got major "Carnival of Souls" vibes from this movie, which is interesting, because that's a horror movie from the 60s, the decade with which Ellie is obsessed in this movie. in "Carnival of Souls," a woman is in a car accident and she starts to have strange visions of figures following her everywhere she goes, ghoulish figures with black eyes and gaping mouths. In "Last Night in Soho," Ellie starts to see visions of faceless men that blend together and shapeshift as they come towards her, arms reaching, trying to grab her. This movie also serves serious "Suspiria" vibes, as flashing neon lights and shadows bland together to create a trippy, mind-bending set of visions that make it hard to tell exactly what is fantasy and what is reality.
This kind of movie is rough on my migraines, because the flashing lights really do a number on me (I used to call "Suspiria" the migraine movie because any time I watched it I was almost sure to get a migraine from all the flashing lights). Halfway through "Last Night in Soho" my eyes were already throbbing. I'd hate for someone with epilepsy to watch this movie and go into a seizure because of all the flashing lights. The plot is twisty and turny, and Ellie isn't the most reliable narrator. I figured out what was going on before the movie revealed the plot twist, but it's like watching a beautiful trainwreck, you can see it coming but there's nothing you can do to stop it while it barrels down the track toward the inevitable conclusion. The movie is absolutely beautiful, visually stunning, and though it's hard to follow the plot because of the unreliable narrator, the movie is rewarding enough if you stick it out until the end.
This movie came out last year while I was in jail, and I was obsessed as soon as I saw the teaser trailer on TV. It looked great, and the movie was produced by Guillermo del Toro, who is one of my favorites, so I was sure it would be good (and probably depressing, since his movies tend to be depressing and dark). So I was definitely excited to check this one out today, but a little worried that it would be too depressing for me. The myth of theWendigo has made for some good movies in the past, and a great episode of the show Supernatural, so let's see what the movie does with this story.
In this movie, a small town Oregon teacher and her brother, the local sheriff, discover that one of her young students in harboring a dangerous secret that could prove dangerous if they don't do something about it. The student's name is Lucas, and he is harboring signs of physical and emotional abuse, as well as an attic at home that is off-limits for some strange reason. Will Julia, the teacher (played by Keri Russell), and her brother Paul, be able to unravel the mystery before it turns deadly?
This movie is very dark, and I don't mean that metaphorically, it's very hard to see in some scenes what is going on because of the darkness in the scenes. This puts us in the same predicament as the characters, who have to stumble around in the darkness trying to figure out what is going on. Keri Russell plays the teacher in this movie and I haven't seen her in anything in awhile, so it was nice to see her in this movie. She plays a teacher who really cares about her students, and she has a special bond with Lucas, the boy who is harboring all these dark secrets. Jeremy T. Thomas does a great job playing Lucas. Jesse Plemons also does a great job as Paul, Julia's brother, though I wanted to snack him for refusing to believe that something supernatural is going on even after many unexplainable events happen. Why do characters in these movies always refuse to believe in ghosts and spirits and demons?
the legend of the Wendigo is a familiar one for me because I've heard it before several times over the years. It talks of a man who was lost in the woods who had to resort to cannibalism in order to survive, and it turned him crazy, and over the course of time he became possessed by a vengeful spirit that turned him into a horrible antlered creature that roams the woods now looking for a host to infect. You would think Julia's character would be the one who didn't believe in the myth of the Wendigo, since the opening scenes show her teaching her class about myths and fables, but she comes around quicker than her brother does. She's more willing to fight the evil no matter what happens, which is much more helpful in a movie like this where obviously supernatural things are happening. I felt bad for the characters in this movie, weighted down by abuse and dark family secrets already before anything otherworldly even happens. No wonder they all look so haunted. Like I expected, this movie is dark and depressing and heavy, but it's definitely worth checking out.
The first time I watched this movie it was on Halloween during one of these challenges, and I was so tired I kept falling asleep and waking up and rewinding the movie and watching it again. I did that like four or five times throughout the course of the movie and it pissed me off so bad because I really liked the movie, I just couldn't stay awake. I vowed one day I would watch it when I was feeling better and I wouldn't keep passing out and having to restart it because I was suffering from overload on some day when I crammed one too many movies in (this year I haven't watched more than five in a day, but in past years I would watch like ten in one day, and my poor brain can't take that overload of information anymore). So today, this is the fourth movie I'm watching, but my brain is still fresh, so I should be ok. Bring on the sci-fi horror!
This movie is about two astronauts named Payton and Bower who awake from what they assume is a long slumber in a hypersleep chamber with no memory of who they are or what their mission might be. Payton takes over running the radio transmitter, while Bower goes out to investigate the rest of the ship, which appears to be eerily abandoned. Unfortunately, they soon realize they're not alone, and the fate of mankind hinges on what they're going to do next.
Payton is played by Dennis Quaid, and Bower is played by Ben Foster, so there's some decent star power behind this movie. As you can see from the three movie posters highlighted above, there were lots of cool designs, and I found it too hard to choose just one. I hear this movie accused of ripping off Event Horizon a lot, but I think it's pretty different from that movie (which I love, by the way, even though it's cool to hate on it now). I like how the movie starts and you're literally in the dark about what's going on, what's happened to our characters, and you only learn in bits and pieces at a time what is happening now. We're just as clueless as our characters, and it's very disorienting.
Yeah, this movie really has no resemblance to "Event Horizon." I mean, they're both movies set in space on spaceships, but that's about it as far as similarities go. Where in "Event Horizon" the villain is really the ship, in this movie the villains are evolved mutant creatures that have a penchant for human flesh, and a mysterious condition called "Pandorum" which is a madness that takes over people when they travel in space. It's never really clear what "Pandorum" is, just that it takes over people's minds and bodies until they're not totally human anymore, and no one on the ship remembers exactly what happened and they all act like they're insane, so it seems that madness is everywhere you look on this ship, so anyone could have Pandorum as far as I'm concerned, and that's the scariest part of all.
When this movie was more than two thirds of the way over with and I still had no idea what was going on, I began to get a bit irritated. It's fine to have a slow burn and unreliable narrators, but after awhile it gets ridiculous and I just can't with this movie. I get it, flesh eating bad guys are scary, but we still didn't know yet what the ship was supposed to be doing or what its mission was, or why everyone left alive on the ship can't remember what happened, or who's crazy and who's done (or if everyone is insane and they're all just having a big crazy party in space). The funniest thing is when the bad guy is giving his long, explainy speech about what happened, the description doesn't make any sense, so you come out knowing less about what's going on than when you started the movie. I literally hate it when that happens. I had to look up the movie's Wikipedia page in order to understand what happened in the movie, and I hate it when that happens, too. Overall this movie is disjointed and messy, but it has a lot of intriguing ideas. If that's your jam, you might want to check it out. I mostly wished I'd watched "Event Horizon" instead.
Speaking of sequels, this one has been out for a little while, but I hadn't had a chance to see it over the years, so today was as good as any to finally check it out. I remember when I first saw the original Zombieland. Comedies are a big gamble for me because I'm really picky when it comes to comedies. I often find them stupid when they're supposed to be funny, and unless they have Adam Sandler is in them, I more often hate them than liking them. I was also not looking forward to seeing a horror comedy where the jokes read like "horror fans are stupid, hahahahaha!" Zombieland was one of those rare comedies that managed to be funny without insulting anyone's intelligence, though, so I had high Hope's for this sequel. Let's do this thing.
Zombie slayers Tallahassee, Columbus, Wichita and Little Rock, are living in the White House when this movie opens, but Witchita and Little Rock decide to leave the nest, which prompts Tallahassee and Columbus to decide to leave as well, and they end up heading for Graceland in Memphis Tennessee. Along their merry way they find other post apocalyptic survivors and some who have taken refuge in a commune. The ragtag band of fighters must rely on their waits and weapons more than ever before as they find themselves fighting a new breed of zombie that is smarter, faster, and seemingly indestructible.
Everyone is older and wiser in this movie. Abigail Breslin in particular is all grown up, and she is getting ready to fly the cooper and seeking out people her own age, much to the chagrin of her older sister, who doesn't want her hooking up with a pacifist (how is a pacifist going to fight zombies? I'm guessing this won't end well). Zoey Deutch is in this movie too, playing Madison, a new rival for Columbus's affections. She's funny because she's kind of an airhead and a softie and everything Witchita is not, which causes a lot of friction between them.
You may be wondering what the zombies are like in this movie, and the answer is STRONG. The zombies are evolving and becoming a stronger, faster, and almost indestructible threat. This movie definitely takes the "sequels must be bigger and badder than the original" rule to heart too, especially with the conclusion (I have two words for you: zombie jump. Don't even ask, it's a sight to behold and you just have to see it first yourself). I have to say, this sequel lives up to the name of the first movie, and I'm glad I watched it.
Check out these cool posters I found online. I love the different designs. They went all out designing posters for this movie. I hope they spent as much time and effort writing the script and crafting the movie as they spent on the designs for the posters. I was excited to hear they made a sequel to this movie, and it's not one of those direct to DVD in-name-only sequels that has nothing to do with the original movie, either. It has returning characters from the first movie and an interesting premise, so I'm excited to check it out and see how I like it.
In this movie, six people find their worst nightmares come true. They find themselves trapped inside another series of escape rooms. slowly uncovering what they have in common in order to survive. Unfortunately for them, this nightmare is all too familiar as they discover that all of them have at least one thing in common: they've all played this game before. I hate it when a group of psychos kidnap me and put me through a torturous experience that I only just barely manage to survive, only to find myself right back where I started, kidnapped by psychos acting out the deadly, sadistic escape rooms in order to survive.
I thought the whole point of the escape rooms in the first movie was to make it so there were no survivors? The existence of this many survivors would suggest that they've been very sloppy indeed to have let this many people escape. Someone hasn't been doing their job. Tsk tsk. Typically in sequels everything has to be twice as big and twice as bad as it was in the first movie, so I was ready for there to be twice as big and twice as deadly puzzles this time around. The first puzzle is very electrifying (sorry, I had to) but it is bigger than what they were facing the first time around in the first movie. The second room is definitely bigger than anything they faced in the first movie too. Who is funding this operation? It must have cost a fortune to build all these rooms. Is this what rich people are doing with all their money? You have to wonder.
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One of the characters in this sequel is a priest. It doesn't say whether he's an Episcopal priest or a Catholic priest, but in my headcanon he's an Episcopal priest, and he's a good guy, too, trying to save others above himself. I appreciated that heroism in a character, even if the other characters didn't always appreciate it. The escape rooms pack a big punch this time around. There's quicksand, a sinking lighthouse, and a room that gives new meaning to the term "acid rain." Plus just when you think it's over, surprise bitch, it's never over. I have to wonder if there's going to be an Escape Room III coming out next. For now, I'm happy with this sequel and I'm glad I checked it out.
This is one of those movies I watched while I was in jail, so I saw it then, but I wanted to watch it again when I didn't have to watch it through bars, so I was excited to check it out today. The very idea of an escape room gives me anxiety. Trapped in a room where you have to figure out a riddle before you can escape? Who thinks that sounds fun? I don't want to do that even if you're not going to kill me if I don't escape in time. Uh-uh, no way, count me out. But this movie manages to take the idea and run with it, because in this escape room, if you don't figure it out in time, you DO die. Great, way to make my nightmares come true.
In this movie, six strangers, two women and four men, answer a mysterious invitation that leads them to an escape room, where they compete to see who can figure out the series of puzzles in time in order to win a $10,000 cash prize. What starts out as seemingly innocent fun soon turns deadly, however, as they realize each room is an elaborate trap that is part of a sadistic game of life or death. If they don't figure it out in time, they die for real. Gee, that sounds like so much fun, sign me up NEVER.
The movie doesn't spend too much time introducing us to the characters before putting them in mortal peril. It's just like "wham, bam, thank you ma'am," aaaannnd they're dying. it kind of reminds me of one of the Saw movies, where they don't figure out until way too late that they're supposed to work together to escape the trap or they all die. At least these people start out working together to escape the PG13 Saw trap they've found themselves in. Lest you think this movie is going to be an easy watch because it's PG13 instead of R, the traps are very sadistic. There's not much gore but there is a lot of violence against these poor characters. I feel bad for them.
I suspect that whether you feel sorry for the characters or not will determine whether you like this movie or not, or at least whether you're invested in what happens to them. Not all of the characters are likeable of course, but I felt bad for them just in general because of the horrifying situation they found themselves in. As one character says at one point, "that is the second time this floor has tried to kill me!" What do you do when the floor is trying to kill you? When everything you've taken for granted your entire life is just turned on its head and you can't trust the floor not to kill you. And my comparison to Saw wasn't exactly accurate, because in this movie the people watching behind the scenes don't want them to work together to solve the puzzle. As their numbers dwindle, it becomes increasingly clear that they want the people in the puzzles to fight each other in order to survive. As if this escape room weren't already messed up enough. This movie is trippy and it messes with my head, but I really enjoyed it. Not bad for a PG13 Saw knockoff. Give this one a chance.
