October Horror Film Binge: 10/1-10/8

So for October I am embarking on a mission to watch a horror film every day. A mixture of good and bad, it's still quite fun; gratuitous amounts of horror films are sure to result in that. I've just made this blog and I've been going for over a week already, so here's my films I've watched up to this point. This is all just copy and pasted from Facebook, so if some things seem out of place, that'll done be why. Also, expect photos in future postings; to avoid making this one even longer than it has to be I haven't included any. Enjoy, and try not to get as warped as I am sure to this month. 

10/1: For October I am attempting, and emphasis on attempting, to watch a horror film a day. Today a my film was Red Dragon. I guess it's more of a thriller, but hey. A pretty obvious ploy to make more money off Silence of the Lambs, it still has an engaging storyline and the ending twist for the most part takes you by surprise. Well acted as well. However, Hannibal Lector feels shoehorned in, the plot is essentially the same as SotL, and the film fails in developing a potentially fascinating serial killer (whom Ralph Fiennes plays masterfully). 

6.5/10

10/2: My horror film of the day today was "Dead Snow" by Tommy Wirkola. A fun zombie film that doesn't hide it's influences (Evil Dead, namely) like some other zombie films attempt to, it's quite entertaining with it's Nazi take on the undead. In a nutshell, group of college med students go up to mountains, Nazi zombies attack, chaos ensues, people die. Adequate amount of blood for a zombie film with an odd fixation on the multiple uses of intestines and plenty of violent zombie killings, the most memorable of which a zombie being killed with a snow mobile. The Nazi part gave it a cool, different back story and gave another level of evil to the creatures. I also enjoyed the no-light-at-the-end-of-the tunnel ending, because honestly, would anyone survive a real zombie attack? I also enjoyed that the film shook up the formula of who dies when, and it kind of took me by surprise. All in all an entertaining, albeit unoriginal even if acknowledged, zombie flick. 

8/10

10/3: Now what you've all been waiting for, and with only a half hour to spare! My horror film of the today was David Cronenberg's "Videodrome." I've only seen several of Cronenberg's films and, in typical fashion for him, "Videodrome" did not disappoint. A critical take on mass media consumption and our obsession with violence as a people, this film stands up just as strongly as it did at it's creationdespite massive changes in technology since. The disturbing gore and bodily disfigurement are very well done and have a nice B-movie schlock to them that I love (very Cronenberg). A thought provoking horror film while still laying on the disgusting in a very imaginative way. Melting into a TV screen and having a gun mechanically bond with your hand whilst a tape inserted into your female genitalia-shaped stomach hole controls you? Long live the new flesh. 

8.5/10

10/4: Today my horror film was Wes Craven's "The Last House on the Left." An iconic horror film with it's share of flaws, the movie finds two teenage girls kidnapped by escape convicts who get more than they bargained for when encountering one of their victims parents. The film becomes an odd torture-pornish/buddy cop movie hybrid and it's quite a jolt going from gruesome, hyper-realistic scenes of murder to a couple of policemen running out of gas trying to catch the criminals. However, this is what makes the movie different and sort of allows such depressing images of violence be watchable as they are balanced with some sort of humor. As previously stated the movie has a fair bit of flaws mostly due to it's budget and failing many times in the realism department (ie the vengeful parents getting the murders at the end) but when it wants to disturb it truly succeeds.

7.5/10

10/5: My horror film 'o the day today was John Carpenter's "The Thing." I had never seen this before and after watching it tonight I have to say it is easily one of my favorite horror films ever. The story is about a research team in Antarctica who are suddenly attacked by a mysterious alien creature that infects and bonds with it's host. Really awesome, over the top, incredibly gory special effects areincredibly well done and despite being made in the early 80s genuinely creeped me out a few times. Carpenter shows how a survival horror, creature film is done right by setting a mood of paranoia and unease throughout the film that the viewer truly feels. Who is infected? What will they become? I also love me some Kurt Russell, so that certainly helped. An incredibly good horror film that is extremely ingenious in it's scares and how the monster is portrayed. 

9/10

10/6: So, Sean's horror film of the day: Stuart Gordon's "Dagon." I picked this movie pretty randomly off Netflix as it's based on H.P Lovecraft's "Shadow Over Innsmouth" (that more so than the actual story "Dagon," oddly enough), and I love Lovecraft. Essentially a man and his girlfriend shipwreck and find themselves in a strange town where the people are half sea creature and worship a sea god named Dagon. A great story idea that suffers from what I'm assuming a very small budget. The acting is fairly atrocious, situations are pretty ridiculously played out/resolved, and the special effects are abysmal (save make up effects, which are actually quite well done). However it did keep me entertained and these flaws sort of feed a B-movie aesthetic in the film. Also has a few very well done horrifying scenes, one involving a man being gruesomely skinned. There also seemed to be a lack of a soundtrack which I wanted badly for some of the more horrifying scenes and to set the mood better. A potentially good horror film mostly due to it's source material that ultimately feels forgettable and lands in a place not over the top enough to be a good "bad" horror film and not good enough to be considered a great.

6.5/10

10/7: A-ha! Sean's horror film of the day, Takeshi Miike's "Audition." I hate to say it, perhaps it was too built up by others, but I was pretty disappointed in the film. For the first 2/3s the film plays out like a sort of romantic film with dark under tones, and as the last 1/3 plays out I felt underwhelmed by the horror I was supposed to feel at the love turned evil this man experiences. Potentially the idea behind Miike's film could have been very powerful, a man's wife dies and he finds a replacement for her only to find she has far more sadistic tendencies, but ultimately the scenes at the end that should have had such an impact after such a slow building film fall flat. Perhaps repeated watchings will reveal further details that change my opinion of the film, but as I stand right now I would easily pick "Visitor Q" over "Audition" for it's ability to shock and it's underlying meaning. Not by any means a bad film, but for me, "Audition" fails to live up to it's hype.

6/10

10/8: Today my horror film was "Jason X," and I'll not even mention the director because honestly, who the hell cares with a movie like this. So... I really forgot just how bad this movie was. Like it's not even so bad it's good. It's just really, really bad. The plot here doesn't really matter, but essentially Jason gets frozen in the present to be awoken in 2455 where there's cyborg women, Earth 2 because Earth 1 is uninhabitable, and women dress like 90s whores apparently. Yup, that's the future for ya. The movie consists of horrible attempts at humor (mostly involving how the futures different, i.e. hockey was outlawed in 2024! Whoa!), cheesy-as-hell murder scenes, rampant sex, and an absolutely ridonkulous story line. The biggest crime of this film is it basically shits all over what Friday the 13th is about as a slasher film and makes it into a laughably bad failure at a mishmash of genres. Oh, and the best part: Uber Jason. Yes. His official name. Really the only reason it's getting this high a rating is the few laughs it gave me throughout at it's ridiculousness. 

2.5/10

And there you go, my horror films so far. I'm quite verbose, aren't I?