slasher movies

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 !! ★★★★★

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 ★★★★★

One year after the brutal murder of her mother, Sidney Prescott and her friends are terrorized by a new killer : Written by Kevin Williamson & Directed by Wes Craven SCREAM is the BEST HORROR MOVIE in the last 25yrs : From that shiver inducing Dimension Film logo before the film starts, it’s smart edgy blood soaked script, the shocking start to the movie that nobody saw coming & the great Homages to horror movies of yester-year the film always delivers and to this day continues to blow my mind : Scream totally re-invented the genre from a director who already owned the scares in the 80s with his freaking great horror A Nightmare on Elm Street but unlike Elm Street Scream uses horror cliches and a whip smart script that’s incredibly funny yet utterly terrifying at times : The way Craven used horror films as the backdrop to Scream was a pure joy to watch, pictures such as Elm Street, Friday 13th, The Exorcist and of course Halloween got nods and even Wes makes a brief cameo as a school janitor dressed in that iconic Freddy Sweater, that small moment alone made me smile sooooooo much : Also let’s not forget the contribution it’s young fresh cast made, stars that were not household names such as Neve Campbell, Matthew Lillard, Rose McGowan, Jamie Kennedy & Skeet Ulrich all helped Craven’s blood lust come to life and create a new horror franchsise : The scene in the movie when Randy explains to his drunken friends about the Rules on How to Survive a Horror Movie whilst watching Halloween is one of my favorites, he pauses the film stands before the TV and tells his audience….. No.1 : Never have Sex…. No.2 : Don’t drink or do drugs…. and finally never ever ever say “I’ll be right back…” it’s sheer brilliance : I remember watching SCREAM in New York when it was released in the cinema, I didn’t know anything about the movie – I came out 2hrs later shouting, laughing and looking over my shoulder for Ghostface for the rest of that evening, what a movie BUZZ ★★★★★

Max (Taissa Farmiga) and some of her rather nerdy friends gets transported through a magical portal, that bizarrely, but brilliantly takes them into an 80s slasher movie titled Camp Bloodbath where the movies killer Billy is stalking his victims, armed with his machete exacting revenge to all who’s wronged him – Camp Bloodbath stars scream queen Nancy (Malin Akerman) who also happens to be Max’s mum, so as you can imagine things get deliciously confusing & delightfully funny – Well if you’ve never heard of Todd Strauss-Schulson you soon will – this is the best I’ve felt coming out of a horror picture at the cinema since Cabin In The Woods, Schulson delivers a love letter to the slasher genre that’s smart, innovative, sexy and downright hilarious – The Final Girls is horror comedy at it’s absolute best and I for one can’t wait for it’s bloody sequel !! ★★★★½

Sad News Movie Fans !! Wes Craven the director who brought us A Nightmare on Elm Street, Scream and many more classic horror films has died aged 76 – his horror characters throughout the years such as Freddy and Ghostface not only reinvented the horror genre but also gave me high blood pressure, phobia of sleep and a high electricity bill as my lights always stayed ON