2020 Halloween Challenge

Sedai's Challenge List:

1 The Entity (1982)
3 Soul to Keep
4 Paranormal Activity
5 Fright Night (1985)
6 Witchboard
7 Annabelle Comes Home
8 The Conjuring
9 Trick r Treat
10 Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark
11 House of the Devil


A. Source Material
1. Doctor Sleep
2. Pit and the Pendulum
3. Color Out of Space

B. Language of Origin
4. Paranormal Activity: The Marked Ones
5. A French Language horror film
6. The Host (Korea)
7. An Eastern European/Slavic Language horror film

C. Time Period
8. Creature From the Black Lagoon
9. A Gothic Horror Tale (40's-60's)
10. Alice, Sweet Alice
11. From Beyond
12. Blair Witch (2016)

D. The Players(Actors/Actresses/Directors/Producers)
13. A Brian De Palma/William Castle/Wes Craven film
14. Prom Night
15. A Peter Cushing/Vincent Price/Christopher Lee film
16. A Lucio Fulci/Dario Argento/Mario Bava film
17. A Alfred Hitchcock/Terence Fisher/Christopher Smith film
18. Annabelle

E. Distributor
19. A Rotten Horror Film from Rotten Tomatoes
20. Dark Encounter
21. Host (2020)
22. Oculus
23. Fright Night
24. 1BR
25. The Lodge

F. Genre
26. The Howling
27. 30 Days of Night
28. The Amityville Horror (2005)
29. The Blair Witch Project (1999)
30. A Frankenstein's Monster Film
31. A Zombie Film

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OCT 1st

I'm not the biggest fan of the original, but I admire and appreciate the artistry behind it. The exact same can be said for this overly long remake. The film seems concerned with how artistic it can be, thinking it is above the genre of "horror" and it delivers something that is slow, sometimes dull, then aggressively violent and obtuse.

There is one scene in particular that I thought was really well done (even though it was a tad long). It involves a young dancer who wants to leave the academy and as she is leaving, our lead is portraying a dance for the instructor. As she is performing this intense dance, the other girl who is leaving is thrust into another room and mimics the dance routine our lead is performing. She has no control over her body and despite her resistance, the body moves at will. The result is a contortionist gone to hell sequence that involves bones breaking, jaws snapping and pants wetting. It's raw and visceral, something this film needed more of.

The rest of the movie trots along at a slow pace, jumping between two storylines. We finally get to the bizarre climax that is full of blood, dancing and naked women. Again, a sequence that is great, but too long. This Suspiria remake thinks it's more important than it really is and despite some good performances and truly horrific moments, it fails to deliver.

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"A laugh can be a very powerful thing. Why, sometimes in life, it's the only weapon we have."

Suspect's Reviews

An adaptation of a Stephen King short, we see Corey Haim scoot around in a motorized wheelchair as a werewolf terrorizes his small town. This is a classic 80's effects horror film, one of the better Stephen King adaptations and comical in just the right amount of places. I'll take this werewolf picture over The Howling any day.

The film is narrated by the sister, despite most of the movie being from the brother's perspective. Starring Corey Haim, Terry O'Quinn, Everett McGill and Gary Busey, the cast seems to be self-aware of the material and has fun with it. At one point the film becomes a whodunnit style investigation. Once the reveal takes place, dread sets in.

I think Scream took from this film's "one last scare" ending. It mirrors it so well it's hard to imagine it wasn't done on purpose. Silver Bullet feels underrated in the werewolf sub-genre, I don't hear too many people talking about it, but it has some good things to offer.

I remember seeing posters for this in comic books and thinking it looked cool. Never saw a trailer for it though. I finally, decades later, sat down to watch this mess of a cheesy film and while it's not a good film at all, it has some charm.

Directed by Robert Kurtzman of KNB fame, this film feels like a demo reel to what they can offer in terms of make-up, gore effects and creature design. Which is funny because they have been around for a long time and work on every damn horror film you can think of. Wishmaster is funny when it shouldn't be, annoying when it wants to be serious and save for a fun performance from Andrew Divoff, wooden actors float around this story.

To beat the villain, she simply wishes things to go back to normal. Give me a break.

I followed your lead on this one (the film was already on my Hulu watchlist, but your positive response gave me the nudge to watch it).

I quite liked it. I'll probably post a longer review in the "Rate the Last Film You Saw" thread.

I thought that the acting was very strong, and that the film repeatedly used ambiguity in a satisfying way, where most films end up being frustrating. The whole film was very atmospheric and foreboding, and frankly a lot darker and more complex than I was expecting.

October 3rd 15. A Peter Cushing/Vincent Price/Christopher Lee film


The Revenge of Frankenstein (1958) starts off where the last one finishes up that darn Frankenstein manages to avoid the guillotine and sets himself up in other town as a new doctor. This is a different take on the mythos focusing on body swapping which is alright but not really what you would want from a Frankenstein film. Cushing is very good in this as Doctor Stein a man trying to put his life back together and I enjoyed the hunchback Karl but really this was just a benigh Frankenstein film

October 4th - 19. A Rotten Horror Film from Rotten Tomatoes

The Evil of Frankenstein(1964) received poor reviews...and I don't get it I enjoyed this one. To start with this is the most of Frankenstein's monster we get in the series up to this point. Peter Cuchings Victor returns home and runs into a hypnotist Zoltan, a mute girl, and Han's together the ensemble wrecks havok on the town as Victor gets revenge on those that took him out in the first one. Visually this is a big step up as the monster looks really good this is a best I've seen him since the classic Whales version. I liked the play between Victor and Zoltan and felt like the film moved along at a brisk pace. I found this to be more watchable than Revenge

Do you know where I can find The Entity? I have been looking for it for years.

Heh, I also watched this the other day (though I might give it at least half a popcorn more, maybe even a full one). I see it as less of a demo reel for KNB than a greatest-hits package where they just decided to do what I'd call "dumb Hellraiser" and throw in as much craziness as they could in 90 minutes (it practically starts with the kind of "monsters running wild" scene that capped off Cabin in the Woods) and manages to have enough of a sense of humour about its whole concept that I can't call it a total failure (that scene at the police station is an all-timer). I will concede that the actual protagonist and her plot are pretty whatever, though. Still better than the sequel, though.

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Iro's Top 100 Movies v3.0

It's on Amazon Prime on the Starz Network.

Here

Douglas, 2005





Most of my rating stems from the fact that Melissa George is in this flick. It's an otherwise forgettable remake of a classic 70s film I have seen about a million times.

Agreed. The effects are a B+ and everything else is a D+.

(A 2020 horror)

I semi-recently watched the 2009 film Book of Blood. The film I watched tonight, Books of Blood is based on the same Clive Barker novel.



I have to say that I didn't like the 2009 film all that much, nor did I love this one.

The 2020 version is superior if only for more effective horror sequences and some solid acting from Anna Friel in one of the major sequences. But some of the acting from others is not so hot, including Friel's main co-star (I read a review praising his acting, but I found him a bit stilted).

I've never read Barker's novel, so I can't say how much of the issue is the source material versus the adaptation. This film was fine, but nothing to rush to see.

Barker's Books of Blood are short story collections (six books in total, I'd remember). I haven't yet watched the new film, but I'm under the impression that it only uses the titular framing story from the books, and the rest is based on new concepts (at least partially) designed by Barker.

There are quite a few films adapted from the stories, and some of them are at least decent (like The Midnight Meat Train and Candyman). The idea behind the framing story is not necessarily that well suited for filming. The books are a little uneven, but generally at least OK.

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Aha.

I knew that they were short stories, but hadn't realized it spanned such a large series.

Yes, this film uses the framing story as the middle entry in the anthology. The 2009 film used only the framing story as the whole film.

"Uneven but at least OK" describes how I've felt about most of what I've read from Barker. (Aside from Mister B Gone which was, and I do not use this phrase lightly, total garbage).

I watched Haunt (2019) as my Amazon movie. The story is familiar, think The Houses October Built, Hell House LLC, and Hell Fest, but I thought Haunt was a little better.

Stephanie (2017) was my Netflix movie. I actually had to stop this movie for a while because I kept cringing during the first few minutes watching this child do all the things parents fear their kids will do if left unsupervised for too long. After going back to it, Stephanie turned out to be pretty good if a bit predictable.

I'm glad you enjoyed it. Psychological horror is not really my cup of tea and had I known before hand what this was I probably would not have watched it. I am glad I did.

I must say I enjoyed Deep Red, fulfilling the 70’s-80’s slasher slot.
I’m not sure if it’s better then Suspiria, as I need to rewatch Suspiria. It sheen over 30 years and I was but a child who didn’t understand camera style and such. It’ll almost be like watching it for the first time really.
I’m using this time to watch a few other films from Argento as well.
Tomorrow, though, I’ll dedicate my time to Les Diaboliques.

So good. First time viewing?

See, I'm almost the opposite. I thought it looked like all of the mediocre haunted house type films that have come out in the last decade or so. Poorly CGI produced figures leaping out at people, etc. The whole psychological angle was really pleasing, as was the way that the film just slowly and steadily escalated.

And I always have to tip my hat to any film that keeps me guessing. I loved the way that it gave us

Yep. All of these challenges are always first time viewings. 😎