Deep Red

Dario Argento is hands down the director that got me from watching regular Americanized horror movies and into watching foreign films. Argento was my gateway drug, so to speak. Suspria was the first one I saw. Deep Red was the second, and then I was hooked. Truly, seriously hooked.

Deep Red is a giallo, full of the traditional bright red blood, the over-the-top murders, and the beautiful art direction and use of color. The story this time around is a psychic is conducting a show and in the process ends up reading the mind of a murderer. David Hemmings witnesses her murder (the brutal, bloody kind of course), and ends up getting involved with Daria Nicoldi, playing the intrepid news hound, to help solve the murder. Whose mind did the psychic read? Who killed her? Will David and Daria figure out the true story and solve the crime without getting killed?

I love the brilliant color use here. You can tell Argento was looking towards Suspiria and it’s beautiful use of color. I also can’t help but love the Edward Hopper reference there at the beginning with the “blue bar” scene. The murders and the mystery are actually pretty good. The solution is hardly telegraphed throughout the movie at all. To top it off, you have a killer Goblin soundtrack. Man I love those guys.

Dario Argento really did some of his best work at this time. Deep Red is truly a classic.

Rating: 5 Purrs for one of my favorite films. Plus you gotta love a movie that was also named The Hatchet Murders.

Horrorfest 2009 - How many horror movies can I watch? Part 4

So I skipped out last night on the movie viewing, and read a whole bunch instead. So tonight I am back on track, especially since I am off work for the next few days and I can stay up late.  Never fear, I am trying really hard to meet my sister-in-law's expectations of 25 movies while the spouse is out of town I'm on 15 now, for those who are counting). So tonight is a night of classics rather than  B-Movies. Tonight I watch the good stuff. (I don't think I have Suspiria in me tonight, but it's on the list.)

• The Shining: God, I love this movie. I remember reading the book when I was in high school and being overwhelmed with how terrifying the story was and yet also how beautiful. Kubrick takes Stephen King's vision and makes it his own without ever really losing the essence of the story that King created.  Jack Nicholson is damn frightening, the kid is so cute and creepy, and Shelly Duvall is terrified. You can tell she is totally stressed out by working with Nicholson and Kubrick. 
• Jaws: I watch this movie even if it's showing on regular TV with commercials and all the good stuff chopped out. Stephen Spielberg makes good movies, but I think this is one of his best. It seems sometimes crap happens for a reason, so I can't help but be happy that Bruce the Shark was such a pissy creature that they could only show him towards the end. It certainly makes that first appearance a shocker, even on the 100th viewing. Plus, that opening scene is downright scary, no matter how many times you watch it. Jaws did the ocean for me like Psycho did for some and showers. I still can't get in the water much more than hip deep without thinking about this film., and to me, that says perfection. That says true horror - forget all the slash, slice, dice and naked teenagers (not that I don't like watching those too of course). 

Just After Sunset by Stephen King

To be honest, I didn't think Just After Sunset was nearly as good as Everything's Eventual, Stephen King's previous short story collection, but I do love how King writes those short stories. 

I think my favorite might be The Gingerbread Girl. The main character here takes up running after a tragedy strikes her family. When I say takes up running, I mean seriously running. Like all the time until she feels like dropping dead (which I have totally felt before but that's because running is like Heaven and dying to me. It's a weird combo, I know.). Of course, this obsessive/compulsive running comes into play later in the story when she has to run with purpose. 

Otherwise, the stories all kind of ran together for me. I'm not saying they weren't good, but none of them really stood out to me like The Gingerbread Girl, except for maybe N., which channels Lovecraft (even if King says it doesn't). I love the play on obsessive/compulsive behavior in that story. 

Overall, I will always love Stephen King's ability to write short stories. It seems like a lost art form these days.  But despite that, I can't wax poetic about this collection.

Rating: 4 Purrs for The Gingerbread Girl, 3 1/2 for everything else

Horrorfest 2009 - How many horror movies can I watch? Part 3

Monday Night's Viewing

Tonight is the night of goof-ball, B-Movies.

• Horror Planet: This low-budget horror flick is pretty silly. A group of explorers are working some sort of mine on a far away planet and they discover some crystals that wake up some really big-eyed alien who decides he likes one of the chickies. Lots of people dies, the girl gets knocked up by the alien, and then everybody goes crazy. Some pretty interesting deaths, but really you could skip it. I watched it for nostalgia's sake after I found it on my Roku.
• Killer Klowns from Outer Space: Basset Hound (my second choice for a dog after the Welsh Corgi)! No horrorfest is complete without a viewing of Killer Klowns. Really, what other movie has a gun that turns people into big balls of cotton candy?
• Chopping Mall: I have a fondness for this movie because it's by the same guy who directed my favorite Christmas story - Night of the Comet, plus it stars Kelli Maroney, also star of Night of the Comet. It's cheeseball at it's cheesiest. Robots patrol the shopping mall, but unfortunately a lightning strike makes them go haywire crazy on a group of kids who sneak into the mall to have a sleepover. Blood, explosions, cheesy 80's hair. It's awesome. "It's not you, Ferdy. I'm just not used to be chased around a mall in the middle of the night by killer robots. " Where else would something like that make sense? 

Horrorfest 2009 - How many horror movies can I watch? Part 2

Sunday Night' s Viewing Extravaganza:

• Blackout: Found this on on NetFlix Watch Instantly and watched it on my Roku. It's actually not that good. In fact, it got kind of icky squeamish at the end but then it was just blah. Three strangers are trapped in an elevator in a deserted apartment building with little hope of rescue. All of them have some place to be, but only one of them needs to dispose of a body. That's right, one of them is a serial killer. It's pretty obvious right off who the bad guy is going to be and it takes forever to come to a head.
• House of Wax: God, I love this movie! Giant house built out of wax, roadside attractions, icky, icky deaths, creepy twins, the list goes on. This is an awesome remake, well re-imagining really, that no matter how many times I watch it I still get spooked and cringe.
• Shaun of the Dead: Okay so this might be more of a horror comedy, but it still counts. I love these guys, plus Lucy Davis, Dylan Moran...well this is just about the best horror comedy ever.
• Land of the Dead: Keeping with the Zed word, and the Edgar Wright Simon Pegg team (cameos!), I figured I would watch Asia Argento and Simon Baker kick zombie ass. This one isn't as good as Dawn of the Dead, but I thought it was better than Diary of the Dead and Day of the Dead, especially the Day of the Dead remake (which was downright painful).
• Shark Attack 3: Megalodon: This movie is so bad is awesome. Seriously, it might be the absolute worst movie I have ever seen. Manos Hands of Fate was better. John Barrowman (Capt. Jack Harkness) is one of the harbor patrol at a Mexican resort. Big, prehistoric shark shows up and starts chomping away. When I say big shark, I mean like a great white they have forced perspective on or taken in Photoshop and stretched it so it can *swallow people on boats whole.* Like I said, this movie is so bad it is awesome.
  

Horrorfest 2009 - How many horror movies can I watch?

When my spouse decided to hit the road for a solo road trip the week of Memorial Day, I decided it was prime time to indulge in my guilty pleasure - horror movies. The good, the bad, and the way below B-quality. I wondered how many I could watch the week he was gone. One friend bet 12, my sister-in-law is betting 25. I'm curious to see which one is closest. So far, I am on movie 5 since he left mid-day on Friday. 

Here's what my viewing schedule has been so far:

• The Fog: The original, of course. John Carpenter is the king as far as cheesy 80's horror goes. Tom Atkins, Jamie Lee Curtis, and the always lovely Adrienne Barbeau take on spooky sailors who come back to seek revenge on the folks in Antonio Bay, CA who done them wrong. Synth heavy JC music, creepy fog, and lots of spooky sailor ghost action makes this one an old favorite, which in turn makes me so sad the remake sucked so badly (which doesn't matter because I own it anyway). The scene where the possessed driftwood makes the tape recorder creepy ghost voice freaks me out every time. It's downright spooky, no matter how many times I watch it. 
• Halloween (Unrated): Rob Zombie takes on a John Carpenter classic. It's no where as good as the original, and Scout Taylor Compton is in no way as good as Jamie Lee Curtis was in embodying the terrified, goody-two shoes Laurie Strode. But honestly, I loved watching Malcolm McDowell chew up the screen playing Dr. Loomis, and while I think some remakes suffer from trying to put too much background to the spooky killer, I like the young Michael Myers scenes. It almost loses my attention once Myers grows up and the teenagers get to dying. 
• The Lost Boys: I haven't watched this one in ages. I remember loving this movie in high school, quoting it endlessly, and having such a huge crush on Alex Winter. Honestly, the music hasn't aged well at all, but it's still a fun, bloody watch. The end kills are just awesome, and Keifer Sutherland is still one of the coolest vampires ever. Even with the age, the dialogue is still snappy, the blood still bloody, and it makes me miss California even more. Any movie with a grandpa that gives you taxidermied animals and kills the head honcho vamp with a truck and a fence post is up for Grandfather of the Year. 
• 28 Days Later: I haven't watched this one in forever too, so watching it was almost like watching it for the first time. I forget just how perfect this movie is, from the beautiful, haunting soundtrack, to the story, the scary infected, the actors, everything. Truly one of my favorites. Plus, Cillian Murphy is very high on my list. Argue if you must, but I am not sure I would count this as a zombie movie. I just can't make up my mind. Really, it doesn't matter. That rage virus is horrifying whether you attach the zed word to it or not. 
• 28 Weeks Later: I couldn't watch one without the other. The thing about these movies is they combine three of my favorite ideas - plague, end of civilization as we know it, and well, zombies (there, I said it). The sequel is not as good as the original, but I like how they didn't just retread like a lot of sequels do. Imogen Poots is beautiful (the sister), and I love Jeremy Renner. I'm interested to see what they do with the next one. 

Acquisitions to the Library

Even more books. I am on a roll.

• Tropic of Cancer by Henry Miller
• Tropic of Capricorn by Henry Miller
• Pulp by Charles Bukowski
• The Most Beautiful Woman in Town & Other Stories by Charles Bukowski
• Love Is a Dog from Hell by Charles Bukowski
• Mother Night by Kurt Vonnegut 

I think I am on a serious Philip K Dick, Kurt Vonnegut, and Charles Bukowski fetish this year.