March & April Horror Movie Watching Thread 2020 - Coronavirus Edition!

Not to make light of the Coronavirus situation. But anyone want to post watched movies here like the Annual October Horror Movie Watching Thread? I watched / listened to Candy Corn this weekend. I can start if there is some interest.

 

Watched The Furies and Warning Sign

 

LOL! I'm into it though.

Saturday night I saw a new movie called VHYes. It's only 70 mins, but the concept is basically that you're watching a VHS tape of a wedding... that was accidentally taped over when the couple's son gets a video camera for Christmas in 1987. So basically you're getting little snippets of the wedding buried under footage of the son trying out his new camera and tons of fake TV shows / commercials (even with a cameo from Susan Sarandon). The actor in the softcore scenes was especially hilarious. It's kind of like WNUF only good. It's more than just random nostalgia footage too, it has a narrative that carries through. It even goes horror at the end. Fun movie, very well executed.

When I got home I watched Scream Factory's new blu-ray of Bug. Crazy '70s animal attack movie about pyromaniac roaches. Pretty wild. Don't let the PG rating fool you. No video extras, unfortunately. Just the trailer.

Tonight I caught up with a few VHS that a friend sent me.

First up was Stranger In The House, a '90s Pierre David thriller. Steve Railsback plays a thief inserting himself into the life of a couple in order to steal a piece of jewelry hidden beneath their floorboards. Only he doesn't realize the husband is having an affair with his secretary and they're plotting to kill the wife... and they see Railsback as the perfect fall guy. Kathleen Kinmont plays the wife's friend who runs a bed and breakfast next door. Not as thrilling as I'd hoped it would be. Aside from some brief nudity, this could have been a Lifetime movie.

After that was Run Stranger, Run. This one is a '70s melodrama for about an hour and 15 minutes, then turns into a full blown slasher film for the final 15 mins. Cast includes Ron Howard, Patricia Neal and her real life daughter, Cloris Leachman, and Bobby Darin. It was directed by Kolchak himself Darren McGavin, and even features his real-life wife being terrorized in an abandoned beach house. Definitely slow, but has great atmosphere and pays off well enough at the end.

 

Candy Corn -



I saw this replica prop from Candy Corn during Toyfair a few weeks back. I didn't really pay much attention to it since the Hellraiser puzzle box is next to it. But I heard about Candy Corn before. I think a few people reviewed it during last year's October topic. I wasn't really going to check it out but I think I saw the actual prop on auction somewhere as well that I can't remember. I knew Tony Todd was in it. So I thought what the hell. I like candy corn too so maybe this will be good.

Turns out the strange guy from the Burbs is in Candy Corn as well as Lynda from the original Halloween. But sadly the presence of good actors doesn't make this movie good. It's one of those country hick backwoods feel type movies where the "normal" people go to beat up a guy in the circus. I guess I'm not too fond of those setups. I didn't care about any of the characters. There was a cute girl but she's like the easy girl who just wants or needs a boyfriend so she for the most part gives a pass to really bad behavior. Except in one scene which I thought was going to make her a better character but it doesn't. She was a fairly good actress though. I wouldn't be surprised to see her in more horror movies.

The movie does have some good kills. Some that predator fans will like. But overall I wouldn't rush to see this one.

Westworld - Season 3 -



We have a topic about Westworld in the forum. It's kind of sci-fi horror. But this episode gave me a memory about the original Terminator and T2. How the Terminators were scary in those movies. It's possible that I had that feeling in parts of Westworld Season 1. I need to see it again. Season 1 is definitely worth owning. But in the premiere of Season 3, Dolores reminds me of a Terminator and how one of the female Terminators behaved in an old Terminator book. I didn't think the female Terminator in Terminator 3 was scary at all. Perhaps all the joke scenes ruined her performance. The blow up boobs and bathroom nonsense. But the concept of a robot that can talk and interact with you, wanting to kill you should be scary. And that's how I felt in some scenes during the premiere.

I'll hold off on watching the rest of the episodes until the season is finished. It's only 8 episodes. Then I'll watch one or two per night. Supposedly Season 3 is more good and bad from what I've heard. Which makes me believe that if Westworld continues, Season 4 will be the end. The premiere just sets a few of the characters and situation after Season 2, which wasn't a great season to me. They tried out too many twists and it just wasn't as good as the excellent first season.

The premiere also left out a few characters that I have little interest in. So once they start to include them in the story. I feel that the quality or at least my interest in the show will start to drop a bit.

Lust for Darkness Video Game -



I just found out about this game because of a story that said the Nintendo Switch version is edited. I read the company's selling points:

- World design inspired with works of Lovecraft, Giger & Zdzisław Beksiński, mixed with the strong erotic vibe.

- Exploring a Victorian mansion and the mysterious and dangerous world of Lusst’ghaa, with deadly creatures.

Sounds like a game I need to check out. Plus I remember this Zdzisław Beksiński artwork that freaked me out.



I'll find an uncut version of Lust for Darkness on computer. Perhaps for now or most likely for October. I'm not sure. I had something else already planned for October.

Supposedly the game isn't that good. But playing at night with a few drinks should help. They are working on a sequel called Lust from Beyond. So the game should be good for horror fans.

That VHYes reminds me of how we would tape over our sports games on Beta tapes. Sadly I wish I didn't do that now. We were too cheap to go and get blanks or our parents didn't break the little tab so they couldn't be taped over.

I remember Kathleen Kinmont from one of those Halloween entries. She was the pretty girl posing with the pumpkin on the front steps wearing seemingly nothing but a large t-shirt. I know I have that image saved somewhere.

Boo Halloween edit -

 

Not horror, but I've been watching Police Story. No, not the Jackie Chan action flick or the Black Flag song, I'm talking the short-lived 70s LA cop anthology show. I was alive when it was on, but the cop shows I watched at the time were dumber, like SWAT or Starsky and Hutch. This show was a little too mature for me at the time.

Two things have stood out to me. One, star power. Just within the last month, I've seen episodes with Kurt Russell, Cleavon Little, Robert Forster (David Hasselhoff has a one-line cameo as a parking lot attendant in that one), and Sylvester fucking Stallone. He even plays a guy named Rocky!
The other thing, this show is DARK. I mean, way darker than you expect in an older cop show. In Russell's ep, he plays a hayseed police cadet who does well in field work but struggles with written exams. Even though he saves an officer's life in the field, he still flunks out of the academy due to poor performance in the written tests. Forster plays a narc with an unusual technique of using informants. His informant is killed, and shortly after he is too. The episode ends with his partner taking over his unusual methods (the whole thing reminded me of To Live and Die in LA). Little's episode was especially bleak, he's a patrol cop who gets killed by a junkie while his partner is unable to assist due to being ill. The junkie is found not guilty and the partner quits the force. Wow. Really depressing ending.

It comes on Saturday nights on a channel called "H&I". If you have it, and like gritty realistic police shows, definitely set your DVRs.

 

Okay I'm really into this. There's literally nothing else to do after they declared a state of emergency this morning. I actually have a fairly large stack of unwatched blu-rays and really there's no better time than now to watch them all.

~Matt

 

Fuck yeah man.....make the best of it. Stay safe.

 

Alien -



Of course I've seen Alien multiple times before. But I saw that Neca has figures of Parker and Brett coming out. I decided not to get them but I've been watching / listening to Alien. And if I wasn't sure before, I've concluded that I definitely prefer the original cut of Alien. I was already settled on the Director's Cut of Aliens. That's how I'll always watch the movies now. I do like that scene when Ripley and Lambert get into a fight. But it's just that egg scene in Alien that I don't like that much and it changes how the eggs work in Aliens. I can't remember which movie I watched first when I was a kid. I would guess Aliens. But I could be wrong.

The image above is from a Aliens poster that I own. I'm putting together an Alien collection and also reconsidered Ripley's wristwatch from Aliens. I know she wore something digital in Alien. But she wears a Seiko in Aliens. I fully watched these reviews.







I decided against the watch. I always thought those buttons were too much. It looks futuristic and that's probably why the watch was picked for the movie. Bishop wears the black version too. But the watch doesn't have lume. Which you think a futuristic watch would have. Or at least some light function. But I'm going to check out the designer's other watches. Perhaps I'll find something else similar that's more functional.

I never heard of that show but I'll check it out. It sounds good. Like some of those old TV shows that had tons of good upcoming actors and actresses. There were a bunch of them back then.

 

Do you have the H&I channel? Not sure how common it is. If you do, three episodes every Saturday night.

Shout Factory also released box sets on DVD.

 

I haven't watched much horror since my last post.

I watched an indie on Showtime called Colewell, which was mostly a quiet character piece for Karen Allen. Haven't seen her in a while. I liked it, but if you don't like calm, quiet, or meditative indies, it will probably bore the hell out of you.

I watched an awful kids movie called Playing With Fire. The less said the better.

I watched a few late '90s indies that I owned on DVD but had never gotten around to watching for whatever reason.

First was Larry Clark's Another Day In Paradise. I love Bully and liked Kids, so I had always wanted to see this but for whatever reason hadn't. This was... meh. Kind of long and meandering. Woods and Griffith are great, as is Natasha Gregson Wagner. Aside from the soundtrack, it just wasn't my thing. Surprisingly, this was written by Christopher Landon (the Happy Death Day movies and Scouts Guide To The Zombie Apocalypse).

The other was Vincent Gallo's Buffalo '66. Aside from his acting roles in the absolutely bonkers Hide And Seek and Freeway 2, I had never seen a Vincent Gallo movie. I liked this much more than Another Day In Paradise, but I still don't think it's a home run. Anjelica Huston and Ben Gazzara are terrific as the parents. Also, was surprised to see Jan-Michael Vincent in the bowling alley. There's a lot about it that is just sort of parroting the hip indie trends of the time. I really loved the ending though, where

Spoiler

it ends with the typical gritty dark downer ending these movies always go for, but then flips it and ends on a hopeful feel-good note.

Aside from those, just catching up on some TV shows. Caught up on the new season of Curb Your Enthusiasm, which is so consistently brilliant. Finale next week. Pre-tay, pre-tay, pre-tay good.

I've also been watching Schitt's Creek for a while now, usually limiting myself to one episode per night. Love this show, it's really charming. I've got 4 episodes left in season 5 on NetFlix, then I'm switching to the DVR for season 6. I should be wrapping up around the same time as the finale.

Also started a NetFlix horror anthology called Bloodride, which is surprisingly decent so far. I've only seen the first two episodes, but I thought they were both great. So far so good.

 

On a bit of an 80s action kick, watched avenging force, the annihilators, and shakedown.

 

I notice that unlike in the annual October thread, nobody's listing the dates. Makes sense. The October thread is a celebratory countdown. This is more like being stranded on a desert island, etchings marks into a piece of wood to count the days. Anyways, I've seen two horror movies so far since my country went into lockdown.

Cannibal Apocalypse: One of the original Section 1 Video Nasties, this one is nowhere near as objectionable and shocking as the jungle cannibal films. There is one scene, where we see the aftermath of a woman's breast that's been mangled by a rabid cannibal, and while the camera doesn't go in for a leering closeup, maybe that's what landed it on the list. Just enough sleaze and gore to ranke it as a minor grindhouse classic.

Return of the Fly: The son of The Fly continues his father's experiements with teleportation and is doublecrossed by an associate who turns him into a hideous human/fly hybrid. Not quite as shocking as I remember the original being, but the monster costume is quite good (though it looks like the actor had difficulty seeing and moving about in it), and Brett Halsey was an incredibly beautiful man at the time.

 

I watched the first 2 Leprechauns flicks on St Patty's. It was weird this year, with most bars-restaurants officially closed, no one seemed to even mention St Patty's day (for obvious reasons) but I still got myself some Guiness, Bailey's, drank all day in my Paddys Pub t shirt and had a good time at home with my wife. She even made some Guiness cupcakes.

I've also been watching Curb your Enthusiasm.......new season has been fucking brilliant. Latte Larry's spite store! Hahaha

I don't know how much longer I can go without some live sports, man..... I'm usually balls deep in baseball, hoops, hockey and golf this time of year..... Miserable, man. Miserable LOL

 

Yeah, I was saddened to learn that they weren't going to dye the river green in Chicago this year for St. Patrick's Day. First time in my lifetime that it was not dyed. There's nothing especially risky in doing it but I guess it could be an attraction spot so they didn't do it as a way to re-enforce the shelter in place.

Anyways, Yoga Hosers raised its head a little on the internet yesterday and I had bought the Blu-ray for a song from Hamilton Books a few months ago (still came with a slip cover) so as a Kevin Smith fan I decided now or never and put it in. As someone who likes anything with Nazi's in it I have to say I enjoyed it. There was an obvious Puppet Master feel to these killer Bratzi's so I found that enjoyable. And Smith did a good job with having kids working in a convenience store but not retreading Clerks beyond one or two obligatory self references. I thought he held himself in check there. Smith and Depp's daughters were pretty good as the leads. Playing teenage girls isn't exactly a stretch for two teenage girls but still they gave a natural and animated performance. I also liked Depp's performance in this more than in Tusk where it felt like the movie was in an elseworld and ground to a halt during his scenes. Here his character fits in nicely. This is a horror spoof so I think fans of horror can dig the Full Moon-esque tiny monsters, Nazi theme, satanists, mad scientist and monster/guy-in-a-suit aspects of this more than your regular Smith/comedy fans would. And at about 80 minutes it's pretty brisk.

I was surprised to see Smith didn't record a commentary track on this. That's half the reason to get more Kevin Smith movies to get more commentary tracks. That's probably my biggest disappointment.

 

Yoga Hosers got seriously panned, yet I found it more enjoyable than Tusk, which for some reason got way too much praise.

I only wish they hadn't shown Smith's daughter saying "I'm not even supposed to BE HERE today!" in the trailer, 'cuz I would have totally lost it had I not known it was coming.

 

I think Tusk is on my watch list. I didn't know that Tusk and Yoga Hosers are part of a planned trilogy. So I'll probably watch them all together one day. Johnny Depp always seems funny. But he made a rough quote in I guess a leaked or released text message about Amber Heard. She's very pretty but it's fairly clear now that she isn't the best person.

I have it. That show comes on late. The channel seems like a sister channel to Me TV. They both show those old TV shows. Police Story is on Season 3 so I'll wait till they restart it. Thanks I'm seeing a bunch of classics in the listings.

I never list the date on my October reviews. Usually I would watch them on Friday and Saturday though because I would have drinks. I just found a new drink too for this October. I have to find a place to buy it first. It will be a good post for my October Halloween Items 2020 topic.

Seems like the whole United States will go into lock down soon. Honestly, it should have been sooner. We have to wait at least two weeks to see who has the virus and who doesn't. Plus no one seems to be really sure how long the virus will last on surfaces. I mentioned that I've seen animal viruses and they will last a long time. Like months if you don't bleach all the surfaces.

 

It's an anthology series, with no recurring characters or plotlines. Every episode is stand-alone. I.E., you don't have to start on Season 1.

 

I'm the kind of person that always likes to start from the beginning. I always stop watching shows and restart at the beginning. I stopped watching CSI and will go back one day.

People seem to still be playing around with this lock down. I glimpsed a story on the news and they still showed people mingling around in New York. The longer we take to shut down the longer the stay in period will be.

 

I'm trying to remember what I watched in the past few days. I'll stick mostly to the horror stuff.

Terror On Tour, which a friend gave me on VHS. Honestly, I thought it was kind of tedious. It was a struggle to make it until the end. As a slasher completest, I'm glad to have that hole filled in my collection though.

Scorpion's Raw Courage blu-ray, which was minimalist but engaging. There are probably better movies of it's kind, but this one is good fun. Thoroughly enjoyed it.

Eat Brains Love, the new Rodman Flender movie on VOD. The title is cringeworthy, but I watched it because I love Idle Hands. I liked it more than expected, certainly gorier than expected, but it was still pretty corny and had an All Cheerleaders Die non-ending. Not a bad watch, but not a must-see either.

Murderock blu-ray, which was pretty bland. I've been on a bit of an Italian horror kick lately, so after seeing really terrific and entertaining entries like Torso or You'll Die At Midnight, this one came across as tepid and mediocre. It was fun seeing Geretta Geretta (Demons, who has a terrific interview on the disc) and that guy from House On The Edge Of The Park though.

Freeway on DVD. Hadn't seen this in a while, but still loved it. Very un-PC, I bet Reese Witherspoon is hoping it never resurfaces, lol! Still, this one's wildly entertaining from start to finish.

I feel like there are a few more I'm forgetting, but whatever.

 

Yeah, but then you wouldn't be watching any during the Coronavirus stay-at-home, would ya?

Nah, I get it, but really, for a show like this it truly doesn't matter. Also, you might not even like it, I'd say DVR a Saturday night's run of episodes and see if it works for you. This past weekend's slate wasn't bad; Stella Stevens as a new narcotics officer who's dedication to the job might cost her her marriage, Don Meredith as a patrol cop who believes a hit-and-run was murder, but because the victim was a black prostitute the detectives don't take up the case. It's up to him to solve it, while still handing out speeding tickets and pulling over DUIs. Finally, a cop is training his younger brother. The younger brother feels he's not getting a fair shake, but despite his desire to do well he's making small mistakes that could be fatal.

As for the movies I've watched while on lockdown,
The Crazies ('73)
Crawl
Across 110th St
Super Fly
Southbound
Strange Brew
Sleepless
Corruption
The Wages of Fear