Well, everyone, Halloween will soon be over for this year but we’ve got 2020 to look forward to! That’s one good thing about Halloween. It may have to end but it always returns, resurrected like an angry ghost or vampire.
Or like Michael Myers!
Yes, that’s right. Michael is returning next year, in a sequel to David Gordon Green’s Halloween. David Gordon Green’s Halloween, of course, should not be mistaken for Rob Zombie’s Halloween or any other Halloween that came out after the original. I swear to God, it’s so hard to keep all of these continuities straight.
Anyway, Halloween Kills is coming out next year and everyone’s really excited, even though Halloween Kills is a TERRIBLE title. Today, in honor of the holiday, Jamie Lee Curtis tweeted out some first-look footage of the film. And, because we love all of you and like to share, here it is!
It’s always interesting to watch Haxan with someone who has never seen it before.
Because this Swedish film was made in 1920 and released in 1922, it’s a silent film. Because it’s sold as being a documentary, it can be a bit of a hard sell among people who 1) hate to read subtitles and 2) instantly recoil at the idea of watching anything might be a educational. Even the fact that the film is subtitled “Witchcraft Through The Ages” might not be enough to get some people to set aside their prejudices.
So, what you do is you beg. You offer to give them popcorn and a Coke if they watch the movie. You stretch out on the couch, arch an eyebrow and suggest that there might be another reward waiting for them at the end of the film. You do whatever you have to do and you get them to watch.
Now admittedly, the first part of Haxan does come across as being a bit slow. The intertitles, which explain that this film was made to examine witchcraft throughout the ages, can come across as being a bit dry. The numerous scenes about how people used to think that the universe revolved around the Earth and that stars were merely lights hanging in the sky goes on for quite some time. Personally, I like these scenes. I enjoy the fact that director Benjamin Christensen actually uses a pointer, as if he’s a lecturer at a university. But they’re not for everyone.
But here’s the thing, skeptical viewers: KEEP WATCHING!
Because eventually, the film moves on from discussing ancient and medieval astronomy and it starts to discussing why people used to believe in witches and how witchcraft used to be punished and suddenly …. OH MY GOD, IS THAT THE DEVIL BURSTING UP OUT OF NOWHERE!? Yes, it is. And yes, that woman is buying a love potion and that monk has become possessed and that witch is flying through the air!
Haxan is an interestingly constructed film. At the start of the film, it proudly declares itself to be the work of a skeptic. Haxan is a film that, in its own scholarly way, ridicules superstition. Those who once believed in witchcraft are compared to those who once believed that the world was flat and that the stars revolved around the Earth. And yet, the film’s greatest moments are the ones that feature scenes of witches and the devil. I don’t think this is accidental. Instead, I think that Benjamin Christensen understood what D.W. Griffith, Ceceil B. DeMille, and Roger Corman understood. Audiences may want to pat themselves on the back for being pure or rational or whatever but, at the same time, they also want that taste of sin and the indulgence of superstition. Haxan makes the argument for science but not before indulging in some old time religion.
And it’s a lot of fun. Haxan is such a visually striking film with it’s taunting devils and its flying witches that one can hardly be shocked that it was initially banned in many countries and, even when it was released, it was often in a heavily censored form. Watching the film, you can also understand why it influenced future horror directors. The images are frequently the stuff of nightmares and the fact that the images are silent just makes them all the more ominous.
Haxan is definitely a film that every horror fan needs to see. Luckily, there’s a Criterion edition for that! Oh Criterion. What would we do without you?
Cujo is a such a depressing movie that I can barely stand to watch it.
Cujo, of course, is the 1983 film adaptation of the book by Stephen King. The book is about a dog that not only gets bit by a rabid bat but also gets possessed by the spirit of Frank Dodd, the serial killer who played a major role in The Dead Zone. The film abandons the subplot about Frank Dodd and, instead, it just deals with a rabid dog that kills a lot of people and who eventually traps Donna Trentonn (Dee Wallace) and her young son, Tad (Danny Pintauro), is a car for several days.
I have to admit that I’m really not the sort of person who should be watching a film like Cujo in the first place. When I was growing up, I was terrified of dogs. According to my family, I was bitten by one when I was just three years old, not that I have any memory of that actually happening. So, up until I was 18, I couldn’t handle being around them. Whenever I would walk home from school, I would run across the street if I heard a dog barking at me from behind a fence. If I was out with my family and I saw a dog approaching, I would hide behind the nearest big person.
I did have one good experience with a big dog when I was about ten years old. My family was up at the lake and this big, black dog started following us around and it was so friendly that I couldn’t help but relax around it. My mom was like, “See, Lisa Marie, not all dogs are bad.” We went to get lunch, leaving the dog behind. When we returned, the dog was there. He was excited to see my mom. He was excited to my aunt. He was excited to see my sisters. Then, he took one look at me and started to growl. I was frozen in fear, just standing there as the dog slowly stood up. My mom immediately stood in front of me, trying to block the dog’s view while I ran back to car. Of course, that didn’t work. The dog started barking and then took off running after me. His owners then showed up and grabbed the dog just as it was about to lunge at me and then they didn’t even bother to apologize! Instead, they told some story about how some other girl had thrown a rock at the dog and, as a result, the dog always growled at “little girls.” They acted like it was no big deal. (My aunt later told me that she had to grab my mom’s hand to keep her from slapping the dog’s owner when they tried to blame me for what happened.) For months afterwards, I had nightmares about that dog.
Fortunately, enough time has passed that I’m no longer petrified in fear of dogs though they still make pretty damn nervous. That said, Cujo, with its growling and killer dog, is exactly the type of film that’s designed to prey on my deepest fears. And yes, the movie does scare me but I have to admit that I don’t really care much about the people who get killed by Cujo. Instead …. I feel bad for Cujo. Yes, even though Cujo scares me to death and I’m not a dog person in general, this movie depresses me specifically because of what happens to the dog.
When we first see him, Cujo is happily chasing a rabbit. When he gets bitten by a rabid bat, he whimpers a little and I have to say that it breaks my heart to hear it. I mean, Cujo is just such a cute dog! And, to be honest, he seems like the type of big dog who maybe could have convinced me that not all dogs are bad. (There’s a part of me that really wishes that I could relax and love dogs as much as everyone else does.) But then he gets bitten by that bat and poor Cujo! Rabies is a terrible disease.
Cujo is a good, straight-forward horror film, one that gets the job done without all of the padding and blather that you sometimes have to deal with when it comes to Stephen King film adaptations. (Thankfully, nobody casually talks about Shawshank Prison or taking a trip to Derry or any of that other nonsense that seems to come up in most King films.) Dee Wallace gives a good performance as Donna Trenton, who is trapped in the car and desperate to save her child. King has said that he felt Wallace deserved an Oscar nomination for her performance and he’s probably right
But my God, I just cannot watch this movie without crying afterwards. I just feel so bad for that dog.
4 Shots From 4 Films is just what it says it is, 4 shots from 4 of our favorite films. As opposed to the reviews and recaps that we usually post, 4 Shots From 4 Films lets the visuals do the talking!
This October, we’re using 4 Shots From 4 Films to look at some of the best years that horror has to offer!
4 Shots From 4 2019 Films
Escape Room (2019, dir by Adam Robitel)
Happy Death Day 2U (2019, dir by Christopher Landon)
Well, as another horrorthon draws to a close, it’s time for another Shattered Lens tradition! Every Halloween, we share one of the greatest and most iconic horror films ever made. For your Halloween enjoyment, here is George Romero’s Night of the Living Dead!
Well, the big day is finally here and that means that it’s time for a special Halloween edition of Lisa Marie’s Favorite Grindhouse Trailers! Below you’ll find the trailers for some of my favorite horror films! Let’s take a look!
That I picked this trailer to start off this special edition should come as a surprise to no one. While I don’t think the trailer really does the film justice, Suspiria is still one of my favorite movies of all time. Don’t talk to me about the remake and we’ll get along just fine.
Some people, undoubtedly, will say, “Martin but no Night of the Living Dead?” Well, we’ll be featuring Night of the Living Dead later today. Martin is one of George Romero’s best films and it’s still criminally unknown. Check out the trailer but definitely be sure to track down the film as well.
Stephen King might not like it but Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining remains one of the best horror films ever made. It’s one of the few films that continues to scare me after multiple viewings. (It’s those two little girls in the hallway. They freak me out every time!)
Oh, The Silence of the Lambs, I have such mixed feelings about you.
On the one hand, I’m a horror fan and Silence of the Lambs is a very important film in the history of horror. Back in 1992, it was the first horror film to win the Academy Award for Best Picture! It even made history by winning all of the big “five” awards — Picture, Director, Actor, Actress, and Adapted Screenplay! It was the first film since One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest and It Happened One Night to pull that off!
Beyond that, it’s one of the most influential films ever made. Every erudite serial killer owes a debt to Anthony Hopkins’s performance as Hannibal Lecter. Every competent but untested and unappreciated female FBI agent owes a debt to Jodie Foster’s performance as Clarice Starling. Even though the whole criminal profiler craze probably owes more to Manhunter (a film to which Silence of the Lambs is a sequel, though that often seems to go unacknowledged) than to anything else, this Oscar winner still definitely played a part. I mean, how many people watched Manhunter for the first time, specifically because Lecter mentioned the events in that earlier film in Silence of the Lambs?
Plus, this won an Oscar for Jonathan Demme, one of my favorite directors! And while I’m sure Jodie Foster would have gone on to have a strong career regardless of whether she had played Clarice Starling or not, it’s generally acknowledged that Silence of the Lambs revitalized the career of Anthony Hopkins. So for that, we should all be thankful.
And yet, it can be strange to watch Silence of the Lambs today. All of the imitations (not to mention some ill-thought sequels and prequels) have lessened its bite. I can only imagine how it must have freaked out audiences when it was first released but I have to admit that I was slightly disappointed the first time that I watched the film. Looking back, I can see that disappointment was due to having been told that it were one of the scariest movies of all time but, because, I had seen a countless number of imitations, parodies, and homages, I felt as if I had already watched the film. So, I wasn’t shocked when Lecter turned out to be ruthlessly manipulative and dangerously charismatic. Nor was I shocked when he managed to escape and poor Charles Napier ended up strung up in that cage. I’m sure that audiences in 1991 were freaked out, though.
Actually, as good as Foster and Hopkins and Scott Glenn are, I think the best performance in the film comes from Ted Levine, playing Buffalo Bill. Seriously, Levine’s performance still freaks me out. It’s the voice and the way he says, “Precious.” Levine’s performance, I found to be a hundred times more frightening than Anthony Hopkins’s and I think it’s due to the fact that Hannibal Lecter was clearly an author’s invention while Levin’s Buffalo Bill came across like he might very will be hiding in an alley somewhere, waiting for one of your friends to walk by. (Interestingly enough, I had the same reaction when I first saw Manhunter. Brian Cox did a good job as Lecter but he still came across as a bit cartoonish. Meanwhile, Tom Noonan was absolutely terrifying.) Levine has subsequently gone on to play a lot of nice guy roles. He was a detective on Monk, for instance. Good for him. I’m glad to see he was able to escape being typecast. Admittedly, I do kinda wonder how many serial killer roles he had to turn down immediately after the release of The Silence Of The Lambs.
Still, it’s a good film. Time may have lessened it’s power but The Silence of the Lambs is still an effective and well-directed thriller. It’s impossible not to cheer for Clarice. It’s impossible not to smile at the fun that Anthony Hopkins seems to be having in the role of Lecter. Jonathan Demme creates a world of shadows and darkness and still adds enough little quirks to keep things interesting. (I especially liked Lecter watching a stand-up special in his cell.) It’s the little details that makes the world of The Silence of the Lambs feel lived in, like Clarice’s nervous laugh as she gives a civilian instructions on what to do in case she accidentally gets trapped in a storage locker. Even the film’s final one liner will make you smile, even though it’s the type of thing that every film seemed to feel the need to do nowadays. It’s still a good movie, even if it no longer feels as fresh as it once may have.
