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zedz wrote:42. Invasion of the Body Snatchers (Siegel)
43. Invasion of the Body Snatchers (Kaufman)

Out of curiosity, zedz, what do you make of Ferrara's version? I'm obviously quite used to fans of the previous films despising it, but I find Ferrara's application of the material's metaphor(s) extremely potent -- the ending is the perfect culmination of the rest of the film's waking nightmare of adolescent dread. Terry Kinney, of course, is a delight, and Forrest Whittaker joyfully goes for broke. I really wish I had voted for it now.

So Netflix only finally decided to send me Triangle this weekend. If I'd seen it a week earlier it most certainly would have made my list, which would of course break up the masterlist's epic tie for 98th place. (Though inevitably in such an alternate reality, someone else would move it off their list, thus restoring it to its current position.) I liked how the film kind of played off of George's role in Mulholland Dr. as an anonymous blonde doppleganger to Naomi Watts, only here of course she is a much more frightening one. My only minor gripe with the film:

Spoiler

The scenes with bodies/objects piling up are very nice touches, but if the film completely adhered to its own logic, wouldn't there be a lot more piles/evidence of violence everywhere from the beginning?

Still, this film was much better than I expected it to be from, say, the DVD cover art. Thanks to those who recommended it!

tarpilot wrote:

zedz wrote:42. Invasion of the Body Snatchers (Siegel)
43. Invasion of the Body Snatchers (Kaufman)

Out of curiosity, zedz, what do you make of Ferrara's version? I'm obviously quite used to fans of the previous films despising it, but I find Ferrara's application of the material's metaphor(s) extremely potent -- the ending is the perfect culmination of the rest of the film's waking nightmare of adolescent dread. Terry Kinney, of course, is a delight, and Forrest Whittaker joyfully goes for broke. I really wish I had voted for it now.

I like the idea of Ferrara's version, and it's got some powerful moments, but in general it seems under-resourced and a bit (uncharacteristically) bland in its execution. Siegel wrung so much out of that wonderful concept the first time around that Kaufman really had his work cut out for him, and it always amazes me how effectively he gives a different, effective, updated spin to the material. Ferrara has the same impulse, obviously, but I don't think his take is as fertile in terms of producing a great horror movie.

I'm normally a much bigger fan of Ferrara than of Kaufman. In fact, Invasion of the Body Snatchers is probably the only Kaufman film I particularly like.

Several orphans I think but notably De Palma's Dressed to Kill. I guess most people either don't consider it a horror film or don't rate it. It's my favourite film

My top 10:

1. Dressed to Kill (1980, De Palma)
2. Rosemary's Baby (1968, Polanski)
3. Don't Look Now (1973, Roeg)
4. The Shining (1980, Kubrick)
5. Dead Ringers (1988, Cronenberg)
6. Vampyr (1932, Dreyer)
7. The Bride of Frankenstein (1935, Whale)
8. Kill List (2011, Wheatley)
9. Hangover Square (1945, Brahm)
10. Theatre of Blood (1973, Hickox)

Orphans:
Dressed to Kill, Theatre of Blood, The Stone Tape, God Told Me To, Ghostwatch

Mike_S wrote:Several orphans I think but notably De Palma's Dressed to Kill. I guess most people either don't consider it a horror film or don't rate it. It's my favourite film

Can't speak to its absence from this list, but there has been a lot of discussion about it on here

Mike_S wrote:Orphans:
Dressed to Kill, Theatre of Blood, The Stone Tape, God Told Me To, Ghostwatch

I actually did vote for Dressed to Kill at #46, and God Told Me To at #22.

Another just-missed-the-deadline viewing: Peter Strickland's sophomore effort Berberian Sound Studio (just out from Artificial Eye in the UK) should be required therapy for all horror list participants. Ostensibly, it's about a mild mannered sound engineer who goes to work on a vile Italian horror film, but it could just as easily be a movie about, say, domino harvey forcing himself to watch every Friday the 13th movie. Gradually over time, just as we've all witnessed domino's transformation over the past year into a creature of the night, the constant barrage of ultraviolence begins to crack through your veneer of humanity until the line between your life and the horror films you've been watching has all but vanished. The horrors depicted here are quite subdued--think NPR mounting a production of Videodrome sans body horror--but all the more relatable and disturbing for it. Then again, this isn't a horror film. (Don't call it a horror film!) It's your life.

swo17 wrote:Another just-missed-the-deadline viewing: Peter Strickland's sophomore effort Berberian Sound Studio (just out from Artificial Eye in the UK) should be required therapy for all horror list participants. Ostensibly, it's about a mild mannered sound engineer who goes to work on a vile Italian horror film, but it could just as easily be a movie about, say, domino harvey forcing himself to watch every Friday the 13th movie. Gradually over time, just as we've all witnessed domino's transformation over the past year into a creature of the night, the constant barrage of ultraviolence begins to crack through your veneer of humanity until the line between your life and the horror films you've been watching has all but vanished. The horrors depicted here are quite subdued--think NPR mounting a production of Videodrome sans body horror--but all the more relatable and disturbing for it. Then again, this isn't a horror film. (Don't call it a horror film!) It's your life.

Any influence of 'Blow-Up'/'Blow-Out'/'The Conversation?

It's definitely set in the same world, though the whole idea of trying to uncover a mystery hidden in a recording/photograph is not what this film is about. However, the whole subplot from Blow Out about trying to find the perfect scream is probably a good reference point.

Mike_S wrote:Several orphans I think but notably De Palma's Dressed to Kill. I guess most people either don't consider it a horror film or don't rate it. It's my favourite film

I rewatched it recently, and liked it very much, but, yep, not a horror film for me. It surely is on the border, and somehow I included Psycho, which is probably inconsequent.

Dressed To Kill is a masterpiece but I also would have classified it as a thriller rather than horror.

swo17 wrote:So Netflix only finally decided to send me Triangle this weekend. If I'd seen it a week earlier it most certainly would have made my list, which would of course break up the masterlist's epic tie for 98th place. (Though inevitably in such an alternate reality, someone else would move it off their list, thus restoring it to its current position.) I liked how the film kind of played off of George's role in Mulholland Dr. as an anonymous blonde doppleganger to Naomi Watts, only here of course she is a much more frightening one. My only minor gripe with the film:

Spoiler

The scenes with bodies/objects piling up are very nice touches, but if the film completely adhered to its own logic, wouldn't there be a lot more piles/evidence of violence everywhere from the beginning?

Still, this film was much better than I expected it to be from, say, the DVD cover art. Thanks to those who recommended it!

Another late to the party as always. I'd like to add to the praise, and I like colin's reading of the film as about the nature of film. Silly as it may be, his reading reminded me of my early adolescence watching movies where I sometimes wondered what happened to the characters when the movie ended. In a sense Triangle answers that by sadistically making each character relive the story ad infinitum.

Spoiler

My only logical quibble (which I admit is always a pointless exercise in these types of films given that there will always be some glitch in the narrative) is the food. Given the mysterious appearance of an ocean liner I can forgive there being a fresh buffet on the ship - and it actually works for the film as a sort last supper for the characters - but since the bodies and necklaces and all else pile up, shouldn't there be piles of decaying food stacked up upon our tragic crew's arrival?

Okay, one more. The first George shoots the hooded George and saves the couple, and this hooded George is then killed by the George the first George saved from Victor. So if the hooded George is killed, doesn't that break the chain since that George does not go to the mainland to kill abusive George? The film seemed premised upon the idea that George always went back to the house to kill herself and inevitably dies in a car crash, thus kicking off the events again. So if no one kills the abusive George then the link is broken.

Regardless, one thing I liked about this movie is that George's actions seemed rather rational and she only conformed herself to the events because she was convinced she could actually change something. Having just watched Timecrimes where the lead's actions all stem from aggravating irrationality this was a good change of pace.

Colin, can you spoiler tag that post please?

swo17 wrote:

Spoiler

I like to think that the whole idea of George thinking she's broken the pattern is itself part of the loop.

Spoiler

I agree, and that is what makes me think of it as a kind of ghost story, of a spirit refusing to accept an exit from repeating events over and over. The character needs to become aware of that futility, and as Murdoch says the way that any action is accommodated by the looping structure, to accept her loss and go in that taxi somewhere other than back to the dock.

In a way perhaps the 'Triangle' of the title could refer to the three main locations of the home and the two boats.

Two more spotlights waiting to be written up.

La donna del lago (Luigi Bazzoni & Franco Rossellini, 1965) - for tarpilot
Easily the most impressive spotlight title I saw this go around, it's ultimately a film that stands a better chance on my 1960s list (where it should be mandatory). Prerequisite Hollywood cast-off Peter Baldwin plays a writer who returns to a resort hotel, deserted in its off-season, to ostensibly finish a new novel, but in actuality to reunite with an old flame. Said flame turns out to be long dead, and suddenly... CONSPIRACY! Maybe I'm more ignorant of the genre than I think, but it's shocking to find such a deliberately modernist giallo in the era preceding Argento. The baroque opulence of Blood and Black Lace seems like something a decade removed from this, not a year. It such a departure I indeed have a hard time associating it with the horror film. In fact, the two things that most link the giallo to the horror film - the macabre atmosphere and the violence - are both largely sidestepped here (even if something of a ghostly atmosphere still remains). It's also shocking to see such a rigorous "anti-thriller" a whole year prior to Blow-Up. For Bazzoni's film is ultimately a mystery film that collapses on itself, a house of cards whose foundation becomes so chipped away by ambiguity and unreliability that you're left wondering if the whole facade existed in the first place. Everything that at first seems concrete and conventional is eroded until at the end there's nothing left.

Even the reliability of our hero proves volatile. Is there anything to truly suggest that he had any real relationship whatsoever with the victim? Or is it just an infatuation grown out of control by the curiosity of her death? The film opens with a cryptic phone call, but we ultimately find nothing to connect it with the rest of the narrative. The "obscured scene" that our hero witnesses and is left to decipher - the driving force behind all gialli - is itself called into question: Bazzoni films it in blown-out black-and-white. Yet this aesthetic choice - delineating the scene as a "flashback" - is later reused for a different scene that's clearly a "fantasy". This shifting between reality and hallucinatory, present and flashback (and flashforwards), ultimately pile up and completely fracture any coherency to the narrative. Even the film's conclusion raises as many questions as it answers.

Spoiler

Irma's confession, expressed in a rambling incoherencies that reflect the structure of the film, comes down to two statements: "I killed again" and "My brother had to kill her". But with four victims, two male and two female, and at least one disappearance, it's just as likely that Tilde's murder is unresolved... if there ever was one.

The unreliability of the narrator and the impermanence of the narrative ultimately can't help call to mind the nouveau roman. Like those "self-begetting novels", this mystery film doesn't emerge from its environment so much as it's drawn-out and constructed by the subjectivity of our hero, a choice that cuts to the heart of the mystery genre while equally destroying its foundational principles. For ultimately the limits of that subjectivity leaves us unable to gleam what truth, if any, may be found in our narrator's construction.

PS. Does anyone know exactly what the situation is with the co-directing credit? I notice a few other Bazzoni's are likewise co-credited.

...Et mourir de plaisir [aka 'Blood and Roses'] (Roger Vadim, 1960) - for Dylan
A very handsome and surprisingly understated film that I liked well enough, but which is probably too tasteful for its own good. Too idiosyncratic to be called workmanlike, I don't know that it's idiosyncratic enough to be called truly personal. It's another adaptation of Sheridan le Fanu's Carmilla, reinvented as an aristocratic love triangle that gets complicated when Annette Stroyberg falls under the sway of a vampiric ancestor. Some people complain about the way the film crucially deviates from the original by making Carmilla suffer from heterosexual desire. I don't think that's true: it seems to me the film dances around the lesbianism by having everyone misinterpret her moodiness as jealousy for the wrong person. The film quite clearly leaves enough hints that Carmilla is much more interested in Georgia than Leopoldo, ultimately conflating the theory of her heterosexual desire with the scientific explanation that the film's final shot calls into question. For someone who's often remembered more for his taste in women than his taste in film, I found this, my first Vadim, to be surprisingly restrained on the exploitative side. The film is atmospheric and (I surmise from the surviving circulating copies) fairly visually beautiful, with Claude Renoir's cinematography and Jean Prodromides's score picking up a lot of the legwork. But perhaps, given its source, it could have used a little more kink and perversity.

Or at least that's what I first thought. I originally chose to watch this film in its "French Cut" which runs about five minutes longer than the US version circulating. Sounds like a smart move, right? Well, perhaps not, because while researching the film, I discovered that this version completely cuts out the entire dream sequence (viewable here), which strikes me as crucial to the film, and as much a climax as the final fireworks show. While the US cut tempers both the local color, ambiguity and lesbianism (cutting and redubbing scenes in a manner where it doesn't surprise me that my interpretation of Carmilla as still-lesbian isn't picked up on), I really don't know if the film completely withstands this omission. Of course, this sequence perhaps leans too heavily on the Cocteau-and-Bergman art-house cliches of the time, and its foray into urban squalor and surgical grotesqueness kind of disrupts the moody, Gothic tone of the rest of the film. Nonetheless, I think it provides a catharsis that the remaining film lacks, enough to have me reconsidering the film. If any film is in need of a reconstruction, combining the best of all surviving versions, this is surely one of them.

In short, I'm not quite under the film's spell as a cult masterpiece, but it strikes me as a forward thinking film, already anticipating the genre's move away from the Hammer-popularized Gothic period pieces, and into the more erotic and surreal films that would make up the Euro-horror boom of the late 60s and 70s. If anything, it makes more interested in finally tracking down The Vampire Lovers and The Blood-Splattered Bride, both made in its wake.

Apollo 18 (Gonzalo López-Gallego, 2011)

This is an attempt to take the found footage, confined space film familiar from the [Rec] films, Paranormal Activity, Cloverfield etc, etc, and apply it to a trip to the Moon. Perhaps the most interesting thing about the whole project is this sense of equivalence of material, acting, even the plot beats (unnoticed invasions of privacy that begin to escalate in intensity) despite the extremely different location! Here it is all about astronauts from a top secret NASA mission finding something on the Moon, with a year later their footage being found

One of the surprising things learnt from the commentary is just how much chopping and changing went on behind the scenes to end up with the relatively straight-forward result (it shouldn't be too much of a surprise that the Wiensteins were involved!) - for example the rather obvious structure of finding another functional spaceship happens about a third of the way through the film in its final version, and is part of a big revelation, but apparently it originally was only stumbled across during the escape scene at the finale in the original draft! There are a lot of changes in a similar vein, both to plot structure, character relationships (for instance the Mission To Mars-esque pre-flight barbeque sequence was added to give some brief time on Earth and introduce the characters outside of the spaceship) and even the alien presences - apparently there was a lot of improvisation going on within scenes as well. It perhaps means that the four alternate endings are not too big of a surprise either!

All of this would have made it fascinating to have had more details of the original version of the film, such as the original pitch or initial outline or something similar, to compare and contrast with. In the absence of that we just have the discussion on the commentary to infer how the film reached its final version.

Anyway, the film itself is OK: lots of jump scares though, including a really neat stobe light exploration of a dark crater that gets overdone with a big sound effect screech as a corpse gets illuminated. The NASA stock footage is awe inspiring as ever, and it gets neatly integrated into this faux mission (the commentary draws attention to the way that both the heavy editing of footage around and the way that the actors are in space suits most of the time meant that entire scenes could easily be re-edited and moved around without damaging continuity too much, with there being more of an emphasis on the soundtrack and radio chatter to link things together. In fact Patrick Lussier, the director of Drive Angry, talks on the commentary of wanting to edit this film because of getting the chance to do things like that with scenes), with quite a few nice created Moon set pieces as well. The aliens, when they arrive, are more than decent too.

The film is played relatively straight too (the big theme, also mentioned on the commentary, is the idea of the classic portrait of an unflappable astronaut reporting and dealing with faults at the beginning of the film ending up a quivering wreck in the face of certain death at the end), although of course the material is far fetched. In a strange way I would not have minded it being more far fetched - given the fact that the material is already stretching credibility, this could have been the filmmakers only opportunity to go off into bizarre Iron Sky-esque territory! Which they kind of do, in a limited way!

However this film did inspire memories of watching a similar premised but far nuttier film I saw fifteen or so years ago that I still remember fondly now, although whether it will have aged well or badly I could not say! That film is the Bruce Campbell/Walter Koenig (the only non-Star Trek related film that I have so far seen Koenig in!) starring Moontrap, which features ancient Moon societies, killer robots, wandering astronauts being harvested for their body parts in underground torture caverns to create mismatched cyborgs, and so on! While I enjoyed Apollo 18 enough, I hate to admit that I kept wishing that I had a copy of Moontrap to hand to watch afterwards!

Cold Bishop, really-really awesome of you to seek out Blood and Roses. You made my day! I've actually done a lot of work on this film myself since I made that spotlight post. In addition to the French cut, I've since seen the American version in its entirety (watched it three times!) as well as the Spanish version & all differ from one another (the Spanish and French slightly, the American version really being an entirely different film in a lot of ways). What's frustrating is that the Italian version seems to have been Vadim's only approved director's cut (and it was the version that was released first)... but it hasn't been seen in years.

Of what's available now, I will revise the opinion posed in my spotlight post and strongly recommend the American version, which has since surfaced on Amazon.com where you can download a very nice-looking and clean transfer of the Paramount VHS master. Being a VHS master it is unfortunately cropped from 2.35:1 to 1:33:1, but while watching this version sacrifices the wide compositions this transfer actually looks like Technicolor and the sound is very good (the French and Spanish rips are faded, dark, and noisy). I would say the music is my favorite part about this film, so any version with it coming through loud and crisp is preferable. As you stated, the American version also has this magnificent dream sequence - now my favorite part of the film. When I wrote the spotlight post originally all that was available to see of the American version was a really horrible-looking EP mode VHS that I just couldn't sit through, but I also didn't know that this version had material not in the French cut. The main titles on the American version are way better, too, with the main harp theme playing over the lovely portraits of the actresses (the French version has the portraits but is completely silent, the Spanish version is just titles over a shot of flames which is just boring).

Cold Bishop wrote:I don't think that's true: it seems to me the film dances around the lesbianism by having everyone misinterpret her moodiness as jealousy for the wrong person. The film quite clearly leaves enough hints that Carmilla is much more interested in Georgia than Leopoldo, ultimately conflating the theory of her heterosexual desire with the scientific explanation that the film's final shot calls into question.

The non-American cuts leave plenty of room open for the interpretation that the fantastic/horror elements are really a projection of Carmilla's repressed sexuality and her longing for Georgia. And really, that's what this movie is about. It's a version of The Fox.

The American version, of course, does everything it possibly can to obliterate this: from the voiceover to the re-cutting of various scenes, and the dubbing of "vampire" to the dialogue of just about every other scene so we never forget it's about vampires.

Cold Bishop wrote:For someone who's often remembered more for his taste in women than his taste in film, I found this, my first Vadim, to be surprisingly restrained on the exploitative side.

In my opinion, Vadim's cinema isn't exploitive at all - I think he's a masterful filmmaker who made some of the most gorgeous and entertaining films of the 1950s and 60s with some absolutely extraordinary roles for actresses and models. I absolutely adore several of his movies to no end, like this one, The Game is Over, (maybe his best if not quite my favorite - I would recommend this one very strongly for you to check out next, Cold Bishop - Michel Piccoli will blow you away here!), And God Created Woman, (fascinating, beautifully-shot and loads of fun & on Criterion but I'm the biggest fan of it I know so...) and my favorite: Barbarella!

Cold Bishop wrote:While the US cut tempers both the local color, ambiguity and lesbianism (cutting and redubbing scenes in a manner where it doesn't surprise me that my interpretation of Carmilla as still-lesbian isn't picked up on), I really don't know if the film completely withstands this omission.

I loved the film before I saw a version with the dream sequence, but the dream sequence really is the film - summing everything up with gorgeous-looking surrealism. All of the dubbing Paramount inserted to make this an all out "horror" film does weaken it, but not nearly as much as poor visual/audio & the omission of the dream sequence, so again, the Amazon.com download is the way to go.

Cold Bishop wrote:In short, I'm not quite under the film's spell as a cult masterpiece, but it strikes me as a forward thinking film, already anticipating the genre's move away from the Hammer-popularized Gothic period pieces, and into the more erotic and surreal films that would make up the Euro-horror boom of the late 60s and 70s. If anything, it makes more interested in finally tracking down The Vampire Lovers and The Blood-Splattered Bride, both made in its wake.

I think it's a masterpiece, in a way, and it's clearly a forerunner to Hammer, Jean Rollin, and Mario Bava. The difference here is that - for me, anyway - everything being so solemn and beautiful, I run the gamut of emotions every time I watch it & it never fails to leave me moved and saddened (the score has a lot to do with that, but I get into the story too).

Some legwork and restoration does need to be done on Blood and Roses as it really is in a purgatory where none of the copies available to view are particularly acceptable. I'm not sure if a reconstruction is needed if the Italian version contains the dream sequence, but having not been seen in over 50 years (?) I wonder where those materials are, if they exist. According to writer David Del Valle, some major DVD labels have passed on releasing this for reasons they didn't go into (for sure, Olive Films was one of these labels), and I suspect this rejection is based on the likelihood that any undertaking of a release of Blood and Roses requires an immense amount of research time and restoration from materials from all over the world & nobody wants to put the money (or even effort?) forth for it.

That said... rather than have nothing, I would actually be happy to settle for a good widescreen transfer of the American version, but something tells me this is a much bigger fish to fry, that there are other hurdles merely beyond a label choosing a version to release and going from there... but who knows?

domino harvey wrote:When a Stranger Calls Back (Fred Walton 1993) And what a sequel it is! Like the original, this pic opens with a more or less self-contained first act. Yet this sequence is no mere gentile repurposing of a tired urban legend as in the first film, but rather a slow-burning ballet of suspense. A fresh-faced babysitter is placed in familiar territory (home alone, kids asleep) when she hears a knock on the front door. More than that I dare not reveal, except to say that the film utilizes dead space (both visual and aural), long shots, and expertly-placed insert shots within the generous academy frame to add layer upon layer to the snowballing dread. Simply put, the twenty-five minute opening of When a Stranger Calls Back ranks as one of the best (if not the best) examples of this type of horror-suspense, and even if the rest of the film was Troma outtake reels it would still make my list. Thankfully the remainder is pretty good too, with a particularly novel twist concerning the villain's abilities that is so ludicrous it floats by on audacity alone-- keep in mind this film came from the same hand as April Fool's Day, so Walton must get a real kick out of these sort of things!

Rifftrax now available

colinr0380 wrote: And while I've never seen it, or could really justify the similarly hefty pricetag to get it, apparently a lot of people swear by Tim Lucas' book Mario Bava: All The Colors Of The Dark as being almost insanely comprehensive.

Finally bought this with something called a credit card...getting it in the mail tomorrow. I. Am. So. Psyched.

Been trying to play catch up with my unwieldy unwatched pile from this project. At this rate I should fittingly be done about three months after I die

Arachnophobia (Frank Marshall 1990) Competent if somewhat bland monster movie in miniature, with a deadly strain of spiders standing in for the usual fill-in-the-blank baddie. I loved this as a kid and I enjoyed rewatching it as an adult, but mostly in a fashion filtered through my fond memories. If you never had the pleasure, there's probably not a lot else here, though the film does a good job of setting up the creepy-crawly scare scenes with lots of shadows and surprise attacks that makes it more fun than suspenseful.

Break Up (Paul Marcus 1998) I reckon this doesn't quite fit the perimeters of "horror" but it is a rape revenge of sorts and so it might as well be recounted here. That said, this is one of the dumbest films, rape revenge or otherwise, I've ever seen. Beyond the base premium cable methods employed in its expression (movies like this might as well include the HBO logo in the corner on the prints), this is a film about battered deaf wife Bridget Fonda getting framed for the murder of her abusive husband, who wouldn't you know it isn't even dead. I'll watch Fonda in anything but this was pushing it. Steven Weber deserves some sort of award for worst movie detective in history. This is a real scene, I shit you not: Fonda's husband has dyed his hair, burned his hands with acid, and smashed his teeth with a pair of pliers. When the cops check his dental records, Weber decides to free him since the guy they're looking for isn't missing any teeth. This movie makes all poverty row productions appear retroactively realistic.

C.H.U.D. (Douglas Cheek 1984) Nothing could ever match how I envisioned this film when I was a kid reading about it in some monster movie book. Even a good film, which this is not, can't compete with the imagined movie a brief summary about sewer monsters and government coverups conjures up, and this is doomed and doubly damned by being pretty dull to boot. Also, not to indulge in Internet Gaffe Squad behavior, but I don't understand how the gas leaking into the sewer was all that dangerous if you can still safely explode a van over an open manhole?

Cannibal Apocalypse (Antonio Margheriti 1980) This looked like such an insane gross-out clusterfuck in the Video Nasties set that of course its more modest means proved disappointing. There's something to be said about John Saxon's protagonist being one of the titular cannibals, and I appreciated how the afflicted behaved like normal humans until they got hungry (this is probably my anti-zombie bias showing-- I also rewatched the original Night of the Living Dead for this round of viewings after its high placement on the list and remain as indifferent as ever to its charms), but the film is formless and peaks early with a violent shootout between one of the infected on one side and cops and bikers (together at last) on the other.

Cherry Falls (Geoffrey Wright 2000) Witless post-Scream slasher with the "mystery" killer targeting virgins for a change. If that sounds clever or like the beginnings of a wry satiric take on the genre, it isn't. Sadly, this is just as slight and forgettable as the other never-rans of the era, as the filmmakers have no ambition beyond resting on the weight of the most basic outline of their premise (and then going out of their way to be conventional and safe). For fans of watching Brittany Murphy high out of her mind while trying to act only.

Christmas Evil (Lewis Jackson 1980) Surprisingly adept character study that's well-made and respectable and never really exploits its gimmick of a damaged man-child judging those he encounters as naughty or nice. Few slashers ever went out of their way to make their villain as sympathetic as the poor schlub here, and the slow burn towards his boiling over is a real treat.

Dressed to Kill (Brian De Palma 1980) The creaky sexual attitudes on display are the least of this film's myriad problems, as De Palma's histrionic stylistic embellishments grind this film to a halt immediately and keep it there. Though the Nancy Allen portion of the film does improve matters somewhat, this is still overwrought to the point of ludicrousness. I know it's trite to even say it in relation to this film, but really, just watch Psycho instead.

the Fury (Brian De Palma 1978) I had a higher estimation of De Palma's abilities before this round of viewings, as this is somehow worse than Dressed to Kill. Much, much worse. Virtually unwatchable. The slow-mo hysteria that served Obsession's heightened melodrama so well only a few years earlier is once more ground in and pissed upon for nonsensical reasons. The plot and characterization (if it can be said to have such things) makes no sense, no effort is made to even be visually stimulating, and forget Nancy Allen, what was going on between De Palma and Denis Franz this era? My prevailing thought throughout (After "Is this over yet?) was how glad I was that I didn't spend $30 on the Twilight Time release.

Hider in the House (Matthew Patrick 1989) Gary Busey leaving a mental hospital and covertly setting up living quarters in the attic of a suburban family's house is a genius premise. While the execution (scripted by Lem Dobbs, of all people) never quite does service to the idea, there's some good wince-inducing moments, like Busey's pathetic attempt to ask out house matron Mimi Rogers, and small moments, like Busey sneaking down into the little boy's room to leave Oreos underneath the kid's pillow, to make it worth a watch for those receptive to such pleasures.

the Host (Bong Joon-ho 2006) And yet again I don't "get" the appeal of a board favorite, as this messy comedy/horror political allegory is lousy on all fronts, from the painfully unfunny broadness of its "humor" to the forehead-slapping obviousness of its "meaning"-- If having a lazy-eyed American admit there's no virus and then shove a needle into one of our hero's head regardless counts as political commentary now, no wonder things never change.

Humongous (Paul Lynch 1982) Oddly genteel "slasher" with next to no blood much less violence (though one character gets hugged to death!) but a certain charm nonetheless, perhaps due to its (mostly in vain) attempts at respectability (a task made easier the longer the film runs, putting more distance between the action and the unfortunate rape/dog-attack that opens the picture). Granted, this is not really the genre for such noble efforts, but it makes for an interesting approach at least. As Colin mentioned earlier, the Scooby Doo comparisons, once made, cannot be unseen.

Jack's Back (Rowdy Herrington 1988) A slasher with such strong James Spader needs that when Spader's character dies thirty minutes in, the movie just throws in another James Spader (as his psychic-connected twin, of course). The plot is typical nonsense about Jack the Ripper copycat crimes allegedly committed by the world's most guilty red herring. Cynthia Gibb does her best Barbara Crampton by way of Clark Kent.

Night Screams (Allen Pione 1987) This is a bad, cheaply made film that's just weird enough to not be boring. A steady reminder that slasher films in the 80s were the prevalent indie cinema, this is a collection of unphotogenic nobodies from Kansas gathered together to make a slasher/escaped convict (?) flick. The film starts with an unidentified couple watching Graduation Day, the carnage from the TV that intercut with their own attack, an act of violence which is then wrapped up by the unseen killer's bloody hands playing "Chopsticks" on the piano, and this brief display of novelty amidst shameless exploitation (and appropriation) sets the tone. This is a film that features early on, for no particular reason, a violent police shootout wherein a redneck thug with a new wave haircut shoots a cop engulfed in flames in the stomach with a shotgun while loudly proclaiming "Party time!" There's also a dance number featuring the "Sweetheart Dancers" and this choice line: "You're a horny bitch and everyone knows it." The prevailing tone of the film is one of confusion of intent, and the producers seemed uncomfortable with the basic requirements of the genre. When the ugly teens start eating it, the filmmakers were so sheepish about any of these people appearing nude that they actually have one of the randy dudes watch a porno, which the film then intercuts in with the fully-clothed sex scenes! This is an awful movie, but I had a great deal of fun trying to picture its creation.

Slaughter High (Mark Ezra, Peter Litten, George Dugdale 1986) It somehow took three credited writers and directors to concoct this mean-spirited and inexplicably beloved slasher about a deformed nerd taking revenge against those who slighted him. I've grown so accustomed to seeing horror movies reenact all means of violence for the pleasure of the viewer that I'm not sure why I was surprised that the camera lingers over every second of the poor geek's humiliation, which includes extended periods full-frontal nudity among other embarrassments, but it felt like it was feeding into the very same alpha instincts the film allegedly decries. Once the carnage happens, special effects take over and the damage is grotesque and rarely enacted with the traditional weaponry. Acid baths, electric beds, stomach-exploding cans of beer-- it's all here, all right. Hooray?

Domino Harvey wrote:Cannibal Apocalypse (Antonio Margheriti 1980) This looked like such an insane gross-out clusterfuck in the Video Nasties set that of course its more modest means proved disappointing. There's something to be said about John Saxon's protagonist being one of the titular cannibals, and I appreciated how the afflicted behaved like normal humans until they got hungry (this is probably my anti-zombie bias showing-- I also rewatched the original Night of the Living Dead for this round of viewings after its high placement on the list and remain as indifferent as ever to its charms), but the film is formless and peaks early with a violent shootout between one of the infected on one side and cops and bikers (together at last) on the other.

Sure you didn't confuse this for Cannibal Holocaust?