Welcome to another installment. This time, I'll be covering slashers and ghosts, as a kind of apology for missing the last Halloween. Now for a disclaimer, I'm not much into slashers as they are too cliched, so I'll pick the top ones I did like. We'll also be doing ghost movies, and I do kinda like them better than slashers because it can get very surrealist at times.
Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974)
This is the one that started it all, because we got the middle of nowhere, masked killers, a group of teenagers, and gruesome murders. However, since this is the early version of slasher films, it also focuses pretty well on the atmosphere. The movie even starts off as a slow build, which is beneficial to horror movies, where a group of teenagers find an old house in the middle of Texas, then ramps it up at one point where we get to the gruesome murders of Leatherface, a masked butcher. The ending to it is pretty bizarre, as the killer, Leatherface, is revealed to have such a fucked up family as well.
Verdict:
Friday the 13th (1980)
The quintessential slasher film, this movie follows a random group of teens in the iconic Camp Crystal Lake where they do their Teen business, until a murderer starts murdering them one by one. That is when they realize their little trip in the lake is a fight for survival against an unseen enemy. The real horror is that no one knows what the killer looks like until the very end, something most modern horror movies can't seem to get right anymore. I mean, for fucks sake, The Nun literally showed us what the monster looked like, so now we don't want to see the movie, whereas Friday the 13th has advertising so effective it made us want to see the movie.
Verdict:
Evil Dead (1981)
With the same premise as Friday the 13th, and Texas Chainsaw Massacre, except this time, there's a supernatural element to it, Evil Dead stars Ash Williams and his friends spending a night in the woods. Of course, the movie is so incredibly gory and frightening, the timing for the scares are so perfect, it's unreal. No spoilers, but an evil magic book is involved with zombifying all the teens, and again turns into a fight for survival.
Verdict:
Scream (1996)
All I gotta say it=s, for the time, this was like a refreshing take on the slasher genre. For a while, the trope of a group of kids going in the middle of nowhere only to get killed by some masked maniac was starting to get a little dull after a while. That is when Scream showed up and did some things up for a change. Instead of being in the middle of nowhere, this time it's in the suburbs, and yes we do know the masked killer is already seen and shown to us early on, but this time the mystery isn't what the masked killer looks like, but the real identity of the killer. In fact, the killer himself always calls his victims and asks if they like scary movies. All I gotta say is this is a clever subversion of all the tropes of previous slasher movies.
Verdict:
The Exorcist (1973)
A little girl becomes posessed by a demon, while a young priest battles through personal issues. The terrifying part was the demon himself. The atmosphere, the pacing, and the characterization is what really sets it for me. Either way I would recommend this if you like classic horror or just want a slow burn scare.
Verdict:
Poltergeist (1982)
This movie is a classic. An American family suddenly gets haunted by poltergeist activity, and you know the rest, exorcisms and stuff like that. I wouldn't spoil anything for the readers, so I'll leave it at this: It's got gruesome visual effects and haunting moments. Again, classic popcorn movie for a Halloween night. There is tons of spooky moments, and each and every minute seems to be even more terrifying than the last. We're talking special effects that were done without CGI, so it aged better.
Verdict:
The Shining (1980)
Stanley Kubrick is at the helm of this flagship horror story. A family in Colorado decides to stay at a hotel they have to themselves...or do they? Many apparitions are spotted, especially by their son Danny, who is psychic. Over time, the husband goes slowly insane and attempts to kill the family. Really psychological, and deeply traumatic, this move is very etherial, and even has some clever camera tricks at the time.
Verdict:
Ghostbusters (1984)
This time I decided to include a comedy movie, three parapsychologists become ghost hunters in New York. What seems like a small job becomes a task to save the city. I love the comedy in this, it doesn't try too hard. I know I complain when comedy doesn't try because of how many reuse old jokes, but I also don't like when they try too hard, the timing is right, and most of the time it lands. I even love the visual effects of the slimer, because this was before CGI (Not that I cre about visually impressive special effects in what is a film not to be taken seriously).
Verdict:
Dragon Maid (2017)
If you wanted an anime that moved at about the same pace as snailshit, this is the perfect anime for you. Holy shit, it was boring as fuck to watch. It was too boring and too unfunny that I didn't pay attention to half of it. The plot is that some dragon maid moves in with a woman, and trust me, that's it, that's all the show is, nothing more, nothing cool ever happens, the only thing I can say what happens is more characters show up, but let's be honest, no one even cares, they're all the same anime tropes. I'd rather suck on salty Elephant Testicles than watch another goddamned episode.
Verdict:
Uzaki-chan Wants to Hang Out (2020)
Honestly, ever since that Twitter freak-out, everytime I mention about how Uzaki-chan sucks, I get some women telling me not to body-shame women like Uzaki...despite the fact I never even mentioned the huge breasts. If there was some feminist movement in Japan where criticizing shows that just so happen to feature busty women is somehow misogynistic, I'm glad I missed that, because this show is incredibly grating and unwatchable. The main girl, Uzaki, is incredibly annoying, somehow that, combined with the slow pacing, makes it even more unbearable. Not to mention the main guy is too much of a pushover, and now that I realized that these two are really the Wal Mart version of Lan Zhan and Wei Ying from Mo Dao Zu Shi (Which is a better show btw), I can safely say that it's unoriginal (And they say China copies everyone). If hating this show somehow makes me misogynistic, then call me Marijan Siklic, I'm watching some Mo Dao Zu Shi.
Verdict:
Okay, now that wraps up this year's (and last) Halloween Movie Reviews, join me next time as we look at some more Comedy, and some parodies as well.
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