Shocktober '07:Senor's Return

Digging this Halloween classic may happen until the day I die; Ive watched it as far back as I can remember CBS broadcasting it; sponsored by Dolly Madison snack cakes..I would have loved to snack on some Zingers this year as Charlie Brown got his trick or treat bag filled w/ rocks

Ive lost count of how many times Ive watched this movie over the years & this Halloween I watched the extended version w/ all the added little bits that were added for tv broadcast. I have to say it will probably be the only time I watch it that way because it made me realize that one of the things that made Halloween such a sleek & gracefully movie was the editing...So the 5 star is based on the version Ive seen a couple dozen times & had landed it @ #3 of my all time favorite horror flix

Friday the 13th has so much going for it for its target audience (people like me who are brought back to a time of sleep-overs on the brink of puberty devouring as many sequels that were available) - a great working title, that land shark score (which I swear that Ja-ja-ja/Ka-ka-ka is ripped from Careful w/ that Axe Eugene by Pink Floyd) complemented by Betsy Palmer's gnashing bridge work in the moonlight, sugar boobies & victim after victim (@ least Warner Bros gives us a little more of Savini's red stuff unlike those bastards @ Paramount). Although this series 'jumped the shark' after part IV the original is always great fun in the 10 little Indian vein even if it is loathed by respectable critics.

For those who didn't get off their asses during Easter weekend & indulge in the mega opus Grindhouse (or those outside North America who got robbed on the entire experience) strap yourself in for the best zombie (or sicko if you prefer) flix to be released since Night of the Living Dead..perhaps even making par w/ the b/w classic. For those who complain that Planet Terror isn't all cleaned up for home release just don't get it..gutter art @ it's finest that causes me to shoot my retro-goo every time I watch it

Rob Zombie's House of 1000 Corpses took a bit to grow on me (far too much solorization) but its sequel (& Zombie's sophomore effort) caught me right by the boo-boo & has become one of my top 25 favorite horror films of all time. Macabrely hilarious w/ a fire cracker cast (Where the hell is Sid Haig's Oscar!?) & a great soundtrax that tells its own story along the way. Fuel by its own energy that is rarely seen in today's market (sorta like Spider Baby meets Bonnie & Clyde directed by Tarantino). Plays its pathos like the devil w/ a red hot fiddle in Georgia. Only personal blemishes was some post production blood (same thing marred Romero's Land of the Dead) but on a whole certainly not to be missed by fans of smart horror & definitely worth revisiting you chicken fuckers

Never has bubbling dish soap been so frightening. A great pace from hysteria to narrative questioning normality, deep suspicion, horrifying truth to a fight for humanities survival..Never has the titling THE END rang so true..classic

Hitchcock's malicious sense of humor is in fine graceful form translating stage play to film. Salty dialog that is music to my ears and style so suspensefully sweet to visit that it should make the synapses of your brain stand on end (well probably not most of the MTV generation since it's not edit-jump cut to shit). Personally a gem

A real gem of a noir that is certainly overlooked & under appreciated by Eastwood fans since most can't relate to the sleaze but Clint is truly a vulnerable anti-hero hero. He's trying to gain control of situations he is losing (or has already lost) control of from the stray dogs he takes in, the role of a single cop father from a wife that has left him to the hookers he handcuffs to their bed posts to satisfy his primal needs. Only then does he realize he's paving the way for the tennis shoed/ribbon strangler who walks in his shadow. Smart & trashy.

A damn fine trilogy of terror w/ my personal favorite smack-dab in the middle (& a little longer than the others to boot). All three tales could have stood on their own weight as full length features but placed together w/ a dab of Karloff's delightful sour cream on the red herring @ the end was priceless...plus the purple lighting was immaculate; I wish my nightmares looked so good

It's too bad that through all the sequels that Freddy Krueger became such a comic book parody of himself (when Hollywood smells $$$ it's bound to happen) because Wes Craven's razor sharp hand of God was truly chilling. It's nice personally revisiting Elm Street when it was such a chilling place to visit..especially w/ John Saxon along for the ride

When beauty is destroyed the beast must be unleashed if we are to survive this savage universe. W/ repeated viewings of Craven's earlier work (this & Last House on the Left) Im really starting to enjoy his submersive horror style (others may be off put though)..plus the confrontation between Michael Berryman & a German Sheppard is one of my favorite moments in 70s B-cinema (so great that the dog has a flashback of it in The Hills' sequel).

Although this truly is a decent sequel to a classic it's too bad it was directed by Rick Rosenthal who's majority of work was for tv therefore not really having a fraction of John Carpenter's elegance & style. W/ that being said it plays just fine (even though it's more bloodletting than suspense) as a continuation of The Shape & the last 20 minutes as Strode limps for her life makes up for it's short coming..As always Donald Pleasence is great in the role he'll always be notorious for.

This little nugget just gets better & better every year. Throw your Michael Myers preconceptions out the window/ learn a little more about the history of Halloween and lap up the canned cheese. You'll never get the Silver Shamrock song out of your head when the leaves begin to fall...ever

Cheap amusing mashing of Kung fu, vampire-zombies & slapstick comedy. Stupid fun that should be a delight to fans of choppy/socky & the 3 Stooges but this movie is a lot of loud mayhem so be forewarned...Buddha bless you

I'd be upset & reduced to a primal fear if a mad plumber came in and destroyed my shitter..hopefully I could keep my wits about me too to rid myself of such a menace..taunt

Vampire lesbians you can't really go wrong w/ though The Hunger wallows in its art house a little too long in spots making it a little long in the tooth but Sarandon's nudity, Bowie & Deneuve's chilling performances & the one two punch of soundtrax of Bauhaus & Iggy Pop make the parts more a winner than the sum.

This isn't a movie that you just sit back & turn your brain off; it's thinking horror & is more frightening the more you wrap your mind around the mathematics & metaphysics. I have been spending a lot of time lately thinking about such concepts that the machines have conquered & life is just an illusion looping through time..Im a little unnerved & am probably better off not trying to eat from the tree of knowledge

Why oh why did I drag this film out again for Shocktober (& subject a good friend to its atrocities..poor KESSLER; he'll never want to come over for flix & coffee again after this one)? Did I need to watch something extremely metaphysical to get me to stop eating off the value menu @ McDonalds?..not really sure but the last reel once again had me grimacing & scarping my teeth together..I think Im going to go have some baked bean on toast instead.

Heretics tortured by the fistful hardly makes for good entertainment (even if those back in the 18th century believed so) but the whole is difficult to take your eyes off of mostly due to bravo performances by Udo Kier, Reggie Nalder & Herbert Lom. It just goes to show that nothing is as horrifying & disdainful as man's fear through ignorance & his own condemned repeating history

Mutant babies love their carnation milkmen; they're so full of vitamins & calcium that makes their fangs & claws so healthy & strong.

Director Joe Dante starts The Howling off well enough w/ its scraping of the borderline sleaze (w/ some roughie porn thrown in) & Corman style (+ cameo) production but its tongue is far to embedded in its cheek that it chews itself off after the local switches to a more rural setting w/ too much up for grabs & accomplished better in An American Were in London (the US film market must have been in love w/ werewolf films once again in the early 80s until the 'slasher' did away w/ them). Happy to see Dick Miller, John Carradine & Slim Pickens in the cast even though they could have chewed the hell out of the raw meat if it was ever really thrown their way (or even supplied). My true disappointment came w/ the sex/transformation scene; I really thought werewolves did it doggie style but I guess not. Great use of smiley faces though that still creep me out 26 years later.

W/ what could have basically been Hong Kong's "I See Dead People" does have a little more meat on its bone then what it first appears to; unfortunately it tries to jerk the scares out of its audience w/ the usual modern day horror trappings when it truly could have worked better @ just being unnerving & illuminating. Worth a look before we're bombarded w/ adverts for the American remake

Scattered as all holy hell but pretty fun kung fu-shaolin sorcery. lol youre a true kung fu master if you can battle the undead while always in the lotus position.

After wanting to see Impulse for so long & finally getting my grubby little hands on a copy I was truly disappointed. Im starting to think Ive seen too many mama's boy gone wrong formulas far too often that it's becoming second hat (& it plays this familiar card right off the shoot) making me long for greater camp found in the likes of Pieces...maybe Im becoming jaded by it. Don't get me wrong though; Shatner's acting & wardrobe brought tears of joy to my eyes so I shouldn't have hoped for anything more

Driller Killer falls victim of many of its own trappings-mostly the alliteration of its own cool ass title when the whole thing would have been better off if the premise of a killer w/ a power drill wasn't even conceived; it actually muddles a little film that slightly looks @ New York during the punk movement (even if most of the band's songs sound like Peter Gunn) & an interesting look @ schizophrenia. Instead once the drill starts-a-spinning so does all logic and the entire project collapses...on the brighter side David Hess is in talks for the remake (surprise-surprise! A remake Im looking forward to)

Myers' return is just a poor imitation (right down to the mask). Now and again it does find it's own footing w/ one on one Myers/Loomis confrontations that give the plodding effort a small glimmer but it's all cooled off by lazy writing and crappy delivery. When will studios learn how to dust off a franchise properly? The beginning of the downward spiral for Michael Myers & the fact that he fell into a well @ the end reeks of bitter irony that no one should have gone there to begin w/..Pleasence is the only reason to watch.

Leap & bounds better than the original but I could have stuff some celluloid up my ass w/ a screwdriver to accomplish that. Sorta like Scream directed by Tobe Hooper (you'll know what Im talking about once you see Sheri Moon dispatched) + the killer is a major red herring..who the hell was it? Darkman mashed w/ Leatherface? Weak.

Poor Crystal Bernard so scared about getting her cherry popped that she's having bloody psychosis of cock rock. Barely tolerable for the first half and really falls apart in the 2nd. Damn you Bernard for wasting $200 of the tax payers money & never getting naked in return

The ski-masked 'hand of God' likes to hum a little ditty & dish out justice from a toolbox. Then after twenty minutes of hardware atrocities the remainder tries to justify the senseless events; even claiming the entire thing was a dramatization of actually events. That's some rough swill to swallow & keep down