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"C"
REVIEWS PAGE 1 |
THE CABINET OF DR. CALIGARI - 1920 - Director: Robert Wiene Considering
the time period this movie was made makes is a masterpiece and one of
horror's most early influencial films. There's been numerous work
done to the film over time, the version I saw had a new music score
and slighlty colored scenes, albeit they were all one color. This
was done in 1996 as was the music. Despite what version I say,
this is a disturbing tale of madness that creates some very spooky images.
This is a silent film so the acting is way overdone which in most cases
could be considered humorous, but in this case, with the choppiness
and grainy camera work, it actually becomes quit disturbing.
It's more of a piece of art than a movie, as the images and settings
are all llike a bad nightmare. The doors and walkways are made
with strange angles and there's peculiar patterns painting on the walls
and floors. Apparently at the time of the filming, there was an
electical shortage, so much of the shadows and sets were made out of
neccesity, which inadvertantly created some of early Cinema's most creepy
moments. |
CAMP BLOOD - 1999 - Dead Alive Productions From the
opening credits, it's obvious this is a low-budget movie. They
already have the required "boob shot" before the opening credits...
not that there's anything wrong with that. Some might not give
this one a chance, but this is worth a watch simply for the goofy characters
that come into play, like the 2 hunters in the woods, and the old man
walking on the roadside who gives the kids directions to Camp Blood.
Where did they find these goofs! They are legitimately funny in
a very hokey kind of way. I laughed out loud when one victim had
their head "removed" and it fell into the creek. The
acting was actually above average for a film of this nature, it's unfortunate
the lighting and camera work wasn't a little more up to speed.
Hey, it's horror by the numbers, the Camp where murders took place,
a bunch of morons that decide to camp there anyway, and a guy with a
machete and clown mask making minced meat of everyone... what else do
you want? |
CAPE FEAR - 1991 - Director: Martin Scorsese "Cape
Fear" and "Silence Of The Lambs" started the decade of
the 90's off with a bang, unfortunatley the fuse went out quickly.
After all, how could anyone possibly reach the disturbing heights of
these two movies. This is a remake of the 1962 movie with the
same name starring Robert Mitchum. Robert Deniro took over the
role of ex-con Max Cady in what has been one of the most disturbing
roles ever put on screen. Cady is out for revenge against his
attorney that misrepresneted years ago which resulted in him spending
some hard time. Nick Nolte plays defense attorney Sam J. Bowden
and his wife is played by Jessica Lange. This is the epitome of
a "Psychological Thriller" as Deniro's character stalks Bowden's
family from every angle possible, including making friends with his
daughter, the dopey Juliette Lewis. Deniro makes you hate his
character, even though Bowden isn't perfect himself, you are completely
consumed with him getting Cady and punishing him. Cady uses biblical
scriptures to justify his revenge on the man who "done him wrong".
In many ways this is more frightening than "Freddy Krueger"
or "Jason" because this situation is all too real. Joe
Don Baker is fantastic as the Private Investigator helping Bowden trap
Cady. You'll also catch cameos from the original cast.
Gregory Peck, who was Bowden in the original, plays Cady's attorney
in scene, and Robert Mitchum, who played Cady, is a policeman in this
one. Very disturbing, scary and will leave you with some permanent
psychological scars. |
THE CARPENTER: 1989 - Director: Kevin Wellington It's hard
to talk about this film without giving the ending away, but let me say
that it was extremely disappointing. The very consistent Wings
Hauser plays "The Carpenter" who mysteriously shows up and
a couple's house to assist in the construction of their home.
The couple had moved to the house after the wife was released from a
Mental Institute. This was one of the main factors in this film
as you never knew if this "Carpenter" was real of a figment
of her imagination. There was some dark humor implemented into
the film and delivered very effectively by Hauser. The gore was
quite graphic, but so silly it wasn't really "gross".
As you can imagine, there's multiple ways to kill people with the tools
of a carpenter. I'm pretty sure they broke the record for the
worst "amputated arm" sequence ever, which again, was part
of the silliness. Overall, Director David Wellington not only
dropped the ball, but the ball went bouncing down the street and was
run over by a bus. He developed a creepy atmosphere but couldn't
deliver the goods. It's worth a watch because of Hauser, but don't
expect to leave completely satisfied. |
CARRIE
2: THE RAGE - 1999 This film
was highly criticized when it came out, and it certainly doesn't have
the shock value of the first film, but I didn't mind this one.
I can honestly say I'm not a huge fan of "Carrie" but I can't
deny the impact it had, but 20 years later there wasn't much that hadn't
been done. This one focuses on boys who have a competition to
see how many girls they can sleep with and accumulate points along the
way, which was in the news at this time for actually happening around
that time period. The main character Rachel, played by Emily Bergl,
is related to the original Carrie, and has some of the same frightening
abilities which are eventually unleashed in a bloodbath that goes far
beyond the first movie. Ironically, with all the modern technology,
they still couldn't disturb you like the original bloodbath Carrie took
at the Prom. |
THE CARRIER - 1988 - Director: Nathan J. White This is
much more than a Horror film, in fact, Horror is most likely used as
a cover. When a small town becomes infected by a deadly disease
and is cut off from outside help, paranoia sets in and it becomes a
sort of "Lord Of The Flies" mentality. The story is
based around a young man (Gregory Fortescu) who is ostracized by the
community for accidentally killing his parents in a fire. After
being attacked by a strange beast, he contracts a disease that will
kill anyone who comes in direct contact with it. The young man
becomes a prisoner of his own skin as he's unable to physically interact
with anyone. In the meantime, the townspeople have lost their
minds trying to save themselves. They cover up in plastic as to
avoid contact and use cats to test buildings and objects for the disease.
Cat's become such a hot commodity they kill each other for them.
This is really a dark comedy when you break it down, it shows the ignorance
of people and the dangers of extreme religious beliefs. The movie
is not without flaws, there are times where you get a little confused
as to who's who because everyone is covered, but it's not drastically
important. This is the only film Nathan J. White has directed
to date, and most of the actors have done limited work since.
It's too bad White hasn't take on other projects as he seemed to have
a unique gift for using Horror to teach us something about ourselves. |
CASTLE FREAK - 1995 Jeffery
Combs (Re-Animator) stars in the Full Moon Production about a "freak"
living in the basement of a castle. Comb's and his family have
inherited this castle in England and are there to visit and scope out
the place. The basic plot is pretty simple, but there's sub-plots
that help this one along. Combs and his wife, played by Barbara
Crampton (Chopping Mall, Re-Animator) have a rocky relationship.
She blames him for the death of one child and causing their other daughter's
blindness after he rolled their car in an accident. The blind
girl becomes a, pardon the poor choice of words, focal point of the
film as she is the first to believe there is some sort of creature in
the castle. Director Stuart Gordon, who directed "Re-Animator),
does a great job with the gothic feel and darkness of the film and keeps
the mystery brewing. There's not a ton of action here, but a lot
of suspense and intrigue. |
CEMETERY MAN - 1995 - Director: MICHELE SOAVI Before Rupert
Everett was in every lame mainstream love-story movie, he did this dark
comedy about the caretaker of a Cemetery who has a problem with the
inhabitants coming back to life. The dry humor of this film is
extremely heavy and may not be for everyone. Michele Soavi, who
learned from the great Dario Argento, does some amazing work with a
limited budget. The Cemetery and setting are gothic and creepy
and give the film a distinct atmosphere. Everett is very likeable
as the the apathetic caretaker who'd rather deal with the Zombies than
fill out paperwork to report the bizarre reanimations. Fans of
"The Living Dead" will most likely appreciate this film despite
the sarcastic nature of the film. Anna Fulchi is delicious as
the love interest of Rupert. |
THE CHANGELING - 1980 - Director: Peter Medak Murder,
mystery, revenge, greed and politics are the driving forces behind this
effective, and sometimes slow, ghost story. George C. Scott plays
a composer and college music professor who has tragically lost his family
in a freak accident. He moves into a huge mansion and soon after
discovers he's not alone. You need to pay attention to this story
or you'll drift away from it easily. If you do focus in, you're
in for some pretty frightening discoveries. Scott is incredible
as always as the tortured soul who's struggling with the past and being
obsessed with the spirit who's trying to tell him a deep dark secret.
One of the better films of this genre directed by the always strong
skills of Peter Medak. There's some genuine scares here as the
subject matter is very strong and disturbing. Would make a nice
double-feature with "The Entity". |
CHEERLEADER CAMP - 1987 With a title
like this, you know you're bound to see a LOT of "pom-poms",
and if that's your thing, you won't be disappointed. I'm not sure
what the scariest part of the movie is, seeing Leif Garrett, yes, THAT
Lief Garrett, doing a rap routine with some fat guy, or the actual murders.
This one is full of sexual innuendos and bad jokes and even worse acting.
There's traces of Troma humor here, but it falls way short.
The juvenile humor is only going to appeal to the young boys on the
level of "Beavus & Butthead". This one barely qualifies
as horror as it's scary for all the wrong reasons. |
CHERRY FALLS - 2000 - Director: Geoffrey Wright Big surprises
here in this smart and sometimes funny modern "Slasher".
To steal from another review I saw it called a cross between "Scream"
and "American Pie", which is a decent comparison for the most
part. The story takes place in "Cherry Falls" a medium
sized city most likely located somewhere like Michigan or somewhere
like that. I compare some of the dark humor to "Heathers"
as it looks at how kids deal with their peers being murdered.
I simply can't get into the story without giving too much away, but
it deals with some skeletons in the closet and how things are conveniently
covered up. The killer is killing virgins in the small town (Cherry
Falls? Get it?) which leads to all kinds of confusion and mayhem with
the parents and kids. Brittany Murphy (Prophecy II) is very effective
as the lead and her on-screen father Michael Biehn (Terminator) brings
some clout to the cast. I'm itching to tell more, which is credit
to director Geoffrey Wright and the way he handles the story. |
CHILD'S PLAY - 1988- Director: Tom Holland It wasn't
the first by a long shot, but certainly the most popular "killer
doll" movie of all time. "Chucky" is still synonymous
with evil toys to this day. Serial Killer, or strangler in this
case, Charles Lee Ray had been shot by police detective Mike Norris
(Chris Sarandon). Fortunately for Charles, he had been studying
witchcraft and before he died was able to put his sole into a "good
guy" doll. Brad Dourif (Death Machine) plays Charles Lee
Ray and "Chucky". For some, this could be a pretty scary
movie for some people who aren't fond of dolls or ventriloquists.
For others it's more laughable than anything, and the material isn't
taken very seriously. If follows all the rules of a good horror
movie, nasty death's, a killer that won't die, and a ton of close calls.
The first 15 minutes are a bit sickening as they try to establish some
characters. A young boy named "Andy Barclay" (Alex Vincent)
get's a "Good Guy" for his birthday from his mother (Catherine
Hicks) which turns out to be "Chucky". They make "Andy"
way too cutsey for awhile, but the second half he does much better and
is much more believable. So far, all "Child's Play"
movies have received theatrical releases, which should say something
for their popularity. |
CHILD'S PLAY 2 - 1990 - Director: John Lafia The little
bastard is back! Chucky returns with more mayhem in this popular
series featuring the killer "Good Guy" doll. It picks
pretty much where the first left off, "Andy" (Alex Vincent)
is a couple years older and has been moved into a new foster home who
are also housing a teenage girl played by Chrisine Elise (Body Snatchers).
Chucky is still after Andy and everyone thinks he's crazy until people
start dying. Overall, this one is actually better than the first
as far as action and overall cinematography. Chucky (Brad Dourif)
is much nastier and uses profanity to an extreme. The ending is
very good as our heros battle the little monster in the "Good Guy"
toy factory. This movie requires very little thought and contains
some pretty funny moments, you could do a lot worse.... like Part 3. |
CHILD'S PLAY 3 - 1991 - Director: Jack Bender Part 3 came
too fast, this series needed to breathe some more before forcing another
storyline. "Andy Barclay", played by an annoying Justin
Whalin, has gone off to military school where he is again tracked down
by Chucky. The humor is forced, and the setting of the military
school just doesn't work. It's hard to care about any of the cast
which results is a long 90 minutes of mediocre Horror. Director
Jack Bender has more experience in lame TV Series and it shows in this
one. |
CHILD'S PLAY 4: BRIDE OF CHUCKY - 1998 - Director: Ronny Yu To their
credit, Part 4 was released in the theatres like all three of the earlier
films, in fact the hype was pretty big on this one. The soundtrack
contained tracks from popular bands like White Zombie, Insane Clown
Posse and Monster Magnet. They took a chapter out of the "Scream"
movies and poked fun at their past, in hopes it would make them seem
cool in the eyes of the younger generation of movie-goers. It's
unfortunate that after all their efforts, the movie didn't live up to
the hype. Had it been a "strait-to-video" release the
perception would have been different. One, or two perhaps, of
the positives was Jennifer Tilly and her ample amount of cleavage.
She plays an old girlfriend of Charles Lee Ray who is trying to bring
back here old beau from the body of Chucky. This ends up being
more of a comedy than horror as there are some funny moments and good
lines from Chucky. The larger budget helps make it one, if not
the best of the series visually, but story-wise it just doesn't measure
up. |
CHILD'S PLAY 5: Seed Of Chucky - 2004 - Director: Don Mancini It's really
amazing how far this series has come from 1989, there's literally a
generation of us that grew up watching this demented doll murder everyone
in sight. Now, Chucky has a son/daughter named Glen/Glenda, which is
homage to the late Ed Wood film "Glen Or Glenda". There's
plenty of other gags, inside jokes and special apperances that make
this film much more entertaining than it should be. John Waters and
Redman appear and Jennifer Tilly plays herself. Tilly deserves a ton
of credit here for completely having a sense of humor about herself
and Hollywood in general. You almost need to have a little knowledge
of the history of the series going in to get some of the jokes, but
then again, this ain't brain surgery. Put it this way, if you masterbating
puppets funny, you'll get a kick out of this one. |
CHILDREN OF THE CORN - 1984 - Based on story by: Stephan King What "Jaws"
did for the ocean, this movie did for cornfields... all right that's
a stretch, but if you grew up on a farm or lived around a cornfield,
this movie is actually pretty disturbing. The kids in a small
Nebraska town have formed a cult and have killed off all the adults,
sounds like Stephan King already doesn't it! Of course the criticism
is that the book is better, well, then read the book and remember that
Stephan King is an AUTHOR, the book better be better or he's in the
wrong businesses. Anyway, two strangers played by Linda Hamilton,
who also did a little movie called "The Terminator" that year,
and Peter Horton, who would later be on that annoying show "Thirtysomething".
There's really not a lot to the plot other than these psychotic kids
running a cult. The leaders were Isaac and Malachai, who were
the best two things about the movie. You found yourself saying
"those little bastards" on numerous occasions. Isaac,
played by Josh Franklin, was an especially freaky kid, his over the
top delivery made him sound like a gay Southern Baptist minister!
Now THAT'S scary! Puuuhraaaise the LOOORD! These kids were
brutal murderers too, they used knives, hammers, scythes and anything
else with a sharp end to kill their victims. They called this
an "adults nightmare", well if it hadn't been for the supernatural
ending, it might have been more scary for the grownups. It was
eight years before a sequel was made, and since then at least 4 more
have made on the same theme. |
CHILDREN OF THE CORN 2- 1993 - Based on story by: Stephan King It's been
8 years since the first movie, and the "strait to video" craze
opened the floodgates for sub-par movies to make it into the stores.
I'll admit, I've seen worse, but this one is a big let down from the
very beginning. It starts where the last movie left off and the
press is all over the small Nebraska town of Gatlin to investigate the
deaths of 50 or so adults. Terrance Knox plays one of those reporters,
and is a decent front man. The only other bright part is seeing
"Days Of Our Lives" cutie Christie Clark in a bikini top.
The kids are considerably less frightening, and the murders are more
bloody. I will admit the church scene is pretty nasty. There's
been numerous sequels since then most are better than this one. |
CHILDREN OF THE CORN 3- 1994 - Based on story by: Stephan King They could
have called this one "Children Of The Corn In The Hood".
Two brothers from the infamous Gatlin community in Nebraska are adopted
and move to the Big City with new parents. This is one of the
DUMBEST ideas in the history of "strait-to-video" horror.
"Eli" is the evil kid this time, who actually does a pretty
good job, actually grows a corn field in the middle of the city in an
abandoned lot. Did I mention how dumb this is? Eli starts
raising Hell, literally, while is father is trying to market this "super-corn"
to investors... I am NOT making this up. The death scenes are
pretty graphic and silly and the only really scary parts are flashbacks
from the first movie. This one is too dumb all-around, for true
horror fans, it's an insult. |
CHILDREN OF THE CORN 4- 1996 - Based on story by: Stephan King Finally
a sequel in the series that is tolerable! There's definitely some
problems with the story, but the overall feel and the cast are a welcomed
improvement. In this one, we start from the beginning, before
the kids have become "possessed" or whatever you want to call
it. All the kids break into a fever and become strangely ill.
When the fever mysteriously disappears, the children have all changed
and taken on the names of children from the past. It's up to a
young nurse and one of the town's residents to stop them from bringing
their leader back to life. Freshman director Greg Spence does a nice
job with the special effects and lighting making this one far more creepy
than even the first film. Karen Black plays a local Mother who
suffers from horrible nightmares about the events to come, she really
gives the movie some needed clout. Overall, not great, but adequate
and watchable with some pretty good amounts of blood and a high body
count. |
CHILDREN OF THE CORN 5 - 1998 - Based on story by: Stephan King While reading
the opening credits I realized this movie had potentially two of the
most annoying actors I could have cast... Ahmet Zappa, yes, Frank's
boy, and Alexis Arquette, brother of David, Patricia and Rosanna.
Needless to say I wasn't really looking forward to seeing these bafoons
for very long. Having an opinion on this one is really hard, it's
the same hashed over story as a group of college-aged kids wander into
a secluded town that is strange to say the least. One of the girls
has ties to the locals and decides to look into it deeper. Unfortunately
even with David Carradine and Fred Williamson in smaller roles can't
save this one... it's run it's course... the harvest is over... or is
it? |
CHILDREN OF THE CORN 666- 1999 - Director: Kari Skogland The scariest
thing about this movie is seeing John Franklin returning as "Isaac"
from the original movie... and it's scary for all the wrong reasons!
What the hell's going on here, he was maybe 12 in the first movie in
1984, now he looks to be easily in his forties! As far as the
movie, this one is simply too fake to be scary. It's almost like
director Kari Skogland got a new video effects program and had to try
each annoying setting. The cast looks like it escaped from "Saved
By The Bell". This movie is most closely related to the
first movie with the return of Isaac from a 19 year coma. The
daughter of one of his disciples has returned to find her mother, but
finds a lot more than she bargained for. Apparently she is part
of some ridiculous prophecy that needs to be full-filled for the "one
who walks behind the rows". The plot and herky-jerky camera
work are both too much to bare, if you are a fan of the first movie,
don't ruin any memories of it by watching this one. |
CHILDREN SHOULDN'T PLAY WITH DEAD THINGS - 1972 - Director: Bob Clark (III) For the
first half of this movie, you should have a "rimshot" ready
for all the bad jokes! Some are so bad their good, others are
just silly. From the future director of "Porky's" comes
the story of a group of actors who venture to a remote cemetery to perform
a satanic ritual to raise the dead. You have to throw out any
logic here or your brain will explode. I'm not sure what they
planned on doing if it worked... which it did, and they had no idea
what to do! This one was put out due to the success of "Night
Of The Living Dead", and in some ways it's more enjoyable, with
some scary moments, but as "N.O.T.L.D." had a more poignant
story, this one basically says, "Don't go messing with dead people!!".
Alan Ormsby helped write the film along with director Bob Clark, and
they would work together on other occasions as well. Ormsby continued
to write movie scripts, including "Porky's 2: The Next Day"
and "The Substitute". The special effects are
actually pretty good in this one, and Clark generates some fear by killing
off the characters you many not expect early in the film. |
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