Title: Terrifier Writer/ Director: Damien Leone Cast: Jenna Kanell, Samantha Scaffidi, David Howard Thorton, Catherine Corcoran, Pooya Mosheni Year: 2017 (Released in 2018) Min: 82
We start with a prologue, where pretty talk show host Monica Brown (Katie Maguire) is interviewing a horribly disfigured woman. This poor woman survived an attack by a killer named Art the Clown (David Howard Thornton). Art, himself, is actually watching the show from his TV set, while applying his makeup. After the show, Monica is in her dressing room talking on the phone. She makes some mean and bitchy comments about the victim, only to have said victim come in and gouge her eyes.
We then cut to, Halloween night, where two beautiful friends, drunk Dawn (Catherine Corcoran) and Tara (Jenna Kanell) are heading home after a clearly fun night. They soon encounter Art, who is carrying a large, black, plastic bag with him. Victoria is rightfully creeped out by him, but Dawn doesn't take it very seriously. When, they both head to a pizzeria for a bite to eat, the clown also walks in quickly there after. Dawn still finds it all rather funny and even takes a selfie with him. Soon after, he does something that is enough to get him kicked out of the eating establishment (we quickly learn that he left the bathroom covered in shit and piss!). The girls eventually go their own way.
Unbeknownst to them, the employee and the manager (whose decapitated head gets carved like a fucking jack-o-lantern!) of the pizza joint get slaughtered by Art. Meanwhile, their car's tire has been slashed. Tara thinks its the scary looking clown, but Dawn doesn't believe it is. Either way, they end up calling Tara's sister, Victoria (the lovely Samantha Scaffidi) to pick them up.
Tara needs to take a piss really badly, so she ends up going in a nearby building. Soon there after, Dawn hears on the radio about two people getting killed at the pizzeria that they just left by a clown! It soon dawns on her (pardon the pun) that Tara was right all along! It's too fucking late though, as Art is in the car. He soon turns his attention to Tara, and will do the same with Victoria when she finally arrives at the rat infested, dump of a building, where the majority of the remaining film will occur at.
Let's not mince words here, Terrifier is the best slasher movie since Hatchet II, hands down! This is 80's inspired splatter done right. It's brutal, uncompromising, and gory as fucking hell. The movie has been garnering strong word of mouth and reviews and is rapidly gaining an ever growing cult following, all of which it rightfully deserves.
Writer/ director Damien Leone has crafted a movie that doesn't simply play oving tribute to stalk and slash movies of their golden age but manages to surpass many of them. This is due to the fact that he doesn't have some cookie cutter bullshit that does the same tired shit over and over again. He also does not play it safe taking it to a far more extreme level than many of the weak ass Friday the 13th sequels and their ilk never had the guts to partake in.
Leone is also very apt at adding much tension and suspense. The pacing is fast and tense, resulting in a short running time that flies by. Most of the time when I watch a movie of this type I just sort of look at the screen and not much else. Watching this one, though, I was screaming at the screen and the characters, telling them to run, hide, fight back, whatever the scene dictated. I don't think there is a better sign that you have done a good job, then getting the audience to shout and be invested in what is happening onscreen.
To achieve this you need to care about the characters and for them to be played by a talented cast. The girls aren't just there to provide eye-candy, though they are certainly gorgeous. You actually don't want to see them die. Most of the cast are unknowns, save for the gorgeous Catherine (Return to Nuke 'Em High Vol. 1 & 2, Sociopathia) Corcoran, who is one of my personal favorite, current scream queens.
But, extra praise must be given to David Howard Thorton. He is perfectly terrifying as Art. Without saying a single word, he manages to be menacing and utterly bone-chilling. His creepy ass smile will fucking haunt you. And, for those of you who are scared of clowns, be prepared to clean the shit from your undies. Cause, Art manages to be more disturbing than Pennywise is on his best day.
Of course, it also helps that his look is unsettling to begin with. Also solid are the gore FX. Decapitation, slashings, stabbings, blood spurting gunshots, eye gouging, cannibalism, and bludgeonings hit the viewer with no mercy. Included in these acts is a snatch to head bisection that is more than likely the year's most memorable and shocking kill and probably one of the vicious kills by a psycho killer since the glory days of Lucio Fulci. Throw in a little bit of nudity, courtesy of Corcoran, and you have something that gives you everything you want and more.
Terrifier is a killer slasher movie and destined to become a modern, cult classic. The movie is brutal, vicious, and does not fuck around. It is also a shit load of fun and keeps you invested throughout its running time. Suspenseful directing and characters you actually give a flying fuck about played by a solid cast help things even further. And, here is hoping Art becomes the next big slasher villain, especially as how he is bought to life by Thorton. Distributed by horror website Bloody Disgusting, Terrifier is currently streaming on Amazon. It is an absolute must for those who like their throwback horror movies to be as uncompromising as possible.
We have a lot more of the best cosplay from Fri at New York Comic Con to look at, so let's get to it!
I am a HUGE fan of the Universal Classic Monsters, especially the Bride. So, naturally, I would love this!
I am the law!
Perhaps the coolest cosplay at the entire show was this one inspired by sci-fi/ horror/ found footage/ World War II flick Frankenstein's Army. The movie is about an Nazi doctor who makes super zombie Nazi creatures. I talked the lady who did this amazing work. It turns out she was the movie was on SyFy, and though that she can do that (meaning the make-up)! And, so she did. Her daughter is under all of that, by the way.
One of the things I mentioned that to my friend, was the lack of Rey from The Force Awakens cosplay. As if the cosplay gods answered my pleas I saw the first and best Rey cosplay of the entire show! And, it came in the form of the lovely KatieBug Princess. And, she was just at the moment joined by an awesome Finn, who didn't come with her! As if to further prove how awesome this was a fun take on Kylo Ren joined in, too!
This monster's eye moved around!! How awesome is that?!!
See, this wins a million points for the fact that it is inspired by the AWESOME Stranger Things, is thoroughly original, yet simple, she looks like Winona Ryder, and the fact that I saw no else do a cosplay of this amazing horror/ sci-fi show.
Baxter Stockman from Teenage Mutant Ninja Tutrles cosplay!!! Awesome!!!
Victoria Secrets Angel cosplay! She is certainly as beautiful, if not more beautiful than an actual Victoria Secrets Angel.
Like the earlier thing that I said about Rey, I was disappointed in the lack of Enchantress from Suicide Squad cosplay. Low and behold this lovely lady and her friend popped-up!
These beauties were at the DC booth, everyday.
This gorgeous stunner above did an amazing job with her Raven cosplay. She looked breathtaking!
No doubt about it. The above Kara Danvers was one of my favorite cosplays of the entire show. I think she really looked the part and was naturally drop-dead gorgeous. She also really knew how to pose for the camera, in character, might I add.
The best Enchantress and perhaps my absolute favorite comic-book cosplay was from this breathtaking beauty.
And, to end it all, I leave you with this image of a scary, evil clown (which are currently all over the news in the real world!) terrifying me, the Master!
Title: 31 Writer/ Director: Rob Zombie Cast: Malcolm McDowell, Richard Brake, Jeff Daniel Phillips, Elizabeth Daily, Sheri Moon Zombie, Meg Foster Year: 2016 Min: 102
On Halloween 1976, a group of friends road trip. As they drive down the road at night, their path is blocked by a row of scarecrows. A group of them get out of their van to move them out of the way. But, they are ambushed, and some of them are killed. Those that are left to live are kidnapped and wake up tied and hung. A trio of eccentric old, rich folk (led by Malcolm McDowell) tell them that they have the night to survive a game where a group of psychotic clowns will try to kill them. Each of them has a set of odds as to their survival, which changes as they do better or worse.
Rob Zombie's latest ran into some problems with the MPAA, over it's intense violence. But, what is the actual film like? Well, it certainly has it's fair share of problems, itself. But, it also has it's merits. I should first and foremost say that if you hate Rob Zombie movies, you will not like this one at all. Now that we have that out of the way, all others continue reading, please.
Let me begin with the bad and get that out of the way:
One of my major problems with this movie is how it really feels like a rehash of the first two Zombie movies, House of 1000 Corpses and The Devil's Rejects, but is never as good as those two. Scenarios and characters are heavily borrowed from them. It made me think that Zombie cannot write original characters and is revisiting his own well too many times. For example, the lovely Sheri Moon Zombie is good in her role. She's a likeable enough lead, but, essentially it feels like what would happen if Baby, from 1000 Corpses and TDR was from an alternate reality where she is a good girl as opposed to bad.
Zombie remains obsessed with curse happy rednecks. Hey, I have a dirty fucking mouth, and anyone who follows this blog or knows me in real fucking life knows this. However, I think the fact that this movie revisits many of his tropes really brings this point, too much into light. His style in this movie is also a bit of determent. I am quite a fan of the almost music video like style coupled with gritty 70s cinema that Zombie has. However, here the fast editing and cuts hurts the gore and intended brutality of the movie.
The male protagonists aren't very interesting, especially Jeff Daniel Phillips. This isn't too say their acting is bad, no, just their characters are kinda just there. Also, I saw the ending coming a mile away, but kept hoping it wouldn't go that route. When it did, I wasn't as much pissed off as I was hoping that something more could have happened. Perhaps, the fact that I knew it was coming lessened the disappointment to some degree, anyways.
But, like I said there are things to be liked. And, here they are:
I said the male protagonists weren't that interesting, but the women are a little different. Like I mentioned before Sheri revisits elements of Baby, but she still is quite good in her role. I liked seeing her kick ass. I also liked looking at her body, which looks slamming in this movie (then, when doesn't it?). Genre favorite Meg Foster has her best role in years. She is a serious badass, here!
The villains are also pretty cool. E.G. Daily is pretty fuckin sexy as Sex-Head. The real scene stealer, though, is Richard Bake as Doom-Head. He is seriously fucking creepy and menacing. The opening monologue is chilling as he looks at the camera, while he talks about killing "you". I would love to see more of this character! Pancho Molar is fucking hilarious as the Nazi, Latino, psycho, clown-midget (yes you read that right!)! Dude, had me laughing my fucking ass off!
That's another thing that I liked, the jet-black humor the movie has. Yes, Zombie has an obsession with foul mouthed people, but I would be lying if I didn't admit that it makes me crack-up. This is a reason why I can't fully damn this this practice.
While, the editing style keeps the gore feeling kind of short handed, the movie has a feeling of violence throughout. It also moves really fast, so it is certainly never boring. There is, at least, a good deal of fun to be had. Adding to this fun is seeing Malcolm McDowell as the head baddie, but I did kind of want more of him. An absolutely fantastic cameo by childhood crush Ginger Lynn Allen is also wonderfully appreciated. It does harken back to her cameo in TDR, but she is naked and just so much fun here, that I won't fucking complain.
31 is not a bad movie, by any means. Unfortunately, it is marred by being an inferior revisiting of Zombie's first two movies. I kind of liked it, but wish I could've enjoyed it more. Still, unlike some recent movies that I have sat through this year (Batman v Superman and Suicide Squad), I didn't dislike it more the more I thought of it. Honestly, I just came out having killed some time and being at least entertained without that many feelings of pissed-offness. As even its' failings are not horribly infuriating. Overall, it's a decent, little movie, that could have been much more has Zombie strayed away from his own tropes. All this being said, I say check it out when it comes if you are a fan of his or of this type of horror flick.
