Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay Last year, I celebrated the Halloween season with a blog sharing my love for horror comedies. Trying to figure out which movies I would write about in that blog was tough because two of them—Edgar Wright’s Shaun of the Dead and Ruben Fleischer’s Zombieland—also happen to be two of my favorite zombie flicks. And, I genuinely enjoy so many flicks that utilize the zombie mythos (not to mention AMC’s The Walking Dead, which is one of my favorite television shows from this century). So, I decided to devote this year’s Halloween blog to shine a light on what are (in my humble opinion) some of the best zombie movies.
Why? I guess you’ll have to keep reading to find out… 😉 [NOTE: This blog contains spoilers for several movies. You have been warned.] Night of the Living Dead (1968) Of course, I can’t write a blog spotlighting my favorite zombie movies without paying due respect to the one that started it all: George Romero’s low-budget classic Night of the Living Dead. While I don’t love this movie, I acknowledge and appreciate its significance in laying the groundwork for all zombie movies that came after it. Prior to Romero left his mark on the genre, zombie movies of the 1930s and 1940s looked and felt very different. If you watch Victor Halperin’s White Zombie, for example, (often cited as the first zombie flick) you will see zombies portrayed not as undead, flesh-eating monsters but as human beings lured by voodoo magic to become mindless, despondent slaves to their wicked masters. For decades, Hollywood conceived of zombies based on the eponymous Afro-Haitian diasporic religion. But Romero changed all that, and I would argue that it was for the better. Simply put, watching a person brainwashed by magic to be a servant doesn’t make for a very thrilling horror movie. However, dozens (if not hundreds) of corpses rising out of the grave to swarm lone survivors and eat them alive certainly does. Replacing voodoo sorcery, Romero’s Night of the Living Dead tells a story about a handful of scared, unprepared people seeking safety from the walking dead. And he says something about our society and human nature in the process. Not only did Romero’s use of blood and gore sicken the audience as they watched zombies attack the main characters, but his deeper examination of what happens when people resort to the “survival of the fittest” mantra became the metaphorical text in which all future filmmakers in this genre added to. It is Romero’s conception of zombies as an allegory for humanity’s proclivity to devour itself in the face of existential crisis and danger that makes Night of the Living Dead a film still worth talking about more than half a century after its release. Beyond just its genre trappings, however, the film clearly fits within its own time as a sharp and dark social critique of racial prejudice. By ending the film as tragically as he does, with the death of Ben (Duane Jones) at the hands of a gun-toting posse, Romero puts his personal politics front and center. Ben is the only African-American character of consequence in the film, and the only character that comes close to the hero of the story, which makes the zombie-hunting group of law enforcement mistaking him for one of “them” and gunning him down all the more horrifying. And timely. Unfortunately, Romero’s social commentary layered through the movie’s subtext remains relevant in a way that it really shouldn’t be fifty-plus years later. Yet its message is also timeless and transcends race to say something about the human species overall. And the fact that it can do all that in a brief, 96-minute runtime (and on a budget of no more than $125,000) is all the more impressive. All in all, Night of the Living Dead has been surpassed in terms of its performances, aesthetic, and visual and special effects. But its screenplay and direction continue to stand out amongst the hundreds of zombie movies that came out afterwards and serves as an important piece of independent cinema. Furthermore, its conception of the modern zombie remains the template for everything else that I’m going to talk about. If all that doesn’t deserve some praise, I’m not sure what it would take. 28 Days Later (2002) I don’t want to reduce Danny Boyle’s 28 Days Later to simply an upgrade of Romero’s original zombie flick. Although, in many ways it is. His choice to shoot several scenes on a handheld digital camera parallels the black-and-white aesthetic of Night of the Living Dead, while the film’s narrative focusing on the intensely horrific experiences of its protagonists fending off both the undead and fellow humans is eerily similar. But in the same way that Romero’s film laid the foundation for the zombie genre in the mid-twentieth century, Boyle’s film revitalized it in the early twenty-first century. Made on a measly budget of eight million dollars, 28 Days Later earned over 85 million dollars at the global box office. Not since 1978’s Dawn of the Dead—Romero’s first sequel to Night of the Living Dead—had zombie flicks experienced that level of commercial success. And it was this movie, alongside Zack Snyder’s remake of Romero’s Dawn of the Dead and Edgar Wright’s zombie parody film Shaun of the Dead, that caused a resurgence in zombie cinema that dominated the rest of the 2000s. On its own terms, however, 28 Days Later works surprisingly well as a stripped-down, bare-bones horror movie about the lengths different kinds of people will go to survive. What it lacks in political commentary, like Romero had, it makes up for in the performances and zombie-centered thrills. Led by a then-unknown Cillian Murphy, who plays the “everyman” character Jim, the cast excels in their respective roles. From Naomie Harris as Selena, the woman who initially saves Jim and teaches him about the post-apocalypse, to Brendan Gleeson as Frank, an older cab driver whose primary concern is the safety of his daughter Hannah (Megan Burns), they all endear the audience to their characters almost immediately. In doing so, we become greatly invested in their daily struggle for survival that quickly becomes hell on earth. But the movie really comes together in its latter half, when Jim and company wind up in the clutches of megalomaniacal Major Henry West (Christopher Eccleston) and his hyper-paranoid soldiers. It is when their horrifying plan for Selena and Hannah is revealed that 28 Days Later establishes itself as an exceptional modernization of Romero’s exploration of the human psyche’s darker shades in a postmodern world. In other words, the zombies aren’t the real monsters in the post-apocalypse: we are. Simply put, 28 Days Later holds up twenty years later as an important addition to the zombie genre that took what came before from filmmakers like Romero and updated it to twenty-first-century eyes and ears. Surprisingly, it stands toe to toe with some of the best zombie movies of the last decade despite being low-budget in casting and creation. But, if nothing else, it gave us Cillian Murphy. 😊 Land of the Dead (2005) In the midst of the zombie genre’s resurgence of the 2000s, George Romero returned to his roots with a fourth entry in his Dead series. Made on a bigger budget, Land of the Dead retains much of the spirit of its three predecessors in terms of mixing social commentary with gore-infused action and bloody horror. And, for my money at least, it was this movie that finally made me admire Romero’s storytelling rather than simply respect it. As I said earlier with regards to Night of the Living Dead, Romero set the standard for all the zombie movies that I really enjoy despite the movie itself not being one of my personal favorites. But Land of the Dead is a different story. Its production values lean heavily into Romero’s message about destructive, post-apocalyptic classism very well, which helps pull off a slightly melodramatic story. Yet I say that fully as a compliment; this movie was just so much fun to watch. The cast seemed to know the movie they were in, particularly John Leguizamo as rebel Cholo and Dennis Hopper as plutocratic dictator Paul Kaufman. Their dynamic with the other characters and with each other heightens the somewhat thin plot with some great dramatic moments and action beats. Simply put, Land of the Dead is just fun. I don’t want to say too much more, because I’d rather you just give the movie a chance and know as little as possible. If you go into it expecting a reasonably entertaining zombie flick from the progenitor of the genre himself, it might just end up being your favorite of George Romero’s Dead series like it is mine. 😊 I Am Legend (2007) Before becoming the go-to director for The Hunger Games franchise, Francis Lawrence collaborated with action star Will Smith to adapt Richard Matheson’s 1954 post-apocalyptic novel for the big screen. In doing so, he made the highest-grossing zombie movie of all time: I Am Legend (unless you don’t count it as a zombie flick; in that case, World War Z starring Brad Pitt holds that claim). Only two years after Romero’s Land of the Dead, this movie made a big impact at the box office by treating zombies as great sources of raw, unfiltered horror for moviegoers. In spite of its rather dated computer-generated special effects, I Am Legend remains genuinely suspenseful throughout to make the pointed moments of fright truly terrifying. Much of this suspense comes from the story of Dr. Robert Neville (Smith), the sole human left in New York City dedicated to curing the virus that wiped out 99 percent of humanity while avoiding the vampiric, cannibalistic “Darkseekers”—infected humans with a thirst for human flesh. Simply put, this movie doesn’t work without Will Smith. In one of his more dramatic roles that (in my humble opinion) stands parallel to his turns in films like The Pursuit of Happyness and last year’s King Richard, Smith embodies the “lone survivor” trope in an impressively humanizing manner. His traumatic past, strong bond with Sam the German Shepherd, and unorthodox methods for coping with his existential loneliness make Neville a great survivor character all thanks to Smith’s fantastic portrayal of the man. Of course, Smith’s performance in I Am Legend is aided very well by the work of Lawrence as director and his crew to beautifully depict the deterioration of urban landscapes. Despite not necessarily being scientifically accurate, the film leans more into creative license to craft a look for post-apocalyptic New York that thematically enriches its story and main character’s descent into madness. If not for the world building of the movie, the audience would simply not be as entertained watching Neville and Sam evade the “Darkseekers” and survive the night. Arguably the scariest film that I’m talking about in this blog, I Am Legend may not be the most technically sophisticated or narratively complex zombie movie out there. But, it doesn’t need to be. Its reliance on stripped-down thrills and strong character work is enough to leap towards the top of my list of favorite movies in the genre. And if this isn’t the most depression “dog moment” in a movie that you’ve seen, then we’ll just have to agree to disagree. 😊 Warm Bodies (2013) More in line with films like Shaun of the Dead and Zombieland, New York native Jonathan Levine (50/50, Long Shot) decided to inject some comedy and heart into the zombie genre with his film Warm Bodies. If Shaun of the Dead is a zombie parody, than Warm Bodies is the zombie rom-com. It tells the story of “R” (Nicholas Hoult), a zombie who’s lost much of his memory of his life while alive but wants to remember and rediscover his humanity. In the process, he falls in love with Julie (Teresa Palmer) who just happens to be the girlfriend of Perry (Dave Franco) who shot R in the chest before R killed Perry and ate his brains. And that’s just the first twenty minutes. Given how much zombies had been exploited for entertainment by 2013, Warm Bodies feels like a surprisingly refreshing (and funny!) take on the genre. By making the central zombie character both endearing and sympathetic, Levine’s direction and screenplay make his romance with Julie never creepy but, at first, unsettling before gradually becoming charming. By the third act, he’s convinced the audience to root for an undead man to prove his love to Julie so that he can become human again. Of course, the film’s premise doesn’t work without the two leads’ infectious (😉) chemistry. Almost from the get-go, Hoult’s stoic yet devoted nature to Julie imprints him on our hearts while Palmer’s slow yet steady willingness to give R a chance effectively balances some pretty hilarious bits with fleshing out the movie’s central message about how love can make us feel alive in a way that nothing else can. That alone could turn off people so easily; its cheesy idea has been done in virtually every romantic comedy ever made. But, Levine’s sensitive approach to the material and smart balance of comedy and drama make Warm Bodies a quirky and bizarre—yet heartwarming and memorable—addition to the zombie genre while also upholding all the tried-and-true elements of virtually any classic rom-com. If you haven’t checked this one out before and want a rather delightful movie about the power of love to watch, then this is the zombie flick for you. Train to Busan (2016) While zombie movies were going out of vogue in the United States by the mid-2010s, filmmakers in East Asia took it upon themselves to make their spin on the genre. Arguably, the most notable example of this is the film Train to Busan by South Korean director Yeon Sang-ho. Set in the urban landscape connecting Seoul to Busan, the film explores the immediate aftermath of a zombie outbreak in Korea through the eyes of a bunch of disparate train passengers. Primarily, the narrative focuses on workaholic and distant father Seok-woo (Gong Yoo) who is taking his daughter Su-an (Kim Su-an) to her mother for her birthday. Along the way, Seok-woo befriends Yoon Sang-hwa (Don Lee) and his pregnant wife Seong-kyeong (Jung Yu-mi) as they work together to survive. While much of the cast is great, it is these four actors that carry the emotional weight of Train to Busan. From Seok-woo stepping up as his daughter’s protector to Yoon and Seong-kyeong becoming a sort of surrogate family to Su-an, their respective journeys culminate in one of the most emotional climaxes to any zombie movie that I’ve ever seen. While this makes the film stand out compared to the rest of the genre, Train to Busan also checks all the boxes that zombie fans are looking for. First and foremost, director Yeon Sang-ho’s combination of making the undead fast and fierce within the confines of train stations and passengers cars results in some superbly tense and suspenseful sequences involving the survivors evading and escaping them (shoutout to the scene in the tunnel). Beyond just the set pieces, though, he also takes full advantage of the claustrophobic nature of the passengers’ environment to explore the subtext of Korea’s class divisions by sowing distrust and betrayal amongst different factions of the train. In a way, the film deals with socioeconomic divides just as well as Bong Joon-ho’s Parasite. Overall, Train to Busan is a movie that makes for a great example of East Asia’s take on the zombie flick. It’s done with all the craft and care of a big-budget Hollywood movie, but includes an unexpectedly effective amount of heart to put it over the top of many of its contemporaries. If you’re looking for a two-hour thrill ride from start to finish, you simply cannot go wrong with Train to Busan. Conclusion Perhaps these movies aren’t the pinnacle of horror cinema, but I generally really love zombie movies. From the more thrilling ones like I Am Legend and Train to Busan to the more lighthearted ones like Warm Bodies, they offer a specific take on scary movies with what is (in my humble opinion) one of the best movie monsters ever put to the silver screen. Why? It’s simple: unlike serial killers, sharks, or vampires, we don’t have to do anything in order for zombies to show up at our doorstep and attack us. Which is, perhaps, precisely the point. As a metaphor about enjoying the little things in life and taking an active role in preparing ourselves for catastrophe, zombies remind us cinephiles that what’s scarier than any ghoul or ghost is, in fact, each other. Despite something of a drought in great zombie films recently, the genre remains alive and kicking (😉). From Julius Avery’s World War II horror movie Overlord to the South Korean movie #Alive to Zack Snyder’s ensemble Netflix original Army of the Dead, filmmakers of all shapes and stripes have not stopped dipping back into the zombie well to varying degrees of success. Who knows if zombies will ever be as relevant to the cultural zeitgeist as they were earlier this century. If not, then I’m grateful we were at least given these movies (among others) to enjoy for all time. What do you like or dislike about zombie movies? What other zombie flicks do you recommend? What opinions of mine do you find absolutely ridiculous? Let me know in the comments below. Until next time, this has been… Yours Truly, Amateur Analyst
0 Comments
Jumping decades ahead from the 1984 “slasher” hit A Nightmare on Elm Street, today’s blog is about a more recent horror movie listed in Steven Jay Schneider’s book “1,001 Movies You Must See Before You Die.” And that movie is none other than the 2012 horror comedy The Cabin in the Woods, directed by Drew Goddard.
[NOTE: This blog will contain spoilers for “The Cabin in the Woods.” You have been warned.] The History Co-writing the screenplay in three days with director Drew Goddard (Cloverfield, World War Z, The Martian), Joss Whedon (Serenity, The Avengers) described this film as a “loving hate letter” to modern horror movies. Specifically, he and Goddard aimed to critique both what they love and hate about horror films in the modern era: a mixture of thrills and horror for the former, and these types of movies leaning into “torture porn” for the latter. Principal photography lasted from March to May of 2009 in Vancouver, Canada. While much of the underground complex featured in the movie is made up of sets, the crew did shoot in the Aerospace building of the British Columbia Institute of Technology. Production designer Martin Whist, inspired by Kubrick, wanted the space to look and feel “industrial,” “utilitarian,” and “institutional.” Visual effects work began in December of 2008 (several months before shooting even started) in order to digitally create sixty different monster types based on performances from “close to a thousand” people. According to Oscar-winning make-up artist David LeRoy Anderson of AFX Studio, the only way that him and his team were able to complete the creature visualizations before production began due to their crew of about seventy employees working “at least two jobs.” Despite the pressure, Anderson reported that they had “an incredible time.” With a production budget of 30 million dollars, The Cabin in the Woods was released in April of 2012 to generally positive critical reception. In addition to grossing more than double its budget worldwide, the film was praised for its humor, screenplay, tone, and effective yet endearing satire of the horror genre. The Pros When it comes to some of the best horror movies ever made (like Rosemary’s Baby or Get Out), a “slow burn” pace involving a compelling mystery is often effective at pulling me in for an entertaining thrill-ride. And, in a sense, The Cabin in the Woods is that. Its first act centered on five archetypal college students staying in a spooky cabin evokes films like Sam Raimi’s The Evil Dead. Of course, it wastes very little time foreshadowing the mystery while simultaneously pulling the rug out from under the audience with monster attacks. Admittedly, this initial sense of familiarity was trying when I watched this movie. But, its effective scares and intriguing mystery kept me interested long enough to feel won over by the peak of the second act, which leads into…well, I’ll get to that. 😊 When it comes to the writing, Goddard and Whedon offer up more than a smart satire of horror tropes but a thoroughly agreeable critique of modern horror. Its focused spotlight on what makes horror movies both revolting and enticing serves the film’s greater purpose that any great movie should have: entertainment. Strip away the social and genre commentary, and The Cabin in the Woods is still a more-than-adequate thriller with plenty of scares and monster antics. But their screenplay, injected with poignantly inspired moments of humor for the cast to bite into, layers its commentary as the frosting on a tasty cinematic cake to elevate the movie to the status of modern classic. And while most horror movies tend to de-emphasize the importance of its protagonists in favor of focus on the villains, I did very much appreciate this early Chris Hemsworth before he became fully immersed in the Marvel Cinematic Universe as Thor. He fully embraces the “bimbo jock” mantra but sprinkles his undeniable charisma with every look and movement to the point where the second act’s lack of sufficient action is more than made up for with his noble yet foolish heroics (and laugh-out-loud death scene). All that being said, however, The Cabin in the Woods is most memorable for its final thirty minutes. Not only is the mystery of the cabin itself finally solved, but Goddard and Whedon’s no-holds-barred third act oozes with monster chaos and bloody insanity that makes up for any minor gripes or criticisms that I have for what comes before. Simply put, the movie is worth watching on this fact alone: it gets better from start to finish, which (in my humble opinion) is certainly preferable to the alternative. The Cons Speaking of the flaws of The Cabin in the Woods, I do not think by any means that the writing is perfect. In fact, I was not super impressed by Goddard and Whedon’s approach to world building with regards to “The Facility.” While I understand the satirical purpose of it, I just found the amount of time spent on the employees and infrastructure of this group of masterminds to be less about serving the film’s social commentary and more there to simply service the plot. On another note, while I gleefully enjoyed Hemsworth fully embracing his “jock” archetype I’m afraid that his presence overshadows the other four members of the cast of “killables.” None of their lines, relationships, or arcs are memorable when put up against the nature of their deaths. And while this doesn’t take away from my enjoyment of the film as a while, it does keep it from achieving a degree of timelessness that other horror movies with unforgettable leads or villains (like Halloween or A Nightmare on Elm Street) have. So, what are my final impressions of The Cabin in the Woods? While not necessarily one of the greatest horror movies ever made, it’s definitely one of my favorites. Its sensitive blend of genuinely funny and scary moments mixed with a compelling mystery and an over-the-top third act that will burn itself into your memory makes for a very fun time. Despite its flaws, I highly recommend checking it out this spooky season. What are your thoughts on Drew Goddard’s The Cabin in the Woods? What modern horror movies do you recommend? What opinions of mine do you find absolutely ridiculous? Let me know in the comments below. Until next time, this has been… Yours Truly, Amateur Analyst With spooky season in full swing, the timing could not be better for me to look back at the unexpected birth of a horror franchise that has lived on for more than forty years in the hearts and minds of moviegoers. And that franchise is none other than the Halloween movies. Initiated by John Carpenter’s low-budget classic from 1978, viewers watched seven sequels and two remakes over the course of the next thirty-plus years that were met with varying degrees of negative reception.
And then, in 2018, under the direction of indie darling David Gordon Green and writer-producer Danny McBride, the series was softly rebooted with a direct sequel to Carpenter’s original film while ignoring everything else. Its box-office success birthed a new trilogy under Green’s direction that concludes with Halloween Ends hitting theaters (and Peacock) this weekend. Thus, I want to look back at this newly-created “quadrilogy” to solve, once and for all, if all the retconning and soft rebooting was worth it. So, without further ado…LET’S GET STARTED! Halloween (1978) For a summary of the production and release of Halloween, click here. Full transparency: I’m not the biggest John Carpenter fan. While I appreciate the artistic achievement of his cult sci-fi horror flick The Thing and thought that his sci-fi romance movie Starman oddly charming, he’s by no means my favorite director from the “New Hollywood” generation. That being said, however, I uphold his 1978 film Halloween as not just one of the greatest “slashers” ever made but as a well-deserving horror classic that holds up to this day. For starters, Halloween remains a great example of low-budget filmmaking at its finest. As both co-writer and director, Carpenter’s approach to both the script and the shots exemplify how (unlike some other accomplished directors) he crafted a movie that played into its lack of money rather than allowing it to get the best of him. His direction of the cinematography, combined with the staging of the scenes, rely not on heavy-duty special effects but classic tension that can be a slow burn at time. Ultimately, however, such an approach worked to his advantage in terms of making Halloween a movie that transcends its time as opposed to feeling tied down by it. But, undoubtedly the greatest technical achievement of Halloween is its score. Also done by Carpenter, the signature theme (most strongly associated with Michael Myers in the film) goes down as one of the best musical stingers of cinematic history alongside the iconic themes from Jaws, Star Wars, Superman, and Indiana Jones made by the industry-defining work of John Williams. Similar to those signature genre themes, the ways in which Carpenter applies the music to certain scenes does a great job of enhancing the horror and ratcheting up the tension. Surprisingly, I’ve found that music in horror movies (in my humble opinion) often works against the director’s overall creative vision by either being too excessive to be special or too minimalistic to feel impactful. Fortunately, that is not the case with Carpenter’s score in Halloween. When it comes to the atmosphere of horror movies, I found on a rewatch that Halloween managed to form a very distinguished and recognizable eerie vibe from the get-go. Even after the noteworthy opening POV-shot scene of young Michael Myers (Will Sandin) murdering his older sister Judith (Sandy Johnson), seemingly without remorse, the film’s time jump with Dr. Sam Loomis (Donald Pleasance) and nurse (Nancy Stephens) embraces a midnight drive through a rainstorm to peak effect. But, more importantly, the small town of Haddonfield Illinois never feels like a place where an elusive killer like the adult Michael Myers (Nick Castle) is unbelievable. Quite the opposite, in fact; Carpenter’s portrayal of the town and its residents in the first and second acts adds to the horror that Michael’s victims experience on Halloween night because nobody wants to peak behind the curtains and become invested in other people’s lives and problems. Unfortunately for many of the characters, that level of small-town nosiness could have saved lives. But what about the characters? Are any of them memorable? Aside from the protagonist and antagonist, not really. But they don’t need to be because Halloween relies on the audience sympathizing with Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis) while simultaneously longing for Michael Myers to kill more of her friends. Carpenter excels at striking this balancing act, allowing for Strode to cement her legacy as one of the original and most iconic “final girls” of the horror genre. Curtis’s portrayal of the plain, wholesome teenager is somehow relatable and pleasant in the first two-thirds of the flick before turning into raw, emotional fear during the climactic fight. In other words, I am certainly glad that Strode has remained a central character of the franchise (particularly David Gordon Green’s “H40” trilogy). But, I think that Halloween ultimately sits on the shoulders of Nick Castle’s embodiment of “The Shape.” He terrifyingly embodies the pseudo-faceless and speechless killer who represents the primal nature of death and human nature. In fact, I would argue that the film is even more enjoyable if viewed through his eyes. As the villainous protagonist, Michael Myers’s quest to relive the thrill of killing his sister fifteen years prior by dispensing Haddonfield of its several horny teenagers an experience that you are genuinely invested in. At the end of the day, Halloween may not be the best acted or producer horror movie compared to some of recent years. But if you watch it, you cannot deny its timeless appeal as a progenitor of the modern slasher flick that remains a brief piece of entertainment and an impressively crafted work of art nearly a half-century after it was released. Halloween (2018) Having never seen a single sequel to Carpenter’s original Halloween flick, I counted myself fortunate when the news of David Gordon Green (Pineapple Express, Stronger) making a direct sequel that would ignore all previous sequels came out. Simply put, I carried no baggage into the theater four years ago seeing 2018’s Halloween for the first time which (in my humble opinion) made the experience more enjoyable. But, the question now was: does Green’s first entry in his “H40” trilogy hold up now? At least for me, the answer is a resounding yes. Much to many peoples’ surprise, Green’s collaboration with Danny McBride crafting a retcon four decades after Carpenter’s film somehow pulls off an incredible feat of this kind of filmmaking. Not only does it respect the original work in the writing and direction, but it also modernizes the story of Michael Myers going on a killing spree by treating its main cast as (mostly) intelligent and resourceful in addition to fleshing out the specter that his murders in 1978 cast over Haddonfield ever since. Of course, no one was more traumatized by the events of the original Halloween movie than Laurie Strode herself. As the sole survivor of “The Shape” forty years prior, Strode’s descent into trauma-inspired paranoia is undoubtedly the heart of Green’s film. Unlike in the original, Jamie Lee Curtis is no longer a young, inexperienced actor here. Rather, she pitch-perfectly embodies the effects of PTSD have had on the character and the ramifications of that night. From her complicated relationships with her daughter Karen (Judy Greer) and granddaughter Allyson (Andi Matichak) to her psychotic break around the Halloween season, Curtis expertly shows the audience how Strode has effectively avoided processing her trauma and moved on from it. Instead, she has become like a war veteran in her later years whose obsessive trap-building, security measures, and weapons training reflect her inability to move on. Sure, it helps her and her family in the third act but that’s beside the point. 😊 The other character from the original that gets much-deserved respect in 2018’s Halloween is Michael Myers himself (now primarily played by James Jude Courtney). Whereas in Carpenter’s film the iconic serial killer is largely relegated to the realm of reality (until the final scene, that is), here Green and McBride fully blur the lines of the true nature of “The Shape.” Throughout the film, characters like true crime podcasters Dana (Rhian Rees) and Aaron (Jefferson Hall) and Michael Myers’s new psychiatrist Dr. Ranbir Sartain (Haluk Bilginer) examine if Myers is just an adaptive and remorseless murderer or if he truly does emit elements of the supernatural. In this movie, “The Shape” fully takes form as the stoic “boogeyman” which elevates it to a thoroughly enjoyable slasher flick that’s bloodier and more gruesome than its predecessor. And, if you ask me, it’s better off for it. That being said, 2018’s Halloween is by no means perfect. Certainly, it includes a few too many visual homages to Carpenter’s movie that almost—key word ALMOST—pushes the film into camp territory. However, the two incredible tribute shots (Laurie Strode standing outside Allyson’s classroom and Michael Myers looking over the balcony to find Laurie gone) more than make up for the several less-than-good callbacks. In terms of the movie’s structure, it is a little slow in the first act largely due to the fact that podcasters Dana and Aaron are simply not very interesting characters to follow. By about twenty minutes, I started asking myself: “How long do they survive?” Fortunately, my wish was answered within the first thirty or forty minutes when Michael Myers fled the bus crash and brutally murdered the podcasters in one fell swoop. This is the catalyst for an amazingly visceral and compelling second-act rampage involving Myers indiscriminately murdering on Halloween night back in Haddonfield. Using a great one-shot following Myers through the neighborhood, Green successfully ratchets up the tension before bringing the conflict to the personal level involving Allyson’s friend-zoned classmate Oscar (Drew Scheid) and Deputy Frank Hawkins (Will Patton) being victims of either Myers himself or the effect he has on people trying to decipher the substance behind his evil deeds. And, of course, it all culminates in an utter blast of a third-act showdown between Michael Myers and three generations of Strodes—all of whom get at least one moment to shine—in which “The Shape” is defeated with brains instead of brawn. Thanks to Laurie’s hidden trap, the movie ends in the visual feast of Laurie’s home burning to the ground with Myers trapped in it before Laurie, Karen, and Allyson flee into the night to mourn their losses of family and friends. In all honesty, there are few more perfect endings to a recent horror movie than 2018’s Halloween. While, in my humble opinion, Green’s first entry in his “H40” trilogy doesn’t quite emanate the vibe of a classic like Carpenter’s 1978 flick. However, it stands on its own as a more-than-entertaining sequel that could have—and, perhaps, should have—served as the end of a retconning duology for Laurie Strode’s story. With a solid murder rampage from Myers and a thoroughly satisfying climax wherein Laurie’s daughter and granddaughter helping her defeat Myers symbolizes the mending of their complicated relationships, I don’t think a better bookend to Halloween could have been than what this movie accomplished. But, the business of moviemaking is a thing and thus Universal Pictures could not help themselves by greenlighting two sequels after 2018’s Halloween grossed 255 million dollars (becoming the highest-grossing slasher movie of all time). So, what did Green and McBride come up with for Halloween Kills? Halloween Kills (2021) Man, did they fumble the ball with this movie. I don’t care what criticisms you may have for Carpenter’s original from 1978 or Green’s first film of the franchise from 2018. No matter the gripes one might hold against those movies, they simply don’t hold a candle to the near-abomination that is Halloween Kills. I want to be clear that the movie had potential to be a fun continuation of the story from 2018’s Halloween. While it had no chance of living up to the iconic status of the original, it could have stood on its own as a solid piece of entertaining “slasher” filmmaking. But it just isn’t. From the piss-poor screenplay to the uninteresting characters, Halloween Kills possesses little can be called good. But, let’s highlight some of those positives before diving into the horrid aspects of this movie. I mean…Carpenter’s music is still great. And…Michael’s kills are good, I guess. And…the flashback scenes are cool…That’s it. ☹ I think one of the biggest problems I have with Halloween Kills is how unnecessary it feels. Even before the trilogy comes to a close with Halloween Ends, I can find virtually no justification for this movie existing other than as a shameless cash-grab to give Green and his crew time to write and prepare to film the sequel. But, why is this movie bad? Let me explain why. 😊 First and foremost, Green and the writers decide to evolve the mythos of Michael Myers from the embodiment of death that the first two Halloween movies did in favor of some forced social commentary about the effects that social paranoia have in crises like these. While the intention is noble, I just think that they misunderstood the kind of movie they were making. To be clear, slasher movies can excel at providing sharp critique about humanity (David Robert Mitchell’s low-budget flick It Follows is a great example). But, more often than not, these movies should be nothing more than sleek entertainment. Yet Green’s indie sensibilities dragged Halloween Kills down when he tried to make it more than that and fell so incredibly short in the process. Beyond the story itself, there is such a drastic and off-putting tonal shift from 2018’s Halloween to this movie. Whereas the former relied more on witty bits of sharp humor designed to break tension in the lead up to savage kills, the latter gives us lazy, over-the-top performances from several principal cast members that are unceremoniously murdered with an excessive amount of blood and guts that feels cheap and uninspired by comparison. In other words, I feel like Halloween Kills is not happening in the same world as the two movies that preceded it. Instead, it creates its own distinctive tone and vibe for the worse. However, perhaps the most damning creative choice was for Halloween Kills to shift the story’s focus away from Laurie Strode and her family in favor of bringing back several survivors of Michael Myers’s murder spree in 1978: namely, Tommy Doyle (Anthony Michael Hall) and Lindsey Wallace (Kyle Richards) whom Laurie babysat that night, Dr. Loomis’s nurse assistant Marion Chambers (Nancy Stephens), and Tommy’s childhood bully Lonnie Elam (Robert Longstreet). Simply put, none of these characters are as compelling survivors nor are these actors as talented as Jamie Lee Curtis (or even Andi Matichak or Will Patton). As a result, the whole plot revolving around the townsfolk gathering into a mob to hunt down Michael Myers ends up feeling vacuous when it should have been engrossing. All of these problems, however, can be tied back to the creative decision by Green and the writers to have Halloween Kills pick up right where its predecessor left off. If some time passed, we could have explored the generational trauma passed down to Laurie’s daughter and granddaughter as a result of them surviving Myers’s rampage while also grieving the death of their husband and father, respectively, Ray (Toby Huss). Instead, we get one brief scene of Karen and Allyson holding together and acknowledging his death before chaos falls upon the hospital where Laurie is laid up. This did not help the fact that I was not at all invested in any of the other characters’ journeys, and with Laurie wounded and in a hospital bed, the lack of focus on Allyson or Karen in favor of Tommy Doyle taking center stage just makes the movie a less-than-adequate, pointless “slasher” sequel. While I can dream that the final film of the “H40” trilogy will retroactively make Halloween Kills a better movie, I’m by no means getting my hopes high. Ultimately, I just want Halloween Ends to be good. Halloween Ends (2022) [NOTE: This blog contains spoilers for “Halloween Ends.” You have been warned.] Is this the worst movie ever made? It’d be dishonest of me to say so… However, I think that Halloween Ends is quite possibly the worst way to conclude both this trilogy of films as well as the story of Laurie Strode and Michael Myers that John Carpenter began in 1978. And while I could nit-pick individual scenes for the weird writing, clunk dialogue, and laborious pace, I want to approach my critique of the movie in a different way. First, to highlight the primary reason why (in my humble opinion) Halloween Ends simply doesn’t work: the introduction of the Corey Cunningham character. Now, to be clear, I have no qualms whatsoever with Rohan Campbell (the actor that played Corey Cunningham). In fact, I think he did the best he could with the material he was given by evoking an ounce of sympathy out of me in the first act before turning full-on serial killer and committing some of the most gruesome kills of any of these Halloween flicks. But, I just cannot get behind the creative decision of David Gordon Green and his writers to introduce a brand-new protagonist in the third and final movie of their trilogy that they expect us to care about just as much (if not more so) than Laurie Strode or her granddaughter. Overall, the first eighty-ish minutes of Halloween Ends feels like a giant middle finger from Green to fans of both the original Halloween movie and his own 2018 sequel by doubling down on spending so little time on both Laurie and Michael Myers. Instead, the movie’s entire first act and much of its second act tries (and fails) to be a character study of Corey Cunningham who embodies the “infection” that Michael Myers has left with Haddonfield itself. With echoes of Pennywise the Clown’s malevolent influence on Derry from Stephen King’s “It” (albeit far less interesting or impactful), Halloween Ends turns Michael Myers into a virus more so than an unstoppable murderer in order to make the point that the true evil lies with the people of Haddonfield and the town itself. Could this have worked in an indie, no-name horror movie like It Comes at Night? Sure, but this is the finale to a trilogy four years in the making and, more importantly, a conclusion to a story that began nearly fifty years ago! Because of that undeniable fact that Green inexplicably forgot about while making this movie, Halloween Ends comes off mostly as a wasted opportunity to conclude Laurie Strode and Michael Myers’s story in satisfying fashion. Thus, after finishing this movie, I asked myself: how could it be done better? And as I sat on the toilet pondering it, I decided to write a treatment that kept the first twenty or so minutes of Green’s version of Halloween Ends intact but diverged it from there into a story that I think would be both more coherent and more entertaining than what we were actually given. So, if you will indulge me, I’d like to share my take on the finale to this forty-four-year journey that Laurie and Michael have been on. Without further ado…here it goes! 😊 Okay, so after Corey Cunningham wakes up from being pushed over the side of the highway and enters the sewers he is killed in spectacular fashion by an in-hiding Michael Myers (the first diversion from Green and company’s screenplay). The next morning, Laurie and Allyson learn of Corey’s death on the news; despite Allyson trying to grieve, Laurie snaps back into paranoia mode as she’s convinced that Michael is back and is going to track them both down. Despite Allyson’s protests, Laurie forces her to flee Haddonfield together. Thus, the second act is essentially an “anti-buddy” road trip/on-the-run movie that explores Allyson’s trauma and culminates in an emotional argument between her and Laurie wherein she blames her grandmother for all of the horrible things that have happened to her since the 2018 movie (specifically, the fact that her obsession to face off against Michael Myers indirectly caused the deaths of her friends and parents). In the aftermath of the fight, Allyson leaves Laurie alone not long before Michael Myers finds and attacks her to conclude the second act. Their first fight is gruesome, but Laurie narrowly escapes Michael and decides to return to Haddonfield because she’s now convinced that the only way to end this all is to go back where her journey with Michael began: the childhood home of Tommy Doyle where Michael nearly killed her over forty years prior. Upon arriving there (the house is abandoned or vacant), Laurie sets up several traps for Michael as she mentally prepares herself for battle (a callback to the militaristic, PTSD-stricken version of the character from Green’s 2018 movie). Then, we get a “calm before the storm” scene where Laurie calls Allyson but it goes to voicemail in which she apologizes to Allyson for her trauma being passed down to both herself and her mother Karen while also asking that, if she hears this, to contact Deputy Frank Hawkins so he can bring the police to the house and find hers and Michael’s bodies (implying that she doesn’t plan to survive this final encounter). Once Michael finally shows up, him and Laurie Strode have an epic showdown throughout the Doyle house (including some visual callbacks to the 1978 film). She is nearly killed more than once, but Laurie manages to finally pin Michael down (much like she actually does in Halloween Ends) and prepares to finally end it all by killing him. However, Michael briefly breaks free and nearly chokes Laurie to death (like in the actual movie) before Allyson arrives, debilitates him, and she and Laurie kill Michael Myers together (like in the actual movie). With the battle over, Allyson helps Laurie bring Michael’s body outside to show to Frank and the Haddonfield cops (who came thanks to Allyson’s warning). Finally, the film ends with a flash-forward one year into the future showing that Allyson has moved away from Haddonfield to start a new life. However, she still keeps in touch with Laurie who has finished her memoir (like in the actual movie) and is finally at peace (á la the epilogue of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 2). I’m no screenwriter, but I came up with what essentially amounts to two acts of a Halloween movie in the span of ten minutes while using the bathroom. If I could do that, certainly multiple paid writers could have concocted a better conclusion to this four-film story than what they actually put out. Again, my pitch isn’t the most original storyline but I’m wholly convinced it would have been a more faithful and entertaining way to end this series without a doubt. Simply put, Halloween Ends is a pathetic excuse for both a sequel and the conclusion to the “H40” trilogy. At the end of the day, how will I remember these four Halloween movies? All differently, of course. Carpenter’s original Halloween from 1978 remains a classic horror movie that defined the “slasher” flick for years to come, while Green’s direct sequel from 2018 earns its reputation as an overall fulfilling continuation of Laurie Strode and Michael Myers’s story that balances the inherent silliness of the slasher subgenre with some genuine thrills and great character moments for both Laurie and Michael. And the two sequels to the 2018 film are bad. Honestly, just watch Carpenter’s film and Green’s first film and ignore that the other two even exist. Trust me; you’ll get much more out of this franchise by doing so. With all that said, here is my official ranking of these four Halloween films:
What is your favorite Halloween film? Are you excited or nervous about David Gordon Green bringing his filmmaking style to The Exorcist franchise next year? What opinions of mine do you find absolutely ridiculous? Let me know in the comments below. Until next time, this has been… Yours Truly, Amateur Analyst Image by iirliinnaa from Pixabay I’ve shared my unexpected love of many horror films from Steven Jay Schneider’s book “1,001 Movies You Must See Before You Die.” From 60s and 70s classics like Psycho, Rosemary’s Baby, The Exorcist and Carrie to modern iterations like Get Out and The Invisible Man, these are just some of the horror flicks that helped me gain an appreciation of this genre. Today, I will be examining the making of an 80s standard of the “slasher” subgenre: Wes Craven’s A Nightmare on Elm Street.
[NOTE: This blog will contain spoilers for “A Nightmare on Elm Street.” You have been warned.] The History The core inspiration from the project came from several unrelated newspaper articles in the Los Angeles Times during the 1970s that director West Craven (The Hills Have Eyes, Scream) came across. The articles in question told stories of several Hmong refugees from Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam who suffered horrible nightmares and thus refused to sleep. Some of them died in their sleep, and medical officials coined the term “Asian Death Syndrome” as they diagnosed some of these men with a potential combination of Sudden Arrhythmic Death Syndrome (SADS) and Brugada syndrome. In conceptualizing the film’s villain, Craven took inspiration from a strange encounter the director had in his childhood wherein an elderly man glared at him while walking past his home one night before walking off. Initially conceived as a child molester, Craven decided to make him a child murderer so as to avoid accusations of being exploitative of contemporary child sex crimes cases that occurred in California around the same time. Ultimately, Craven thought of the film’s villain as “the worst of parenthood” and “the worst fear of children.” He came up with the name Freddy Krueger based on his childhood bully and clothed him in a red-and-green sweater because, according to a 1982 article in Scientific American, they clash the most to the human retina. Due to the project coming a handful of years after other notable slasher flicks like Tobe Hooper’s The Texas Chain Saw Massacre and John Carpenter’s Halloween, Craven knew he wanted Krueger to stand out alongside Leatherface, Michael Myers, and other notable slasher monsters. Instead of Krueger wearing a literal mask, he made him burned and scarred so that he would “be able to talk…taunt and threaten.” Furthermore, Craven found a knife as a slasher’s weapon to be too common and thus considered arming Krueger with a sickle before ultimately deciding on giving him “a glove with steak knives.” By 1981, once he completed production on the comic book horror movie Swamp Thing, Craven began writing the screenplay for this project. Funny enough, the first studio to express interest in the project was Wat Disney Productions but Craven ultimately rejected them because of their request that he tone down the content for children. After both Paramount Pictures and Universal Studios passed on the script, Craven’s dire straits were temporarily resolved when New Line Cinema (at that point only a distributor) agreed to finance and produce the project. However, the studio struggled throughout pre-production with financing the project and thus had to turn to external financiers (all of whom backed out and came back in at one point or another). Despite going on to finance far more profitable and noteworthy films (notably Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit trilogies), this project being the studio’s first commercial success cemented New Line Cinema as “The House That Freddy Built.” David Warner (Tom Jones, The Omen, Titanic) was originally cast to play Krueger, but dropped out due to scheduling conflicts. While looking for his replacement, Craven met with Kane Hodder (who would go on to play Jason Voorhees in the Friday the 13th franchise). However, Craven felt that all the actors he met with were “too quiet” and “compassionate towards children.” It was not until Robert Englund (Wes Craven’s New Nightmare, Stranger Things) that Craven found his Freddy because, according to the director, Englund was “comfortable with [the] idea” of getting “malicious and malevolent.” In reading for the role, Englund acted “rat-like” based on descriptions of real child abusers and molesters not as physically intimidating but as “weasels.” Principal photography lasted for just over a month, starting in mid-June of 1984, utilizing various locations in and around Los Angeles. To film the blood geyser sequence and Tina’s death scene, Craven and his cameraman were strapped into seats from a Datsun B-210 which were mounted on a custom frame that rotated. The set itself was inverted so that the room appeared right side up, and ended up using water dyed red rather than fake blood because the latter didn’t have the right look for the geyser effect. However, while filming the water’s flow went in an unexpected manner resulting in the rotating room to spin and both Craven and actress Heather Langenkamp (who played the “final girl” Nancy Thompson) being covered in the red water. Throughout production, over 500 gallons of fake blood were used in the special effects. For the film’s ending, Craven originally intended for Nancy to drive off with her friends through the fog without any clear indication of the truth behind Kruger surviving or not. However, after coming up with several alternative endings to replace it, Craven and his team were “so amused” by ending with Krueger pulling Nancy’s mother through the door that they ultimately went with that one. Ultimately made on a budget of 1.1 million dollars, A Nightmare on Elm Street was released in November of 1984 to critical and commercial success. Not only did it earn 57 million dollars at the worldwide box office, but many critics singled out Craven’s direction and screenplay, Krueger’s performance, the cinematography, and the special effects as the best aspects of the movie. The film has gone down as one of the best horror films of all time, and was one of last year’s twenty-five additions to the National Film Registry by the Library of Congress for its cultural, historical, and aesthetic significance. The Pros To be perfectly honest, I’m not the biggest of Wes Craven’s movies. There are a select few that I enjoy, like the Meryl Streep-led biopic Music of the Heart and the mid-2000s thriller Red Eye starring Rachel McAdams and Cillian Murphy. However, I’ve found myself underwhelmed by some of his notable horror flicks like The Hills Have Eyes and Scream. But the one Craven horror movie that, more than thirty after being released, remains both scary and entertaining is A Nightmare on Elm Street. For starters, Craven’s premise for an original slasher flick is simply inspired. It feels unique within the historical context of other slashes of the time like John Carpenter’s Halloween and Sean S. Cunningham’s Friday the 13th. Whereas both those movies (uncoincidentally) have similar plots, A Nightmare on Elm Street has something to say about adolescence with its take on the slasher. Furthermore, Craven embraces a dark version of fantasy by utilizing the story to blur the lines of reality in an incredibly engaging manner for this kind of manner. But what’s perhaps most impressive about the film’s central idea is that few (if any) movies in the slasher genre in the years since have even come close to this level of conceptual creativity. Of course, you don’t have a good slasher movie without an iconic slasher villain. Without a doubt, A Nightmare on Elm Street is greatly enhanced by Robert Englund’s portrayal of the witty but deadly Freddy Krueger. Rather than a masked killer with a mysterious backstory that lacks any sense of personality, Krueger defies this archetype by being an expressive, emotional, and captivating person behind the facial scars and sharp leather gloves. While the film might suffice on the back of Craven’s direction and screenplay, it is the way that Englund terrorizes the teen characters and terrifies the audience that seared the movie into my memory. But the most underappreciated aspect of A Nightmare on Elm Street, in my humble opinion, is the special effects. From the bathtub scene to the creative kills, Craven’s crew wastes no ounce of ingenuity and talent making the dream world crossing over into the real world utterly believable. Furthermore, it adds to the immersive nature of the film’s horror vibes by making the situations that the characters find them in “feel real” despite the fact that they’re questionable even in the context of the movie’s fictional universe. While I’m not always impressed by the use of practical effects in movies from this time, I’ve found that when it works (in cases like this)—it really works. The Cons Surely, all those aforementioned strengths of A Nightmare on Elm Street outweigh any flaws, right? While (in my humble opinion) they do, the flaws on display here are still significant enough to mention. So, let’s get to it! 😊 I think the most evident flaw of the movie lies with its characters (aside from Freddy Krueger, of course). Whether it’s the largely forgettable teens or the cartoonishly idiotic/malevolent adults in the town, I just found them to be too evocative of the worst tendencies of Stephen King when he writes bullies and unrealistically flawed adults. In other words, the inclusion of these sensibilities keeps the movie from achieving a certain degree of timelessness that I hoped it would have. Specifically, I just never found Nancy Thompson’s (Heather Langenkamp) rivalry with Freddy Krueger to be nearly as compelling as the other iconic slasher pairings like Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis) and Michael Myers in the Halloween franchise or even Sidney Prescott (Neve Campbell) and the Ghostface killers of the Scream series. So, what are my final impressions of A Nightmare on Elm Street? Despite some generally lackluster characters, Craven and his cast and crew brought into existence a very iconic slasher villain with smart writing, great direction, timeless special effects, and an overall vibe that embraces its primary objective while embracing the best of classic horror. If you haven’t checked it out before, give it a watch! I don’t think you’ll be disappointed. 😊 What are your thoughts on Wes Craven’s A Nightmare on Elm Street? What other 80s horror movies do you recommend? What opinions of mine do you find absolutely ridiculous? Let me know in the comments below. Until next time, this has been… Yours Truly, Amateur Analyst “Universal [Studios] created one of the first (if not the first) franchises in Hollywood history with its monster movies, and absolutely created the first cinematic universe when they started having those monsters meet each other and hang out with Abbott and Costello. It was a different time.” – Tom Reimann Image by Clker-Free-Vector-Images from Pixabay Without a doubt, franchises have dominated Hollywood filmmaking for a long time. From a decades-in-the-making Top Gun sequel to new iterations on classic characters like The Batman to another shameless cash grab like Jurassic World: Dominion, people nowadays are simply more likely to spend money going to the movies if they recognize its brand. Considering how ubiquitous franchises are now with the moviegoing experience, I asked myself some time ago: what was the first film franchise?
To kick off my horror-themed October blogs, I wanted to celebrate the legacy of Universal Pictures’ “Classic Monsters” by delving into the histories (and sharing my thoughts) on some of the iconic movie monsters from this inaugural cinematic universe. So, without further ado…LET’S GET STARTED!! [NOTE: This blog contains spoilers for several movies. You have been warned.] Dracula (1931) In the wake of F.W. Murnau being sued by the widow of Bram Stoker for the release of his silent horror film Nosferatu, enthusiastic Hollywood producer and co-founder of Universal Studios Carl Laemmle, Jr. (All Quiet on the Western Front, Frankenstein, The Invisible Man) legally purchased the film rights to Stoker’s gothic fiction for $40,000. Upon recognizing its potential at the American box office, he conceptualized his adaption of the vampiric story to be a large-scale spectacle akin to Wallace Worsley’s The Hunchback of Notre Dame and Rupert Julian’s The Phantom of the Opera. Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist Louis Bromfield was hired to pen the first draft of the screenplay. However, many aspects of his attempt to reconcile Stoker’s novel with the stage-play version were rejected by Universal due to budget constraints or deemed as potentially controversial. As a result, Bromfield was replaced with playwright and screenwriter Garrett Fort (Frankenstein, The Mask of Zorro). Successfully channeling inspirations from both the hit Broadway adaptation and Murnau’s Nosferatu (notably the scene of Renfield’s pricked finger evoking the Count’s bloodlust), Fort’s final draft became the shooting script and earned him the writing credit for the film. Silent horror film star Lon Chaney (The Hunchback of Notre Dame, The Phantom of the Opera) was intended to star in the lead role. However, his sudden death due to a throat hemorrhage forced Laemmle, Jr. to consider other actors. After several were up for the role, the studio hired Lew Ayres (All Quiet on the Western Front, Johnny Belinda) before he was recast with Robert Ames (The Trespasser, Holiday) who was quickly recast with David Manners (The Miracle Woman, The Mummy). As Manners ultimately agreed to the role of John Harker, Laemmle, Jr. remained reluctant to consider Hungarian native Bela Lugosi (White Zombie, The Raven, Bride of the Monster) who received positive reviews for his portrayal of Dracula on the stage. Coincidentally, Lugosi was in Los Angeles for a tour version of the play while the film was being cast. Despite the studio resisting, Lugosi lobbied for the role and ultimately won them over after accepting a salary of thirty-five hundred dollars for a nearly two-month shooting schedule. Principal photography took place over the course of 36 days in Los Angeles, starting in late September of 1930. Due to director Tod Browning’s lackadaisical shooting style, cinematographer Karl Freund took over much of the shoot and thus became an uncredited director for the project. Manners recalls Lugosi being “polite” but “distant” from the rest of the cast as he struck him as not so much acting as being just his true, eccentric self. Several performers in the film, from Edward Van Sloan (Van Helsing) and Helen Chandler (Mina Seward), derided the film and/or their role in it. Lugosi himself refused offers to play Dracula on stage going forward due to his fear of being typecast. Ultimately coming in under budget at just over $340,000, Dracula subverted Universal Studios’ expectations by being a box office success upon its release in February of 1931. Raking in a profit of $700,000, the film became Universal’s best-selling film of that year. Newspaper reports indicated that audience members fainted in shock at the horror on screen, seemingly confirming the studio’s worry that American theatergoers were not prepared for a strait-laced “chiller” flick that included no humor to undermine the movie’s supernatural elements. It was later revealed that these reports were orchestrated by the studio to increase audience interest in the film. Contemporarily, critics received Dracula positively (particularly highlighting Browning’s direction, the creepy atmosphere, and Chandler’s performance). Decades later, the film was re-evaluated for its cinematography and Lugosi’s iconic turn as the most famous vampire character ever to hit the silver screen. Film historians credited the movie with popularizing the cinematic vampire; some even contend that the horror genre in film was born with Dracula. The film’s critical and commercial success launched Universal Studios’ representation as the progenitor of early horror cinema, from James Whale’s Frankenstein (released that same year) to George Waggner’s The Wolf Man. Pretty similar to my thoughts about films like Terminator 2: Judgment Day and Jurassic Park, Bela Lugosi’s Dracula is an important movie more than it is a good one. Did it set the standard for the monster flick? Sure, but it’s been surpassed by nearly every big-name film in its subgenre that’s been released since (including the three other movies that I’m talking about today). I say that for a number of reasons. First and foremost, it looks old. The sets for Dracula, whether they be matte paintings or drapes with illusory 3-D depth, appear very cheap even for the standards of 1930s moviemaking. Furthermore, its special effects (notably the use of a bat on a string) fail to effectively immerse the audience in its story or evoke any kind of terror. The movie also feels old. I particularly found the cinematography to be dull in comparison to other horror flicks of the time (the fact that Murnau’s Nosferatu, a German silent film made ten years prior, looks more haunting than this movie is simply inexcusable). The editing does the film no favors either; the director’s overuse of awkward close-ups on the actors’ uninteresting faces clearly indicate that he failed to differentiate between what looks good on camera to a movie theater versus what looks good on stage to a Broadway audience. And given the fact that silent movies generally made pretty good use of its score to indicate emotion and progress the story, Dracula’s utter lack of musical sound in any way, shape or form to accentuate its “scarier” moments just shows a lack of grasp on how horror should be done. However, what was most clear on a recent rewatch was that filmmakers from the time were still not entirely sure how to direct actors in the sound era. While the cheese feigning as horror is most apparent in Helen Chandler’s performance as the damsel victim of Count Dracula’s mind control, virtually all of the performances (yes, including Lugosi) feel like they’re either trying too hard to be scary in front of the camera or simply not trying at all. All in all, Dracula paled in comparison to its German predecessor and simply does not hold up through 21st-century eyes. While this doesn’t detract from its historical significance as a seminal progenitor of modern horror, I am very glad that we evolved from this style of filmmaking since then. Frankenstein (1931) In the wake of losing over two million dollars in revenue in 1930, Universal Studios was in need of some profitable movies. Their wish came true in the form of Tod Browning’s Dracula, which convinced producer and studio executive Carl Laemmle, Jr. to announce Universal’s intentions to make more horror films. Their first move? To purchase the film rights to the stage adaptation of Mary Shelley’s gothic novel “Frankenstein.” Bela Lugosi hoped to play Henry Frankenstein in the film, but Laemmle, Jr. hoped for Lugosi to play the Monster in order to keep his name on the bill for the movie. At the time, it was reported that Lugosi rejected the offer and left the project due to creative differences with Laemmle, Jr. and Robert Florey (The Cocoanuts, Daughter of Shanghai), who was hired to direct the project. However, later evidence suggests that Lugosi was forced out when James Whale (The Invisible Man, Bride of Frankenstein) took over as director. In doing so, Whale cast British actor Boris Karloff (The Mummy, The Body Snatcher) as the Monster. As consolation for losing the role, Universal had Florey and Lugosi direct and star, respectively, in their film adaptation of Edgar Allen Poe’s short story “Murders in the Rue Morgue.” Special effects artist Kenneth Strickfaden (The Wizard of Oz, Young Frankenstein) designed landmark special effects for the “creation scene” in the movie. Supposedly, Strickfaden secured the use of a Tesla coil from the eponymous inventor himself. The effects were so successful that Universal used them for every subsequent movie involving the Monster. Furthermore, many actors in the project ended up becoming regulars in Universal’s slate of horror flicks during this era: Lionel Belmore (Son of Frankenstein, The Ghost of Frankenstein), Marilyn Harris (The Bride of Frankenstein), and Dwight Frye (The Invisible Man, Bride of Frankenstein, Son of Frankenstein), to name a few. Following its initial release in November of 1931, Frankenstein (made on a budget of approximately $262,000) grossed 1.4 million dollars from theater rentals (and earned Universal a profit of twelve million dollars by 1953 following several re-releases). Critics at the time compared the movie favorably to Dracula, with many lauding it as a significant improvement over it and a landmark achievement for the horror genre. Near-universal praise went towards the make-up effects on Karloff. Nine years before Dracula, the movie was selected by the Library of Congress for preservation in the National Film Registry for its cultural, historical, or aesthetic significance. Today, it is considered by film historians as one of the greatest movies of all time. In many ways, I tend to agree with the contemporary critics who hailed Frankenstein as a superior horror movie to Dracula. Even more so, it supersedes in virtually every aspect of filmmaking. First of all, its concept is scarier than its predecessor. Whereas Dracula plays into the idea of fictional monsters terrifying us, Frankenstein emphasizes the fact that the worst evils on this Earth are the ones that we create ourselves. Colin Clive’s foundational portrayal of the “mad scientist” Henry Frankenstein helps this mission along by offering a character whose pseudo-scientific hubris and God complex makes for a far more compelling tragic figure than David Manners’ John Harker or Helen Chandler’s Mina Seward from Dracula. Yet, the heart and soul of Frankenstein is Boris Karloff as Dr. Frankenstein’s Monster. Despite not being written as overtly sympathetic, Karloff injects subtle moments that help the audience empathize with this humanoid automaton with the mind of a toddler by portraying his aggression being the result of ignorance rather than malevolence. This, of course, makes the Monster’s demise in the fiery climax at the windmill all the more saddening. Simply put, the fact that Karloff got 1930s moviegoers to care about a nameless, synthetic creature with no dialogue is rather impressive. But what is more impressive is that his version of the character still holds up today. Another vast improvement over Dracula is how the film’s screenplay is pretty decently paced. While the first act establishes Dr. Frankenstein’s hubris in the form of creating his monster, the rest of the film fleshes out the increasingly severe consequences of that decision as the monster wastes no time exploring the world around him (often to the detriment of others). Ultimately, the build to the third act is propelled by the subtler and more heartwarming moments (i.e. the Monster bonding with a little girl over tossing flowers into a pond) only enhances the story’s tragic nature in which both Dr. Frankenstein and his creation suffer at the hands of a paranoid angry mob who have no patience for mercy or forgiveness. So, is Frankenstein a great movie? I don’t think so, but I hold it in higher regard than many of its contemporaries (including Dracula) for taking a more sensitive and heartfelt approach to the monster genre. Without it, we would have never gotten Tim Burton’s Edward Scissorhands. 😊 The Invisible Man (1933) In the wake of the critical and commercial success of Dracula, director Robert Florey suggested to Universal Studios that they should adapt H.G. Wells’ novel “The Invisible Man” as part of their plan to make more horror movies. Despite studio executive Carl Laemmle, Jr. initially opting to make Frankenstein that year, the studio purchased the film rights to the book in September of 1931 for ten thousand dollars (Wells demanded final script approval as a condition for selling the rights). Having bought the rights to Philip Wylie’s novel “The Murderer Invisible” already, Universal planned to inject some of that book’s more gruesome elements into their film adaptation of Wells’ story. Due to the critical and commercial success of Frankenstein, both director James Whale and star Boris Karloff were expected to return for Universal’s adaptation of “The Invisible Man.” However, Whale left the project by January of 1932 to avoid being profiled exclusively as a horror director. Thus, the studio hired Robert Florey to direct after the release of his film Murders in the Rue Morgue with Bela Lugosi. By April of that year, Florey completed a first draft of the screenplay that he co-wrote with Garrett Fort (who wrote Dracula and co-wrote Frankenstein). Meanwhile, after his next film The Impatient Maiden flopped, Whale returned to directing horror flicks around the same time that Florey left Universal to work with producer Samuel Bischoff. Meanwhile, screenwriter John L. Balderston (The Mummy, Bride of Frankenstein) submitted his screenplay adaptation of “The Invisible Man” to the newly-hired director Cyril Gardener (Grumpy, Doomed Battalion) which was also primarily based on Wylie’s novel. Despite more treatments being written, the studio had no final screenplay by July of 1932 and thus loaned Karloff to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer to shoot Charles Brabin’s adventure flick The Mask of Fu Manchu. Upon the release of another horror film for Universal, 1932’s The Old Dark House, Whale signed on once again to direct the adaptation. Still, no final script was written. After eight weeks writing a screenplay involving a revenge plot against the Bolsheviks, Preston Sturges (The Great McGinty, Unfaithfully Yours) turned in his draft to the studio only to be fired the next day. Due to the troubles with the script, Whale wrote his own treatment which Wells rejected (convincing Whale to leave the project for a second time). By January of 1933, Universal reported over one million dollars lost in film productions for the year prior and decided to shut down production for six to eight weeks. In the meantime, German filmmaker E.A. Dupont (Piccadilly, Atlantic) and American journalist John Weld became the studio’s new director-writer team. However, by February of 1933 Whale agreed to sign back on as director (despite being laid off by Universal for twelve weeks during the production shutdown). The film’s new screenwriter, R.C. Sherriff (Goodbye, Mr. Chips, The Dam Busters), ignored the studio’s request to incorporate material from Wylie’s novel or the previous drafts. As Sherriff neared completion on his screenplay while living in London, Karloff was said to be leaving the project in the newspapers by May. After Wells approved his screenplay (notably his decision to make the protagonist a lunatic), Sherriff returned to Hollywood in July where Universal Studios accepted his script. Whale considered a few English stage actors for the lead role, but ultimately wanted Claude Rains (Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, Casablanca, Lawrence of Arabia) who was seriously considering retiring from acting to live on a farm stateside. Despite being initially hesitant about hiring an unknown actor, Universal eventually approved of Rains’s casting after Whale showed them a screen test of the actor reading a scene from the script (and gave him top billing). Without knowing the full extent of the role, Rains was sent by Whale to Universal Studios labs to have molds and casts of his head made for the special effects team. Principal photography lasted from June to August of 1933 with another two months of post-production which primarily focused on special-effects work. According to leading lady Gloria Stuart (The Old Dark House, Titanic), the visual effects shots were filmed “in utmost secrecy” on set; Universal kept the secret by falsely claiming in press for the movie that the invisibility effects were done with optical illusions and mirrors. Whale worked with John P. Fulton (The Ten Commandments, Vertigo) on the special effects for the movie. Over a year after the film was released, Fulton broke down how duplicate negatives, black velvet tights, wires, and wire frames contributed to the effects work, stressing that his major obstacle was matching lighting and fixing small imperfections within the frame with a brush and opaque dye. With a final budget of approximately $328,000, The Invisible Man was released in October of 1933 and was a big success (despite its final box-office gross being unknown to this day). Contemporary critics were generally positive, specifically with regards to Whale’s direction, Sherriff’s screenplay, and Rains’s performance. Later on, cinephiles and historians highlighted the film’s strengths as its humor and groundbreaking special effects, with some describing the movie as a black comedy. In 2008, the movie was selected by the Library of Congress for preservation in the National Film Registry for its cultural, historical, or aesthetic significance. The legacy of The Invisible Man differs from other tentpoles horror flicks of the time like Dracula and Frankenstein. For one, its sequels were not directly tied to the original. Also, there were no immediate remakes from other studios (á la the Christopher Lee Dracula films of the 1950s and 1960s). However, director Leigh Whannell (Upgrade) revitalized interest in the character with the release of his 2020 remake starring Elisabeth Moss. While I fully acknowledge that The Invisible Man isn’t technically a monster movie, I simply could not do this blog without talking about it. In my humble opinion, it is undoubtedly the best of Universal’s classic monster movie line-up despite not having a classic monster in it. For me, though, that’s probably its best quality. Much of this, of course, is thanks to the exceptional lead performance of Claude Rains as Dr. Jack Griffin (otherwise known as the titular “Invisible Man”). Watching the film for a second time, it became even more clear that Rains unquestionably comprehended what he was tasked with and embraces the mission of his character. Griffin, an ambitious chemist who discovers the secret to invisibility, is a man whose reality-altering discovery that empowers him is also what has exponentially stripped him of his sanity. That, in and of itself, is a compelling arc for the villainous protagonist. However, mix in Griffin’s psychopathic and sadistic antics and The Invisible Man transcends its character-study formula to become one heck of a fun watch. While Rains’s performance is a huge part of the movie’s fun factor, much of the nihilistic wit of the eponymous character comes from R.C. Sheriff’s screenplay. Without being too zany all the time, his writing of the increasingly paranoid townsfolk helps the Claude Rains-free scenes move the plot along in entertaining fashion. But it’s Griffin’s sardonic, maniacal dialogue that truly elevates the film’s writing far and above all of its contemporaries (and even some horror movies today). The fact that a scary movie from 1933 manages to make me laugh with it and at it simultaneously is, in my humble opinion, a genuine achievement. Coming off of Frankenstein, I found James Whale’s directing style to be more refined in The Invisible Man. His approach to editing, particularly in the third act, helps propel the story towards its violent yet pointed climax with a combination of wipes and cuts spiced up with beats from the score (thank God this studio finally added music to these horror movies!). However, the technical prowess most on display in The Invisible Man is the “invisibility” effects. Having seen the movie twice, I still don’t understand how Whale’s special-effects team managed to pull this off nearly ninety years ago. In the same way that King Kong revolutionized stop-motion and All Quiet on the Western Front brought realistic warfare to the silver screen, The Invisible Man showed that sci-fi B-movies could be innovative moviemaking for the better. Simply put, the fact that those effects still hold up and look better than some modern CGI says a lot about what is and is not needed in order for a movie to become magical. If you haven’t seen The Invisible Man and are skeptical based on other monster movies from the era, I implore you to give it a shot. It’s fun, funny, and entertaining because of its age rather than in spite of it. A movie that old that’s still enjoyable to watch? Worth a shot! 😊 Creature from the Black Lagoon (1954) While filming Orson Welles’ Citizen Kane in 1941, actor and producer William Alland (It Came from Outer Space, Tarantula) was attending a dinner party where he met Mexican cinematographer Gabriel Figueroa (The Pearl, The Night of the Iguana) who shared with him a myth about a race of humanoid, underwater creatures that inhabit the Amazon River. This influenced his story notes for a film idea, which he entitled “The Sea Monster,” a decade later (although the French fairy tale “Beauty and the Beast” also served as inspiration). By 1953, Alland’s notes were expanded into a full treatment entitled “The Black Lagoon” by Harry Essex (The Fat Man, It Came from Outer Space) and Arthur A. Ross (Kazan, Brubaker) around the same time that Andre DeToth’s horror film House of Wax was released to major box-office success. Universal Studios was inspired to film the project in 3-D, and hired acclaimed sci-fi director Jack Arnold (It Came from Outer Space, Tarantula, The Incredible Shrinking Man) to helm the production. Milicent Patrick, a trailblazing female animator at Walt Disney Studios, designed the head of “The Creature” costume for the film (although make-up artist Bud Westmore significantly downplayed her creative contributions for roughly fifty years). Jack Kevan (The Wizard of Oz), whose primary work involved constructing prosthetics for World War II veterans with amputated limbs, created the monster’s body suit. Two performers portrayed “The Creature”: Ben Chapman, a Korean War veteran and Purple Heart recipient, played him on land in Los Angeles while Ricou Browning (20,000 Leagues Under the Sea) filmed his underwater scenes with a second unit in Wakulla Springs, Florida. On the Universal back lot, Chapman worked an average of fourteen hours per day and was unable to sit in the costume. Due to easily becoming overheated, Chapman frequently remained in the artificial lake of the studio’s back-lot requesting to be hosed down and his vision was usually obscured resulting in unintentionally injuring his co-star, Julie Adams, while carrying her. On the opposite coastline, Browning would hold his breath for anywhere from two to four minutes at a time. One day while shooting underwater, a snapping turtle purportedly bit off a chunk of the costume’s foot and Browning chased the turtle to get it back. Released in March of 1954, Creature from the Black Lagoon earned over one million dollars at the box office and was generally well-received by critics for its underwater cinematography and atmosphere. Retrospectively, the movie’s eponymous monster has had a significant impact on popular culture from television and music to games. Most recently, “The Amphibian Man” from Guillermo del Toro’s Oscar-winning film The Shape of Water was directly influenced by “The Creature.” Following the classic monster flicks of the 1930s and early 1940s, Universal focused on crossover films like Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man and House of Dracula for much of the World War II era. While these films can be credited for making Universal’s monster movies a cinematic universe, they aren’t nearly as iconic as Dracula, Frankenstein, and others. But one movie from the post-“Golden Age” era that I think deserves more praise is Creature from the Black Lagoon. While pretty removed from its classic predecessors, this movie is an ideal representative for the best sci-fi B-movies of the 1950s like The Blob and Invasion of the Body Snatchers. At approximately 80 minutes long, it moves at a steady pace and never feels like wasted time. Furthermore, its simple yet fun concept makes for a good, old-fashioned “creature feature” that (in my humble opinion) surpasses the likes of Dracula and even Frankenstein. Much of its fun factor has to do with the film never leaning too heavily into the romantic subtext involving “Gil-Man.” While it’s certainly there, you can just ignore it and appreciate it as a monster-hunting tale. However, the thing that helps Creature from the Black Lagoon stand out among its contemporaries is its cinematography. For a black-and-white film made in the early 1950s, its underwater photography is crisp, clear, and clean-looking in a way that some movies that utilize shooting beneath the ocean’s surface nowadays simply cannot mimic. In addition to the ahead-of-its-time aesthetic, the film’s emphasis on shooting underwater helps flesh out the day-to-day existence of the world of “Gil-Man” so as to aid the audience immerse ourselves in his story. While by no means the best monster movie, Creature from the Black Lagoon is a solidly entertaining movie that surprisingly holds up despite some of its acting and characterization being clearly dated. If you want a movie with (slightly) more modern sensibilities than the likes of Frankenstein or The Invisible Man, this is probably a good choice for a slow Sunday evening. Which of these classic monster movies is your favorite (or least favorite)? What other old-school monster flicks do you think people should check out? What opinions of mine do you find absolutely ridiculous? Let me know in the comments below. Until next time, this has been… Yours Truly, Amateur Analyst |
Austin McManusI have no academic or professional background in film production or criticism; I simply love watching and talking about movies. Archives
May 2024
Categories
All
|