This Week In Film (8/9 – 8/29)
August 9, 2021 - August 29, 2021
• Home For The Holidays • Vampire • This House Possessed • Flesh and Blood Hammer Horror Heritage • Friday The 13th • Friday The 13th 2 • Texas Chainsaw Massacre • Shock • New York Ripper • Free Guy • The Big Lebowski • Annette • 30 Miles From Nowhere • Nightmares • Student Bodies • Jason Rising • Teen Wolf •Candyman •
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Hello readers. We've flown through another month. We were given a literal Friday The 13th of August and a few great theatrical experiences before Delta decided to shut the world down again. Prior to the next collapse of society, we traveled out to Denver to see some old friends. As the world teetered between mask or no mask rules, we mainly stayed in and caught up. We shared some Jason films, hung out with our pup nieces, visited a horror themed bar, and took comfort in one another's company. We hadn't seen each other since before Covid. The visit was short, but everything I didn't know I needed. While I have openly admitted to a crumbling mental health, it was the ability to speak directly with someone who's known me for twenty years that finally allowed room inside the gloom for a bit of hope. Since the visit, we've set up Check In Fridays where we can vent to one another about anything, no matter how big or how small. It's great to feel like a human being again, even if it's only a little at a time. But that's not what I came here to tell you about...
Welcome to This Week In Film where we create a weekly rundown of the random sh*t we watch. There’s a HIGH / LOW at the end of this entry, so if words aren't really your thing, you can scroll quickly, look at pictures, and skip to my favorite viewings of the week.
Lets begin...
OVERVIEW:
Dir: John Llewellyn Moxey
After purchasing Are You In The House Alone? Growing Up
With Gargoyles, Giant Turtles, Valerie Harper, The Cold War, Stephen King &
Co-Ed Call Girls TV movie compendium 1964-1999 edited by Amanda Reyes of
Made For TV Mayhem, I’ve become obsessed with finding the gems. I’ve found most
of the TV movies that I’ve viewed recently are impressive in myriad ways, but I
have also started from the top of the heap. Home For The Holidays rests
firmly at the top and for good reason.
The patriarch of a well-to-do family has sent word that he
believes his wife (their stepmother) is slowly poisoning him to death. Each of
the four estranged daughters are summoned back home. Father passes judgement on
each one and we get to know them as the put-upon, the addict, the lover, and
the student. He requests his children get rid of his wife. Kill her! The
backstory is then introduced through monologues. The new wife had a husband who
died from poisoning, she was acquitted of the charges, went to an asylum, and
met and married the girls’ father. The other backstory is that of the girls’
mother who we believe to have committed suicide when she found out that their
father was stepping out on her. This background gives the film enough meat so
we care when the girls are butchered one after another.
Before they were commonplace, this film features a few red
herrings and becomes a guessing game midway through. Had this film come a
decade later, it would have been a run-of-the-mill slasher knockoff. But in
1972, we are in proto-slasher territory where all horror films and their
elements are scrutinized and academically discussed to see if they had a
bearing on the early eighties slasher boom. There’s the Italian Giallo films of
the sixties and seventies and Black Christmas (1974) that are held as
the main inspirations for John Carpenter’s Halloween (1978). But, is
there also a chance that Carpenter and his college friend Dan O’Bannon tuned in
for Home For The Holidays when it aired? I’d say yes. That chance also
increases with Julie Harris from The Haunting (1963) portraying
the ‘wicked’ stepmother. Any genre geek would have flocked to that.
The film also features a young, but still drunk, Lucille
Bluth (Jessica Walter) who graces the screen along with Julie Harris and an
even younger Sally Field. The kills don’t show much but they are effective. The
twists are intriguing, explanations are satisfactory, and the pre-slasher
street cred makes the whole thing worth it.
VAMPIRE (1979)
Dir: E.W. Swackhamer
Swackhamer’s TV movie follow up to Night Drive (1977) may
not feature Valerie Harper being terrorized by a killer on the road, but it
does follow Father Karris (Jason Miller from The Exorcist (1973)) as a
vampire hunter. Vampire tells the story of Prince Anton Voytek (Richard
Lynch from Invasion U.S.A (1985)), an age-old bloodsucker, who is
awakened after a few decade sleep by the construction of a church. Voytek
befriends an architect, Jason Rowlins (Jason Miller) and requests his help to
unearth a collection of artwork. When Rowlins does a little digging, literal
and metaphorical, he finds all the lost works of art had been stolen through
the ages. Rowlins calls the authorities and all of Voytek’s artwork and potential
wealth are taken. This triggers our main plot: the vampire seeking revenge and
Rowlins forced into becoming a vampire hunter.
Aired on October 7, 1979 on ABC Vampire has become
overshadowed by history. In a little over a month, on November 17, 1979 CBS
would give the world Salem’s Lot. And vampire cinema would never be the
same. Placed in direct comparison by the one month that separated them, there
is no comparison. Vampire fails to create enough suspense to keep you
immersed. The film isn’t without merit as Richard Lynch is more than
serviceable as Voytek and story wise, seeing a vampire seeking revenge is
straight from the pages of Dracula. Jessica Walter plays the vampire’s
daytime servant lawyer, but she believes she’s his lover. She provides a monologue
late in the film about how she had no control when he was around. There are a
few scenes that make the film watchable, maybe not enjoyable, but at least
viewable. After Anton’s been locked up for stolen artwork, he has to rush home
against the morning sun. We see smoke rising from his body in a few interesting
exterior shots. Anton kills the architect’s wife off-screen, and later he must
drive a stake through her heart. And the most memorable aspect of Vampire
is the ending.
Normally, because it is uncouth for a review to reveal a
film’s ending, we stay away from those spoils of spectacle. But in this case,
there may be a select few who wish to track this film down because it features
an open-ended ending. The vampire is never destroyed, and our protagonists must
continue their search for him. It is handled as a happy ending. As good as
somehow prevailed. But, it all felt like wishing for a spin-off show. While it
could have been fun to see Father Karris Vampire Hunter go into a season or
two, Vampire was no The Night Stalker (1972) and the
architect was definitely no Kolchak.
THIS HOUSE POSSESSED (1981)
Dir: William Wiard
Taking a look at Wiard’s filmography, I think I’ve found
another film to seek out Deadly Lessons (1983) with Donna Reed, Ally Sheedy,
Nancy Cartwright, Bill Paxton, and Ellen Geer. It looks like an interesting
slasher film and with star power. Unfortunately, I was watching Wiard’s earlier
TV Movie effort. Just kidding, the film is f*cking weird. And in a good way.
A rockstar, if you can call him that, has a breakdown due to
exhaustion. He does so while belting out a banal ballad to an unimpressed
audience. This leads him to a hospital stay and the hiring of a personal nurse.
The two of them drive off into the middle of nowhere, pick a random town, visit
a real estate agent, and end up in a possessed house.
In an unexplained and ominous way, the house has been
following the exploits of the nurse. The strange domicile is state of the art
with a CCTV system, full automation, and a thirst for bloodshed. You can
believe the nurse was always destined to end up at the house or that the
randomness of the universe led her there. It doesn’t matter. Once the nurse is
‘home,’ the house will never let her leave. From killing a nosey librarian in a
fiery car accident to strangling the musician and deadly projectile glass
shards this house doesn’t f*ck around.
The home’s obsession with our nurse drive the plot. It also
provides a strangeness that endures. The acting works until our nurse has to
plead with the house, but I don’t believe even Meryl Streep could have acted
her way out of that one. Where a decent portion of Made-For-TV movies succeed
is in their building of tension. If you can’t have blood, gore, or nudity, then
suspense is everything. William Wiard gives us fire and a shower of blood, but
nothing ever feels as if it’s at stake. Joan Bennet (Madame Blanc from Suspiria
(1977) or Elizabeth Collins from Dark Shadows) may be boiled in a
swimming pool, but if we are not aware of the full power the house can wield,
then it’s all just death and destruction.
Slim Pickens from Dr. Strangelove…(1964) shows up
after the librarian burns up in her car. He looks at the residue from the fire
and says, “Did your BBQ get out of hand?” Gallows humor is fun when it has a
place in the film, but here an evil house is played in all seriousness. Maybe a
little more tongue-in-cheek material could have made This House Possessed
more impressive.
Side note: There’s a precursor to Oculus (2013) with
a haunted mirror and there’s a red-headed doll that bares a resemblance to the
real Anabelle doll.
FLESH AND BLOOD: THE HAMMER HERITAGE OF HORROR (1994)
Dir: Ted Newsom
The history and legacy of Hammer studios. An informative
documentary that proves director Terrence Fisher was the king of the Hammer
style. It was nice to have Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing narrate the
studios rise to horror fame. There’s not much to say about this. If you’d like
to learn more about Hammer films or want to see a thorough clip show, you’re in
luck. This doc also features behind-the-scenes footage while on sets and
interviews with Joe Dante, John Carpenter, Ray Harryhausen, Roy Ward Baker, Raquel
Welch, Val Guest, Ingrid Pitt and others.
FRIDAY THE 13TH (1980)
Dir: Sean Cunningham
“You’re an American original.”
A boy drowned in 1957, two camp counselors were murdered in
1958, fires and bad water ruined the opening of the camp in 1962, and the camp
laid dormant for 17 years. Against the wishes of the town, a descendant of the
original owner shows up and decides to fix up Camp Crystal Lake. He hires a few
counselors to come out and assist in the rebuild, prep, and eventually take
care of the kids. But some camps should remain closed.
What do you get when you mix Halloween (1978) with Meatballs
(1979)? One of the most successful slasher franchises of all time. Just
like the other slasher heavyweights such as Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974),
Halloween, and A Nightmare On Elm Street (1984) they were biproducts
of a perfect combination of creative artists. Each of the directors (Tobe
Hooper, John Carpenter, Sean Cunningham, and Wes Craven) of these landmarks
found their equally creative special effects artists, actors and actresses, and
writers. These four films spawned – as of this writing – a total of 42 films
over the course of 6 decades. There are camps who swear their horror devotion
to each of these films. And they will defend their decision for singling out
one of the four. If I were forced to choose, I’d be team Halloween, but
that’s mainly because without exaggeration I’ve seen it at least 175 times in
my life and it continues to scare me. However, one major caveat to that choice
is that when I’m feeling depressed Friday The 13th is my
go-to cheer-me-up. The nostalgia I’ve tied to the series makes me return again
and again. But whatever camp you find yourself in, you’re in good company. That
is unless you try to come over to our table and talk about how Child’s Play
(1988) and Chucky are better than the other titans of terror. If that’s
your stance, I don’t know what to tell you bud, you’re on your own.
So, it’s actually Friday the 13th and you’re
starting your marathon with the first film. I remember marathons in my teen
years when I would actually skip the first film to get straight to Jason. I’d
watch the MonsterVision marathon or the USA Up All Night marathons, but I
remember one marathon the best. It was a homemade marathon cobbled together
from VHS tapes. I skipped to Jason so I started with part 2 and I also skipped
part 5. I was going the strictly Jason route. As a ten-year-old, Jason Takes
Manhattan was the end of the Voorhees saga. I began the marathon around
eight at night after school, homework, and dinner. I sat through final girls:
Ginny, Chris, Trish and Tommy Jarvis, Tommy Jarvis, and Tina. My eyes began to
close as a group of students went on a class cruise to New York. The sun was
rising, and I was sleeping. But when I finally woke up, I felt a sense of
accomplishment. And I’ve been marathoning the Friday The 13th
films ever since. Traditions should be made from things that make you happy.
FRIDAY THE 13TH PART II (1981)
Dir: Steve Miner
"I don't want to scare anyone, but I'm going to give it
to you straight about Jason. His body was never recovered from the lake after
he drowned. And if you listen to the old timers in town, they'll tell you he's
still out there...”
The opening of Part II is infuriating. Our final girl from
the first film is the first to be killed off. We learn that it’s only been two
months since tragedy befell Camp Crystal Lake, and Alice Hardy is trying to get
on with her life. The trauma is very present, and she’s trying to work through
it with painting. Her lover, Steve Christy, is dead along with a group of new
friends. She decapitated a murderer. And she was pulled into the lake by a
deformed boy. Alice is doing her best under the circumstances. Instead of
forcing her to go back to the camp in a plot point that would be reused
throughout horror – most notably with Ripley in Aliens (1986), Steve
Miner and writer Ron Kurz decided to include a Hitchcock flourish. Kill off
your star, and your audience will throw their expectations out the window.
But here’s the problem with that. Now, I can’t go back to
1981 when this film was released and try to understand audience expectations.
All I can assume is that a typical viewer would think the new killer would be
the boy from the lake. So, the moment a foot steps through a puddle and we see
that the film is following Alice, we know that if she is going to die it will
be due to the boy from the lake. Instead of a Hitchcock flourish, this scene is
pure revenge. Jason has tracked down the killer of his mother and has placed
his mother’s decapitated head inside her killer’s fridge. He makes sure she is
reminded of what she has done before he enacts his justice.
Most viewers catch on to the thrill of Jason’s kills later
into the series. Meaning, Jason becomes the star and must kill a new stable of
vice-ridden teens. But it is in the first scene of Part II that we are already
thrust into Jason’s perspective, and we never leave through the rest of the
series. Of course, this lends itself into horror theory. One theory states: we
are given the permission to do heinous things through the eyes the of the
killer, then transform into the final girl to punish that horrible side of us.
If we view the rest of Part II from Jason’s
perspective then we have a boy who has grown into a young adult that has been
living on his own in the woods since he found justice for the death of his mom,
and he likes to spy on others. It has been quiet for five years since the death
of Alice. But it is either when Jason sees Jeff and Sandra trespassing into his
territory or when the prophet of doom trespasses, that sets him on his killing
spree. From Part II, this spree continues until the end of Part IV
as the continuity is over the course a few weeks, if that. Those meddling kids.
Should have just left him alone. Or gone drinking.
One of my favorite realizations in Part II is that
the councilors who choose to go out and get sh*tfaced are safe. This includes
the African American councilors. While the black councilors do not get more
than a few seconds of screentime, they are there. And more importantly in the
annuls of horror films, they survive. This flock of survivalists are led by,
what Cabin In The Woods (2011) would deem The Fool, Ted. Head councilor
trainers Paul and Ginny leave Ted in charge. Ted is told to wrap it up and get
all the councilors back to camp. Instead, Ted, inquires about after-hours bars.
They are far from sober, far from returning to camp, and far from Jason’s
reach. Later in the series, academics would liken Jason to a Reagan-era
response to decency. If Jason senses vice, he must destroy it. Anyone caught
with sex or drugs on the mind must be punished. This is even used to comedic
effect in later sequels. However, with Part II, getting drunk with
locals saved lives. That’s the PSA I get from the film now.
I’m realizing there’s too much to say about the Friday
the 13th series. I want to talk about how Ginny is one of the
best final girls. Because in one moment she pisses herself seeing a rat but, in
another moment, she uses psychology to really mindf*ck Jason. Vulnerable and
intelligent as most horror audiences feel. Alone with the big bad scary thing
on the screen. Our emotions heightened. Anything can happen. We can get so
scared we piss ourselves or squeeze the life out of the loved one next to us,
or jump from our seat, but we’re smart enough to scream at the character when
they’re being stupid. But, Ginny, you are never that. You make decisions we
would all make in your situation. Then you want to talk about that cobbled together
ending. Where is Paul? Where the f*ck is Paul? I mean, I only care that Ginny
survived, her deuteragonist sidekick isn’t as important. But to give us that
normal Friday fade to white and no Paul? I mean he is still the guy that
tried to subtly shame Ginny for having her period by scrawling, "Beware of
Bears" on her mirror. And maybe he deserves no ending. Maybe Paul, being
the smarmy guy who opens his training center right on the property line of Camp
Crystal Lake gets a fade to white and nothing else. Ultimately, he is the one
responsible for all the deaths in… possibly the rest of the series. Let me
think that one through. Then I’ll let you go.
Paul opens training camp, his councilors trespass, Jason
begins killing spree, and this spree lasts until Tommy Jarvis kills him. Roy
dons Jason’s mask to kill as revenge for the death of his son. Tommy revives
Jason in an accidental Frankenstein moment which continues Jason’s rampage
through the rest of the series. Yeah, that’s a lot of death you’re responsible
for sir. A fade to white is sufficient.
TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE (1974)
Dir: Tobe Hooper
A big thank you to Slashers in Denver. What an excellent
night! The theme for the day was chainsaw Saturday. As the wife and I came into
Denver to visit friends, our wardrobe was limited. But, why would I ever leave
the house without my fancy purple Pieces (1982) shirt? Now, if you’ve
never been to Slashers, don’t beat yourself up too bad they haven’t been open
that long. You walk through the door and directly in front of you on the far
wall is a projected horror film. The bar is to your right and there are tables
on your left. There’s also an assortment of flat screens hanging from the walls
on either side. I took one look at the projected image, and I saw a boy sitting
down putting a puzzle together. It was f*cking Timmy from Pieces,
moments before he’d take an axe to his mother’s head. While I hate being the
center of attention, there was a modicum of pride as the proprietor gave me a
shout out. It was absolute coincidence as they played random chainsaw films all
day long. To come in from Chicago on Chainsaw Saturday, wear a Pieces shirt,
and then wear said shirt entering the establishment at the same time they were
showing the film… Coincidence? Yes, it’s that random sh*t of the universe.
Later, this guy who looked exactly like Rob Corddry, started quizzing me on Pieces
for fun. If it was you Rob Corddry, thanks for putting me on the spot. What
does all this have to do with Texas Chainsaw Massacre? You can’t have
Chainsaw Saturday without the Granddaddy of them all.
It was super fun with a bar audience. Everyone appropriately
laughed at Franklin falling into a ditch and gasped at the hitchhiker and
screamed when the big steel door closes after first seeing Leatherface. As you
can tell this isn’t a review of the film. If anything, I just really want to
celebrate the curation culture we’re living in. Shudder, Telluride Horror Film
Festival, Chattanooga Film Festival, Music Box of Horrors, Overlook Film
Festival, everything the Alamo Drafthouse does, and every repertory cinema
house across the globe, keep showing classic horror. Keep the conversation
going. There’s such a great community of nerds across the globe that come
together every time a hillbilly from Texas does a chainsaw ballet in front of a
rising summer sun. Provide the event and they will come. Field Of Screams…
amirite?
SHOCK (1977)
Dir: Mario Bava
Quick review: should this be the first Bava film you see,
absolutely not. Is it the worst Bava film I’ve seen, absolutely not. I love
Bava. I could always dive deeper into his filmography, but I’m a fan of his
landmarks Black Sunday (1960), The Evil Eye (1963), Black Sabbath (1963),
Blood and Black Lace (1964), Hatchet For The Honeymoon (1970), and A Bay
Of Blood (1971). The dive could go deeper, but Bava’s cinematography and
invention have always been my favorite aspects of his films. Each frame of Black
Sunday is a perfectly composed photograph. The colors are so rich and
saturated in Blood and Black Lace that we understand how the beauty of Suspiria
(1977) could one day happen. The Evil Eye or also known as The
Girl Who Knew Too Much is the birth of the Giallo film and coupled with
Hitchcock’s Psycho (1960) and Powell’s Peeping Tom (1960) we see
the birth of the proto-slasher film. Without Bay of Blood the impressive
kills in several Friday The 13th films would not exist. To
begin a write up of Shock with a celebration of the director’s career is
to steer away from the more banal aspects found in the filmmaker’s final film.
Bava’s filmography has its fair share of missteps, and keeping that in mind, Shock
is not one of those either.
Dora played by Daria Nicolodi has moved back into her former
home after years away. She's brought her son Marco and new airline pilot
husband with her. Dora is plagued by her past. Marco's father was abusive and a
drug addict. It's said he committed suicide at sea, but his body was never
found. Dora had a breakdown, spent time in an institution, had some
electroshock therapy to destroy some memories, but is doing much better now. It
seems the house wants her to remember more. Marco begins to exhibit incestuous
tendencies toward his mom, talk to empty swings, and shred his mom’s underwear.
Is the boy screwed up, is it in the mom's head, or is he becoming possessed by
his drug addict father? Are we going to be shocked?
We may grow tired asking ourselves questions about the
film’s motive, but all will be answered. And the shock that we seek is coming.
While it takes a few story beats to find its bearings, Shock is still
well crafted. Mario’s son, Lamberto Bava wrote the script. Lamberto had
assisted his father directing from 1966 (age 22) on. When Mario died, Lamberto
assisted Dario Argento on Inferno (1980), Ruggero Deodato on Cannibal
Holocaust (1980), and made his first feature Macabre (1980). The
idea of being possessed by one’s own father lingers as a metaphor for
Lamberto’s own career as he dove headfirst into horror filmmaking.
NEW YORK RIPPER (1982)
Dir: Lucio Fulci
A dog playing fetch by the waterfront, brings back a severed
hand. Thus, our investigation begins. All we learn is the killer has a
duck-like voice. Our first kill. A woman attempts to vandalize a car from
within. The killer slides in the car. His switchblade springs erect, and the
woman is trapped between the ferry and the killer. We see Lady Liberty in the
distance. The killer stabs her in the stomach, slicing upward toward her
sternum, another stab in her left breast, and then he pulls the blade down. The
wounds bleed dark red. We see her scream. The ferry's horn and the water's
current drown her out. We've reached the other side, the car remains lifeless,
and we see her topless corpse. Our first on-screen kill down, and if we made it
through unscathed, Fulci will see to it that the next one will up the ante.
Filled with live sex acts on 42nd Street, broken bottles
penetrating female organs, razor blades slicing through nipples, big toe
seduction, ASMR in the 80's, throat slicing, burnt-out cops, sex-workers, and
DJ's dedicated to the case. This is the grisly world of Fulci's New York City. The
New York Ripper has no redeeming value to it. It’s misogynistic, nasty, and
brilliant. There is still not a version of this film that has been release
fully uncut. The effects work here are so convincingly brutal they are on par
with Cannibal Holocaust (1980). If Ripper was shot as a
documentary film and the actresses provided additional funds to hide out for a
few months for promotion, Fulci would have been arrested too. The gore that
Fulci insisted upon in Zombie (1979) or his Gates Of Hell trilogy
made his name synonymous with gross-out effects. The practical effects he
includes in Ripper are all reality-based. There are no zombies, there’s
no puss, there’s no eye splinters, there is just an old-fashion knife-wielding
serial killer. Fulci, when he’s at his simplest, is at his most depraved.
FREE GUY (2021)
Dir: Sean Leavy
The popcorn event of the summer is not Marvel’s Black
Widow (2021), it’s a strange mixture of what Deadline and a RelishMix call
a combination of, “Ready Player One, Wreck-It Ralph, The Matrix, The Truman
Show on steroids, and Grand Theft Auto.” From early trailers, where
audiences had no idea what to expect from the world Ryan Reynolds’ character
inhabits to later trailers that spell out he’s a non-playable character in a
game owned by Taika Waititi, we knew the humor would be razor-sharp. As a 20th
Century Studios film, we quickly forget it’s owned by Disney. But then we see
some Marvel references and remember that even our new original entertainment is
owned by a conglomerate monopolizing our amusement.
You have to love how Ryan Reynolds plays a live action Emmet
Brickowski from The Lego Movie (2014). Instead of, “Everything is
awesome!” Reynolds’ Guy has a mantra of, “Don’t have a good day, have a great
day!” That is until he meets someone who destroys his normal routine. From then
on, his eyes are opened to the world he creates, and he will do anything in the
name of love.
In Free Guy, there are sunglasses people. These
people seem to do whatever they want to do and get away with it. By
not-so-random chance, Guy gets ahold of a pair of these glasses. Now he sees
his world as playable missions. The moment he dons the glasses, I’m waiting for
him to chew bubblegum and kick some *ss. He only does the latter. I’m thinking
it’s such a wasted reference until there’s a moment where he grabs a second
pair of sunglasses and asks his friend, Buddy to put them on. This is it. The
two of them are going to go full Carpenter. Sean Leavy won’t be able to contain
himself. We’re going to get a ten minute fight scene right in the middle of
this bank. I gripped my wife’s hand, her eyes glimmered with the same hope mine
did. But nothing. F*cking nothing. How dare you! You can’t just get our hopes
up like that. But, the character of Dude almost makes up for it. I love how
Dude is not entirely finished. It’s very smart. He’ll scream out,
“Catchphrase!” Or, my favorite and maybe that subtle They Live reference
I was looking for, “There are three things I love in life: kicking *ss, TBD,
insert third thing here.”
While there’s a conventional romantic comedy under layers of
technology, open world games, and discourses on advances in artificial
intelligence, I agree with Sean Leavy when he says, “Free Guy was built
with one prime objective, audience delight.” Whether we feel manipulated by
another Disney property, it’s that delightful kind of manipulation.
THE BIG LEBOWSKI (1998)
Dir: Coen Brothers
"Yeah, well, that's just, like, your opinion,
man." Just like many others before and after. There is no way to pin down
the Dude. A rug, that really ties the room together, is pissed on, and it sets
into motion a neo-noir tale that none of the characters care to be in. Nothing
is learned. Nothing is gained. There is no arc for the main character. He is
who he is from beginning to end. From one White Russian to another the world
spins as he lights up another joint. The Dude is our hero because of this.
The period of the late nineties is an odd one filled with
apathetic white dudes emasculated by the world around them and completely
ineffectual to their surroundings. The Narrator in Fight Club (1999) is
often misread from the perspective of weakened white dudes seeking power when
in fact it was a satire of misogyny itself. The Narrator prior to meeting his
split personality is content with owning things that eventually own him. He is
content with not feeling and not sleeping and not caring about life around him.
How about Lester Burnham (*cringe* Kevin Spacey) from American Beauty
(1999)? He’s reached his midlife crisis and the best part of his day is
hiding in his shower and masturbating before he has to face his wasted life. He
fears the end has come, but as art imitating life would have it, a predilection
for pedophilia gives him a new lease at getting his sh*t together. The only
difference is that Lester doesn’t act on his urges the way Kevin did. Let’s
look at Raoul Duke (Johnny Depp) in Fear And Loathing In Las Vegas (1998)
based on the real life Hunter S. Thompson who allowed life to happen to him,
happen all around him, and he reacted in his writings. And sometimes with a
gun, but that’s besides the point. There’s the one-two punch of The Truman
Show (1998) and EdTV (1999) that thought that boring white dudes
were so important we should be watching them 24/7. But all of these films
create a breakthrough in the main character whether it’s the creation of an
imaginary friend, recapturing their youth, a bender to end-all-benders, their
boat crashing through the fourth wall, or the realization that worship is
overrated. This leaves The Big Lebowski, whose Jeffrey Lebowski is the
same when we meet him as when we leave him. If we do see any movement in The
Dude’s character, it is when Donny dies.
“I didn't like seein' Donny go.” Within all the humor of Lebowski,
we have the death of Donny. In the world of Walter and The Dude, Donny was the
innocent. You can see it when he’s sipping his sodas and excited by his
strikes. He can’t ever understand the depraved sh*t Walter and Dude get
themselves into, and that’s why he’s constantly asking questions. Whether you
like it or not, you respond to Donny’s innocence, and when he dies for no
reason to the plot you’re affected. His meaningless heart attack that has no
place in the plot is a result of the conflict with the nihilists. This is funny
on its own. But, Donny’s death does give Dude the chance to finally speak up
against Walter’s bullsh*t… while covered in Donny’s ashes. Does this explosion
amount to anything? No, the pair go bowling. The same can be said for the Noir
characters Lebowski draws from. After the case, life for the hard-living
detective seemingly go back to normal.
Maude: Lord, you can imagine where it goes from here?
The Dude: He fixes the cable?
Dude as a Bogart-esque detective is one of those impressive details place right beneath the surface that keeps you returning again and again to the film. The Coen brothers have made a perfect parody of Noir films, but by injecting absurdism, surrealist dream imagery, and quirky characters we’re never confronted directly with their film-geek musings. We have the mystery, Dude as detective, Margot as femme fatale, and twists in plot. Even the quick wit dialogue of film noir is present. It’s just delivered through the slur of White Russians. Bogart would never show fear in the face of any threat. Neither does the Dude. We can easily write it off as him being an impressive *sshole, but instead, it’s that noir trope shining through. “Careful man, there’s a beverage here!” While being manhandled and tossed into a car is humorous because its calm in the face of aggression. “Obviously, you’re not a golfer,” “At least I’m housebroken,” and, “Yeah well, I still jerk off manually.” All among Dude’s arsenal of quips to disarm his would-be aggressors. Can you imagine Dude as a late nineties Philip Marlowe? Absolutely. Think about the evolution: Humphrey Bogart in The Big Sleep (1946), to Elliott Gould in The Long Goodbye (1973) to Jeff Bridges in The Big Lebowski. I can see it.
ANNETTE (2021)
Dir: Leos Carax
Are we so bankrupt in entertainment, that a musical
desperate to be a tragedy feels as though it must force cliches through a
student experimental film aesthetic? Nothing in this film is as good as its
intro and outro. As we plug in with the Sparks brothers and follow them outside
with the cast we are rejuvenated. We are about to see something we’ve never
seen before. We’re going to see a spectacle. Then nothing happens for two hours
and ten minutes until we see the cast again behind the running end credits.
They tell us goodbye. They’re having a jovial time as they leave this film. So
are we.
If you want to make an opera musical, then do it. If you
want to make a surrealist film, then do it. Don’t take the elements that don’t
work from each thing you want to make and cobble something together out of it.
Disclosure: I am a fan of musicals, normally any musical. I have even seen Cats
(2020) twice. Not a fact that I am proud of, but it relates because it was
hard to watch Annette once. Disclosure: This cast is phenomenal, just
not in this film. Who doesn’t love Adam Driver and Marion Cotillard? And I
actively watched Big Bang Theory for eight seasons, so I also have love
for Simon Helberg. Disclosure: Leos Carax is a brilliant filmmaker. Holy
Motors (2012) is a revelation in cinema. Had Annette had an ounce of
the energy contained in a single minute of Holy Motors, there’d be
nothing but praise.
The story. Turn back now if you actually care. Also, avert
your eyes if there’s a chance that reading a full spoiler summary might make
you want to watch this. Okay, here it goes. Comedian and opera singer wed, give
birth to a wooden puppet, wife becomes successful, comedian becomes a loser,
they try to mend the relationship but the wife dies, wife's voice gets trapped into
their daughter, the comedian is financially wrecked so he hires his wife's
former accompanist to help baby Annette's career as a miracle baby, miracle
baby goes on tour, daddy is tortured by hearing his dead wife's voice coming
out of his daughter, he gets more drunk, he eventually kills, Annette witnesses
the murder, instead of one last show she tells the world her dad kills people,
daddy goes to jail, he finally sees his child as a person and not a puppet, and
he'll be alone forever. The bone-chilling metaphor of a child as a puppet, oh
no, that’s that student film aesthetic I was mentioning earlier.
Be nice. Alright, there is a scene of Marion Cotillard
singing while receiving cunnilingus. And to mention the sets and cinematography
were impressive, not all the time, but most of the time. The award for
creepiest baby ever captured on film goes to Baby Annette. You never get used
to it, and that’s saying a lot considering the film is nearly two and a half
hours long. Have I already mentioned the film’s length? Oh, I’m sorry. Another
interesting tidbit came up in the end credits. I haven’t enjoyed end credits
this much in a long time. Adam Driver personally wished to thank Chris Rock and
Bill Burr. I’m assuming this meant that the terrible comedy skits he did, he
based his style of delivery on Rock and Burr. The more you know, right?
30 MILES FROM NOWHERE (2018)
Dir: Caitlin Koller
30 Miles From Nowhere is the feature directorial
debut of Caitlin Koller, who has created a suspenseful and horror fueled version
of The Big Chill (1983). But don’t tell anyone in 30 Miles that,
because they believe the characters in The Big Chill were ancient and
boring… and didn’t they all sleep with each other. Moments of brevity and
character backstory and interactions between the college friends plant the
story firmly in a reality you can grasp. It raises the stakes and allows us
viewers to walk in their shoes. Simple story elements are shaken out early on.
We are as the title says 30 miles from nowhere, cell signal is shoddy at best,
there’s a storm coming, when it rains the roads wash out, and there’s an old
woman with dementia wandering the property at all hours so have a good night.
Five friends from college reunite to bury their friend Max.
The widow Sylvia (played to perfection by Carrie Preston from True Blood) has
invited Max’s college friends to stay the weekend in a cabin on Max’s childhood
estate. The friends all bond over their past and bicker over not being more
present in each other’s lives. All while something slowly stirs around them.
Eventually the bonds of friendship are tested and not everyone will survive the
weekend.
Caitlin Koller and writer Seana Kofoed bring these
characters to life. It is a cliched statement but a genuine sentiment. Each of
the friends have layers that shed light on their decisions which works more
than enough to service a minimalist blueprint story. Nowhere in this film, do
we feel as though we are in the hands of a first-time filmmaker. The suspense
is palpable and the questions we direct at the plot keep it moving at a
break-neck speed. I’m excited to follow all future projects from this creative
team.
NIGHTMARES (AKA STAGE FRIGHT (1980))
Dir: John D. Lamond
We watch a girl traumatized by watching her mother have sex
with random men. She eventually causes her mother and one of her lovers to die
in a car accident. After years of being institutionalized she is released. She
auditions and gets a role in a play about the absurdity of death. As her fellow
actors and crew begin to die off, her sanity seems to slip away. Each death is
shot through the trappings of a slasher / Giallo whodunnit film. The killer
breaks a window or mirror, grabs a glass shard, and stabs anyone near. The
cinematography and ample amounts of nudity almost make this film tolerable. But
you have this question in your head the whole time, “It’s the girl from the
beginning, the actress we’re following, who’s the killer right?” Then our brain
tells us, “No, there’s no reason for POV shots if it’s her.” If it was
Cathy/Helen, our lead, then the film should have that Maniac (1980) feeling
where we watch someone become completely unstable. Wait, as of this sentence I
think I realized what the director / writers were going for.
The girl at the beginning is named Cathy. There are hints
that Helen drops in the film that Cathy won’t let her do things. So, we are
supposed to believe there is a Cathy and a Helen. But it takes two viewings and
an attempt at writing something critical about this film to even discover that
detail. Developing this idea would have been easy. The inclusion of a Cathy and
Helen as sisters in the beginning of the film and having Cathy also die in the
accident would have solved any plot issues. Then when it came out that Helen
was some Norman / Norma Bates-type killer we would understand. And the mystery
would make sense. But as it is, the film is a complete mess.
STUDENT BODIES (1981)
Dir: Mickey Rose, Michael Ritchie
I’ve seen Student Bodies a few times and each time I
do so, I’m let down all over again. I wanted to view it this time with the
hopes of adding it to our upcoming 31 Days of Horror list for Halloween 2021,
but I don’t want to subject others to this letdown.
The film starts off strong a title card says it’s Halloween,
then says Friday The 13th, and finally Jamie Lee Curtis’ Birthday.
We enter a suburban home where a babysitter is chatting with a friend on the
phone while a heavy breathing POV shot lingers outside. The breather calls the
babysitter multiple times and here we learn we are firmly in Airplane!
(1980) slapstick territory with a parody of slasher films. Next, the
babysitter’s boyfriend shows up, and they head upstairs for sex. The breather
opens a roll top desk to find an arsenal of potential weapons, but the killer
chooses a paperclip. Slapstick territory indeed.
Student Bodies features a Carnival of Souls (1962)
surrealist fake-out ending after it is discovered the killer is a mother and
son duo, but the mother is actually the son’s father, and none of it matters
anyway because our star wakes up to a Wizard of Oz (1939) ending. And
you were there, and you were there, and you were there too. But if those
endings weren’t enough, they throw in a Carrie (1976) one as well. In
this style of spoof, they toss anything at the screen to see what will stick.
But that’s the anomaly, that so-called style of spoof didn’t exist in 1981.
Maybe I have to walk that statement back and take a look at horror parody
through the ages and see if this thesis holds up.
Abbott and Costello met Frankenstein, Dracula, The Wolf Man,
Boris Karloff, The Invisible Man, Dr. Jekyll, and The Mummy during the 1940’s
and 1950’s with sight gags and drawing their stories around the central fiends.
Mel Brooks gave us a parody of Frankenstein’s monster with Young Frankenstein
(1974). In Brooks’ film, the knowledge of the Shelly’s Frankenstein
helps; however, the laughs come from humor built into the situations springing
from the plot. Without knowledge of the creature or a new creature all-together,
and the comedy may remain. You could argue Attack of the Killer Tomatoes
(1978) was another creature feature spoof as well. Rocky Horror Picture
Show (1975) is at times a parody of RKO science fiction films of the 1950s.
But what does all this data imply? Well, I’d like to say it means that Student
Bodies is wholly different, but it’s not. It is true, the film mimics a
sub-genre for laughs like all horror parodies that came before it. The major
difference seems to lie in the source material for the spoof. When Abbot and
Costello poked fun of horror they did so with long established Universal
characters. And again, when Mel Brooks did horror for humor he did so with one
of the most iconic monsters. The killer tomatoes rolling across movie screens
were just an extension of 1950’s B-movies. But when we get to Student Bodies
we get a film that isn’t spoofing long held traditions in horror. The slasher
film had only become a firm sub-genre within the same year of the filming and
release of Student Bodies.
This is not the place to discuss the golden age of the
slasher. We merely place this here to create the historical relevance of Student
Bodies. And while the film itself isn’t great, it holds a landmark status
for how quick the popularity of a slew of films veered to a parody of itself.
This isn’t just a one-off strange occurrence; it would happen again. At the
peak of the slasher resurgence after Scream (1996), Scary Movie
(2000) would be released and lead to the downfall of Slashers 2.0. But if
we go back to May 9, 1980 when Friday The 13th was released,
it was the starting gun for a marathon of slasher films. Yes, we all know that Halloween
(1978), Black Christmas (1974), and Psycho (1960) were blueprints
for the slasher film, but we’re talking about that great river of imitators that
spewed forth between 1980 and 1984. Let’s narrow our search to May 1980 to
August 1981 – when Student Bodies was released. In a little over a year
there were nearly 40 slasher films released. Even in 1980 when Airplane!
Was released, it drew from Airport (1970) film series and various
disaster films of the 1970’s. It pulled from a decade of films. This is Student
Bodies greatest achievement and greatest failure at the same time. The
makers created a spoof of a sub-genre that had not been established which is
impressive; however, there wasn’t enough material or subtext from the sub-genre
to pull from.
JASON RISING: A FRIDAY THE 13TH FAN FILM (2021)
Dir: James Sweet
It’s getting old already. Stop fighting over the f*cking
rights already and make more Jason movies! There’s enough money to be made by
all interested parties. I get it Sean, you made Jason the badass villain he is today,
and Victor had him as a drowned deformed child. Do you see what you’ve done to
fans by letting this litigation linger on? We’re content with content where no
one gets paid. How about a slice of that humble pie?
One day, horror historians will look back and see this spat
of homegrown Voorhees love, and they will include each of these films in the
official canon of the Friday The 13th series. Vincente
DiSanti’s Never Hike Alone (2017) and Never Hike In The Snow (2020)
will sit alongside Cody Faulk’s Voorhees (2020), Riley Lorden’s Fall
of Camp Blood (2021), Peter Antony’s Rose Blood (2021), Jason
Brooks’ Friday The 13th Vengeance (2019), and all the varying
sequels to these fan films will be included as a box set for Friday The 13th
13!. Until then, keep em’ coming.
In Jason Rising we see a sheriff ensuring Jason is
chained, crated, and buried after the events at Camp Crystal Lake. Years later,
a few inmates from Wessex County Corrections Farm escape into the Crystal Lake
wilderness. A couple US Marshals, a local sheriff, and deputy help add to the
possible body count as they are all eventually hunted by our hockey-masked
maniac. But we also get a headless and headed Pamela Voorhees in a great homage
to The Evil Dead II (1987). The film also reworks the history of Friday
The 13th and Friday The 13th Part II with the
inclusion of Alice (Adrienne King) and Ginny (Amy Steel) but I’m not going to
say how.
Made via a $38,738.00 Indiegogo campaign and immeasurable
hours of dedication and love, James Sweet and his cohorts set out to create the
New Jersey slasher in Oregon’s more-than-picturesque forests. The spate of fan
made Friday films all have great production values. They have realized
that if you’re going to rise above the crop of homemade, backyard, horror
productions you should know how to light a scene, utilize a drone for epic
cutaways, color correct, and focus all your efforts on sound. While you may not
have the best non-actors ever, if it looks like a million-dollar production,
you’re going to turn heads. And you are making this for Friday fans. You
know you’re filling the gap, providing entertainment, and paying fan service
any way you can. Thank you Alice! If for any reason, you hear the words fan
film and they make you cringe, think again. It is from these films, your inner
child will feel heard and rejuvenated.
TEEN WOLF (1985)
Dir: Rod Daniel
We have it marked in our shared calendar. I don’t know why,
but we do. August 23, 1985 the day Teen Wolf was released. I believe it started
as a joke. We saw it come up on one of our news feeds and said, “Sure, let’s
watch Teen Wolf.” That was five years ago. And now it’s tradition. And
like they say on Letterkenny, “You don’t f*ck with tradition.”
The three main characters in the film are fantastic. At
first you want to say that Scott Howard (Michael J. Fox) is a school wimp turned
cool wolf, but Scott was never uncool. Scott’s on the basketball team. He has
his own clique of friends. He’s nice to everyone. There’s nothing categorically
wrong with Scott. Sure, maybe he pines after the blonde who prefers
twenty-year-old seniors from other high schools. And it gives him a complex
about himself. But, aside from a lack of confidence, Scott’s a cool dude.
His friend Stiles (Jerry Levine) is off-the-charts dreamy.
Aside from his problematic and uninformed stance on homosexuals or his cringe-inducing
attempts at an 80’s blaccent when speaking with Beacon Town High’s one of maybe
four black students, Stiles has bravado. The ignorant aspects of Stiles’
personality seem easily fixed as he is malleable in every sense. Had Scott came
out as gay instead of a werewolf, I have no doubt that Stiles would have made
T-shirts for his gay best friend. I’m not advocating for Stiles’ innocence
here, but some people are just f*cking stupid. They need, as the wife says,
some sense beaten’ into them. But that confidence Stiles has is dreamy indeed.
Lisa “Boof” Marconi (Susan Ursitti) still has the worst
nickname ever on film. There is no explanation anywhere on how she was given
the nickname BOOF. But luckily/unluckily for us we were given the sh*tshow of
the slimy rapist Brett Kavanaugh’s confirmation hearings which went into a
diatribe on the word Boof as it appeared in one of Brett’s yearbooks. From here
we were given two parallel definitions to the word. Boof as Kavanaugh would
describe was a common phrase for farting; however, the yearbook asked the
question, “Have you boofed yet?” This then leads back to an early 80’s
etymology of the word and in this context it’s parlance would be more equivocal
to the reference to anal sex. So, thanks Kavanaugh hearing, now I’m wondering
if the true love interest of Teen Wolf is Fart or Anal Sex? Either way,
Boof has more style, understanding, history, and coolness than Pam the blonde.
Boof could probably do way better than Scott.
Anyway, lets talk about werewolves. The myth of the
lycanthrope is normally derived from the inability to control one’s Id. Or
that’s just something I read once, but lets stick with it. The Id is some Freud
territory, Ego, Superego, and Id. We can just as easily use Jung’s Shadow to
describe the wolf characteristics or any number of loss of self, pop psychology
terms. Literature and film have always used the wolf to bring out the literal
animal inside us. To set aside the millions of years of evolution and get to
that primordial – survival – self. When we become the beast, all that was human
is gone in service to instinct. What does Scott do as a werewolf? He plays
basketball. But if we continue this path we see he gives up aspects of his
humanity in service to his confidence/instincts. Scott never veers too far off
from his good-guy self. I mean if tearing Mick-the-prick’s tie and shirt at the
‘big dance’ is the loss of Scott’s humanity, may we all be so inhumane. The
werewolf can either learn to live with it like Scott or Oz from Buffy,
give into the beast entirely like Nicholson and Spader in Wolf (1994),
or die as every other werewolf. It always depends on the underpinning morality
being displayed in the fiction. These stories tell us those instincts are never
done with us. We can manage them or let them control us and see our
consequences.
My favorite part of Teen Wolf? I’m so glad you asked
that question. That has to be at the end. Scott’s won the big game, snubbed
Pam, kissed Boof, gets the applause of his father, and then we get to see the
guy behind Scott’s dad stand up. This random extra stands up and not only is
his fly down, but his pants are unbuttoned, and you see his Tighty Whities. He
notices, fumbles his coat to block his groin, and attempts to nonchalantly zip
up. The film actually ends with a freeze frame the moment after he’s fully
zipped. F*cking classic.
CANDYMAN (2021)
Dir: Nia DaCosta
“Say his name.”
Brilliant reboot sequel that shows the myth of Candyman is
as needed today as it was in 1992. Nia DaCosta updates the legend of Candyman
in a direction that feels as if it originated in Bernard Rose’s 1992 film. While Clive Barker's short story is set in the
UK on Spector Street, Bernard Rose learned of the high murder rate and terrible
living conditions that were forced upon Chicago's low-income black population
and knew the story gave itself more to Cabrini-Green than anywhere else. Rose
was also influenced by the 1987 killing of Ruthie Mae McCoy who was shot dead
by intruders who broke into her apartment by entering through her bathroom
mirror. Once Rose chose the housing project in Chicago and gathered his
research, he changed the Jaundiced villain of Barker's story to a black man
suffering from a history of trauma. That trauma was created once Rose chose
Tony Todd to portray his myth. Todd assisted in developing the backstory for
Candyman that wasn't present in the short story. It was this backstory that
provides Helen and Candyman a deeper connection that's rooted in ancestral
trauma, and it birthed an origin story soaked in honey and slavery.
As the story of Helen is retold through generations, she is
remembered as the villain once we get to Nia DaCosta's remake. The myth of
Helen is one where a lunatic white woman kidnapped a black child from the
projects as a sacrifice to Candyman. We know that it is Helen's ignorance at
attempting to defraud the myth of Candyman that causes his return. He must
return to re-ignite the belief in his own legend. A white woman coming in to
discredit a story about a black man tortured by slave owners for falling in
love sounds a lot like whitewashing history. Helen is punished but is also
allowed to be a white savior at the end of the 1992 Candyman; that information
is forgotten as the legend is passed down. The nineties had a lot of white
saviors in films, DaCosta's film takes that away as one of the first layered
details to connect this film to the original.
Cabrini-Green has changed a lot since 1992. They have torn
down the red and white high rises as of 2011, promising to rebuild with more
modern homes for the Chicago Housing Authority. Instead, the area is gentrified
with mid-rise condo-plexes that no one can afford. What’s left is a cluster of
137 row houses just north of Chicago Avenue. These units sit next to another
450 that are fenced-off and rot away. The stretch of Division Street that once
showcased the high-rises is now an open lot utilized for a City Farm. But all
around that landmark, there's Xavier lofts, Parkside condos, @Properties, and
Larrabee Place Apartments.
DaCosta's new characters inhabit this newly gentrified world
of Cabrini-Green. When our protagonist, Anthony McCoy (Yahya Abdul-Mateen II)
hears the story of Helen and Candyman, he becomes obsessed. Much in the same
way Helen became obsessed, but here, Anthony is a struggling artist who hasn't
had a new painting in a few years. There is something about the story that he
connects with and sends him down the rabbit-hole. While it may feel as if it
has several of the same beats as Helen's Candyman story, it shifts quickly.
Anthony produces a work for an art show that invites participants to "Say
His Name." The installation includes a bathroom mirror, which when opened,
shows violent artworks inside. This sparks others to say Candyman five times in
the mirror, but this becomes a story happening in the background. We follow
Anthony as he uncovers more about the origin of Candyman and what he can do to
stop him, making us question if he even should stop him.
The wife and I were blown away. The film was a perfect mix
of social commentary, reboot, sequel, fan service, and conversation engagement.
I had a few qualms about the film, so when I ran to social media I wanted to
see what other people had to say about the same issues I had. I figured
everyone would be talking about how the rampant virus of Candyman killings were
mostly shown as PG-13 or off-screen - especially when teens may or may have not
been the victims (not spoiling). I figured horror hounds would be quick to
sniff out a copped-out PG-13 scene in an R film. But to my surprise I find
everyone bitching about there being too much commentary in the film, the film
is too woke, there's too much BLM messaging, it's too forced on one opinion,
and my jaw hasn't come from the floor since.
This is an effective horror film. It gets under your skin.
It makes you think. It has a parable about the world around you. It digs into
generational trauma. It has a message. But unfortunately, it did not kill teens
on-screen. That's the only qualm I can see. The lack of gore in a horror film, that's an issue we can discuss,
because all other points are moot. Every aspect of this film is effective. If
you don't think it is, then go back to the original Candyman - it too is filled
with message, social commentary, opinions, and it contains black representation
in an era of horror cinema which usually had few and far between. If you have
issues with the 'messages' contained in the film, there are many other films
out there that represent you better.
It's upsetting when you must explain that horror as a genre
was created to handle your fears. The genre is there to represent a parable for
all things individuals may find terrifying. For a lot of people, it is
terrifying to be pulled over by a police officer because proportionately the
color of their skin is seen as an immediate threat, especially after 164
African Americans were killed by police officers during the production of this
film. I never thought a review for this film would have to include anything
about supporting the film's message. I enjoy the, “Say his name,” tagline because
it is glaringly close to, “Say their names.” #SayTheirNames
*****
High: Highlights include Home For The Holidays, Friday The 13th, Friday The 13th 2, Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Free Guy, Big Lebowski, and Teen Wolf. But my favorite has to be the last one seen, the new Candyman. By far, best viewing of this stack. Now, I love my Friday The 13th movies and TCMs and all the classics, but seeing the new Candyman in the theater and how perfectly it was crafted moves it to the best viewing.
BEST VIEWING: CANDYMAN
Low: Lowlights include Student Bodies because I always want more from it and Nightmares is horrible. But the lowest of lows this week goes to: Annette
WORST VIEWING: ANNETTE
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