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Showing posts from 2016

Jack Frost (1997) - Michael Cooney

This was another movie that had been haunting me from the video store shelves for years. Jack Frost was one in a slew of holiday themed horror movies that went straight to video in the mid-nineties. This was the "better" of the group. While it seemed intriguing to see a movie about a killer snowman, I should have known better. This is the same studio that had done Ice Cream Man in 1995.  The serial killer, Jack Frost was being transported to his execution when the transport truck crashed. Frost started running away but was killed when a vat of acid spilled over his entire body, melding him with the snow on the ground. This turns Jack Frost into a murderous supernatural snowman that terrorizes the town of Snowmonton. People around town are dropping like flies and the Sheriff is purplexed. This movie definitely has some issues with the budget. The effects are terrible. The snow doesn't even look like snow. It looks like oatmeal or something. The kid is also

Krampus (2015) - Michael Dougherty

It's that magical time of the year. The time of giving and loving. The time of getting together with your loved ones. A time for bloodshed and mayhem. So it's as good a time as any to cozy up to the fire for Krampus. A horror movie with that certain holly and poinsettia theme. Warm, fuzzy and scary. A family gets together for Christmas and obviously it doesn't go well. They hate each other. During an explosive family dinner our lead Max loses all faith in Santa Claus and Christmas. He immediately tears up his Letter to Santa. A move that he soon regrets. This act summons the frightening Krampus.  This movie explores the Krampus tale with superb embellishment. They actually have a really amazing narrated flashback sequence that acts as the origin story. This flashback was stylized in claymation and it was really neat. Krampus is really terrifying, The horror sequences are actually horrific and scary. This is definitely an easy movie to fall in love with as a hor

31 (2016) - Rob Zombie

They can't all be winners. If you've seen one Rob Zombie movie then you've seen them all. They have the same cliche'd cuts and edits. They use the same type of soundtrack. They have the same actors and carry the same feeling. Some directors can pull it off really well. But Rob just feels like he is out of ideas. On October 30th, a group of carnival workers are abducted, tortured and held against their will at some weird compound called MurderWorld. They try to survive as their captors force them into a deadly game called 31. They are hunted and tested for the pleasure of some weird powdered wig wearing psychopaths. I feel as if Rob Zombie thinks that it's his duty to bring back sleazy grindhouse cinema. Its almost like these movies are exploitation-sploitation. Obscenity is commonplace. Mutilation, gore and dismemberment are merely filler moments in between thin layers of obscured normalcy. Grindhouse is less of a film style and more of a natural occurrence

Salem's Lot (1979) - Tobe Hooper

Halloween just wouldn't be the same without a good Stephen King picture. I had just finished reading Salem's Lot and thought that I would check out the television mini-series as well. It has actually been pretty hard to find. There are a lot of different versions of this movie too. Apparently, Stephen King himself loves the cut-down theatrical version. However, I found a near three and a half hour version. I think it is the actual Television version. It has fades for commercial breaks. Either way, I dug it. Ben Mears, a writer, returns home to Salem's Lot after many years away. He has had this fascination with this dirty old home in town, The Marsden House. Where, as a child, he had seen the owner decrepit and decaying, hanging by the neck. This image stays with him for a long time. It actually turns out that Ben is returning home when a mysterious old figure is moving into the house. Also people are going missing and being stricken ill all around 'the Lot'.

Scary Movie (2000) - Keenen Ivory Wayans

During the nineties, Keenan Ivory Wayans ran the parody comedy game. His hit television show In Living Color introduced key Wayans family members that have been a staple in his work for years. Namely, Shawn Wayans and Marlon Wayans. Both hilarious and both stars in the Keenan Ivory's Scream spoof Scary Movie.  Following the same narrative of Scream and I Know What You Did Last Summer. Teens are ending up murdered in a small California town. Cindy, Bobby, Shorty, Brenda, Ray, Buffy and Greg are all students together at B.A. Corpse High School, We join them just as they had learned that their friend was murdered and it might have something to do with the night that they hit and murdered some fisherman.   It's hilarious. Like the Animal House of horror. Scenes are memorable and quotable. It should have your sides splitting while simultaneously satisfying your horror thirst. It has so many callbacks to the genre, like our lead Cindy Campbell's name is a play on t

Sleepaway Camp (1983) - Robert Hiltzik

Really good horror movies need to leave an impression on you. Sleepaway Camp is definitely the type of movie that leaves it's mark. While being infamous for it's graphic ending. It's also a quintessential eighties horror film that captures the time in the style and fashion. It encompasses that summer camp style that was really popular during this time. It actually captures the camp feeling a whole lot better than most Friday the 13th films.  Angela Baker and her cousin Ricky attend Summer Camp. Ricky had been coming for a while, but this was Angela's first time. Needless to say, the adjustment doesn't go very well. The camp is full of creeps, assholes and jerkbags. And someone is running around trying to kill them all! This really doesn't help things for Angela.  This movie isn't afraid to go places that other movies don't. It explores all sorts of themes from gender bending to child molestation, while simultaneously being an entertaining