It's been a while since i last posted something for you wonderful wonderful people so seeing as we're now in the month of October, the month of horror, I thought i'd make a little list of films for the non-horror aficionado's to help them ease into the genre. So please click read more to find out my recommendation...
For many films obsessives, October is a the month of fear. 31 days of horror movies and a lot people, myself included, annually do the 31DAYSOFHORROR challenge where the idea is to watch one horror film a day leading up to Halloween on the 31st. I've started my challenge with the classice 1968 Terrance Fisher Hammer production The Devil Rides Out and Scott Derricks' 2012 creepfest, Sinister. The post is just a few recommendations for people who are new to horror, or stuck with what to watch. So check out my recommendations below and let the blood flow freely.
HALLOWEEN (1978)
Dir: John Carpenter.
This is the obvious
one, you can't watch horror movies for Halloween and not watch where
it all began. Carpenter's follow-up to the successful action thriller
Assault On Precinct 13 is a completely different beast of a film, a
slow-burn slasher, well it's not that slow but the pace allows for
atmosphere galore. This is the film that gave us the first truly
terrifying franchise killer, 3 years before Jason Vorhees and 6 years
before Freddy Kruger killed them in their dreams (do that in a
Scottish accent-you'll get the reference). I could easily just list
all of Carpenters films from Halloween right through the 1980s but
i'll just post them here as “also recommended”. The cast has
everyone from Jamie Lee Curtis, P.J Soles and Donald Pleasance. Watch
it and enjoy....
Also Recommended:
The Thing, The Fog, Christine, Prince Of Darkness, In The Mouth Of
Madness.
TRICK
r' TREAT (2007) Dir: Michael Dougherty
Trick
r' Treat has become a tradition amongst horror fans since it's
release in 2007 as it perfectly captures the fun and darkness of
Halloween. A portmanteau style anthology film consisting of 4
inter-connecting stories taking place on Halloween eve. The stories
consist of a grumpy old man who hates Halloween, a psychopath
Teacher, A virgin with a twist and a group of kids pulling a prank.
While at times it's very cartoonish with it's tongue firmly in it's
cheek at other times it's down right dark and gory. With it's 70s
style aesthetics and a weird sort of Tales From The Crypt feel, Trick
r' Treat is a treat for fans of horror, comedy and anthology films. I
sort of see it as Hocus Pocus for adults although I bet you won't
find one adult who doesn't watch Hocus Pocus at Halloween, regardless
of whether or not they have children.
“Poison,
Drowning, Claw or Knife, So Many Ways To Take a Life!”
BRAINDEAD
(1992) Dir. Peter Jackson
Before
he discovered the art of CGI and making huge fantasy epics, New
Zealand director Peter Jackson, was the king of low-budget practical
FX Splatter. Braindead is his biggest gore fest to date, a zombie
love story comedy with more gore than Al (i'm super serial). The best
thing about Braindead is how far Jackson takes the practical FX and
gore. Braindead is and always will be the goriest movie of all time
but it's not sickening, it gets to a point in the film where the
blood and guts become so OTT that they actually become comical. The
films is also actually very funny too and it's a credit to Jackson
for pushing the FX to the limit on such a small, tight budget. I'm
not a huge fan of Lord Of The Rings or The Hobbit films and would one
day love to see Jackson return to the Horror genre.
Also
Recommended: Bad Taste, The Frighteners, Black Sheep, Wolf Creek,
Undead
A
NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET (1984) Dir: Wes Craven
Wes
Craven was known for making the brutal rape/revenge film The Last
House On The Left and the cannibals in the mountains film, The Hills
Have Eyes, he continued his horror career with the absolutely bonkers
slasher flick, A Nightmare On Elm Street. The film introduced us to
the eponymous Freddy Kruger, the murdered child killer who haunts the
dreams of the children of the lynch mob that killed him. Craven
employs some utter brilliance in the script and the visuals are
fantastic. The original film is a far more serious affair compared to
the films that followed it but that's not to say it doesn't have it's
humorous moments. Craven made a great, scary film in which (spoiler)
Johnny Deep famously gets devoured by a bed. Definitely worth a watch
on a dark and scary October night.
Also
Recommended: Friday 13th, Laid To Rest,
Sleepaway Camp, Slumber Party Massacre.
FRIGHT
NIGHT (1985) Dir: Tom Holland
The
80s wouldn't have been complete without Fright Night, there were a
lot of Vampire films in the 80s, Lost Boys, Near Dark and Vamp just
to name a few but Fright Night is the one which you'll have most fun
with. Not only is the film super fun but also have a great
performance from the great Roddy McDowell as Peter Vincent, a fake TV
vampire hunter hired to help High School student Charley Brewster
kill his neighbour who he suspects is a vampire, throw into the mix a
best friend called Evil Edd and Marcy Darcy from Married With
Children and you my friend have a hell of a time coming your way.
Great special FX, a good score and some good performances are the
order of the day with Fright Night. The remake ain't half bad
either..
Also
Recommended: The Lost Boys, Near Dark, Vamp, Salem's Lot ('79),
Fright Night (remake).
EVIL
DEAD (1981) Dir: Sam Raimi
The
film horror author Stephen King referred to as “the ultimate
experience in gruelling terror”, well in 1981 he may have been onto
something, 33 years later, it does lose that appeal but Evil Dead is
still a phenomenal piece of horror film making. Made for a very low
budget and starring a cast of unknown actors including it's lead, the
almighty one and only Bruce Campbell, The Evil Dead has become a
classic of the genre and paved way for countless imitations and
“creepy cabin in the woods” horror flicks including the horror
dissecting awesomeness that is Joss Whedon and Drew Goddard film,
Cabin In The Woods. Upon it's release, Evil Dead was extremely
controversial, especially here in the U.K where it was considered a
video nasty and director Sam Raimi was held up in court on obscenity
charges. But The Evil Dead and it's sequels, Evil Dead 2 and Army OF
Darkness hold up extremely well today. Definitely worth every minute
of your time.
THE
SHINING (1980) Dir: Stanley Kubrick
The
first film to ever scare the shit out of me, Stanley Kubrick's vision
of Stephen King's novel is, from what I gather a little different
from King's source novel. What Kubrick does with The Shining is not
only brilliantly realized, visually and narratively but also the
unease you feel as you watch a man descend into madness. It's a hard
watch but it's a must see for any horror fan. Watching Jack Nicholson
underplay for the majority of the film is more uneasy than most of
the actual scary shit in the Shining and really shows how incredible
Jack can be as an actor. Shelly Duvall gives an utter bravura
performance as the wife watching her husband slowly go mad and she
should have earned an Oscar for her performance. Unfortunately over
the years the impact that The Shining had on me as child has been
destroyed due to this line...”no TV and no Beer make homer
something something”, but despite the Simpsons, The Shining is
still a masterclass in both visual and performance led horror. If you
can get the uncut 144 minute version I highly recommend it, if not
the 119 minute European cut is more than satisfactory.
THE
OMEN (1976) Dir: Richard Donner
From
the director of Lethal Weapons 1 through 4, The Goonies and Superman
(1977) comes The Omen, a frankly creepy as shit occult horror which
introduced the world to Damien, the Anti-christ, born with a birth
mark of 666 on his head and able to make people do things and the
name alone gave Rodney Trotter the heebie jeebies. The Omen is just
creepy for creepy's sake but gives legendary hollywood actor Gregory
Peck a great role as the American ambassador who finds that a lot of
people are dying around him since the birth of his son Damien. The
Omen is atmospheric and well directed by Donner and contains some
really twisted death scenes. All three of the Omen films are worth
your time, especially the first and the third which finds Sam Neill
as the older Damien. It followed in the footsteps of The Exorcist but
managed to be it's own film. Another worthwhile film to watch this
Halloween.
Also
Recommended: The Changeling, The Ninth Gate, Insidious, Sinister.
SUSPIRIA
(1977) Dir: Dario Argento
Like
Carpenter I could easily list countless Argento films like Tenebre,
Phenomena, Deep Red etc... but i'm going with what I consider to be
Argento's crowning achievement. A little harder to get into than the
films posted so far but Suspiria is a phenomenal film, full of
vibrant cinematography and a truly haunting score from Goblin. It's
also very violent. It follows an American student as she arrives at a
prestigious Italian ballet school where people start turning up dead
or missing. She discovers that the school houses a coven of witches.
Dario's eye for the visual is fantastic, not as symmetrical as
Kubrick's but his use of Colour really make Suspiria stand out.
Jessica Harper (the 70s version of Ellen Page) carries the film
incredibly well as the lead but the support cast also hold their own
including a short role for everyone's favourite evil German, Udo
Kier. I highly recommend spending some time with Suspiria, I don't
think you'll be disappointed.
Also
Recommended: Tenebre, Inferno, Deep Red, New York Ripper,
Dellamorte Dellamore (Cemetery Man).
NIGHT,
DAWN & DAY OF THE DEAD (1968, '78, '85) Dir George A. Romero
This
one is a no-brainer for me, THE zombie trilogy to end all zombie
trilogies. Romero's films are not just iconic horror films but also
some of the most intelligent horror films you're ever likely to see.
Each of his films has an underlying theme of something, Night's theme
is that of the Vietnam war, Dawn's is consumerism and Day's is brains
over brawn. Each film is expertly written and crafted films. Yes they
have moments of sheer horror such as the “ghouls” coming to the
house in Night, the mooney priest zombie coming for franny in Dawn
and the overun/escape from Day. I'm a bit biased here with the
inclusion of these movies as Dawn is my favourite horror film of all
time so it was clearly going to make it the list but watched as a
trilogy, the three films work incredibly well together. It's also
worth pointing out that the remakes of both Night and Dawn are well
worth your time too, Day on the other hand is a steaming pile of wank
and if you really want to go all out I suggest Night, Dawn, Day,
Land, Diary and Survival Of The Dead as a full on Romero Zombie
blitz. Greatest zombie movies ever made.
Also
Recommended: Zombie Flesh Eaters, The Living Dead At The
Manchester Morgue, The Beyond, Return Of The Living Dead plus many
many more.
SCREAM
(1996) Dir: Wes Craven
Craven's
second film on this list and it's a damn good one to. Scream brought
about the slasher film renaissance when it hit theaters in 1996, a
return to the 80s style slasher flick but a film that would reference
those films in both visuals and in dialogue, a testament to writer
Kevin Williamson's love of the genre. Scream was the first
post-modern slasher film and it was huge. It paved the way for
Williamson's other written work, I Know What You did Last Summer and
guff like Urban Legend and sequels to IKWYDLS, Halloween, Candyman
and also sequels to Scream it's self. Scream took the well worn
themes of the 80s and updated them to the 90s. It followed high
schooler Sydney Prescott and her home town of Woodsboro, where a
masked killer is offing her friends and classmates. It's up to
Sydney, TV reporter Gail Weathers and doofy deputy Dewy to get to the
bottom of the killing. Scream worked on so many level, you never knew
who the killer was until the last 15 minutes but it kept making the
audience believe they knew then off'd that person. It was brilliant
writing and directing from Craven. Scream is an iconic 90s horror
film which I still get an enormous amount of joy from watching even
after 10 or 15 views.
Also
Recommended: Scream 2, 3 & 4, SAW, Cherry Falls.
THE
SIMPSONS TREEHOUSE OF HORRORS 1-10 (The 90s)Dir: Various
Remember
when the Simpsons was laugh out loud funny and not just smirk a bit
when Moe said something about syphilis? Those were fucking awesome
times. Between 1990 and 1999, The Simpsons put out 10 utterly
brilliant Halloween specials, each episode featured three tales of
terror, some of them were set up in an anthology style, the first one
was Lisa and Bart in the treehouse telling spooky tales, a haunted
house, an alien abduction and one of best tellings of Edgar Allen
Poe's The Raven, narrated by James Earl Jones. Each year a new
episode would air and each episode would again tell three tales of
terror whether it be a brand new story like “Time & Punishment”
where Homer travels through time and different dimensions or
sometimes they'd be parodies of films or TV shows like The Twilight
Zone, some of the stand out stories are things like Terror At 5 ½
Feet, Nightmare Cafeteria, The Homega Man, Hell Toupee, Attack OF The
50 ft Eyesores and my personal favourite, Nightmare on Evergreen
Terrace which I referenced above in the Elm Street review. These were
and still are some of the best written and conceived episodes of The
Simpsons and remain today, for me especially, a Halloween tradition.
Whatever you do though, stop at episode 10, after that they just get
shit.
Well
there we go, these are pretty much the gateway horror films for you
to get started with, I'll list a few more below for you but these, I
would say, are the most accessible films for new horror fans to use
to get into the genre. For all you hardcore horror whores, y'all know
ya shit so you ain't getting nowt from me....So from all of us here
at CA towers (pretty much just me and about 5 cats) I bid you all a
happy Halloween and a remember, when there's no more room in hell,
the dead will walk the earth, stay safe!....
Additional
recommendations
- Re-Animator
- Silence Of The Lambs
- The Faculty
- Bram Stoker's Dracula
- The Devil Rides Out
- Night OF The Eagle
- Halloween H20
- Bride Of Chucky
- The Wicker Man.
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