2017 Halloween Horror Month

Much like the Muppets, Gonzo is the only thing worth anything. A rather lame werewolf and his crap friends try to stop him from killing people, only to be really bad at it. I can't even give the monster credit, he looks like a bad Halloween costume. Thankfully, its up to the efforts of a black Grecian to salvage any entertainment.

Pretty good, I guess. Not much to say, flimsy science and piss poor criminology rule the day in this horror mystery. At times they are staggeringly incompetent, sometimes somewhat capable, but always hoaky. The gorilla costume is amazing however, at no point does it look like a man in a gorilla suit. Maybe not a real gorilla, but at least some sort of savage creature.

The director needs an award and the writer needs to be beaten with an oar. Since they are one in the same, they will get a modest nod of the head. The camera work and pacing is really good all things considered. They know the monster looks like ass and know better than to show it for more than a glimpse, and the lighting and angles are fantastic at setting the mood. Unfortunately, the actual script writing would only get a passing grade from the most Marxist of liberal college professors. The ones that don't use red pens when they circle your mistakes.

There was certainly a time we needed to stop and we have most definitely passed, but I still kind of want to see where this goes. I unabashedly love the Puppet Master series but lets face it, they have seen hard times. Crumbling budgets and progressively worse actors have been spiraling the franchise down the toilet for some time. Its a pleasure to see one of them start to climb back out, this being one of the better of their modern movies. And I'm as biased as CNN, it gets a few more points because I can.

Too artsy for my liking. The characters are cool looking and the "vampire" is appropriately creepy, but the writing can get hokey and there is little tension. The ultimate theme of a girl's coming of age is accessible, but the story is very unconventional. It goes from scene to scene like a machine gun, as fast and unceremoniously as possible. The rapid pace makes it a little comical, Eagle gets captured twice in the span of five minutes and the monster's health is treated almost like a mood swing, going from near death to rapey in record time. There isn't much tension and just not particularly geared towards my tastes.

So much promise, squandered on bad CGI and a boring conclusion. I liked 75% of this movie, a man alone in the woods, constantly being watched by a mysterious being, being imitated by something smarter even than him. Then it all goes south, the plot takes a nose dive into the same old alien shtick and the alien may as well be Superman, making you wonder why it ever bothered to study his hunting skills when it could blast its prey into a tree with telekinesis and be done with it.

10 movies, and maybe three of them know how to make a horror story. Most of the movie is just pointless meandering, a pointless fight scene drawn out for an entire segment and unfunny gory slapstick. Nothing really stands out as great, or even good for that matter. Still, better than XX. At lest they hired people that like horror.

I came in nervous, coming off of It its hard to expect another home run from the Stephen King vault. Still managed to impress, some great disturbing imagery like the Moonlight Man licking her feet and the bickering going on in her fragile psyche do well to pass the time. This is good as most of the movie takes place in one room. Ranks pretty well.

Singapore's first horror movie. Its pretty much what you would expect from a first, no one knows what there doing and throw as much $%@& at the screen as they can. They understand the value of a shrill screech of a violin but damn do they abuse the hell out of their violinist. Not ever scene needs a jump scare and this man has earned an early retirement. Still, there are some interesting scares, not a full waste of time.

Its an hour and a half set up for a 5 min punch line! And it is the best 5 minutes in cinema history. The acting is awful, the hero is laughable, the plot has more holes than Suicide Squad, but all is made right with the final confrontation. 10/10, would watch again.

Do it again, but this time louder and with your mouth open. A few decent scares and a story that is actually pretty decent,ruined by the worst casting job. The hero who never closes her mouth, the DJ with the craziest eyes, the psychic that steps on everyone's lines, they scraped the bottom of the barrel for this lot. And then comes the final fight, bolt cutters vs a tire iron, which is the most unwieldy weapon. The hero gets beaten so bad, you'd think it was a Lifetime movie. The ghost was alright, kind of wish it did more than just pop up for cheap and counterproductive scares.

An unorthodox source but it works pretty well. Based on a painting, without any story to jump off from they are left very much to their own devices. The end result is a pretty competent movie with hints of Poe, particularly the Cask of Amontillado, satirical historical depictions of , and historical accounts of the mistreatment in asylums. Karloff plays the cruel master of the asylum and does the role well, asphyxiating a young man with gold paint for the entertainment of his benefactors and is implied to molest the attractive women in his care, and is genuinely detestable. Unfortunately, it just doesn't stand out as much as other Val Lewton stories like Cat People and I walked with a Zombie. Still a good movie though, I would recommend it.

A classic ghost story, it feels like something that belongs being told around a camp fire. Even after the passage of time, there is a lot to enjoy in this movie's presentation. The lighting shift for when the ghosts show up accentuates the grotesque make up well. While a dated technique, it is still as visually appealing as it is nauseating.

A movie written by a man who likely had never seen a snake before filming, there is so much wrong with what these scientists and experts said that would make Steve Erwin roll over in his grave. Venom is certainly used to create medicine, but injecting it straight from the snakes fang just makes an even busier way for someone to suffer a snake bite. But factual errors aside, there is a far more pressing issue with this movie. Its boring as sin. Low stakes and low risk, the movie meanders along with the urgency of an oncoming glacier. The fact that the snake woman doesn't have much in the way of snake traits is a major let down. Instead of fangs and venom they took the lazy route, she turns into a real snake. While I wouldn't want to wrestle a snake, it really is an underwhelming villain for a monster movie.

Its watchable, I guess. Nothing that will disgust you, outside of residents of Cocepcion, but nothing really worth recommending. Its a movie that exists, aspiring for maybe the bargain bin or beneath the sofa where it will never be missed. I mean if I were to try to dig for fault its the role of the priest that gives the worst advice before being consumed in hellfire for no real reason other than to get him out of the movie.

Blacula is a rather boring character. There isn't all that much evolution in him, he starts as a noble prince and becomes a monster. Only it doesn't really get that much exploration. He kills people certainly, but there is no psychology in it. He is too focused on Tina, the reincarnation of his former wife, who in turn reciprocates his affection. There is nothing grounding her to the human world, she has no other love interest, so there is no real conflict beyond her sister's boyfriend telling her to stay away from him. She says no.

Its a horror movie where most of the cast has plot armor. Every actor that has an on screen role is put in a position where they simply can't be killed off while behind the scenes characters are nothing more than red shirts, it makes it ridiculously easy to point out who the designated survivors are. It kind of kills the movie's momentum, all the worse when it is the longest in the franchise. It could have spent some more time in the editing room, just about every scene with Robert Englund could have been cut out without any recourse, and that is not something that I never thought nor wanted to say.

An interesting premise. Based on the true events that plagued a family stalked by a man whose family had watched over their house for generations. Then they abandoned the Watcher for the Raven, the family with a couple, and added much ado about nothing.

Yep, its Asylum. Low budget, crap CGI, star slumming it, and unfortunately not Sharknado.

Turkish hell, lot of creepy sex stuff. I had read the sins were supposed to be tailored to the sins of the officers but I just don't see it. There is plenty of gore and disgusting imagery and the villain's condition makes him very off putting to look at. But the ending left me a little disappointed. I am just not a fan of movies with less definitive endings with only a few exceptions. I would be hesitant to recommend it, maybe if they are into movies like Jigoku but it may be too off putting for anyone else.

Its a found footage movie. Everyone dies. There is the guy tossed around by nothing. The guy that's isolated and killed off screen. And the inevitable possession and double cross. It hits every plot point of an already tired sub-genre. Its watchable at least. Its just a matter of why bother if you watched any other found footage movie? Watch Noroi, its the only one that I would bother recommending.

Babadook is a really good move. It takes an actual condition, depression, and portrays it in a surrealistic and evil manner while still showing it the respect it deserves. Dead Awake does not. Sleep paralysis, actually surprisingly common in Hawaii, is made into a cartoon. An old hag creeps up on you as you sleep, strangling the life out of you, but you can resist it. Kind of. If you try really hard I guess? The rules aren't really clear but the end result is a rather boring journey on how to kill the choking ghost. The fact that the spirit has to be defeated makes the condition seem even more minor than it really is.

I'm tired of nihilist horror movies. At least give me some catharsis, don't just shrug and let the villain go free. At least have some semblance of hope in your characters. At least don't think yourself clever undermining everything you've done. A girl with a creepy relationship with her sick brother competes with a bunch of paper thin characters in a game of life and death. With such characters as nondescript gambler, super bitch, and black guy, there is just not that much in the way of competition and its just a contest of how low the characters can degrade themselves.

This one left a bad taste in my mouth. There is a weird moment that seems to absolve Jim Jones, the cult leader that killed 900 of his own followers as well as ordered the murder of a US congressman and journalists, by having an FBI agent's daughter apologize to him. Yes he is the monster but that moment lingers in my mind. It doesn't help that the real Jim Jones is far more evil than this movie's interpretation. There is also a problem that there is no conflict in this movie. There is no struggle, each character is popped off without any fight or ceremony that its hard to care. Its just a series of someone gets isolated and another one bites the dust.

Humorous but perhaps a little too dated to be funny. The under clerk reading essentially Investigations for Dummies and being a genuine dweeb, I thought he was a woman with a fake mustache at first, is perfectly cast for the role. The bads are threatening, except Dan but he wasn't meant to be, and are especially daunting when confronted by a hero that looks like he may not break a hundred pounds of hollow skin. But its Lon Chaney that stands out. It feels like he doesn't get as much screen time as he should but he easily stands out as the mastermind. He lacks the vicious gleam of Rigo or the sheer size of Caliban but you can see just why he is their master the moment he steps from the shadows of his doorway. He caries an evil glint in his eyes that can curdle milk, even though I don't quite know what his intent was, possibly by my own fault, I knew that it was bad news and that he needed to be stopped.

I was happily surprised by this movie. Unappealing characters, a less than compelling monster, and some questionable writing, it still manages to create an intense horror movie. The chupacabra may look like an old man with monster dentures, but it moves fast enough, hides well enough, to be a threat. It comes out of nowhere, when they least expect it, and does so in a way that is consistently jarring. What is questionable was the social media aspect. It feels like it was designed to set up a criptid universe, and with the monster universe proposed by The Mummy, I have grown anxious on the concept.

It starts out pretty good, going through the mind of a psychopath on a murder spree makes for a very unrelenting movie. It churns the stomach as you see him first hand scalping his victims and slitting their heels to keep them from running. Then it gets a little ridiculous. The amount of damage he sustains at the end of the movie, it becomes almost a farce that he can keep on going. He isn't built up like Jason Vorhees, which would never have worked, so seeing him tank through being stabbed and battered as he does just turns it into the stay down sketch from The Kids in the Hall.

Bobcat Goldthwaith! A daring movie, it takes some pretty big risks on an 18 minute scene of two people listening to noises in the tent. Unfortunately, that 18 minutes could have used some tightening up, there was just so little content to fill in it feels every bit of 18 minutes. But the characters aren't terrible, they are a little annoying as tourists but not to the degree of being disdained. They feel natural, not like a group of vulgar jackasses wandering in a circle for an hour. A better found footage movie though still hampered by the limitations of the genre. The stories they hear in the first half would have been a bit more interesting if the audience was allowed to experience them as opposed to an exposition dump.

Why does this exist?

Hammer salvages the most abused of classical monsters. Unlike Dracula and Frankenstein's monster, poor Imhotep/Kharis hadn't the greatest MGM career trajectory. Yet from the less than stellar films Hammer managed to cobble a fairly good movie. Its only a shame the trials and tribulations doomed it to be a one off for Lee and Cushings. Poor Lee went through hell for the role and suffered all the injuries of a pro wrestling career over the span of a single film.

A big step down from its predecessor. Less appealing characters, the unceremonious dumping of the previous characters, no real use for the puppets themselves, its a showing of everything wrong with the new movies. There isn;t even a conflict between the puppets to note, they only kill off a few red shirts and never share a moment of screen time.

This was a hard year. With an average score of 5.4, this year was full of middle of the road movies but few stood out for better or for worse. For best movie, I have to give it to Billy The Kid Versus Dracula. Its not a good movie and there is a ton wrong with it, but those last few minutes instantly made it the most memorable of all of them. Its the best bad movie of the year. Worst is a toss up as well between Tales of Halloween and Little Dead Rotting Hood. Neither was particularly painful to watch, but they weren't good nor were they entertaining in the slightest. I think I'll go with the Asylum film. It feels right.