Horror

MS .45 (1981)

October 16, 2022

CONTENT WARNING: This post includes mentions of sexual violence.

To be completely clear: I do not like rape/revenge tales. While I realize that they can be cathartic for some, I almost always find them singularly unpleasant and poorly handled and wonder why I put myself through that, so I usually don’t. (This is partially why I’m mentioning it during my 31 Days of Horror posts.)

Abel Ferrara’s MS .45 is one of the few exceptions. I could go into detail about the film, but I’ll simply summarize it as so: a mute seamstress is raped twice in a day and, after the second, matters escalate.

It’s a visually striking film (partially thanks to its film stock), it feels sympathetic, and it features an amazing debut performance from Zoë Lund as a woman who just wants to be left alone. It feels subversive, especially for its time.

Instead of discussing it further, as I’m not quite the right person to do so, I highly suggest reading the RogerEbert.com exchange between Christy Lemire, Sheila O’Malley, and Susan Wloszczyna as they break down the film.

WE HAVE ALWAYS LIVED IN THE CASTLE (2018)

October 15, 2022

(AMC+/kanopy/peacock/Prime/VOD) Shirley Jackson has been lucky in that she had to suffer few terrible film adaptations — even THE HAUNTING (1999) is better than it needed to be and probably wouldn’t cause her to roll in her grave — and this adaptation of WE HAVE ALWAYS LIVED IN THE CASTLE is no exception. While it ramps up the spectacle a bit and cuts a bit of the fat, it’s completely faithful to a tale of two sisters, of abuse, of being castigated by locals. Oh, and it’s bolstered by an amazing cast: Taissa Farmiga as the younger Blackwood, Alexandra Daddario as the elder, and Crispin Glover as their uncle.

Stacie Passon’s take captures the vacillation between fear and comfort that I felt Jackson captured as an anxious person; Daddario is perfectly cast, with her almost-preternatural blue eyes, and Passon commands the atmosphere. The set design is pitch-perfect, and she even manages to keep Crispin Glover dialed-in.

“The world is full of terrible people.”

WE HAVE ALWAYS LIVED IN THE CASTLE (1962)

October 14, 2022

THE HAUNTING OF HILL HOUSE is arguably Shirley Jackson’s second-best known work next to THE LOTTERY — partially because of the film adaptation THE HAUNTING (which she was on set to consult) and, perhaps, because of Mike Flanagan’s wild deviation of a TV adaptation. (A fine series that, sadly, I feel has little to do with its source material.) However, I found WE HAVE ALWAYS LIVED IN THE CASTLE — her final novel before she sadly passed away — to be far more affecting.

WE HAVE ALWAYS LIVED IN THE CASTLE harbors many of Jackson’s tropes: gothic horror, family strife, New England iciness and societal rejection, agoraphobia, and decaying homesteads. However, it also feels like the apotheosis of her works, that this story of two sisters living together in their family’s house in Vermont, their mother and father, aunt and brother, dead due to poison before the youngest daughter, Mary Katherine “Merricat”, became a teenager. Only the uncle survived, barely, and they house and take care of him.

It’s a riveting, wild read, one that — while it received wide recognition and critical acclaim when it was released — appears to have faded into the stacks.

https://penguinrandomhousehighereducation.com/book/?isbn=9781101530658

SERIAL MOM (1994)

October 13, 2022

(Starz/VOD) SERIAL MOM is, admittedly, not the most popular John Waters film, but it is one of my favorites of his. (That said, I’m a bad cinephile and have never seen PINK FLAMINGOS, but oddly have seen everything else of his.) It heralds to a time during the 1990s when charisma and murder could get you anywhere, and Waters sensationalizes and satirizes that with a brilliant cast: a never better Kathleen Turner, Sam Waterston, a pre-HACKERS Matthew Lilliard, and Waters staple Ricki Lake.

It features the suburban candy-coating you expect from John Waters with a bitter, but welcome, aftertaste.

OBSCURE (2004)

October 12, 2022

(PC/PS2/Xbox) Horror videogames are the best for playing with a close friend, even when they aren’t co-op and you’re just passing the controller left and right. The highs hit higher, but seem safer, and it’s a genuine bonding activity. I still have fond memories of playing RESIDENT EVIL 4 with a friend, both of us letting the other take over when it got too intense, while chowing down on some of the best garlic pita chips and hummus in Chicago.

OBSCURE is basically THE FACULTY: The videogame, and I also have fond memories of playing it in an old apartment with the lights off, brandishing my in-game flashlight. However, I did play it solo and most folks who still rave about it focus on the co-op. Rather than expound on it, I’ll let Dave Riley from our prior site, THE NEW GAMER, do so via his 2005 review. (Apologies for the few errors — the site shuttered almost a decade ago and I haven’t tended to it.)

WOLF CREEK (2005)

October 11, 2022

(freevee/Plex/Pluto/tubi/VOD) WOLF CREEK is the first film from Australian Greg McLean — I previously wrote about his second film, the creature feature ROGUE — but WOLF CREEK was what made me take note of him. While WOLF CREEK is ultimately a slasher film, it prioritizes the human experience, and revels in it as much as possible. It’s a slow burn of a character drama, of youths exploring their freedom for about the first half of the film, and it’s quaint and peaceful and safe. Then it takes a hard left-turn, as some lives do.

EVERYBODY’S GONE TO THE RAPTURE (2015)

October 10, 2022

(PC/PS4/PS5) From The Chinese Room and Dan Pinchback, the developer of DEAR ESTER — which can probably lay claim to being one of the most popular ‘walking simulators’ — came this extraordinarily fascinating and exceedingly measured look at an apocalyptic scientific event in a small English town.

It’s all there in the name: EVERYBODY’S GONE TO THE RAPTURE. Scientific forces are toyed with, and an entire town’s inhabitants disappear. ‘You’ discover their memories and piece together the event that unfolded.

Some might not label this as horror as it’s quite bloodless — in fact, if you didn’t know the context of why you’re there, it might feel quite quaint and cozy to explore this verdant Shropshire locale — but you do know why you’re there, and you know peoples lives have disappeared, and they are not coming back. Despite being entirely different tonally, it reminds me a bit of Carpenter’s PRINCE OF DARKNESS: the result of unbridled science.

I’d be remiss not to mention Jessica Curry’s orchestral score, as it’s expertly composed and woven into the work; it’s perfectly melancholy with its swell of strings and ethereal vocals, and is often what I think of first when I think of this game.

GHOST SHIP (2002)

October 9, 2022

(Cinemax/VOD) GHOST SHIP is a mostly forgotten film, partially because once you get past the opening it’s very much a stock haunted house movie except set on a stylish 1960s cruise liner.

However, the opening sequence is absolutely worth the price of admission and, despite the fact that I haven’t seen the film in years and years, I still remember it fondly. The scene lasts under five minutes, has the barest of dialogue, but it leaves a lasting impression. Once you know that Steve Beck — mostly known for visual effects for water-based features like THE ABYSS and THE HUNT FOR RED OCTOBER — directed it you realize why he was drawn to this for his follow-up to THIR13EN GHOSTS.

Opening scene:

It also features a quality cast, including Karl Urban, Gabriel Byrne, Julianna Margulies, and a very young Emily Browning (GOD HELP THE GIRL’s -Musician Please Take Heed-). Is it an essential work of horror? No, but it’s a lot of fun.

TRIANGLE (2009)

October 8, 2022

(AMC+/hoopla/kanopy/peacock/tubi/etc.) TRIANGLE is a sort of THE PHILADELPHIA EXPERIMENT meets TIMECRIMES horror-thriller that’s tautly and expertly woven by SEVERANCE (2006) writer/director Christopher Smith. It features Melissa George (best known by me via her time on ALIAS but she was also a lead in 30 DAYS OF NIGHT), and really, that’s all you need to know.

MESSIAH OF EVIL (1973)

October 7, 2022

(epix/Prime/Shudder) MESSIAH OF EVIL was the first film from power-couple Willard Huyck and Gloria Katz, who went on to pen AMERICAN GRAFFITI and INDIANA JONES AND THE TEMPLE OF DOOM (and HOWARD THE DUCK, which almost certainly killed their Hollywood careers), but you wouldn’t quite know it from the ramshackle structure of the film.

MESSIAH OF EVIL feels like a very padded CARNIVAL OF SOULS by way of George Romero; it almost feels like outsider art at times. It’s barely cohesive, it’s clearly borrowing from Italian giallo films — to the point where I was shocked to see an Los Angeles-based Ralph’s appear — but I found it to be a fascinating work, partially due to its use of Godard-ian pop art, splashes of paint, and flashy production design. It’s not a great film, but it’s an extraordinarily striking horror film, and that’s enough for me in October.