2011 October Horror Movie Challenge Movie 1: Them (1954)

I've waited long enough to watch this movie. I bought it years ago and haven't gotten around to watching it until now. Surprisingly, for a 1950s era sci-fi movie about giant ants, it holds up pretty well. The script tosses in some explanation about how the atomic bomb dropped 9 years before the movie's release date had a hand in mutating the ants to giant proportions, but it's wise enough not to try and over-explain everything, thus making the plot seem even more ridiculous. The acting is good as well. The little girl in the opening sequences plays shocked and scared very well, and the small-town cop Ben is likable (even if he seems to be perpetually on duty 24/7 despite having a pregnant wife and two kids). The giant ants are creepy and surprisingly effective (with today's technology we seem to have only been able to make giant insects look WORSE with our computer generated imagery than this movie from the 1950s). We get to see some people get chomped by ants, hear some freaky ant-communication screeching, and listen to precious lines like "Saliva is the only thing holding me together right now, too." This movie is a fun watch. Good way to kick off the festivities.

Insidious

This movie gave me about five heart attacks and a few images that will stick with me and probably pop up whenever I try to go to sleep for the next 30 years. great. The only downfall of this movie was the two techs who helped investigate the paranormal happenings with the psychic woman, Elise. I think these guys were supposed to be "comic relief" but like most comic relief when it's shoehorned into a movie where it doesn't fit, they were annoying instead of funny. I got over it, though, since everything else about this movie was good. It reminded me of other movies and horror stories (Stephen King's novella "The Sun Dog," the movie "Poltergeist," the movie "Wes Craven's A New Nightmare") but not in a bad way, more like they were reminiscent of things that had used similar themes in the past, but it definitely put a new spin on the "haunting" subgenre. In fact, I had managed to forget about "The Sun Dog" and how it scared me so badly I never wanted to take pictures again, so thanks a lot for reminding me and making me afraid of my camera again, "Insidious."

All in all, highly recommended.

Red and Case 39

Devil

I've recently seen two movies from two of my favorite directors, and it's given me a lot to think about. "My Soul to Take" is a movie by Wes Craven, who's been one of my favorite directors since I was a kid, and who's recently made movies that a lot of people don't like, which cause them to say he's "lost it" ("it" being whatever he had once that made his movies good to begin with). Since I like the movie, I don't agree with the,, but I can definitely see what people are talking about when they call the movie dumb, or incoherent or whatever they hate about it that makes them dislike it so much.

M. Night Shaymalan is another story. He burst onto the scene with "The Sixth Sense" (he directed "Wide Awake" previously, which is actually a good movie that deserves more attention than it gets, but "The Sixth Sense" is the movie everyone remembers Shaymalan for) and then made a name for himself as the director who always brings the "twist" ending. The problem with that, of course, is that when people come into your movies expecting a twist, they're wise to your game, and it makes it harder and harder to actually surprise them. The "twist" endings got more and more elaborate over time, and most people were pissed at the "twist" in the movie "The Village" (I liked it, of course). Then when he made a movie where he tried to do something different, drawing on folklore and fairy tales and exploring the nature of belief and doubt, everyone hated it (I of course loved "Lady in the Water"). Then he tried to return to the "twist" genre, giving us "The Happening" which remains the only movie of his that I've seen that I DON'T like. I haven't seen "The Last Airbender," but it's based on a beloved kids show with a cult following and so it pissed almost everyone off. Lately, people have been so annoyed with his ego and his overblown plot twists that they're all going back an complaining about movies that they all liked back when the movies first came out (I was around when "Signs" was in theaters, I remember how everyone raved about it, so they can't pretend they didn't like it now).

My biggest problem with M. Night Shaymalan isn't that his movies are BAD. I've actually enjoyed moist of his movies, even when they're pretentious and overwrought and sinking in their own melodrama (that's what finally killed "The Happening" for me in the end). I think he's got an ego the size of Rhode Island, but it would be hard not to, what with everyone going on about how brilliant he was for such a long time. When he's on his game, he can actually do a great job weaving complex plotlines together into a story that's fun to watch as it unravels. In "Devil," I think he's totally on his game. This movie was fun to watch from start to finish, and the twists add to the story instead of distracting from it or getting in the way. I think "Devil" is a true return to form and it reminds me why I liked Shaymalan so much, back before everyone got so sick of him. The man knows how to tell a story. Maybe he forgot that when he decided to spend all his time trying to pone-up himself, but when he sits down and tries to actually tell a story, he can do that better than a lot of other directors I know. That's what made me a fan in the first place. If he sticks to that, it will KEEP me a fan.

Saw: The Final Chapter

I believe this is the "final chapter" like I believe there's a Santa Claus, but I'm also not upset at the prospect of more movies. This movie had problems, but it's FAR better than the seventh installment of any film series has any right to be, and it still managed to bring the twists, turns, and suspense. I also loved the gore and cared about the characters, so I really enjoyed it.

My Soul to Take

Everyone else hated this, so of course, I loved it. Story of my life. It's far from perfect but I think it does some really interesting things. It's a very experimental movie for Wes Craven to be making this late in his career. Of course, my friend Jes says "Experimental? Is that what we call it when it doesn't make sense?" so to each their own.

Movie Marathon!

What I love about these four movies is that seeing them all together here makes me realize what a weird freak I am that I thought these four movies would go together in a movie marathon. But really, they do. I mean, three of them are love stories (yes, "Zombieland" is a love story, fuck off) and "Attack of the Giant Leeches" well...the less said about that movie the better. But it was fun to watch and mock anyway. So yay.

The Collector

This movie actually has a somewhat original premise: a burglar breaks into a house, but unbeknownst to him, a serial killer is already inside. People keep comparing these movies to the "Saw" movies, but really, there aren't that many similarities. So both movies feature torture, big deal, the premise for the two movies couldn't be more different. Jigsaw in the Saw movies was at least ostensibly trying to teach his victims about valuing their lives. the killer in "The Collector" doesn't give a shit what his victims take away from his killings, he does this as a hobby. A gory, nasty, disgustingly icky and creepy hobby. I won't spoil this any further. Give it a watch. It's worthwhile.

Martyrs

This movie is disturbing. I know, shocker, right? It's supposed to be disturbing. but a lot of movies that are supposed to be disturbing are just dull and annoying (with filmmakers drowning in their own smug arrogance) and this one is different. I refuse to read any interviews with the filmmakers, because if I read and find out they're a bunch of arrogant assholes I might change my mind about the movie...right now I'm teetering on the edge of "great and disturbing" and "exploitative garbage" and I don't want a push. Seriously though, some of the disgusting crap in this movie even got to me, and disgusting crap usually doesn't, so be warned if you want to see this. Unlike every other reviewer, I'm not going to give away everything that happens in the movie (I'm looking at YOU, Netflix) so you'll just have to find out for yourself.

The Last Exorcism

The next person to tell me that I didn't like a movie's ending because I didn't understand it, and then proceeds to EXPLAIN it to me, is going to get my foot up his or her ass. Let's just get that out of the way right now.

I was with this movie right up until the end. I'm one of those people who sits there in a movie and comes up with endings in my head to pass the time, and sometimes I think my endings are better than the real ending once it happens. I think that happened this time. I still think the quiet little ending that I had planned in my head would have been better than the one I saw onscreen, but now that I've let it sit for awhile I am happier with the ending the way it appeared, and I'd like to say a few things.

1. I did not dislike the ending because it wasn't happy. I came into the movie not expecting it to end with rainbows and puppies and kittens, and indeed, if it HAD a happy ending, I would have felt it was a cop-out.

2. I do not need your little 18 year old self to EXPLAIN the particulars of the ending to me. I grew up in the 80s, with satanic panic and ritual abuse reports all over the media, and the McMartin trial, and if you don't kn ow what any of these things are, that's because I know more than you, not the other way around. I UNDERSTOOD what was happening in the ending perfectly well, I just don't think it was as powerful as the ending I had in my head. Yeah, I get it, and I'm ok with it now, but I was let down because I still think my ending would have been better. It's not the movie's fault, though, and I need to evaluate the movie for what it is, not piss all over it because of what it ISN'T. On those terms, it was a good little movie.

3. I most certainly do NOT think the ending is as cut and dried as some people are making it out to be. I think there are several different interpretations and ideas you can come up with from what we're shown onscreen and most of those interpretations could be perfectly valid. Whenever anyone makes a post declaring THIS IS WHAT THE ENDING MEANT AND ALL OTHER IDEAS ARE TOTALLY FALSE AND STUFF, that person just comes across looking like a pompous assdrip.

Lost Boys II: The Tribe

I totally almost typed "Lost Boys II: The TriPe" when I was typing the title of this movie, and I think that's a Freudian slip of the best kind in this case. This movie was a mess. The shower scene is the best part of the movie. I love Corey Feldman and Corey Haim and the original "Lost Boys" is one of my all-time favorite movies, but this isn't even worthy to be called a sequel.

Amusement

This movie almost seems like an anthology of scary stories at first, and each of the stories on their own, though not always the most realistic thing I've ever seen, are freaky enough to keep me totally interested in the movie. Once things tie together, again, it gets a little hard to believe, but the actors and actresses play everything totally straight so there's never a sense that anyone is just cashing a paycheck here, and in the end, I really enjoyed this movie, in spite of its flaws. Clowns freak me out, and some of the other images I won't spoil here will stick in your head, as will the killer's maniacal laugh. I recommend this one. Give it a shot. It's not perfect, but its good scenes are better than some movies I watch in their entirety, so it's totally worth the watch.

Spike

OMG this is the worst movie ever made. Seriously. No one in this movie can act, not even a little, and nothing that happens makes any kind of sense, and we have no idea who these characters are, and we hate them all for being so stupid from the very beginning so we don't care what happens to them, and then just when you think the movie couldn't get any stupider, it gets worse and it tries to have pretensions to a PLOT and a DEEPER MEANING and you just want to stab the director in the face and then vomit into the open knife wounds. Seriously. Skip this.

Repo Men (2010)

I don't know how I feel about the ending to this movie. Up until the ending, I loved it, and the ending did make sense and answered some questions I'd been yelling at the screen, but I'm going to have to let the ending sit for a bit before I form a final opinion on it. Otherwise, this was a lot of cool, gory fun and it's also a bit unnerving. 20 years ago I might not have batted an eye at this movie, but now, I can TOTALLY see this happening in our country, so it really freaked me out and got under my skin a little (hardy har har).

Kolchak: the Night Ripper

This is the first episode in the short-lived "Kolchak: The Night Stalker" TV series where Kolchak the reporter had a monster-movie-of-the-week kind of format where he'd try to crack a supernatural murder case in under an hour every week. the format got old, but some of these mini-movies are supposed to be good. This one was ok. A tad dated and Kolchak is kind of a jerk, but otherwise the episode kept me entertained. I like anything Jack the Ripper related, so I had fun with this episode but I hope some of the others are better.

Triangle

At some point halfway through this movie I thought maybe I'd dropped acid sometime during the day and forgot about it, because I couldn't explain the movie any other way, but the feeling passed and I'm left with admiration for this movie. This is a twist I've seen done before, but never quite this way, and if it's true there's nothing new under the sun, at least these filmmakers found a way to redo this twist and make it worth watching again, and for that, I'm thankful. Give this movie a chance (but you might want to take some Dramamine first).

Drag Me to Hell

I saw the opening sequence of this movie and thought "Oh lord, what have I gotten myself into?" But it gets better after that, I promise, so give this movie a chance. The effects are too cartoony for my taste (seriously, sometimes they look downright ridiculous) but the story is good, and I actually liked the main character. Not a big fan of her boyfriend's snobby, wasp-y family, but he was ok, and I actually cared what happened to her (even if she was an idiot throughout most of the movie).

Blood and Black Lace

Lest you want to burn me at the stake for insulting one of the most beloved and talked-about Italian horror movies, let me assure you, I LOVE Italian horror movies. I've seen plenty of them, and most of them are a million times better than this movie. that's right, I didn't like it. I don't care if Mario Bava is supposed to have been a genius, you can't tell that from this movie. Right from the beginning the movie is "stylish" in the most annoying way possible, with opening credits that made me want to gouge out my eyes (and ears...what the FUCK was that music?)

The acting in this movie is pretty terrible, with everyone acting as suspicious as possible (I think we're supposed to suspect everyone) so the actual killer doesn't stand out too much because everyone is acting like a raving lunatic, but by the end of the movie when the killer is revealed, I honestly didn't care anymore. I was falling asleep, and everyone was so sleazy, using coke and stealing money from each other and blackmailing each other that they pretty much all deserved to die anyway. One particular character was having sex with/using drugs with the first three victims of the killer (slut that he is) an I was disappointed when he didn't die, but other than that, I didn't really give a shit what happened to anyone in the movie and the lighting was annoying, not stylish, and the music was grating, not shocking, and everything about the movie felt like it was working against the feeling it wanted to achieve. This was a spectacular failure for me and it made me want to watch a better Giallo to wash the taste of this one out of my mouth. You can safely skip this "classic." You won't miss much (except a headache).

The Crazies (remake)

Words can't describe how much better this movie is than the original, but I'll try. First of all, the plot follows a much more logical pattern in this movie. I'm sure the original thought it was being all edgy and shocking with its opening scene, but it was muddled and confusing, not shocking. Plus it threw us into the fray before we even knew any of the characters enough to care what happened to them yet. We didn't get to meet those characters until they were already in a crazy situation and on the run from the military. In the remake, we see a scene of chaos, and then we flash back to two days earlier and see the town before all this started, and we get to know and care about the characters, so we actually give a shit what happens to them. Much better.

Second, the characters in this movie act like residents of a small town would actually act. Everyone knows everyone else, they all know who's the town drunk, who's dating who, etc. I've lived in small towns all my life and this is much more believable than whatever bullshit dialogue the people in the original were supposed to be spewing. Instead of standing in our faces and screaming "THE GOVERNMENT DOESN'T CARE ABOUT YOU!" this movie SHOWS US with its plot and the events that happen. Again, much better.

Third, the gore and special effects and acting were much better, and the sets were far more realistic. Now this might sound like a nasty thing to say, since I know the original didn't have a very good budget, but I can't forgive Romero for having a good idea and then going ahead with it anyway if he didn't have the budget to pull it off. "Night of the Living Dead" worked with a tiny budget because its idea didn't call for huge sweeping sets (like a decontamination chamber, for instance) and when Romero had the idea to adapt Stephen King's novel "The Stand" into a movie in the early 80s, he put the idea on hold because he knew he didn't have the budget to pull it off and he wanted it to be good. He should have realized how silly it would look to have the military be five guys in green pajamas running around a town in makeshift Hazmat suits that look like Hefty bags, herding all the infected people into one school gymnasium and then being surprised when they escape. Come on, give me a break. This movie doesn't have a ton of expensive sets either, but what they do have looks believable. Instead of randomly trying to herd everyone in town into one gymnasium, they herd the townspeople into vans and then check to see if people are showing signs of infection, and then they separate the infected from the uninfected, which not only creates drama and pathos, it looks more believable, and it adds a huge emotional impact later on in the story when other details are revealed (which I won't spoil here). Suffice it to say, "The Crazies" of 2010 isn't perfect, but it's a damn sight closer than the original.

The special effects falter a little at the very end, but I didn't mind too much, and all in all, for my money, this is a remake that is superior in every way to the original. THIS is what remakes should be. They should take movies with good ideas and poor execution and make them better. That's what this movie does, and I love it for that.

Who Sloo Auntie Roo? / What's the Matter with Helen?

Alright, I don't care what the movie cover says, the name of the movie is "Who Sloo Auntie Roo?" That's the title that makes sense and it rhymes, too. Somewhere someone decided "whoever" was more "correct" but when I watched this schlocky little movie as a kid, the title I remember was "Who Sloo Auntie Roo" so that's what I'm sticking with. I was excited to find this two pack for $4.99 at Meijer today because I loved these movies when I was a kid. Good stuff. I love October!