It is now the halfway point of this year’s Horrorshow, and I’m enjoying watching all these classic Hammer horror flicks. But, watching them all close together like this means I’m more aware of when they are repeating themselves compared to watching them on a normal release schedule. For example, the three Mummy flicks I’ve reviewed so far this month have basically been the same film. There is still a good film to be made from the idea, but by The Mummy’s Shroud, I’m not sure the filmmakers were trying. Today’s film, Dracula Has Risen from the Grave, suffers from some of the same sort of creative malaise that doomed The Mummy’s Shroud. Continue reading “October Hammershow: Dracula Has Risen from the Grave”
Tag: Supernatural Flick
October Horrorshow: The Void
A movie like this has been a long time coming. After two decades of CGI, most of it subpar, dominating effects in horror flicks, The Void comes along and shows that latex, and other dangerously flammable stuff, still has a place in horror. Continue reading “October Horrorshow: The Void”
October Horrorshow: Jason X
It’s Friday the 13th! In October! Missile Test couldn’t possibly let the day go by without watching a Friday the 13th flick, and this one is a doozy. By 2001, the original Friday the 13th franchise was on its last legs. The producers, recognizing that the old formula had been ground into dust by overuse, decided to shake things up. And by shake things up, I mean they all contracted serious cases of the awfuckits and sent their franchise property into space. That’s right, no more summer camp and no more Crystal Lake. This film takes place in outer space…in the future. Hell yeah.
Jason X, from writer Todd Farmer and director James Isaac, is the tenth film in the Friday the 13th franchise. It’s the second to ditch the Friday the 13th moniker, after 1993’s Jason Goes to Hell: The Final Friday. When a film franchise forgoes using its title — the most significant brand that it has — a viewer can tell that things haven’t been going so well lately. The Friday the 13th flicks were always moneymakers, but the return on investment had been going down with every film, and the franchise had earned an unsavory reputation for being cheap, exploitative schlock. Clearly the only thing to do was to double down. Continue reading “October Horrorshow: Jason X”
October Hammershow: The Mummy’s Shroud
Hammer must have been out of ideas by the time they made The Mummy’s Shroud in 1967. At least, that’s what it feels like. There is not a single moment of tension or surprise in writer/director John Gillings’ film. But that isn’t to say The Mummy’s Shroud is a bad film. It’s not. It’s cheap and fairly stupid, and it doesn’t bother to challenge any of the tropes audiences had come to expect with a mummy film, but it has its charms. Continue reading “October Hammershow: The Mummy’s Shroud”
October Horrorshow: Hell House LLC
Yet another found footage horror flick. I suppose they’ll stop making them when we stop watching them. But, while most found footage horror flicks have little to offer beyond a gimmick, sometimes the filmmakers get it right.
Hell House LLC comes from way back in 2015. It was written and directed by Stephen Cognetti, and judging from the names listed as producers, was financed with a lot of loans from family members. This is Cognetti’s first feature, and it will be recognizable to horror fans as a first time filmmaker’s magnum opus. Horror is the genre, after all, most open to new filmmakers. No one wants to see a romcom that cost a buck and a half to film. But we viewers have a much higher tolerance for low budget flicks if they do a decent job of frightening us. Continue reading “October Horrorshow: Hell House LLC”
October Hammershow: Dracula: Prince of Darkness
After eight years, Dracula, the actual Dracula and not some misdirection with the title, is back in Hammer’s 1966 film Dracula: Prince of Darkness. 1958’s Dracula (Horror of Dracula in the US) is among the most well-known and revered of Hammer’s horror catalogue. It was also a moneymaker. So, for a company that was in the business to make a buck I find it surprising that it took Hammer eight years to put a sequel together. Part of the problem may have been Dracula’s recalcitrant star, Christopher Lee. He led a most interesting life, mingling with true giants on a regular basis. Sometimes it feels like he did all this cheap horror to pay the rent, but his heart was never really in it. Like many stars he often failed to do the decent thing and keep his mouth shut about a project after filming wrapped. Continue reading “October Hammershow: Dracula: Prince of Darkness”
October Hammershow: The Curse of the Mummy’s Tomb
This is a first for the Hammershow — a Hammer horror film that does not feature either Anthony Hinds, Terrence Fisher, Jimmy Sangster, Peter Cushing, or Christopher Lee in the credits. What sacrilege is this? Not to worry. That august group of filmmakers and actors is not required to make a good Hammer flick, although it helps. Continue reading “October Hammershow: The Curse of the Mummy’s Tomb”
October Horrorshow: I Am the Pretty Thing That Lives in the House
Horror flicks don’t get much more atmospheric than writer/director Osgood Perkins’ I Am the Pretty Thing That Lives in the House. There is so much dim lighting and soft focus in this film that it’s impossible to watch in a lighted room. I suppose that’s a good thing. The overall darkness of the film forces a viewer to watch it in a more immersive fashion. In many places, a viewer must pay closer attention to the screen than they otherwise would. It almost feels like we are having our senses piqued by the movie, deliberately, so that should Perkins feel that is the right moment for a scare, viewers are physically primed to feel the effect to the fullest. Continue reading “October Horrorshow: I Am the Pretty Thing That Lives in the House”
October Horrorshow: Burial Ground, aka The Nights of Terror, aka Le notti del terrore
What a gloriously shitty movie. Burial Ground, also released under a number of different titles, is an Italian horror gore-fest from 1981. Director Andrea Bianchi crafted a flick that ticks off just about all the boxes when it comes to shitty Italian cinema. The film stock is cheap, the dubbing sucks, there are numerous overlong shots used to mask a distinct lack of plot, et cetera. It really is a wonderful example of bad cinema of the era, taking its place alongside anything from Shitty Movie Sundays favorite Enzo G. Castellari. But, it also has the added benefit of being somewhat watchable.
Somewhere in Italy near an old villa (the Villa Parisi just north of Rome was the filming location), an unnamed professor (Raimondo Barbieri) is excavating an old tomb. Unfortunately for him, his digging and poking invokes an ancient curse of protection, and all the dead from olden times in the area come to life as flesh eating zombies. They’re just about the slowest zombies that have ever been put to film, but they are unique. Rosario Prestopino is credited with the special effects makeup, and he and his team did a better job than could be expected from a flick like this. Continue reading “October Horrorshow: Burial Ground, aka The Nights of Terror, aka Le notti del terrore”
October Hammershow: The Brides of Dracula
Sangster! Fisher! Cushing! But, no Lee. Despite the name ‘Dracula’ being in the title of this film, The Brides of Dracula, Hammer’s 1960 follow-up to its Dracula remake, does not feature either Dracula or Christopher Lee playing him. But that could be forgiven, right? The title could be referring to the actual brides who lived in Dracula’s castle in Transylvania, only that isn’t the case, either. Not only is this film not about Dracula, it’s not about his brides. Instead, it features a completely different vampire in a completely different Transylvanian castle. That is gross misdirection on the part of Hammer. Continue reading “October Hammershow: The Brides of Dracula”