Episode 1 8
This Week in Movies #18 – Halloween Special!
Sundays at 8pm PDT
This week, it’s a special spooky Halloween horror episode of This Week in Movies. Hosts Lon Harris and Farrell Roth look at the trailers for the upcoming “And Soon the Darkness” and “Scream 4.” Plus 2 new streaming movies give Farrell nightmares, Lon reviews “Saw 3D” and we count down the Top 10 Underappreciated Horror Films of All Time. Finally, we’ll take our first trip down to the Screening Dungeon where Lon and Farrell will be forced to watch films that are sure to terrorize all 5 of their senses!
Introduction
Lon and Farrell are in costume as Tony Montana and Elvira Hancock from 1983′s “Scarface.” News reporter Roger Erik Tinch was not in costume. He’d focused his efforts for the day on his son, who went trick or treating as a monkey.
Trailer Talk
Farrell discussed the trailer for this 1970 remake of a British thriller from first-time director Marcos Efron. She is looking forward to the film because of stars Odette Yustman and Amber Heard.
The original was a ’90s satire of ’80s horror. Now we have a ’00s satire of ’90s horror. Predictable, but not without its charm. This one is still directed by Wes Craven and written by Kevin Williamson, from the original film.
In Theaters
This is the 7th film in the venerable “Saw” series, directed by Kevin Greutert. On the plus side, Lon felt the gore effects were well-done and effective, and he liked that the plot is easy to follow and straight-forward, even for someone who is not totally caught up on the “Saw” universe. However, he noted that it felt a bit like an elaborate excuse to show some torture sequences, and that the loss of Jigsaw as an enemy in the earlier films has made these later entries less effective. He also lamented the fact that the 3D, which could have been used so promisingly, was really just a gimmick and almost totally pointless.
The Screening Dungeon
In this new feature, Lon and Farrell force one another to watch movies that are definitely outside of their comfort zones.
Lon chose for Farrell the ’80s comedy-horror classic, “Fright Night”:
Farrell actually enjoyed the movie (well, most of it), and liked the campy sense of humor, and the clever premise. She sort of zoned out towards the end when it became a more traditional monster movie.
She chose romantic comedy “A Lot Like Love” to torture Lon. It was effective.
Billy Wilder said that the key to making a film romance interesting is to keep the couple apart. We know why they want to be together – they’re beautiful! – so the challenge is setting up why they CAN’T be together. This film takes that rule a bit too much to heart. It spends the whole time pulling these people into scenarios together only to interrupt the story just when it gets interesting to throw up artificial-feeling roadblocks. (They can’t casually date while he’s in SF and she’s in LA? It’s a few hours apart. Weekends! He owns his own company!)
Lon did note that the humor, unlike in most cheesy mainstream romantic comedies, comes from the wacky characters and their perspectives on life, rather than falling back on “shenanigans” to get laughs. He also noted that stars Ashton Kutcher and Amanda Peet have genuine chemistry, which he’s never felt about an Ashton Kutcher vehicle before.
Hollywood Headlines with Roger Tinch
Some of the stories discussed this week:
- Wired.com’s Best Ever Horror Films
Included in Wired’s list were “Freaks,” “The Exorcist,” “Rosemary’s Baby,” “Eyes Without a Face” and more. Though Lon loves all of these movies, he noted that these sorts of lists always contain the same 20-30 universally-acclaimed classics. His list, later in the show, looks at some non-mainstream horror films that don’t get enough attention.
- James Cameron to direct two sequels to “Avatar”
The director has announced that he will film not one but two follow-ups to his global smash “Avatar” as his next project. He says he’s looking forward to returning to Pandora in two films slated for December 2014 and December 2015. The original film has grossed grossed nearly $2.8 billion so far.
The world has gotten its first glimpses of the Steven Spielberg-Peter Jackson collaboration, “The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret of the Unicorn.” The film, based on a classic Belgian book series, will be animated using motion-capture, the same technique utilized in “Lord of the Rings,” “Avatar” and “Beowulf.”
On the heels of the homage to “Rocky Horror Picture Show” on “Glee,” show creator Ryan Murphy has entered talks to direct a feature-length remake of the legendary camp musical. Murphy has yet to comment on the nature of the discussions, but it has been confirmed that meetings have occurred.
DVD
This reimagining of the classic Edgar Allen Poe short story “The Tell-Tale Heart” is relatively well made and acted, but Farrell said she could easily tell why it had gone straight to video. She wondered if the actors in this movie knew while they were making it that it would go directly to DVD, and if this bothers them.
Lon’s Top 10 Overlooked Horror Films
Lon noted that these are not ranked in any particular order.
Largely unseen 2009 British thriller about an ill-fated yachting trip. The movie is tense and mind-bending, and builds to a conclusion Lon didn’t see coming. He had previously recommended it to Farrell and Tinch, who also both enjoyed it.
- “The Black Pit of Dr. M” (“Misterios de Ultratumba”)
This clever spin on the Faust legend is a remarkably ahead-of-its-time 1959 Mexican horror film that throws in pretty much EVERY classic horror movie trope into one story. Directed by Fernando Mendez, who made a long list of terrific, low-budget horror films in Mexico in the ’50s. Lon called it “one of the most diabolically clever and atmospheric horror movies ever made.”
- “May”
This 2002 indie horror-satire from director Lucky McKee should have made him and star Angela Bettis into household names. Instead, they have continued to do interesting work ever since, but under-the-radar. This film was an early success for Anna Faris, who went on to success in the “Scary Movie” franchise. It’s a pitch-black comedy about a very peculiar young woman and her fascination with lifelike dolls.
Chilling 1999 ghost story from David Koepp, based on a novel by Richard Matheson. Lon likes it because the movie so carefully introduces a believable blue-collar family (headed by star Kevin Bacon). When their world starts to come apart due to supernatural intruders in their home, you feel for them, because they are so well-developed.
The movie was overshadowed by the superficially-similar “The Sixth Sense” back in ’99, but Lon thinks this one holds up better.
1961 thriller directed by Jack Clayton and shot by the great Freddie Francis, and co-written by Truman Capote! It’s a chilling, quiet, deliberately-paced haunted house movie about a governess caring for two strange children who seem to be keeping some private secret. “The Others” with Nicole Kidman shares a similar setting and style, and was clearly inspired by this mysterious, unsettling black-and-white film.
Though this 1982 slasher mystery rarely makes lists of the best Dario Argento films, it remains one of Lon’s favorites, particularly due to the amazing, extended single-take sequence depicting the grisly murder of a lesbian couple. The film follows an American novelist on a trip to Rome, only to find that a local serial killer is basing a string of murder’s on his works.
The 1960 original is often mocked, but really inspired a lot of subsequent “creepy children” films. It features maybe the scariest child performances of any movie ever, and though the premise – about a town full of odd telepathic children all born on the same down – now sounds silly, the film itself remains scary to this day.
Antonia Bird’s ingenious period comedy horror Western works both as a snowbound gorefest and as a more thoughtful take on Manifest Destiny and the introduction of whites to the frontier. A group of disaffected soldiers, mainly veterans of the Mexican-American war, are set upon by a ferocious man-eating cavedweller (Robert Carlyle).
Though rarely mentioned alongside David Cronenberg’s most infamous early horror films, this 1979 film builds to arguably his most disturbing climax ever. Nola Carveth (Samatha Eggar) is under the care of a mysterious psychiatrist (Oliver Reed) for a strange disorder that has in some indirect way led to brutal attacks. The solution to the mystery here is memorably peculiar and gruesome.
- “Captain Kronos: Vampire Hunter”
Brian Clemens, one of the creators of the original “Avengers” TV show, wrote and directed this swashbuckling vampire adventure that’s arguably the most fun film ever produced by Britain’s legendary Hammer studios. Goofy-looking German actor Horst Janson scours the countryside looking for vampires, who suck out their victim’s youth and beauty along with their blood. It’s a near-perfect blend of swordfighting action, gory horror and dry comedy.
DVD, Part 2
“After.Life”
Farrell was intrigued by this indie thriller in which Christina Ricci finds herself under the care of a strange mortician (Liam Neeson) who says he can commune with the dead. She found the set-up compelling, but also thought the movie cheated by never revealing any clues, making the “twist” ending pointless. She noted that the film obviously was made with a very low-budget, as it contains few effects and all takes place on a single set.
Closing
The show will return LIVE next week with special guest Seth Gordon, director of the amazing, beloved documentary “The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters.” His next project is “Horrible Bosses” set to be released next year.
