Welcome To Our Nightmare II: The Return of Terror and Wooley

Halloween III: Season Of The Witch

This movie actually just bumped Young Frankenstein, Ghostbusters, Candyman, and The Shining from the list. Because it’s so g*ddamn Halloween even if it’s not so damn good (though it kinda is).


I had forgotten that this movie is where I got the term “Horrorthon”, when I first named mine in 2005.
I think if you were like me, a Horror-kid who loved any and everything spooky, and about 10 years old right when this came out, you would have trouble imagining an Ultimate Halloween run without this movie. Though, for years, I actually thought it was a bad movie. What a fool I was. It has the right vibe, that’s all there is to it. Does it bother me that there are supernatural robots? I mean, maybe a little but f*ck it.
It was interesting to see the they do actually set up the “clockwork humans” thing earlier in the story. I somehow had overlooked that and thought the robots just came out of nowhere and historically they have been my big beef with the film. Not so anymore.
I actually ended up really liking that story this time, the idea of this crazy man who's life has been dedicated to toy-making and has built an empire from his business actually being a sort of Warlock who has discovered the magic (and technology) to do the horrible thing a Warlock might do. And he's so freaking charming and wears a suit well, despite being very quietly menacing as hell.


And they really lean hard into this Celtic angle, I didn’t realize. I had always thought, in my memory, that the Celtic/Druidic Magic thing was a bit of an ass-pull late in the game but it’s all there at the beginning of the second act.
Also, for people who have seen the movie only, here is a super-spoilery discussion question:


Wow. I enjoyed this so much more than I did the last time or two. I mean, it gets better and better now that I’m over my issues with it and I enjoyed the hell out of this. Honestly, if this isn't one of the most Halloween movies ever made, I just don't know what is and I could totally see myself actually making this a Halloween Night tradition.


Ok, a few bullet-points from my notes before we go...

- I actually love the opening credits to this. Great Carpenter music and a kind of hi-tech (for 1982) ode to the opening jack-o-lanterns of I and II.
- I love that Nancy Loomis from Halloween and The Fog plays Atkins’ wife.
- Jamie Lee Curtis is the voice on the phone and on the intercom?!
- Also, so cool that he ends up back in the same gas-station that the movie starts in with the same guy running it.


Post Script - As a doctor, it’s always hilarious to see actors portray doctors. The shit that comes out of their mouths. I ain’t mad about it. It’s adorable.
And honestly, I like to think of doctors the way Atkins portrays

I've said this before, but HIII would be one of my all-time favorite horror movies if not for one thing: I REALLY didn't like that they killed off the medical examiner, especially in a such a brutal way.



And it's such stupid reasoning - hey, I found a few clockwork pieces in this exploded car - obviously the guy who blew himself up is actually an android that couldn't possible exist.So therefore another android must now kill this person.

Durr.

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I agree. Not the film's finest moment. I would almost wonder if that was done post-production because someone felt like the movie needed another kill-scene. It was pretty unnecessary. And yet, it does add a little bit of an "anyone who knows is a walking dead-person" element.

City Of The Living Dead
Aka, Fear In The City Of The Living Dead, aka The Gates Of Hell

I think this is my 6th time watching this movie and I still don’t understand it, but I don’t think Fulci and company were really worried about people understanding it. As many have noted, the movie doesn't make a whole lotta sense on a scene-by scene basis, but I'll try to give you the very basic:
A priest in the town of Dunwich, which was built on the original secret-site of the Salem Witch Trials, commits suicide, which opens the Gates Of Hell and allowed some demonic/dead business to slip through into this world. The event is witnessed, psychically, by a medium during a seance in New York, who promptly dies. However, this does not deter her. Because some badly dubbed mumbo-jumbo ensues that makes it clear that if they don't go to Dunwich and do something (which is also not clear) by the end of business on Halloween, the dead will storm through into this World and it will be the End Of Days. Unfortunately, the priest and other Living Dead/Demons will stop them from doing the thing that it is never explained they need to do. So numerous people will become pizza-faced like they're in Prince Of Darkness and attack everyone and somehow, unlike that movie, it's kind of awesome.


And I love that the demons can just disappear and reappear wherever they want. One of the scariest parts is that you can't really just run away cuz they just pop up wherever they wanna be. I remember that that was something I really enjoyed and wrote about my very first viewing.
So much to enjoy here. Lots of brains, eyeballs, intestines, maggots, what have you, vague references to Lovecraftian lore (“Dunwich” and all, they have The Book Of Enoch instead of The Book Of Eibon, etc.). Tons of pretty startling gore that actually works. I mean, for the most part, the girl vomiting up her own intestines, which has always been my favorite scene in the film, is pretty impressive. I mean, it shocks, and it really does, but the execution is actually pretty good.


Man, on the one hand, the ripping out the brains from the back and squishing them kill is used three times. On the other, it’s gruesome as shit every time. I was really surprised that the “hero” of the movie (at least by my perception, maybe the shrink was meant to be) ends up getting killed and not last. By the brain-squish method.
Also, I had forgotten how far Fulci can stretch a set piece (Argento and Bava too, actually). They got to the cemetery, which is the climax of the movie, and I paused the movie and there was still over TWENTY MINUTES LEFT. That’s how ****ing long they are in that tomb!
Of course, it is never explained how stabbing Father Thomas in the groin with a wooden cross not only kills him when he’s an undead demon by causing him to burst into flames...


... but also apparently kills all the dead who have risen and closes the Gates Of Hell … AFTER THE POINT WHEN IT WAS SUPPOSED TO BE TOO LATE! They say earlier in the movie that if the Gates aren't closed by the time All Saints Day begins it's too late. Then they say the clock has struck and it is now All Saints Day. Then they win anyway.
Still, I just enjoy the hell outta this film. I would really love to remake this movie. I would love to have a good budget and the right people and just do the few things you could do to make this film really soar. I actually don't think it would hurt the film a bit if you just tidied up the narrative a bit. But I don't care, I love it anyway.


Post Script - I feel like this film and Prince Of Darkness have a LOT in common, yet I really like this film and am always disappointed by PoD. To some degree it almost feels like Carpenter saw and really liked this movie and wanted to do something like it and I think I just expect Carpenter and American filmmaking to deliver a narrative that is internally consistent, whereas I would never expect that from an Italian Horror film. And Carpenter doesn't quite hit the bananas button either. So it gets stuck somewhere in the middle which, interestingly just isn't that great.

Yeah that's how I interpreted it. Which is kind of ironic, cause I thought that actress had by far the most flat and mechanical performance of all in the movie.

As a film fan, I think it's kinda your duty to start behaving like doctors do in movies, ie "HEY IM A DOCTOR OPEN THE DOOR DAMMNIT!!" and so forth.

Ha!

Yeah, I already drink as much as Atkins' Dr. Challis.

Dracula throwing a plant at The Wolfman is certainly one of my favorite things I've seen this month.

Another of my favorite things of all time here for you guys:

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Yes! Happy Birthday, Wooley!

I streamed The Old Dark House on Discord earlier this year and the reactions to it were a lot more positive than I expected. it also got me to bump my rating for the film up by a couple points.

Mad Love is pretty good, too, though I prefer The Hands of Orlac.

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Hope you feel better, partner!
I see you got to three that I was really bummed I couldn't fit in (Mad Love, The Old Dark House, and Doctor X, which I can never shut up about.)
And I'm actually not quite done yet. Gonna be a lot of typing tomorrow.

Aw, thanks, Rock! I appreciate that, really.

Thanks, Tak!

Thank you, my friend!