Author Topic: Shocktober Group Marathon 2013  (Read 53120 times)

Bondo

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Re: Shocktober Group Marathon 2013
« Reply #390 on: October 31, 2013, 11:23:45 AM »
Yay for Usher. It was my favorite Corman/Pie when I marathoned them. Masque of the Red Death was close second.

1SO

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Re: Shocktober Group Marathon 2013
« Reply #391 on: October 31, 2013, 12:20:54 PM »


The Little Girl Who Lives Down the Lane
"How old do you have to be before people start treating you like a person?"

aka. All the Boys Love Underage Jodie Foster

I don't know what bothered me more, the film using threatening scenes of potential child molestation as a means of being creepy/scary or that this is essentially a slow and boring filmed play. It must say something that in 1976, this unsavory material was rated 'PG' even though it features a scene where Foster - or more accurately her body double - strips completely naked to crawl in bed with another man. I had problems with the film before and after that moment, but I keep coming back to it and asking 'why?' What is the purpose of this moment and why was it decided not to frame out the nudity? When the film is already dealing with the hot button issue of sexualizing a 14-year-old, why make the audience complicit?

As for the rest, the acting is good, with a lot of it riding on Foster. She really was the greatest child actor ever. Martin Sheen is basically doing a sleazier version of his Badlands character. The rest of the cast is adequate, but the material has to draw out the thin mystery about Foster's character as long as possible because there's nothing else there. If the idea of 'when a girl no longer a girl' was something talked about in the many endless conversations there might be a movie here. Instead it's only about the not so big secret. This script needs more subtext, more context and less text.
RATING: * 1/2

- moments of scariness

oldkid

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Re: Shocktober Group Marathon 2013
« Reply #392 on: October 31, 2013, 01:22:20 PM »
No review.  Just a moment of clarity.

Mrs. Oldkid often spoke of a film called The Hand which was stupid and fun.  Great B movie fodder.  So I got The Hand (1960) on Netflix and ordered it for my Shocktober B-movie fun.  Watched it last night and found that it didn't have to do with a creeping hand at all, but is a British Noir.  I'll save my review for next month, I guess.

So what is this movie she was talking about?  There's a film called The Creeping Hand about an astronauts severed hand that must have been struck with radiation or something.  And there's the Peter Lorre film from 1947 called The Beast with Five Fingers, which I must watch.  At first, though, I thought it was this YouTube video also called The Beast with Five Fingers which was only 15 minutes.  But that was a bunch of teenage boys doing a home remake of the Lorre film.  That was funny, honestly, classic home movie stuff.

Of course, there is The Hand with Michael Caine directed by Oliver Stone which I hear is a remake of TBWFF, and that's got to be a lot of fun as well.  But no time to get these films or watch them this year.  I might just watch the Peter Lorre film for fun without Shocktober pushing me on.
"It's not art unless it has the potential to be a disaster." Bansky

1SO

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Re: Shocktober Group Marathon 2013
« Reply #393 on: October 31, 2013, 01:51:50 PM »
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vHLgob-PpIk

Watched this again last night. This opening is 4 perfect minutes of cinema, a masterful artistic and technical achievement equal to a film like Avatar or Gravity. The lighting, camerawork, art direction and special effects are top shelf. How many films give such a direct shorthand to so many characters in such a small amount of time? Song's a lot of fun too.

1SO

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Re: Shocktober Group Marathon 2013
« Reply #394 on: October 31, 2013, 04:30:20 PM »


Terror Train
"I'll get you for this!"

The cinematographer on Terror Train is John Alcott. How the hell did they get John Alcott? Maybe he was looking to have some fun after The Shining. There's a good deal of color in Terror Train, but overall the lighting is unexceptional. Ben Johnson's in it, with one of those guest star old timers on the decline paycheck parts. He's really good. Easily the best performance in the film. The star is Jamie Lee Curtis, at the height of her Scream Queen popularity. Funny to think her start was where many great actors ended.

For a slasher film, it has a step more mystery and class than similar fare. Unlike The Prowler, the reveal of the killer does come with some surprise (like how were they able to hide on a moving train). The train is a great location, with its tight spaces and hidden compartments. Also clever is the killer's ability to change disguises with their victims, making it like a Halloween version of The Thing.

However, a slasher is a slasher is a slasher. The kills don't have the creativity like they do in The Prowler. The final battle is dull, and when it was over there was a bad taste in my mouth. This stems from a prank in the opening where the victim is a kid nobody knew was mentally slow and unstable. That kind of bullying it's hard to root against the revenge murders. No matter how many times Curtis apologizes, she still played her part and went along with it.
RATING: * *

- scary

Bondo

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Re: Shocktober Group Marathon 2013
« Reply #395 on: October 31, 2013, 05:30:36 PM »
Thesis (1996)

Thesis (because why would I start using foreign film titles now) is one of the ilk of horror films that provide a subtle (or perhaps unsubtle) commentary on our desire to watch horror films, or in this case more broadly our fascination with the morbid. It opens Angela (Ana Torrent) on a train that has been halted after someone jumped to their death on the track. Being told that he was split in half and that they shouldn't look, she finds herself pulled toward the scene. It is a very effective thematic start as we as the viewer start to get anxious, feeling the gruesome shot is coming. That instinct to rubberneck is just too deep.

Angela is a film student focused on violence on film, in particular real footage, like might have been recorded of the train accident. When the death of a professor leads to her discovery of a snuff film, she gets involved in a mystery that places her in peril. The film's next real class comes when she sits down to see what is on the tape. One time she (and us) are given audio, another time a verbal description is added. It is a really effective way to build the tension and point out the way violence can get abstracted and more tolerated as it becomes less sensory. It is both promoting and damning video as the closest to a real experience, but still that comforting one step removed.

Everything between this stellar first act and a nice touch at the end feels a little lesser in comparison as the commentary on our interaction with violence gets drowned out by an overly bendy thriller as Angela weaves back and forth between suspects, and it feels like it could have been constructed with three different endings, each as easily believable as the other, which feels like a problem. My stretched logic, given a love triangle (or quadrangle or something) going on here is that it acts as a commentary about violence against women...there is a real threat but it is hard to discern where that real threat is. This might justify it intellectually but it doesn't really solve the narrative issues.

Still, it is hard to argue this isn't an effective film and along with The Others makes Amenabar a vital force in the horror genre and makes me want to catch up with Agora.

4/5

1SO

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Re: Shocktober Group Marathon 2013
« Reply #396 on: October 31, 2013, 05:52:45 PM »
That's three thumbs way up, a rarity around here.

I agree with your narrative concerns, though I saw the two men as people who are affected by violence and violent images, fiction and reality in different ways that kept it interesting. It's like Amenabar was juggling two opposing but equally valid theories and in the end he must choose one, but in the final scene he gives the other just as much credibility. While all that is fine, I agree it's the least interesting part of this fascinating film which I hope more people check out. (It's less soul-crushing than Eden Lake.)

oldkid

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"It's not art unless it has the potential to be a disaster." Bansky

1SO

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Re: Shocktober Group Marathon 2013
« Reply #398 on: October 31, 2013, 10:26:58 PM »
That was EXCELLENT. Thanks for sharing.

oldkid

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Re: Shocktober Group Marathon 2013
« Reply #399 on: November 01, 2013, 12:11:26 AM »
The Exorcist



Wow. I think I've seen the most perfect horror film.

I saw this film many years ago as a teen, but that was on commercial television, with the re-edit and breaks. I thought well of it, but I couldn't remember it well.

Having seen a number of horror films since, I can see why this is so well regarded. The narrative progression is almost perfect, leading us step by step into the world that the character Marrin knew so well-- that of demons possessing humans. It assumes our doubt and distrust of the narrative and draws us in with expertise. It tells us nothing too early, and gives us some data, allowing us to make our own conclusion. We are the detectives, we are the doubters. And by the climatic scenes we are sold.

The character of Father Karras is perfect. He is a psychologist, a man struggling with his faith and his calling. He has his own struggles and we are sympathetic if not empathetic by the time his story enters the story of a young girl with a severe trauma. Even his name speaks of his struggle, for in Greek his name means "Demon/Grace" (Damion Karras).

The mother, movie star Chris McNeil is also perfect. She isn't proud, but a mother with her own struggles and love for her daughter, and money is no object to help her daughter overcome her trauma, until she knows enough that money won't help in this case. She needs a priest, the right priest.

In this case, the right priest is Marrin, played by Max von Sydow, who has more gravitas in his little finger than most actors have in a whole production of Hamlet. He speaks little, but he need not say much.

And that is the power of this film. It is a perfect example of show, don't tell. It is a marvelous piece of cinematic art, as well as a horror film. And it is compelling beyond what the subject matter deserves.

4.5/5

Probably between 1SO and LukeRobot scary. 
"It's not art unless it has the potential to be a disaster." Bansky