Category: Horror Movies (Page 85 of 96)

Hey, kids! Who wants to see a crappy sequel to a crappy film remake? “Sign me up,” you say…? Awesome. Then you can totally have my copy of “Return to House on Haunted Hill,” because it sucks ass.

I’m not looking to be overly critical here – honest, I’m not – but, hand on heart, the film was so God-awful boring and filled to the brim with cliché-ridden dialogue that I actually briefly fell asleep somewhere around the 20-minute mark and had to be roused by my wife. (This event would recur at least two more times before the end of the 81-minute film.)

The only person brave enough to return from the original film is Jeffrey Combs, who reprises his role of Dr. Richard Benjamin Vannacutt, the decidedly deceased former head of the Vannacutt Psychiatric Institute for the Criminally Insane, now otherwise known as the House on Haunted Hill. Given Combs’ history in the horror and sci-fi genres, we wouldn’t begin to begrudge him the paycheck, but it’s only fair to note that when he’s the biggest name in a film, it’s not what you’d call a great sign. Cast-wise, it’s also a major, major comedown from the first film, which starred Geoffrey Rush, Famke Janssen, Taye Diggs, Peter Gallagher, Chris Kattan, Ali Larter, and Bridgette Wilson.

The lead character this time around is Ariel Wolfe (Amanda Righetti), whose sister, Sara, was in the original film, played by Larter. Ariel’s the ballbusting editor of a fashion magazine, but she becomes a caring sister about, oh, maybe five seconds after finding out that Sara’s killed herself. (Bad timing, that.) As it turns out, however, it wasn’t actually suicide; Sara was murdered by someone looking for access to something called the Baphomet Idol, which Dr. Vannacutt referenced in his journals.

God, y’know, I’m sorry, but I’m bored just talking about this film, so I’m just gonna cut to the chase here: this entire film exists solely to get some more people back into the house, so they can get killed. The dialogue is so bad that it makes me want to write a film script, because, damn, come on, I can write better lines than…

* “I think I’m losing my mind.”
* “They say the ghosts of the people who died here still haunt this house.”
* “What are you saying, that someone killed my sister?” “All I’m saying is…be careful.”

The only thing this film has going for it at all are the special effects; it isn’t until almost the 30-minute mark that they really kick in, and they’re not really that great when they do. (Oh, wait, I just remembered that the film has one other thing going for it: lesbian ghosts. But they’re only for one scene…dammit.) The sound mix on the DVD is really the only thing that makes the film even remotely scary, as it provides the sounds of doors slamming and machines creaking in different speakers.

I did, at least, come up with a new entry for Roger Ebert’s Little Movie Glossary while watching this film: when there’s a knock on a closed door and the person who goes to open it is addressing the person on the other side, the person on the other side is invariably not who they thought they were addressing.

If this entry already exists, however, please don’t tell me; I’d hate to think the entire experience of watching “Return to House on Haunted Hill was in vain.

P.S. As I struggled to stay awake for the last few minutes, I leaned over to my wife and said, “Okay, well, there’s the ending, so now all we need is the tacked-on scene to provide the link to the sequel to the sequel.” But we didn’t get it. Instead, it went to the credits, and I did NOT let the door hit me on the ass on the way out. As it turns out, however, if you watched beyond the credits, that’s where the scene resides. So be prepared for that sequel to the sequel after all…and be prepared for it to suck even more ass than this one did.

Call me cynical, but from my experience, it’s reasonable to be skeptical of the quality of any motion picture which features the words “MTV Presents” above the title. It’s all fine and well that MTV Films has brought us quality comedies like “Election,” “Orange County,” and “Napoleon Dynamite” over the years, but they’re still responsible for the bad movie trifecta of “Joe’s Apartment,” “Pootie Tang,” and the Britney Spears vehicle, “Crossroads,” and even releasing “Hustle and Flow” ain’t gonna wipe away sins like those.

In the case of “Beneath,” though, I have to admit that the imprint’s first-ever horror flick is more successful than I ever would’ve expected. Now, normally, I’d just chalk it up to the fact that I went into the film with really low expectations…but, no, I was legitimately sucked into the proceedings.

Nora Zehetner, who played the highly persuasive Eden McCain on “Heroes,” is Christy, a girl who lost her sister, Vanessa (Carly Pope), in a car accident when she was a teenager. Well, actually, Christy didn’t lose her in the accident; Vanessa suffered 3rd degree burns all over her body as a result of being trapped in the flaming wreckage, eventually succumbing to them…or did she?!? Given that Christy had a nervous breakdown at Vanessa’s funeral when she became convinced that her sister was still alive within the coffin, we’re left to suspect that perhaps she didn’t. Now, Christy is 20, and although she’s taking prescriptions to combat the psychological scars that remain from her sister’s death, she’s having strange visions which make her more certain that Vanessa’s demise was hastened by someone else.

Since we’re dealing with a 2007 release, I’m not going to dive quite so deep into the plot of “Beneath” as I have with some of the other flicks I’ve been discussing. I will, however, say that Zehetner is the perfect lead for this flick, looking just doe-eyed and innocent enough for you to feel for her while still coming off crazy enough for you to be uncertain as to whether her visions are real or not. The film does drag a little in its middle third, but it starts intriguingly and has a power-packed finish with a shocking moment in the last few minutes that actually succeeded in catching me by surprise. In short, if you can hang on through the slow bits, you’ll get your pay-off.

I don’t want to play “Beneath” up as the best horror film of the year or anything (though by clocking it at a mere 81 minutes, it may yet prove to be the shortest), but it’s another entry into the field of films that try to be scary without being gory, and given that we’re mere days away from being hit with “Saw IV,” surely that alone is worthy of a certain amount of applause.

It’s no wonder “The Burning” got greenlit. I mean, c’mon, think about it: it’s 1981, and somebody offers you an uber-gory slasher film that takes place in a summer camp…? Hel-lo, “Friday the 13th”-sized box office! You know the studio execs’ eyeballs were turning into dollar signs and popping about six inches out of their sockets, like something straight out of a Tex Avery cartoon.

Well, clearly, the flick never hit the heights the Weinsteins might’ve hoped, which is a shame, since I’d like to think that, had it been a success, we’d’ve been the recipients of sequels with titles like “Still Burning After All These Years,” “The Burn Goes On,” “Once Bitten, Twice Burnt,” and…um, wait, hang on, I’ve got more. (Editor’s note: Actually, that’s quite enough, thanks.) But even without setting the box office on fire – and can I get a high-five for that one? – “The Burning” has still maintained a cult following over the years, resulting in this special-featured-laden DVD release, which includes audio commentary as well as a new retrospective documentary.

The opening minutes of “The Burning” set the stage for the rest of the film. A bunch of campers decide to get even with the camp’s particularly obnoxious caretaker nicknamed Cropsy – something to do with his omnipresent garden shears, apparently – by trying to scare the living shit out of him, so they place a skull candle on his nightstand while he’s sleeping, light it, then wake him abruptly. Unfortunately, he’s so scared that he knocks the candle onto his bed, sets his blanket and himself afire, and ends up going up in flames, running through the woods and jumping into the river to extinguish himself. Understandably, he’s a little bitter about this, especially when it turns out that the burns are so bad that he can’t even get skin grafts, so upon his release from the hospital, it’s off to extract revenge on the camp. He can’t even be bothered to find the campers responsible; it’s just, like, “Okay, anybody at the camp will do.”

You have to admire the restraint on the part of the folks at Fox for not making note anywhere on the DVD box that “The Burning” features Holly Hunter, Fisher Stevens, and even a very young Jason Alexander amongst its cast…the latter with a full head of curly hair, no less. (If you’ve ever headed over to YouTube and watched Alexander extol the merits of McDonald’s McDLT…and if you haven’t, now’s your chance…this movie was filmed right around the same time, maybe even a few years earlier.) Stevens, who looks like he’s about 12 years old, even bares his buttocks for the camera, God love him, bending so far over that only careful camera positioning saves us from getting a good shot of his nut sac.

Wondering about the gore level? Well, there’s a really nasty scissor stab to the stomach immediately following the credits, but after that, there are more fake-outs than you can shake a sharp stick at. You needn’t worry, though: special effects master Tom Savini more than makes up for lost time during the last 45 minutes or so, particularly during the infamous “raft massacre” scene. But even with all the stabbing and the cutting and the “please, oh, God, please don’t,” there’s something rather…quaint about “The Burning.” Sure, it might’ve been…oh, shit, never mind, there ain’t no “might’ve been” about it: it is a “Friday the 13th” knock-off! And, yet, given all the dreck today that’s supposed to pass for horror, there’s something refreshing about a film that features a long, lingering shot on one of the female campers taking an extra-soapy shower. Damned refreshing. Oh, and then there’s the full-frontal skinny-dipping scene. Mmmmmmmm…

Sorry, where was I?

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Welcome back to the wonderful world of Roger Corman, where today we take a look at one of his greatest creative successes: 1959’s “A Bucket of Blood,” starring Dick Miller.

Walter (Miller) is a tad on the slow side, working as a bus boy in a beatnik club to make ends meet while forever dreaming of being an artist himself; he rents a room from an old woman, but he otherwise lives a solitary existence. A transitional moment occurs in his life, however, when his landlady’s cat accidentally gets caught in the apartment wall. Walter tries to help the cat escape by thrusting his knife into the wall to cut a hole in the plaster…but, unfortunately, his aim proves a bit too precise, and with his one, quick motion, he realizes that he’s stabbed the cat dead! (The dark humor of Walter’s horrified query after he hears the cat’s abrupt squawk – “You alright, Frankie?” – is straight out of a Farrelly Brothers movie…well, one of the earlier, funnier ones, anyway.)

Taking life’s lemons and making them into lemonade, Walter proceeds to wrap the kitty corpse in clay, knife and all, and is pleasantly surprised to find that his work is praised by the patrons of the club. Unfortunately, he impresses one woman so much that she gives him the gift that keeps on giving – that’s heroin, baby! – and the “transaction,” as it were, is witnessed by an undercover cop. Frantic to escape from the clutches of the law, Walter hits the cop over the head with a frying pan and, voila, he’s got a new piece of art on his hands: “Murdered Man.”

Beatnik #1: Hey, that’s a pretty far-out name for a statue!
Beatnik #2: I saw a statue once. It was called, “The Third Time Phyllis Saw Me, She Exploded.”
Beatnik #1: Man, what kind of a statue was that?
Beatnik #2: I don’t know, but it was made out of driftwood and dripped in fluoric acid. It was very wild.

And, yes, that really is dialogue from the film.

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