Halloween Horror Movie Marathon: Film #5

Today, a recommended, must-watch for Halloween, plus a recommended must-avoid-like-the-freakin'-plague.

Beware of the fog ...

We can keep this pretty short and simple.  I love this movie.  Love it, love it, love it.  Directed by John Carpenter, and written by him and producer Debra Hill, "The Fog" was released in 1980, just a few years after the release of their now classic, "Halloween."  Coming off the surprising commercial success that "Halloween" became, expectations for this film - as expectations often are - were a little over the top.  As such, the film was looked at critically as a bit of a sophomore slump for Carpenter (despite actually being his fourth feature).  And while I would agree that, yes, technically, "Halloween" is the better made film, there's just something about "The Fog" that I find more entertaining, at least as a repeat viewing experience.

Here we have a classically styled tale of a town cursed by a past injustice, and the ghosts who come back seeking vengeance.  The tone of the film is established beautifully in an opening scene featuring the late John Housman telling ghost stories to a group of kids on the beach, perfectly setting up the campfire-tale flavor of the film's plot.  Of course there's a bit of a modern spin to the tale.  Well, 80's modern.  These aren't your simple haunting-type ghosts.  To put it simply, these are pissed off, sailor ghosts with swords and big-ass hooks, and they fuck people up.

Look, I could go on about the "The Fog" for a while, but I said I'd keep this one short.  Just trust me here.  "The Fog" is straight-up creepy, Halloween fun.

Oh, and if you need more convincing, "The Fog" sports an outstanding 80's horror movie cast including Jamie Lee Curtis, her real life mom, Janet Leigh (Psycho), Hal Holbrook, Adrienne Barbeau, and, making his second appearance in my Halloween Marathon, Tom Atkins, this time sans mustache.

  

Beware of the fog.  No, seriously.  Beware.

If you are out looking for a copy of "The Fog" to watch this Halloween, please be careful that you don't accidentally pick up this 2005 remake.  This movie is bad on so many levels one scarcely knows where to begin in bashing it.

Firstly, let me state categorically that I am not anti-remakes, so that's not where this is coming from.  Yes, I sometimes scoff and don't see the point, but look, I'm always happy to see a good movie, so if someone has a great idea for a remake and they make it work, awesome.  And if I don't like it, hey, they didn't do anything that changes the original.  At least not unless they're George Lucas.  But that's a different discussion.

So anyway, I heard they were remaking "The Fog" and I thought, okay, whatever.  Obviously I love the original, so I didn't see the point, but fine, whatever.  I mean hey, earlier that same year I'd been entertained by another remake of an early John Carpenter film, "Assault on Precinct 13," so why not give "The Fog" a chance.  Well, the movie comes out and I go see it just hoping to be entertained.  What I was, though, was insulted for about an hour and a half in almost every way a movie can insult you.  Now, I must confess; in the theater in 2005 is the one and only time I've ever seen this film, so I can't talk about too many specifics.  I just remember hurting.  But I do recall exactly the point when the pain began.  It was the introduction of the most insultingly racially stereotyped "comic-relief" black-man character to appear on screen this side of Amos and Andy.

From there it's all a blur.

Just do yourself a favor.  Stay away.  If you're looking for the original, it's available on Netflix streaming, and it's still available for purchase on DVD.  But if you come across a DVD and the stars of the film are that guy who played Superman in the TV show "Smallville" and the 30 year-old actress who played Liam Neeson's 17 year-old daughter in "Taken" you've got the wrong one.

Halloween Horror Movie Marathon: Film #4

Today's film posed an interesting dilemma  for me. I'm writing this series of blogs to recommend fun Halloween movies that I've always liked and watched for years, and to hopefully discover a few new ones to share.  Hence today's question. I watched a new movie.  I liked it.  I would recommend it.  But I would not recommend it as a Halloween movie, so should bother writing about it?  Obviously, I've decided to and I'll explain why after I tell you about the film.

"The Tall Man" is the new film from French director Pascal Laugier, and it's his first English language film.  Laugier is well known in the horror genre for his notoriously brutal 2008 film "Martyrs," another film I'd definitely not recommend for Halloween.  Actually I'm not sure I'd recommend that one at all.  Oh it's a good film.  It's aces in all the technical areas as well as the performances.  It's just ... it's ugly.  I've had several people defend the film saying the brutality is at service to a higher message that the film is trying to get across.  And I acknowledge that that's entirely possibly ... I just don't know what the hell that message is.  Granted, I've only watched it once.  But it's an uncomfortable experience, and I'm not sure I need to sit through it again to try and ferret out its message.  That and the fact that I'm not wholly convinced that it's not just pretending to be about something bigger in order to justify itself.  That aside, I do acknowledge it's a well made and effective film.

"The Tall Man" on the other hand does have very interesting ideas at its core.  The story concerns a mining town whose fortunes have gone south - way south - with the closing of the local mine.  Poverty abounds, and to make matters worse, children are seemingly vanishing without a trace.  Rumors link the missing children to a local legend known as The Tall Man.  Some see him, or it, as a dark, supernatural presence.  Others believe The Tall Man is nothing more than a child molester who will eventually be caught and prosecuted.

Enter our main character, portrayed magnificently by Jessica Biel.  If you'll allow me a quick tangent, this is easily the best acting of Biel's career thus far.  She stretches beyond anything I've seen her do in the past giving an emotionally complex, multi-layered performance that I'd put up there with any of the best I've seen this year.

Back to the story.  Biel plays a local nurse, and the only medical professional in town since the death of her doctor husband.  She is warm and compassionate, giving her all to the people who trust her.  Her life seems particularly in tune despite the dying town she lives in.  That is up until the night the Tall Man shows up for her son.  She catches the hooded figure in the act of abduction and gives chase leading to a visually intense pursuit, going from a foot chase to clinging to the side of a truck.

And from there I'll say no more about what happens as it would turn deep into spoiler territory.  All I will say is whatever you expect to happen, you're wrong.  I'd hesitate to call what takes place a "twist" as that often leads one to think of a forced, gotcha sort of story turn.  That isn't the case here.  It's just that the story goes off in a completely different direction than one would expect from a film built around child disappearances and local legends of supernatural entities.  It's a thoughtful film posing questions about poverty, wealth and the welfare of children.  Thoughtful, but not pretentious as it poses questions, but doesn't throw answers at you.  In fact, I'd argue it offers no answers at all.  It's more of a simple, hey, here's some ideas, think about them.

So why wouldn't I recommend this film for Halloween?  It's just not fun and it's not particularly scary.  Why write about it then?  Because I think the film deserves an audience.  It's a very good, thought-provoking film with a fantastic performance from the lead actress, so I'd recommend you see it sometime if what I've said has peaked your interest.  But for a Halloween film?  Nah.  For me, at least, I'm looking for more entertainment and chills, and I just didn't get that from "The Tall Man."

I caught "The Tall Man" on Netflix streaming service, it's available on Amazon Instant Movies for $3.99, and it's also available in some Redbox machines last I checked.

Halloween Horror Movie Marathon: Film #3

Back to the "classics," so to speak, today we have the third film in the "Halloween" franchise, though it has nothing to do with the "Halloween" franchise.

Now let's get this out of the way right up front; this isn't a really good movie.  It's got issues.  A lot of them.  But if you can overlook them, what you've got in the plus column is a lot of goofy, silly, 80's horror movie fun that would make for a good watch with a group of friends (maybe not so much on your own).

"Halloween III: Season of the Witch" was conceived as a new direction for the "Halloween" films. Instead of continuing the exploits of that wacky kid with a weird penchant for killing babysitters, "Halloween" would become something of an anthology series of feature films.  Each October would bring a new entry in the series, but rather than sequels, they'd all be original, standalone stories.

Not a bad idea.  Except of course they'd already made one "Halloween" sequel that picked up the original story at exactly the point where the first film ended thereby setting up audience expectations that future sequels would continue the story of Michael Myers. Perhaps a new story could have overcome those expectations  had the film been at least tonally similar to the first two films, another killer stalking teens picking up where Michael left off or something, then maybe audiences would have bought in.  But comparatively, this film feels completely alien.  Add to that the marketing for the film really did nothing to dissuade expectations of Michael Myers or at least a new killer and you end up with a completely pissed off audience.

Too bad, really, because had it been sold as a standalone film, or maybe just moved the "Halloween" to a subtitle - "Season of the Witch: A Halloween Film" - then it certainly might have fared better at the box office, especially during the cheesy-horror loving 80's.  As it stands, "Halloween III: Season of the Witch" is seen as kind of a footnote/misstep in the "Halloween" franchise.

But like I mentioned, this wasn't the best movie from the get go, so honestly, nothing may have saved it.  The story is beyond silly with it's attempt to marry science fiction with Gothic witchcraft, and a villain's sinister plot that makes absolutely no sense.  Really, I don't expect movies - horror movies especially - to make logical sense in the real world, but come on, at least make sense within the world you create.

So why would I recommend this to you?  What's it got going for it?  Come on!  It's "Halloween III."  It's just plain dumb, Halloween fun.  And it's got Tom Atkins running and screaming, plus big, squishy, wormy, snakey kid-head scene!

Oh, and that cheesy, yet creepy-ass commercial jingle is worth the price of admission alone.

Plus, it's a lot more fun than those god-awful Rob Zombie "Halloween" remakes.  Ugh!

"Halloween III: Season of the Witch" is available on Amazon's OnDemand service for a $2.99 rental or you can probably pick up an older DVD from the $5 bin at Walmart (where I got mine) or there's even a special edition Blu-ray if you're feeling all collectory.

Halloween Horror Movie Marathon: Film #2

So much for getting a head start.  Well, it's October now and I'd hoped to be a few Halloween movie suggestions into this by now.  But that lovely flu-like bug I had last week altered my plans.  On the plus side, I watched several movies while lying on the couch all week.  On the not-a-plus side, I didn't feel like writing about them.  

But oh well.  Such is life.  On with the show.

There seems to be very little middle ground when it comes to the "found-footage" style of horror film.  There's lots of love and lots of hate, but very little "ehh, they're ok."  And then there are those that refuse to see them not because of any dislike towards the found-footage style, but because the shaky-cam that inevitable comes with those films makes them nauseous.  And if it's allergy season, count me in that last group.  Sinus pressure equals headaches, and that plus shaky-cam makes Chuck a sick boy.  Seeing one in a theater, where the screen takes up your entire field of vision only makes matters worse.  I remember seeing "The Blair Witch Project" in the theater and, though I never hurled, I did need to take a long nap afterwards.

Outside of allergy season, though, I've got no issues with found-footage films if they are well made with a compelling story.  Style is just a tool for telling your story effectively.  If you've got a good reason for choosing a particular shooting style and it suits the story, then what's the issue?  If, however, a filmmaker thinks they'll shoot a found-footage film because it's "easier and cheaper" than doing it the traditional way, then fuck 'em because the end result will most likely be an insulting piece of shit.  I've definitely seen a few of those.

That whole preamble sets us up for today's film, "V/H/S".  This one is a new release, so new in fact that it hasn't even hit theaters yet, but will very soon.  It is currently available OnDemand on Amazon and DirecTV (which is how I saw it), and probably most other cable providers that offer an OnDemand option.  At $9.99 for a pre-theatrical rental, it's a pretty good bargain.

But what is it and should you bother?

"V/H/S" is an anthology film made up of five short films plus the wrap-around story tying them all together, albeit loosely, and all shot as "found-footage" films.  As with all anthologies, there are stronger and weaker segments to the film.  Never have I seen an anthology where every piece worked perfectly and equally, and that's certainly not the case here.  What they all are, though, are solid, well conceived stories that delivery plenty of creepiness and a fair bit of gore, so there is plenty here for the horror movie fan to like.  This really would make for an excellent Halloween movie watching experience, especially with a few friends over because everyone will likely have their own favorite as the segments each offer a different tone and are trying to achieve different goals within the found-footage framework.  Mine, hands down, was the segment directed by David Bruckner ("The Signal").  More than the slamming doors and "oww, did you see that in the corner of the screen!" stuff you get from something like "Paranormal Activity," this segment was downright ghoulish, with an excellent monster right there in your face.  Unfortunately, it's also the first segment in the film (after the wrap-around segment setup, that is), which made the rest of the film slightly disappointing to me as nothing else that followed lived up to the completely screwed up nature of that first story.  Things never got boring, mind you, and I also really dug the final segment directed by a group calling themselves Radio Silence.  But the stories in between those two really never achieve better than just "okay," with one actually being a disappointment (surprisingly it's the segment directed by Ti West, probably the most accomplished of the directors involved).

So final word; yes, definitely would recommend for Halloween viewing.  Fun, creepy, nasty and lots of other horror film related adjectives.  Two warnings; this is a hard R-rated film, so don't watch with the kids, and lastly, despite a lot of hyperbole from some reviewers who saw this film at Sundance and other festival screenings, it really doesn't break any new ground in the realm of found-footage films, so if you already don't like that type film, this one isn't likely to change your mind.  Otherwise, have fun!

Halloween Horror Movie Marathon: Intro and Film #1

So Autumn, my favorite time of the year, is creeping up on us again; cooler weather and Halloween. Yay! Oh, and college football for some, but since my Alma Mater isn't fairing so well this year, I'll leave that one out of my list of positives. Also, the sun isn't showing up as early as it did a month ago so it's still dark when I have to wake up, which sucks. Wait, why is this my favorite time of year again?

OH! Halloween. So anyway, as I'll be watching a lot of horror movies in the coming days I thought this would be a good opportunity to get back into my blog. Or maybe I'm blogging about it as an excuse to watch a bunch of movies. Either way, I'm doing it.  And yes, I know, everyone and their kid sister does a horror movie review blog at this time of year. 31 Days of Horror, A Horror Movie a Day for October, blah, blah, blah. But so what. If you're one of the five people reading this, maybe you don't read any of those other blogs. Maybe you're looking for some good suggestions on movies you could watch this spooky season. Well, that's what I'm here for. Besides, I'm also getting a jump on everyone else by starting early.  It's not quite October yet, but hey, Halloween Express just opened and CVS is already selling candy corn, so in the name of good capitalism, I'm starting my Halloween movie watching now too.

These won't be hard-hitting, in-depth reviews, but more overviews of films I dig, why I re-watch them again and again, and then maybe a new film or two. So let's not even call them reviews.  More like holiday viewing suggestions. Might even throw in a "warning, stay away suggestion" as well just because I'm nice like that.

I'm going to shoot for at least three moves a week, with maybe a double feature or two thrown in on weekends, but don't hold me to that. Life sometimes gets in the way of movie watching. Yeah, I know, sucks.

So here we go, my Halloween Movie Marathon begins with ...

We all know that "The Exorcist" is a classic film regardless of genre. We also know that the money-grab of a sequel, "The Exorcist II: Heretic" is a goofy, train wreck of a film. Wait, scratch that. A train wreck of a film is one that's so bad you can't look away. You would quite easily look away, or more likely fall asleep, during "The Exorcist II."

"The Exorcist III" is a completely different animal. Firstly, it was written and directed by William Peter Blatty, the writer of the original novel and film, and the writer of the novel that this film is based on.  That's not always a good thing, but in this case it is. Secondly, it isn't a sequel really. At least not in the typical way one thinks of a sequel. Honestly, I always believed this film would have done better keeping the title of the novel, "Legion," and then being sold as a standalone film allowing audiences to find out the links to "The Exorcist" on their own.  But I guess that's why I'm not in Marketing.

The story follows a police detective - a minor character in "The Exorcist" - as he tracks down a serial killer who supposedly died in the electric chair years before. A few other minor characters and loose ties to the original pop up here and there, but as I said, this is really its own story. (The original script didn't even contain an actual exorcism scene, though the producers later demanded one be added.) Part police procedural, part character study, part supernatural horror story all wrapped up with interesting philosophical musings on the nature of evil. And Blatty writes wonderfully witty banter for his characters, which is one of the things I've always loved about his films and books.

Now, truth told, if you're a hardcore horror movie fan you're not likely going to find this film terribly scary.  The casual horror fan might, but really the film is more about creating a creepy atmosphere than trying to out and out scare you. That is with the exception of one scene, which I assure you, you will know which one I mean when it happens. I could write an entire post on that scene, but I'm already running long, so I'll move on.

To sum up, great characters, wonderfully performances, well directed, humor, scares, and a bit of thoughtful pondering make this one of my Halloween regulars.

And if you're interested in getting away from the TV for a while ...

I also highly recommend the book, which is available in paperback and on most e-readers.

New Year's Resolution

What's my New Year's resolution?  I will never again say, "I promise to blog more regularly."

Happy 2012!

Scramblers, Let's Start Scrambling

Ok, so let's get this out of the way first; where the hell have I been?!   Well, that’s a good question.   I’m glad I asked.

Back towards the end of July I went on vacation with my entire family, and I got really lazy for a while, then I got kinda busy and forgot to update my blog.

Yep, that’s it. 

What? You were expecting something more elaborate? Some tale of prolonged misery and/or great fortune? Sorry, my life isn’t that exciting.

Anyway, I’m back and I’m going to try to be a bit more consistent for the one or two of you that read my blog. My next post will be the second in my “Story of ‘Transfers’” that I started last time, but today I wanted to tell you about the Sidewalk Scramble. As you may know (and if you don’t, please check out their link) the Sidewalk Moving Picture Festival is a yearly independent film festival that takes place over a long weekend in and around the Alabama Theatre in downtown Birmingham. They just completed their 13^th festival back in August. What you may not know is that Sidewalk hosts other, much smaller scale events throughout the year. One of which took place this past weekend; the Sidewalk Scramble. The Scramble is a 48 hour film competition. That is, you have 48 hours, beginning Friday evening, to write, shoot, edit and score a short film. You get all the rules and certain props and themes (dubbed “inspiration items”) at the kick-off Friday night, so you can’t really plan ahead other than getting your team together and figuring out what each person is contributing.

This time around the overarching theme was Horror. Seasonally appropriate. Chance and I went to the kick-off at 6pm Friday evening to get our instructions and inspiration items. I’ll quickly break it down for you; all films had to be under 5 minutes, our horror sub-genre was “stalker,” our inspiration item was a length of oxygen tubing, and we had to incorporate some theme, concept, line of dialogue, something from the film “Orphan.”

And so it went. Chance and I sat down at Rocky’s Pizza and hashed out a concept, came up with a storyline, then broke it down into individual scenes. That was about as elaborate as the scripting got. The rest, like dialogue, we figured out as we went along. Then we called in the full team and went to work. The weekend was long and exhausting, and I was unfortunately on call for my day job, so at least twice I had to leave to drive out to the hospital and replace a printer or some such issue. But, man, was it a blast. Tough work, long and tiring, but we had such great people on our team making the whole experience just amazing fun. I’d do it again this weekend if my weary brain could handle the lack of sleep (but without the trips to work).

Here are some behind the scenes pictures from the Scramble.  Thanks to Jonathan Nelson for taking these.  Click on the image for a larger view.

Here's me manhandling Michael Shelton.

Our lead actress, Catherine, and Michael looking entirely too menacing.

Chance laughs as I try to use a camera.

If you’re in the Birmingham area and want to see what the Scramble is all about, the Sidewalk Horror Scramble Screening is October 6^th at Sloss Furnaces beginning at sundown I believe since it’s an outdoor screening. All the films made during the Scramble will be shown (I think there were around 12 or 13 teams), followed by the announcement of the winners of the competition. Should be a lot of fun. And it’s free!

And now ...

Congratulations to Alabama native and Sidewalk Scramble alum Adam Wingard.  The new film he directed, "You're Next," recently played the Toronto International Film Festival and Fantastic Fest in Austin, TX to rave reviews at both fests, and was then aquired by Lionsgate Films for theatrical release.  And if that weren't enough, his previous film, "A Horrible Way to Die" was just released on DVD and Blu-Ray.  Stop showing off, dude.

And finally today, a new feature; Music I Dig.  Here's a cat I came across a few years ago.  Josh Pyke is an Australian singer/songwriter, and he deserves a much wider audience ... but, you know, he's from Australia.  This song is one of my favorites of his, and the video is visually awesome.