When it comes to the American slasher movie, 1980 is a big year.  There's little doubt that 1978s Halloween was the supernova that started the process, but with the long production process of film, especially in the celluloid days of hand editing, it wouldn't really be until 1980 that producers and directors would be able to sift through the formula and build on it in ways that they thought would grab fans of Halloween while adding their own signature to gain adherents of their own.  For my money (and the money of the theater going public of the day,) if Halloween is the proof of concept, Friday the 13th is the blockbuster success that opened for floodgates for the dozens and dozens (by some accounts over 100 entries in just 4 short years) of films that would follow the blueprint and try to grab as much adulation and cash as they could before fan burnout and political pressures in Ronald Reagan's newly conservative political climate would essentially lead to a smothering of excitement for the genre both amongst horror fans and film makers.  

Despite being a film that clearly leans heavily on the legacy of Halloween, I'd suggest that Friday the 13th is an unabashed success both as a catalyst in shaping film history, but also in simply being a film of excellent quality that stands up today.  While done on a very modest budget with a young inexperienced cast, and apparently with a script written in just a couple of weeks, it's got a depth that I think will be surprising to people who rightfully have a generalized assumption of what an 80s slasher has to offer.  If you haven't seen it, Matt and I both highly recommend it.  If you have, we hope you enjoy our analysis of this fun and important film in the history of Horror.

Cheers!

Shonny Constant 4.19.19

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It's been a bumpy release schedule, but we've made it to 20 episodes.  Thank you so much for sticking with us through these early growing pains.  This week, we went tangential again with the choose your own adventure inspired Netflix experience Bandersnatch.  It's an interesting tale set in the framework of Black Mirror, the British series that explores potential dystopian outcomes to technological advancements colliding with the human experience today.  It's not close to what one might call pure horror, but it's full of intrigue, madness, and murder so we decided to check it out.  Let us know what you think!

Cheers!

Shonny Constant

3.21.19

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Cover art for this episode by Crystal Mielcarek!  Find more of her work on Facebook, Instagram, or Smushbox.net

Cold Skin is a newer release on Shudder, a 2017 movie that caught my eye with it's preview showing a bleak lighthouse environment, remote and in the past.  I like this set up for a movie, because if it's done well, I feel like I'm being immersed into a story and a fantastical place.  In the case of Cold Skin, Matt and I both agree that the movie delivers in both areas, with a great setting, an interesting enemy, and some depth to what we're supposed to interpret that doesn't (for us at least) dip too far off of a fun and compelling story.  

Gruner especially, with his semi-malicious nature and far flung sensibilities, is a fun character to follow.  A convincingly paranoid but invaluable partner when it comes to surviving the environment, I'd place him in the lineage of Quint from Jaws.  

We'd love to hear your opinions of Cold Skin!  Find us at one of the links below and tell us what you thought of it.

Cheers!

-Shonny Constant

2. 21. 2019 

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Cheers!

I don't recall the first time I saw C.H.U.D.  Long enough ago that I remember smiling, probably tittering, when Marge admonished Homer about the folly of judging New York City on the pimps and the C.H.U.D.S.  It's not a movie that quite hits the mark with it's hard boiled morality play, or frankly the titular monsters unless they be obscured with one of the numerous camera tricks employed by the film makers, the deftness of which is one reason why the film deserves to be remembered.  Another is that it's just fun.  It's people tellinng stories for the camera while some sad dope is shuffling around in a rubber monster suit.  That's only been employed a few times successfully enough to end up as a movie worth revisiting, if maybe only once. 

Besides, without it, we wouldn't have Bud the Chud, and who wants that dimension? 

Cheers!

-Shonny Constant

2. 1. 2019 

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Cover art for this episode by Crystal Mielcarek!  Find more of her work on Facebook, Instagram, or Smushbox.net

When this film first arrived on Netflix in late 2016, it immediately created a buzz amongst the horror fan groups I was following.  Comparisons were being made to John Carpenter's The Thing (1982), which of course had me quite intrigued.  As my life was going through a transition at the time, rather than watching it immediately, I let it simmer for a while, and while in the bigger scope, reviews were quite mixed, the ones I was hearing had me thinking something great was in store for me.

Finally seeing it, I felt quite torn.  While there was certainly a lot to appreciate from this ambitious film, I felt that too many of the details throughout the presentation muddied up the experience.  Having only been keen on the highest of reviews, I a bit unfairly  looked too closely at how it measured up to The Thing, one of my favorite of all cinematic experiences, and that left me with a list of complaints.  Having now watched it again, I was able to set those biases aside, and as a result experience the thrills of this well made practical effects and image strong movie the way I'd hope most people will.

Matt was watching the movie for the first time for this episode.  That worked out well, as his enthusiasm helped drive the tone of our discussion.  The Void is a movie that we both recommend.  Even if that mysterious portal is a little too much of a hole for me to be fully comfortable with.

Cheers!

-Shonny Constant

1. 8. 2019 

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Our first sequel episode is fittingly a follow up to our very first episode (1: Hellraiser (1987)).  The film starts off in fantastic fashion, with shades of the first film mingled with something of a mad doctor twist (which always reminds me of Re-Animator (1985), even if there's no obvious cinematic connection) but begins to go off the rails for us as the movie descends into Hell for it's ambitious but unfortunately underfunded third act.  Despite our modern day depreciation of the movie's value for present day viewers, there can be little doubt that the movie has made an impact on many people, as the series is to go on for (at the time of this writing) another 8 entries.  For us even, despite something less than a fully glowing review, the high spots of the film are indeed so good that we found they outweighed the shortcomings to provide a quite good follow up to the original, with our complaint being that the film makers weren't given the resources to make something that quite possibly could have met or exceeded the quality of the first as a viewing experience.  

What are your feelings on the Hellbound: Hellraiser II (1988)?  When did you first see it and what are your thoughts?  Come let us know at one of the links below.  

Cheers!

-Shonny Constant

1. 3. 2019 

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