Horror-tober 1: The Blackcoat's Daughter

At a boarding school before winter break, two young women are left behind to wait for their parents to arrive, if they ever will. However, they are not alone. A disturbing evil resides in the halls. Will they survive until their parents come? Or will they be overcome by the darkness inside?

So the in-laws were in town for the beginning of Horrotober this year. Luckily it was easy to convince them to watch a couple of movies with us. However, instead of wanting to watch my planned Lights Out ("too scary"), they chose this one. The Blackcoat's Daughter tells a story about two young women at the Bramford School for girls left to spend winter break at the school because their parents did not arrive to take them home. Katherine (Kat; Kiernan Shipka) has a disturbing dream where she stands by a dark figure she calls "daddy" looking at a smashed up car. Rose (Lucy Boynton) is an angsty teen that discovers she may be pregnant and when she talks to her boyfriend about it, he seems to reject her. Rose and Kat don't really get along but when Kat finds Rose in the boiler room talking to the furnace, she is scared for Kat, herself, and those who remain at the school. It is not clear if some evil or the devil possesses Kat, but something at Bramford is quite wrong. Oh and then throw Joan (Emma Roberts) into the mix, a young woman that appears down on her luck and hitches a ride with some strangers. What is Joan's story? Is it connected? Who are the strangers that she rides with? Will they arrive at Bramford and Joan will be trapped with Kat, Rose, and the evil at the school? (see below for spoilers to those answers) The film had a creepy atmosphere with some great sound editing and score, pretty good acting from all three of the leading ladies, and a fairly intriguing story written and directed by the son of Psycho (Anthony Perkins' son, Oz Perkins).

SPOILERS: Once some key information is supplied (the strangers are Rose's parents) it becomes clear that Joan is actually Kat escaped from some hospital. Kat was maybe possessed by the devil and killed Rose along with the two workers that stayed with the girls at the school. Later she is found with their severed heads in front of the furnace and is shot by an officer after she nonchalantly says,"Hail Satan." At a hospital, the head priest of the school attempts to exorcise the devil out of Kat and when the not so terrifying devil or bunny shadow disappears, Kat whispers, "Don't go." So back to Joan, now that we know she is Kat, she is travelling with Rose's parents and then kills them before they reach Bramford, severing their heads and stuffing them into a suitcase to then drag it back to the school. When she lays the heads in front of the furnace and sees that it is not on, and does not come on with her sacrifice, she realizes she is truly alone.

I liked that the movie was very atmospheric, a bit gruesome, and a little bit more of a psychological drama with Kat/Joan. Some dark force may have preyed on Kat when she had a premonition of her parents' deaths and felt alone but it is almost as if she became attached to that presence. She is sad when it leaves her and when she returns and brings the severed heads, she is hoping the presence returns. When it doesn't, she screams in agony because maybe the loss of her parents and the reality of the horrendous acts she has committed under the guise of the devil, finally hits her. However, some aspects of the film bothered me. Like, what really are the chances that she would encounter Rose's parents after she escaped the hospital? Did she plan it, and if she was trapped in the hospital how would she have known they would be on a certain route to Bramford to lay flowers on their daughter's grave? Or was it more of she really wanted to escape it all but upon learning they were Rose's parents the memories returned and motivated her to return to Bramford and bring back the devil? Or were they merely used in the plot to make it more mysterious and seem that Joan at first was a different character from Kat? Either way, the predictability of Kat/Joan and the use of Rose's parents cheapened an otherwise nearly perfect story for me and hence I gave it a lower rating.

Aimee's rating:

Michael's and Joey's rating:

My rating:

Horror-tober 15: Special Quadruple Feature

Special Poster made for the event by artist Tristan Jones @tyrannojones

This day was a special quadruple horror feature event. Hollywood Theatre is a local, historic non-profit theater with a lot of interesting events and special showings. The group that does a Grindhouse Film Festival at the theater put this event on this year. Four movies - a Satanic film, an underrated horror sequel, a forgotten 80's slasher, and a batshit-crazy Italian gutmuncher - all rare, 35mm reels. I knew this wasn't for Joey, so I went on my own. But two friends were there and I had some company to sit through these four movies with. On to the ratings!

Satanic Film 

Race with the Devil

Motorcycle racer and dealer, Roger (Peter Fonda) heads out in an RV for a vacation with his wife, Kelly and longtime friends Frank (Warren Oates) and Alice (Loretta Swit of M*A*S*H fame). All seems well until they witness some satanic ritual while camping in a remote spot in Texas on the way to Colorado. Hell breaks lose after they report what they saw to the local law enforcement and they find themselves pursued by the relentless satanists to the very end.

I liked this one alright, it was very action-packed and pretty suspenseful. It was also fun to see Peter Fonda in something unlike I have ever seen him in before. The emcee of the event, for lack of a better word, mentioned that Warren Oates is an underrated actor of the time, and then made a comment about his reaction in the film when he believes he is witnessing an orgy. He was right, it was a pretty fantastic reaction. My main complaint, as is true with a lot of these earlier movies, is the blatant animal abuse. There is a scene where the satanists snuck into the RV and left two live rattlesnakes. Ten intense, grueling, and painfully awful minutes later the two snakes are killed and thrown out of the RV. Not clear if the snakes were actually killed but they seemed to be beat with various items in this scene and it is pretty difficult to watch (mostly because of the constant shrieking from the two female leads). Otherwise the movie was goofy and pretty entertaining throughout.    

Underrated Horror Sequel 

Psycho II

Norman Bates has spent the last 22 years in a mental institution and is released to return home. The victims' families are not happy and incessantly tell the police he needs to be put away forever, not free to kill again. When people start disappearing around the house, everyone questions if Norman is truly "cured" or if being home has made his mind snap back to his "old ways".  

Anthony Perkins revives his role as iconic Norman Bates in this sequel and he does it really well. You almost feel for the guy and don't want him to go crazy and start killing people again. But as he appears to slip further into madness because of the circumstances at the house, you can see that crazy look return. 

It was funny, weird, and pretty darn good overall. It had the best death scene of the night, when a man is stab on a staircase and falls backwards over the railing and with the knife still in him, he lands on the second railing below right on the knife hilt. Gruesome, ridiculous, but well done. This one also has some other recognizable faces, including Dennis Franz, Meg Tilly, Robert Loggia, and Vera Miles (in her same role from Psycho). This might have been my favorite of the night, so it gets the highest rating.

Forgotten 80's Slasher

The Funhouse

The fair is in town and Amy's little brother wants to go! But he is stuck at home while she goes with her boyfriend and another couple. They decide, wouldn't it be fun to stay in the funhouse over night? Yeah, I suppose it would be, but they soon find out the fair hides some dark secrets and they will have to pay a price for discovering those secrets, trapped in the funhouse.

From the director of Texas Chanisaw Massacre (Tobe Hooper), The Funhouse is a fun romp in the "hillbilly", freakshow slasher way. This is one I had actually seen before (the only of all four, which is pretty good!) but back in my early twenties so it was nice to see it again after so long. Also of note, the 35mm of this film was borrowed from Quentin Tarantino's private collection. This movie is genuinely creepy with fantastic cinematography. It is a slow build with a pretty good score. Yes, there is some poor acting and it is goofy but it ends so perfectly. A gem in my eyes and definitely worth a watch.

Batshit-crazy Italian Gutmuncher

Burial Ground

A scientist of some sort is in a crypt when the dead come to life. A group of people come to visit said scientist at his estate and the dead escape from the crypt, coming to eat the living!

So many words for this one. First, I was very happy that this was the last one shown for the night. One because it was entertaining enough to keep me awake until the end and two because it was SUCH a bizarre movie that if I was in my right mind, I may not have enjoyed it at all. As far as calling it a batshit-crazy Italian gutmuncher, all correct and completely accurate. Second, there is an underlying plot, but the movie is just so relentless with the undead and gore that all character development just flies right out the window. Whoosh! Really all I can say for the story is, "It smells of death." Third, the "child" played by a small adult man. That's right. I'm actually not even sure how old he is supposed to be, 6? 8? 11? Who knows. But it is creepy, weird, hilarious, and sort of makes a lot of sense as to why it was not an actual child in the movie (SPOILERS and links for the brave!).

Finally, the gore. It seems like a running theme in the 80's Italian genre to be gross-out gory, and this film fits that mold. The makeup effects have real worms and maggots crawling around the eye socket of the undead for close-up shots. The guts that the undead tear into when they make a fresh kill are all totally real (from some animal obviously). And buckets of blood.    

I only give this one a three because I was in such a weird state of mind and am also rating it in comparison to the others (not as good as Psycho or Funhouse but better than Devil). If I watched it today, it would not be rated as high. I give the movie a rating after I see it even if I feel a bit delirious at the time and it takes me a week to write the blog.  

After about 6-7 hours the last film ended and I headed home at a little after 5am. I think the best part of the whole event was being with an audience to laugh, cheer, and otherwise engage with during the showings. Also the ridiculous trailers matching the theme of the movie were spectacular (Satanic films, horror sequels, slashers all with "Don't" in the title, and seriously WTF kind of trailer did I just see, is that really a movie?). Actually I wish I had remembered what the Asian horror one was called that was shown before Burial, I think it looked even more batshit-crazy than that film. 100% would do this again next year if they do it, I suspect they will. Big thanks to Leif for making me aware of this event and sticking in to the end with me!