Thursday, February 25, 2010

Trick, or treat?

Torture, gore and death are the three elements that are required in order to produce a high-quality bloodcurdling scary movie. My whole life I have enjoyed watching horror movies, although I will admit that I am terrified of zombies!!!! My name is Jackie and I am a student at the University of St. Francis. In my blogs I will give me opinion as well as little known facts on various scary movies, both new and old.

How often is a movie made that incorporates every idea of Halloween? Well this next movie is one that will get you in the Halloween mood. "Trick 'r Treat" (2008) was written and directed by Michael Dougherty. His directing style is simialr to that of "Creepshow" and "Tales From the Crypt" with the focus of the movie being four interwoven tales....on Halloween NIGHT!


The residents of the small town of Warren Valley, Ohio take Halloween very seriously, making sure to remember four simple rules:
1) Wear a constume
2) Hand out treats
3) NEVER blow out a jack o' lantern
4) Most important is to ALWAYS check your candy.

Several stories are brought together in this film by the monsters of this grusome holiday, including zombies, warewolfs, psychopathic murders, vampires and a demon. The Principle takes a look at a murderous principle and his demented family. Surprise Party shows the bizarre fate of a group of hot school girls who go to a party deep in the woods. This story also involves one young virgin's quest for that special someone, which takes a gruesome turn. The Halloween School Bus Massacre Revisited follows a group of kids who decide to play a prank on one of thier classmates. The town holds a secret of a decade-old murder. The children trick this young girl into going with them to "honor those that had passed" at the actual site of the murder. The last story called Meet Sam focuses on the fate of a bitter old man when a demon trick-or-treater comes knocking at his door looking for his treat.

The cast includes Brian Cox (Mr. Kregg), Quinn Lord (Sam/ Peeping Tom), Dylan Baker (Stephen), Leslie Bibb (Emma), Rochelle Aytes (Maria), Anna Paquin (Laurie), Moneca Delain (Janet), Tahmoh Penikett (Henry) and Lauren Lee Smith (Danielle).
The best creature in this movie would have to be the demon trick-or-treater. The little tricks he played were clever, but his killing and tourturing methods were awesome!!! The old man shoots him with a double barrell rifle and it was able to piece itself back together. And to think if the old man had followed the rules of Halloween and given him a treat he never would have gotten the tricks played on him.

The demon was very cunning in the way that he killed the woman he saw blowing out the jack o' lantern. He disguised himself in the decorations her husband put up and makes sure to make an example of her.
The director was very clever in the way that he tied everything together in the end. All the stories tied in together and it is not evident how until the very end. So come next Halloween keep this movie in mind to help get you in the spirit. Make sure to check out the link below for the trailer....if you're not scared!

Wednesday, February 17, 2010

Don't Miss Your Train!






Torture, gore and death are the three elements that are required in order to produce a high-quality, bloodcurdling scary movie. My whole life I have enjoyed watching horror movies, although I will admit that I am terrified of zombies!!!! My name is Jackie and I am a student at the University of St. Francis. In my blogs I will give my opinion as well as little known facts on various scary movies.
A more recent movie that would be of interest to watch would have to be the movie called “Midnight Meat Train” (2008), which is an adaptation of a short story from the horror heavyweight Clive Barker, but directed by Ryuhei Kitamura. The movie focuses on a struggling photographer named Leon (Bradley Cooper) just waiting to catch his ‘big break’ while living with his girlfriend Maya (Leslie Bibb). He is given an opportunity to have his work analyzed by Susan Hoff (Brooke Shields), who is a successful owner of an art gallery. She encourages him to explore the sinister side of humanity. As he walks the streets later on that night, he photographs a woman being mugged by three punks. Like a gentleman he steps in and makes sure that she gets to her train safely. The next morning, he sees on the news that the same woman that got mugged last night was missing. He immediately goes to the police, but Detective Lynn Hadley (Barbara Eve Harris) does not seem to care for what he has to say, so he begins to take matters in his own hands.
Leon begins to look at the details of his picture from that night more closely and notices that the same face keeps reappearing, which is that of an elegant butcher. In an attempt to get to the bottom of whatever may be happening, he unknowingly stalks a notorious serial killer named Mahogany (Vinnie Jones). His obsession brings about his descent into the killer’s putrid world, along with his girlfriend. They enter a perverse path of darkness from which there is no return.

The detail in this movie is what makes it worth watching. The scenes where he kills the unsuspecting passengers are so bloody I was actually left speechless! Mahogany uses old school butcher tools in order to take the lives of the people. But the thing that makes the movie so interesting is that in the end you find out that he is not really a monster, rather a slave that was somehow recruited to find the food, skin it properly (which means removing the hair, nails and teeth) and hang it up to be prepared for the ghouls in the depths of the subway tunnels.
The way he kills is interesting. One man is struck on the back/side of his face with a meat cleaver, causing his eyeballs to be projected from their sockets. The same scene shows the gruesome death of a poor, helpless woman as she struggles to crawl away on the blood soaked floor. The thought and time that was put into the details of the movie really make it worthwhile to watch.

Wednesday, February 10, 2010

We all float down here!

Torture, gore and death are the three elements that are required in order to produce a high-quality bloodcurdling scary movie. My whole life I have enjoyed watching horror movies, although I will admit that I am terrified of zombies!!!! My name is Jackie and I am a student at the University of St. Francis. In my blogs I will give my opinion as well as little known facts on various scary movies, both new and old.
A true horror lover will enjoy the next movie that I have decided to talk about, which is none other than Stephen King’s “IT”. The movie is set in the quiet town of Derry, Maine where seven friends named Bill, Eddie, Mike, Bev, Stan, Richie, and Ben (the Lucky Seven) have been experiencing, seeing, and hearing strange things. Their fears are only worsened when they discover that a creature referred to as ‘It’ is terrorizing them in their childhood. The worst comes when Bill’s brother George falls prey to this deadly creature, losing his life.

The peculiar thing is that the adults seem to ignore the occurrences and act like ‘It’ does not exist. This could be because this creature only goes after children. After watching him murder one of their bullies and sending another to a mental institution, the Lucky Seven do not hear anything about the clown again and continue on with their lives, trying to make them as normal as possible.
30 years later, one lone member of the group stays in his quiet little town. Mike Hanlon begins to notice that children seem to be disappearing in the same fashion that they did when he was growing up. He gets the Lucky Seven back together in order to finally try and rid the town of the child eating creature clown later referred to as Pennywise. But he knows that they are coming for him, so he also fights back and uses their fears to terrorize them like he did when they were children, but this time around he does succeed in killing some of them. The movie ends in a final battle between who is left of the Luck Seven and Pennywise.

Honestly, as a child this move did creep me out. My bus stop was actually by a sewage thing like in the picture. I used to get a hair-raising feeling that the clown was going to try and pop his head through the hole and try and kill me!!!

The only thing I disliked about this movie would be the ending. I liked the fact that this creature was a clown; very scary looking with razor sharp teeth, but how he really looked in the end was just ridiculous. He was a giant, goofy looking spider! How does he go from being a sinister clown tearing children up with his razor sharp teeth to being an enormous spider? It just did not really make sense to me.Otherwise, I did enjoy this movie for both its creativity and how much it stuck in my mind when I was growing up.

Wednesday, February 3, 2010

"Thanks for the ride lady!"


Torture, gore and death are the three elements that are required in order to produce a high-quality, bloodcurdling scary movie. My whole life I have enjoyed watching horror movies, although I will admit that I am terrified of zombies!!!! My name is Jackie and I am a student at the University of St. Francis. In my blogs I will give my opinion as well as little known facts on various scary movies, both new and old.

Stephen King and George A. Romero are considered the masters of terror and the macabre. Their joint efforts in the films “Creepshow” (1982) and “Creepshow” 2 (1987) show how these minds together can both frighten and intrigue. The style of these movies is similar to the ghouls-and-gags style of classic ‘50s horror comics.

“Creepshow” is unique in the way that it has creepiness to it and at the same time has a bit of humor. The film is based around five stories which consist of a murderous revenge tale of a father on father’s day (Father’s Day), a redneck who begins growing like a plant after coming into contact with a meteor’s green substance (The Lonesome Death of Jody Verrill), a man who buries his wife and her lover up to their necks on the beach as the tide is coming in (Something to Tide You Over), a strange monster that lives in a crate discovered beneath a stairwell (The Crate), and lastly a Scrooge-like businessman who lives in a sanitized apartment infested with pesky cockroaches (They’re Creeping Up on You). Some of the actors included Ed Harris, Leslie Nielsen, Ted Danson, Adrienne Barbeau and E.G. Marshall.

Of course after viewing this you might want a second helping. That is where Creepshow 2 steps in. This movie brings you three more tales about Chief Wooden Head, a raft, and a hitchhiker. Chief Wooden Head launches the movie with an older couple running a store in the middle of a desert town. The owner has lent a lot of credit for items in his store to the local Native tribe. In an attempt to pay him back, they provide all of their most precious valuables. Shortly after receiving them, the old couple is robbed and murdered. So Chief Wooden Head sets out for revenge. The next story is called The Raft. It is about four college students going out for a fall swim. That swims turns fatal when the kids are trapped on the raft just waiting till it is their time. The last story is called The Hitchhiker. It is about a wealthy wife who speed home after having a rendezvous’ with her boy toy. On her way to beat her husband home, she runs over a hitchhiker, killing him and then drives off. Little does she know that he wants his ride, dead or not.

Although these movies are not “jump out of your seat thrillers”, any true fans of Stephen King and or George A. Romero will appreciate the creativity and thought that went into the directing and writing of these movies. The creepiest part of the first “Creepshow” would be the story about the crate. I do appreciate the fact that you never got a full body shot of the monster, just a shot of his face and big powerful jaws. This actually leaves your mind wondering how it would look, allowing you to imagine the most foul creature from the depth of some remote place. The one thing that I do appreciate about the older horror films is that they make you think.