1. Cannibal Holocaust (1980)

In terms of film history, this is a must-see for any horror fan, as it’s the prototype for films such as Hostel, Saw, and all the found-footage films that are popular right now. For all its grainy, trashy aesthetics, Cannibal Holocaust is actually far more intelligent and deliberate than it sometimes appears to be. In some ways, the film is a cogent parody of the Western world’s assumptions about native culture, as well as the problematic role of media. That being said, it’s a deeply disturbing film, largely because the director employs real violence to animals as an analog to the fake violence to humans. It’s incredibly gut-wrenching and effective, and also blatantly unethical. I’ll never watch this film again.

2. Scream (1996)

Let me begin by stressing that I like this film if for no other reason than it famously revitalized the slasher genre in the 1990s. It also made horror mainstream by using an all-star cast, and like every other teenage boy in the 90s, I loved every second that Neve Campbell was on screen. It also gave horror a then-needed dose of wit and tongue-in-cheek self-reflection. At its heart, Scream is a horror movie about horror movies. I suppose that being so ground-breaking and influential has a price, as every horror film that followed for a very long time had a similar tone and technique. I love Cherry Falls (a better sequel to Scream than the actual sequels) and the more recent meta-film Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon. Scream paved the way for both of these films. And I’m sure I’ll watch Scream 4 when it hits theaters, if only to reminisce about my younger days as a horror fan. But I’ll likely never watch the original Scream again, because all the irony and punch of it is long gone, thanks in part to the rise of the Scary Movie franchise, which thoroughly lampooned everything that was once pithy and subtle about Scream.

3. The Blair Witch Project (1999)

This movie had me cowering in my seat when I saw it in the theater. I’d never seen anything quite like it, as it was one of the first horror films to really make extensive use of shaky-cam, found-footage style film-making in a way that was more realistic and immersive than Cannibal Holocaust. But, like the meta-narrative style of Scream, all of this has been copied and rehashed to the point that its lost its effectiveness. I tried watching The Blair Witch Project again, hoping to recapture that feeling I had when I saw it for the first time. But the twigs tied up in a knot just seemed silly the second time, and the blurry, indiscriminate shapes and sounds were annoying instead of scary, and the amateur acting seemed puerile. Of course, it’s an important film, and it proves that film-makers should be innovative and try new things. But it also means that there’s no real and permanent substitute for having things like a polished script, professional acting, refined cinematography, and the other timeless elements of good film. If there’s another sequel to The Blair Witch Project that has all of those things, then I’ll watch it. Otherwise, I’m finished with this franchise.

4. The Amityville Horror (1979)

This is another film that scared the loving bejeesus out of me as a kid. This is probably because children think of their homes as being both the center of their world, as well as a very safe place to be. So there was something about the idea of a haunted house, with its dark and sinister inner room (the famous “red room”) that turned my adolescent mind upside down. For a long time, it made me afraid to go in the basement of my own house. I saw the film again as an adult and I had two reactions. It’s actually an incredibly slow and boring film, and James Brolin must have been the hairiest, manliest actor in the 70s. The dude belongs in a Brawny paper-towel commercial. I’m glad I saw this film as a kid, but now that I’m an adult, I’ll never see it again.

5. Suspiria (1977), or any of Argento’s films

I’ve loved every Dario Argento movie that I’ve ever seen, including Suspiria. I’m even a big fan of Jenifer and Pelts, his controversial installments in the sadly defunct Masters of Horror series. Suspiria is a well-crafted, exquisitely paced, and beautifully shot film, with choreographed color palettes and carefully orchestrated music. But I’ll never see it again, because I really don’t need to. Argento keeps making the same movie over and over, whether he’s exploring the secret, evil world of dance, or the secret, evil world of the fur trade. They all look and feel about the same, so I’ll never watch Suspiria again, and wait for the next Argento movie instead.

6. Dawn of the Dead (1978)

I have the utmost respect for this movie. And I’m a little surprised myself that it’s on this list, as I could watch the original Night of the Living Dead every night of the week. And Dawn of the Dead is a smart zombie film with lots of important stuff to say. But I tried watching it again a while back, and, as much as it pains me to say this, it’s really kinda boring. I’d forgotten how slowly paced it is, or how there’s a long sequence of events that we have to muddle through before we get to the good stuff in the shopping mall. This might not be fair, but I also can’t help but compare it to Zack Snyder’s 2004 remake. It’s derivative, of course, of Romero’s work, and indebted to it in every way imaginable. But its pacing is perfect, the characters are all interesting, the tone and editing are contemplative but also relentless, and it has a soundtrack that includes the punk-rock poet Jim Carroll and the one-and-only Johnny Cash. What’s not to love? It’s the better film. And I’ll never watch Romero’s Dawn of the Dead again because of it.

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from my own childhood, the item i remember most that seemed to serve no other purpose than to gross out those around you was ‘garbage pail kids’ collectible cards. designed as sort of an “eff you” to both the baseball cards our fathers once collected and, obviously, the ‘cabbage patch kid’ mania sweeping the nation in the mid 1980s, these cards were the must-have item when i was eleven. each card featured a cartoon image of a child experiencing some sort of trauma, torture, fatal injury or performing some similarly heinous act themselves. under that picture would be the child’s name, which was usually some sort of bad pun, rhyme or alliteration. a good example of this is ‘blown joan.’

there were usually two variations of each card, each with the same image but a different name (e.g. ‘blown joan’ is also known as ‘curly shirley’). the cards pretty much grossed out anyone who saw them (including the kids who bought them). which was, of course, awesome. how they were able to release images of children either in the process of dying or already dead is beyond me, but the cards were very popular through the late 1980s and early 1990s, and have actually seen a resurgence as new cards and retro releases of the originals have been produced in the last few years. i found several sites that catalog all the cards, so this weekend i spent quite a while looking through every single garbage pail kids card ever released, pulling out those that either directly reference horror films or are based heavily on horror themes. below is the fruit of that labor, so take a stroll with me down horror-nostalgia-gross-out lane…

not many of the cards directly references slasher films, but two notable exceptions are ‘slasher asher’ (aka ‘claude flesh’) and ‘hollow wayne’ (aka ‘jacqueline lantern’).

when i was a kid, having a ‘garbage pail kids’ card with your name was the ultimate in coolness (which is probably why they released at least two names for every card). unfortunately there was never a ‘corey’ card as i was growing up (the closest thing was ‘cory on the cob’), but in the new cards there are two! now if only i was eleven again, these would both go front-and-center on my trapper keeper.

if you want to look at more cards or search for your own name, the three sites below will allow you to do both of those things.

• Barren AARON’s GPK World
• Wayne’s Garbage Pail Kids Reference
• GPK Central

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the layout of my awards are similar to last year, with best films & documentaries, worst films, and special categories for particularly surprising or disappointing films. oddly, the same as last year, a single director appears both in my “best” list and my “most disappointing” list, something i didn’t notice until i’d already finished compiling it. last year, director toby wilkins appeared in the “best” category with SPLINTER and in the “most disappointing” list with THE GRUDGE 3. this year, adam green found his way into both categories. both directors are very active on twitter and seem like nice guys, so i can only assume this is a trend that will continue next year with yet another friendly director who loves to tweet finding his way to make one film i love and one that doesn’t quite live up to my (probably unreasonably high) expectations. mark that down as my prediction for 2011.

the best horror films of 2010

#10

SAW 3D

the latest tri-dimensional entry into the SAW franchise is far from perfect, but a damn sight better than some of the later entries (i’m looking at you 4 & 5). the 3d is fun, and the triumphant return of a principal character from the original made this a very enjoyable, if not horribly original, “ending” to the series (i trust this being the last entry as much as i did THE FINAL CHAPTER and FREDDY’S DEAD.)

#9

SPLICE

SPLICE starts off weird, and then just keeps getting stranger and more depraved. not every choice pays off in the film, but regardless a lot of the storyline and visual directions were brave, whether they all worked or not. a little inconsistent, but definitely worth a view from cronenberg fans or genetic scientists who wish their profession involved more kinky sex.

#8

THE CRAZIES

one of films i’m embarrassed to say i’ve never seen is george romero’s THE CRAZIES. it’s on netflix instant, so i really have no excuse. after seeing this slick, enjoyable remake, i may have to finally sit down and watch the original, because if it it’s anything like the new one, then i’m missing out. the remake features some great suspense moments, likable characters and law enforcement (timothy olyphant and his deputy) wearing some disturbingly tight pants (maybe that’s an iowa fashion thing i’m unaware of).

#7

THE HUMAN CENTIPEDE

i went into THE HUMAN CENTIPEDE like most — equally horrified and intrigued at the film’s simple premise, but not expecting much beyond that. i was shocked to find a clever and surprisingly restrained thriller with some great and (in the case of dieter laser) incredibly creepy performances.

#6

PIRANHA 3D

this is a remake of a film that was itself a blatant rip-off of another, more successful movie about a shark eating people. if that sounds like something you might like, then i doubt you’ll be disappointed by this tongue-in-cheek and ridiculously gory and nudity filled 3d extravaganza.

#5

THE LAST EXORCISM

i have yet to tire of these shaky-cam horror films when they’re done well, and this one is. doesn’t quite reach the heights of creepiness that BLAIR WITCH and PARANORMAL ACTIVITY achieved, but still well worth checking out.

#4

BURIED

in the hitchcockian tradition set by LIFEBOAT and ROPE, BURIED is an exercise in filmmaking. in this case, the exercise is setting an entire movie in a closed coffin. there are no cheats here… no flashbacks or dream sequences. this is an hour and a half of ryan reynolds stuck in a box. you’d think that’d be a hard thing to make tense and interesting for 90 minutes, but this film did it.

#3

FROZEN

adam green’s FROZEN is similar to BURIED in that the majority of the film takes place with people trapped in a single location (here it’s a stopped chair lift). it also shares the same serious tone, with the very occasional moment of dark comedy thrown in to alleviate the near-constant tension. a welcome departure from green’s over-the-top silliness exhibited in the HATCHET series.

#2

LET ME IN

i have not seen LET ME IN, but i am including it in the number two slot anyway, because that’s the kind of shit-house-rat crazy bastard i am. i wouldn’t blame you if that makes you disregard my opinion or this list, but bear with me. every review i’ve read of this film (at least the ones written by people i trust) says the same thing — “almost, but not quite as good as the original.” since i know exactly how i feel about the original, i’m going to trust my fellow horror reviewers on this one (well, at least until it hits blu-ray). after seeing it, i will add an addendum^* to this entry stating whether my educated guess on its placement on this list was accurate or not — but i’m almost certain it would reside here, if not higher. ^*after seeing LET ME IN, it would definitely either be in the #2 slot or tied with #1. i’m planning to look at the film more closely in an upcoming post.

#1

LAKE MUNGO

this film was the biggest holy crap that was better than i ever thought it would be moment of 2010, which would definitely place it on my “most surprising” list if it weren’t already residing at the top of this one. i’d kind of given up on the 8films2die4 gimmick as the films usually range from the terribly bad to the terribly mediocre and this one looked to be more of the same (although, to mix things up, it also looked to be “terribly australian”). i wouldn’t blame you if you missed this one, but i urge you to go back and give it another chance. PARANORMAL ACTIVITY left me a little unsettled when the curtain fell, but LAKE MUNGO had me feeling ill-at-ease hours after it’d finished. if you’re a fan of ghost stories and faux documentaries, this is one of the best out there.

the worst horror films of 2010

LEGION

LEGION is like THE PROPHECY but without christopher walken or anything else cool or interesting. the trailers centered around an ice-cream man opening his mouth real wide which seemed like an odd choice, until i saw the film and realized that was the least crappy two seconds in the whole film.

THE RIG

i normally try not to come down too hard on low-budget films, but this one is damn near unwatchable. other films this year managed to come up with something slightly interesting with limited resources, but THE RIG fails to even make william forsythe seem cool, a feat i’d previously thought impossible. this monster tale on an oil rig (which looks suspiciously like a high school in most scenes) redefines tedium and is the only film this year that caused me to literally yell at it, begging it to just, please, end already.

the best horror documentaries of 2010

NEVER SLEEP AGAIN: THE ELM STREET LEGACY

similar to last year’s voorhees’-centric documentary HIS NAME WAS JASON, this in-depth look at the ELM STREET series is far slicker and engaging.

BEST WORST MOVIE

this bizarre but oddly touching look into the making of and current lives of those involved in the cult classic TROLL 2 is well worth seeing, regardless of whether you’re familiar with the film it examines.

the most surprising horror films of 2010

BURNING BRIGHT

when i first read the description of BURNING BRIGHT on netflix (woman is trapped in a house with a circus tiger), my initial thought was “there’s no way i’m adding that to my queue.” after a moment’s reflection, that quickly changed to “that sounds so stupid, there’s no way i’m not moving that up to #1 in my queue.” i’m glad i changed my mind as this turned out to be a surprisingly tension-filled film, despite a few minor short-comings (mainly due to budget limitations, i suspect).

NIGHT OF THE DEMONS

i’ve always had a soft spot for the 1980s NIGHT OF THE DEMONS, so when i heard it was getting a straight-to-video remake, i was not particularly optimistic. however, the new version far exceeded my expectations, retaining the same silly tone of the original while adding some interesting new plot points and imaginative special effects. also it features a scene where people’s lives depend on how fast they can trace, which must be a horror film first.

the most disappointing horror films of 2010

DEVIL

after the beat-you-over-the-head ya-gotta-have-faith message at the end of SIGNS (which, apart from that bit, i kind of liked), i should have known that m. night shamalamadingdong could not possibly treat the idea of satan trapped in an elevator any less subtly. i was optimistic though given he did not direct it himself, but that optimism was misplaced. DEVIL has a few good moments and some decent scares (even if it uses the same ones over and over again), but the overall effect, theme and tacked on “moral” of the film felt insultingly lame.

HATCHET 2

i have mixed feelings about the first HATCHET because it’s just so damn silly and hardly the return to “old school american horror” that it billed itself as, but i had to admit it was an often funny and entertaining film. the news that fan-favorite danielle harris would be joining the sequel gave me high hopes that it might eclipse the first, but those hopes were smashed against the rocks minutes into my pay-per-view screening of HATCHET 2. the sequel keeps the over-the-top gruesome deaths of the original film, but makes the bizarre choice to be just as silly but not nearly as funny as its predecessor. if it’s not scary and it’s not funny, then you’d think that with a slasher film you’d at least be able to enjoy looking at some young, attractive people talking about sororities and fumbling with bra straps before being killed — but there too you’d be wrong, as the people being hunted by victor crowley are almost all middle-aged, slightly over-weight hunters and bikers (with the exception of harris, of course). despite dying in the last film, parry shen returns, but is completely underused and is never given the chance to be as funny and interesting as he was in HATCHET. i give adam green huge props for going up against the mpaa and standing up for independent horror, and i loved FROZEN, but i was horribly underwhelmed by victor crowley’s second outing.

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1. Lisbeth Salander in The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo
I never read Stieg Larsson’s novel, but the Swedish film adaptation of it is stylish and intriguing, largely because of Noomi Rapace’s portrayal of Lisbeth. She’s sexy, street-savvy, brilliant, tough, and all of this is symbolized by the full-length dragon tattoo on her back. But that’s not the only bad-ass tattoo in the film. When Lisbeth is victimized by her probation officer, she has her revenge by videotaping his attack, and then tattooing the words “I am a rapist and a sadistic pig” on his stomach.

2. Seth Gecko in From Dusk ‘Til Dawn
A picture of Seth Gecko should be printed in the dictionary under the word “cool.” Sure, he’s a cold-blooded psychopath, but he’s also confident, bold, focused, and absolutely stylish. Everything from his car, to his clothes, and his tattoo screams that he’s cooler than you’ll ever be. And I love the way we never see the full extent of his tattoo until the end of the film. In a way, this mirrors one of the film’s themes. Just when you think a bad-ass biker bar couldn’t be more dangerous, it gets more dangerous. And just when you think Seth Gecko couldn’t get any cooler, he takes off his coat and does just that.

3. Viper in Doomsday
The reviews of this film were decidedly mixed, but I thought it was a fun and stylish mash-up of conventional post-apocalyptic scenarios. Plus, it’s got Viper in it. She’s the ultimate “bad girl” in that she’s wild, dangerous, and seductive, as evident by her tribal facial tattoos. I know that Sinclair is the film’s protagonist, and I like the fact that she’s basically the female version of Snake Plissken, but I couldn’t help but wish that she wouldn’t have killed Viper. Still, it was far more entertaining to watch those two go at it than watching Snake fight that sweaty fat man with a spiked baseball bat in Escape From New York.

4. Francis Dolarhyde in Red Dragon
The “Tooth-Fairy” is a lousy nickname for Dolarhyde. Sure, he bites his victims and all that, but it’s just too silly an appellation for this far-out, cosmic-minded killer with his Blakean delusions. And the placement of this particular tattoo is rather ingenious in that he can keep it so well hidden during his workaday life. It’s a much safer route than, say, having dragon horns or something implanted in his skull, but still creepy enough to satisfy his dark, freaky urges and scare the bejeesus out of his victims.

5. Beth in Hostel Part 2
As much as I liked Paxton in the first Hostel, he’s not nearly the bad-ass that Beth turns out to be in Hostel Part 2. In a typical horror film, a girl like Beth would stumble into something she wasn’t prepared to handle, and then fight her way out. Beth goes one or two steps further and proves that she’s much more than a scared, spoiled rich girl. In one of the greatest, turn-the-tables scenes in horror cinema, Beth demonstrates that she’s the much more qualified to join Elite Hunting than Stuart, her would-be killer. And by the end of the film, she’s got an Elite Hunting tattoo, as well as Stuart’s severed genitals, to prove it.

6. Reverend Harry Powell in Night of the Hunter
Robert Mitchum had already established himself as 1940’s film-noir staple, but his role as Reverend Harry Powell, the bible-thumping, throat-slitting con-artist with the words “LOVE” and “HATE” tattooed on his knuckles, made him the ultimate bad-ass. He’s got a little story to explain the tattoos, saying that helps him illustrate the inner struggle between good and evil that all men face. But with Powell, there is no inner struggle, as he’s perfectly fine with marrying his dead prison-mate’s widow before murdering her, then bullying her brother and stalking her children.

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given this extensive resume, had he chosen another profession other than ‘really, really incredibly complex death-trap designer,’ he surely would have succeeded. personally, after listening to his various recorded messages left for victims which are often delivered in beautiful and flowery prose, i think john “jigsaw” kramer may have missed his calling as… (wait for it)… a greeting card writer.

sure, maybe he would have made more money as an architect, locksmith or interior decorator… but i really think this is a profession where he could have really excelled. below are a few examples (using dialogue from the first film) of what it might have looked like, had he followed this career advice.

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THE HUMAN CENTIPEDE (FIRST SEQUENCE)

i rarely get horror movie related questions at work, despite being known as “the horror guy.” the exception to that rule happened earlier this year when i was asked on no less than four occasions if i’d seen THE HUMAN CENTIPEDE. usually the questions basically boiled down to “omg! i heard about this sick, depraved movie i can’t even imagine a normal person wanting to see called THE HUMAN CENTIPEDE. have you seen it yet?” like everyone else, my interest was piqued by the film’s central concept because it is undeniably disgusting and bizarre, but also so instantly understandable that it’s oh-so-easy to describe to shocked friends and co-workers. the film itself is not nearly as shocking as it’s premise as most of the graphic details are left to the imagination. however, the core of the story still revolves around sewing people’s mouths to other people’s anuses — so it’d be difficult for the film to not be shocking, no matter how much restraint the director used. while not a great film, THE HUMAN CENTIPEDE is entertaining, well-acted and about as enjoyable as a film about pooping in other people’s mouths could be.

TRIANGLE

part re-telling of an ancient myth, part twisty time travel cluster-f, deciphering an exact linear explanation for everything in TRIANGLE would be a daunting task. in many ways though, piecing that together would be a waste of time… the film is more about appreciating the puzzle rather than solving it. at its core, TRIANGLE is about human subjectivity and the futility of trying to fight our own nature. while you may not be able to understand and even abhor the actions of a future you when seen from the outside, once you’re put in the same situation, you’ll inevitably make the same choice. we’re all stuck in a predictable pattern of behavior determined not by gods on high, fate or a clever screenwriter… but by our own graces and flaws, acting themselves out over and over again. smart, creepy and filled with plenty of “wtf?” moments, TRIANGLE is well worth searching out.

THE BOX

while THE BOX certainly features a box as a central plot point, a more accurate name for the film would be WACKINESS: THE MOTION PICTURE. i have little idea what happened in this film, but even less understanding of what it meant or why i should care. this film goes in so many bizarre directions and is so ultimately unsatisfying, that i’m utterly perplexed at how it ever got made. still, it’s a refreshing change from the scookie-cutter sci-fi trash we’re usually being spoon-fed, so i will at least give it props for trying something new.

NEVER SLEEP AGAIN: THE ELM STREET LEGACY

i’m a bigger jason fan-boy than freddy, but this documentary is easily superior on almost every level to the similarly structured HIS NAME WAS JASON doc released last year. slick, polished and comprehensive, this impressive documentary succeeded in both increasing my enjoyment of the ELM STREET series and reminding me of why i loved it in the first place.

TRANSYLMANIA

there are few films that are, to me, truly unwatchable — but this is one of them. after less than twenty minutes, my opinion of the film is probably a rather unfair critique because it is based on only 20% of the film, but holy hell did that 20% suck. unfunny to the point of being aggressively so, i felt had no choice but to order the TRANSYLMANIA disc to exit my player and march itself back into its netflix envelope. i was prepared to use force if necessary, but TRANSYLMANIA seemed to understand my reasoning and went quietly.

SURVIVAL OF THE DEAD

I admire romero for avoiding large studio productions and sticking to his independent roots. say what you want about his zombie films, but each is undeniably his own. DAY OF THE DEAD remains my favorite of the films, but it’s been a fairly steady decline since then, hitting a low point for the entire series with SURVIVAL OF THE DEAD. i’m not sure why romero thought the focus of the series should turn to two old guys arguing over whether zombies could be taught to eat farm animals, but that’s about all i got out of this film. i’ve seen positive reviews, some even calling it a return to form for the series, so maybe i’m in the minority here — but i found SURVIVAL completely unsatisfying. it’s not necessarily a bad film… but like DIARY before it, it just seems to lack any sense of joy or energy and seems content to just quietly sit and spin in a mess of shallow metaphors and uninspired social commentary.

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AFTERMATH, perhaps the most disgusting film ever made (and one of the films on our most disturbing horror films ever made list), has just popped up on netflix watch instantly. the only circumstance i can imagine you wanting to put this on would be a during a really bad blind date you want to get out of fast, but i thought i’d point it out to those of you who are either a) into cinematic endurance tests or b) really, really sick puppies.

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jennifer’s body
maybe it’s because megan fox was a part of the travesty that is transformers 2 or because i had no idea going in that the film was scribed by juno writer diablo cody, but i expected jennifer’s body to suck and suck hard. given such low expectations, it’s not a huge shock then that it surpassed them… but what was shocking was by how much. this is a damn good movie! a smart mixture of heathers, buffy the vampire slayer and the exorcist, jennifer’s body is a funny, bitingly satirical film revolving around the often unhealthy and parasitic nature of teen female friendships. while perhaps not oscar-worthy, megan fox turns in a surprisingly layered performance, deals very well with cody’s highly stylized dialogue and (as shown to the left) pulls off one hell of a creepy smile. not a perfect film, but highly recommended. just make sure to avoid the inferior theatrical version and watch the unrated director’s cut instead.

the butcher
referring to the snuff-film-within-a-gore-film in the butcher, a character says “i know we can sell it to the US. they’re always looking for something bloody.” and, you know… he’s right, because i was intrigued enough by the description of this low-budget korean hostel knock-off to cue it up on netflix watch instantly. and while there are a few unique disturbing images to be found in the butcher (a first-person view of a homosexual rape by a man wearing a pig’s head leaps to mind), all lose their impact due to poor setup of the situations, shoddy camera-work and the incessant and annoying babbling, squealing and whining of the main character. i have no doubt i would be reduced to a babbling wreck as well if kidnapped and tortured, but the primary victim in the butcher takes it to such ridiculous, comedic extremes that they should have just named the film a guy cries, yells, begs, spits and crawls around in the dirt for about an hour. the film seems to have few aspirations above qualifying for the label ‘torture porn’ and, in that, it does succeed. and while it may fit very squarely into that subgenre, it’s not a very noteworthy example of it.

wrong turn 3: left for dead
many seem to prefer the campiness and insanity of the sequel to the original film, but in my mind wrong turn 2 doesn’t hold a candle to wrong turn. while i will not deny the inherent awesome-ness in having henry rollins square off against a bunch of cannibal hillbillies in the second film, the original wrong turn had a terrifying atmosphere and vicious tone that the sequel lacked. wrong turn 3 follows in that trend, replacing style and scares with camp and over-the-top comic violence. the kills are entertaining enough, but both the script and characters (even the once-creepy cackling antagonist, “three-finger”) are dull and lifeless. wrong turn 3 didn’t bore me to tears, but left me wishing for something that more firmly built on the scares of the first film or was more successful at imitating the ridiculous antics of the second.

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paranormal activity
while the year is not yet over, i can easily state that paranormal activity will be on my top ten list for the year and has a damn good chance at the #1 slot. the hype surrounding it just keeps growing, but after seeing the film last week i have no problem saying that the hype is well-deserved. it’s not often that a film gets under my skin and continues creeping me out long after the credits have rolled… but paranormal activity did just that.

this film isn’t going to please everyone, especially those looking for an action/gore packed roller-coaster ride. this is a slow-burn, suspense-driven piece that may not work for those that quickly grow impatient with films of this sort (e.g., the blair witch project). further, paranormal activity really needs to be seen in a crowded theater to be fully enjoyed. the sense of dread and anticipation of each scare is palatable in the theater, and i just don’t see that working at home nearly as well unless you make sure you’re watching it with as few distractions as possible (i.e., turn out the lights, put away your iphone and give the film your full attention). still, i’m looking forward to the dvd release, not just because of the much-talked-about alternate endings, but because it may be a more comfortable experience when viewed from underneath the blanket i’ll undoubtedly need to be hiding under in order to watch it again.

saw vi
paranormal activity got thrown into the boxoffice ring with the reigning champ of late october horror films, the saw franchise. despite decent reviews, saw vi got pummelled its opening weekend… which makes this ridiculous poster for the film i saw at the theater rather ironic. however, despite the boxoffice beating that saw vi took to a film that cost less than a used hyundai to make, there was another shocker… saw vi is actually decent. i’ve always liked the saw series overall, but even i was about to jump ship after part 5. luckily they’ve steered the series back on course with part 6, creating a film heavy on political satire (think hostel meets michael moore’s sicko) and arguably as good as any of the previous sequels. oh, and you get to see tanedra, who won scream queens season one, overact quite a bit. so that’s fun too.

the texas chainsaw massacre iii: leatherface
despite a spectacularly over-the-top performance from viggo “aragon” mortenson as a sexually conflicted cowboy (long before brokeback mountain made it cool), this is just not a very good movie. i really enjoy the platinum dunes remake, but for those that complain that michael bay ruined the this franchise… i point you towards the texas chainsaw massacre iii: leatherface (and the even worse texas chainsaw massacre: the next generation) as evidence that the series was already ruined.

Related posts:

1. Stuff I’ve Been Watching (chainsaw edition)
2. Stuff I’ve Been Watching (ghost house edition)
3. Stuff I’ve Been Watching — The Power of Expectation Edition
4. Stuff I’ve Been Watching (gore & Megan Fox edition)
5. Stuff I’ve Been Watching (Human Centipedes and Boring Zombies Edition)

the texas chainsaw massacre (2003)
platinum dunes gets an unfair shake from many hardcore horror fans, i think. i was a big fan of friday the 13th and the trailer for their upcoming elm street re-imagining also looks interesting, but it all started with 2003′s remake of the texas chainsaw massacre, my favorite of their releases thus far. director marcus nispel seems to have an odd fascination with teens journeying far from home in search of bushels of marijuana, given that both texas chainsaw (2003) and the new friday the 13th open with that setup, but that storyline works far better in 1970s texas than it does in modern-day crystal lake. this remake abandons the camp of the original series’ sequels, and instead focuses on being as vicious and brutal as the original film, a goal which it largely succeeds in reaching. oh, and kudos to platinum dunes for opening the film with narration voiced by john laroquette (just as in the original) which perfectly sets the tone of the film.

the texas chainsaw massacre: the beginning
in what may be a first, the texas chainsaw massacre: the beginning is technically a sequel which is a prequel to a remake. it actually makes sense though given that the remake had introduced us to a host of bizarre characters, the next logical step was to explain how these characters came to be. the plot line is basically the same (kids run afoul of leatherface’s family and hijinks ensue), but that’s fine because this film has the same gritty tone, mood and visual feel of the remake, which was its biggest asset. as in the first film, r. lee ermey steals the show, in many ways eclipsing leatherface himself as the series’ prime villain, which is no small feat. i think there was even less enthusiasm for this film than the first from horror fans at large, but i personally love them both.

the texas chainsaw massacre 2
two chainsaw films in, i decided to just go ahead and officially make it a southern perennial-unfriendly marathon by throwing in tcm part 2. now maybe it was the fact that i was mainlining nyquil at the time, but i’d completely forgotten how f’ing weird this film is. the whole thing feels like a comedic torture-porn directed by david lynch, which i can’t honestly say is necessarily a bad thing. it would be a bizarre dark comedy all on its own, but tcm 2 is just so different from the original film that i can’t imagine what audiences must have thought back in 1986. while it may lack the scares and visual style of the original, it more than makes up for it in blood-crazed whimsy, gore and wacky dialogue (e.g., “oh, my achin’ banana!”, “leatherface, you bitch! look what you did to my sonny bono wig!”, “dog will hunt!”, and “it’s like super-feedback. just put the underwoofer across the overflapper”).

Related posts:

1. Stuff I’ve Been Watching (Saw VI Gets Smacked Down by a Ghost Edition)
2. Villanelle Review of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre Part Two
3. The Fashion & Aesthetics of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre
4. Stuff I’ve Been Watching (Human Centipedes and Boring Zombies Edition)
5. Frontier(s) – Horrorfest 2007 Follow-up

i couldn’t find any that just had the bloodhound and the company name, so i decided to just go and make it myself. the finished logo is hardly a huge accomplishment in graphical design, but simple is what i was going for. if anyone else happened to want such a shirt, i’ve added a few variations of it to my zazzle store.

Related posts:

1. New Logo and Super Fun Contest Time
2. F13 Megapost – Jason Contest – Crystal Lake Webcam – New Logo
3. True Blood Merchandise

Audition

Seed

Cannibal Holocaust

Related posts:

1. The Most Disturbing Horror Films Ever Made – Part I
2. Great Horror Films That I Will Never See Again
3. Uwe Boll Week
4. Pop Music and Horror Films – Part Two
5. Where Have all the Real Horror Films Gone?

in truth, those behind the films we see, even those of graphic horror films, usually have the audience’s best interests at heart. they want you to enjoy their movie. like the creators of a rollercoaster, horror directors may want to make a scary ride… but not one so scary that it actually injures or traumatizes.

but what if this were not true? what if a horror filmmaker set out to make a film not to entertain, but simply to disturb or harm? a film that didn’t just push the envelope of the acceptable, but blatantly crossed the line? over the last few weeks jon and i have watched dozens of ‘extreme’ horror films in an effort to put together a list of films that we believe attempt to do just that. you will find part one of that list, and our brief impressions of each film, below.

now, what one person finds disturbing another might not. for example, you might find evil dead 2 to be a riotous comedy, while your grandparents would probably be a bit freaked out by it. these are not those kind of films. while it’s arguable that they were created to entertain on some level, there isn’t a film on this list that won’t disturb you in some way. these are films so f’d up that if you did decide to show one to your grandparents, they wouldn’t just be freaked out — they might tie you to a chair and call the police. consider yourself warned.

stay tuned for part two of this post when our list concludes with beautiful psychopaths, peckish cannibals and the oddly titled german gore-fest dard divorce. same bat-time. same bat-channel.

Related posts:

1. The Most Disturbing Horror Films Ever Made – Part II
2. AFTERMATH pops up on Netflix Watch Instantly
3. Great Horror Films That I Will Never See Again
4. Where Have all the Real Horror Films Gone?
5. Corey’s Best of 2008

P2
Anyone who’s a fan of Seinfeld knows the “Parking Garage” episode in which George, Jerry, Elaine, and Kramer spend the entire show wandering a parking garage looking for their lost car, while encountering unsympathetic strangers and a heartless security guard. More than any other episode, “The Parking Garage” perfectly embodies the absurd humor and peripatetic sense of postmodern alienation of this “show about nothing.” I can’t prove it, but I’ll wager that the writers of P2, Alexandre Aja and Grégory Levasseur, love that episode as well, and not just because P2 has the same setting. P2 also has a subversive sense of humor, largely due to the terrific performance of Wes Bentley as the psychotic parking attendant Thomas. He’s all the more terrifying because he loves Elvis (and does a pretty decent impersonation) and insists that he’s basically a good guy. Toward the end of the film, as his victim turns the tables on him, he sincerely complains that “you’re trying to get me fired!” This isn’t to say that P2 isn’t horrifying. Thomas is all the more unsettling because of his delusions, and he does a good job of traumatizing Angela, the unfortunate woman he’s been stalking and who’s trapped in his parking garage. She’s rendered barefoot, bare-chested, and bloodied, but she survives the ordeal and emerges from it with perhaps a new sense of strength and determination, all of which is symbolized at the end of the film by the way she hobbles her way out of the garage’s darkened tunnel toward the warm, bright light of the outside world. If all of this is a bit formulaic—and it certainly is—then it’s forgivable because it’s executed so perfectly well. As Rolling Stone critic Peter Travers is fond of saying, “if you don’t know where this movie will go, then you’ve never seen a movie.” Even so, P2 is thoroughly enjoyable from beginning to end.

Martyrs
If you’re reading this blog, then there’s a pretty good chance that you’ve seen Martyrs and that you have strong opinions about it. It’s one of those rare films that has galvanized the horror community into camps. However, I think the one thing that’s beyond dispute is that this is NOT a formulaic film. What begins as a straightforward (and really terrific) torture/revenge story about the psychology of survival transforms into something else entirely. The film’s odd trajectory might not work for everyone, but I think it’s an interesting attempt to take “torture porn” into new terrain, or to underscore one of the underlying themes of the genre. Martyrs is an attempt to illustrate that something horrifying, grotesque, and also strangely sublime happens when we’re traumatized beyond our breaking point. As Hunter S. Thompson put it (and as Warren Zevon sang it), “you’re a whole different person when you’re scared.” Ironically, in exploring this new terrain, director Pascal Laugier borrows extensively from the theme and iconography of Carl Dreyer’s landmark 1928 film La Passion de Jeanne d’Arc. In order to more faithfully narrate the trial and execution of the famous French martyr, Dreyer developed new camera techniques to meticulously document the nuanced suffering and spiritual transformation as expressed by the actor’s face. Dreyer’s film is a haunting, fearless, and brilliant study of the politics and psychology of human suffering and spiritual transformation. Even though Martyrs never flinches from its treatment of pain and torment, it doesn’t quite capture Dreyer’s esoteric sense of his subject matter because Laugier reduces his version to something far more brazen and glib. Still, to his credit, Laugier proves that contemporary torture porn, especially of the French variety, has a very austere and established pedigree.

Related posts:

1. While She Was Out

Splatter: Naked Blood (1996) is about a young scientist who invents a new kind of painkiller. The first problem with it is that it works by turning pain into pleasure. The second problem is that he tests it on unsuspecting women undergoing a clinical trial on an experimental birth control. Things go horribly awry, and the women begin systematically mutilating themselves. One of the women enjoys food, so she deep fries her own hand and eats it. Another woman enjoys jewelry, so she adorns herself with homemade piercings made out of knives, crotchet needles, and forks. But things really take a turn for the worse when director Hisayasu Sato sabotages his own film by trying to make it an artsy David Cronenberg-style meditation on the hybrid nature of eroticism and human flesh. Or something like that. Unfortunately, in Splatter: Naked Blood, this involves one of the women having what looks like virtual reality sex with a VR goggle-wearing cactus. Words alone cannot describe the freaky strangeness of this scene. Sadly, I sent my copy of the DVD back to Netflix, so I was unable to provide a screenshot of said cactus. However, after spending literally hours sorting through images on google, I finally found a rough approximation. Another problem with the film is its long and tedious setup. We learn that the young scientist has abandonment issues, and his father committed suicide by drowning himself in the ocean, and that he’s living in his father’s shadow, and he feels alone in the world, and none of this really matters. I could always rent Bergman’s Persona if I want a film that explores the emotional wreckage of our inevitable human disconnect. What I wanted from Splatter was more splatter and less chatter. And no cacti.

Splatter doesn’t work because all of its terrific special effects and old-fashioned, stomach-churning fun is ruined when Sato tries to employ a highbrow auteur theory of film making to a genre of film that really can’t accommodate it. And this is why I highly recommend Botched (2007). Unlike Splatter, it has no pretenses of exploring the complexities or exotic corners of the human condition, but instead knows its own limitations and opts for the simple ambition of having fun. A professional thief (played by Stephen Dorff, who’s terrific in this role) is forced by a powerful crime boss to steal a religious artifact from the penthouse of a Moscow skyscraper. He’s accompanied by sidekicks who are equal parts bloodthirsty thugs and clumsy Marx brothers stooges. They manage to steal the artifact, but things go badly when the elevator gets stuck on the building’s 13th floor. They’re forced to take hostages, including an alpha-male security guard who has learned all he knows from soldier of fortune magazines, and an icy corporate vamp. Then things go from bad to bizarre when it turns out that they’ve stumbled into the lair of a pair of murderous twins, one who fashions himself after Ivan the Terrible and claims to be his descendent, and the other a crazed prioress complete with a posse of evil nuns. Ivan dispatches the unlucky hostages with deadly, blood splattering booby traps and by decapitating them with his sword in a spinning, spiraling move that looks like a combination of ballet and disco-dancing. Other scenes involve Ivan chasing his victims through the maze of corridors on the 14th floor in a mockup of a Benny Hill sketch. Reviews of the film have tended to describe it as 1/2 comedy, and 1/2 Hostel, but I don’t see the comparison to the latter. It’s a squishy, gloppy, bloody, fun mess of a film, more along the lines of From Dusk ‘Til Dawn, with absurd combinations of the horror and heist genres, and with a little history, and even a love story thrown into the mix.

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1. True Blood Merchandise

below is my list of the 2008′s ten best horror films. while there’s some general agreement amongst fans on films like inside and the happening, 2008 was a strange year in that it saw many releases that elicited very polar reactions from the horror community. many of the films that made my top ten can be seen in other site’s list of the year’s worst. even within the same site (e.g., bloody-disgusting), many of the films that appear on one writer’s best list also show up on another’s list of the worst. all i can say is that this list represents the ten films from this year that i enjoyed most… stories that drew me in and/or gave me the wiggins might not do the same for you, but i think all of the films listed here deserve a watch from anyone interested in the horror genre.

#10

[rec]

another in the recently revived ‘found footage’ genre, [rec] is a film from spain that documents a small-scale zombie outbreak in an apartment building. an ambitious news reporter and her camera man frame the story, giving the filming of the entire event a feeling of reality lacking in most films of this type (e.g., why did heather donahue feel compelled to continue filming throughout her ordeal?). less ambitious (but also less pompous and pretentious) than diary of the dead, [rec] is a far more visceral experience than romero’s similar take on the genre. i have yet to the see the american remake quarantine, but i hear it is almost a shot-for-shot retelling of the story — so i’m confident in saying that i’ll enjoy it when it makes it to dvd.

#8

inside (à l’intérieur)

i’d heard that inside was a rather grotesque film. about half way into this film’s rather short running time i was all, “hey, i don’t see what the big deal is.” boy did that last half prove me wrong.

this is a messed up little french movie about a messed up little french lady who really wants a baby. unfortunately, the baby belongs to another little french lady who hasn’t so much given birth to the baby yet as hasn’t. home invasion, multiple murders and torture ensues, resulting in a bizarre and rather disturbing climax. likely even more disturbing for pregnant women, women planning on getting pregnant, people who know pregnant women, or people whose mothers were ever pregnant. another little buttery croissant of horror further solidifying france as a force to be reckoned with in the genre. highly recommended.

#6

frontière(s)

i just realized six of my top ten films are foreign (seven if you count funny games, a remake of a foreign film by the same director). what’s up america? hopefully having obama in the white house, in addition to the unicorns and happiness and candy corn for everyone that we’re expecting, will also bring with it something that inspires some much-needed creativity in the horror-related corners of hollywood.

anyway, yeah. back to frontier(s). this is another nasty french film cut from the same bloody cloth as the texas chainsaw massacre. a group of fleeing thieves (including one who is pregnant… what’s with the french and pregnant women being tortured?) take refuge at a bed & breakfast that isn’t run by the stereotypical nice old couple, but instead by a family of nazi cannibals. as you would expect, the predictable hilarity ensues. less psychological and more action oriented than inside, both films are still probably equal on the ‘gruesomeness’ scale. the film’s climax really puts the final girl through her paces too… this is no simple “run through the woods, put on a crusty old sweater and swing a machete” american slasher film obstacle course — this french girl really has to work to get her final girl credentials.

#4

black water

when i heard the guy who did wolf creek was making a killer alligator film, i couldn’t wait. then i saw rogue and was largely underwhelmed… how did the disturbing and subversive tone of wolf creek transform into the castrated, audience friendly hollywood-ized (but admittedly, still fun) antics of rogue? it did whet my appetite for more gator action though, so i put black water in my netflix queue. as it turns out, black water is exactly what i was expecting when i heard about rogue… it’s bleak, frightening and humorless. imagine open water in the swamp. there are no giant cgi crocs to be found and no silly heroics or sappy hollywood endings. despite stiff competition from rogue (and rather flacid competition from the abysmal lake placid 2), this is the alligator movie of the year.

#2

the strangers

apparently this is not a remake of the french film ils (them), but i find that very hard to believe given the similarities. regardless, the strangers surpasses that film in every respect. creepy, moody and unrelenting — the strangers touches on the same fears as funny games — home invasion and torture. the strangers is much scarier though, and just as disturbing. and my god — that mask! apart from those based on the face of william shatner (michael myers’) or borrowed from my favorite sport (jason’s mask), this film features the scariest mask in horror film history.

honorable mentions: i really liked all the boys love mandy lane, but it wasn’t released this year. again. even though it was completed in 2006. the weinstein’s really need to decide what to do with this film and get it out already. i also saw repo: the genetic opera, but despite it being a downright gorgeous film and my love of musicals of this type (e.g., dr. horrible and the rocky horror picture show) — i’m afraid to admit (particularly given its near-universal critical acclaim), it just didn’t do it for me. maybe once i experience it in the theater (as it was intended), i’ll reconsider my opinion…

bonus list: best horror video games of 2008

#3

silent hill: homecoming

i was concerned the creepiness and undefinable “silent hill-iness” of the silent hill franchise would suffer when it moved to an american studio. i need not have been concerned.

#2

dead space

story wise, dead space borrows (read: steals) liberally from the thing and, even more-so, event horizon… but it does so extremely well. furthermore, it features the best user interface in recent memory and is one of the prettiest games ever released.

#1

left 4 dead

valve + co-op play + the inevitable zombie apocalypse we all know is coming. nothing had a chance of topping that.

Related posts:

1. Best of 2008 Update: Quarantine and Eden Lake
2. Corey’s Worst of 2008
3. Cloverfield (2008) and Diary of the Dead (2008)
4. Horror Remakes By The Same Director
5. Stuff I’ve Been Watching — Needs More Cowbell Edition

one of the better trailers i’ve seen in a while was for the UK release of the french film frontier(s) (see video on the right). it was finally released here on dvd last week, so i rushed out tuesday and picked up a copy. i was a little surprised to see the dvd packaging… it’s very clearly identified as one of the “8 films to die for” and part of horrorfest 2007. the packaging is exactly the same as the eight films i reviewed last month. so, it appears there are now nine films in the eight films to die for series this year, which is causing me some minor degree of confusion. do they believe horror fans cannot count? are they going to release another film next month… and then another and another, in the hopes that we won’t notice and will just keep buying them saying to ourselves “well, i have the other seven, i better get this one too?” if so… that’s marketing genius.

a far less plausible explanation is the official one… frontier(s) could not secure an R rating and was removed from the original octuplet to be released separately later. that still doesn’t explain why the packaging includes it as one of the “eight,” but i am willing to let it go — and i will tell you why.

this is a kick-ass movie.

if this had been released in the original 2007 horrorfest line-up, it would have easily been the best of the eight. the film excels in most areas, lacking the most in the “originality” department (but who said originality was so important?). the story is familiar… a group of criminals on the lamb stumble into a something much, much worse than prison (e.g., from dusk ’til dawn). a strong female lead suffers through numerous unspeakable experiences (e.g., haute tension, hostel 2) at the hands of an inbred family (e.g., texas chainsaw massacre, the hills have eyes) determined to torture and/or kill and/or impregnate her (depending on where you are in the narrative), leading to a conclusion involving her fighting back while losing most of her sanity along the way (e.g., pretty much all of the afore-mentioned films). the tone and feel of the film are most similar to the two most recent texas chainsaw films (going so far as to include the “forced to have dinner with the insane family” sequence) and the hills have eyes remake, which is not all that surprising since the latter is directed by alexandre aja whose haute tension started the current gore trend in french horror. like haute tension, this is a vicious film which refuses to hold anything back and leaves nothing to the imagination… which basically means it was awesome.

the only possible criticism is that frontier(s) is never quite as good as the films it so unabashedly steals from. the ‘final girl’ is given little characterization, making identifying with her difficult. the psychotic family members are never quite as creepy as they could have been (with the possible exception of the nazi-crazed father). that said, the good aspects far outweigh any bad. the film is overflowing with style and often leaves you with that wonderful feeling i first felt when seeing the original texas chainsaw massacre… that perhaps the filmmakers don’t have your best interests at heart, and maybe entertaining you isn’t their primary goal. it also features one of the more grotesque deaths i’ve seen involving a table saw, and a head explosion rivaled only by the prowler, maniac and scanners. while its possible not every movie-goer shares my love of exploding heads, in my mind that moment is worth the price of admission alone.

Related posts:

1. Horrorfest 2007
2. Stuff I’ve Been Watching (chainsaw edition)
3. Stuff I’ve Been Watching (Saw VI Gets Smacked Down by a Ghost Edition)
4. The Hair of Halloween (2007)
5. Somebody Help Me (2007)

before we get to anything else… let me state a fact. scarecrows are freakin’ awesome. it’s a shame that they don’t appear in horror films more often and that when they do, they’re usually used ineffectively (yes, i’m looking at you, hallowed ground). the wizard of oz gave us the world’s most famous scarecrow, but horror is really where they belong. how many other agricultural tools primary function revolves around the ability to instill fear? zero. unless this thing cuts corn.

that said… the only thing more awesome than scarecrows would obviously be scarecrows in the 1980s, which brings us to this month’s selection in the final girl film club (see lots more about scarecrows there).

i admit it — i have a super-sized, two decade old crush on the movie scarecrows. i loved this movie in 1988 and i love it now, but i’m fully aware that this probably has more to do with when i saw it than the film’s overall quality. i was very excited when stacie over at finalgirl chose it as her film club selection this month. it was released on dvd a few months ago and i’m guessing that most horror fans are experiencing it for the first time since it wasn’t a huge success when it was first released (but has always had a loyal, if small following). if you’re seeing it for the first time now, then you will probably like the film but not fully understand why someone might lavish it with extraordinary praise and affection… but hopefully you can indulge my nostalgia-induced infatuation with this film as we take a closer look at it.

first of all… let’s look at the box cover. when i was 13 years old, browsing the local horror section at ‘video vision’ (located next door to the ‘food lion’ near my house), i distinctly remember first seeing the box for scarecrows. above and on the left is the vhs cover that i recall so vividly… on the right is the far inferior new dvd cover art. i can’t quite figure out exactly why the vhs cover is so effective… but i remember thinking “wow, that is one scary looking over-sized vhs video cassette sitting there, my friend. that movie will probably scare you so bad you’ll end up sleeping in the dryer.” maybe it’s the smoke in the background, the just slightly too-human looking face on the scarecrow or the fact that you can just tell that no retouching was done to it (it’s just a simple, unmanipulated photo), but that cover freaked me right out. i highly doubt the stylized “crows flying away from a ufo landing” dvd cover would have the same effect on a 13 year old me. i also think it has something to do with anticipation (something the movie expands on). in the original cover the scarecrow is just hanging there, but it seems like at any moment it could start moving, climb off that cross and come eat your liver… even though logically you know scarecrows don’t do such things. in the dvd cover the scarecrow is already walking around, machete raised high. while i will concede a moving scarecrow with a machete is more dangerous than an immobile scarecrow without one… the active scarecrow isn’t scarier because he’s already shown his hand. you know what he can and can’t do. fear comes from the anticipation of something creepy happening, not in the event itself.

i didn’t rent the movie the first time i saw the box… like texas chainsaw massacre at the time, i wasn’t sure i was ready for the terrors contained within that little plastic case. a few weeks later though i mustered some bravery and paid my $1.99 rental fee. and while i didn’t end up in the drier, my jeebies were appropriately heebied. the movie starts off with that same damn scarecrow from the cover that freaked me out, intercut with the credits. the camera moves slowly towards the scarecrow which, given how creepy he looks, wouldn’t be my choice of trajectories if i was there. the credits look rather similar to the the exorcist and the steady, somber music lets you know they’re not playing this one up for laughs — this scarecrow’s hardcore and is gonna fuck some people up.

the plot of the film is incredibly simple. a bunch of bad-ass military folks steal a bunch of money from a military base and hijack a private plane (along with the pilot and his daughter) and take off for mexico. one of the thieves double-crosses everyone and parachutes out of the plane with the money over a farm. the other thieves chase him down in an attempt to get the money back, but unfortunately this farm is inhabited by 3 animate scarecrows who like removing people’s body parts without permission. lots of people die in nasty ways and then the credits roll.

the film was directed by william wesley (which an imdb search reveals is also known as jose rolando rodriguez). i couldn’t find much information on wiliam/jose except this rather cryptic exchange on his imdb message board…

question: is william wesley still alive?
answer: i don’t know if he’s still alive but he had some serious problems in the mid-90s when i knew him.

you would think the combo of silly concept meets first time director who uses a pseudonym would result in a horrible film… but not in this case. somehow this film manages to create a taut, well-executed horror film from the strange blend of killer scarecrows, a creepy location and ultra-80s fashion. that’s about as close as i’d like to come to reviewing the film (you can find that elsewhere)… instead i’m just going to draw your attention to some of the more memorable aspects of this film.

made at exactly the time the mpaa was being particularly unreasonable towards violent content (e.g., the ridiculous amount of cuts required for friday the 13th part VII to secure an R rating, made the same year), scarecrows is surprisingly violent. whether it escaped the mpaa’s wrath because of its supernatural slant and low-profile or because the dvd release has incorporated missing footage… i’m not sure. in any case, there is some truly grotesque stuff here, most of which works because it hits you at such a visceral level. the gutting of a re-animated soldier (who has been hollowed out and stuffed with straw and money) is particularly cringe-inducing, but the kill that made me jump the most is shown in the video above. it’s a very simple effect achieved through misdirection and editing, but incredibly effective. the long, static shots of the scarecrows afterwards exemplifies the same tone and mood that the whole film exudes from beginning to end.

one thing i remember really liking when i first saw scarecrows was the frequent use of night-vision. maybe because its use in film wasn’t very common yet (i.e., pre silence of the lambs)… i found that green filter to be very effective in conveying “these are some hi-tech army dudes with state-of-the-art weaponry.” odd how something as simple as basically covering the lens in colored saran wrap could create such a profound effect in the 80s.

in 1988 i thought scarecrows was an ultra-realistic portrayal of the military. looking at the film now, either the military was very different then or, more likely, i was a moron. the hair… that girl’s makeup… those radio-shack headsets… that pellet gun… that beard… that red neckerchief. omg, that red neckerchief! and i’m fairly certain that the leader of the military thieves is wearing a single diamond earring in his left ear. i don’t think they let you do that… although, in his defense, they don’t let you steal millions of dollars either and he managed that.

if the neckerchief or roxanne’s perm (the blond soldier chick) didn’t tip you off to the timeframe of the film, there’s another way to very accurately pinpoint a film’s origins in the late 1980s. far more accurate than carbon dating, the presence of rolled jeans is a dead give-away that your film is set in 1989 (+/- 3 years). the pilot’s daughter (with her oh-so-bouncy hair) is sporting a very nicely rolled pair of jordache jeans (see above). if you’re too young to remember (or have unconsciously blocked out the memory of) rolled jeans, please see here.

about half way into the film, roxanne begins touching up her makeup. given that she’s currently standing in a less-sanitary version of the texas chainsaw massacre farm house, is involved in a crime consisting of grand larceny, murder and kindnapping and should really be either watching the kidnapped girl or looking out for murderous scarecrows… vanity seems like it should be lower on her list of priorities. of course, with the film’s focus on how greed and personal self-interest equates with having your spleen removed forcibly — this was probably intentional. still, it’s an odd scene… particularly when roxanne offers the makeup case to her kidnapped prisoner, asking “rouge? it will make you look happier.”

in addition to the utterly creepy mood and pacing of this film, it has some phenomenal pieces of dialogue. one of my favorite occurs during the scene pictured above where one of the soldiers, taking a break from trying to recover his money while avoiding rampaging straw monsters, decides to chow down on some corn-on-the-cob.

soldier: want an ear? best way to eat corn.
girl: get away from me, you cold-blooded bastard.

other great writing examples include…

soldier #1: i think this place is possessed by demonic demons.
soldier #2: your head’s gonna be possessed by the butt of my gun if you don’t shutup.

soldier: all that time you were just jacking us off with sandpaper. kick his ass!

and my personal favorite…

soldier: (referring to scarecrows) they’ll rip your tight little asshole out before you can say que fucking pasa.

one rather refreshing change from the norm is that the monsters here are given no real explanation or consistent motivation. you might think this would be a problem, but it’s really not… i’ve always loved films like tremors where an explanation for the creature is left out because the writers know that no possible explanation would really be satisfactory. here, a few hints are dropped as to the origins of the scarecrows, but ultimately it’s left ambiguous. above are the three “mangy looking guys” who used to own the house (these two shots are shown constantly throughout the film… in one the photo is cracked, in the other it’s not. spooky.). one of the soldiers discovers some “black magic” stuff in one of the rooms and later says “these guys died and no one told them.” apart from that… they’re just killer scarecrows. it’s unclear what they want (sometimes they keep body parts, but mostly they just scare and then kill anyone they meet). even the rules of what they can and can’t do aren’t very clear as they appear to be very physical creatures (explosions can hurt or destroy them), yet they can read minds, mimic voices (and a dog bark), cause out-of-service phones to ring, make decapitated heads talk and turn on/off generators magically. is that a demon, a monster or a ghost? i dunno… but this film plays like a haunted house ride with each scene using whatever rules it wants to be most effective — and for the most part, that works.

the scarecrows certainly aren’t traditional ghosts, as when jack (seen above) is re-animated by the scarecrows and sent back to kills his friend, he is stopped by a wooden door. i don’t know how murderous scarecrows could make a dead body walk and talk… and i don’t know why such a creature would feel the need to put on night-vision goggles over a towel… but the end effect is pretty spooky. i remember being utterly creeped out when curry (the not-dead-yet friend above) is hiding in a locked room and the possessed-jack creature is calmly asking from the other side of the door, “come on, curry. open the door. gee, these fucking things. they’re definitely demonic. you’re not one of them, are you curry? tell me you’re not.” it’s as if jack isn’t fully aware of what’s happened to him or, more likely, it’s just an attempt to drive the already butterfly-net-worthy curry out of his mind.

while my 13 year old self didn’t notice any grand deviations from reality in the film, the much older me picked up on a few. one of my favorites bits occurs at the film’s finale as the last remaining soldier uses a hand grenade to reduce himself and the last scarecrow to their respective bits of flesh and straw. forget the fact that hand grenades tend to make quite a bang and would probably cause quite a bit of damage to a small, 2 engine plane in flight… forget that the pilot of the plane is about 8 feet away and suffers no harm. no, what i noticed was the pilot’s dog. being a dog owner, i know that clapping your hands, opening a soda or thunder from a storm 10 miles away are all things that make dogs scurry away looking for a bed to hide under in a matter of milliseconds. i love this dog’s rather nonchalant reaction to a grenade exploding just a couple feet away…

so, to close… scarecrows rocks my socks, and if you haven’t seen it and you like quirky, moody 80s horror… go rent it or something.

bonus animated gif to make you go “gah!”

Jon’s Thoughts…

I’ll admit that before watching Scarecrows for this Final Girl film club review, I knew very little about the film, aside from its reputation as a cult classic. After watching it, I was instantly intrigued so I did a quick background check on the film’s director, William Wesley, and became even more intrigued. Aside from his 2001 film Route 666, plus a bit part in Showtime’s Red Shoe Diaries and a surprising role as a go-go dancer in the video for Janet Jackson’s 1989 “Rhythm Nation 1814,” this film seems to be Wesley’s only real claim to fame. I’ll wager that Scarecrows probably got lost in that vast 80s sea of so many Kruegers, Jasons, Michaels and other now famous slashers. Horror fans are fortunate that Scarecrows has a strong enough cult following to warrant its 2007 release on DVD. I suppose I could spend the bulk of this review wondering what in the heck happened to William Wesley. There’s a post at his IMDB message board that asks the existentially riddled question: “is William Wesley still alive?” I even thought that he just might be William “Worldwide” Wesley, the famous Detroit-area NBA basketball promoter, but, alas, they’re not the same person, so the world may never know what really happened to Wesley. I am usually not given to this sort of sentimentality, but I can’t help it; this film makes me nostalgic.

The plot of Scarecrows is simple enough, which is to the film’s credit. Scarecrows begins with a team of commandos who steal money from Fort Pennington. They hijack a plane and kidnap its pilot and daughter to make their escape, but their plans go awry when they are double crossed by their fellow commando, Bert, who parachutes from the plane with all their money into the middle of the creepiest farm country you’re ever likely to see. Wesley is able to build an effectively spooky atmosphere with this very simple set. The team’s leader, Curry, then leads the attempt to find Bert and recover the money. Things go from bad to worse as the farm’s scarecrows come to life and have at them one by one.

There’s not much to be said, really, for the plot, but I loved every minute of this film, largely because it made me miss the 80s, the decade in which I really fell in love with film. For instance, I had forgotten how 80s films made EVERYTHING look so glamorous: boardrooms, vampires, and even commandos were all sexy cool.

Roxanne

Jack

Bennet

Fame

Don’t get me wrong. Scarecrow’s Jack and Roxeanne can kick as much ass as Bennet (from 1988′s Commando), but that’s not going to stop them from at least trying to be stylish while going about it. Bennet is one of the creepiest commandos you’re likely to ever encounter, and yet his chainmail reminds me of an outfit you’d find in Flashdance . Jack looks like he’s just come from the 1982 video for “Come on Eileen” by Dexy’s Midnight Runners. And the conspicuous height and volume of Roxeanne”s hair would make her right at home on the set of “Dynasty” . Even the all-American badass Rambo wore the fashionable red headband as he tore his way through the jungle. Really, the entire tone and tenor of the entire decade began with Allan Parker’s 1980 Fame, a film about passion, sacrifice, and well-used fashion accessories. I like dark and gritty realism as much as the next guy, but sometimes I do miss all that strange and surreal neon-glow of the 80s.

Of course, aside from big poofy hair and handkerchiefs, 80s films were also prone to include morality tales, no doubt in part due to Reagan’s revival of 50s-style cold war rhetoric with its battle lines between good and evil . I’m not at all interested in films that get preachy, but the 80s films were rather complex in their depictions of moral struggle. 80s films such as Scarecrows and 1988′s Pumpkinhead are less explicit than, say, Invasion of the Body Snatchers in depicting a hard line between good and evil, but instead depict a far more ambivalent spirit of vengeance.

Pumpkinhead

As in Pumpkinead, the moral and political concept of “blowback” is a subtext found in Scarecrows. Like the Pumpkinhead creature, the scarecrows are, as Jack overstates it, “demonic demons” that punish you for your particular sins and repay violence and greed in kind. For instance, they stuff Bert with the money he so coveted. They kill the otherwise innocent pilot after he gives into temptation and goes for the money. The message, in other words, is that the 80s might be a decade of high-fashion and conspicuous consumption, but greed is sinful, and the wages of sin are death, or something like that. In addition their drive to punish, the scarecrows mimic the personalities of those who encounter them. They torment Curry by mimicking the voice of his recently killed friend, and, in a particularly nasty instance of irony, they give Jack his beloved harmonica just before killing him. Had the commandos shown up with smiles on their faces and songs in their heart, then perhaps it could have all turned out differently, but, alas, human greed is too powerful.

There is, however, an equally clear redemptive spirit to Scarecrows. Al, the last commando standing, learns his lesson too late to save himself, but soon enough to save the innocent Kellie by sacrificing himself with a hand grenade that destroys the last remaining scarecrow. I love the daring of recent horror films such as the Wolf Creek or the satirically excessive violence of such films as The Devil’s Rejects, but the unabashed clarity and simplicity of Scarecrows was a welcome tonic. Still, the special effects in Scarecrows were as gut-wrenching as anything you’ll likely to see in recent horror films, and serve as a reminder that sometimes the old “less is more” cliché is exactly right.

The allegory in the fact that Roxeanne’s hand is stabbed while reaching for the money is clear enough, just as the fact that Jack is literally blinded as to what’s happening to him, but what makes this film so horrifying is that the scarecrows have a knack for striking your most vulnerable parts. For instance, in one scene, they repeatedly stab poor Al in the exact same spot in his leg.

This film could have easily devolved into b-grade camp, and the fact that it doesn’t is a real testament to Wesley’s success in directing this film. Not only are the scarecrows the creepiest horror villains I’ve seen in a very long time, the setting is effective, the pacing is appropriately slow without ever seeming to drag, and the soundtrack is moody and suspenseful. I especially like the envelope structure of the film. We begin with a shot of a scarecrow as it slowly zooms in to a close up, while a radio broadcast informs us about the robbery.

At the film’s conclusion, we return to the close up of the scarecrow as the camera slowly pulls back and a radio broadcast tells us that Kellie has barely survived her ordeal. This sounds simple, but the effect is rather chilling. It’s the film’s attempt to return us to normalcy, to restore order, but the implication is that after-effects will likely continue. Shakespeare liked to do something similar at the end of his plays. Fortinbras shows up at the end of Hamlet to restore order to Denmark. But we all know it’s too late and that the violence we’ve just witnessed will stay with us long after we leave the theater. Of course I’m not saying that Scarecrows approaches anything the Bard ever wrote, but it’s fun, scary stuff and an oddly intriguing reminder that I really do miss the 80s.

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