13 Nights of Shocktober: Club Dread (2004)

by A.J.

Happy Halloween! The countdown is over and Halloween is finally upon us. Tonight, hopefully, you'll be relaxing, eating some candy, and watching a scary, or not-so-scary, movie. There are a lot of options for tonight and I hope I've been of some help. Here is my final recommendation to help bring an end to Shocktober:

Night 13: Happy Happy Halloween!

“I think you’re referring to my song Pina Colada-burg.”

Club Dread (2004)

To follow up the hilarious film Super Troopers, the comedy troupe Broken Lizard turned their style of comedy to the slasher movie. The result is Broken Lizard’s Club Dread, a self-aware horror-comedy that is as bloody as it is funny. It works as a comedy and as a horror-slasher movie; and since it features a hilarious performance from the late Bill Paxton, I couldn’t think of a better movie to close out this Shocktober.

Club Dread takes place on Pleasure Island, a tropical spring break style party resort. The island paradise is owned by Coconut Pete (Bill Paxton), a mostly washed up Jimmy Buffet-esque musician whose song Pina Colada-burg would’ve been a bigger hit if not for a certain Jimmy Buffet song. College age kids arrive on the island for a nonstop party, but a masked killer starts murdering the staff members one by one. The remaining staff try to keep the murders a secret from the party guests while trying to figure out the identity of the killer. The staff are played by the Broken Lizard members. The standouts of the group are Jay Chandrasekhar (who is also the director) as Putman, the tennis instructor with a vague, indeterminable accent and a comical mass of dreadlocks, and Kevin Heffernan as Lars, the new masseur with a close to magic touch. The female lead is Brittany Daniel who plays Jenny, the aerobics instructor that has all the men tripping over themselves.

Instead of just making fun of horror movie clichés and tropes, Club Dread uses those elements for comedic effect. The killer, like all slasher movie killers, lurks and moves slowly towards his running victims. One girl runs and gets into a golf cart that moves so slow the killer almost passes her as he walks. The killer leaves clues too, and the staff has to interpret the silly lyrics of Coconut Pete’s songs to find out who is going to be killed next. In a great self-aware moment Jenny is all alone in her cabin and getting ready to take a shower while there is a killer on the loose. She decides against the cliched shower scene. Jenny, like any Final Girl is resourceful and level headed, but unlike the typical Final Girl, Jenny is blonde and sexually active. The movie gets some jokes out of Jenny’s promiscuity, but it never judges her for that.

The cast, Broken Lizard or not, is incredibly likable and fun to be around for an hour and forty-five minutes. Even the non-professional comedians are very funny. Bill Paxton is great to watch as a beach bum musician that can’t remember the lyrics to his songs or even making the albums. He’s no stranger to comedic roles and knows just how to deliver the Broken Lizard material. He has a lot of fun playing Coconut Pete and passes that fun along to the audience. Plus, it’s great to hear Paxton sing ridiculous beach songs.

Club Dread is great horror movie fun from beginning to end. The blood and gore, though plentiful, are not too intense. This movie never loses sight of its main goal: to make sure everyone has a great time. It’s clear that the Broken Lizard team knows and loves horror movies. Their movie follows the plot points of a slasher movie, but Broken Lizard uses that template for their own unique version. They find fun ways to poke fun at each slasher cliché. My favorite comes when the killer reveals his identity but forgets the reason he’s killing everybody. There’s so much to enjoy here, even if you don’t like horror movies. I highly recommend Club Dread for a spooky-fun Shocktober night.

13 Nights of Shocktober: Masque of the Red Death (1964)

by A. J.

This is my favorite time of year, second only to Christmas. Autumn has arrived, the weather is cooling down, and October becomes the month-long celebration of scary movies called Shocktober. There are a lot of horror movies out there, but as a genre, horror is still looked down upon by some mainstream critics and moviegoers. It doesn’t help that, admittedly, there are so few quality horror movies made but, like comedy, it’s a very difficult and subjective genre. So, in the days leading up Halloween I’ll be posting some recommendations for scary movies to help you celebrate Shocktober.

Night 12: Vincent Price Night

The Red Death held illimitable dominion over all.

Masque of the Red Death (1964)

You never know what you’re going to get from a Roger Corman movie. He has produced an incredible number of movies of wildly varying degrees of quality. This includes the films he directed himself, such as this one. You may get absolute dreck (prime fodder for Mystery Science Theater 3000), an enjoyable but campy B-movie, or you may get a genuinely good film. Masque of the Red Death falls into the third, and smallest, category.

Vincent Price stars as the villainous Prince Prospero, a tyrannical medieval lord that worships the devil. He is passing through a village when he is confronted by two of the angry and poor villagers. Prospero sentences them to death but Francesca (Jane Asher) begs for their lives because they are her father, Lodovico, and her lover, Gino. Prospero takes them all to his castle and orders the village burned to the ground when the plague known as the Red Death is discovered there.

Lavish, decadent parties are the order of the day at Prospero’s castle. At these gatherings Prospero humiliates his guests by commanding them to act like animals and even kills people without a second thought. While Francesca is taught etiquette by Prospero’s consort, Juliana, Gino and Lodovico are forced to train to fight each other to the death. Prospero gives Francesca a tour of his palace and its different colored rooms. One room is solid yellow, another is solid purple, another white, and so on. Everything in each room is the same shade of color making the rooms look unnatural and surreal. The colors of the sets and costumes are rich and bold and easily capture the eye. The sets look artificial but this only adds to the surreal, gothic atmosphere of the film.

Vincent Price is excellent as the evil Prince Prospero. He plays his villains as characters that know they are bad and enjoy being bad, or he plays them as sympathetic, tragic figures forced to do villainous deeds. Prince Prospero is firmly in the former group. Price is the rare kind of actor that always knows exactly what kind of film he is in and attunes his performance accordingly. Because Price allows himself to have fun with his performance it allows the audience to enjoy the villain and the film completely. 

Masque of the Red Death is based on the Edgar Allen Poe story of the same name, and also has a subplot based on Hop-Frog. It also includes references to other Poe stories like The Raven and The Pit and the Pendulum. The screenplay was co-written by Charles Beaumont, who also wrote many of the best episodes of The Twilight Zone. As you might imagine, the film greatly expands upon Poe’s short story but the chilling touch of Poe is never lost. This is one of several films based on Poe stories that Roger Corman and Vincent Price made together and it is widely acknowledged as one of, if not the, best. 

13 Nights of Shocktober: An American Werewolf in London (1981)

by A.J.

This is my favorite time of year, second only to Christmas. Autumn has arrived, the weather is cooling down, and October becomes the month-long celebration of scary movies called Shocktober. There are a lot of horror movies out there, but as a genre, horror is still looked down upon by some mainstream critics and moviegoers. It doesn’t help that, admittedly, there are so few quality horror movies made but, like comedy, it’s a very difficult and subjective genre. So, in the days leading up Halloween I’ll be posting some recommendations for scary movies to help you celebrate Shocktober.

Night 11: Werewolf Party Night!

“Beware the moon.”

 An American Werewolf in London (1981)

Aside from the classic Universal Monsters movie The Wolf Man (1941), An American Werewolf in London is arguably the most well-known werewolf movie. It is famous for its prolonged transformation scene done in full light with incredible practical effects created by special makeup effects master Rick Baker and set to the song “Blue Moon.” Writer/director John Landis’s previous work as director had been the frenetic comedies The Blues Brothers (1980), National Lampoon’s Animal House (1978), and Kentucky Fried Movie (1977). With his first horror movie, Landis combines his skills as a comedy director with his personal love of monster movies and created one of the most memorable modern monster movies.

The film begins with a classic horror movie scenario: young travelers fall victim to hidden local dangers. The travelers are two American college students, David (David Naughton) and Jack (Griffin Dunne), backpacking their way through Europe. Their plan is to start in England and finish in Italy. They are making their way through the North of England looking for a place to get dinner and stay the night. The locals at the pub are suspicious, shady characters. Some of them want David and Jack to leave, others beg that they stay. When David and Jack do leave they are told to “keep clear of the moors" and “beware the moon.” They don’t, and they are attacked on the moors by a large, vicious beast. Jack is killed and David is patched up and taken to a hospital in London. Jack returns as a bloody, mauled, mutilated corpse and tells David that they were attacked by a werewolf and now David is a werewolf. Jack and any others he kills will be in limbo until David ends the curse by killing himself.

Though Jack is an undead corpse, his personality is intact and he’s still very funny. Griffin Dunne does a great job of being both comic relief and an exposition source. He also decays more and more each time he appears. The makeup effects used on Dunne are gloriously gross. He’s still able to act naturally under the makeup and the juxtaposition of his bloody, gory condition with his still casual attitude (he talks to David about the girls that showed up to his own funeral) make for great, strange humor. The stereotype of British people as ever subdued and reserved people is used for maximum comic effect and makes for some great scenes. When the werewolf attacks a couple outside of an apartment building, someone inside looks out the window and calmly remarks, “I think something’s happening outside.”

There are plenty of laughs and silly moments in An American Werewolf in London, more so than you may expect. While it is usually classified as a horror-comedy, it leans heavily in favor of horror. Long before David transforms into a werewolf he has terrible, frightening nightmares which provide some intense scares. The infamous transformation scene is the centerpiece of the film. Landis wanted a werewolf transformation that could be shown in full light without having to hide anything in shadows. The result is one of the most memorable scenes in modern horror history. The transformation remains impressive to say the least. David does not just become hairy and grow fangs. His body morphs and grows into a giant wolf and it looks and sounds incredibly painful. While I nearly always prefer a half-wolf half-man werewolf, as opposed to someone that just turns into a wolf, the monster wolf in this movie is a happy exception. For his work in An American Werewolf in London, Rick Baker won the first Academy Award for makeup (making this movie part of the very small club of Oscar nominated and/or winning horror movies).

There’s more to An American Werewolf in London than cool special effects. Landis’s screenplay and the actors’ performances find a nice balance between the horror and comedy of the film. These characters live in a world of real history (David’s doctor fought Nazis in WWII) and real movies (references to the Universal classic The Wolf Man), so they are as aware as the audience of the absurd and bizarre nature of the situation in which they find themselves. This may not make the werewolf plot any more believable, but it allows us to easily follow these characters on the strange, wild ride that is An American Werewolf in London.

13 Nights of Shocktober: Near Dark (1987)

by A.J.

This is my favorite time of year, second only to Christmas. Autumn has arrived, the weather is cooling down, and October becomes the month-long celebration of scary movies called Shocktober. There are a lot of horror movies out there, but as a genre, horror is still looked down upon by some mainstream critics and moviegoers. It doesn’t help that, admittedly, there are so few quality horror movies made but, like comedy, it’s a very difficult and subjective genre. So, in the days leading up Halloween I’ll be posting some recommendations for scary movies to help you celebrate Shocktober.

Night 10: Bill Paxton Memorial Night III/Vampire Night

“Howdy. I'm gonna separate your head from your shoulders. Hope you don't mind none.”
Near Dark (1987)

The DVD rerelease cover art for Near Dark has the male and female leads airbrushed to like characters from Twilight, but don’t be fooled. Though there is a romance, Near Dark is a full bore action-horror vampire western. The original poster for Near Dark shows only Bill Paxton, skin burned black and covered in dirt and blood with shafts of light bursting through his body. It’s a much more accurate promise of what’s in store for the audience.

After a night out at a bar, small town cowboy, Caleb (Adrian Pasdar), meets a mysterious young woman with short hair. She says that the light that just left the stars will take a billion years to get to Earth and when it does, she’ll still be here. As dawn approaches she becomes nervous and when Caleb won’t drive her home right away, she bites him and runs away. When the sun comes up Caleb becomes sick and starts to smolder and burn. An RV speeds by and pulls him inside.

The mysterious young woman is Mae (Jenny Wright). She’s one of a motley crew of Oklahoma vampires. The gang is led by Lance Henriksen as Jesse, who is so old he says he fought for the South (“We lost.”). Jenette Goldstein plays his longtime companion, Diamondback. Joshua Miller plays Homer, an aged vampire trapped in the body of a child. Rounding out the monstrous family is Bill Paxton as Severen, the flamboyant and ultra-violent loose cannon. They reluctantly take in Caleb but pressure him to make a kill. Meanwhile, Caleb’s father and local law enforcement are on their trail.

There is not as much bloodsucking in Near Dark as there is bloodshed. Necks are bitten but most of the violence comes from shootouts and Severen’s creative killing techniques. The gang takes Caleb to a bar to make a kill and we watch and each vampire kill a patron. It’s a prolonged and bloody scene but is incredibly engaging and totally dominated by Bill Paxton. The scene plays out not like a group of vampires preying on victims, but a group of psychos entertaining themselves. This may sound like a torture porn-esque scene, but it is not full of dread and despair. The blood and gore are not the point of the scene; it’s about seeing what these vampires are capable of and the intense danger that surrounds Caleb and Mae.

There’s really not much to the character of Caleb or the romance plot between him and Mae, but the eccentric and violent vampire family are incredibly interesting and entertaining. Paxton swings for the rafters with his performance and lands every time. He’s easily the most memorable part of Near Dark and it’s no wonder he’s the poster for movie. Lance Henriksen’s performance is as subtle and lowkey as Paxton’s is loud and centerstage, Since Hendriksen plays his character as a quiet menace, he and Paxton balance each other.

Near Dark is more influenced by The Wild Bunch than any vampire movie. It has the look of gritty westerns of the 1970’s. Everything looks and feels run down and lived in, even the character’s clothes and hair. The cinematography by Adam Greenberg gives the film an excellent dusty look. For being a movie about vampires, this movie has a very bright, sun-drenched look. In every daylight scene the sunlight feels intense, like you could almost feel the heat and there is dust or smoke in nearly every shot. The score by Tangerine Dream gives this unusual vampire movie a unique, mysterious feel. All of these elements come together most excellently under Katherine Bigelow’s direction. Her sole entry into the horror genre gave us a most noteworthy and entertaining vampire movie. 

13 Nights of Shocktober: Kwaidan

by A.J. 

This is my favorite time of year, second only to Christmas. Autumn has arrived, the weather is cooling down, and October becomes the month-long celebration of scary movies called Shocktober. There are a lot of horror movies out there, but as a genre, horror is still looked down upon by some mainstream critics and moviegoers. It doesn’t help that, admittedly, there are so few quality horror movies made but, like comedy, it’s a very difficult and subjective genre. So, in the days leading up Halloween I’ll be posting some recommendations for scary movies to help you celebrate Shocktober.

Night 9: Anthology Horror Night
Ghost Stories of Old Japan

Kwaidan (1964)

Kwaidan is one of my favorite Japanese horror movies. It is also an anthology film, another favorite genre of mine. I first saw this film several years ago on TCM late at night. It has since become part of their programming rotation and usually airs in October. Kwaidan translates to “Ghost Stories” or “Strange Stories” and the film is exactly that: a collection of ghost stories from Japanese folklore. The vignettes are based on the writings of Lafcadio Hearn, a writer and folklorist who was born in Greece, spent time in the United States, and eventually moved to Japan in the late 1800’s where he married into a samurai family and changed his name to Yakumo Koizumi. Everything about Kwaidan feels so distinctly Japanese that I was surprised to learn that a Westerner was in any way involved.

The first story, titled "The Black Hair," is about a young samurai that abandons his wife to marry into another family of higher status. He comes to regret his decision and returns to his first wife to make amends, but all it not what it seems. This where the story turns to the supernatural. This first segment is a slow burn, but builds to a satisfyingly spooky reveal and sets the tone for the rest of the film. 

The second story, "The Woman of the Snow," is my favorite. A young woodcutter becomes lost in a forest during a snowstorm. The Woman of the Snow, a cold, icy spirit comes to drink the warm blood of the woodcutter, but she takes pity on him because he is so young and handsome. She tells him that he ever tells anyone what he saw in the snowy woods, even his own mother, she will return and kill him. Soon after, the woodcutter meets a lovely girl alone on a road and invites her to take shelter with him and his mother. He and the woman fall in love, marry, and have children, but as the years go by the other women in the village notice that the woman doesn’t age... 

In "Hoichi the Earless," a mysterious samurai comes to a temple at night and asks Hoichi, a blind singer, to perform the ballad of a massacred samurai clan for his lord. The samurai leads Hoichi to a mysterious gathering every night and Hoichi must keep it a secret. The final story, "In a Cup of Tea," is the shortest and most peculiar. A samurai fills up a cup with tea and sees the reflection of another man in the cup. He drinks the tea, mysterious reflection included. Later, at night the samurai gets an otherworldly visitation from the man he drank.

Kwaidan is directed by Masaki Kobayashi whose previous films were social dramas. This was his first horror film and also his first film in color. Kobayashi brilliantly and effectively utilizes color throughout his nearly 3-hour film. Rich, bold colors along with a surreal production design fill Kwaidan with memorable, vivid visuals. The sets and matte paintings are highly stylized so that they appear obviously artificial and surreal. This only enriches the ethereal, storybook atmosphere of the movie. When the woodcutter is lost in the forest in "The Woman of the Snow," the painted clouds in the sky resemble watching eyes. Somehow even the white snow is vivid and intense. Probably the most memorable image in all of Kwaidan is of Hoichi with a holy text written all over his body... except for his ears. This was the image chosen for the Criterion DVD release of Kwaidan.

Kwaidan won the Special Jury Prize at the 1964 Cannes Film Festival. It also received an Oscar nomination for Best Foreign Language Picture, making it part of the very small club of Oscar nominated horror films. Kwaidan was heavily edited for its American theatrical release but has since been restored to its original version. Though this movie does take its time telling these stories, it doesn’t drag and its epic scope justifies the runtime. Kwaidan feels unique among anthology horror films, and even among other Japanese horror films. It chronicles folklore and evokes the same tone and feel these stories likely had when told by one generation to the next. There is not blood or gore or pop-up scares in Kwaidan, but there is plenty to chill you and make you want to keep the lights on. 

13 Nights of Shocktober: Brain Dead (1990)

by A.J.

This is my favorite time of year, second only to Christmas. Autumn has arrived, the weather is cooling down, and October becomes the month-long celebration of scary movies called Shocktober. There are a lot of horror movies out there, but as a genre, horror is still looked down upon by some mainstream critics and moviegoers. It doesn’t help that, admittedly, there are so few quality horror movies made but, like comedy, it’s a very difficult and subjective genre. So, in the days leading up Halloween I’ll be posting some recommendations for scary movies to help you celebrate Shocktober.

Night 8: Bill Paxton Memorial Night II/Psychological Horror Night

"We can’t all do good, but at least do no harm."

Brain Dead (1990) 

Brain Dead is perhaps most famous for being the movie that stars both Bill Pullman and the late Bill Paxton. No one would blame you if the movie’s DVD cover art and producer, Julie Corman (wife of the legendary B-movie producer Roger Corman), made you think that Brain Dead was just B-horror movie schlock. It’s actually a psychological thriller about the mind’s perception of reality, with some B-horror schlock thrown in. The screenplay was written in the 1960’s by Charles Beaumont for Roger Corman, but remained unproduced until Julie Corman rediscovered the script in the late 80’s. Charles Beaumont’s other writing credits include several episodes of The Twilight Zone (including some of my favorites: "Number 12 Looks Just Like You," "The Living Doll", and "Perchance to Dream"). Director Adam Simon updated the story for the 80’s and the film was released in 1990. 

Bill Pullman plays Dr. Rex Martin, a neurosurgeon researching brain functions and mental illnesses. He is asked by an old friend, Jim Reston, played by Bill Paxton, to investigate a mathematician, Halsey, played by Bud Cort, that had a mental breakdown, killed his family, and destroyed the top secret research he was doing for Paxton’s company. Paxton pressures Pullman to perform a risky brain operation that would either cure Halsey’s mind and allow him to remember the sensitive corporate information or would leave him brain dead. Each actor fits nicely into their respective roles. Pullman as Dr. Rex is completely comfortable with his character and great to watch as the reserved, intellectual scientist that loses his mind to paranoia and delusions. Paxton as Reston, with his slicked back hair, is great as a corporate sleaze and potentially dubious friend.You're equally willing to believe that he has a devious secret agenda or that he's a trustworthy friend. It's a role he plays with brilliant ease. The company Paxton’s character works for is a giant conglomerate whose holdings are so ridiculously diverse that a cutting edge neuroscience division seems plausible. The downside is that science is expected to conform to corporate bottom lines, once again proving that real villain of many 80’s and early 90’s movies is, you guessed it, Reaganomics.

While Brian Dead is more than just B-movie schlock, it still does not take itself too seriously. Pullman works in a lab with brains floating in jars and the approach to brain surgery is just a step above The Man With Two Brains. The film really hits its stride when it travels into mind bending territory. The visions Halsey has while being operated on are creative, fascinating, and surreal. Pullman’s character keeps seeing a laughing man in a bloody white suit. At an incredibly awkward dinner he hallucinates that Paxton is kissing his wife while his boss pats him on the back. Pullman reaches for the rafters with his descent into madness and hits every note solidly.

Even as it delves into dreams, delusions, and altered reality Brain Dead still keeps an exciting and very interesting tone. Don’t get caught up in trying to figure out where a mental break happened or a dream began. The fun in Brain Dead is in the twists and turns and not knowing what will happen next. 

Brain Dead is a psychological mind bender with more traditional horror movie effects and scares. Shades of The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari and The Twilight Zone run throughout the story. It finds a nice balance between serious psychological horror and campy fun horror. You could call it cerebral schlock, but no matter how you categorize it, Brain Dead makes for great Shocktober viewing.

13 Nights of Shocktober: Martin (1978)

by A.J.

This is my favorite time of year, second only to Christmas. Autumn has arrived, the weather is cooling down, and October becomes the month-long celebration of scary movies called Shocktober. There are a lot of horror movies out there, but as a genre, horror is still looked down upon by some mainstream critics and moviegoers. It doesn’t help that, admittedly, there are so few quality horror movies made but, like comedy, it’s a very difficult and subjective genre. So, in the days leading up Halloween I’ll be posting some recommendations for scary movies to help you celebrate Shocktober.

Night 7: George Romero Memorial Night
“A real live honest to goodness vampire”

Martin (1978) 

A decade after director George Romero changed horror cinema and pop culture forever with his landmark film Night of the Living Dead, he tackled another iconic movie monster: the vampire. Martin is not like any other vampire film, and the titular character is not like any other movie vampire. Martin (John Amplas), a shy 17-year-old, believes that he is a vampire—not the creature of folklore and movies, but a real-life vampire. He doesn’t sleep in a coffin, can be out in daylight, and doesn’t have fangs, but he craves human blood. He goes to live with his kind cousin, Christine, and his fanatical grandfather, Cuda, who swears to cure Martin of vampirism.

This is a most unusual movie. it contains nothing supernatural. As Martin says many times: there is no magic. The atmosphere is low-key and subdued emphasizing the odd nature of Martin’s delusions and making the scenes of violence especially stand out. The third act is just as unusual, involving a car chase and a big bloody shootout. However, even this sequence somehow does not break the movie’s low-key tone.

Martin has the grainy, low budget look of many movies from the 1970’s giving it a quasi-documentary feel. Romero had originally intended to shoot the entire film in black and white. The film's producers insisted that the movie be in color, but the flashes of Martin’s fantasies are in black and white. These short scenes have a dreamlike quality thanks to the black and white photography. The fantasy sequences mirror the events of the movie giving a brief glimpse into Martin’s mind and how he experiences those moments.

The blood and gore in Martin are mild compared to other horror movies, even other horror movies from the 70’s, but they may still make the squeamish turn away. This was legendary special makeup effects artist Tom Savini’s first movie as both a makeup artist and an actor. He originally auditioned for the role of Martin but was given a smaller role and hired for special effects instead. This movie is also Savini and Romero’s first collaboration. They would go on to work together on Dawn of the Dead, Day of the Dead, Creepshow, Monkey Shines, and Two Evil Eyes. Romero eventually gave Savini a much larger acting role in his odd Renaissance fair motorcycle movie, Knightriders. The recipe Savini used for the blood in Martin was the same recipe for stage blood  and the result was a bright orange-red blood. It doesn’t look entirely realistic on film, but it does give the movie a stylish feel similar to Italian horror movies of the same era. Savini also ended up doing stunts and can be spotted getting hit by a car.

Martin may lack big scares but its approach to the vampire makes it incredibly interesting. The score, cinematography, direction from Romero give Martin a lyrical, dreamlike quality at times. This is the sort of movie you could watch with someone that doesn’t like horror movies since it’s secretly an offbeat drama about a disturbed young man. Unfortunately, Martin is a very rare film. The DVD is out of print and expensive to purchase, but if you ever get the chance to see Martin I highly recommend watching it for Shocktober. 

13 Nights of Shocktober: The 'Burbs (1989)

by A.J.

This is my favorite time of year, second only to Christmas. Autumn has arrived, the weather is cooling down, and October becomes the month-long celebration of scary movies called Shocktober. There are a lot of horror movies out there, but as a genre, horror is still looked down upon by some mainstream critics and moviegoers. It doesn’t help that, admittedly, there are so few quality horror movies made but, like comedy, it’s a very difficult and subjective genre. So, in the days leading up Halloween I’ll be posting some recommendations for scary movies to help you celebrate Shocktober.

Night 6: Horror-Comedy Night
“I love this street.”

The ‘Burbs (1989)

The ‘Burbs is a spooky fun horror-comedy set in a slightly goofier version of everyday suburbia. Director Joe Dante is right at home in horror-comedy having previously directed 1984’s Gremlins and 1981’s The Howling, both of which played with genre conventions and tropes. The ‘Burbs is no different. With shades of Rear Window, the classic Twilight Zone episode “The Monsters are Due on Maple Street,” and classic horror movies of the 30s and 40s, The ‘Burbs has a genuine admiration for the movies it draws inspiration from while also having fun with them.

Tom Hanks stars as Ray Peterson, an average, sensible everyman spending his vacation just hanging around the house. He gets bored, as you might imagine, and starts watching his neighbors. Something suspicious seems to be going on at the out of place old, creepy house next door. The new neighbors, the Klopeks, are rarely seen except at night and there are strange lights coming from the basement. Ray and his neighbor friends then start to speculate that the Klopeks killed the previous owner of the house and another elderly neighbor that suddenly disappeared.

The cast of The ‘Burbs is a list of great performers in major and minor roles. Aside from Hanks in the lead, Carrie Fisher plays his wife, Carol, the voice of reason. The great character actor Rick Ducommun—you may not recognize the name but you'd certainly recognize his face—plays Ray’s annoying, not too bright neighbor friend that fills his head with paranoid ideas. Bruce Dern plays the military veteran neighbor that still thinks he’s in the military. Henry Gibson—another great character actor whose face you’d certainly recognize—is the unassuming, but believably sinister, Dr. Klopek. Courtney Gaines, the menacing Malachi from Children of the Corn, is funny as the oddball Hans Klopek. Corey Feldman rounds out the cast as the young cool dude on the block. He also serves as a sort of narrator/guide to the world these people have created out of their block of suburbia. He invites his friends over to watch Hanks, Ducommun, and Dern poke around the Klopek house and sits back for an entertaining show.

The ‘Burbs has a pretty broad sense of humor. It draws on horror movie situations for comedy and never takes itself too seriously. Some of the gags are even cartoonish. When Hanks and Ducommun discover part of a skeleton, the camera frantically zooms in and out on them as they scream in terror. These goofy moments are all part of the fun. 

The ‘Burbs is not quite a meta horror film, but the influence of horror films of the past is ever present. The Klopeks being new, potentially dangerous, neighbors from eastern Europe is meant to be reminiscent of Dracula. Cory Feldman compares what the street is experiencing to the horror film The Sentinel. The score by Jerry Goldsmith is meant to evoke the grand ominous music of horror films of the 30’s and 40’s. The only genuinely scary moment in The 'Burbs comes when Hanks has a nightmare after watching parts the horror films Race with the Devil, The Exorcist, and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 on TV. The characters in The Burbs are aware of horror movies, so they know how outlandish it seems that the new neighbors are serial killers. This movie is heavy on laughs and light on actual scares, so even if you don’t like horror movies you’ll still be able to enjoy this horror-comedy. 

13 Nights of Shocktober: Frailty (2001)

by A.J.

This is my favorite time of year, second only to Christmas. Autumn has arrived, the weather is cooling down, and October becomes the month-long celebration of scary movies called Shocktober. There are a lot of horror movies out there, but as a genre, horror is still looked down upon by some mainstream critics and moviegoers. It doesn’t help that, admittedly, there are so few quality horror movies made but, like comedy, it’s a very difficult and subjective genre. So, in the days leading up Halloween I’ll be posting some recommendations for scary movies to help you celebrate Shocktober.

Night 5: Bill Paxton Memorial Night

“The Angel called us God’s Hands”

Frailty (2001)

Actor Bill Paxton made his directorial debut in 2001 with the religious horror thriller Frailty. Paxton was no stranger to the horror and thriller genres having had roles in Aliens, Brain Dead, Near Dark, Predator 2, an episode of Tales from the Crypt, and Sam Raimi’s A Simple Plan. Behind the camera he demonstrates an incredible amount of skill at crafting a moody thriller of real substance. Frailty has more than enough to enjoy as a horror/thriller, but there are also more than a few religious and theological ideas to ruminate over.

The opening title sequence is of old newspaper clippings of brutal axe murders set to a creepy violin score. The headlines call the unidentified murderer the God’s Hand Killer. The story is told in flashbacks as Fenton Meeks (Matthew McConaughey) tells FBI agent Doyle (Powers Boothe) that his brother is the God’s Hand Killer and is carrying on the “work” begun by their father. The flashbacks take us to the summer of 1979 when their father (Bill Paxton) receives a vision from an angel telling him that he is to kill demons that have taken on human form. He enlists his sons, Fenton and Adam, in carrying out this mission.

The main tool the angel gives Paxton to “destroy” the demons is an axe. Paxton tells his sons that the angel will give him the names people that are secretly demons and God will protect them from being caught. When he touches the “demons,” he says, their sins will be revealed. The older son thinks their dad has gone crazy; the younger son wholeheartedly believes and claims to see the demons too. The film keeps its distance from stating whether Paxton’s visions are real or delusional until it is most effective for the story.

The key to Frailty's emotional conflict is Bill Paxton’s performance. His character is a loving father even as he has the boys help him with the axe murders. He explains his visions to his boys in calm, gentle tones and never raises his voice in anger at them. There is no change in his personality after the visions begin; he doesn’t become disheveled, he never rants.

Though this is a film about a father that becomes an axe murderer, there is very little blood and no gore. Instead of typical horror violence, Paxton uses the circumstance the characters are in to create unease in the audience. Thanks to the great lived in production design and costumes, this film feels like it takes place in the real world making it all the more unnerving. The cellar where Paxton kills the people on his list and the abandoned community rose garden where he and the boys bury the bodies are just a few visual elements that give Frailty its dark, moody atmosphere.

The original screenplay by Brent Hanley is smart but not too clever for its own good. The plot twists and turns and while you may figure out one twist another will catch you off guard. Bill Paxton, as an actor and as a director, knows exactly what marks he needs to hit and lands each and every one. Frailty feels like a campfire story or urban legend. It tries to explain seemingly inexplicable local occurrences, give you thrills and scares, but also leaves you with thoughts that linger long after the story has ended.

13 Nights of Shocktober: Children of the Corn (1984)

by A.J.

This is my favorite time of year, second only to Christmas. Autumn has arrived, the weather is cooling down, and October becomes the month-long celebration of scary movies called Shocktober. There are a lot of horror movies out there, but as a genre, horror is still looked down upon by some mainstream critics and moviegoers. It doesn’t help that, admittedly, there are so few quality horror movies made but, like comedy, it’s a very difficult and subjective genre. So, in the days leading up Halloween I’ll be posting some recommendations for scary movies to help you celebrate Shocktober.

Night 4: Stephen King Rules Night
"He Who Walks Behind the Rows"
Children of the Corn (1984)

Children of the Corn is not quite as iconic as other 1980’s horror classics like Friday the 13^th or A Nightmare on Elm Street, however, it is still one of those horror movies that everyone knows about, even if they’ve never seen it. The source material is a short story by master of horror Stephen King. By 1984, when this movie was released, Stephen King was an established powerhouse brand in horror fiction and horror movies;this film is billed as Stephen King’s Children of the Corn. With a budget of less than $1 million, it ended up grossing $14 million at the box office and spawned numerous sequels of drastically diminishing quality. The first and only time I saw Children of the Corn II: The Final Sacrifice (it wasn’t) was as part of Monster-Vision on TNT, hosted by Joe Bob Briggs. The best part of that movie was the jokes Joe Bob would make just before or after the commercial breaks. I think all of the sequels may turn people away from the original, which while not a masterpiece is a scary good time.

Children of the Corn opens with shots of a quiet, empty rural town. The titles play over a child’s drawings of what has happened to the town of Gatlin and are set to creepy choral music. All the children of Gatlin have fallen under the spell of a mysterious creature that lives in the cornfields and have formed a cult to “He Who Walks Behind the Rows.” One Sunday after church, the children murder every adult in town and begin a new way of life and follow a new religion. Three years later, Burt and Vicky (Peter Horton and Linda Hamilton) are driving across the country so Burt can start a new job in Seattle. While passing through rural Nebraska they runover a young boy that stumbles into the road. They examine the body and find that the boy’s throat has been cut. They decide to drive the body to the nearest town, which happens to be, you guessed it, Gatlin.

The influence of the bloody slasher movies of the 1980’s looms large over Children of the Corn. While not graphic or gory by current standards, there is still a lot of slashing and a lot of blood. The supernatural element (He Who Walks Behind the Rows) doesn’t come into play until the end of the movie. The optical effects at the climax are visually dated, but are still effective for the scene. The climax is an exciting action centric scene, but until then Children of the Corn is a creepy, moody slasher movie. It makes the most out of a low budget: empty streets, abandoned buildings, deserted roads all build a great unsettling atmosphere. But, as you might imagine, the element that Children of the Corn utilizes most, and best, is creepy children. When Burt and Vicky arrive in the ghost town of Gatlin, there are creepy children lurking around every corner. The town is now lead by a twelve-year-old boy named Isaac (John Franklin) who dresses in black and speaks for He Who Walk Behind the Rows. His lieutenant is a teenager named Malachai (Courtney Gaines), who strictly enforces the new laws. Isaac demands blind faith from all the children of the town, but the children fear Malachai since he is the enforcer. Malachai is such a staunch believer in He Who Walk Behind the Rows that he begins to question Isaac. Courtney Gaines is probably the most memorable thing about this movie. He stands out because of his red hair, but much more so for his menacing performance.

This is a well-paced, effective horror movie that finds a good balance between atmospheric creepy horror and bloody slasher horror. It makes good use of handheld camera shots and POV shots, a mainstay of slasher movies. I’ll give you fair warning that Children of the Corn ends with perhaps the weakest final scare ever put on film, but, fortunately, this does not undo everything that came before it and is one of only a couple of missteps the movie makes. Despite all of the blood and death, this is not an especially dark or dreadful film. I was pleasantly surprised the first time I saw Children of the Corn and hopefully you will be too.