So this is All Hallows, and what have you done? Another challenge over, and a new one... to begin next September- yeah, this John Lennon tribute doesn't really work. Anyhoo, that's another October Horror Movie Challenge wrapped up, and it's been an interesting one this year. Whilst I have to say I didn't have a lot of luck with the random draw this time around, I did find some real gems, some potential future favourites I'll talk about in a moment. Also, very successful year's fundraising, a total of over £436 (if we include gift aid) for Crisis, mainly down to some extremely generous donators, we salute you! I'll leave the page open for a bit, I'll only close donations on there when it's time to sort out next year. As for the end of this year's challenge, we still have a little more to do, partially in terms of closing things down, partially for following up on a few things. I polished off Inhumanoids yesterday, and theres's something else I promised to watch if funding got to a certain amount, but I figured I'd save it for this month, for reasons I'll explain later. For today, let's have the traditional round-up and awards for what I watched...
So first off, here's the full list of what I watched, with links to my Letterboxd reviews for all of them- The Video Dead
- Terrorvision
- Smile
- The New York Ripper
- Man Made Monster
- Monster on the Campus
- Bones
- The Monster of Piedras Blancas
- Awake
- Sometimes they Come Back
- Werewolf by Night
- The Last Witch Hunter
- The Origin (at the London Film Festival)
- Nightmares in a Damaged Brain
- Sleepwalkers
- Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City
- Shadow of the Hawk
- Enys Men (at the London Film Festival)
- Nightwing
- Unicorn Wars
- Halloween Ends
- The Queen of Spades (Rewatch at the London Film Festival)
- Manhattan Baby
- Lesbian Vampire Killers
- Panic Button
- Venom (1971)
- Ganja & Hess (Rewatch)
- Habit
- A Perfect Getaway
- Alone in the Dark (Not that one)
- Invisible Invaders
- The Brain from Planet Arous
- The Devil's Men
- La Llorona (1933)
- Eye of the Cat
- Voices
- The Ballad of Tam Lin
- The Appointment
- Wendell & Wild
- Inhumanoids
- 247°F
- The Phantom of the Monastery
- Tenderness of the Wolves
- Barbarian
- Gozu
Quite an eclectic selection, I think you'll agree. Now, let's get this unfortunate duty out the way quick....
Worst Film - The Devil's Men
It wasn't Lesbian Vampire Killers! Honestly, I'm surprised as you are about this! No, this dishonour is that of, and I am even more shocked to say this, the one Peter Cushing movie this year. I said a lot about James Corden's... efforts, but what I will say is that it was nowhere near as utterly boring as TDM. At least it didn't waste great talents to the same degree as TDM, as Cushing and Pleasence had nothing to work with at all there. And this is the one that I'm really shocked by; I actually think that LVK respected its female character more. No seriously! The Devil's Men's female lead gets nothing to do bar getting naked, so still far below LVK's bar, which is set so low, it's in the Earth's mantle. I don't like dwelling on negatives, so I'll just say that I can't believe I enjoyed something far less than the film that did the "disintegrated vampire leaving their breast implants behind" gag, and move them.
Time to be more positive! Unlike other years, I won't do separate awards, this time I'll just do a recap of my top five films I watched for the first time in this challenge. Before those though, a quick...
Honourable Mention: The Queen of Spades
One of the few rewatches this year, I want to give a special note to this one as it's getting a re-release this December. This isn't talked about nearly as much as they should, perhaps because it's from an odd time for genre cinema, after the initial wave of gothics and monsters from Hollywood, but before the B-Movie and Hammer ages. Nevertheless, it's one of the best supernatural films made in the UK, and deserves to be discussed in the same sentence as such classics as Night of the Demon and Dead of Night. Mostly playing as a period drama but with an eerie edge, this builds well to a truly unsettling haunting scene, and a very satisfying fate for the main villain. It's slated to get a limited re-release in its new 4K restoration come the 23rd of December, a traditional Ghost Story for Christmas, and I do recommend catching it on the big screen, it's just the thing for the season.
Now the top five proper, in chronological order, oldest to newest, starting with...
The Phantom of the Monastery
From the time just when Universal were getting into the swing of things came this title from Mexico which in many ways was many years ahead of the game. Whilst it might not seem quite so fresh these days, due to so many things taking inspiration from it over the years, it's still a fine story well told. It's perhaps the most atmospheric sound horror film of that era, with only the likes of Edgar Ulmer's The Black Cat to give it a run for it's money. I am glad that Indicator did their big sale in time for me to pick it up last minute, it's a true gem whose reputation deserves to grow and grow!
The Appointment
A recent release on the BFI Flipside label, a film so obscure they couldn't even find a single 35mm print to source the disc from, it's criminal that something this good could be buried. Another pure exercise in mood and atmosphere, it can be best summed up as "What if Final Destination wasn't going for dark comedy?". There are some truly unsettling sights in here, especially the recurring motif of the dogs, which might be a tip of the hat to The Omen, but are used very effectively. What I especially like is a refusal for the film to explain what's happening; nothing kills intrigue like over explanation, and whilst the Appointment gives big hints as to what might be going on, it trusts us enough to put the pieces together ourselves. Definitely pick up the BFI blu ray, not least for it also including director Lindsey C. Vickers' previous work, an eerie short called The Lake.
Gozu
I am aiming to work my way through a lot of Takashi Miike's filmography, as though there are films of this I don't get on with, I am always guaranteed with them to get at least one thing I have never seen before. Well, this is one of his works that contains A LOT that I haven't seen before; going into full on dream logic mode, this isn't one of his most shocking films per se (although the climax, holy hell!), but it's one of his most unsettling, conveying all the way through a sense of pure "wrongness". What's more, it constantly tries to pull the rug from under you; there's a section in the middle, just two of the characters talking, that feels like it's building to something akin to the Man Behind Winkie's scene from Mulholland Drive... only to then go a completely different route. Speaking of, I do get the sense that this was Miike trying to do a sort of David Lynch peerfic, and if that was his goal, mission accomplished, not least for capturing the sort of genuine warmth that is buried in a lot of Lynch's works.
Unicorn Wars
Now this is the controversial one, as it's far from pure horror as some might classify it, but the fact is this is a genuinely unsettling, shocking piece of work; there are a lot of war films that bring the sheer horror of conflict into focus, and this is one of them. From what may seem an absurd gimmick comes a tale of war, toxic masculine attitudes, a subtle environmental message, religious indoctrination, and a lot more that you wouldn't believe comes from a film containing what look like Care Bears. This is the sort of fascinating indie project that I love shining a light on with these, I think films like this should be encouraged, especially considering how gorgeous it looks being mainly done on a teeny budget on Blender. It's been confirmed that it has been picked up for UK distribution, so I look forward to bending you ear towards it again when it finally comes out.
The Origin
A stripped bare, tough, very slick survival story, this tale of prehistoric survival is one of the most immersive watches in quite a while. For such low resources, and acting in a made up language, it's incredibly how well the cast brings across the early settlers in this tale; apparently this has gotten some praise for how well it fits in with many current archaeological theories. Even the soundtrack works in some authentic instruments of the era. What's more, when this film decides to show its hand and reveal what's happening, it's a rare case of where doing so makes the story more unsettling, as you realise what all this has really been in aid of. It's still on the festival circuit at the moment, but I really hope it gets proper big screen distribution, I can attest that it works well with a crowd, especially some truly shocking moments of gore.
For the record, the ones having the traditional brawl in the car park over who is number six (no I'm not going to make the obvious gag!) are Werewolf by Night and Bones. Seriously, Werewolf was a lot of fun, really hope Marvel does more fun little one offs like that, they have plenty of characters to make that work! So, that wraps up another year of these; next year I'm planning something a bit different, I've set aside a bunch of things to do a whole lot of themed marathons on disc, that should be fun. However, well before then, I still have a lot of horror content to enjoy and discover this year, and I'll be getting into that in a future blog post.
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