^

This was fun. The silly parts were tolerable, funny parts funny, and creepy parts hella creepy. More than a bit heavy, triggering, and wholly entertaining. Great to see Emily Hampshire stretching their legs a bit. Love them.

VHS85 was also cool. Good "Hamburger Lady" placement. The SCP-inspired wraparound was a weird, campy, disturbing 80's throwback. Each chapter had something whether it be funny, unique, or creepy about it. Better than VHS99 which could be my favorite one overall.

Aside from those two movies my spooky season is off to a slow start. Hopefully the aforementioned flicks will get me out of my watching crappy horror movie rut I seem to have mired myself in over the past couple of weeks...good lord. I watched two shorts that are both amusing and spooky. #ChadGetsTheAxe is horror-comedy indebted to the hilarious Deadstream. Both deal with unlikeable influencers with Deadstream being the obvious smarter, funnier film, but once #ChadGetsTheAxe shifts to sheer terror it's pretty great. I also enjoyed the pre-Smile short, Laura Hasn't Slept.

What I am TOTALLY looking forward to watching is When Evil Lurks. Demián Rugna directed Terrified, one of my favorite horror films of the past few years and I've been impatiently waiting for his new one, which, if one listens to scuttlebutt, and I do, makes Terrified look like child's play.

Very effective short about a visually impaired elderly woman, her home healthcare worker, and someone else she thinks might be living there. All atmosphere and dread. No gore. It's great.

Someone recommended it in the Netflix/Hulu etc. thread, but I finally caught this on Netflix:



Vivarium is more of a psychological horror movie than a horror movie, but it is genuinely unsettling throughout.

^ had to stop the trailer because I like to be surprised.

Speaking of surprises...
The proper tagline for this depraved short film is: you can forget your sins, but you can never forget your Gwilliam, but I also like the line of script used in the poster: this is what you wanted. Damn straight! An unpleasant watching experience is exactly what I wanted, and Gwilliam delivers. Seriously, I couldn't sleep for a bit not because I was scared, but scarred. Couldn't stop thinking about it. Runtime is a little over 5 minutes and the time zips right by but the images remain.

It stars the machete-wielding killer from Too Many Cooks as an ex-con looking for action on his release from jail but things don't go as planned. This is a hilarious, but profoundly fucked-up unforgettable movie with zero amounts of gore or violence. If you occasionally seek out wild, freaky, and upsetting films that are also darkly humorous, then look for Gwilliam on YouTube.

rsmurphy wrote: Mon Oct 09, 2023 3:09 pm ^ had to stop the trailer because I like to be surprised.

I should note that I could tell you everything that happens in Vivarium, and it still would barely lose any of its power, but, yes, I really highly recommend this movie, and if you go into it based on Netflix’s description (“While exploring a new housing development, a young couple finds themselves trapped in a labyrinth of identical houses.”), you will find that those words are both accurate and completely and utterly misleading.

in case anyone dare watch a recent creepy David Yow performance

^ good flick. Trippy! Yow is great with anything in his hands. I wasn't the biggest fan of Southbound but I enjoyed his performance.

Re-watched His House the other night and it still completely rules. So heavy, depressing, legitimately frightening, and topical with the world's deplorable treatment of migrants, and how in the case of His House it could lead to migrants doing terrible things to survive. Add an African witch (apeth) to the stew and you've got scary shit afoot. I liked the ending much better on the second watch. Looking forward to what the director, Remi Weeks, accomplishes in the future. As an aside, Savageland and Most Beautiful Island are two horror films dealing with the plight of migrants worth your time.

El Conde was a recent watch that was quite entertaining. It's satire which reimagines Pinochet as a centuries-old vampire who wants to end his life, and his ruthless children looking to inherit his wealth. Gorgeous-looking film shot in b&w. Gory. Funny. Recommended.

rsmurphy wrote: Sun Oct 22, 2023 10:15 am ^ good flick. Trippy! Yow is great with anything in his hands. I wasn't the biggest fan of Southbound but I enjoyed his performance.

Re-watched His House the other night and it still completely rules. So heavy, depressing, legitimately frightening, and topical with the world's deplorable treatment of migrants, and how in the case of His House it could lead to migrants doing terrible things to survive. Add an African witch (apeth) to the stew and you've got scary shit afoot. I liked the ending much better on the second watch. Looking forward to what the director, Remi Weeks, accomplishes in the future. As an aside, Savageland and Most Beautiful Island are two horror films dealing with the plight of migrants worth your time.

El Conde was a recent watch that was quite entertaining. It's satire which reimagines Pinochet as a centuries-old vampire who wants to end his life, and his ruthless children looking to inherit his wealth. Gorgeous-looking film shot in b&w. Gory. Funny. Recommended.

Have you seen Atlantics? It is more an art house drama with horror elements than it is a full-on horror, but it deals with the folks that are left behind or lost. The director, Mati Diop, is the niece of Djibril Diop Mambety of Touki Bouki and Hyenas fame and was a main actor in Claire Denis' 35 Shots of Rum. There are definite stylistic ties to both Mambety and Denis in it.


In the vein of South American horror with allegorical tales of a dictatorial past, you might also like History of the Occult. It is a low budget but imaginative paranoid thriller/cosmic horror mashup that reimagines Argentina's tumultuous 80s as a supernatural conspiracy. There are some funny bits like the commercial about the vacation destination of the Malvinas and the line about soap star Andrea del Boca being the lead in The Exorcist that point to things being slightly off.


I'd also recommend the action/African folk horror film Saloum. I was really surprised by this one.

^ all added to the watchlist. thank you for the suggestions as I haven't seen any of those features!

When Evil Lurks is good but a tad over hyped imo. It is brutal, relentless, and grim, but I didn't get the creeps as much as I did with the director's first film, Terrified, which is super spooky. I do appreciate how in both the director pulls no punches when it comes to children. That's a warning!

Rewatched The Harbinger from Andy Mitton, and it's more heartbreaking and scary than I initially remembered. It definitely gets more under the skin on a repeated viewing. The nightmare sequences are calm, understated, and seamless when switching between reality and dreamworld. So powerful and terrifying. It's also weird watching a proper COVID film much after the fact. I'm aware that we are still deep in it, but watching how the world initially changed at the start of it feels like ages ago (maybe that's the true horror). Respect to the two leads, Emily Davis and the delightfully-named Gabby Beans who nailed expressions of terror and grief. My favorite line comes from Emily's character, Mavis, who laments once she figures out what is happening: "this is so cruel." I will be forever shocked that Smile overshadowed this gem. The harbinger will fuck-up your existence completely.

Hell House LLC Origins: The Carmichael Manor just dropped. The first one is comfort food and has no right to be as scary as it is. The sequel sucked big time, and the third is just abysmal. Gotta keep the money train rolling, though, and I'll get onboard tonight. Online scuttlebutt is said to be a return to form, but they all say that!