3. Swamp Thing

Swamp Thing
Wes Craven, 1982

A scientist (Ray Wise) turns into a a swamp monster (Dick Durock) and takes revenge on those responsible.

I'm a big fan of Swamp Thing - that is, of the comic book character Swamp Thing. I also loved the TV series growing up. One of those (the comic) is fantastic, the other (TV show) kind of terrible, but this movie makes them both look like high art. It starts of reasonably well - it's sort of got the feel of an old Universal horror film, one of the later ones from the 40's and 50's, but crossed with a cheap 80's A-Team sort of aesthetic. It shouldn't work, but it does. The problem is mainly Swamp Thing himself - the costume just looks terrible. I'm willing to forgive a lot in my low-budget effects, but when your star's skin (I presume) doesn't even fit the actor, it's pretty tough to deal with. Add in an obnoxious comic-relief kid, a plethora of horrible "comic-booky" transitions, and another monster that manages to look even worse than Swamp Thing, and you can see it all fall apart right before your eyes.

3/10 (and I'm being generous)

The 50 Best Horror Movies: #46-50

I changed my mind slightly on the format. These are going to be coming five at a time, not 10. So, without further ado, here are the worst of the best (but really, just think of them as some of the best).

50. In the Mouth of Madness

John Carpenter, 1995

Objectively, this is a weaker movie than a lot of the runners-up, but there’s just something about it. It may be a personal thing – 1995 was right smack in the middle of my formative years, and when you’re in that frame of mind and hear a character say something like “sane and insane could easily trade places if the insane were to become the majority,” it’s a little bit mind-blowing. Now, a lot of the metatextual commentary comes off as a tad obnoxiously smug, but even so, In the Mouth of Madness remains a fairly clever movie. It also gets bonus points for rooting its horror in a sort of creeping, almost existentialist dread, rather than the more concrete rubber monsters and crazy killers – and yet, not entirely eschewing said monsters and killers. It’s the best of both worlds.

49. Below

David Twohy, 2002

Criminally underseen, Below takes the trappings of the haunted house movie and transposes them to a novel setting – a US submarine during World War II. Ghosts are frightening enough, and submarines doubly so – which means the combination is tremendously effective. It’s not all about the high concept, however – the characters remain front and center, thanks in part to the efforts of a strong cast led by Olivia Williams and Bruce Greenwood. For those of you, unlike me, prefer your horror “realistic,” know that the movie spends most of its running time (maybe the entire time – I won’t give away which it is) playing up the ambiguity of whether there really are ghosts, or whether the things we see are the result of stress and chemical imbalances on the part of the intrepid sailors.

48. The Body Snatcher

Robert Wise, 1945

One of many movies based loosely on the Burke and Hare scandal (by way of a Robert Louis Stevensen short story that was based on them), The Body Snatcher condenses the two graverobbers into a single character, John Gray, played by the great Boris Karloff. Most of the movie plays as a sort of sinister drama, until the chilling end that cements its genre status. Watch for the outstanding mid-movie confrontation between Karloff and his fellow legend, Bela Lugosi.

47. The Signal

David Bruckner, Dan Bush, Jacob Gentry, 2008

The Signal is an odd hybrid between a straightforward narrative and an anthology, with a story that follows the same three principal characters, trapped in a city where a mysterious signal turns people into psychopaths, but which is broken into three chapters, each directed by a different director and each with a markedly different tone. The most notable of these is the second segment, which is largely a pitch-black comedy. This would seem extremely out of place next to the straightforwardly brutal first segment and the surreal, more intellectual third segment, but it is presented in such a way that it can be read as coming from the perspective of one of the infected crazy people. This interpretation gives another interesting level of meaning to all three segments, and helps to elevate it to the status of modern classic.

46. Hellraiser

Clive Barker, 1987

Unlike most horror icons of the era, Pinhead is not a particularly significant part of his debut movie. He may have roughly the same amount of screen time as, say, Jason Voorhees (and a lot more dialogue), but whereas Friday the 13^th is all about Jason killing teenagers (okay, okay, Friday the 13^th Part 2, technically), Hellraiser actually has very little to do with Pinhead and his machinations. At its core, it’s a simple story about a woman and the lengths she would go to in order to have her lover back, and the havoc (in monster form) that it wreaks on her family (hey, did someone say metaphor?). That central conflict alone could make for a strong film, but when you throw in the monsters and creatures and gooey, gooey effects, it’s magic.

2. Fright Night

Fright Night
1985, Tom Holland

A high school student believes his new neighbor is a vampire (spoiler: he's right!) and enlists the aid of a washed up horror movie star (Roddy McDowall) to stop him.

Well, that was disappointing. Fright Night is kind of a mess, with tonal problems and inconsistent performances. For every solid Roddy McDowall moment, there's a terrible William Ragsdale scene. For every good Stephen Geoffreys as a vampire bit, there's a terrible Stephen Geoffreys as a human bit. It's also oddly paced and tends to drag - our heroes head to the vampire's house to confront him with 37 minutes left, and that final confrontation does indeed take 37 minutes, and you do indeed feel every one of them.

On the other hand, there were some very effective make-up effects (the wolf transformation, Amy's mouth at the end), although those really only make up for the awful vampire design. And Chris Sarandon made for one of the better modern-day vampires I've seen. . . except when the makeup came out. I probably sound more down on this movie than I actually am - it isn't really bad. I was just expecting more. Maybe the remake (with David Tennant!) will be better.

5.5/10

1. Repulsion

Repulsion
Roman Polanski, 1965

A fragile, repressed young woman goes very, very mad when left at home alone for a couple of weeks.

I was initially unwilling to include this in the October countdown, because it didn't seem appropriate, genre-wise - however, it did show up on Rotten Tomatoes' list of 50 best-reviewed horror movies, so I gave it a shot. After watching it, I'm still not completely convinced, but I can certainly see understand the argument - there are some really unsettling moments. Either way, the one thing that can't be disputed is that it's terrific, all around. From Catherine Deneuve's edgy performance to the stellar sound design, I can't think of a single element that was sub-par. Probably the greatest stroke of genius was the creation of a second set for the apartment that was used for dream sequences. It's similar to the real one, but much, much larger, and that break with reality just gave me chills. Definitely the best of Polanski's so-called apartment trilogy (also including Rosemary's Baby and The Tenant).

8/10

It's October! Er, almost. Kind of.

Well, hey, look at that. It's been five months since I last posted. I guess time really does fly. Don't worry, though, this isn't another boring catch-up post where I just list a bunch of movies I've seen without comment (although I will give a count of 39, which is how many first-time viewings I've had since my last accounting). No, I'm here to talk about something much more important: Halloween! Typically, I make a holiday out of the entire month of October, with lots of trips to haunted houses and a plan to view at least 31 new horror movies over the 31 days. However, this year I'll be doing some traveling, and spending some time with people from out of town, so I'm a little worried about whether I'll be able to accomplish everything. The solution? Start early. If the twelve days of Christmas can last two months (since all the stores seem to have their decorations up by Halloween day. Which, by the way, fills me with an unspeakable rage), then there's no reason the 31 days of Halloween can't become 50 days. Or so.

So what does this mean? Well, for one, it actually has me feeling motivated enough to start writing about what I watch again. Secondly, while building my queue of movies to watch this season, I've been reading a lot of "best horror movies" lists, and that's inspired me to generate my own. I'll be posting the list, in groups of 10, periodically throughout the month, with the entire thing hopefully finished by the beginning of October. That way, anyone looking for something seasonal to watch will know objectively and absolutely what the best options are.

One thing that I struggled with a bit was what exactly qualifies as horror? A lot of lists that I saw included movies such as Silence of the Lambs, Seven, or King Kong. I can certainly agree about the quality of those films, but when I think about horror movies, they just don't fit. To be honest, I'm even dubious about calling Psycho horror (fortunately, that movie won't be found anywhere near my top 50 list of anything, so the genre is moot). I tried several different criteria, but nothing worked consistently. A requirement that there be an "otherworldly" element got rid of Silence of the Lambs and Seven, but not King Kong. Plus, it didn't explain why Alien qualifies, but Aliens does not. Plus, that would eliminate 70% of the slasher genre if it was applied strictly. I also thought about defining horror in a negative sense - it's horror if there is not another specific genre that it fits - but that eliminated all manner of things, from the afore-mentioned Alien to Shaun of the Dead. Ultimately, I just had to define horror like obscenity - I know it when I see it.

Just to kick things off, I'm going to make a liar of myself by listing a bunch of movies without comment. These are the runners up, numbers 51-75, in alphabetical order:

[REC]
Audition
Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon
Black Sunday
The Changeling
Day of the Dead
Demons
Dracula, Prince of Darkness
The Exorcist
The Haunting
The Innocents
Kill, Baby. . . Kill!
Leviathan
Lifeforce
Marebito
The Mist
Night of the Demon
A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors
Phantasm
The Phantom of the Opera
Phenomena
Pumpkinhead
Revenge of Frankenstein
Tales of Terror
The Wicker Man

30-37. Catching up (yes, again)

Well, so much for the plan to get back on track with my write-ups. Maybe this time it will work. Here's what, other than old Doctor Who serials, I've been watching over the past (yikes) almost a month:

30. Green Zone
Paul Greengrass, 2010
5.5/10

31. L'Atalante
Jean Vigo, 1934
7/10

32. M. Hulot's Holiday
Jacques Tati, 1953
4/10
To be fair, I feel a little more positively toward this one looking back at it, and I may like it more on a second viewing. But for now, I reacted to it about the same way I felt about Modern Times.

33. Kick-Ass
Matthew Vaughn, 2010
7.5/10

34. Belle de Jour
Luis Bunuel, 1968
8/10

35. Vivre Sa Vie
Jean-Luc Godard, 1963
7.5/10

36. Steamboat Bill, Jr.
Charles Reisner and Buster Keaton, 1928
8/10

37. The Room
Tommy Wiseau, 2003
1/10
And just to be clear, this isn't "1 out of 10 for being so bad it's good." This is for just being bad, without providing me that expected degree of sick enjoyment. Although there were moments.

Now, let's see if this time I actually do get back on track. The next movie I'm likely to watch is the remake of A Nightmare on Elm Street - and I can only assume I'll have a little something to say about that.

29. Caddyshack

Caddyshack
Harold Ramis, 1980
Shenanigans at a golf club. Er, country club.

There are some things I think you just have to have been there for. I was not there when Caddyshack came out.

But Chevy Chase was pretty good. That's something I've never said before, and likely won't again.

3/10