Big, old, empty houses are creepy, right? Lots of dark, musty spaces to get the imagination conjuring up all manner of nasty things that might be lurking.
There are some nasty things lurking in Shudder’s Stay Out of the F**kingAttic, but the way they’re conjured leans more toward laborious and silly.
Shillinger (Ryan Francis), Imani (Morgan Alexandria) and Carlos (Bryce Fernelius) are three ex-cons working for the Second Chance moving company. When they show up to move the elderly Vern (Michael Flynn) out of his mansion, he surprises them with a hard-to-resist offer.
If the three will work through the night to get the job done by morning, Vern will reward them with a nice chunk of cash. Two things, though: stay out of the attic and the basement.
Bet they don’t.
The use of the edited F**king in the title suggests a mischievous, knowing tone that got off the bus in a totally different zip code than director/co-writer Jerren Lauder. That’s too bad, because this film is in serious need of lightening up.
Almost every element – from performances to dialog to cheesy score to practical creature effects – lands as stilted and overly staged. Though Flynn does make an effective villain and one particular creature ain’t half bad, even the brisk 80-minute run of Lauder’s feature debut seems like an overstayed welcome.
As our Second Chance movers uncover secrets about Vern (and each other), Lauder leans on body horror closeups and weak jump scares on the way to a big reveal that is bigly ridiculous.
Shudder’s been on an impressive run of originals lately, which makes this misfire a little surprising. Here’s hoping Lauder’s second chance will be a bit more worthy of the investment.
The music world and the horror world have a simpatico relationship. The Rocky Horror Picture Show and The Phantom of the Paradise are quintessential cool horror rock operas. More recently, Deathgasm – the New Zealand love letter to metal – has gained momentum as a cult classic with its fun mix of gory carnage and shredding guitars.
Where does the world of underground DJing fit into this legacy? Well, if Dreamcatcher is any indication, any legacy might be over before it starts.
Pierce (Niki Koss) and her friend, Jake (Zachary Gordon), tag along to a hot-ticket underground music fest with Pierce’s sister, Ivy (Elizabeth Posey), and her friend, Brecken (Emrhys Cooper). As the show winds down, tragedy strikes and the friends are thrust into a world of deceit and violence.
It’s hard to get excited about slasher flicks these days. Heck, it was hard to get excited about them by the mid-80s. These are movies built on tropes – it’s what the fans expect – and Dreamcatcher is no exception, despite a few clumsy attempts to be something different. The film swings big, trying to be more character-focused. This approach does nothing but put a spotlight on the incredibly weak script, and pad the running time to an excruciating hour and 48 minutes.
The parts of the movie that are your standard stalk-and-slash clash with the other side that wants to be something more akin to a 90s thriller (think Kiss the Girls or other Silence of the Lambs wannabes). Director Jacob Johnston handles the slasher elements well. These scenes are shot in a more grounded and brutal fashion. When the story starts to dip its toe into character motivation or anything resembling drama, the suspense falls apart.
The characters in Dreamcatcher run the gamut from unlikeable to downright loathsome. Scene after scene of Pierce, Jake, and Ivy airing their petty grievances wear out fast. Dreamcatcher lacks even one character for the audience to latch onto as a surrogate. This ends up making the horror shallow and meaningless.
Dreamcatcher might satisfy die hard fans of the slasher genre, but those looking for something a little more challenging will find themselves checking their watches on more than a few occasions.
Google has meant a lot of changes, perhaps the most tragic is the end of the old library scene in horror. While we find ourselves settling for the new cliche of the quick online search to uncover the hidden history behind a haunted home or town tragedy, this never used to be the case. Countless horror films led invariably to the Act 2 discovery in the old library. Either a helpful librarian carried large, impressive volumes to our hero at their tidy, green lamp lit library table, or a plucky sleuth scrolled their way through the old microfiche via the big microfilm machine.
How much do we miss those days? Enough to look into the very best in library horror.
Big thank you to Jennifer Snoek Brown of Reel Librarians for dropping loads of knowledge.
5. Se7en (1995)
Countless horror films begin Act 2 with a trip to the library. Act 1 has something creepy happening that puts our hero (or, more often than not, heroine) on edge and there’s nothing that can put them at ease except a little information search.
But David Fincher is not like other directors. While the beats are all here: big books stacked on an elegant desk, green lamps illuminating pen-and-ink drawings of the macabre and unsavory, a montage of pages being copied. But here, by flashing back and forth between Somerset (Morgan Freeman) doing the research and Mills (Brad Pitt) simultaneously studying case files, we learn a great deal more about what has happened and – don’t overlook all those decapitation images – what will happen.
The music gives the whole affair am appropriately religious fervor. This is how you make that cliche library scene work.
4. It (2017)
Poor Ben. It’s not enough that he pines in poetic silence for the lovely Beverly. It’s not enough that he’s the lonely new kid without even a posse of losers to hang out with (yet, anyway).
Nope, now he’s got intel and he doesn’t even have anyone to talk to about it.
This is the traditional “digging up big ol’ books about my spooky new hometown” scene, complete with a very creepy librarian. (Keep an eye on her in the background while Ben’s reading.)
But then comes the balloon. I have come to learn that a red balloon is never a welcome sight in a small town library.
3. It (1990)
Normally, we don’t include TV horror, but this scene is just so good! The Nineties TV miniseries is inferior to the later big screen adaptation (Part 1, anyway) in many ways, but not here.
Part of the credit goes to the fact that this film does not recreate that same, tired library scene. No microfiche, no big books on the history of Derry. Not in this scene. Just lunacy, Prince Albert in a Can jokes, and exploding, blood-filled balloons.
Plus Tim Curry, who improves any scene.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cmOLwrvH-Ag
2. Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon (2006)
Another film that takes what you know to expect and serves it up to you in the most delightful way, Behind the Mask is among the greatest of all horror comedies and satires.
This particular scene points out the inevitability of that library research scene in horror movies. That would be reason enough to appreciate it, but Zelda Rubenstein (of Poltergeist, obviously) is the icing on the cake. Ever the dramatic, weirdly helpful librarian that the genre relies on for all its historical towny gossip, Rubenstein shines as a woman who really wants to shine in the spotlight.
Just one more reason this film is such a treasure.
1. Ghostbusters (1984)
No, it’s not horror – but it is a scary scene! In fact, for most people it is the scariest scene in Ivan Reitman’s comedy classic.
What makes it perfect is the tension it generates before the jump scare because we know Pete Venkman (Bill Murray, perfection) is going to get in trouble. You just can’t keep talking like that in the library.
For the garden variety movie viewer (myself included), it
can be hard to get comfortable with the idea of spending a bunch of time alone
in a room with a corpse, even if that’s your job.
We always expect to see a figure sit up under that drawn
sheet.
When done well, movies that pick that particular scab can be incredibly effective. Keith Thomas’s The Vigil is one such movie. He leaves us alone in a house with the late Mr. Litvak. But we’re not really alone, are we?
An endlessly tender Dave Davis plays Yakov, who has recently
left the Hasidic Jewish community in Brooklyn. It’s so recent, in fact, that he
goes to a support group of others like himself, all of them in need of some
kind of training to figure out how to live a “normal” life. And as much as
Yakov really does want to distance himself, when his former rabbi approaches
him about Mr. Litvak, well, Yakov just needs the money.
Yakov will serve as Mr. Litvak’s shomer, sitting with the
body for the night to protect Mr. Litvak’s soul until his body can be interred
in the morning. Mrs. Litvak (Lynn Cohen, remarkable as always) doesn’t want him
there.
It’s a straightforward enough premise, something Thomas
executes with plenty of spectral dread. What the basic outline and many of the
jump scares lack in originality, The Vigil makes up for with the underexplored
folklore and customs specific to Orthodox Judaism. The general ideas are common
to the genre, but the specific acts and images are precise and certainly new to
horror cinema.
As Yakov’s night wares dangerously forward, he faces a Mazzik.
But, as is usually the case in films such as these, the real demons Yakov faces
are his own.
Thomas’s screenplay may present that metaphor more bluntly than necessary, and certain scenes are just so obvious (old footage projecting on a wall near a diorama of newspaper clippings and photos). But the compassion the filmmaker has for both Yakov and Mrs. Litvak, combined with the impressive performances from both actors, gives the film a soft spot that heightens the dread and terror.
It’s a solid effort, one that reframes a story you’re used to in a way that gives it more depth and emotional power.
Writer/director Mark P. Nelson is kind of fixated on the social
rifts in America.
His 2018 film Domestics followed the aftermath of an
apocalypse intentionally deployed by a ruling class looking to thin the herd.
The smaller herds only fracture into groups of radicalized, violent maniacs,
though, and even your white bread nuclear family types are threatened.
Which is to say, this filmmaker brings a different
perspective to the inbred cannibal franchise, Wrong Turn.
Yes, big city liberals on a hiking trip run afoul of Virginia
rednecks. But where Nelson varies from the script of the 2003 original is in reimagining
the antagonists.
We know there’s trouble afoot from the opening scene when Matthew Modine drives into the quaint Virginia town looking for his character Scott’s missing daughter (Charlotte Vega). The lovely blonde was last seen here, along with her African American boyfriend, another heterosexual couple, and a gay couple, one of whom is Muslim.
Because apparently not one of these people has ever seen a
horror movie.
The film gets into trouble early by conjuring moments from Tucker
and Dale vs Evil, which is a great movie. It’s an insightful lampooning
of movies just like the one Nelson is trying to make, though.
Nelson’s more successful when he borrows a bit from the
likes of Green Room and The Ritual, although he plants Wrong
Turn’s folkloric barbarism firmly on American soil. This is a film about
America.
If you’re looking for a movie about cannibal families, you
will most definitely be disappointed.
The horror is less unseemly, all of it in support of Nelson’s
image of a divided America. There are some startling moments of gore, and other
more harrowing ideas that suit the picture well.
Nelson takes too long getting to the point, unfortunately. The film runs just under two hours, which is at least 20 minutes too long. A trimmer runtime might have helped the film leave more of a mark. Instead, Wrong Turn is a decent if unremarkable backwoods thriller.
Watching Alice Fades Away is akin to stepping into a Flannery O’Connor short story (without the overt religiosity). The film crackles with ominous energy as a larger-than-life villain haunts the rural, isolated landscape. As a horror/thriller blend, this one hits the mark.
In his first feature, writer/director Ryan Bliss crafts a
film that seamlessly blends genres: horror, drama, mystery. Set in the early
1950’s, the film is reminiscent not only of O’Connor, but films such as The
Night of the Hunter. The tradition of the Southern gothic lends itself well
to Bliss’s vision.
Seeking refuge on her uncle Bishop’s farm, Alice (Ashley
Shelton) is on the run. She is accepted by a group of people suffering from
their own terrible pasts, all taken under the wing of her generous uncle. We’re
not quite sure of Alice’s story, but we’re given disturbing glimpses as past
and present merge on screen.
As Alice’s past catches up with her, we’re held hostage to the increasing dread the situation conjures. The cinematography works wonders at turning the idyllic setting of Bishop’s farm into one of dreadful isolation. Its setup as the ideal hideaway melts beautifully into a desolate trap.
All of the actors in the movie are well cast, but the one to watch is Timothy Sekk as Holden. His performance, along with Bliss’s writing, adds depth to a character that could have easily been a lifeless stereotype. Sekk’s energy adds to the mounting horror of what has followed Alice.
With so many great scenes, the film’s blunders are even more obvious. It performs best when it has minimal dialogue, some lines are melodramatic while others are poorly delivered. Many themes are broached, but only a few are explored. A character disappears, leaving us scratching our heads. And what’s with the rabbits?
However, the few moments that don’t land can’t wholly detract from the film’s overall effect. Bliss knows how to invoke dread, and the moments that take us out of the film are easily ignored considering what works. You’ll care less about some of the details and more about what’s ahead.
Same goes for the filmmaker, as Alice Fades Away is a debut that will make you curious to see what Bliss does next.
Is it ever too cold to ride? My God, yes – it is way too cold to ride. So instead, we invited our friend Jamie Ray from the Fave Five from Fans podcast to join us as we talk through our favorite chopper-themed horror flicks. Some of these are pretty bad – but so fun! – so prepare for a bumpy ride!
5. Deathmaster (1972)
Oh, there were so many terrible films that could have taken this final slot. Would it be Blood Freak? Chopper Chicks in Zombietown? Werewolves on Wheels?
So many choices!
Deathmaster gets the nod because it combines all the required elements – Satanism, hippies, and motorcycles – but it cranks it up a notch. This subgenre owes its very existence to Charles Manson, who braided those three elements together in the minds of Americans. But Deathmaster takes that one step further by creating a specifically Manson-like character—the charismatic guru Khorda – and making him a vampire.
Why is he a vampire? Maybe because they cast Robert Quarry (Count Yorga), who already had the teeth. Who knows, it comes off as utter nonsense, but it makes for a little fun variety.
4. These Are the Damned (1963)
Black leather, black leather, smash smash smash
Black leather, black leather, crash crash crash
Black leather, black leather, kill kill kill
I got that feelin’ – black leather rock
That, in a nutshell, is how dumb this movie is. And yet, like the ludicrous theme song, it’s just weird enough to stay in your head.
Oliver Reed is at his youngest, sultriest, Oliver Reediest as the street tough who chases his sister and her older American boyfriend right into some kind of underground lair where radioactive children are kept.
Suddenly you’re in what appears to be an entirely different movie. It’s like somebody sewed A Clockwork Orange and Village of the Damned together, buried them under rock, and them lobotomized the final version.
Which is kind of appealing, isn’t it?
3. Psychomania (The Death Wheelers) (1973)
More adorably sketchy Brit motorbikers in this one. Some mods wreak havoc on their bikes (because apparently drivers in England have no idea how much more vulnerable a bike is than a truck). But they crave more!
More danger! More excitement!
So they decide that if they kill themselves they can will themselves back to life and become hip zombie bikers.
The film’s appeal has a strange longevity. It’s never scary for even a moment, and it’s often outright ludicrous – if not adorable – but it does have a style and a couple of performances you can admire.
2. The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975)
Yes, Janet. Life’s pretty cheap to that type.
Whether it’s the Transylvanians traveling dto Time Warp with the doctor and his domestics, or the arrival (and quick removal) of Eddie, motorcycles play a significant role in this treasure of a film.
It was 1975, after all, and no self-respecting edgy, dangerous film could possibly convince the world of its anti-establishment bonafides if no one rode a motorcycle. It turns out, it’s the ones who aren’t riders you need to watch out for.
1. Race with the Devil (1975)
At some point somebody decided they were tired of seeing the motorcycle riders always turning out to be Satanic hippies. Nope, not this time.
The film re-teams Peter Fonda and Warren Oates – so great together in 1971’s The Hired Hand. They’re buddies taking a top-of-the-line RV out for a spin across Texas, along with their lovely wives. They stop to camp in the middle of nowhere, the guys take their bikes out for a stretch, and next thing you know, they’re being followed by Satanists and who knows which of these backwoods locals can be trusted?
The film generates real tension in much the same way Spielberg had done four years earlier with Duel. That tension, supported by solid, gritty performances, give this one surprising punch.
There are a lot of films that can be considered a passion
project. Sator fits the category, that passion coming from
writer/director/producer/cinematographer/composer Jordan Graham.
Graham essentially did everything besides act, and it gives the film a specific vision that’s clearly undiluted by collaboration. That is in the film’s win column, but it’s also a bit of a loss.
Graham’s vision is one of isolation, dysfunction, paranoia, and
mental illness—or it’s about the presence of a supernatural being with bad
intentions concerning Adam (Gabriel Nicholson) and his family.
The sound design here is as impressive as the way Graham
guides us visually. The filmmaker shifts slowly between different aspect ratios,
as well as from black and white to color and back. The movement is so gradual
as to almost hypnotize.
Meanwhile, somewhere in the background Nani (June Peterson)—Adam’s
grandmother—talks on and on. The voice is pre-recorded, and she’s talking
about, and sometimes talking for, a presence.
Graham slides in an out of the audio, which often mismatches
the visual although all of it blends into a dreamlike horror. The film resembles
a nightmare, but it may also simply resemble a form of mental illness that is
itself a bit of a nightmare.
Graham’s slow burn unveils trauma as it wallows in its aftermath, and the thick fog of delusion hangs everywhere. But films like this sometimes paint themselves into a corner because there are no real answers, and the audience investment needs to be repaid somehow.
Here’s where Sator comes up slightly short. Though
the sudden punctuation of violence startles you from the dream of the film and
provides a reasonable and horrific cap to the picture, it’s hard to shake the
feeling that the whole adventure took too long. Act 2 feels too often like a
slog, and the entirely unresolved images peppered here and there wind up
feeling less like spooky ambiguity and more like points of frustration.
It’s not nearly enough to sink this Herculean effort. Graham’s film possesses an artistry that can’t be denied, and it succeeds more than it fails.
Fuzzy math takes over as we count cast members and celebrate minimalist films that can seep into your nightmares with the help of very few performers. There are some great options, but here are our six favorites films with 1, 2, or 3 people in the cast.
Thanks Fright Clubber Michael for the topic!
6. Hard Candy (2005)
It would be two years before Elliot Paige burst into public
consciousness as the hilarious and pregnant teen in Juno–still a kid
getting herself into trouble, I guess. But the trouble in Hard Candy is
tougher to manage.
Paige is a force of nature, playing off Patrick Wilson in a
cat-and-mouse game where roles are flexible. Director David Slade keeps
tensions ratcheted up to an unbearable level while Brian Nelson (who
collaborated with Spade on the underappreciated vampire flick 30 Days of Night)
twists the knife in a script as sharp and shady as these actors are wily and
hard edged. It’s a breathless exploration of all that’s bad in the world.
5. Buried (2010)
If you’re claustrophobic, you might want to sit this one
out. A tour de force meant to unveil Ryan Reynolds’s skill as an actor, Buried
spends a breathless 95 minutes inside a coffin with the lanky Canadian, who’s
left his quips on the surface.
Writer Chris Spalding stretches credibility as he tries to
keep the crises lively, which is unfortunate because the simple story and
Reynolds’s raw delivery makes this a gut-wrenching experience.
4. Creep (2014)
This true two-man show boasts dark and twisted humor, a
great jump scare, and a truly exceptional mask.
Writer/director Patrick Brice plays Aaron, hapless videographer
seeking work, thrills, maybe even love. He answers an ad to record Josef (Mark
Duplass) at home, and then on the road. The film toys with that inner warning
you hear and then choose to ignore.
Duplass has an incredible aptitude for pushing boundaries just
enough to prick that inner voice but not quite enough to guarantee that you’ll
head for the exit. As red flag after red flag go unheeded, Brice unveils more
and more chilling detail.
3. 10 Cloverfield Lane (2016)
This one is a threesome. Well, not if Howard (a glorious
John Goodman) has anything to say about it.
The feature debut from director Dan Trachtenberg toys with
the idea of an alien invasion (or some kind of chemical warfare), but it keeps
you snugly indoors with Howard and his guests Michelle (Mary Elizabeth
Winstead) and Emmett (John Gallagher Jr.). Guess which one Howard doesn’t
really want around?
The trio of performances compel your attention, even in the
few down moments. This is a tight, taut thrill ride—even if it is confined to
one guy’s basement.
2. Antichrist (2009)
Boy, Charlotte Gainsbourg and Willem Dafoe are a one/two
punch in this one. A married couple overcoming the guilt and desperate grief of
their son’s death, the two make some increasingly dreadful decisions.
Alone in their apartment, the two bodies take up much of the
screen. Once we move to the cabin in the woods, the colors become deeper and darker,
the atmosphere denser, and the actors appear almost tiny and insignificant
inside all this throbbing, living nature. Both performances are jarring and
fantastic in a movie quite unlike any other.
1. The Lighthouse (2019)
The one thing you just don’t do as you descend into madness
is spill your beans.
Dafoe again, this time with Robert Pattinson as his wickie
mate in one of the most fascinating examinations of power shifts in horror
history. Gorgeously photographed in black and white and boasting 2019’s best
sound design, The Lighthouse offers these two actors plenty to work
with.
But in the end, it’s the performances that kill you.
Madness!
Filmmaker Kimo Stamboel resurrects 70s exploitation horror
with The Queen of Black Magic. Not a remake or really a sequel or reboot
of the Indonesian cult classic, Stamboel’s film is more inspired by its namesake.
Fun throwbacks to Liliek Sudjio’s original over the end
credits do more to remind you how comparably tame this one is.
Not that it is without merit. Or gore.
Hanif (Ario Bayu) returns to the orphanage where he grew up. The man who raised him is dying, and now Hanif and his two childhood friends reunite, families in tow, having come home to pay their respects.
But bad things haunt the old orphanage.
Of course they do! What are you, new?!
Stamboel and writer Joko Anwar can’t come up with anything
particularly new when deciding what, exactly, is the problem with this orphanage.
But they populate their scenes of carnage with actors who generate some
empathy, and put those actors into scenes that are pretty compelling.
Especially if you have a thing about crawly creatures. Or a sensitive gag
reflex.
Anwar is a master of conjuring nightmarish environments,
complete with nightmare logic. His 2017 remake Satan’s Slave and his
2019 original Impetigore
throw narrative logic aside in favor of a denseness of dread punctuated with
unseemly carnage.
The Queen of Black Magic makes more narrative sense,
but somehow that seems to flatten it out a little. It feels less magically
horrific and unsettling as the films Anwar directs. But strong, dimensional
performances elevate every scene.
And both filmmakers know gore. They know what sounds make you wince, what sights make you look away. Between that, the performances, and a tight enough screenplay to keep your interest, they’ve pieced together a tough little horror flick worth a genre fan’s time.
