A Thank You Letter To Joe Bob Briggs.

    Hey guys, sorry for the lack of posts, my birthday was 3 days ago. I am now 34 please shoot me. Recently my mother sent me a shoe box full of things from my past. I was having a wonderful time looking at old cards and photos when I stumbled across this.

   I have been a horror fan since I was 7, when my father let me watch Nightmare on Elm Street. Granted, I slept with the lights on that night but a horror fan had been born. I lived and breathed horror much to my non horror loving mom's annoyance.

   In '95 I discovered the wonderful world of TNT Monstervision. It was a my favorite program, a combination of good and not so good horror films. I also developed quite the crush on the host, Joe Bob Briggs. Don't worry it wasn't a bunny boiling crush just an innocent teen aged one.

   One day on a whim I sent him a fan letter. I had sent many fan letters throughout my youth but had never received a response back. So naturally I didn't expect one. Imagine my delight when the response came, hand written with references that proved he actually read my letter.

    So on behalf of younger me, I thank Joe Bob Briggs. He is definitely a class act and a pretty awesome guy.

The Hand That Rocks The Cradle

 

I debated long and hard over posting this movie. Technically it's a thriller but it contains some horror elements and a terrific death scene. So I present The Hand That Rocks The Cradle an official Cinemania Horror Pass.

  The Hand That Rocks The Cradle is a 1992 thriller starring Annabella Sciorra and Rebecca De Mornay. The movie centers on Claire (Sciorra), a pregnant woman who learns that her obstetrician has been molesting her. She turns him in leading to his suicide and the miscarriage of his wife, Peyton (De Mornay). A vengeful Peyton takes a job as their nanny, intent on taking Claire's family from her.

  Rebecca De Mornay is perfect as Peyton. She's intense, genuinely scary, and can play a psycho without being over the top. She makes the simple task of eating an apple seem sinister.

  While De Mornay owns the film, I have to give props for Sciorra stuck with the usually thankless role as the protagonist. Sciorra brings a certain vulnerability and feistiness to her role that makes you genuinely root for her.

   Ernie Hudson plays Solomon, a special needs handyman who rooms with Claire's family. He's not saddled with the stereotypical and often insulting traits that generally shows up with special needs characters. He's actually portrayed as a person not a stock character. Julianne Moore also stars but her character is pretty boring and showcases none of Moore's talents. Trekkies take note, John de Lancie a.k.a Q plays Claire's rather handsy doctor.

   This film contains one of the most awesome deaths in cinema. Peyton rigs a greenhouse to crash in on Clare but is forced instead to use it to take out Moore whose character has learned Peyton's identity. It's wonderfully shot and actually comes off as realistic.

   The only thing really wrong with the film is the lighthearted family scenes. The movie constantly forces the point home on how perfect and happy the family is. Not only are they redundant, they really don't move the plot along.

  For instance we are treated to a scene where the father and daughter sing an off key rendition of HMS Pinafore. Cute, maybe necessary to the plot, hell no. This movie seems obsessed with the works of Gilbert & Sullivan, music from Pirates of Penzance also makes an appearance.

   If you haven't seen this film, I'd recommend doing so. It's well done with some great acting and a decent if rather schmaltzy ending.

 

 

31 Days Of Horror #5: Deadly Friend

The original Lady Ga Ga

  Wes Craven is a fabulous director and a horror icon, creating some of the best horror films in our lifetime. But sometimes he can also bring us disasters such as My Soul To Keep and of course Deadly Friend.

  Deadly Friend is just awful, dark, depressing, and just unpleasant to boot. It also inexplicably is home to one of the best kill scenes in recent horror history, but more on that later.

   We meet uber geek Paul who has just moved to town with his mother. Paul is owner of a robot named BB who looks like the product of a one night stand between Johnny 5 and the yellow Power Ranger.

  Matt soon befriends Samantha, the typical girl next door. Samantha's father is an abusive alcoholic who is getting worse every day. One night Samantha and Paul play a prank on a crotchety old neighbor woman played by Anne Ramsay of the Goonies fame. She winds up shooting BB and essentially destroying it.

  Tragedy strikes again when Samantha is killed by her father. Paul realizes the odds of finding another hot blond who thinks robots are sexy are slim to none. So he takes the BB's AI, steals Sam's body and implants said chip right into her brain.

 Sam 2.0 stumbles around expressionless and talking in a monotone. Not too different from pretty much every role Kristy Swanson ever played. Sam's true self keeps flashing through and eventually she takes our her revenge on her father and the evil neighbor. This is where the awesome kill scene happens, she decapitates the neighbor with a basketball. The reason I think this scenes is so badass is how uncovential and unpredictable the weapon was. Check out the scene here if you are interested.

   Eventually Sam 2.0 gathers the attention of the police and Paul tries to hide her in a woodshed. Cops find her, she finally becomes the old Sam, cops shoot her, Paul cries, it's a feel good film for the whole family. Now the end scene confuses me as I have no idea whether it was a dream sequence of the stupidest scare ending ever created.

  Paul just hasn't learned his lesson and goes off to steal Sam's body. All of a sudden she comes to life, tears off her skin to reveal an evil BB who then apparently strangles him to death as the credit roll.

   Avoid this movie, there is only one good aspect and you can find that on Youtube. Attempting to view the rest of this film will just result in 91 minutes being cruelly stolen from your life.

Jennifer's Body

So I finally broke down and rented Jennifer's Body and it wasn't as terrible as I expected. For the most part, the movie delivered what it promised cheesy horror, comedy and the obligatory T&A.

I liked most of the cast Kyle Gallner is always a pleasure to watch and I adore Amanda Seyfried. Adam Brody was hysterical and I almost wished he could have had a bigger role in the film. The problem is naturally Megan Fox, she's pretty but simply cannot emote on the silver screen. Her portrayal of Jennifer was just boring, the lights are on but nobody's home I can only imagine how much better the film would have been had they cast someone else.

The things that really bothered me about the film was the slang. It seemed almost forced like Diablo Cody is desperate to invent a new language. It reminds me of that line from Mean Girls "Stop trying to make Fetch happen, it will never happen." Slang in a film is fine as long as it is someone natural. Movies like Clueless and Wayne's World managed to achieve that without sinking the film.

The soundtrack was awesome. I love Little Boots and Florence and The Machine and their music did make the film more enjoyable to watch. Even Hole contributes Violet for the soundtrack. Thank goodness they didn't use the actual song, Jennifer's Body. It wouldn't have fit in with the film and would have just been cheesy.


Don't get me wrong, despite the concerns I have listed above, Jennifer's Body is still a fun film. There's some great kill scenes for the horror fan, good one liners for the comedy fans, and a little smut thrown in for fun.

Ginger Snaps, Fizzles, and Ends

The Ginger Snaps Trilogy


Werewolf movies are generally a lost art. For every American Werewolf In London there's an American Werewolf In Paris. For every Underworld there's a Van Hellsing. Unlike vampire or zombie genres werewolf flicks generally lay stagnant. Ginger Snaps was a film that I had heard of many times but never seemed interested in. Until one day out of abject boredom I decided to peruse the trilogy

Ginger Snaps A+: A great start to the series. It stars Katharine Isabelle and Emily Perkins, both no stranger to the horror film genre. Brigitte and Ginger Fitzgerald are sisters who are complete outsiders. They seem to need nobody but each other even excluding their own parents. This all changes when Ginger is bitten by a werewolf and begins to change. The film actually uses Ginger's werewolf transformation as a metaphor for puberty. The wolves from Ginger Snaps are also not your everyday werewolves. No silver bullets, a wolf can die from hit by a car or stabbed. No transforming every month, once you turn it's permanent. And rather than be transmitted by bite, it can be transmitted by blood or by sex. This film is fun, dark, and all in all a great flick.

Ginger Snaps 2:Unleashed D+ Unleashed, try unwatchable and you'll get a good idea of how awful this film is. Brigitte now on her own is on the run from a mysterious other werewolf. She spends her days keeping her transformation at bay with the help of wolfs bane. However she od's and winds up in a rehab clinic. Brigitte now has to deal with her transformation and the lecherous orderly who could her get her the wolf's bane for a price. Boring what can you say about a "sequel" that leaves hundreds of plot points dangling, a "surprise" ending that can be seen miles away and for some inexplicable reason a group masturbation scene. The only reason to watch is for Emily Perkins who deserved better.

Ginger Snaps Back:The Beginning B Having gone as far as they could with the current sisters the writers reach back in the past. In 1861 orphans Ginger and Brigitte Fitzgerald wind up at a trading post besieged by werewolves. Ginger is promptly bitten and Brigitte must fulfill a prophecy before losing her sister for good. This was much better than the previous installment and it's good to have Katharine Isabelle back a starring role and Emily Perkins is as flawless as always. I have some issues with the ending which implies that the Fitzgerald clan has had werewolf blood in the lineage for hundreds of years. However Ginger Snaps 1 states otherwise. Other than that good times.



ginger snaps