Topic: Jimmy's - 2012 Ooctober Horror Marathon

[addicted2dvd]

I haven't gotten to it yet... but I do plan to watch it before the month is over.

[Jimmy]

MOVIE / DVD INFO:

Title: The Brood (1979)

Genre: Horror
Director: David Cronenberg
Rating: R
Length: 1h32
Video: Widescreen 1.85:1
Audio: English
Subtitles: English, French and Spanish

Stars:
Oliver Reed
Samantha Eggar
Art Hindle
Henry Beckman
Nuala Fitzgerald

Plot:
Behind the walls of his secluded Somafree Institute, Dr. Hal Raglan (Reed) experiments with "Psychoplasmics," a controversial therapy designed to help release pent-up emotions in his patients. He keeps his star patient Nola (Eggar) in isolation, but as she vents her fury during their sessions, brutal murders befall the people she's angry with outside the institute. What is the connection between Raglan's methods and these monstrous killings? The answer will unleash a whole new breed of terror!

My Thoughts:

I have no idea why but this film just doesn't make it to me... The cast is good, the theme is strange, the effects are top notch and some scene are particullary effective (by exemple the school one). But it didn't keep my attention at all...

I'm probably completly in the field but I can't find a reason why it didn't succeed with me...
    


Rating :

[Achim]

Nice Cronenberg retrospective... Although my favorite of his has always been The Fly. ...and Videodrome.

I keep forgetting if it was in Shivers or Rabid, but that scene at the pool freaked me out when I first saw it. The Brood has some similar moments.

[Jimmy]

Nice Cronenberg retrospective... Although my favorite of his has always been The Fly. ...and Videodrome.

The Fly is on the program too, but I've already The Dead Zone on my reader next... I don't have Videodrome yet, but I expect it in a future package.

Three more Cronenberg's film to watch (the other one is Scanners) and I will have to think at something else to watch... I've the Scanners sequels but I don't consider them as Cronenberg's films, but I will probably watch them too...

I keep forgetting if it was in Shivers or Rabid, but that scene at the pool freaked me out when I first saw it.

If you talk about the pool scene with a lot of people (I don't want to write too many details) it's from Shivers and if you talk about a two persons pool scene (more a spa to be exact) it's from Rabid.

[Achim]

I don't have Videodrome yet, but I expect it in a future package.

The Criterion? Nice set, of course, but as always not cheap.

Three more Cronenberg's film to watch (the other one is Scanners) and I will have to think at something else to watch... I've the Scanners sequels but I don't consider them as Cronenberg's films, but I will probably watch them too...

Scanners always strangely underwhelmed me. The first thing we all now about it is that early scene with the exploding head, but the rest of the film is actually far from that level of gore

If you talk about the pool scene with a lot of people (I don't want to write too many details) it's from Shivers and if you talk about a two persons pool scene (more a spa to be exact) it's from Rabid.

The first one, with a lot of people.



Oh, by the way Jimmy. I am planning to order from Amazon.ca soon (REC 3). To fill that order up a bit, anything I should get that maybe doesn't have a US release, is somewhat exclusive to Canada (at least for North america)?

[Jimmy]

The first title that jump trough my mind was the special edition of Ginger Snaps but you can get it only via marketplace so it won't help you to complete your order...

This one is cheap to get and contrary to the US set the films are in their original screen ratio. But none of those films are that great but if you are a completist.

This one is a Best Buy exclusive in the US but you can get it here from amazon... but it's costly so I'm not sure it's a good suggestion

This one is a canadian exclusive...

Of course there are a ton of French Canadian films that you won't find anywhere else

Québec-Montréal, Horloge Biologique, Aurore, ...

But the problem is the fact that I don't know for most of them if english subtitles are included (the one I've listed are english friendly).

[Jimmy]

MOVIE / DVD INFO:

Title: The Dead Zone (1983)

Genre: Horror
Director: David Cronenberg
Rating: R
Length: 1h44
Video: Widescreen 1.85:1
Audio: English and French
Subtitles: English

Stars:
Christopher Walken
Brooke Adams
Tom Skerritt
Herbert Lom
Anthony Zerbe

Plot:
Christopher Walken stars in this tense, gripping screen adaption of Stephen King's best-selling novel, 'The Dead Zone'. One fateful night, Johnny Smith (Walken) smashes head-on into an enormous truck. For five long years, Johnny is plunged into a deep coma. When he awakens, he discovers that his youth, his career and his fiancee, Sarah (Brooke Adams), have all been lost. But Johnny has gained something - extraordinary psychic powers allowing him to see visions of the past, present and future. In episode after episode, Johnny is propelled into horror-filled, supernatural experiences. Desperately, Johnny seeks seclusion, but a moral decision must be made - should he use his powers to change the future of mankind? Martin Sheen gives a chilling portrayal as a sinister, psychotic Senate hopeful aspiring to the U.S. Presidency.

My Thoughts:

One of the rare case where I can watch an adaptation of a Stephen King's book that I've never read (wich is strange since I have read everything he had done from Salem's Lot trough Desperation), so I had no film in my imagination the first time I saw it. First comment I'll do is that I don't really see it as an horror film but it had enough element to count as one here. This is the first american films of Cronenberg and, not surprisingly, this is quite a conventional one as american studios aren't big risk taker. But it doesn't mean that it isn't a good film as I like it even if it doesn't feel like a David Cronenberg's film. Of course most of the film success is because of the performance of Christopher Walken, we really had no problem to sympathise with him and feel sorry for him. Martin Sheen also is good in this in the role of a senatorial candidate who isn't the good guy he seems to be (to be honest no politicians in real life are the good guy they seem to be as they don't give a damn about the little people... but this is another story). The script isn't perfect as the story jump a little bit all over the place by moment, but I can live with that.

A little bit on the safer side but not a bad film per se. 
    


Rating :

[Danae Cassandra]

I love The Dead Zone.  Haven't seen it in a number of years, but a really good film.  It's the only Stephen King movie I've seen that I've liked (admittedly haven't seen many - Cujo was alright for a single watch, Pet Semetary was just okay, and I hated Salem's Lot so much that I didn't watch any more after I saw it), and one of only 3 of his books that I've liked well enough to keep here at the house (the others are Salem's Lot and Eyes of the Dragon - I'd love to see an adaptation of Dragon). 

[Jimmy]

MOVIE / DVD INFO:

Title: The Fly (1986)

Genre: Horror
Director: David Cronenberg
Rating: R
Length: 1h35
Video: Widescreen 1.85:1
Audio: English, French and Spanish
Subtitles: English and Spanish

Stars:
Jeff Goldblum
Geena Davis
John Getz
Joy Boushel
Leslie Carlson

Plot:
A chilling, contemporary remake of an all-time horror classic has now been transformed into the ultimate Collector's Edition DVD. Reborn with hours of in-depth, never-before-seen extras, this all-new 2-disc set takes terror to a whole new level! Jeff Goldblum stars as an overly ambitious scientitst who accidentally merges with a housefly while conducting a bizarre teleporting experiment. Now his journalist girlfriend (Geena Davis) suddenly finds herself caring for a hideous creature whose insect half gradually begins to take over.

My Thoughts:

Not something you will see me wrote often but this remake was effective, necessary and probably the best remake ever made. I mean the original was silly even for a fifties movie and that fake french canadian was absolutly ridiculous (believe me no one talk with that accent here). David Cronenberg even succeed at making us believe that it's a scientifical possibility (at least the teleportation, but I think the scientists had succeed at doing it with elementary atoms) and the believebility factor is sure important in a film like that. The film is so well done and written that we feel sad for Brundle even if he is the bad guy (at least what is the closest thing we can call a bad guy here), common I cried the first time I've seen it when I was a teenager. The effects are also incredible, much better than a fly head for sure, and don't tell me that it would be the same done with computer graphics. Jeff Goldblum give also a very credible job as a "mad" scientist and Geena Davis, who is not really a favorite of mine, isn't too bad either.
    


Rating :

[Jimmy]

MOVIE / DVD INFO:

Title: Killer Klowns from Outer Space (1988)

Genre: Comedy
Director: Stephen Chiodo
Rating: PG-13
Length: 1h26
Video: Widescreen 1.85:1
Audio: English
Subtitles: French and Spanish

Stars:
Grant Cramer
Suzanne Snyder
John Allen Nelson
John Vernon
Michael Siegel

Plot:
A spaceship – looking like a circus tent – lands in a field near a small town, signaling the attack of deviant, red-nosed, balloon-twisting psychos from another world who plan to annihilate mankind – by turning people into cotton candy! Luckily, the town's teen citizenry decides to fight back and teach the cosmic bozos a lesson. But these klowns are no klutzes, turning popcorn, peanuts and caramel corn into playful – but deadly – weapons of madcap destruction and mayhem!

My Thoughts:

I was in the mood for some fun and no horror film can't beat silliness of Killer Klowns. The weird fact is that it can play as an horror film if the alien invaders were different type of mutant, but they are clowns and clowns aren't scary but silly (unless your name is Brittany and clowns scare you... I guess this is one movie that Pete will never watch with her ). Anyway for what it is this is surely well done, most of the dialogue is funny (there are so many quotable lines in this) and the acting is done deliberatly bad (John Vernon is funny as hell in his over the top policeman interpretation).

You can't go wrong with this one.
    


Rating :

[addicted2dvd]

I just wish I could get Brittany to watch it with me! 

[Piffi]

Wow.. Klowns! There are two things that really scares me, KLOWNS and CREEPY DOLLS!
And in a horror movie. I just watched one movie with dolls.. Would i be able to sleep if i
watched this "Killerklown" movie? 

[addicted2dvd]

Brittany is also afraid of clowns... and dolls bothers her too... especially the porcelain face dolls.

[Piffi]

Brittany is also afraid of clowns... and dolls bothers her too... especially the porcelain face dolls.

Bah, i cant stand those either! (The porcelain ones) Just something about them. 

[Jimmy]

Would i be able to sleep if i watched this "Killerklown" movie? 

Sure this is a comedy...

Frogs scare me in real life and when I watched Frogs previously this month it didn't prevent me to sleep... in fact it was the contrary