Archive for the ‘Classics’ Category

Dawn of the Dead

Monday, December 1st, 2008

This movie is about flesh-eating zombies. If you’re not sure what zombies do, they eat the flesh off of people and then that person also turns into a zombie. Anyway this movie is about a dozen people or so fighting off the zombies in a mall.

Ana, a nurse comes home has sex with her husband, Louis and goes asleep for the night without watching the TV news about the zombies. The next morning, a young girl comes into their house and bites her husband, Louis in the neck. Ana is obviously terrified by the whole and tries to help him, but then Louis tries to attack her. She gets away into her car and then crashes into a tree. She is eventually helped by a police sergeant and they walk away from the accident together. Then they run into a pregnant couple and a jack-of-all trades named Michael.

They decided the safest place to go is the shopping mall where they meet some security officers from the mall. They were skeptical at first in helping them, but they eventually knew they need all of the help that they can get.

In the mall, they all confront zombies. It is a exciting battle.

I would give the movie 8 out of 10 stars.

Posted in Classics, General Horror, Monsters, Zombies | No Comments »

Night of the Living Dead – the original

Friday, October 10th, 2008

Well Toby and I started watching the original Night of the LIving Dead the other day.  I have to say that this is a fairly good movie.  I like George Romero a lot who also brough us such great films as The Crazies (which I have yet to see), Dawn of the Dead, Creepshow and MonkeyShines.

I’ve always liked his films.  The have a gritty, down-and-dirty feel to them.  I think his films are typically more about the psychological effects of horror on its victims than it is simply about blood and guts.  I think too many filmmakers today spend too much time trying to make the goriest, nastiest films they can, when in fact they should focus a little more on the actors and how their characters would really feel in the situation they are facing.

If you look at all of the great horror movies: Psycho, Night of the Living Dead, Poltergeist, The Exorcist etc. – when you are watching those movies you really feel for the characters.  What makes them so scary is that you start to look at the movie from the character’s point of view and start to feel the terror they are portraying.

Now movies like the later Nightmare on Elm Street movies might be fun, but you never get into the characters the way you did in the first one.  Or stupid movies like Demons or Killer Colows from Outerspace.

One of the movies that I think that did the best job of putting you in touch with the actors and characters was IT by Stephen King.  That is the same reason that book ranks up there as one of my all-time favorites.  I tend to read sci-fi and watch horror, but occassionally I cross the line and read horror as well including: Stephen King and Dean Koontz (of which my all time favorite book is Odd Thomas – now there is a character worth getting in to).

Anyway the next time you watch a scary movie – think about if you are scared because of tricks like spooky music and things popping out at you, or whether you are really scared because you FEEL the terror that the character is going through.

Just my little rant for the day – I’ll write a full review on Night of the Living Dead once we finish watching it – I’ve seen it a couple of times before and have it on disc, but its been awhile.

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Posted in Classics, GraveYards, Monsters, Zombies | No Comments »

Tremors

Wednesday, September 17th, 2008

Well I finished watching the 1990 movie Tremors starring Kevin Bacon and Fred Ward.  This is a cult classic and one of my favorite non-scary scary movies.  The cast is great and the plot is OK (giant mutated killer worms attacka small town and kill the inhabitants one by one).

I watched this movie with my 9 year old daughter who is scared of her own shadow, which tells you how scary this realy is.  Ron Underwood is a great director and also directed City Slickers and the 2nd and 4th installment of Tremors (plus a bunch of TV stuff as well).

What are your thoughts on this movie Toby?  Even though we didn’t get a chance to watch it together this time we’ve certainly seen it enough times.  I need to re-watch the sequels to remember them, but this one I’ve seen about a dozen times.

PS: Toby is going to write on “The Grudge” which we saw again recently!

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Posted in Classics, Monsters, Sci-Fi, Weird and Unusual | 2 Comments »

From Dusk Till Dawn

Friday, June 27th, 2008

This is one of those vampire/comedy movies. Definitely a must-see. It has two great actors (George Clooney and Quentin Tarantino) who are bank robbers trying to get to Mexico. They end up kidnapping a family (which includes a former priest, a son and a daughter (Juliette Lewis)) and they take their RV to get past the border.

Once they arrive in Mexico, Clooney and Tarantino who are the Gecko brothers in the movie are meeting their friends to split up their share of the money that they stole from the bank. The place to meet was the Titty Twister (great name huh?).

Everything was going fine until a big fight breaks out and almost everyone in the bar turns into vampires. The best part of the movie has to be the show that Selma Hayek puts on in the bar. She is absolutely amazing.

This movie is a must-see just for that part with Selma Hayek alone.

This movie won 9 out of 10 stars for me.

What are your thoughts Mark?

Click on the link below if you wish to purchase From Dusk Till Dawn.

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Posted in Classics, Monsters, Vampires | 1 Comment »

Salem’s Lot

Tuesday, June 17th, 2008

From Wikipedia:

‘Salem’s Lot is a 1975 horror novel written by Stephen King, and was the author’s second published novel. The title King originally chose for his book was Second Coming, but he later decided on Jerusalem’s Lot. The publishers, Doubleday, shortened it to the current title, thinking the author’s choice sounded too religious.

The novel has been adapted into a television mini-series twice, first in 1979 and years later in 2004. The novel was also adapted by the BBC as a seven part radio play in 1995.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/’Salem’s_Lot

Mark’s thoughts on this movie:

We chose to start with this movie to review mostly because this was one of the first horror movies that Toby and I watched together. We have a real thing for vampire flicks and this is a good one. The book is better, by far, but the made-for-tv movie wasn’t a bad adaption. This movie has always kind of given me the chills. The thought of the way this vampire-virus might spread through a small town is compelling. We are talking here about the 1979 version and not the newer one in 2004 – we might review that one later, but as I’ve read the book about 12 times and have watched the movie at least that many in the last 4 years we’ll stick with this one first.

One of my favorite parts in this movie is when the good doctor, played by Ed Flanders and Ben Mears played by Starsky and Hutch star, David Soul go to the morgue to see if a woman who they believe to have been bitten by a vampire would rise from the dead or not.

The vampires are a bit hokey by todays standards, but the movie seems to move along quite well and the acting is OK for a TV movie. I’m a huge fan of this movie. Its not the best vampire ever made – I’d leave that to Vampires by John Carpenter (the original – not the follow-ups), but this movie tends to do a pretty good job of following a pretty good book.

The other thing I like about this movie is that it seems to be one of the few films based on a Stephen King novel (except maybe Carrie, Firestarter, Coojo and IT) that really flows well. I mean the movie seems to take out all of the extra fluff from the book and really moves through the scenes with intesity.

If you haven’t seen the original Salem’s Lot, you should. It makes for a great night curled up on the couch with your significant other.

I’d give this one an 8 out of 10 stars.

What are your thoughts Toby? What about our visitors? Any comments from the peanut gallery?

Click on the link below if you wish to purchase From Dusk Till Dawn.

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Posted in Classics, Monsters, Vampires | 4 Comments »