Tag: horror

My Neighbor’s Halloween Movie Recommendations

The Portly Politico28 Comments

I have two neighbors named Jerry.  I identify them as “Next Door Jerry” (NDJ) and “Across the Field Jerry” (AtFJ).  NDJ is a temperamental alcoholic who shouts incomprehensible frontier gibberish while hosting his drinking buddies for a Tuesday box social.

AtFJ is an upstanding citizen and modern-day Renaissance Man with the physique and demeanor of Gimli the dwarf.  He and his son walk Murphy for me while I’m working, and AtFJ even mows my lawn (NDJ did the same until his health and riding mower deteriorated too much, so I’ve somehow managed to dupe two Jerries into engaging in lawn care on my behalf).

That background information isn’t necessarily germane to today’s post, but I thought it would add a bit of “local color” to the proceedings.  If you just came for the list of Halloween flicks, well, you’re almost there!

Monday evening AtFJ texted me with excitement for the imminent arrival of Halloween.  He sent along a list of films to watch each night of the month, although his list runs to thirty-two flicks in total.  We discussed some other possible additions, but here is Across the Field Jerry’s Halloween Movie Recommendations (in no particular order):

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Monday Morning Movie Review: Salem’s Lot (1979)

The Portly Politico4 Comments

Do you feel it, dear reader?  The crisp little nip in the air?  That delicious coolness first thing in the morning?

Yes, autumn is close—and the spooky season is near!  That refreshing sense of autumnality (my favorite made-up word) conjures up all manner of pumpkin-spiced fantasies for the season ahead.

It also means Halloween is coming!

Naturally, yours portly loves Halloween—I probably won’t shut up about it from now until probably well into November—and Halloween means scary movies, which are even better when it’s dark and chilly.

What’s even better are scary movies that I saw when I was entirely too young, and which have seared themselves into my mind over the intervening decades.

The 1979 miniseries Salem’s Lot, an adaptation of the Stephen King novel “‘Salem’s Lot,” is one such film.  It’s streaming now on Shudder, and I’ve been soaking in its vampiric scares off and on for the past week.

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Monday Morning Movie Review: In the Mouth of Madness (1994)

The Portly Politico11 Comments

Regular readers will know that I love John Carpenter films.  Indeed, two Carpenter films featured in the Top 3 of my favorite movies of all time—Big Trouble in Little China (1986) and The Thing (1982).  I’ll watch pretty much anything Carpenter directs.  He has such a distinct visual style, his films are instantly recognizable.

One Carpenter film I’ve always struggled with, though, is 1994’s In the Mouth of Madness.  I’ve probably watched this film three times—it’s a perennial offering on Shudder—and each time I love the aesthetics of it, and the iconic lines—“Do you read Sutter Cane?”—but I’m never quite sure what to make of it.

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Monday Morning Movie Review: B-Monster Movies: The Giant Gila Monster (1959) and Gorgo (1961)

The Portly Politico13 Comments

Yours portly had a pretty lazy (yet oddly productive) Saturday.  I spent a good bit of the day at the computer, hammering out some blog posts, tweaking some assignments for the first two weeks of school, playing some old video games.  I also did a bit of composing, and listed several new pieces for sale via Noteflight.

I also watched some schlocky old movies, as I am wont to do.  Shudder had a couple of B-movies featuring giant monsters wreaking havoc, both from the late 1950s and early 1960s—the golden age of loud, alarmist monster movies.

These classic monster movies are the kind of thing that would have aired on cable television in the 1990s on a dead, lazy Saturday or Sunday afternoon, when nothing else was worth watching.  You’d stumble upon them in your idle quest for entertainment, then nod off into a fitful, sweaty nap, maybe waking up as the beast undertaking its third-act rampage.  These airings would be buttressed by ninety-minute infomercials for vinyl siding, which you (or, at least, yours portly) would endure, hoping that it’s got to end any minute now, vainly waiting for the vinyl to sidle into some crumb of afternoon mediocrity.

I could see myself drifting off into a fitful, sweaty nap with these two films, The Giant Gila Monster (1959) and Gorgo (1961).  That’s not an indictment, though; while neither film is a masterpiece, both possess their own dated, nostalgic charm.

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Monday Morning Movie Review: The Shining (1980)

The Portly Politico35 Comments

With the passing of Shelley Duvall earlier this month, Shudder has offered up The Shining (1980), one of the best horror films ever captured on celluloid.  Stanley Kubrick’s adaptation of Stephen King’s 1977 novel—which King famously hated, until he didn’t—has been analyzed to death, but like the ghosts of the Overlook Hotel, yours portly will offer up his own humble exorcism of these now-familiar haunts.

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Monday Morning Movie Review: Deathdream (1974)

The Portly Politico7 Comments

A common thread among horror aficionados is seeing some horror flick at an age that is far too young.  Maybe it was a whole movie, or maybe just snippets and scenes, but the movie terrifies and fascinates, leaving in indelible imprint on the impressionable young mind.

Often, we don’t even know the name of the film that affected us so.  If we’re lucky, we might stumble upon it years later, and go back to that time when we experienced horror for the first (or one of the first) time(s).

There were several such moments for yours portly.  Growing up with a Stephen King- and Halloween-loving mom, two that immediately come to mind are the It (1990) miniseries and the Salem’s Lot (1979) miniseries.  That little boy vampire scratching at the window still frightens me.

Another possible film is Deathdream (1974).  I’m not 100% sure if Deathdream is the movie I saw as a kid, but I remember seeing a flick as a kid that featured a deceased son who came back from the dead and was utterly soulless.  I think the film I saw was made a bit later, but Deathdream sucked me in because it seemed so familiar.  The soulless Andy—who is killed in the Vietnam War—is truly haunting.

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Monday Morning Movie Review: Dario Argento’s Dracula (2012)

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Dario Argento is one of my favorite giallo directors.  The man’s name is synonymous with Italian horror, and he is probably the best known giallo director of all time, at least here in the States.

So when I saw he directed a film based on Dracula, I got excited.  I figured it would be a masterpiece of giallo styling against the classic story.

Instead, Dario Argento’s Dracula (also known as Dracula 3D; 2012) is a hideous abuse of CGI—and, I suspect, of Argento’s name to sell some tickets to a crappy movie.

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Monday Morning Movie Review: Hard Rock Zombies (1985) and Hard Rock Nightmare (1988)

The Portly Politico4 Comments

Ah, yes—the air is turning crisp and cool.  Stores are bustling with busy shoppers.  Christmas music is blaring across the land.

What better time of year to review two little-known 1980s flicks with “Hard Rock” in their titles?

So it is that I’m diving into a twin review of two quite different films:  Hard Rock Zombies (1985) and Hard Rock Nightmare (1988).

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Monday Morning Movie Review: Berberian Sound Studio (2012)

The Portly Politico1 Comment

This week’s pick is the definition of niche:  a British indie film about sound design for an Italian giallo film.  If you’re a horror aficionado and interested in film scoring and sound design, you’ll love this film, as I did.  If not, it’s still worth watching, but you’re probably not going to appreciate it as much.

That’s my basic take on Berberian Sound Studio (2012), the story of a meek British sound engineer who finds himself working in a hostile Italian sound studio on an (apparently) very graphic giallo flick.

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