13 Nights of Shocktober: Hocus Pocus

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

“It’s all just a bunch of hocus pocus.”

Hocus Pocus 

You never know which movies will stick around or why. Throughout the 2010's, I and the rest of the staff at Vulcan Video noticed that in October Hocus Pocus rented more and more each year. It is quite peculiar to actually notice as a film grows into a cult classic. There aren’t many horror or horror themed movies that families can watch together on Halloween, so from that perspective it is easy to see why Hocus Pocus has stuck around. Now, 29 years after it flopped at the box office and was panned by critics, this increased popularity led Disney to produce a sequel. I’m skeptical about the new sequel, but I rewatched the original for the first time in years and had a fun silly time. 

Omri Katz plays Max, a teenager whose family just moved to Salem, Massachusetts. He doesn’t like his new town, school, or Halloween. His little sister, Dani (Thora Birch), is very into Halloween and the legend of the Sanderson sisters, three witches who were executed for their crimes against children three hundred years ago. On Halloween night, in an attempt to impress Allison (Vinessa Shaw), who he has a crush on, Max takes Dani to the old Sanderson sisters’ house, which Allison’s parents now own. Wouldn’t you know it, Max accidentally summons the Sanderson sisters back from beyond and it’s up to the kids to stop the witch sisters from stealing the souls of the children of Salem. 

The highlight of the movie is of course the Sanderson sisters: Winifred (Bette Midler), Sarah (Sarah Jessica Parker), and Mary (Kathy Najimy). They are over the top and hamming it up and it is great. Winifred is the leader and frustrated by her bumbling, clueless sisters, though she is not much more competent. The actresses have great chemistry together and of course you wish there were more scenes of them (I suppose this sentiment helps explain the sequel). The scene where they think they meet the devil (actually just Gary Marshall, in an uncredited cameo, in a Halloween costume) is very funny. Of course, there is a musical number where Bette Midler sings “I Put a Spell on You” as she puts a spell on the parents of the town to keep them dancing all night at the town hall. This scene is a great example of how the movie can be hokey and silly but still entertaining.

The Salem, Massachusetts presented here is a movie version of Salem, lacking the very real historical baggage of the infamous and tragic witch trials. Everything about this movie is very broad and not meant to be taken seriously, so the Salem setting does not feel as irresponsible as it could have been, but it also could have been set in a fictional town. 

Most of the special effects hold up well, the witches flying on their brooms, or Kathy Najimy flying on a vacuum cleaner look pretty good. There is a talking black cat named Binx, who is actually Thakery Binx, a teenage boy the Sanderson sisters cursed to live forever as a cat with the guilt of failing to save his sister from them. In certain shots the talking cat effects look better than in others. Doug Jones, who would go on to work with Guillermo Del Toro as Fauno/Pale Man in Pan’s Labyrinth and the amphibian man in The Shape of Water, plays Billy Butcherson, a reanimated corpse with his mouth sewn shut. For most of the movie the witches are chasing the kids and trying to get back their book of spells, which has a large blinking eye. It is not a big effect but it is a nice touch. 

Of course, nostalgia plays a factor in the enduring and still growing popularity of Hocus Pocus, but perhaps it has also stuck around because it is ridiculous Halloween fun. Parents can watch it with kids, kids can watch it on their own, you can have it playing in the background of a Halloween party, or you can grab some candy and unwind with a fun, stress free Halloween movie. Hocus Pocus was released in theaters during the summer, perhaps one of the reasons it flopped at the box office, but now it is where it belongs, as a part of Halloween. 

13 Nights of Shocktober: Tales of Terror

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. So, for the days leading up Halloween I’ll be posting some horror movie recommendations to help you celebrate Shocktober.

Night 11: Vincent Price & Roger Corman Night

“And it is with death and dying that we concern ourselves. What happens at the point of death? What happens afterwards? What happens after death to someone who does not choose to stay dead…”

Tales of Terror

Here are two of my favorite Shocktober subgenres in one movie: a Vincent Price-Roger Corman movie and a horror anthology. It gets even better. Tales of Terror is made up of three short films, each starring the great Vincent Price and each based on the works of Edgar Allan Poe. I’m not sure it gets more Shocktober than this. Legendary B-movie producer-director Roger Corman made so many films of such wildly differing quality that you never know if you’re going to watch a quality entertaining picture or fodder for Mystery Science Theater 3000 or Rifftrax. Corman hit his stride in the early 1960’s with a cycle of Edgar Allan Poe adaptations starring Vincent Price. The best of these is The Masque of the Red Death (1964), probably the worst is The Raven (1963). Tales of Terror (1962) leans more toward The Masque of the Red Death on the Corman-Price spectrum. 

Each of the three stories is prefaced with a narration by Price and red silhouettes on a black screen hinting at the story to come. The first story, based on Morella, has a young woman, Lenora (Maggie Pierce), arriving at the dilapidated mansion of her long-estranged father, Locke (Price). Her mother, Locke’s beloved Morella, died in childbirth and he blamed and resented his daughter so much for “killing” Morella that he sent her away. He begins to open up to her but mysterious apparitions and Lenora’s own sickness intervene. It is a weird, creepy story that maintains a tone very much in keeping with Poe’s more melancholy, macabre stories. 

The second story is the standout of the anthology. In an impressive feat, it successfully combines Poe’s The Black Cat, The Cask of Amontillado, and even touches upon the Tell-Tale Heart. Of course, an adaptation of any Poe short story necessitates expanding the characters and plot. In a brilliant stroke, screenwriter Richard Matheson (writer of several The Twilight Zone episodes and author of I Am Legend) combines two stories with the same plot device (hiding a body behind a wall) and allows the expansion to come from Poe’s stories. The Black Cat is about a man who murders his wife and then must dispose of her body. In this short film, he murders her is because she was having an affair with his rival. The choice to make the man Montresor (Peter Lorre) and his rival Fortunato (Vincent Price) is such a smart one that it seems obvious. This is the comedic entry in the anthology and it blends comedy and the macabre well. The comedy doesn’t really kick in until Price makes his entrance and starts hamming it up as the vain and ridiculous Fortunato, a famous professional wine taster. Peter Lorre is great as Montresor, a down on his luck wine taster. They have a wine tasting duel which is pretty silly and very entertaining. Montresor is a mean drunk always in search of money but Lorre plays him as a buffoon. This doesn’t make him sympathetic but makes him a tolerable character, especially since you know he is headed for a comeuppance. 

The final installment is an adaptation of The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar, not exactly a horror story but a macabre one. It involves a dying man, Valdemar (Price), hypnotized at the moment of death to allow for a more peaceful crossing into the afterlife. However, the hypnotist, Carmichael (Basil Rathbone), is a cruel and sinister man with designs on Valdemar’s soon to be widow, Helene (Debra Paget). Rathbone is most famous for playing Sherlock Holmes in a series of films in the 1940’s, but he is also great at playing a dastardly villain. This short departs the most drastically from Poe’s original work, involving a zombie of sorts, but the additions work and it provides a nice conclusion. 

Each of these tales plays like a daytime friendly Tales From the Crypt episode. They involve unsavory or cruel characters but the short length makes them easy watch. As with Corman’s other Poe adaptations, the period costumes and sets go a long way to creating atmosphere. Each of the characters Vincent Price plays are very different from each other, allowing him to show off his range and skill as an actor. In Morella he is a cruel, cold person haunted by heartbreak. In The Black Cat he is an immoral but ridiculous character. In the last story he is a kind, innocent old man, who, in a macabre way, ends up being a hero. Price is easily convincing in all three roles. One of the great things about Tales of Terror is it also has great roles for Peter Lorre and Basil Rathbone to show off and have fun. The special effects are dated but that is part of the atmosphere and appeal. These Vincent Price-Roger Corman movies are not scary, but they are spooky great fun to watch on any Shocktober night.

Tales of Terror is streaming on Amazon Prime Video and Paramount Plus.

13 Nights of Shocktober: From Beyond (1986)

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. So, for the days leading up Halloween I’ll be posting some horror movie recommendations to help you celebrate Shocktober.

Night 11: Lovecraft/Stuart Gordon Night

“I saw you die” 

–“No. Not die. Just pass beyond”

From Beyond (1986)

One of the few filmmakers daring enough to adapt the unfilmable eldridge horrors of H.P. Lovecraft to film was Stuart Gordon. His most famous film is also perhaps the most famous Lovecraft adaptation, the 1985 cult classic Re-Animator. The following year he adapted another Lovecraft story for the big screen: the grotesque but entertaining From Beyond. Aside from Roger Corman and Edgar Allen Poe or Kenneth Branagh and Shakespeare, I can’t think of many other filmmakers so closely linked to a particular author. Gordon’s film naturally updates and expands the original Lovecraft short story but it feels true to the essence of Lovecraft's weird fiction. 

The stars of Re-Animator, Barbara Crampton and Jeffery Combs also have the starring roles in From Beyond. Crawford Tillinghast (Combs), a scientist charged with murder, agrees to recreate the experiment that really killed his mentor Dr. Pretorious (Ted Sorrel) in order to prove his innocence. Crawford’s psychologist, Dr. McMichaels (Crampton) and a detective, Bubba Brownlee (Ken Foree), return to the house where the original experiment was conducted; unsightly horrors from other dimensions await. The experiment involved a machine called The Resonator that enhances the senses so that a person can see and even interact with creatures that exist all around us but in another plane of existence. Crawford repairs The Resonator and instead of things going horribly wrong, they go horribly right. The Resonator also has an addictive quality, so Crawford and McMichaels keep revisiting the machine. They also learn that Pretorius still exists as an evil being in the other dimension and has become an inhuman monster. 

The flying eel-like creatures are very much like something from a Lovecraft story but they are on the tamer end of the horror special effects. All of the special effects are gross and scary in just the right way and still pack tremendous shock value. The mutating Pretorius-monster is grotesque and slimy and, unlike other movie monsters, doesn’t become less scary the more it is shown. When one character’s “third eye” becomes so enhanced that it pops out of their skull and moves like the false worm of an angler fish, it is truly disgusting, and perfect for the movie. There’s enough story and suspense to keep From Beyond from being just a geek show, but this film is not for the faint of heart.  

The characters are not terribly complex but they are not flimsy either. By far the movie’s biggest asset is Ken Foree who plays Bubba not like a character in a horror movie but as a normal person. He is terrified and perplexed by what he sees and experiences, can’t understand Crawford and McMichaals’s obsession with the other dimension, and doesn’t see the point in staying there longer. Combs is over-the-top , as he usually is, but this is what makes him believable as a mad scientist. Crampton gives a good performance but the film doesn't find anything too interesting for her to do aside from becoming possessed and suddenly and randomly being dressed in S&M bondage gear.

From Beyond does a great job of showing us how one of Lovecraft’s narrators would have ended up insane. There is definitely a sense of camp value but the film still takes the material seriously enough to be scary and horrifying. If anything the camp undertones of the first half of the film help you accept the plot and outrageous visuals. It meets you halfway instead of talking down to you like so many recent horror films.

From Beyond is streaming for free on Tubi, PlutoTV, and Hoopla.

13 Nights of Shocktober: My Best Friend's Exorcism

 by A.J.

Night 10: Teenage Horror Night

"Dollars to donuts it's demonic possession."

My Best Friend’s Exorcism

This is a nice blend of horror and comedy though it leans firmly towards comedy. It might not be exactly scary, but it is fun. The story begins as more of a light comedy about teenagers Abby and Gretchen, best friends despite their different socio-economic backgrounds. Gretchen (Amiah Miller) is from a well-to-do family. Abby (Elsie Fisher) attends their private parochial school on scholarship. Gretchen's family is preparing to move and that makes Abby anxious about their future as friends and her future without Gretchen by her side. 

Those concerns get pushed to the background after a terrifying night in the woods. Along with their friends Glee (Cathy Ang) and Margaret (Rachel Ogechi Kanu), and Margaret's obnoxious boyfriend, Wallace (Clayton Johnson), they take LSD, but Abby and Gretchen wander into a dilapidated cabin, rumored to be haunted. Gretchen is attacked by someone, or some thing, but they are not sure what was a hallucination and what was real. 

After the attack, Gretchen's behavior changes and this is when the movie switches gears to horror. At first Gretchen is withdrawn and strung out, then she seems to gain confidence and a new mean personality. The change in her personality and the cruel, hurtful acts she inflicts on her friends happen gradually and believably in scenes that add tension and the supernatural, specifically demonic possession to the story. The final act, that is the exorcism, is horror-comedy and even gets goofy thanks to Christopher Lowell as Christian Lemon, the youth minister bodybuilder performing the exorcism. This gear switch will either work for you or it won't. By this point I cared enough about the characters to want to see their story through and hoped things worked out for them (you can never tell with horror, even a horror comedy). The few scenes with special effects are well done. One CGI effect in particular is as strange as it is grotesque.

Setting this story in the 1980’s is not exactly a weakness but it is unnecessary. There are the benefits that a pre-internet and pre-cellphone time period affords a horror movie and Abby and Gretchen would have more of a challenge remaining in touch if one of them moved away, but the 80’s setting seems mostly for superficial throwback nostalgia. Also, none of the characters speak or act like teens from the 1980's (except for Wallace, whose gross sex-obsessed dialogue is spot on for that kind of character). However, aside from the soundtrack, the other elements of the film (script, production design, costumes) do not revel in nostalgia. The epilogue cards for each character at the end of the movie, are probably the most blatantly 80’s throwback element, but they fit with the movie’s fun nature. 

Elsie Fisher and Amiah Miller have great chemistry and their performances are the highlight and greatest strength of the movie. Fisher is great as the shy and meek Abby, who has such a big heart she can never fully give up on her friend. The real tension of the exorcism is how she is going to stand up to an evil demon and save her friend. Amiah Miller does a good job of playing Gretchen at every stage: good natured teen, a person in distress, and demon possessed. 

My Best Friend's Exorcism belongs in the same vein as the meta-horror movies Happy Death Day and Freaky (Christopher Landon, the director of those movies, is a producer here), though it lacks the self-awareness that helped make those movies so much fun. Here, the fun comes mainly from the performances and a willingness to be silly in certain scenes. Director Damon Thomas and writer Jenna Lamia, adapting the Quirk Books published novel by Grady Hendrix) have made a movie that is most of all about friendship and that is why it works no matter the genre. 

My Best Friend's Exorcism is streaming on Amazon Prime Video.

13 Nights of Shocktober: Peeping Tom

 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. So, for the days leading up Halloween I’ll be posting some horror movie recommendations to help you celebrate Shocktober.

Night 9: Psychological Horror

“Taking my picture?”

Peeping Tom

Whether you are interested in horror movies, classic movies, or film history in general, eventually you find Peeping Tom. It is a peculiar film: made in a classic style, shot in bold technicolor, and made at a time when horror, like other genres, was beginning to touch on darker subjects and themes. Too dark for many in 1960. Peeping Tom was so reviled by critics and audiences that it was pulled from theaters and essentially ended the career of Michael Powell, the renowned British director of many revered classics such as The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp, The Red Shoes, Black Narcissus, and The Thief of Bagdad. Powell and Peeping Tom were ahead of their time; a cliché but true. Only eight years later Rosemary’s Baby, a much much darker film, would achieve mainstream success with critics and audiences. In the decades since it’s disastrous release, Peeping Tom has been recognized as a classic, and you’ll find it on many underrated, overlooked, or “best movies you’ve never seen” lists. Of course the standards of what is shocking and vile change so much that the visuals and set pieces in Peeping Tom would be considered tame by the next decade. The real horror in Peeping Tom is in what you don’t see, in what it implies, and in its themes which retain their disturbing and dreadful shock value. 

In a way, Peeping Tom is about making movies. It is certainly about watching movies. Our main character is Mark (Carl Boehm) , a young, handsome Austrian man, who works as a focus puller at a British movie studio. He also moonlights as a smut photographer for pornographic magazines. Also, he is a serial killer who films his victims at the moment of their death. As memorable as Freddy Kruger’s glove with knives or Leatherface’s chainsaw is Mark’s weapon of choice: a knife hidden in the leg of his camera’s tripod. As he moves in for a close up, so does the blade. 

Mark owns the building where he lives, inherited from his father, but he cannot afford the upkeep so he rents the other rooms. His apartment is unassuming, but there is, as you might imagine, a back room where he develops and screens the films of his murders. In the apartment below him live Helen (Anne Massey) and her mother (Maxine Audley). In the excitement of her 21st birthday, Helen invites Mark to her apartment. When he hesitates, she goes to his apartment where she, and we, learn his backstory. We learn that Mark’s father, a famous psychologist, conducted and filmed experiments on Mark as a child to learn about children’s reactions to fear. We see “home movies” of him harshly waking up Mark in the middle of the night by shining a light in his face or dropping  lizards on him. Mark’s killings are part of of own his own documentary on fear and death. It is not until the climax that we realize the full scope of Mark’s documentary of death.

Helen is shy, like Mark, but also full of life. She is a strong enough force on him that she convinces him to go on their date without bringing along his beloved camera. However, after Helen kisses Mark, he responds by kissing the lens of his camera as though he is compelled to do this. Perhaps this is because Mark was not able to film their kiss, or perhaps because experiences are only real for him if is his camera “sees” them, or perhaps because Mark sees himself as a camera. That Peeping Tom allows for multiple pathways to explore its themes and subtexts is what makes it a great film and explains why it has endured through the decades despite its initial unwelcome reception. 

Perhaps the film’s signature sequence involves Mark and Viv (Moira Shearer), an extra in the film currently shooting at the studio, sneaking on set at night. Viv believes they are there so Mark can film her dance. Mark, and we, know the real reason she is there. Shearer, who starred in Powell’s The Red Shoes, dances as Mark rearranges the set and adjusts the lights, making sure everything is just right for the camera. Shearer is so full of life that we feel the full weight of the impending tragedy yet we accept it as a fulfillment. 

It is worth noting that Peeping Tom was released in not only in the same year, but mere months before Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho. The reaction to the two films could not have been more different. Roger Ebert speculated in his Great Movies essay on Peeping Tom that this was “because audiences expected the macabre from Hitchcock” while Powell was known for “elegant and stylized films.” It’s hard not to compare and contrast the films once they are linked. Both films feature psychologically damaged young men but while Psycho only flirts with voyeurism, Peeping Tom is expressly about voyeurism. Powell employs the POV (point of view) shot that not only shows us exactly what Mark sees when he commits the murders, but implicates the audience in the crime. Countless slasher films from the 1980’s onward would use the POV shot to either not reveal the identity of the killer or for pure sensation. Powell uses the POV shot not only for sensation but as part of an attempt to explore the life and mind of a person who would commit such crimes. However, unlike Psycho, shot in black and white, Peeping Tom is shot in bold and vivid technicolor. I believe that this is major reason why audiences had such an intense negative reaction. 

The saturated technicolor look which Powell had mastered through the 1940’s and 50’s implied a warm, uplifting picture. It was generally used by musicals and comedies while noir films and prestige dramas where shot in black and white. Even dramas shot in technicolor tended to be broad melodramas, well done soap operas on the big screen, like the films of Douglas Sirk (Imitation of Life, Magnificent Obsession, Written on the Wind). Peeping Tom showed people in full technicolor something they would rather leave in the shadows.

Peeping Tom airs on TCM on Sunday, October 30th at 7PM CT and is streaming free on Tubi and the Roku Channel. 

13 Nights of Shocktober: Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1931)

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. So, for the days leading up Halloween I’ll be posting some horror movie recommendations to help you celebrate Shocktober.

Night 8: Classic Horror Night

“Things one can't do, are the ones I want to.”

Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1931)

Made only a few years into the sound era, the 1931 version of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, directed by Rouben Mamoulian, remains an entertaining and effective horror film. This adaptation of Robert Louis Stevenson’s novella stars the great Fredric March as the good natured Dr. Jekyll and also the monstrous Mr. Hyde. Even at this time, despite their success and even their artistic merits, horror movies were produced as and thought of as B-pictures. However, March’s performance is so undeniably good that he won Best Actor at the 5th  Academy Awards (tying with Wallace Beery for The Champ). Like Dracula and Frankenstein, The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde has so permeated the culture that whether you’ve seen any film version or not, or read the novel or not, you are already familiar with the basic story. 

Dr. Henry Jekyll is a good natured doctor in London in the late 1800’s. He is not a saint but is pretty close to it. Still, he struggles with dark and unsavory impulses. He believes that every person has a light and dark side and that through his scientific experiments he can separate the two halves allowing the good half to live unburdened by the dark half. He also believes that the dark half, once its urges are satisfied, will simply fade away. While his fiancé is out of town with her father, Jekyll conducts his dangerous experiment with results that are equally successful and horrific. 

The scenes of Jekyll transforming into Hyde are still impressive and pack good shock value even after 90 years. In this version, Hyde is manifested as an atavistic monster. His hair turns into thick wiry fur that covers his body and his teeth become sharp fangs. This suggests that Hyde, the dark side, embodies the animalistic origins of human nature. Jekyll makes his transformation into Hyde by drinking a bubbling potion (a cliched image, but satisfying to watch in a black and white 1930’s film). When he begins to transform the camera holds a tight close up on March as he chokes, makes pained expressions, and heavy shadows and dark spots appear on his face. The camera pans down to his transforming hands or swirls around the room and then reveals the hideous face of Hyde. One of the best things that helps ground this horror movie is that though Hyde has money and dresses like a gentleman, everyone is repulsed and frightened by his monstrous inhuman appearance.

The unfortunate object of Hyde’s obsession is a poor, lower class girl named Ivy (Miriam Hopkins) who Jekyll treated after she was assaulted. She tries to seduce Jekyll and he puts up little defense to the shock of his friend. The image of her leg swinging over her bed is superimposed over the following scene of Jekyll making excuses for his natural impulses. Her swinging leg fades slowly but never really leaves Jekyll’s mind.

Ivy is cruelly tortured by Hyde both physically and psychologically. He whips her back (offscreen) and torments her by reminding her that he can find her at any time, no matter where she goes or what she does. Hopkins, with her incredible performance as Ivy, is able to match March as both Jekyll and Hyde. She plays Ivy not just as the damsel in a horror movie, but as a victim of abuse. Despite the urging of her landlady, Ivy refuses to leave town or go to the police. Hopkins portrays Ivy’s plight so well that we understand her refusal to seek help. As the movie goes on, we find that Jekyll is perhaps not such a good natured person after all since he takes the potion voluntarily each night allowing himself to transform into Hyde and torture Ivy. When his fiancé returns, he stops taking the potion only to find that now Hyde can emerge whenever he wants. 

The scenes of Hyde being chased by police have him leaping over stairs or swinging on chandeliers; everyone’s capes flap wildly. The ending is abrupt, which is typical of classic era films, especially horror movies. This is a great film to watch on any Shocktober night with casual or hardcore horror fans or classic film fans. This version of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde was made by Paramount Pictures to compete with the success of Universal’s Dracula and Frankenstein, also made in 1931. Without a doubt it deserves to stand alongside these other horror classics.  

Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde airs on TCM on Saturday, October 29th at 11AM CT.

13 Nights of Shocktober: Scanners

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. So, for the days leading up Halloween I’ll be posting some horror movie recommendations to help you celebrate Shocktober.

Night 7: Cronenberg Night

We're gonna do this the scanner way.

Scanners

“You’re a scanner but you don’t realize it,” the main character of Scanners is told about six minutes into the film. Writer-director David Cronenberg wastes no time in getting to the plot and action of his 1981 sci-fi horror thriller. Wasting no time may as well be the mantra of Scanners, which is famous for being the movie where someone’s head explodes in the first 10 minutes (it actually happens around 13 minutes into the movie). I don’t want to give the impression that Scanners is some sort of adrenaline filled special effects geek show. This is a well-paced thriller that combines science-fiction, action, and, of course, body horror that also manages to be a surprisingly believable story about warring groups of psychics. 

Cameron Vale (Stephen Lack), a drifter suffering from constantly hearing voices, awakes in a strange room and is told by Dr. Ruth (Patrick McGoohan) that he is a scanner, a person able to connect with and affect others by means of telepathy. Dr. Ruth works for an organization called Consec that recruits scanners and develops a serum that suppresses the constant barrage of voices. It is unclear whether Consec is a private company or government organization, but it certainly has secrets and shady members. Dr. Ruth trains Vale to harness his ability to use against Daryll Revok (Michael Ironside), a rogue scanner out to build a scanner army and dominate non-scanning humans. Revok kills all scanners who will not join.

At a public but sparsely attended demonstration a scanner attempts to demonstrate proof of his telepathy by scanning people from the audience. Unfortunately, the volunteer is Revok, who, in one of the most famous moments in modern horror film history, makes the other scanner’s head explode. The exploding effect is done in full light in a single shot and in close up. Even if you’ve never seen the movie, you’ve likely seen this moment as a meme or gif around the internet to demonstrate that something is “mindblowing”. Yes, it is graphic and gross, but honestly, I think most viewers would be too in shock by what they’ve just seen to be grossed out. In a nice touch there is a reaction shot of Revok and even he is shocked by what just happened. It manages to catch me off guard at each viewing. In any case, there is nothing else like that in the movie, so if you can make it past that scene the rest of the violence is tame by comparison. On the other hand, if you are looking for a movie filled with impressive practical visual and make-up effects, you’ll probably be disappointed and should check out Cronenberg’s version of The Fly. 

As in many of Cronenberg’s films, the paranormal is presented as a new scientific finding. For a movie about telepathy and psychics, nothing feels mystical or magical. This is a film where scanning can be clearly demonstrated and studied in controlled environments and is in the realm of scientists instead of mystics. The only time scanning seems metaphysical is when Vale finds a commune of peaceful hippy scanners who use it as a means of mediation and communion. Yet, the overall attitude the film takes towards scanning and telepathy is not as the communion of souls or even consciousnesses. Dr. Ruth says flatly, “Telepathy is not mind reading. It is the direct linking of two nervous systems separated by space.” It is more important to the plot that Vale scans a computer system, instead of a person, for secret knowledge. It is clear that the metaphysical movement of the 1970’s influenced Cronenberg’s script. Another layer is added when you remember that his wife joined a cult in the 1970’s. As with Cronenberg movies like Rabid (where the Canadian government acknowledges and responds fairly well to a zombie outbreak), or Videodrome, or The Brood,  you don’t get a sense that the scanners are being concealed or covered up, even if the public doesn’t take notice. 

This is the kind of film that has lines of dialogue like: “I’m a Psycho-pharmacist by trade, specializing in the phenomenon of scanners” and “I scanned him. He’s for real.” I’ll admit this movie might not work for everyone. If you can buy the scenes of the scanners using their abilities, meaning scenes of the actors shaking their heads, making pained expressions, using overly expressive eyes, and intense face acting, then this will be an interesting, even thrilling movie. A psychic thriller as it were. If you can’t, I can’t blame you. There isn’t much to Stephen Lack’s performance as Vale. He comes across as a blank, but he is meant as the audience surrogate, learning as he goes along. Patrick McGoohan plays Dr. Ruth with a cold authority that is serious but not stern. We’re able to believe everything he tells us. The stand out is Michael Ironside as the evil scanner, Revok. Ironside plays a great villain but he’s also a great screen presence with his own kind of charm. He sells the intense facial expressions of scanning in a way that make those scenes and the whole movie compelling and tense. 

Scanners is streaming on HBOmax and the Criterion Channel.

13 Nights of Shocktober: The Exorcist III & Legion (Director's Cut)

 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. So, for the days leading up Halloween I’ll be posting some horror movie recommendations to help you celebrate Shocktober.

Night 6: Sequel Night

“And Jesus said to the man who was possessed 'what is your name?' and he answered, 'Legion, for we are many.'" 

The Exorcist III & The Exorcist III: Legion 

When author William Peter Blatty got the chance to direct an adaptation of his novel Legion, an indirect sequel of sorts to his infamous novel turned horror cinema touchstone, The Exorcist, he made a pretty faithful adaptation, as you might expect. However, unhappy executives at Warner Bros. demanded reshoots, including adding an exorcism and changing the title to The Exorcist III. The final theatrical version was dismissed by audiences at the time and has only recently received a fair reevaluation by cinephiles and horror fans. When I finally saw The Exorcist III last year, I was pleasantly surprised, and chilled, even despite obvious scenes of studio interference. 

In 2016, Shout Factory released a Blu-ray restoration, including a director’s cut with Blatty’s original footage, long thought to be lost. To restore the missing scenes, the director’s cut, titled The Exorcist III: Legion, used footage from VHS copies of the original dailies, so there is a dramatic shift in quality at times. It may not be exactly Blatty’s original version but is closer to his novel. Overall, the two versions are not drastically different, until the climax, even the intensely creepy tone is mostly unchanged. 

George C. Scott plays Lt. Kinderman, a Washington, D.C. detective investigating a series of brutal Christian themed murders. The forensic evidence points to a different killer for each murder but the similarities between the killings point to the infamous Gemini Killer, who was executed years ago on the same night a certain exorcism was performed on a certain girl resulting in the death Father Karras, a Jesuit priest and friend of Lt. Kinderman. The case takes an even stranger turn when Kinderman finds a mysterious patient in a hospital psychiatric ward, Patient X, who claims to be the Gemini Killer and resembles Father Karras (Jason Miller reprising his role from the first film). 

Blatty’s novel is a murder mystery that meditates on theology and good and evil. Both film versions play like a mystery whose solution happens to be supernatural with the theatrical emphasizing the horror aspects and Legion emphasizing the psychological. The ending of the theatrical version doesn’t feel so much tacked on as it feels poorly set up. A priest character added in reshoots is introduced at the beginning and then is forgotten about until the climax when it seems like he shows up out of nowhere. Still, the exorcism sequence makes good use of special effects and bloody, gruesome sights, even if they are out of step with the rest of the movie. The ending of Legion is a low key, almost anticlimactic note that leaves you wondering about Kinderman’s final action. 

Without a doubt the reason to watch either version is for the chilling and frightening performance of Brad Dourif as the Gemini Killer/Patient X, though only Legion contains his full performance. He really steals the whole movie and keeps it from being just another middling sequel. Even though he’s restrained in a straightjacket, Dourif exudes such intensity that he still comes across as a real malevolent danger. These scenes with light pouring though windows of his cell are wonderfully creepy. In one shot Dourif leans back into the shadows and his eyes become glowing red dots. Amongst all of the horror effects and other chilling scenes, his performance, even in its reduced form in the theatrical version, is either movie’s most terrifying element. 

The Exorcist III works as a slow build to a spectacle laden finale and Legion works as an intriguing psychological horror film. The Exorcist III is now widely available on Blu-ray and various streaming services. The director’s cut is only available as a bonus feature of the Blu-ray release for now. Of course, neither version comes anywhere close to the terrifying level of The Exorcist, directed by William Friedkin, but both succeed on their own terms.