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Halloween Recommendations
It’s that season, the season of my people. Since some folks only watch horror flicks this time of year, I thought I’d provide my services and offer up a charcuterie board of spooky movies for those precious days we have left before All Hallows’ Eve. I assume you already know Beetlejuice and The Bride of Frankenstein. This will be a list of the lesser known, the overlooked, and the unsung. Grab a bag of Takis and let the Caro Syrup flow.
Fiend Without a Face (1958)
This one is slow to start as is any 50s sci-fi feature, but it’s worth it for one of screen’s best menaces: floating brains with eyestalks and spinal tails to strangle their victims. The final sequence, where the characters board themselves inside a house, had Night of the Living Dead beaten to the punch by a decade. The stop motion animation was more eerie and the blood spurt effects more visceral than the rubber-suited creatures of its contemporaries.
The Night Evelyn Came Out of the Grave (1971)
A giallo not from Argento, Fulci, or Bava. A freaky thriller with mystery, style, high-class nudity, and a very ’70s score courtesy of Bruno Nicolai. The VHS cover made my imagination run wild when I saw it in a movie catalog as a child. Japanese black metal band Sabbat used stills from the film for the cover of their 2011 compilation Bloody Countess. What better endorsement could you ask for?
Deathdream, aka Dead of Night (1974)
Early effort from director Bob Clark (A Christmas Story, Porky’s) about a soldier who returns home after he was declared dead, but he’s not the same as he used to be. Clark and screenwriter Alan Ormsby use this supernatural shocker to comment on those boys who left Vietnam but couldn’t escape the war. Straightforward filmmaking that relies on the strength of its story. The final line will haunt you to your grave.
Deranged (1974)
Another collaboration between Bob Clark and Alan Ormsby, though this time Clark produced (uncredited because he didn’t want to be associated with a movie so dark) and Ormsby wrote and co-directed with Jeff Gillen. While many movie killers have taken inspiration from Wisconsin serial killer Ed Gein, Deranged sticks close to Gein’s real life. Filmed in a docudrama style, the lack of sensationalism makes it all the more disturbing. Features the blackest of humor. The killer is played by Roberts Blossom, the old man from Home Alone. Maybe Buzz was telling the truth.
Alucarda (1977)
Mexican film about two orphan girls in a convent who become possessed. Goes completely nuts with surreal imagery, sacrilege, world record hysterics, and blood, blood, blood. Instead of habits, the nuns wear bloody bandages. A favorite of Guillermo del Toro.
The Hunger (1983)
Susan Sarandon plays a monkey scientist and David Bowie and Catherine Deneuve play a vampire couple in this Tony Scott film that is thin on plot and fat with style. In a film so brooding, it’s only right it begins with Bauhaus performing “Bela Lugosi’s Dead.” It devolves into scenes of lesbianism as every vampire story does. Warner Bros. is producing a remake, because of course they are.
Cat’s Eye (1985)
In a rarity for anthology films, this trio of chillers are all hits. Based on short stories by Stephen King, the first tale about James Woods trying to quit smoking is obviously inspired by Steve’s own struggles with cocaine. The second, about a mob boss’s sadistic payback against the man his wife is cheating with, is genuinely scary. Never has a pigeon been so terrifying. The third segment plays like an update of the Zuni doll segment from Trilogy of Terror. The kitty is adorable. And this is PG-13!
Plaga Zombie: Zona Mutante (2001)
A shot-on-video zombie flick from Argentina that despite its lack of budget looks like a movie. Lots of creative gore with charming DIY makeup. The tone is tongue-in-cheek and the action slapstick, yet you can’t help but get caught up in the travails of our scrappy heroes. This is the second in a trilogy, but can be watched independently no problem.
Director Shinya Tsukamoto.
Haze (2005)
Director Shinya Tsukamoto is best known for his feature debut Tetsuo: The Iron Man, and since then he hasn’t let up with the shocking, mindbending content. Haze starts with a man waking in a hall barely wide enough for his body. Claustrophobic to the extreme, the movie follows its nightmare logic right to the end and never becomes boring because it’s only 49 minutes long in its extended cut. If you’re hankering for more Tsukamoto, A Snake of June is a monochrome-blue wet nightmare. Hiruko the Goblin stands out among his work as a lighthearted, creature-centric horror film. That’s also his semen in the title sequence of Takashi Miike’s Ichi the Killer.
Fear(s) of the Dark (2007)
The animated shorts in this French production are uneven even by horror anthology standards—one is just abstract shapes over which a woman narrates her existential angst—but it’s all worth it for the last segment, the story of a man taking refuge in an abandoned house during a blizzard. Told without dialogue and in minimal black and white (no gray), this is perfection of animation and narrative. We won’t judge if you skip right to it.
Dream Home (2010)
Made during the Great Recession, this is a cutting satire of the insane Hong Kong housing market. After being priced out of her dream flat, Cheng goes on a killing spree of everyone who moves into the building. The kills are vicious, making this easily the most brutal movie on the list. It can also be horribly funny. A twisted good time, and I think the first Cat III movie I’ve talked about in a post.
There you go, boys and ghouls. Eleven scary picks to put on while you wait for trick ‘r’ treaters. This is far from a comprehensive list. What are your seasonal favorites? What movies keep you up at night? Let us know below.
Gladys Cunningham (Marina Malfatti) in “The Night Evelyn Came Out of the Grave.”
Shinya Tsukamoto plays an unnamed man in his own “Haze.”
Alucarda (Tina Romero) and Justine (Susana Kamini) make communion with the devil in “Alucarda.”
Peter Murphy of Bauhaus performs at the beginning of “The Hunger.”
Wow. I’ve actually seen some of these!
I saw Fiend Without a Face on a Saturday afternoon when I was about ten.
The Hunger is one of my mom’s favorite movies. I saw it in the theater with her and many times on cable since. It barely missed my October rotation at Oscar’s bar this month.
And of course I’ve seen Cat’s Eye with my mom, since the cat is what ostensibly ties the three segments together.
What about “Don’t Be Afraid Of The Dark” from 1973 starring Family Favorite/Wholesome-Faced Kim Darby? No blood that I remember, but the end is still pretty creepy even almost 50 years later.
Hopefully you can find something interesting in the other eight picks. Sounds like our mothers are pretty different, though I did see Cat’s Eye with mine too.
No, thank you. I try to avoid movies that will give me nightmares. I like to be entertained, not scared out of my wits. I think I made that decision when I was a little kid, and saw the preview for The Blob when seeing another movie. Just the preview gave me nightmares.
I’ve seen the Guillermo del Toro produced remake, but haven’t seen the original. The remake is forgettable.
I’m guessing the Steve McQueen The Blob from the 50s and not the remake from the 80s.
Next year, once it’s established, I can venture further. I don’t really watch “horror” movies, so I depended on my friend Jackie this month.
Well if nothing but “Buckets Of Blood Pouring Out Of People’s Heads” (a Monty Python reference) will satisfy you, then DBAOTD isn’t going to do anything for you.
Or maybe “Salad Days.”
It’s all good, but relevant portion starts at 5:15.
Whatchu talkin’ bout? Cat’s Eye and Fear(s) of the Dark are bloodless, and Fiend Without a Face is only bloody by 1950s standards.
Sam Peckinpah’s Salad Days was always my favorite MP sketch.
You mean just from the series right? Otherwise I’d have to think Mr Creosote.
I’ve only seen The Holy Grail and some of The Flying Circus, so I don’t have a comprehensive knowledge of their material, though I have seen the Mr. Creosote clip.
I’m more familiar with the Nintendo commercial that ripped it off:
Pretty good amount of blood in “Jabberwocky,” you should try it.
Oh yeah, gotta see that and Life of Brian and The Meaning of Life.
I did see A Fish Called Wanda. That has to count for something.
Only if you have access to a steamroller and a fiend standing in wet cement.
I should watch that first one! Thank you.
I’m a fan of House on Haunted Hill, Of Arsenic and Old Lace, and Orson Welles as Macbeth. Probably any decent movie about Hamlet or Macbeth would make a fine Halloween show.
Star Trek, “The Conscience Of the King.” :-)
And, of course, “Catspaw.”
I haven’t seen it in a while, but my recollection of “Jabberwocky” is how the audience for the jousting matches got splattered with more and more blood (and mud, and maybe horse-poop too) as it went on.
Oh yeah, that and “rats on sticks!”
Amen!
Arsenic and Old Lace is a fun time. Don’t know if I’ve ever seen House on Haunted Hill. I always get it mixed up with The Haunting of Hill House, the Shirley Jackson novel adapted into The Haunting (1963) which I have seen.
https://archive.org/details/The_House_On_Haunted_Hill
It was mentioned in the PIT the other day, but check out Tucker & Dale Versus Evil.
I’m not a fan of horror or slasher films, this is a very entertaining take on the genre.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tucker_%26_Dale_vs._Evil
Although not a gore film, 1963’s The Haunting, directed by Robert Wise, is brilliant. An excellent film adaptation of the novel The Haunting of Hill House written by Shirley Jackson. I found the book so scary, that I could only read it during the daytime. The movie is perfect for the Halloween season.
Everyone at Oscar’s bar really enjoyed Tucker and Dale.
I really liked The Babadook.
The original scared the crap out of me as a kid. Tiny demons, living in the walls of the house, whispering to hapless Kim Darby. They don’t like light, so they would shut the lights off in clever ways, before attempting to steal your soul.
Oh, and since we’re revisiting things that scared crap out of small children. Chiller Theater was an intro to horror/sci-fi movies broadcast from Channel 11 in NYC (I lived in VT, this was one of the bigger channels we got).
The intro scared the hell out of me, I had dreams of Chiller Hand ™ chasing me in a variety of terrifying scenarios. They’d show some pretty awful flicks, but I ate them all up.
https://youtu.be/Ei2HMkzmsVo
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chiller_Theatre_(1961_TV_series)
Welles’ Macbeth is amazing.
Two more I really need to get to. Tucker & Dale especially has my eye.
It all relies on suggestion. Whatever haunts the house is invisible and remains so. Its 1999 remake is the exact opposite and is purely a showcase of (what would soon be terribly dated) CGI.