Nosferatu (1922) (Silent)
3.25 out of 4stars
"Count Orlok expresses interest in a new residence Wisborg and is met at his Transylvania home by real estate agent Hutter to complete the transaction, where Hutter finds out that Count Orlok may be a vampire."
The expressionist vampire horror film masterpiece. Schreck may have only had 9minutes of screen time as Nosferatu, yet the extension and impact of his character was felt throughout the movie and burned into many a viewer's mind I am sure of. From the moment Orlok hits the screen, there is an endless feeling of dread. His mannerisms and gaze are nothing short of perfection. The lighting use, castle/wilderness settings, and score/music all add layers to this experience also. While there are probably a dozen vampire characteristics that portrayed that have since been repeated throughout history, none that I've experienced have had the chilling style seen here. I think the costars are underappreciated here also, because they act out this fear more than believably and Knock plays his role with mischievous delight. Beautiful exercise in how horror can be successfully unforgettable with the right story, direction, and imagery...while not needing the cliches/worn out tricks too many use today.
Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (1931)
3.25 out of 4stars
"Dr. Jekyll faces horrible consequences when he lets his dark side run wild with a potion that transforms him into the animalistic Mr. Hyde."
The classic "Jee-kull" and Hyde story, described as sci-fi horror. It starts off with proposing the premise and interesting idea of the story "In every man lies both good and evil battling which hide under our civilized nature", or the old conscience/morality/duality of human nature concept. Evil and good lurks in every person, no matter how good or bad they appear on the surface. Now what gets explored here is the extreme "evil" side of this spectrum in Dr Hyde (alongside the "controlled" or good side in Dr Jekyll). Everyone says March's oscar winning performance in the main role was overacting, but I really can't see the role done any other way and he is extremely convincing as both personalities. The make-up is excellent and the transformations are done smoothly. The commentary on this I am still thinking about. On one hand, most people are internally selfish and if consequences and attachments in this world didn't exist, we'd be savages fulfilling our every primal and subconsciously wicked desires. This side of us is self-destructive though and unsustainable, especially in a civilized environment. Civility is the only answer when making choices and actions, at minimum in public. Possibly even, civility is the reason we have evolved to what we have as a society. That said, the music hall scene has an eerie feel of a "strip club" to today's standards, which insinuates there is a place for "the darkness" of people to come out, but it must be done in a restrained manner and in specific places, possibly out of the eye of every person involved in one's personal life (albeit I could be wrong here). An interesting discussion to be had on the topic at hand either way. Also noted, March or a stunt double shows some impressive parkour attributes throughout.
The Most Dangerous Game (1932)
3.00 out of 4stars
"A psychotic big game hunter deliberately strands a luxury yacht on a remote island, where he begins to hunt its passengers for sport."
The classic action horror tale of hunting fellow human beings for sport. About halfway through the film the gravity of the situation hits full force with "the trophy room". The tension built from then on an escalated with some fantastic chase/hunt sequences, especially for it's time. I won't ruin anything, but the cat and mouse game if full of smart and graphic surprises. Sadly, this film was even more graphic and 'gorey' and darkly descriptive of it's nature than what previously hit screens, which imo could have put this movie over the top. Fun note also, I found one early scene unpurposefully comical, when the ship passengers were floating on debris in the ocean and were taken to their deaths by shark attacks, each had a few seconds to clearly shout about their demise prior to it's completence.
Horror Express (1972)
2.70 out of 4stars
"An English anthropologist has discovered a frozen monster in the frozen wastes of Manchuria which he believes may be the Missing Link. He brings the creature back to Europe aboard a trans-Siberian express, but during the trip the monster thaws out and starts to butcher the passengers one by one."
A very fun horror adventure movie that makes the most of it's premise. The story evolves in a joyous/slightly over the top manor more than it needs to be for a "murderer on a train story". The horror effects are simple yet effective and memorable. I'm surprised I've read that some consider it to be a gorey film, because this is easily PG-13 material by today's standards and mildly gorey at best minus 1 graphic yet harmless/naturalistic scene. I see it might be considered a bit of a rip off or spin off of a couple of earlier horror movies, but it mixes everything up in all the right ways. And I agree with Kallio's previous review, Savalas really chews into his role, and I'll add that even De Mendoza makes his presence known when on screen.
The Old Dark House (1932)
2.65 out of 4stars
"Seeking shelter from a storm, five travelers are in for a bizarre and terrifying night when they stumble upon the Femm family estate."
I am quite conflicted on this in possibly many ironic ways. It's definitely creepy and atmospheric, but I think it's tonally a bit all over the place to a fault. The house residents hit just about all the right notes....the sister adds uneasiness and creates backstory, the brother is awkwardly anxious, the wildcard butler is played gloriously by Karloff, the father is memorable and hits all the right notes he/she is given, and Saul is the perfect firecracker conclusion (no pun intended). So what happened you might ask? It wastes too much time on other things that harm it's flow and feeling for me. The humor, while fun and entertaining, didn't gel well with the horror part of the story, it at times felt just comically over the top, in a good but distractingly uneven way. The romance side story, while done entertainingly, just felt like it wasted a good portion of the film for no meaningful reason. And again, weakened the horror part of the story. Lastly and maybe mostly ironic, time wasted on character development of the non-residents. Laughton's backstory, for a character with such little screen time when he's not interacting with others, was only used to show his chops and fuel the romance side story imo. Gladys' and Roger's backstory add nothing to the story and Penderel's lines aren't even spoken clearly part of the time. It's a very odd mix for me to take in and gave me a hard time giving it a rating. There is a great horror story here, but I feel there are too many diversions for me to rate it in classic horror territory. Good suggestion Osprey, definitely worth watching.
Strait-Jacket (1964)
2.60 out of 4stars
"Lucy Harbin (Joan Crawford) is released from the asylum where she was sent 20 years ago for slaying her unfaithful husband and his lover with an axe. Lucy goes to stay at her brother's farm and reconnect with her grown daughter Carol, although murders occur after this happening."
A pretty fun psychological thriller. I seem to be using fun a lot, but that's what they are to me. Crawford in her bordering on sanity performance elevates the film along with a few very nice 'horror' touches and turns throughout. The ending is predictable, but the ride is enjoyable.
Friday the 13th (1980)
2.30 out of 4stars
"A group of camp counselors trying to reopen a summer camp called Crystal Lake, which has a grim past, are stalked by a mysterious killer."
Of all the classic horror slasher franchises, this is by far the weakest origin movie. The only appealing qualities I see in this are the use of point of view style for the murders and the twist. Everything else is mediocre...the writing, the murders, the targets, the 'scared' acting, etc. The suspense may be a bit above average, but it comes and goes based on the movie's pacing and laughably unentertaining intermediary scenes. I knew the next thing going in, but still confusingly enough, the major icons of this franchise are almost completely absent: Jason isn't the killer and there is only 1 clear murder with the notorious machete from what I can tell throughout the whole movie. I'm also kind of pissed about the "stand-in" actors for some of the point of view murders early on. I see clear hands and other 'body pieces' of these 'actors' which look completely different from those of the real murderer, throwing off any potential guesses one had if they paid attention the details on those. I guess the twist ending on top of the teasing of Jason's post-death existence are the saviors that turned this film into a box office success that spurned the franchise?
The French Dispatch (2021)
2.60 out of 4stars
"A love letter to journalists set in an outpost of an American newspaper in a fictional twentieth century French city that brings to life a collection of stories published in "The French Dispatch Magazine.""
If you have never seen a Wes Anderson movie, this is definitely not where to start. I have enjoyed almost all of Wes's films, Life Aquatic was hit and miss and Darjeeling Limited I honestly disliked, and enjoyed this to an extent also, but this is one of his worst efforts. Without question Wes is eloquent, witty, and has an eye for fascinating visuals, but he made a lot of poor choices here. For starters, it's overly convoluted. His overlapping of extended quickly spoken monologues, visuals, and 'action' pieces created more confusion and incompleteness than understanding and entertainment for the viewer, and it happened way too often. I get that he's trying to portray written newspaper articles spoken over background occurrences, but it doesn't work with the pacing on both sides he's using. Also on this problem, he's telling 4 separate stories/newspaper articles each in roughly a 20-25minute "TV" episode time period. 2ndly, only the Benecio jailed artist story was enjoyable start to finish. The first story was a mostly incoherent flash in the pan, the 3rd story I only truly got into when it was halfway through, and the last story was overly complex and visually experimental for way too much of it's length. That said, it has it's entertaining qualities, but being a smooth coherent thoroughly appealing movie it is not. This all may have just worked better on paper.
Eternals (2021)
2.30 out of 4stars
"The saga of the Eternals, a race of immortal beings who lived on Earth and shaped its history and civilizations."
It's definitely a different type of marvel movie, a marvel movie with action and superheroes and humor dribbled throughout, but definitely different. It's definitely ambitious, but missteps a lot and it's self-inflicting imo mostly there. I get wanting to bring this story to life but.....
Introducing 10 new "main" characters in 1 movie? Having your 2 lead cast members being not widely recognizable actors and far less charismatic and accomplished than the vast majority of the rest of the Immortals? Having multiple villains that are underexplored and/or underutilized? Zhao, an odd choice for this type of film, was really the director they wanted to handle this action and material? And I still can't comprehend how an eternal, who is not supposed to interfere in human conflicts beyond Deviant fighting, has the superpower of mind controlling humans? It just became a jumbled underdeveloped mess. I like the effort, but this feels like it set from the get go to be an average at best marvel movie if not for the uniqueness of the characters and story, alongside the higher end action/set pieces.
