horror genre

Director : Leigh Janiak – Cast Includes : Sadie Sink, Kiana Madeira, Benjamin Flores Jr, Ryan Simpkins, Gillian Jacobs, Olivia Scott Welch, Ashley Zukerman, Maya Hawke

As you guys know I love my horror and especially the slasher genre, from the Italian Maestro’s Argento, Bava & Fulci to the American slice and dice Kings in Hitchcock, Carpenter, Craven & Cunningham, this blood lust is my movie jam, I love being scared so when over a week ago I sat down and watched the first in a trilogy of movies that was landing on Netflix based around the work of author R. L. Stine I was bubbling with excitement… for those in the dark Leigh Janiak is an american filmmaker, her only other feature film was 2014’s Honeymoon, she has also directed a few episode’s of Scream the TV series and the underrated Outcast… her latest is the trilogy of weekly movies titled FEAR STREET…

OMG !! firstly let me mention the cool freaking opening to Fear Street: Part One 1994 that took me back in time and kicked off this trilogy, Janiak obviously knows her shit, so the start & finish must rock your socks off right?… the setting is a bookshop in the Shadyside Mall where Heather is working late… the phone rings (the tone gives you chills like the one Casey Becker answers in Scream… you know… “You hang up on me again and I’ll gut you like a fish!”…. that one!!), the person on the end of the line hangs up and Heather continues to work until she notices books on the floor and then behind her a figure rushes past one of the book stands, Heather rounds the corner and… (well I’m not gona tell you what happened next, now am I?) Part One is all played out like a Wes Craven movie and this guy right here is lapping up every single insane minute of it… SHIT that bread slicer and that whole chaotic finale is soooo fucked up right !!

I was to discover that Part One was just the appertiser, what came next BLEW my mind and shook me to the core… in FEAR STREET: Part Two 1978 Leigh Janiak truly captures the essence of summer camp in a horror movie, that Friday the 13th vibe is everywhere, you can smell & taste that rule breaking teen, the thrills of sex and spills of guts as the body count rises, it’s killer 70s score and like the first it’s obvious nods to horror’s of yesteryear… so right from the offset we have a quick recap of what happened in Part One and then it’s over to Deena and Josh travelling to the Berman’s house in hope of finding more answers and tracking down the witches hand… I just love EVERYTHING about this movie, it’s like a big cake with so may layers and a creamy yummy centre… not only are the scares more unforgiving, the violence a darker shade of cruel but it’s story is devilishly good too, entwined with the first and contains a few twists along the road to it’s insane crescendo… and don’t get me started on the wickid young cast such as the magnificent Kiana Madiera as Deena, McCabe Slye as Tommy, Ryan Simpkins as Alice but my pick and scream queen for the day is the incredible Sadie Sink her role as Ziggy will become iconic, from those opening 10 minutes as she’s chased and bullied by some of the other kids to that breathtaking blood splattered show down with the killer, her performance is far removed from that of MAD-Max in Stranger Things, she’s tough, independent and don’t suffer fools gladly, she’s quite the revelation…

And then onto FEAR STREET: Part Three 1666 where the story takes us back to the original settlement before it became Shadyside, when the curse first struck the town folk at a time when it was common to hang or burn someone for being different… the pace of Part Three may be slower but it’s tone is as dark if not darker than than the other two with chilling moments of dread filling it’s narrative including that disturbing chapel scene, Sarah being chased in the tunnels that gave me the feeling of Jack in The Shining, I still can’t shake that moment with the baby pigs, the sight of the rotten food you can almost smell, the removal of body parts and that gut wrenching hanging… the star of Part Three is without question Kiana Madiera she’s like a magnet, sucking you into Fear Street’s conclusion, Sarah’s story is both harrowing yet beautiful, showing us her forbidden love and with the help of some familiar faces Kiana like a ribbon ties everything together…

Leigh Janiak‘s FEAR STREET is a love letter to all us horror fans… Leigh’s given us a trilogy of darkness that not only pays homage to the great’s of yesteryear but she’s also created her own blueprint on a genre that’s been in need of refreshing new material… it’s like an adults only Stranger Things I found myself overecome with nostalgia, I was unnerved by it’s brutality, in love with it’s characters and bewitched by it’s storyline… WOW !! ★★★★★

A criminal mastermind unleashes a form of justice that will terrify in a new chapter from the book of Saw : Let’s dive straight in and get to the nitty gritty… DON’T listen to anybody who says that SPIRAL is like Fincher’s Se7en or that the movie is shifting in a new direction NO it is not : Darren Lynn Bousman’s movie is NOT a new beginning it’s just a pure and evil continuation of the dark & gory horror franchise that I love with every insane horror bone in my body : Bousman himself is a veteran of the SAW movies directing Saw II, Saw III, Saw IV, so let’s be honest Lionsgate wasn’t about to change the formula were they? and can you blame them…. yes Spiral is a tad predictable, but the writing is sharp with it’s focus on police corruption, it’s pace is quick and it’s creativity in setting up those grizzly murders is top draw and kept my butt clenched throughout… the cast ain’t too shabby either with stand out roles from Chris Rock who actually suits playing a lead detective, Samuel L Jackson, Max Minghella and Marisol Nichols who all fuel to this well oiled horror franchise : so if you’ve been a fan since 2004 and love your horror to contain plenty of blood and twisted carnage then SPIRAL will fill that 90min void with it’s own cruel blend of sick entertainment ★★★½

Sometime in the future, prisoners housed in a Vertical Self-Management Center watch as inmates in the upper cells are fed while those below starve : Galder Gaztelu-Urrutia’s directorial debut The Platform is a trip into the depth’s of madness, a disturbing dystopian gem that’s not for the faint hearted : the movie follows Goreng a normal guy who has agreed to spend 6 months of his life in this prison centre for the promise of a diploma on the outside world, of course this is dependant on whether he makes it through his term as each 30 days spent in the center the residents are transfered to another cell on a new level, the higher the cell number the more chance of survival : the story written by David Desola is fresh & downright scary and the work by Iván Massagué in & Zorion Eguileor in bringing Goreng & Trimagasi to life respectively is paramount to how the movie plays out, I could not keep my eyes off the pair of them, it was like watching some sort of depraved stage show, the desperation and brutality in surviving their term is absolute bonkers : the woman travelling up and down the food lift looking for her kid is messed up, that dog scene and Baharat’s attempt to climb a level had me feeling utterly nauseous : overall if your looking for something new & nasty in the horror genre then look no further than The Platform it’s a white knuckle ride that had me rocking in my chair praying for some kind of merciful resolution ★★★★½

Daria Nicolodi (1950-2020)

Posted by absolutebadasses on November 27, 2020

Posted in: Views. Tagged: actress, asia argento, cinephile, Daria Nicolodi, dario argento, Deep Red, film, film collector, film geek, films, giallo, horror genre, horror movies, horror night, Inferno, italian cinema, Mater Suspiriarum, movie writing, opera, Paganini Horror, photos, suspiria, tenebrae, writer. Leave a comment

Yesterday we lost a giant in Daria Nicolodi : her contribution to the horror genre and Italian Cinema can only be described as immense : her legacy will live on through her work, starring in films such as Deep Red, Tenebrae, Opera, Paganini Horror and Inferno and her partnership with horror maestro Dario Argento she also co-wrote Suspiria and provided the voice of Mater Suspiriarum, Daria also wrote the Argento classic Inferno : her work has played a huge part in me growing into the Cinephile I am today and my enjoyment of her work will continue to play on until I too find myself in the arms of whatever comes next RIP x

Number 4 of My Top 31 Horror Movies : Fifteen years after murdering his sister on Halloween night, a young man escapes from a mental hospital and returns to Haddonfield to kill again : I’ve lost count how many times I’ve watched John Carpenter’s HALLOWEEN : to me it’s the greatest slasher movie of them all, influenced no doubt in a small way by Bob Clark’s Black Christmas it just ooozes a tour de force in the horror genre that’s been emulated many times but never surpassed : Halloween was developed and put to film by Carpenter & Hill, on a shoe string budget of $300,000 and is the finest use of lightening, sound and music in the genre, with it’s eerie atmosphere, suspense that drips from each scene like the blood from Myers knife, Jamie Lee Curtis movie debut and an alluring, chilling score that cranks up the mood perfectly when required : from those early scenes of a young Michael Myers butchering his sister to it’s nerve jangling, exciting climax, there’s nothing quite like this slice of late 70s horror to get your heart pumping : John Carpenter’s Halloween is not gory or drenched in blood like many of the slashers that succeeded it but instead relies heavily on it’s suspense and effective story telling : it’s also the most immersive experience I’ve felt watching a horror movie in a theater, from it’s wide & open interiors to the creepy neighborhood shots capturing the street’s autumn look and the scene’s of Michael Myers masked figure stalking Laurie Strode at every turn, the photography combined with Carpenter’s score really does make you chew your nails frantically as the pace slowly builds to it’s terrifying crecendo : if like me you love your slasher movies then why not check out the newly remastered edition of this 1978 masterpiece, even after all these years it’s still the perfect slasher movie ★★★★★

Number 5 of My Top 31 Horror Movies : The film follows a group of friends who fall victim to a bunch of psychopaths whilst travelling to visit a family grave : The very first adult horror movie I watched was Tobe Hooper’s THE TEXAS CHAIN SAW MASSACRE : I was twelve years of age and I remember sneaking over a friends house, inserting this battered video tape and being terrorised by these cannibalistic serial killers led by Gunnar Hansen’s terrifying Leatherface and the house of horrors he lived in : I’ve since watched Texas pretty much every year since and although it’s suprisingly not that bloody it’s the look of authenticity of what takes place in that farm house, especially the infamous dinner scene that really did a number on me : watching Marilyn Burn’s Sally tied to that chair screaming hysterically, the extreme close up of her twitching eyeball, the manic laughing of the depraved family sat around the table and the total insanity of what’s happening is incredibly unsettling : it’s the only horror movie on the list that makes me feel queasy, uneasy & downright afraid right from the gecko, from the creepy hitchhiker & his antics, the bringing down of Grandpa played by John Dugan and that hammer scene to Pam played by the brilliant Teri McMinn who stumbles into the room full of feathers & bones mostly human but some are animal, the camera taking us on a tour of the carnage that Pam sees before her, the big chicken housed in the smallest of cages, the skulls & tools that were used to mutilate it’s victims, this is nasty, unflinching horror at it’s sweet mercy best : due it’s very low budget the cast was mainly unknown and Gunnar Hansen wore the same Leatherface outfit for the film’s four week shoot, the lack of a score as such and Daniel Pearl’s low angle, handheld at times raw photography gives The Texas Chain Saw Massacre it’s realism and makes Tobe Hooper’s influential horror one of the fines low-budget exploitation movies that’s ever been ★★★★★

Number 8 of My Top 31 Horror Movies : The evil spirit of a slain killer seeks revenge by invading the dreams of teenagers whose parents were responsible for his death : A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET is the epitome of terror and Wes Craven was the master of serving it up, he knew what scared his audience and delivered a fearsome, bloody nightmare which has since spawned eight movies and a dreadful remake : In 1984 I was barely a teenager when Wes Craven gave us the iconic FREDDY KRUEGER, with his trademark hat, red & green sweater and a glove with razors for fingers, this demented killer not only petrified me and gave me sleepless nights back in the 80s but still does to this day : in 1984, and to make his movie Craven needed an actor to play a deceased child murderer built from the fires of hell, he needed a villain with menance & pure evil in his eye’s so they turned to Robert Englund a charasmatic actor known for bit parts in movies such as Galaxy of Terror, Dead & Buried and Eaten Alive to turn this monster into horror icon : like Carpenter’s Halloween Wes Craven’s movie also needed a heroine, a teenage girl who was innocent, beautiful and smart, a girl who would be Freddy’s equal on the horror battlefield, so after an extensive search Craven discovered Heather Langenkamp she would be the film’s Nancy and the perfect fit for Craven’s horror masterpiece : but why is A Nightmare On Elm Street still scary after all these years? well unlike Craven’s Scream the killer is supernatural, for me there’s something brutal about the way Freddy goes about his business of killing his victims, the death scenes are terrifying and made more squeamish due to the not seeing of who’s performing the act, you see the blood, the mutilation and you know it’s Freddy but you don’t see him and that’s where Craven excels, Tina’s death scene is the best example, as her boyfriend watches on she’s sliced open and then thrown around the cealing of her bedroom like a rag doll, blood draining from her body as she crashes back to her bed and the way Johnny Depp’s character Glen, like a vaccum cleaner is sucked into his bed and then spat back out pureed, the room awash with his remains, I found the scenes when Nancy wakes up from her nightmare in the Katja Institute bringing back Freddy’s hat and her arm sliced to be alarming and I still find the boiler rooms scenes particulary scary, the steam and the darkness only lit by the reflection of the flames engulfing the oven to be so unnerving, you just know Freddy is lurking somehwere in the shadows : from it’s chilling score written by Charles Bernstein, the wonderful John Saxon who plays Nancy’s dad and sheriff of the town to Wes Craven’s script that was turned down by Universal & Paramount Pictures back in the day but thank god for New Line Cinema who showed their trust in the filmmaker and was rewarded with a box office smash A Nightmare On Elm Street is essential Halloween viewing and even after all these years will turn your stomach and make it hard to sleep when the lights go down…… One two, Freddy’s coming for you. Three four, better lock your door. Five six, grab your crucifix. Seven eight, gonna stay up late. Nine ten, never sleep again ★★★★★

Number 24 of My Top 31 Horror Movies : When five friends arrive at a remote cabin in the woods for a little vacation, little do they expect the horrors that await them : I have rewatched Drew Goddard’s THE CABIN IN THE WOODS several times since the big screen back in 2011 and each & every time I have found something new to smile about : from Goddard & Whedon’s FRESH, FUNNY & ORIGINAL script to that bizzare feeling your watching two movies wrapped up in one it’s almost like an R rated Twilight Zone episode, it just keeps getting better and better, so much so that it recently made My Top 20 Movies of the Decade : The Cabin in the Woods is so far removed from their work together on Buffy the Vampire Slayer it’s actually insane to think it’s from the same team, but when it sinks in and you’ve watched it a few time the penny drops and you realise HELL YEAH this has their stamp it’s just on a different level, a more sadistic, crueler and blood splattered level : The Cabin in the Woods has so many horror layers and each time you peel one away the next is scarier, first you get the old garage attendent who’s creepy as fuck and at this point I would have turned for home, then it’s the cabin with it’s remote location, double sided mirrors and a goddam cellar and then the monsters start to come out to play, one by one each scarier and more violent than the next… well you get the picture….. it’s brilliant : the film is just everything you’d want from a horror movie, it’s scary, sexy and relentless, I mean watching Jules make out with the wolf is just…..wtf just happened have I been smoking some of Marty’s drugs or what?, the pair of Amy Acker & Fran Kranz add so much greatness and nostalgia to each scene their part of, the way the story arc twists and turns like a Rubik Cube is utterly bonkers and not since Wes Craven gave us Scream have I seen a better horror lead than Kristen Connolly, she’s fearless, gorgeous, takes no shit and she just owns her character : WHAT A MOVIE !! ★★★★★