(I think I'll just do this from now on, in between tilting at windmills.)
"Tomatoe".
matrixschmatrix wrote:
knives wrote:Maybe I just didn't see it at the right time, but I found it fascinating more for the character interactions than for the scares. The way that Jones interacts with that one asshole (who turns out to be right all along)
Does he? The only reason they don't get away in the truck is that the one dude suddenly turns ludicrously incompetent- there was nothing wrong with the plan there, for sure.
Spoiler
I was referring to how at the end of the film Jones only lives by taking his advice and staying in the cellar. Which would have worked if not for rednecks.
knives wrote:As to Gregory, you're the first positive word I've heard on Diary.
See also, Robin Wood in Film Comment. Wood was one of the very first critics to "get" what American horror directors such as Romero and Cohen were doing in the 1970s (and even to seriously acknowledge it).
(EDIT: Also, the Rotten Tomatoes "all critics" rating for Diary isn't too far below that of Land (62% vs 74%) but I don't think anyone should place any stock in that kind of thing anyway. I agree with knives that Land wasn't too interesting.)
knives wrote:As to Gregory, you're the first positive word I've heard on Diary.
See also, Robin Wood in Film Comment. Wood was one of the very first critics to "get" what American horror directors such as Romero and Cohen were doing in the 1970s (and even to seriously acknowledge it).
Sweet read, thanks. I might go against everything I've heard and actually watch these two.
I was referring to how at the end of the film Jones only lives by taking his advice and staying in the cellar. Which would have worked if not for rednecks.
Well, right, but I still think Jones' long term strategy was correct- he never said the basement wouldn't work at all, just that was a deathtrap.
The Vampire Lovers (Roy Ward Baker, 1970): I'm going to say it: Hammer's best film from its 70's period. Part of Hammer's attempt during the 70's to lure in audiences by upping the level of sex and violence, the film is somewhat infamous for its overt lesbianism, but it avoids making its increased levels of eroticism feel opportunistic. The sexuality is anchored in the narrative and the characters, and the trashier elements are handled with just enough class and grace to be sexy without being exploitative. What really puts this movie at the top is two-fold: first, the atmosphere of the fantastical that director Baker lends it (such as in the beautiful and eerie opening scene where a shrouded figure dances slowly in a fog-bound grave yard), and second, its complex depiction of its lead character, the vampire Mircalla Karnstein (played by the ravishing Ingrid Pitt). Not a simple predator, she genuinely loves the girls she seduces and drains, and seems to fear for their own mortality. Indeed, she herself manifests a crippling and morbid anxiety over the idea of death, the very thing she has avoided experiencing and yet is doomed to spread. Her hysterical reactions to her own mayhem are so intense that they come across as neurotic rather than remorseful. This one will figure high on my list.
Lust For a Vampire (Jimmy Sangster, 1970): Hammer goes from their best 70's film to possibly their worst. Censorial prudishness greatly reduced the lesbian element of this one, so we get instead a tame and irritating movie about a couple of school teachers who fall in love with the newly reanimated Mircalla Karnstein (played by Yutte Stensgaard who, while beautiful, is no Ingrid Pitt). It has one of the most ill-conceived scenes in a Hammer film, where Mircalla and one of her suitors go all soft-core in a graveyard to the tune of some bubbly pop song. It's unbelievably awful.
Twins of Evil (John Hough, 1971): An odd mixture of puritan witch-hunting and vampirism, this is one of Hammer's most interesting 70's films. It has very little relationship to the previous two (I still can't tell if it's supposed to be a sequel, a prequel, or both). Oddly, the very thing that makes the movie so interesting ends up inadvertently revealing the weakness of its material: the fact is that Peter Cushing's puritan witch-burner is just plain more terrifying than any of the vampires. He makes the gothic horror element seem trifling and hokey. This is in many ways a tribute to Cushing's effectiveness and to how well-written his role is, but the strength of it only makes the rest seem weaker than it otherwise would. Highly recommended even if it probably won't make my list.
Mummy Series:
The Mummy (Terence Fisher, 1959): This one's probably going in my top ten. My personal pick as the best film Hammer ever made. Everything is pitch perfect. Christopher Lee does what no one else has ever managed to do in the history of horror: make the shuffling, bandaged mummy truly frightening. The way he smashes through doors and tears off iron bars turns his mummy from a simple zombie into an inexorable force that you really believe could terrify the characters he stalks. Rivals Universal's The Mummy. Can't recommend it more highly.
The Curse of the Mummy's Tomb (Michael Carreras, 1964): Plays exactly like a colour version of the Universal Kharis movies, and that's not a compliment. In stark contrast to its predecessor, the shuffling, bandaged mummy once again fails to be a credible threat (and how does he keep managing to creep up on people? He's nearly seven feet tall and seems constantly on the verge of an asthma attack). It also feels like a lot of plot points were left out of the script, as a bunch of things happen that seem like they should have an explanation (like why the mummy falls in love with the lead girl, or who those guys were at the beginning). One of Hammer's weaker films.
The Mummy’s Shroud (John Gilling, 1967): Pretty much exactly like Curse, except with even goofier mummy make-up. Hard to shake off the feeling of redundancy with this one, tho' it is nice to see Hammer stalwart Michael Ripper get a more sizeable role. He brings real pathos to his death scene. Not much to say about this one.
Blood From the Mummy’s Tomb (Seth Holt, 1971): Hammer wisely dropped its shambling mummy in favour of adapting a Bram Stoker story about reincarnation. Unfortunately, the result is undercooked. For starters, it's incoherent. There's this whole set of bizarre metaphysics at work that gets so little explanation that you have trouble figuring out what the exact purpose or significance is of most of the things going on. Second, no one ever seems to have a psychologically plausible reaction to all the bizarre stuff happening (always a sign of a poor script when the characters blithely accept things that would shatter any reasonable person's world). Finally, this is a movie in which the wind rips out people's throats. The wind. As in a breeze comes up on the soundtrack and people collapse. I'll give the movie credit for having a truly fantastic ending, tho'.
Hammer Sci-Fi:
The Quatermass Xperiment (Val Guest, 1955): This one struck me as being a feature length Outer Limits episode. It lacks the heady attempts at philosophy and social comment that characterized that show and a lot of other 50's sci-fi, and is I think the better for it. It's a lean, stripped down alien-on-the-rampage story that builds tension by withholding necessary information, parceling it out only at the point when something else inexplicable is ready to be introduced. The later Quatermass and the Pit would perfect this manner of story-telling, but it's still used to good effect here.
X: The Unknown (Leslie Norman, 1956): It's the Nuclear Blob! Another one that reminded me of a feature length Outer Limits episode. Originally intended to be another Quatermass film, creator Nigel Kneale denied Hammer use of the character, so the project was turned into a sort of Quatermass clone. It's a solid, unambitious thriller that, however skilfully plotted, lacks the headlong momentum of the Quatermass films. Sadly, the stand-in for the good professor has been bleached of all personality. I missed Quatermass' crankiness and his weary desperation for someone--anyone--to believe him. It's easy to be harsher on this one than I should since it's sandwiched between two superior examples of the same thing. Still a good film in its own right.
Quatermass 2 (Val Guest, 1957): I appreciate these Quatermass films as tightly constructed mysteries more than anything. There's nothing ponderous or excessive about them; they're pure forward momentum. I don't want to say anything about the plot since it benefits from going in totally blind, except to say it makes nice use of industrial and bureaucratic paranoia. I think it's even better than its predecessor.
These are the Damned (Joseph Losey, 1963): Nuclear age sci-fi story that overcomes its datedness with the perversions that bubble under its surface and through a surprising and laudable bleakness. I don't want to say much about the plot, but it's something like a more socially conscious version of Village of the Damned. I liked it, especially its attention to its minor characters, and of course its ending; but I was less taken with it than a lot of other people given that this one has the reputation of being a Sci-Fi masterpiece while I don't think it quite reaches that level.
Quatermass and the Pit (Roy Ward Baker, 1967): One of the great British sci-fi films. When you think about it, this film shouldn't work: it's made up mostly of people talking to each other on one of three or four perpetually revolving sets; and yet the mounting tension and unease wrung out of these scenes is incredible. From almost the first frame this movie sucks you into its mystery and with expert pacing continues to parcel out detail after mysterious detail until the whole thing ends in a great bang. One of Hammer's finest moments. Will make my list.
Mr Sausage wrote:
The Mummy’s Shroud (John Gilling, 1967): Pretty much exactly like Curse, except with even goofier mummy make-up. Hard to shake off the feeling of redundancy with this one, tho' it is nice to see Hammer stalwart Michael Ripper get a more sizeable role. He brings real pathos to his death scene. Not much to say about this one.
Funnily this is my favorite of the Mummy films. It has a lot to do with how I see Gilling poking holes at the whole premise. Throughout his career I never really have gotten the feeling that he believes in scaring the audience so instead he takes a self-referential look at the cliches he's working through (on this accord Plague of the Zombies may very well be his best). Much like Wes Craven I do feel sometimes he isn't able to balance his comedic sensibility with his horror responsibilities and this film definitely runs the harshest of that, but I think it manages a few evocative moments.
Mr Sausage wrote:The Mummy’s Shroud (John Gilling, 1967): Pretty much exactly like Curse, except with even goofier mummy make-up. Hard to shake off the feeling of redundancy with this one, tho' it is nice to see Hammer stalwart Michael Ripper get a more sizeable role. He brings real pathos to his death scene. Not much to say about this one.
Funnily this is my favorite of the Mummy films. It has a lot to do with how I see Gilling poking holes at the whole premise. Throughout his career I never really have gotten the feeling that he believes in scaring the audience so instead he takes a self-referential look at the cliches he's working through (on this accord Plague of the Zombies may very well be his best). Much like Wes Craven I do feel sometimes he isn't able to balance his comedic sensibility with his horror responsibilities and this film definitely runs the harshest of that, but I think it manages a few evocative moments.
Hmm. I did sometimes wonder if Shadow of the Cat, for instance, was deliberately underlining its own ridiculousness by using more cat than shadow.
Further to sausage's comments above, if you like the Quatermass films, you should definitely seek out the TV series they were adapted from. They're very early television, with all the compromises that entails, but they're groundbreaking stuff, landmarks in mature science fiction, and they allow the material more space than the features.
zedz wrote:Further to sausage's comments above, if you like the Quatermass films, you should definitely seek out the TV series they were adapted from. They're very early television, with all the compromises that entails, but they're groundbreaking stuff, landmarks in mature science fiction, and they allow the material more space than the features.
As well, I think it should be pointed out to Domino, who surprisingly likes Halloween III (I personally think the movie never follows up on its good first act), that the writer of the Quatermass films and television minseries, Nigel Kneale, also wrote the original script for Halloween III, which Carpenter apparently watered down with a rewrite, although the subject matter and the mode of story-telling has Kneale's stamp all over them.
Oh. My. God. This isn't a horror film, but an unfettered piece of insanity. The Hong Kong strain of horror films has always fascinated me: starting in the late 70s and culminating in the Category III boom of the 1990s, they really are some of the most energetic and insane horror films ever made. Western critics liked to call them Raimi-esque, but frankly, I think they surpass the Evil Dead films for madcap intensity, and films like Hex and Black Magic precede the first Evil Dead (and Raimi later revealed himself to be a big HK film fan, making you wonder whether he was aware of them at the time). This film pushes it to the edge: brutal kickboxing matches, resurrected Buddhist monks, cackling black magicians, half-naked zombie-witches, demonic bats, poisonous spiders, maggots, killer disembodied heads, living Sanskrit tattoos, alligator stomach resurrections, the most dangerous game of Hungry Hungry Hippos ever, robot-statues, maggots, Bolo Yeung, maggots and more maggots... I can almost guarantee you've never seen anything like it. It's gleefully incoherent: the film moves as such a rapid pace, with absolutely no intention of explaining the internal logic of it's black magic/white magic, that it comes out the other side of narrative ineptness, and the sheer unpredictability and inscrutability becomes part of the fun. I'd like to think that the film makes sense to a Buddhist audience, but I find that even hard to believe. There's a reason this works: Kuei doesn't seem to care too much for his narrative outside of the opportunities it allows to build jaw-dropping set-pieces. In fact, the film commits it to it's wild logic so thoroughly that it transcends being a simple gross-out film: the only thing I can honestly compare it to is Alejandro Jodorowsky and Juan Lopez Moctezuma's films of the period, or even something like Hausu, albeit less lighthearted and more gross.
It's also an interesting hybrid: the film's structure is pretty much the same as a kung-fu film: 1) A angry young man is wronged and swears revenge 2) he undergoes an intense and rigorous training to prepare himself for that revenge 3) he gets his revenge in some final extravagant showdown. Interestingly, it plays around with this narrative, as the cycle replays itself at least several different times throughout the film. If I could extract any sort of deeper meaning throughout the film, there's a sort of ying-and-yang thing going on: the forces of white magic and black magic are constantly fighting, defeating each other, reviving and playing out the cycle again. The film also bears the influence of the fx-heavy fantasy film, then at it's peaks after Tsui Hark's era-defining Zu: Warriors from the Magic Mountain, albeit, used at the service of sleaze. The fact is this: don't analyze the film, don't try to follow it, just accept it as a found surrealist object, buried in mysteries and rituals impenetrable to a modern Western viewer, and which takes on the properties of a violent, obscene dream.
Also, in the film's recently growing popularity, I don't see enough people mention that it's a sequel, the purportedly much more coherent and conventionally structured Bewitched. I will be trying to check it out.
HORROR HOTEL John Llewellyn Moxey, 1960 [Mr. Sausage spotlight]
Not quite as taken with this as I was anticipating, but there are a number of outstanding moments -- the camera peering up at Nan from below the trap door is a highlight (I guess I’m a sucker for spiderwebs by candlelight) -- and Moxey’s use of repeating imagery -- the same two bitties hilariously reappearing multiple times; Nan’s brother staring through the same window she did when she saw the passing black mass -- very effectively contributes to the otherworldly atmosphere (as does the way in which Moxey arranges the shrouded figures on the foggy town square; it’s always nice to see a horror film place so much Scary Stock in the positioning and geography of the human body).
CIRCUS OF FEAR John Llewellyn Moxey, 1966
So, where to start? Not with the play button, I assure you. Unless you desperately need to cross it off of your Spot-Klaus-Kinski-in-Random-Eurotrash bingo card, I’d recommend skipping this heap about a series of throwing-knife murders set against what is quite possibly the most tedious police investigation ever committed to film. Wisely, Christopher Lee hides behind a mask practically the entire movie.
TASTE OF FEAR Seth Holt, 1961
I do like Holt’s The Nanny, but it does not come close to reaching the bar set by this. If the later film rapidly deteriorated in its dwindling second half, then Taste of Fear at least does so in spectacularly confident fashion, the lurid twists beset by an unmistakable sense of fun on Holt’s part, with special mention going out to a shot of Ann Todd’s sneaky stepmother standing atop a cliff beside an empty wheelchair, the foreshadowing implications of which change hands about a half-dozen times before the film’s conclusion. Holt’s depiction of the house itself heavily anticipates Jack Clayton’s equally masterful The Innocents, as a sumptuous maze of shadow and light that turns into the twisting narrative’s greatest ally in never giving us a firm grasp on reality. Also, the sight of Ronald Lewis stepping out in his package-hugging bathing suit is one of the funniest things I’ve seen in some time.
Last edited by tarpilot on Thu Aug 23, 2012 8:22 am, edited 4 times in total.
I'll add another recommendation for The Boxer's Omen, though The Killer Snakes (1974) is Kuei Chih-hung's most disturbing (and depressing) film to me. Related films include the already mentioned Black Magic (1975: Ho Meng-hua) it's sequel Black Magic 2 (1976: Ho Meng-hua) and Seeding of a Ghost (1983: Richard Yeung kuen).
Three good articles on Shaw Brother's horror (NSFW):
Two more recommendations for Hong Kong horror hybrids:
Encounter of the Spooky Kind (1980: Sammo Hung): I feel that this is the greatest comedic, martial arts Hong Kong with horror film there is. Sammo Hung who stars and directs this is in his prime. He is in the best shape of his life as well as in his creative peak. The dueling Taoist finale is the best scene in the film. Fans of exploding chickens and hopping vampires (kyonsi) will definitely appreciate this. Be warned, the filmmakers were as nice to chickens in this as Sam Peckinpah was in Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid (1973). This is definitely recommended to those who are interested in seeing many different aspects of Chinese supernatural concepts.
Mr. Vampire (1985: Ricky Lau Koon-wai):[/b] Not only is this the film that would typecast Lam Ching-ying as a mono-brow Taoist priest (fat-si) master of sticky rice and remover of evil things, it is a film that would spawn more sequels than any other film in the kyonsi (jiangshi aka hopping vampire) horror subgenre -- though none of them really compare to the first one. This movie is one of the high points in the horror/comedy/action genre from Hong Kong alongside Spooky Encounters. Easily recommended to those who are new to Hong Kong horror, that is unless they have a fondness for chickens or snakes. Ricky Hui, who recently passed away, is superb in his supporting role as a bumbling assistant.
There is no way to convey the insanity that is this movie. It's almost as tho' the filmmakers started to make a straightforward martial arts revenge movie, got bored, took the film's budget and started to play an elaborate game of who can come up with the wackiest plot twist. You have to admire its total lack of inhibition and restraint: it gleefully gives itself over to its own craziness.
Regarding the kung fu film structure, I don't wonder if the makers of the later Jean-Claude Van Damme vehicle, Kickboxer, had seen this movie at some point, because the plots of the two films are almost identical: a foreign kickboxer goes to Thailand to fight against a champion Thai Boxer and is left paralyzed by a series of illegal moves. His brother vows revenge, and travels to Thailand to train, eventually defeating the enemy while his brother cheers from his wheelchair. It reminded me of Van Damme's film Bloodsport as well, which also has him fighting Bolo Yeung while blind.
I'm ready to check out more HK horror, even tho' the prospect leaves me with conflicted feelings: I worry that no other entry will surpass this one, while also worrying that one actually might!
Image put it out on DVD. Visually looks good, but there's problems in motion, some Image's fault, mostly Celestial's. In fact, I'm surprised how many of these HK horror films have found their way to R1 DVD in the last few years.
Mr Sausage wrote:I'm ready to check out more HK horror, even tho' the prospect leaves me with conflicted feelings: I worry that no other entry will surpass this one, while also worrying that one actually might!
Well the previously mentioned The Killer Snakes, while less surrealistic, definitely distinguishes itself as an effectively disturbing classic of 70s sleaze. I'm partial to The Seventh Curse, starring Maggie Cheung and a pre-Woo Chow Yun-Fat as Wisely, a hugely popular Chinese literary character. The only way I can describe it is as an Indiana Jones-style adventure film pushed straight into EC Horror territory. It's more grounded in a conventional narrative (by which I mean it has a discernible one), but there are moments of gorey weirdness to challenge the Kuei film. The director, Ngai Kai Lam, would go on to direct such crossover Cat III cult hits as Her Vengeance and Riki-Oh: The Story of Ricky, just so you know what to expect. It is, however, a whole lot more fun than those two.
There's also Tsui Hark's We're Going to Eat You, a Kung-Fu comedy-cum-political allegory heavily influenced by the Italian Cannibal films of the period, albeit not in the ways that make them so skeezy. It's also the only one of his three genuine Hong Kong New Wave films available in R1. It's far too long of a film, and some of the humor wears itself out (the big sex-starved woman sub-plot, which I can't decide is either misogynist or homophobic), but it's great fun, before nosediving into one of those patently nihilistic endings which make his first three films so striking
masterofoneinchpunch wrote:Mr. Vampire (1985: Ricky Lau Koon-wai)
Frankly, I've never been a big fan of this film, although I should definitely revisit it. My personal favorite is the "sequel" Magic Cop, which was also the first of these HK horrors that I saw: I got the film by sheer accident in a shipping mix-up and they let me keep it. A few months later, I watched it and was blown away. I followed the trail from there... I imagine it must seem pretty tame compared to the films above, but I still like it's mix of buddy cop film, Ghostbusters and Taoist witchcraft.
END OF EDITS.
Last edited by Cold Bishop on Sat Dec 24, 2011 6:27 am, edited 10 times in total.
Just to add some praise to some films already mentioned.
Encounters of the Spooky Kind - This is probably one of the funniest kung-fu horror blends out there, and definitely worth checking out. Though it makes me awful conflicted about putting it in my final list. It's no doubt a horror film, but it also plays very heavily into comedy, and the final black magic duel, while hilarious, feels more like a kung-fu finale than a horror one.
The Seventh Curse - This is my second favorite Ngai Kai Lam film, after Ricky. His films may not be quite as insane as Kuei, but they feature some wonderful creature effects, and the demon fetuses in this film are wonderful. I find it to be the best paced and most entertaining of his creature/fantasy/horror films. Also worth checking out of his is The Cat which features a pretty cool blob-slime-fungus type creature, though I think it gets a bit over-praised at times.
We're Going to Eat You - It loses it's steam in a few parts, but is quite brilliant in others. Quite heavy on the blood, and some really inventive comedy gore moments. Definitely one of the more unique HK horror films I've seen.
As far as new viewing goes I decided I was going to delve deeper and re-visit the HK horror scenes first (Though definitely got a lot of other films to check out, my knowledge of Universal and Hammer horror is terrible). Today I watched two very early Shaw Brothers produced films from Malaysia (I think?). Both of these didn't have English subtitles unfortunately, but I'm hoping to find some english-friendly horror films from this early period of Shaw Brothers horror before the end of the project.
Sumpah orang minyak [Curse of the Oily Maniac] (1956) - Directed by P. Ramlee. This film follows the story of the Hunchback who's shunned by certain people in the village he lives. He's a pretty sympathetic character and the acting is quite good. There's also a pretty stunning dream sequence around the middle of the film. It actually takes quite a while before it gets to the horror elements. I was enjoying the build the whole time and was waiting for it to go crazy horror revenge flick. I almost though I had misread the description towards the end that this was a straight drama, but the last 15 minutes he finally becomes the oily maniac and goes on his rape/murder spree. I enjoyed this quite a bit, and the story was easy to follow even without subtitles though not sure if I'd want to put it on a "top horror" list when only the last bit has any true horror moments. That kind of what's wonderful about it too though, so it just may make my list.
Anak Pontianak [Son of Pontianak] (1958) - Directed by Roman Estella. Wow, this one was really wacky. It starts out following a woman who's some sort of zombie/ghost thing that can start fires with her mind. But then it ends up following the story of her son who's a sort of wolf man. Then the villain is some kind of bizarre Dr. Jeckyll/Flying Mr. Hyde character. It ends up with a pretty big duel between the flying ape man and the werewolf, but then I guess they decided they needed more monster duels so a strange snake-man-ghost pops up to fight as well. I had a bit more difficulty following the story of this one, but reading a summary helped everything make more sense. The story in this one actually seemed pretty solid despite all the crazy monster costumes going around, though there were some pretty awful performances from some of the comic side-characters. This one feels like sub-titles would've helped more, but it was quite enjoyable none the less.
I should also mention both these films were musicals, and that made them all the more wonderful.
Meng-Hua Ho's The Oily Maniac (1976) is one of the more popular Shaw Horror titles. Is it a remake? Or are oily monsters just as commonplace as werewolves in that region?
Sorry for describing April Fool's Day as being like The Game, domino - just think of it as my attempt to warn you of the twist! (If it is any consolation I'm not going to forgive you for finally making me dig Dr Giggles out of my video collection and finally watch it - OK it has Larry Drake from the Darkman films in the wisecracking killer title role, but other than that nothing else really going for it)
If you are looking for interesting but not quite outstanding early 90s US horror, I might as well recommend this film: Body Parts, starring Jeff Fahey a year or two before he was in The Lawnmower Man and which is very much in the Mad Love/Beast With Five Fingers style of transplanted body parts having a life of their own, though it is apparently based on an original Boileau and Narcejac story from the 1960s! (Which would still not rule out the influence of earlier films, of course!)
It is directed by Eric Red (screenwriter of The Hitcher, which I totally agree with tarpilot as being a great film - the 'gay panic' flipside to Nightmare On Elm Street 2!) and while the film does have its share of utterly ludicrous moments (the standout being the basketball player who has received the murderer's leg and who finds himself kicking people with it!) and a rather predictable plot there are a lot of worthwhile aspects such as the excellent car crash scene at the opening and the great supporting performances from Zakes Mokae (as the police officer who of course doesn't believe Fahey's crazy story - this is a couple of years before he stars in Dust Devil), Lindsay Duncan (playing the mad doctor to perfection!) and the ever-underrated Brad Dourif adding a neat twist to the story as an artist who receives one of the killer's hands and finds himself painting horrifically disturbing pictures of the killer's crime scenes, but also finds that these pictures are selling better than his staid watercolour landscapes had previously done! (I also think Dourif's character here bears comparison with the other loft-based looney supporting role he played in Argento's Trauma a couple of years later)
YnEoS wrote:The Seventh Curse - This is my second favorite Ngai Kai Lam film, after Ricky. His films may not be quite as insane as Kuei, but they feature some wonderful creature effects, and the demon fetuses in this film are wonderful. I find it to be the best paced and most entertaining of his creature/fantasy/horror films. Also worth checking out of his is The Cat which features a pretty cool blob-slime-fungus type creature, though I think it gets a bit over-praised at times.
It has been a very long time since I last saw it, but isn't The Seventh Curse the one where Chow Yun-Fat gets cursed with painful-looking exploding kneecaps that occur at unfortunate moments?
On the Mr Vampire films, I have a soft spot for Mr Vampire II which is much more of a comedy than a horror, updates the action to contemporary times (i.e. mid 1980s Hong Kong) and really shows the Spielberg influence in the mid-section as two kids befriend the child vampire and the film turns into a kind of E.T. meets Gremlins spoof.
The other great Hong Kong horror that I have not seen mentioned which can be thrown in with the Encounters of the Spooky Kind series is Sammo Hung's The Dead and The Deadly, a nice mix of broad comedy, kung fu and ghostly body-swapping antics.
Cold Bishop wrote:Meng-Hua Ho's The Oily Maniac (1976) is one of the more popular Shaw Horror titles. Is it a remake? Or are oily monsters just as commonplace as werewolves in that region?
Both having been made by Shaw Brothers it's tempting to call the 70s one a remake. I haven't seen the 70s version, but the Oily man is a Malaysian legend, so perhaps they are just trying a different variation on the same source material. Guess it also depend on your definition of remake. More info on the Oily man legend in the following link.
colinr0380 wrote:
It has been a very long time since I last saw it, but isn't The Seventh Curse the one where Chow Yun-Fat gets cursed with painful-looking exploding kneecaps that occur at unfortunate moments?
Sounds like the same movie, but it's not Chow Yun-Fat, who has a rather minor roll in the film.
While I'm just thinking of horror subjects off the top of my head, I'm a big fan of Jeffrey Combs and would recommend any film which he appears. However while I like the Re-animator series, From Beyond is even better and Necronomicon (in which Combs plays Lovecraft trying to steal the titular book in the wraparound segments) is one of the best recent anthology films.
And if and when we touch on the subject of ecological horror or the 'animals running amok' subgenre, I would wholeheartedly recommend the excellent Australian film about a bickering unlikeable couple going to the countryside, wrecking things and paying the ultimate price, The Long Weekend. In fact can I make this my swap for the round?
For those looking to get more into Italian horror, I'd recommend The Horrible Dr. Hitchcock/L'orribile segreto del Dr. Hichcock (Riccardo Freda, 1962). It's gaudy and stylized and has a lot of the usual gothic tropes; but what really makes it interesting is how directly it addresses the issue of necrophilia, especially for 1962. There's no prudishness or censorial reticence, although neither is the film exploitative. It just feels no need to code things. Its major theme is how psycho-sexual perversions can override one's self-control and plunge you into obsession and madness--and that's without even mentioning the supernatural element! It's far better than Freda's other early horrors (I Vampiri, Caltiki), and if you need any other reason to see it: it stars Barbara Steele.
