Tag Archives: thriller

Horror Movie: Scream (R; 1996; 111 min.)

Posted on October 29, 2010 | Leave a comment

How can a horror movie go wrong when Wes Craven is directing it? I love this movie not only for its good scares, but also for its fun and funny horror movie self-references, its knowledge that it is a standard horror movie with all the tricks and subplots that implies. Plus, it has some major star power with Drew Barrymore, David Arquette, Courteney Cox, Neve Campbell…the list goes on!

Neve is Sidney, a high school girl whose mother was brutally murdered the previous year. In fact, almost EXACTLY one year ago…the anniversary is only a day or two away! Well, of course her father goes away on a business trip, leaving her alone at this crucial time, and her boyfriend starts pressuring her once again for sex. Nice people, huh? Meanwhile, two classmates are murdered (Drew Barrymore is excellent in this role as the typical blonde being tormented and chased while she’s all alone, and I was sad she doesn’t make it past the first 10 minutes of the movie), and the kids’ school goes on full alert.

Enter the ultimate high school principal: THE FONZ! He tries to keep the teens safe, while a local news anchorwoman, Gale Weathers (ha! ha!), tries to get the scoop. Poor Sidney encounters “Father Death,” the costumed/masked killer around every corner, but manages to escape time and again. Finally, due to the killings, school is cancelled. So – of course! – the kids throw a party and watch the ultimate horror movie, Halloween, while drinking and making out. As the death toll rises one by one, Sidney must fight for her life, especially when she discovers who is behind all the killings, and why!

  • Top Scare: Early “Father Death” chase scenes
  • Heartbeats: 3 out of 5
  • Gore Factor: 4 1/4 out of 5
  • Suspense Factor: 4 out of 5
  • Recommended for: 17 and up for language, gory deaths, scare factor, and sexual situations

Next up: The Shining

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Posted in 31 Days of Horror, Blood, horror, Movies, scary movies, Scream

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Horror Movie: Whiteout (R; 2009; 101 min.)

Posted on October 19, 2010 | Leave a comment

Couldn’t really call this a horror movie, after seeing it, but is does have a couple of good scares so it still qualified for my 31 Days of Horror project. For me one of the scariest parts was seeing Tom Skerritt in a bushy gray beard and hairdo! Another? A group of naked men running through the cold during a prank…yuck!

U.S. Marshal Carrie Stetko is ready to leave her post in Antarctica when she gets one last assignment. Hope it doesn’t delay her since a huge storm is now brewing and the VERY LAST flight out for six months has just been moved up!

Well, upon finding the gory body of a man from another outpost, and realizing he was murdered, she sets off to investigate in negative 55 degree celsius weather with little more than a few layers, some goggles, and a carabiner to tie her to the ropes running between buildings for moving around in whiteout conditions.

When she arrives to talk to one of the other three men stationed at that outpost and discovers he is dead too, all is not lost because she meets a handsome, mysterious UN investigator there. But she really should not wait around to be the last one heading back to base, because an ice-axe wielding madman in head-to-toe snow gear and goggles (you know, to keep warm AND so we can’t see his face) nearly chops her to bits. Luckily, she survives with only severe frostbite to two fingers (which must later be amputated by the Doc, Tom Skerritt).

As the clock is ticking, poor Carrie must decide to stay on in the cold, cold winter to pursue the killer. She and the UN guy discover a Cold War-era tie-in to the murder spree, and set out to stop this madman once and for all.

  • Top Scares: Madman’s rampages
  • Heartbeats: 2 out of 5
  • Gore Factor: 4 out of 5
  • Suspense Factor: 2 1/2 out of 5
  • Recommended for: 14 and up, due to nudity and gore/killing

Next up: Friday the 13th

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Posted in 31 Days of Horror, Antarctica, Blood, Movies, scary movies, Thriller

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Horror Movie: Psycho (TV-14; 1960; 109 min.)

Posted on October 19, 2010 | Leave a comment

This movie that kind of started it all is considered a classic for a good reason…it features great characters, suspense, a psycho on the loose, and even a dark, stormy night. Directed by Alfred Hitchcock, how could you ask for more?

Psycho stars Janet Leigh as Marion Crane, an office worker who decides to steal $40,000 from her employer’s client and flee to another town to marry her boyfriend. On her way out of town, the skies let loose and she must pull off the road at the small Bates Motel for the night. There she meets Norman Bates (played oh, so deliciously by Anthony Perkins), the owner of the motel, who invites her “up to the house” where he lives behind the motel, for a bit of dinner. Since she can’t get out in the storm to look for food, she accepts. But as she “freshens up,” she overhears Norman and his elderly, ill mother argue about her joining them, so she simply eats with Norman in the hotel office.

Over sandwiches she discovers Norman’s interest in taxidermy (knew that was coming, didn’t ya?), and talks to him about his long, lonely days and nights spent caring for his mother. Perhaps he should put her in a “home?” Wrong thing to say, honey! How do we know? Because as Marion showers before bed, Norman’s mother opens the shower curtain and slashes her to death!

Norman quickly cleans up the evidence of Marion’s visit to the motel and her death. Which is a good thing since a private investigator has already begun looking for her and has tracked her to the Bates Motel. He asks a few too many questions though, so when he slips into Norman’s creepy, old house on the hill to talk to his mother, he discovers Momma isn’t such the invalid he thought. Bye-Bye Mr. Investigator!

Well, by this time Marion’s sister and boyfriend haven’t heard back from the P.I., so they also head to the B.M. (Bates Motel, not the yucky swamp-like land behind it which looks like a big toilet bowl). They devise a strategy to search the motel and the house, but when Norman grows suspicious, he takes off after them for one last showdown starring him and his UGLY Momma!

  • Top Scare: Shower scene!
  • Heartbeats: 4 out of 5
  • Gore Factor: 1 1/2 out of 5
  • Suspense Factor: 4 1/2 out of 5
  • Recommended for: 14 and up

Next up: Whiteout

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Posted in 31 Days of Horror, Alfred Hitchcock, haunting, horror, Movies, Norman Bates, Psycho, psychosis, scary movies, Thriller

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Horror Movie: The Omen (R; 1976; 111 min.)

Posted on October 17, 2010 | 5 comments

I wanted to watch the original version of this horror classic, not the recent remake, because I believe if it was good enough to want to remake it, it’s pretty good to begin with.

Gregory Peck stars as Robert Thorn, who’s wife has (unbeknownst to her) supposedly just given birth to a stillborn son. A priest shows Thorn another newborn boy who’s mother has just died, and offers him as a replacement saying, “She never has to know.” Let’s see how well that works out for him…

First, we see lovely scenes of the boy, whom they’ve named Damien, growing up a mostly normal child, that is until his fifth birthday party. At this event, Damien’s nanny calls out to him as he plays in the backyard with all the other children at his party, then commits suicide right in front of them all. As Thorn is the American Ambassador to Great Britain, this children’s party is being recorded by various photographers. One, Jennings, starts following Thorn after this incident, taking photos of various priests who seem to always be around Thorn, warning him of his son’s evil-ness, which he doesn’t believe…at first! Meanwhile, a new nanny, Mrs. Baylock, has taken charge of young Damien and vowed to him to keep him safe!

Finally, Jennings convinces Thorn that the devil is involved. Thorn is more sure than ever when his wife miscarries a baby and breaks numerous bones after Damien runs into her with his tricycle as she stands on a ladder to water a plant, causing her to topple two stories down over the bannister. Why does this cause him to believe? Because one of the cuckoo priests had warned him of just such a thing!

Thorn and Jennings head to Rome to look for the priest (different priest, not the cuckoo one) who gave him the newborn Damien that fateful day. When he discovers the grave of Damien’s real mother and sees she was not human, he calls the hospital and tells his wife to leave London immediately. As she already seems to know Damien is evil incarnate, she readies herself to go, but the new nanny, Mrs. Baylock, throws her over the balcony instead.

Still with me? Good. Now, Jennings and Thorn discover a still-different priest who says he can help them – Thorn must kill Damien using these special daggers he provides. Thorn says he cannot do it, Damien is just a child. Jennings says, then I will. But, that doesn’t work out so well for Jennings (don’t want to spoil it here). Thorn changes his mind and heads off to kill his evil son. But will he succeed?

  • Top Scare: Evil dogs
  • Heartbeats: 2 3/4 out of 5
  • Gore Factor: 3 out of 5
  • Suspense Factor: 3 1/2 out of 5
  • Recommended for: 14 and up, mainly due to suicide scene and other death scenes

Next up: Psycho

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Posted in 31 Days of Horror, baby, Exorcism, Hell, horror, Horror Movie, Movies, Omen, Satan, scary movies, Thriller

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Horror Movie: The Orphanage (R; 2007; 105 min.)

Posted on October 16, 2010 | Leave a comment

This spanish movie with English subtitles was actually better than I anticipated, creepy and well-told, with a satisfying ending. Very suspenseful too!

Laura and her husband Carlos, along with their adopted son Simon, have moved into what used to be the orphanage where Laura lived before being adopted as a young girl. They have plans to care for several disabled children there and are preparing for their arrival. After a walk on the nearby beach, Laura and Simon enter into a cave where Simon “meets” several young children who tell him that he is adopted and ill as well (he is HIV positive, which his parents have kept from him along with the fact he is adopted). They invite him to come play with them, and to join their group. Laura and Carlos think it normal that a young boy would have these imaginary friends and play along as well.

On the day of their Open House for the disabled children’s families, Simon disappears. Laura soon comes to believe that these imaginary friends are not so imaginary after all, but are the ghosts of her childhood friends from the orphanage who have somehow taken Simon to live with them. She calls in a medium to help her reach these children to find out about Simon.

The medium tells her that “when something terrible happens sometimes it leaves a trace…a wound that acts as a knot between two time lines. It’s like an echo repeated over and over, waiting to be heard. Like a scar…or a pinch that begs for a caress to relieve it.” Cool.

So Laura does discover that something terrible did happen to these children after she was adopted out, and asks them if they want to play one more time together. They do…

  • Top Scare: The medium’s visit
  • Heartbeats: 3 1/2 out of 5
  • Gore Factor: 2 1/4 out of 5
  • Suspense Factor: 3 3/4 out of 5
  • Recommended for: 13 and up

Next up: The Omen

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Horror Movie: Guess the Name (R; 1976; 98 min.)

Posted on October 15, 2010 | Leave a comment

I was too tired last night for subtitles (The Orphanage), so chose to watch a classic instead. My husband had never seen it, so  that made it even better. It was a literal bloodbath, or bloodshower I should say (in two scenes!), starring The Coal Miner’s Daughter, Urban Cowboy, Greatest American Hero, and Mrs. Bradford…can you guess its title?

Okay, hopefully you said Psycho…nah, just kidding. Carrie, of course! Now I know I just reviewed another Stephen King adaptation yesterday, Salem’s Lot, but he is the King of Horror after all, so I thought another so soon was okay.

Carrie is set in the land of true horror, aka High School. Raised by a fanatically religious mother, Carrie is “different” from the other kids. Not only does she become the world’s oldest girl to start menstruating, she discovers she has special abilities to move items, close doors, break mirrors, and make young, bratty boys riding bikes fall to the ground when she gets angry! Okay, take away the crazy mother and it sounds like a pretty good life to me so far, right?

Wrong! Carrie’s prom is coming up, and the most popular boy in school’s girlfriend, played by the young and beautiful Amy Irving, encourages him to ask Carrie to the prom to make up for a mean prank she pulled on Carrie with her classmates. Carrie accepts, but her mother says, “They’ll make fun of you!” in an incredibly creepy voice. Carrie says, “Things are going to change around here, Momma” as she throws her mother onto the bed (twice!) using only the powers emanating from her huge, round eyes.

Off to the prom she goes, and is having a great time dancing and being a “normal” kind of girl, but little does she know another classmate, who has been banned from the prom due to her participation in the cruel prank on Carrie, is seeking her revenge that night. Enlisting her boyfriend’s help, the Urban Cowboy, this classmate will soon learn that hell hath no fury like a teenaged girl drenched in blood!

Carrie is the ultimate high school girl’s revenge fantasy; revenge for all the wrongs that have been done to her over the years, for all the pointing and laughing and “cold shoulder-ing.” One of my favorite scenes is during Carrie’s walk home following the prom, when a quick cut-away shot shows Carrie/a creepy doll-like figure in the road diverting a car from hitting her. Second favorite scene: the final minute…got my husband good on that one!

  • Top Scare: Ending
  • Hearbeats: 3 out of 5
  • Gore Factor: 2 out of 5
  • Suspense Factor: 3 1/2 out of 5
  • Psycho Factor: 4 out of 5
  • Recommended for: 16 and up, due to lots of cussing, date and teacher/student violence, sex scenes and general themes

Next up: The Orphanage

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Posted in 31 Days of Horror, Blood, Hell, horror, Movies, psychosis, scary movies, Telekenesis, Thriller

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Horror Movie: Salem’s Lot (1979 TV Miniseries; 3 hours)

Posted on October 14, 2010 | Leave a comment

I found in my collection an old VHS tape of this movie which appeared on TV in 1979, and which used to terrify me. Based on a book by one of my favorite authors (Stephen King) and starring three of my favorite actors from the time period (David Soul, Lance Kerwin and James Mason), I just had to watch it again.

David Soul stars as a Ben Mears, a writer who returns to his hometown of Salem’s Lot, Maine, to discover some creepy, weird things are going on. Mears wants to write about the old Marston House in town, a purportedly haunted house where Mason (as Richard Straker) is living while preparing to open an antiques store with a colleague, an always-absent partner named Barlow.

Now, it seems young boys have been disappearing from Salem’s Lot for years, but people don’t seem to be too worked up about it. Weird. When a local boy once again goes missing, and other townsfolk begin dying off (or “not-dying” off), Mears and a local kid named Mark Petrie figure out that Barlow is really an ancient vampire and Straker is mixed up in helping him to “relocate” to Salem’s Lot.

Much killing and biting and mayhem ensue, plus we get to see what a Master Vampire looks like (picture this: white, glowing eyes, gray skin on an elongated skull, disgusting teeth and claw-like hands). Can Mark and Ben kill off the vampires and escape their evil clutches? Or will they too become one of the undead in Salem’s Lot? Only VHS can tell…

  • Top Scare: Vampire scene
  • Heartbeats: 3 1/4 out of 5
  • Gore Factor: 1 3/4 out of 5
  • Suspense Factor: 3 3/4 out of 5
  • Recommended for: 13 and up, due to the aftermath of a bedroom scene

Next up: The Orphanage

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Horror Movie: The Fourth Kind (PG-13; 2009; 98 min.)

Posted on October 14, 2010 | Leave a comment

Okay, so I’m a sucker for “reality-based” alien-abduction movies if the aliens are not here for peaceful purposes (E.T. was great, but not for a good scare). That’s why I chose this movie starring Milla Jovovich as Dr. Abigail Tyler, a psychologist in Nome, Alaska, a town where hundreds of people have (supposedly) mysteriously disappeared since the 1960’s. Formatted as a re-creation of events entertwined with actual interview footage of Dr. Tyler herself and Dr. Tyler with several of her patients, The Fourth Kind tries to appear to blend fact with the unknown. And it kind of succeeds.

The supposedly “real” Dr. Tyler is a pale, sickly looking woman telling us of the events which led up to her daughter’s abduction by aliens (the Fourth Kind is actually the name of this type of interaction with aliens…an abduction). It all began some time after her husband’s death, when several of her patients talked of seeing an owl at night. That’s, unfortunately, all they can remember. Upon hypnosis (Milla Jovovich’s soft, fluid voice here almost had me under too!), the patients reveal that the owl, which is not at that point an owl, comes into the room and then “AAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHH…” That’s all we discover, as they are too terrified to go on with their story.

Soon, these patients are killing off family members and Dr. Tyler falls under suspicion for her “hypnotic spells.” We discover this entity which the patients are experiencing speaks to them in an ancient Sumarian language, and seems to take over their bodies as well. A couple of these scenes are especially cool to watch.

Finally, one night the aliens descend upon Dr. Tyler’s house, abducting her young daughter. Trying to find her, Dr. Tyler herself is hypnotized by a colleague, and it does not go well. This is where I must end my review to prevent spoiling the ending (of the movie) for you. Suffice it to say, this is a good suspense/thriller type of movie with a scare or two thrown in as well.

  • Top Scare: One of the hypnosis scenes
  • Heartbeats: 3 out of 5
  • Gore Factor: 1/2 out of 5
  • Suspense Factor: 3 1/4 out of 5
  • Recommended for: 12 and up

Next up: Salem’s Lot

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Horror Movie: The Amityville Horror (R; 1979; 119 min.)

Posted on October 12, 2010 | Leave a comment

I first saw this movie when I was 11 years old, way too young. In fact for months afterwards, I awoke at 3:15 am every morning in a cold sweat (true story!)…when you watch the movie you’ll learn the significance of 3:15 am. Now that I’m, ahem, a bit older, this movie no longer terrifies me, but I still consider it a horror classic! It features a creepy house that appears to have eyes, lots of plaid shirts, a mom who wears pigtails tied with ribbons, and singing children’s voices as background music. Hard to believe, but those aren’t even the scary parts!

George and Kathy Lutz are newlyweds, and along with Kathy’s three children, they move into this great house on a river where a 20-year-old man killed his parents and siblings one year earlier. They see no problem with this, since “houses don’t have memories,” as one of them says. Or do they?

Just fourteen minutes into the movie, we learn that flies enjoy one room in the house in particular as they swarm the priest who is alone in it, blessing the house. An evil digital voice cries, “Get out,” which he does, falling very ill over the next two weeks while no one believes his assertions that the house is evil.

Meanwhile, the young girl of the family, Amy, has befriended an “imaginary” girl/spirit named Jody who resides in the house. One night Jody keeps Amy from releasing her sitter (decked out in full retainer headgear) from a “locked” walk-in closet she had gone into. Hours later, Mom and Dad return home to release the sitter from the magically unlocked closet and scold Amy for being so mean. When they learn Jody was the cause, the warning bells do not go off yet. In fact, that doesn’t start happening even when George becomes obsessed with splitting logs in the back yard instead of going to work, a nun related to Kathy stops by but runs right out again, the family dog tries to dig up part of the basement until his paws are bloody, and George’s business partner’s girlfriend “feels” the evil emanating from the house and retreats quickly to the car.

The Lutz’s continue on in their fine new home until one night, the front door to the house blows off its hinges. “What was that?” Kathy yells. “I don’t know. You stay up here,” George replies, running down the stairs. “Like hell!” Kathy says, following him. Good stuff.

Then, finally, we learn that the house itself is located in a devil worship location, and that “energy cannot be created or destroyed, it can only change forms.” The business partner’s friend goes into the basement and her voice changes to a deep growl that warns them to “Find the well…it’s the passage to hell.” Hmmm. Maybe we should move, after all, honey? But as the Lutz’s try to escape their possessed home, the real horror begins! Cue the singing children…

  • Top Scare: A surprise visitor on a dark night
  • Heartbeats: 2 out of 5
  • Gore Factor: 2 1/2 out of 5, mainly from Kathy’s dream
  • Suspense Factor: 2 3/4 out of 5
  • Recommended for: 13-14 and up

Next up: The Fourth Kind

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Posted in 31 Days of Horror, Amityville, Hell, horror, Movies, Satan, scary movies

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Horror Movie: Rosemary’s Baby (R; 1968; 136 min.)

Posted on October 11, 2010 | Leave a comment

What a classic horror movie…love it still! And amazingly, many of the styles in the movie are “back in!”

Mia Farrow is Rosemary, who along with her husband Guy, a struggling actor,  is looking for a new apartment in New York City. They find a great one and get settled in. Soon, they meet their neighbors, an older couple named Roman and Minnie Castevet, and become friendly with them. Guy begins to spend more and more time with Roman despite Rosemary’s uneasy feelings about him.

Rosemary and Guy are anxious to start a family, and following a very creepy “dream” of Rosemary’s, they soon discover she is pregnant. Minnie convinces Rosemary to see a well-known obstetrician she’s friendly with, who prescribes a daily vitamin drink that Minnie will make for Rosemary’s baby’s health. Rosemary has terrible pains during the beginning of the pregnancy, loses lots of weight, and eats various cuts of raw meat, all concerns poo-poo’d by the doc, Guy and the Castevets when she states them.

Meanwhile, Guy’s fledgling acting career has suddenly taken off after a friend who had won a coveted role goes blind and Guy steps into the role. Rosemary begins to have even more misgivings about her neighbors, Guy, and her doctor after talking to some friends, and after a close friend, who falls suddenly ill, passes on to her a book about witches and the history of her building. Could her neighbors and her husband really be witches, she wonders? Is her baby tied into this somehow?

The story continues in this vain, following Rosemary through the pregnancy and birth, with wonderful acting by Farrow and Ruth Gordon (Minnie) especially. Fun to watch even though not very scary!

  • Top Scare: Rosemary’s dream, I guess
  • Heartbeats: 1  out of 5
  • Gore Factor: 1/2 out of 5
  • Suspense Factor: 2 1/2 out of 5
  • Recommended for: 15 and up, mainly due to the “dream” scene

Next up: Amityville Horror

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