Horror on the Lens: The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (dir by Robert Wiene)

Posted on October 28, 2015 by Lisa Marie Bowman

The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari is a film that I’ve shared twice previously on the Shattered Lens. The first tim was in 2011 and then I shared it again last year. Well, you know what? I’m sharing it again because it’s a classic, it’s Halloween, and everyone should see it!

Released in 1920, the German film The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari is one of those films that we’ve all heard about but far too few of us have actually seen. Like most silent films, it requires some patience and a willingess to adapt to the narrative convictions of an earlier time. However, for those of us who love horror cinema, The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari remains required viewing. Not only did it introduce the concept of the twist ending (M. Night Shyamalan owes his career to this film) but it also helped to introduce German expressionism to the cinematic world.

My initial reaction to The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari was that it simply wasn’t that scary. It was certainly interesting to watch and I was happy that I was finally experiencing this film that I had previously only read about. However, the film itself was obviously primitive and it was difficult for my mind (which takes CGI for granted) to adjust to watching a silent film. I didn’t regret watching the film but I’d be lying (much like a first-year film student) if I said that I truly appreciated it after my first viewing.

But you know what? Despite my dismissive initial reaction, the film stayed with me. Whereas most modern films fade from the memory about 30 minutes after the end credits, The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari has stuck with me and the night after I watched it, I even had a nightmare in which Dr. Caligari was trying to break into my apartment. Yes, Dr. Caligari looked a little bit silly staring through my bedroom window but it still caused me to wake up with my heart about to explode out of my chest.

In short, The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari passes the most important test that a horror film can pass. It sticks with you even after it’s over.

For the curious who have 50 minutes to spare and an open mind to watch with, here is Robert Wiene’s The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari…

4 Shots From 4 Films: Goodnight Mommy, Bone Tomahawk, Let Us Prey, Starry Eyes

Posted on October 27, 2015 by Arleigh

The month of October is winding down and I still have a stack of horror films to watch. To say I’ve been lagging behind on my horror-related entertainment would be an understatement. Yet, I’ve still been able to catch several horror films that tells me that all the doom and gloom that the current state of horror is running out of ideas.

The four shots chosen from four horror films I’ve witnessed this month run the gamut of Cronenbergian body-horror mashed together with some Bentley Little-style narrative, a disturbing little family horror piece from Austria, a siege horror with major Biblical overtones right up to that rare sighting of a great horror western.

4 SHOTS FROM 4 FILMS

Goodnight Mommy (dir. by Veronika Franz and Severin Fiala)

Bone Tomahawk (dir. by S. Craig Zahler)

Let Us Prey (dir. by Brian O’Malley)

Starry Eyes (dir. by Kevin Kölsch and Dennis Widmyer)

The TSL’s Daily Horror Grindhouse: The Hollow (dir by Sheldon Wilson)

Posted on October 27, 2015 by Lisa Marie Bowman

So, earlier today, I finally got around to watching the latest SyFy original film, The Hollow. (The Hollow originally aired last Saturday but I missed it because I was going from Halloween party to Halloween party, wandering around in chilly and wet weather without much on and eventually coming down with a cold as a result.) Now, it may seem strange to review a made-for-TV movie as a part of a series of grindhouse film reviews but, much like They Found Hell, The Hollow probably would have played at the grindhouse if there was still a grindhouse around for it to play at.

As for the film itself, it was a story of death, curses, family dysfunction, and sisterhood. The Hollow takes place on Shelter Island. To be honest, just the name Shelter Island should let you know that something bad is going to happen. I mean, Shelter Island sounds too similar to Shutter Island for it to be a totally safe place. One hundred years ago, a legendary storm wiped out the island’s population. Over the century, the island has recovered and new people have moved in. But now, another storm is threatening to hit and that storm is bringing a curse with it! Soon, the island will be attacked by monsters that appear to be made out of dirt and fire…

Of course, the monsters aren’t the only ones coming to Shelter Island. There are three sisters as well — Sarah (Stephanie Hunt), Marley (Sarah Dugdale), and Emma (Alisha Newton). Coming from a dysfunctional family, they’re planning on spending Halloween in a cabin on the island and working on their fractured relationship. Unfortunately, those plans are interrupted by the arrival of the monsters. As the sisters try to find some way to get off the island, Emma suddenly vanishes. Sarah and Marley search for her, while dealing not only with the monster but also with other survivors, some of whom are more helpful than others.

I actually really enjoyed The Hollow. Why? Well, it all comes down to three things:

Number one, Shelter Island was extremely creepy! This film is full of images of characters running through a seemingly endless forest, with all the trees enshrouded by a thick fog. Director Sheldon Wilson took full advantage of the menacing possibilities of his location. When it comes to a horror film — especially a low-budget one — never underestimate the importance of atmosphere.

Number two, the monsters were genuinely scary and well-done. You never knew where they were going to suddenly show up and, as a result, you were kept off-balance throughout the entire film.

Finally, the main reason I enjoyed The Hollow was because Stephanie Hunt, Sarah Dugdale, and Alisha Newton were perfectly cast and believable as the three sisters. I’m the youngest of four sisters and, needless to say, there were many scenes to which I could relate. Since you believed their relationship and cared about them as characters, this brought a bit more depth to The Hollow than you might otherwise have expected.

The Hollow was a nice surprise. Keep an eye out for it on the SyFy channel.

Horror on TV: Baywatch Nights 2.21 — “The Vortex”

Posted on October 27, 2015 by Lisa Marie Bowman

On tonight’s horror on TV, we present the next-to-last episode of Baywatch Nights. In this episode, David Hasselhoff and Angie Harmon visit a Native American fortune teller (Floyd “Red Crow” Westerman) and end up entering a vortex that sends them into the future. They then watch as their future selves investigate something weird that happened on a ship that’s just arrived from the Amazon.

This is a very weird episode and it originally aired on May 9th. 1997.

Horror Film Review: Prom Night IV: Deliver Us From Evil (dir by Clay Borris)

Posted on October 27, 2015 by Lisa Marie Bowman

From the minute I learned that Val would be reviewing Prom Night III: The Last Kiss, I knew that I simply had to rewatch and a post a review of Prom Night IV: Deliver Us From Evil. I mean, considering that I had already reviewed the original Prom Night on this site, it only made sense. Now, I just have to convince Leonard to review Hello Mary Lou: Prom Night II and Leon The Duke to review the Prom Night remake and we’ll have the whole series covered!

Anyway, most reviews of Prom Night IV: Deliver Us From Evil will tell you that it has absolutely nothing to do with any of the other Prom Night films but that’s not quite true. For one thing, all five of these films take place on Prom Night! Also, they all deal with students who go to Hamilton High School. Now, seriously — considering how many proms at Hamilton have ended in death and disaster, you would think that the school would just stop having a prom. Obviously, that wouldn’t be a popular decision but lives are at stake!

Like Hello Mary Lou and Prom Night III, Prom Night IV also opens with the 1957 prom. Now, of course, the 1957 prom was famous for the fiery death of Mary Lou Maloney but apparently, that wasn’t the only death that occurred that night. While Mary Lou was getting ready to be named prom queen, two other students (one of whom is named Lisa — agck, it always freaks me out when a slasher movie victim has the same name as me!) were making out in the parking lot. When a homicidal priest named Father Jonas came across them, he stabbed them to death a sharpened crucifix.

35 years later, Father Jonas is hidden away in a church basement. He’s kept in a drug-induced coma. Father Jaeger (Kenneth McGregor) is his guardian but when the Jaeger passes away, the young Father Colin (Brock Simpson) takes his place. Foolishly, Colin decides not to give Jonas his daily injection. Jonas wakes up, murders Colin, and then sets off for his old church. While Jonas is out murdering sinners, the Cardinal tries to cover up any evidence of his existence.

(In case you hadn’t guessed, Prom Night IV is probably one of the most anti-Catholic films ever made. That said, speaking as someone who was raised Catholic, I was never really offended by the movie. I mean, it featured a killer priest and a sinister Cardinal but it would still be wrong to mistake Prom Night IV for a Luis Bunuel film.)

What Jonas doesn’t know is that the old church is now a summer home. Four teenagers — virginal Meagan (Nikki de Boer), her boyfriend Mark (J.H. Wyman), his best friend Jeff (Alle Ghadaban), and his girlfriend, the adventurous Laura (Joy Tanner, who later played Fiona and Declan’s mom on Degrassi) — are spending the night at the house. After all, who wants to waste prom night by actually going to the prom? Mark’s younger brother, Jonathan, is also hanging around outside the house, secretly filming everything that happens inside. Or, at least he is until Jonas shows up and kills him.

There really aren’t any big surprises to be found in Prom Night IV but the film is still a step above the average slasher film. Director Clay Borris keeps the action moving and does a good job maintaining a properly evil atmosphere. Some of the shots of the snow falling over the isolated house are actually quite stunning. As played by James Carver, Jonas is a truly menacing and ruthless villain. Seriously, Jonas is so mean! Even the fact that he utters a few regrettable one liners does nothing to diminish Jonas as a threat.

Prom Night IV may be missing both Jamie Lee Curtis and Mary Lou Maloney but it’s still a surprisingly effective little horror film. And remember —

It’s not who you come with … it’s who takes you home.

Prom Night … everything is alright…

Horror on The Lens: The Maze (dir by William Cameron Menzies)

Posted on October 27, 2015 by Lisa Marie Bowman

For today’s Horror on the Lens, we offer up The Maze, a film from 1953 that originally released in 3D.

Directed by noted set designer William Cameron Menzies, The Maze is an atmospheric haunted castle story, one that will prevent you from ever looking at a frog the same way again. A few months ago, I watched this with my friends in the Late Night Movie Gang and we all greatly enjoyed it.

As I watched The Maze, I couldn’t help but think about some of the truly impressive hedge mazes that I made in my Sims game. Of course, I always placed some fireworks at the end of the maze, which, unfortunately, often led to both the maze and my sims being consumed by fire. Oh well.

Anyway, enjoy The Maze!

The TSL’s Daily Horror Grindhouse: Hands of the Ripper (dir by Peter Sasdy)

Posted on October 26, 2015 by Lisa Marie Bowman

The 1971 Hammer film Hands of the Ripper tells the story of Anna (Angharad Rees), a woman living in Victorian England who has a few issues.

What type of issues, you may wonder? Well, first off, she’s the daughter of the infamous serial killer known as Jack The Ripper. When she was just a baby, her father killed her mother while Anna watched from her crib. Now, years later, the teenage Anna is working for a fake medium named Mrs. Golding (Dora Bryan). It’s Anna’s job to stand behind the curtain and provide the ghostly voices whenever Mrs. Golding is holding one of her fake seances.

One such séance is attended by both a sleazy member of Parliament named Dysart (Derek Godfrey) and a progressive psychiatrist named Dr. John Pritchard (Eric Porter). When Mrs. Golding’s ruse is discovered, she decides to “give” Anna to Dysart. However, this plan falls apart when Anna suddenly goes crazy, grabs a fireplace poker, and murders Mrs. Golding. Dysart flees the scene, leaving Anna, who claims to have no memory of attacking anyone, with John. Assuming that he can cure her, John takes Anna in and set her up at his house.

Well, it turns out that curing Anna will not be quite as easy as John assumed. For one thing, Anna is extremely repressed and often refuses to open up to him. Also, there’s the fact that Anna keeps killing people. Whenever anyone stands to close to Anna or kisses her on the cheek, Anna goes into a trance and hears her father’s voice demanding that she kill. John, convinced that he can save Anna, continues to cover up every murder.

I really wasn’t expecting much from Hands of the Ripper. In fact, I have to admit that the main reason I dvred it off of TCM was because I thought this might be the film in which Klaus Kinski played Jack the Ripper. I was wrong, of course. The Kinski Jack the Ripper film was called Jack the Ripper and it was directed by Jess Franco. Hands of the Ripper, on the other hand, is a Hammer film that was released in 1971, at a time when Hammer was struggling to stay relevant in an ever-changing cinematic landscape. Perhaps that’s why the murders in Hands of the Ripper were gory, even be the bloody standards of Hammer Films.

Interestingly enough, though the film was made over 40 years ago, the murders themselves remain quite shocking. I can only imagine how audiences in 1971 reacted to them. The scene where Anna suddenly attacks a housekeeper made me flinch, as did a later scene in which one of Anna’s victims stumbled out onto a crowded street, minus an eye. Angharad Rees gave a good performance as Anna, one that keeps you guessing as to whether or not she’s just crazy or if maybe she really is possessed by the spirit of her father.

Hands of the Ripper is a good Hammer film, one that combines the usual Hammer tropes with a bit more psychological depth than one might expect. This is one to keep an eye out for.

Horror on TV: Baywatch Nights 2.20 “Hot Winds”

Posted on October 26, 2015 by Lisa Marie Bowman

On tonight’s episode of Baywatch Nights, the wind is making people in California go insane! Could it because the wind is hot and annoying? Or is it that there’s a Satanist doing something evil out in the desert?

Don’t worry, California! David Hasselhoff and Angie Harmon are on the case!

This episode originally aired on May 3rd, 1997.

Horror Film Review: Sleepwalkers (dir by Mick Garris)

Posted on October 26, 2015 by Lisa Marie Bowman

So, last night, I was looking for something to watch and I came across Sleepwalkers, a horror film from 1992. And you know what? I could sit here and I could get all snarky about Sleepwalkers and I could be hypercritical and all that other stuff. It’s tempting because the film was written by Stephen King and Stephen King has had so much success that it’s easy to be overly critical of anything he’s involved with.

But I’m not going to do that. Or, at least, that’s not my main objective with this review. No, with this review, I want to pay tribute to cat named Clovis.

You see, there are several humans and humanoids in Sleepwalkers. The film is about two energy vampires — Charles (Brian Krause) and his mother Mary (Alice Krige) — who have an icky incestuous relationship and who need to suck energy from virgins in order to survive. Charles, who appears to be a teenager, has selected Tanya (Madchen Amick) as his latest target. Tanya has loving parents (Lyman Ward and Cindy Pickett, who also played Ferris Bueller‘s parents) and there’s also a creepy English teacher (Glenn Shadix) who tries to blackmail Charles and ends up losing a hand as a result. There’s several police officers, one of whom is killed when a corncob is driven into his spine. And Steven King appears in an awkward cameo, along with Clive Barker and Tobe Hooper.

That’s right — there’s a lot of people in this movie but none of them made as big an impression as Sparks, the talented little kitty who plays Clovis. Seriously, check Clovis out!

You see, there’s only one thing that can kill Charles and Mary and that’s the scratch of a cat. From the minute that Charles and Mary move into their latest home, cats start to gather outside the house, meowing and just waiting for their chance to pounce. And, when it comes time for the cats to finally make their movie, who is their leader?

CLOVIS!

After Charles kills Clovis’s owner, Clovis gathers every other cat around and we watch as, in slow motion, they run through the streets of the town. That’s right — whatever else you may want to say about Sleepwalkers, this is a movie where cats finally get to kick some ass.

And who is the main ass kicker?

Little Clovis, of course!

At the end of the film, Tanya might not have many people left in her life but she’s got Clovis and, because of that, you know that everything’s going to be okay.

As for the rest of Sleepwalkers … well, it’s watchable but it still really doesn’t make a huge impression. And, to be honest, that really is the fault of the script. It’s hard to know who (out of the humans) you’re supposed to care about. Charles and Mary are pure evil and Charles has a really bad habit of speaking in lame one liners. Tanya, meanwhile, is well-played by Madchen Amick but, as written, she’s a bit of a nonentity. There is one fun scene when Tanya dances but then again, you have to wonder why movies, regardless of when they were made, always insist on making teenagers dance to songs that were written decades before they were born.

Fortunately, the film has Clovis. Not only does he save the day but he saves the movie as well!

GO CLOVIS!

Horror on the Lens: Galaxy Invader (dir by Don Dohler)

Posted on October 26, 2015 by Lisa Marie Bowman

For today’s horror on the lens, we present the 1985 film, Galaxy Invader! In this film, an alien that looks a lot like the Creature from the Black Lagoon crash lands in the woods of Maryland. He soon finds himself being hunted by rednecks, students, and even more rednecks. A much more in depth review of this little film can be found over on Ryan The Trash Film Guru’s site so let me just say that Galaxy Invader is a prime example of so-bad-that-its-good filmmaking. This is one of those films that was made for a low budget, featured actors who were definitely not professionals, and yet, it’s so achingly sincere that you can’t help but appreciate it on some level.

Enjoy Galaxy Invader!