Horror-tober 5: Bride of the Monster

Bela Lugosi is one of the kings of early horror films. I wanted to like this one but it didn't seem to have the substance of other Lugosi titles, such as Dracula and White Zombie. I admit that I wasn't 100% paying attention throughout most of the movie, but was for the first half and the plot was just hard to follow and was pretty hoaky.

A victim for the mutated octopus monster

Scientist, Dr. Eric Vornoff, wants to create a superhuman race using nuclear energy. His only success so far has been his assistant, Lobo, who has gained superhuman strength. Oh, and he has a mutated octopus (the monster) guarding his house/laboratory. Because every villain needs a vicious pet, I guess. When journalist, Janet Lawton (the bride) comes to the house she is captured by Vornoff and he schemes to turn her into a nucleated superhuman. Her cop fiancee, Lt. Dick Craig, comes to rescue her but he is captured too. So it is up to Lobo to step in to help them. He straps Vornoff to his own contraption but then Vornoff escapes and is chased around outside by the cops. Who are apparently horrible shots because I'm pretty sure they never hit him but they shot at him a lot or Vornoff gained some superhuman power himself.

A LOT.

In the end, he falls into the pool with the octopus and is attacked and killed by the monster. I guess when you break it down like that it is not hard to follow the plot. But Vornoff didn't seem to have a clear motive for creating an army of superhuman and the monster seemed a little out of place other than a means to draw attention to Vornoff's lab and to be his demise at the end. I mean come on, who wouldn't notice a giant, scary octopus in likely some kind of moat around some creepy house? Also, at some point Vornoff hypnotizes Janet to bring her into the lab but that seemed out of character for a mad scientist and likely the creators were just using the same "schitck" because... Bela Lugosi. I would say not among Lugosi's best but an OK one to watch especially because it is short.

My rating:

Five Years, Seriously?!

I've been doing this for five years?! And I still haven't finished a whole month of blogs? Well, maybe this year we will get through all the reviews. 

Anyway, I am pretty excited about this year as there are quite a few new releases I've been meaning to watch from the last few years and I intend to include most of them on the list. I have watched a few horror movies already this year (Shhhhh, it's our little secret) and may also include some of those as special features. Lately though, I've been thinking about changing up the categories a bit. Especially because we have lost a few greats in the world of horror this year (George A. Romero and Tobe Hopper among them) and I've been thinking of featuring more of their movies this year in honor but don't really want to try to "fit" them into some category. In all honesty, I am running out of zombie movies and there are only so many new schlocky ones I can take. If you have any suggestions, I am all ears. For now, same old categories below.

            Supernatural Sunday A day to fit ghosts, witches, vampires, and anything otherworldly 

            that doesn’t necessarily fall into any of the other categories.

            Zombday In a zombie apocalypse, these slow-shuffling, brain-loving undead take over the 

            world. In Horror-tober, they take over a day. BRAAAAAAINS!

            Transcontinental Tuesday Foreign films. Japan, Korea, Spain, even Canada – wherever 

            offers up a good old scary story for viewing pleasure.

            Wacky Wednesday The fun and lighthearted. The funny and dark. The campy. Or the 

            animated and weird. Just plain "wacky". 

            Throwback Thursday Those classics I love or new favorites I want to watch again.

            Creature-Feature Friday For all things monster and creepy-crawly. 

            Slasher Saturday Slashers, thrillers, home invasions, torture porn, body horror, et al.

Again, I did not finish last year’s posts. However, I kind of like doing these breakdowns of the ratings from the previous year now. It's nice to remind myself of all the great, OK, and terrible movies I subject myself to in the span of a single month. 
   

1 – Holidays – 2.5 skulls – Creepy vignettes about various holidays. Was mostly OK.

2 – We Are Still Here – 3 skulls – Good haunted house vibes and throwback to horror movies of the 70s.  

3 – Scouts Guide to the Zombie Apocalypse – 1.5 skulls – Just too juvenile for my tastes. 

4 – Onibaba – 4 skulls – Superb storytelling and cinematography in this classic.

5 – Extraordinary Tales – 3 skulls – Different Poe stories animated in varying styles. Was decent. 

6 – The Babadook – 4 skulls – Psychological horror and family drama. Creepy as hell and good for a rewatch. BABA DOOK DOOK DOOOOOOK! 

7 – Grizzly – 3.5 skulls – Ridiculous prehistoric grizzly bear attacks and hunky men of the 70s. Worth it.

8 – Hush – 4 skulls – Definitely my favorite of the new ones for 2016. A nice twist on home invasion thrillers and well worth the watch. 

9 – Supernatural Shorts:

Foxes – 3.5 skulls – I love foxes, but they definitely have a blood-curdling scream.

Don't Move – 4 skulls – Delightfully gory and kind of funny. 

Teddy Bears are for Lovers – 4 skulls – Also delightfully funny. 

Geist – 3.5 skulls – Animated ghost story that was kind of heartbreaking.
             Red Girl – 2.5 skulls – Really short, OK. 
             Daddy – 2 skulls – Don't remember too much but that it was OK.
             Abandoned – 2.5 skulls – I gave this one an extra .5 skull compared to Daddy because I                was not expecting the ending. Otherwise OK.
             Coffer – 3.5 skulls – From the same director of the Lights Out short from last year. Good,              but not as good. 
             The Wicked – 2.5 skulls – Liked the single frame shot throughout, but meh.
             The Pride of Strathmoor – 3 skulls – Animated, decent but fairly disturbing.    

10 – Maggie – 3 skulls – Arnold zombie drama. Not too bad.

11 – Witching and Bitching – 3.5 skulls – Raucous and ridiculous and loved it. 

12 – The Voices – 3 skulls – Ryan Reynolds shines as a weirdo hearing voices (his pets talk to him, but not really. Because voices).
The Neon Dead – 1.5 skulls – Was the one I had originally planned to watch this night but it was so bad I had to fast forward and then watched The Voices.

13 – 2001 Maniacs – 3 skulls – Robert Englund. Cannibalistic, redneck/hillbilly/confederate ghosts? Need I say more? 

14 – Hobgoblins – 1.5 skulls – Best scene was the band playing at the bar. Literally almost 6 minutes (I could be exaggerating) of just the band playing and people dancing. 

15 – Special 4 Movie Feature at Hollywood Theatre – 4 movies. 1 night. Friends. Beer. Coffee. Rad.
             Race with the Devil – 2.5 skulls – Peter Fonda. You can't escape the Satanists, no matter              how long or far you run (or drive)! It was OK, a bit weird and somewhat comical. 
             Psycho II – 4 skulls – The best of the night. A sequel made over 20 years after the                          original. Most definitely an "underrated sequel". Was fun and pretty dang good. 
             The Funhouse – 3.5 skulls – Maybe a lesser well known Tobe Hooper scare. The only of                the 4 I had previously seen and I still enjoyed it. 
             Burial Ground – 3 skulls – "Bat shit crazy Italian gutmuncher" is an appropriate descriptor              for this movie. This was insane. And being the last of the 4 made it even that much more                  insane (because watching it at around 4am after sitting through 3 other movies).    

16 – Ghost concert – After 4 movies in one night, took a break to see one of my favorite bands! 

17 – Southbound – 2.5 skulls – Another anthology film with the stories all tied together in some way. Really enjoyed a couple of the stories but overall was nothing to get that excited about. 

18 – The Psychic – 3.5 skulls – Watched based on recommendation from a friend. Was not disappointed. 

19 – He Never Died – 3.5 skulls – Henry Rollins. 'Nough said.

20 – Special Presentation of "new" Rocky Horror Picture Show on FOX – 1.5 skulls – I had to give it a shot but I just, I don't even know why I watched the whole thing. I do love Laverne Cox and even was happy to see Tim Curry stepping into the role of the Criminologist/Narrator. But it just, no. Bad. No more words for how much I did not like this.  

21 – The Corpse Grinders – 2 skulls – Cat food made with corpses! I fell asleep, tried to watch again and fell asleep again. Not worth it. 

22 – Open Grave – 2 skulls – I wanted to like it because I love Sharlto Copley but it just wasn't very good.   

23 – Stake Land – 3 skulls – Decent vampire fare. Saw recently that there is a sequel, might give that one a try this year. 

24 – Monsters – 3.5 skulls – A good science-fiction/monster flick. Some good subtle social commentary in it as well.     

25 – Baskin – 3.5 skulls – I still feel fucked up after watching this movie. I liked it, but damn. Just writing this snippet about it is fucking with me. And it really wasn't terribly more shocking than other movies I've watched, but it just got to me in a fucked up way.   

26 – Goosebumps – 2 skulls – As an avid Goosebumps reader in my younger days, I had to watch this. It was OK.   

27 – Poltergeist - 2.5 skulls – I try my darndest to give remakes a shot and some are actually decent (Rob Zombie's Halloween for one, honestly). But I just wasn't feeling this one.

28 – Stung - 3 skulls –The only note I have on this one is that I gave it 3 skulls because of the practical effects. Seriously, a good way to win me over is the use of practical effects. Especially for "newer" films to use practical effects over CGI (or a combination of the two). 

29 – We Are What We Are – 3.5 skulls – A cannibalistic family drama. Decent. 

30 – The Houses October Built – 2 skulls – Haunted houses, the kind you go to to be scared, that are a little more "serious". I liked the premise, but poor execution.

31 – Ghostbusters – 3.5 skulls – Despite what the critics and even die hard original Ghostbusters fans have said about this movie, I really liked this. I wouldn't go as far as saying it was better than the original, but honestly having four female leads, and three in scientific fields, was pretty dang great. Yay for progress, I guess, yay! I also just fucking LOVED Kate McKinnon as Holtzmann. (I admit I have an Abby Yates Funko Pop! toy on my desk at work but every time I look at it I wish it was Holtzmann. Shhhh, don't tell Abby).  

Welp that's it for last year's movies. We've got about a week until the feast-ivities begin. AGGGGGHHHH! I can't wait!    

Horror-tober 14: Hobgoblins

Creatures from outer space are contained in a vault on a Hollywood movie lot, or something similar. One night they escape and begin to wreak havoc in the town. They make your dream come true, but at a price!

Some familiar silhouettes with some hobgoblins on screen.

The only reason this one came up was 1) because it sort of became a cult classic when it was featured on Mystery Science Theater 3000 (MST3K) and 2) because one of the taglines said, "The movie lampooned by Mystery Science Theater 3000, this is Gremlins as seen through the campy eyes of John Waters." How could I resist? I should have resisted. For B-horror movies, it is expected that it would be kind of a stinker. But maybe would be a kind of funny and entertaining stinker. Or become a cult classic kind of stinker. A Troll 2 kind of stinker. Nope, just bad. The best part of the film was when the main characters went to a club and there was a punk band playing. The scene was literally the whole song. Maybe a good 4 minutes of one song while our characters are sitting at a table glancing around awkwardly. The band was actually decent, the Fontanelles (not to be mistaken with the band from the UK) and turns out they have an interesting story of how they became a band. But the scene was pretty pointless.

The creatures were sort of designed well, but unlike Gremlins, they were not puppets. Or at least not the kind that actually moved, no eye blinks, no mouth moving, no head turning, nothing. I don't really know if I can say much more. I actually fell asleep during most of this movie. Sometimes that is just because I am really tired, not so in this case. It bored me to sleep. Half way through I had just wished that we had found and watched the MST3K version. It would have been more enjoyable that way. But honestly the soundtrack is pretty good with some other Fontanelles songs.

Joey's rating:

He actually said he gave it "a dollar". So I quickly made this hobgoblin dollar for his rating.

My rating:

Horror-tober 7: Grizzly

As I stated in my original post for the blog, the picks for Creature Feature Friday this year are mostly animals going crazy, or "natural horror". This first one is definitely in the "natural horror" category. Joey's out of town for the weekend, so I watched this one with my bestie, Skyra.

The great outdoors. Young people enjoying the freedom and peace of nature. But in the woods lurks danger. 18 feet and 2,000 lbs of danger! When a couple of backpackers are killed by a bear, the park rangers realize they have more than just a black bear on their hands. A guy that calls himself a naturalist says that it is a very large grizzly. But there haven't been grizzlies in this part of the country for years, millennia even. But he is certain, it is the largest of all the grizzlies, a monster of a grizzly, I think there was even a hint that it was an "ancient" grizzly from the Pleistocene. Yeah, sure uh huh.

A lot of the 70's natural horror films kind of have a soft spot in my heart. I am not sure why because most aren't that great, but they are just so darn funny to me even when they are not meant to be. Also, they're just so much fun to write about, the hokey effects, the blatant nudity where there really is no reasoning for it, the cheesy music. And this one was no exception. It did not hold back on the gore or "camp" either.

Did you see what I did there? Because they have a tent and are...ah forget it. Anyway, this one starts off with the most ridiculous, chipper music. I thought I had started the wrong film. But shortly in we see our first bear on camper carnage with a severed arm.

Gore-tastic. The best part about the opening scenes basically until halfway through the movie is that you never "see" the bear. Scenes are shot from the bear's point of view and the attacks are done with a man in a bear suit, but it only ever shows the paws/claws. Pretty fine horror editing on that front. Later though, a real grizzly steps in as the star and although it makes sense, it gets a little hokey and turned into more on an action movie than a horror movie.

I get it, it's the 70's and we want an excuse for a boob shot. Remember that blatant nudity for seemingly no reason is kind of a trope? But does it really have to be the female park ranger? Really? She's out hunting the bear with her fellow ranger and boyfriend and decides she wants to skinny dip in the waterfall. Really? Come on. The naturalist barely reacting to hearing that two women were killed by a bear in the park and that it buried one was more realistic than that. "But bears do that anyway, they cover their kill with a shallow grave. Then they go away and come back later and finish eating."

Also, the bear sneaks up on her under the waterfall. Seriously? Why? Just, why? But whatever, I guess I can look past it because it is such a ridiculous movie anyway. Bonus pictures below showcasing two of the many ways you know it is from the 70's.

This reporter's mustache:

Main character (aka the "Hunk" of the film) with open shirt and chest hair:

The freeze frame I captured on this last one was just too perfect. That grimace. Anyway, Grizzly kept me entertained and honestly wasn't that bad when I just let myself get into how completely ridiculous it really was. 

Skyra and I agree on rating for this one:

Horror-tober 16: Tusk

Another that has been on my list for awhile but haven't gotten around to it until now. It seemed to do poorly in theaters but I thought it was pretty fun.

Tusk is a story about a podcaster, Wallace (Justin Long), and his search for a good story or really just his search for someone to make fun of on his podcast with his best friend, Teddy (Haley Joel Osment). When he travels to Manitoba to do an interview with a kid that cut his own leg off on video, he finds himself stuck there with no interview because the kid committed suicide before his arrival. Searching for a new story or just a weirdo Canadian he can exploit, he winds up in a bar where he finds an advertisement for a room for rent. The guy, Howard Howe (Michael Parks) as we find out, used to be a seaman and has many stories to tell. Wallace contacts him and arranges to meet him that same night. Howard gives off a strange vibe but regales Wallace with some crazy stories and then drugs him. The next day Wallace wakes up with a missing leg and soon discovers Howard wants more from him than to just share his stories of the sea. He wants a companion to fill the void of a walrus he knew, named Mr. Tusk.

Howard operating on Wallace

Directed by Kevin Smith, Tusk is a humorous and gruesome horror comedy. It is based on a story that Smith with friend Scott Mosier told on his own podcast, SModcast. I know it is not explicitly a creature-feature and sort of fits more into the "body horror" genre. But Wallace (almost sounds like walrus) is turned into and conditioned to behave like a creature, albeit a really messed up one. Johnny Depp also makes an appearance in this one as the detective from Quebec chasing an unknown serial killer that turns out to be our Mr. Howe. I enjoyed it because it was such a weird premise and Long played a great douchey guy that you honestly do not feel sorry for. Depp was also delightfully weird as the French Canadian detective although he seemed to lose his accent here and there. Tusk is the first installment of a triology of horror comedies Smith is making about the True North or Canada. I look forward to seeing what he does with the others since this one was quite entertaining.

Howard lamenting about the world with his new Mr. Tusk

My rating:

Joey's rating: 

Skyra's rating: 

Horror-tober 9: Shorts

I haven't done this in previous years, but have discovered that it is actually quite nice to do, especially when I do not have enough time to watch a full movie. Also, because they are shorts, I can post them on the blog and then everyone can watch them! 

First up was a Canadian short titled, There are Monsters. Didn't really know what to expect from this one. People start acting strangely and even though it had some pretty cheesy editing it had some good scares. There is also a full-length horror by the same name but do not think they are related. 

Lights Out is one of my favorite horror shorts. It is just so simply done and so creepy. Even though I have seen this one a few times in the past, I still check all the shadows and and corners before turning the lights off at night. 

The Little Witch is really, really short. But reminds me of this cartoon and each have just the perfect amount of creepiness. 

The cartoon I mentioned above.

Lastly there is The Whistler. Aside from Lights Out this one might be my favorite of the bunch. It is beautifully filmed and has a good scare. Beware if you hear a strange whistling outside your window at night.

Horror-tober 2: Cursed

I'm kind of breaking my rules this year, just to make it a bit easier on myself when I have busier days than others. That said, I watched Cursed for Creature-Feature Friday even though I have seen it before. I also feel that this year I want to pay homage to the late Wes Craven, mostly because that man made some great movies, some of my favorite horror films of all time, most of which really helped to form my interest and love for the genre.

A brother and sister living in Hollywood, find themselves changed after an encounter with some mysterious creature on Mulholand Drive. Not Wes Craven's best by any means, but it is still pretty good and fun. I like this one because it has some decent effects and good scares, albeit most fairly predicatable. Werewolves seem hard to make well while avoiding being too hokey or unrealistic. But this one does a pretty good job of creating a menacing and pretty believable werewolf character. It also has some good humor. All in all, a decent little film that gets some slack probably because the overall plot is pretty silly, but I don't mind it. 

That's all I really have to say about this one. Again, I make the rules about how I do this so deal with it.

I couldn't resist this gif.

Rating:

Aberration

My Creature Feature Friday list is pretty dismal this year and after spending about an hour trying to find something better, I just ended up choosing this one.

A woman moves to a cabin in the woods (first sign of an often used horror movie cliche). It also had the typical creepy old guy warning her, foreshadowing events to come, "it's not tourist season anymore. It's the mean season. Get out while you still can." Our main character finds herself alone in her cabin (well with her two fish and cat) but something is eating her and her cat's food. She purchases some rat poison and traps to kill off whatever is invading her quaint little abode. A gentleman enters the town's general store and identifies himself as a biologist studying the ecosystem in the area. He tells her it is strange that there are a bunch of species disappearing. Upon leaving the store, her car has exhausted its last... exhaust and he offers to take her home. On the way he shows her some odd slime(?)/hair(?)/something he found on the pond near her cabin. Then, at the cabin they discover what has been eating her food, and sadly her cat (trust me, it doesn't ruin it for you. We all saw it coming.). They are... the aberration. Mutated creatures that are so horrible, so adaptable, so hokey. Seriously, even for a low-budget film the creature effects are so very bad.

Cabin in the woods, oooh. Cabin in the woods, yeah.

Killer lizard

It's so scary, I can't even look!

It was probably the worst choice I could have made for this evening. However, on nights when Joey goes to bed early for work and I am left alone watching a movie, I can't have it too loud so I usually end up watching it with subtitles. So for something super schlocky, it's not that bad since I don't really hear the bad acting or cheesy music cues. I was definitely thankful for that with this one since the acting really was very bad. The biologist character is not believable, although more so than the one in Prometheus, but that's a whole different discussion. Our heroine is also whiny and dumb. Not to mention the highly evolved killer geckos. That's right, a tropical or desert species in a temperate climate. Totally makes sense right? With the sudden winter storm, they've holed up in the cabin, and inside the neighbor (remember the old man? Mean season indeed.), because they are a TROPIC species and need warmth. I mean, our biologist points the peculiarity out, yet doesn't try to make anything of it. I could go on, but it really isn't worth trying to analyze who thought it was a good idea to  have mutated geckos outside of their natural habitat as killer creatures in a horror film.

I spy, with my little eye. A terrible movie! 

Someone, please save me from my bad acting.

It's not often that I watch something so bad that I can't even give it an "ok" rating of two skulls.

My rating:

Orca: The Killer Whale

Before Jesse freed Willy, Willy terrorized a small Newfoundland town! Not really, I just thought I was being funny and clever... but here is this year's first Creature-Feature Friday.

I pretty much chose this one for tonight because I had a dream about killer whales the night before. Plus, it has been on my list for awhile. It opens with music composed by the famous Ennio Morricone (John Carpenter's The Thing) eerily put to the sounds of orca songs and echolocation. Early on we are introduced to the two main characters, one a fisherman, Nolan, played by Richard Harris and a marine mammal biologist, Rachel, played by Charlotte Rampling. Honestly, the cast in this film is another reason this has been on my list for so long, including some small very early performances by Robert Carradine (of Revenge of the Nerds fame) and Bo Derek (10). After the characters witness a great white shark being killed by an orca, it cuts to Rachel mid-lecture. She discusses the intelligence of killer whales and states that they have a, "profound instinct for vengeance." Nolan, upon attending Rachel's classes is interested in capturing and selling one of these profoundly intelligent creatures to a zoo. He succeeds, but in his success unwittingly kills a female and her unborn calf, igniting her mate's vengeance against him. Nolan is very regretful and empathizes with the whale as he also lost his wife and child in a car accident, but it all comes down to a man vs. whale battle in the very end. 

After killing the female, Nolan doesn't look that regretful

It's the final showdown! (sung to Europe's "Final Countdown")

At a time when we became more conscious of our impact on the environment, and the Endangered Species Act was passed and Rachel Carson's "Silent Spring" hit book shelves; Hollywood produced a lot of movies we classify into the "Natural Horror" sub-genre. Also partly because of Jaws but, I may be inferring this a bit, from 1960 to 1980 a lot of "nature strikes back" horror films were made, including Orca (1977). As an example from the film; Nolan asks the priest at his friend's funeral after he is killed by the rampaging orca, if you can commit a sin against an animal and the priest replies, "Sins are really against one's self." Which we can interpret as stating that our sin's against nature are not only harmful to it but to ourselves as well. Also, unlike others in the genre (Jaws again) Orca is also a dramatic piece about loss and suffering. The scene of the female losing her calf was much more disturbing than anything in Jaws or any other "natural horror" movies I have seen. In fact, the fake whales used in the film were so realistic that animal rights activists tried to stop the trucks transporting them to and from the set. With all of that in mind, I only give it two skulls because it was so far-fetched although a bit entertaining. I mean, the whale roared in anguish several times. It roared. ROARED. So silly.

ROAR!

My rating:

Infestation

The last of Creature-Feature Friday for the month and I couldn't resist something with large creepy crawlies even though it probably would have been a good fit for a Wacky Wednesday too.

Infestation plays on everyone's fear of large and ferocious insects. Cooper is kind of a loser, although we don't know it yet, he recently lost his mom, and his dad is a hard-ass. So when Cooper loses his job, there seems to be no hope for him. In the firing meeting with his boss, an ear-piercing sound afflicts the entire office and the film jumps right into the action after that. In the next scene, there are a bunch of people wrapped in cocoons with very large insects jamming appendages into them and excreting some kind of fluid. Cooper wakes from his catatonic state, escapes from the cocoon, vomits the fluid and is attacked by what appears to be a large beetle. He rescues some fellow workers and discovers that the entire city has succumbed to this swarm of bugs. 

Cooper in the office with co-workers in cocoons

Some of the insects turn people into this. Yikes! 

It had some pretty well done special effects - just the right amount of cheese. The story is pretty typical as end-of-the-world monster movies go but with a good sense of humor about it. There is a love story to go along with it, which, meh. I enjoyed seeing Ray Wise (Reaper, How I Met Your Mother). He plays a good tough father that doesn't easily show his emotions or connect with his son. Otherwise, most of the acting and story development was kind of blah. 

Ray Wise

NO! Not Fluffykins! 

My rating: