Child's Play

I always wrote of this franchise as goofy pseudo horror, but I never actually sat down and watched the first one til the other day. It's good! Not that gory in the style of most mainstream 80s slashers, but great doll effects especially when he gets all burnt up. I imagine the late sequels don't get as bad as the late sequels of say Hellraiser, but that's a theory best left answered another October.

RATING: 76%

The Neon Demon

A girl runs away from home to become an LA supermodel but older models get tres jelly. The movie looks terrific and it's got like one of the most uncomfortable/gross scenes in any movie in recent memory (corpse masturbation).

RATING: 75%

Cat's Eye

This is an anthology of Stephen King shorts, adapted by King himself, that maybe is more Twilight Zone than true horror. Anyway, the first one is about a dude who hires a company to torture his family if he doesn't quit smoking (um divorce city?), the second segment is a fantastic short about a gambling dude who forces a tennis player to walk around the ledge of the twentieth floor, and the third segment a cat fights a troll for Drew Barrymore's soul (bad but good creature effects I guess). Anyway, it's a good PG13 horror movie to catch late at night on TBS or something.

RATING: 60% (82% for the second part alone)

Kuroneko

A couple women are murdered and worse by some samurai so they turn into cat ghosts trying to get revenge on all samurai ever which goes pretty well until the older woman's kidnapped son/younger woman's kidnapped husband (same guy) shows up. It gets real sad!

RATING: 71%  

Madman

I can understand why Madman has a cult following. The movie has a good theme song. The killer, Madman Marz, is fairly original. And the lead actress is Gaylen Ross, who's only other acting credits were Dawn of the Dead and Creepshow. It's a backwoods slasher film set around a camp where the counselors seem to outnumber the kids three to one. It's a little slow and none of the kills are all that remarkable. It's also the kind of movie where characters are constantly looking for other characters. "We've got to find so-and-so." But little do they know, so-and-so is dead. It's not the easiest movie to get your hands on but it's worth a watch.

Rating: Axe me later%

(Image from Wikipedia)

The Final Girls

Six years ago I watched Midnight Movie. I hated Midnight Movie. So it was definitely a bad sign when I couldn't help but think about Midnight Movie while I watched The Final Girls. The problem with Midnight Movie was that it was relentlessly stupid and poorly made. The problem with The Final Girls is that it isn't capable of balancing a variety of different tones. A lot of the movie is a send up of '80s slashers and the trappings of the era. But, at the same time, the movie is also about a girl trying to save her dead mother, who is an actress in the film within the film. The emotional through line is constantly undermined by poorly written Reagan-era gay panic jokes and surface level observations about the difference between the '80s and modern times.

Rating: 6.6 on IMDB is probably fair%

(Image from Wikipedia)

Night Breed

Hm I don't mean to quibble about what exactly makes a horror movie a horror movie, but this movie, where a cool dude dies and joins a cabal of cool undead monsters in a monster city seems more like a fantasy adventure? Although the monsters (who are good monsters) must unite to kill some bad cops and a serial killing David Cronenberg, and the latter is sorta horror I suppose. Anyway it's fun!

RATING: 65%

The Blob

Well I watched the remake first and loved it, so I figured I better give the original a shot. A blob falls out of space and eats people, and the local police won't believe those crazy teenagers when they try to warn them. Judged by the standards of 2016 (I'm only human!) the remake is more fun, but this one's pretty good for a 60-something year old independent horror flick.

RATING: 63%

Blood Rage

I have to assume that Blood Rage doesn't have a particularly large fan base. Shot in 1983 but not released until 1987, it arrived a few years after the '80s slasher boom had cooled off. And this is definitely a movie that was made in the mold of a typical '80s slasher. I'd be curious to know how many people actually saw Blood Rage during its brief theatrical run or during its life on VHS. As of this review, Blood Rage has only 870 user ratings on IMDB, while movies like Sleepaway Camp, The Burning and My Bloody Valentine each have over 10,000. Still, it warms my heart that there are people and companies out there that continue to find, restore and re-release movies like Blood Rage. Even though I may never watch it again and I don't necessarily recommend that anyone else go out of their way to see it either.

Rating: Eating leftovers on the kitchen floor%

(Image from thewolfmancometh.com)

The Witch

Some puritans in the olden days deal with a witch and witchy feelings. It's real slow and atmospheric, and the kid actors are great. It's the scariest witch movie for sure (second place is um Practical Magic?).

RATING: 83%

Event Horizon

This movie has a great premise (spaceship goes to Hell), and looks great, but I dunno, the execution makes it really boring and not scary. Many of my friends tell me how terrifying the movie is, but I'm willing to bet it's only scary because they last saw it as a child, sorta like that one Herbie movie with the nightmare is scary to me now as an adult.  Anyway, there is a cool scene where somebody briefly survives being shot out an airlock, which oughtta count for something?

RATING: 37%

Creature From The Haunted Sea

As a relic of late 50s pseudo-sleaze this is interesting but as a movie for human consumption?

RATING: 11%

Cabin Fever

Ya know, Eli Roth gets a bad rap - the Hostel movies are actually solid flicks, great structural deviations from standard horror fare. This one, his debut, is also pretty weird and fun and I'm sorry I scoffed at it these past 14 years without watching it ever. A group of "friends" (in horror movies these friend groups all seem to hate each other) go to a cabin and catch a little case of the flesh-eating whatsits. It's actually a lot less gorier than it sounds.

RATING: 55%

Nightmare Castle

This is a mostly boring (though surprisingly gory) movie but there is one real cool freakout dream sequence a half hour in.

RATING: 31%

WolfCop

I don't know if there are any other movies out there about an alcoholic cop who becomes an alcoholic werewolf cop but I do know that there probably aren't any other movies where the violent transition from alcoholic cop to alcoholic werewolf cop starts at the dick. And that's because WolfCop was clearly a passion project. It was made by people in Saskatchewan who knew that the story of an alcoholic werewolf cop was clearly a story that had to be told. And it had to be made with a lot of practical special effects. And it had to have nudity in it. And explosions. And there had to be a scene where the wolfcop rips a guy's face off and then throws it onto the windshield of a cop car. And knowing full well that it would be funny to see that ripped-off face get caught up in the windshield wipers, there still had to be a shot of the guy, now without a face, screaming. And the gore had to look good. And you know what? They were right. They were right about everything. So, if you have to see a movie about an alcoholic cop who becomes an alcoholic werewolf cop, see WolfCop because it will be the best movie about an alcoholic cop who becomes an alcoholic werewolf cop you will see all year. And that is my solemn guarantee.

Rating: All the ripped-off faces%

(Image from thedudedesigns.com)

Bruiser

A dude wakes up one day with no face (well, a blank white mask where his face was) and decides to finally kill all those people who cheated on him or denied him a promotion or took five bucks out of his jacket.

RATING: 53%

(Here's my old reviews of Land of the Dead, Diary of the Dead, and Survival of the Dead, which wraps up George Romero!)

The Dark Half

A supposedly literary author who writes trash under a pseudonym starts to let his pen name take over his life and kill his enemies etc. Ya know, for an author with untold success, Stephen King sure has a literary fiction complex that seems to rear its head in his work an awful lot!

RATING: 51%

The Facts in the Case of Mr. Valdemar

This half of the movie Two Evil Eyes, for which Romero and Dario Argento each adapted a Poe story. Anyway, while trying to hide a hypnotized dead body, a doctor and his mistress accidentally put ghosts into the corpse, and believe me, you don't want ghosts in a corpse!

RATING: 44%

Monkey Shines

Monkeys aren't exactly scary but I guess if you had to rely on a monkey and it was giving you a bad name by killing birds and your friends you'd probably be a bit stressed out?

RATING: 41%

(Here's Ryo's take)

(Also here are my reviews of Creepshow, Dawn of the Dead, and Day of the Dead.)

Knightriders

I think it's a sign of a true artists that when you have a massive hit, say, zombie movie, you follow it up with swashbuckling motorcycle jousters who reenact King Arthur's court at various Ren Fairs. I can't recommend it enough!

RATING: 88%

(Here's my review for Dawn of the Dead from six years ago)

Martin

An awkward teen thinks he's a vampire, but there's more to being a vampire than killing people and drinking their blood. Or, I mean, I'd like to think Dracula didn't waste all that time in Vampire school just to have some kid do it better. Anyway, great, cheap sleaze and a lot of teen sadness.

RATING: 81%

The Crazies

Well Quammy already brought up this Romero B-Side, but I'm watching every Romero flick in order so I figured I'd weigh in. It's got some great scenes, and great cinematography if you find a good copy, but it's tough to care about these characters as they fight a government infection or w/e.

RATING: 63%

Season Of The Witch

Aka Hungry Wives, aka Jack's Wife, a frustrated middle age housewife starts reading some books about witches and whatnot (but like if I read Dracula that doesn't make me a vampire you know) and sleeps with the lead from There's Always Vanilla. It's not exactly a horror movie, so I shoulda posted it in September I guess though there is a little psychedelic freak factor.

RATING: 40%