This is going to have to be split up into three posts, since we already needed to take a month to watch the movies and don’t want to take another month writing this.
Even with the number of horror movies ole Mrs. Horror Boom sees being more in a month that the average movie-goer sees in a year, you’d think finding 31 I hadn’t seen yet would be a cinch, right? Wrong! Fortunately, there was a huge number of new releases for the month of October 2014. I actually saw more than 31, but some were so shitty I don’t even want to add them to the list. A couple of them literally put me to sleep, and there were a couple of others that were so bad I blew a mental fuse just sitting through and trying to tolerate the goddamned things, and either picked up my iPad for some task/game that required most of my attention, or just said the hell with it and turned it off, then re-watched something I knew was a sure thing and would not disappoint me (thus, the few re-watches on the list).
However, let’s just start with the list. I could put them in the order I saw them, but then I would have to look at a detail of our Amazon Instant Video and the VOD cable bill, which I am too nervous to look at and see how fast the charges added up (I’ve seen enough scary movies, I don’t need scary real-life). Let’s try alphabetical order. An asterisk means that the movie was a fairly new release, say available on VOD less than six weeks.
Oh, and if there is an R-Rated and an Unrated version available for a flick, assume I watched the Unrated (such as the very torture porn-y Carver. Also if they ever tried to make an R-Rated version of The ABCs of Death 2,* it would probably cut the running time by a good 10 minutes, depending how much of a prude the ratings board members were for that project. For PG-13, there would be about 200 words that you cannot say in a PG-13 movie cut out, and some of the shorts (they usually average 3-4 minutes) would last maybe 30 seconds and you would not definitely know what the fuck was going on with most of them. So thank you, Magnet Releasing!
I also added links to the IMDB pages (or pieces Horror Boom did on the fright flick in question previously), and stuck in a few of the better trailers to keep things interesting. Turns out roughly a third of the horror movies on the list are found footage, and while at least a couple will end up on the “worst” list, there were some nice surprises (including the “mockumentary” The Gerber Syndrome).
Up next? The ten worst films on the list; after that we’ll get to the ten best.
* We will have a review of ABCs of Death 2 coming up where we name the top ten entries. This will actually take some work, because the shorts were so much better it’d be faster just to name the few stupid or lazy ones. In the first ABCs of Death, I couldn’t even get a list of the top ten together; after “X is for XXL”, “L is for Libido”, “T is For Toilet”, “Young Buck”, and “Dog Fight”, picking five more would be a stretch. A list of the ten worst for the same movie, however, would pretty much write itself. I was happy to discover after the sequel roared to a finish that I could barely list the five worst. But I digress…
We may say this quite a bit lately, but here’s another creepy-ass horror short that we found both scary and impressive enough to be a pick of the week in which the less you know going in, the better. This one, written and directed by Jay Dahl, will raise the hairs on the back of your neck even in daylight… in fact, some disturbing shit that goes down in the movie itself happens during daylight. Take a look and find out for yourself…
So, as to the question we posed in the subject line? Yeah, we’re pretty sure that…
Here’s some notable and recent additions to Fantastic Fest 2013. We weren’t sure we could describe A Field In England (by the director of Kill ListandSightseers,Ben Wheatley) as horror (or even what sub-category under our ‘Cross-Genre’ category to put it under, we settled for a few); watch the trailer and you’ll see what we mean. The poster art is pretty damn cool though, we’ll give it that. Of all three, the David Cronenberg -narrated documentary Tales From the Organ Trade should be the most horrifying and disturbing …and we’re pretty sure we’re not alone in our opinion. Alex de la Iglesia‘s Witching and Bitching sounds like the most entertaining of these (and that title helps it hit the ground running); check the Related Articles below for the trailer.
First, a quick site update (more to come). So, the holidays came so fast our ‘Christmas/Holiday Countdown’ consisted of exactly two holiday-themed posts (one, if you don’t count the actual Christmas greeting that contained this commercial). We were planning a sorta “Twelve Days Of Christmas” countdown. Even had notes jotted down for this grandiose scheme. Example- On the first day of Christmas, Horror Boom gave to Me- The Collector’s Backstory! On the second day, two reasons to avoid escalators (clip from Terror Firmer, Final Destination 4 clip) etc. all the way up to “Ten Dr. West jokes” and “Twelve Romero Zombie Kills”. That turned out to be waaaaaay too ambitious. First problem, we came up with the idea ten days before Christmas, before we even wrote anything. OK, let’s see, we could retro-post a few of them, let’s get working on that, first we got to take care of holiday shopping, but now we can catch up and (blink) oh, hey! It’s Christmas Eve tomorrow! Shit, we gotta get started on our wrapping! (blink) Wow, we need to send thank-you notes for those cool gifts.
OK, on to that 2013 projects/movies list!
So, we were chatting with friends and started naming off our top five we were drooling to see. I went to jot them down, and realized there were ten movies we were all hopped up for. Mrs. Horror Boom here got an actual adrenaline rush just writing the complete list down and seeing all ten at once. OK, if you want to get technical, one item on the list are the final four episodes of a certain TV show (that will air starting January second), but we doubt we’ll get complaints on that, judging from the fact at least 50% of our traffic come from various American Horror Story Asylum-related searches (especially those tagged with “Pinhead Pepper”).
We couldn’t find a graceful way to include this in the title, but these are all coming out in the first half of 2013. Many will hit before Spring is officially here. After Memorial Day, we’ll probably do a list for the second half. Some of these all of us horror fans have been waiting for over 6 months (and almost a year on Inbred’s U.S. release). The ABCS os Death was supposed to be an early October release, for God’s sake.
There’s no way we’d get the list out in a timely manner if we attempted to rank them in order of excitement, so we decided to go with the release dates- first come, first written about.
Here’s the entire list- we’ll go back and add links to the pieces focusing on each one as they get published. Also, these are in no particular order; we’re having trouble hunting down the release dates on several. Until then, several have previously written pieces with trailers and/or other cool stuff. We’ll take those down when we put up the links to the new spotlight pieces on each one. So let’s get it on!
If you’re looking for air dates, you can peep them here. I highly doubt that we’re alone when we say we’re not ready to say goodbye yet to this cast of characters, and this story!
The final four episodes of American Horror Story Asylum are a great jumping off point for our list, and the first of the final four acts (The Name Game) is a matter of days away (January 2nd). So, read on about AHSA’s “final four” coming up next…
So, probably not a big shocker what “Halloween Edition” means… these are all from horror movies that take place on Halloween, or in the days leading up to it, with at least the last act taking place on Halloween. You won’t see Michael Myers, but John Carpenter is in the mix here. Actually, once I started in with the screen caps I was having so much fun I had trouble stopping… Anyway, check this out. Look familiar?
Hey! No white shoes after Labor Day! BITE
I only own one of these movies, and I’m re-considering that right now. Second, I own the special edition of this flick and boy is it worth it:
Ginger is looking good …for now!
and finally… I think anyone who saw the movie will pick up on this one…
Hint: we’re in flashback/back-story mode.
OK, that’s it! Now I have to force myself to toss the rest of the grabs on my desktop. More Halloween goodness coming soon, so I better get to writing it. Plus, you guys remember there’s a prize for this, right?
No need to guess this, I just really liked it and wanted to put it in here!
Well, a clip has been released leaked from Grave Encounters 2; our friends at Dread Central have the article and the clip that arrived mysteriously in their email inbox from someone with the username DeathAwaits. Hmmm, that sounds familiar, the kind of username that would be in a press kit… let’s see here.
I wish I had some reviews to link to, but none of the IMDB links work at the time of this writing; they all take me to an error page of some kind. I hope that’s some kind of creative marketing gimmick and not because they ordered all the less-than-positive advance reviews pulled. I think they’ll be positive, though (I trust Uncle Creepy here). Actually, I don’t even know if they could do that (have reviews pulled, that is), so I guess I might actually have to go into a movie clean for once! I don’t have the kind of willpower to avoid reviews of a movie I’ve been excited about for months, even if it’s going to be available to watch in 48 hours.
However, Back To The Movies has posted an exclusive interview (audio) with the director of Grave Encounters 2, John Poloquin:
Oooo, prosthetics! I’m sure certain shots couldn’t be done without CGI, but I’m really happy they are using practical effects whenever possible. That’s all the new info I’ve got for you for Grave Encounters 2 as of this writing. However, in anticipation of the On Demand premiere being around the corner, I do have a little ‘photo gallery’ from the original Grave Encounters (2011)! I snapped them the last time I rented it and watched on our flat screen*, and turned the closed captions on (otherwise they wouldn’t be very interesting). I do NOT own the copyrights to any of these images, I’m posting them here for entertainment purposes only (I’ve got a full disclaimer about copyright issues on this page to cover my ass). If you haven’t seen Grave Encounters yet, and plan to, you might want to skip the gallery, because several are spoilers as to the fate of certain characters …and BIG jump moments …especially towards the end.
You’d be surprised how many of the shots I took have this exact closed caption. I love how there’s about eight exclamation points, in case the viewer might not get the idea…
I seemed to get a lot of those. I could put up ten photos from different scenes in the movie, and the captions would all be: [screams] Ahhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!! We see plenty of scream-worthy things in Grave Encounters, but I ended up capturing an equal number of verbal reactions, some of which didn’t have any distinct image to go with them like the shot above. Example:
And here’s about as minimalist as those shots get for you:
Well, the below “Aaaaaaahhhhh!!!!!!!!” is in color. Shout out to the top commenter on my Grave Encounters -themed pieces,”Lobotomy Jack” — I bet you can tell which scene this is from! (10/1 update: he could)
Well, at least that one’s in color. I seriously could put up a dozen of them (plus, the CCs use the caption “Raaaaaar!” for several scary creatures shrieking/roaring). There’s also a bunch that are captioned with very realistic reactions (I know I’d be yelling the same things at the top of my lungs in their situation at some points):
And I’d be saying/yelling THIS more or less non-stop if I was trapped in that fucking hell-hole:
OK, I’ll get to the gallery/slideshow (however you want to view it) now. I basically picked the shots that were most memorable, as well as lines that strongly evoke the spirit (so to speak) of the movie– the reason why it haunts many of us devoted Grave Encounters fans. Here we go…
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Is it Tuesday yet?
*As I often do with really cool horror movies, especially if I’m going to write about them. If I’m too tired, taking notes isn’t always fast enough for my horrible short-term memory and ADD, so I get out the camera. The bonus is, though, cool pics for postings and galleries!
OK, so that’s not the actual end of the title. Sorry, for some reason if the syllables are right, I can’t stop myself from typing that after the name of a sequel ending in “two”. Actually, there’s a point in the trailer where some poor guy appears to be doing some kind of sick electric boogaloo (it looks like ECT gone horribly wrong—you’ll know it when you see it). Anyway, I’ve been psyched about Grave Encounters 2 since I discovered it was in production!
Damn! What the fuck was that thing climbing out into the hallway from, well, whatever hole in the wall it came out of? I couldn’t even tell it’s gender (not that I am complaining, that creature is grotesque enough without having to see its junk)
I raved previously about Grave Encounters when I put it on the list of Ten Trailers to Keep You Awake. I think it might be one of, if not THE, scariest found-footage movies to come out of the US and Canada. I’m probably in the minority here, but it scared me a hell of a lot more than Blair Witch. Spain’s [REC] is probably the most terrifying found-footage movie I’ve ever seen, and might even make my list of the top ten scariest horror movies, period- -if not the top ten, then it would definitely earn a place in the top twenty. But I digress. In the interest of full disclosure, The Vicious Brothers wrote and directed the first film; this time they wrote the script, but handed the directing reigns to John Pollquin, making this his full-length directing début. I still have plenty of faith in The Vicious Brothers to deliver the goods. The one thing I would have liked to see, though, is a ‘viral site’ marketing the movie campaign. Especially since the movie is so ‘meta’, and involves ‘a mysterious blogger,’ (see the official plot description after the jump) they could have come up with a GREAT marketing campaign and had some fun with it. I LOVE IT when genre films go the extra mile when it comes to promotion …and it’s clear they’re having as much fun playing with it as the fans were. Links to great, entertaining, and just plain fun promo sites will be coming soon in a feature piece, by the way, and there’s some serious must-sees in there.
Here’s the official plot description for Grave Encounters 2…
In 2011, GRAVE ENCOUNTERS was a found-footage horror phenomenon from the Vicious Brothers, with a trailer garnering over 20 million views on YouTube. Many people believed it was just a movie. They were wrong, and film student Alex Wright is out to prove it in GRAVE ENCOUNTERS 2.
While researching the events depicted in the original film and the subsequent disappearance of its lead ”actor” Sean Rogerson, Alex Wright received a bizarre video from a mysterious blogger named “DeathAwaits666.” Appearing to show Rogerson still alive but trapped inside the Collingwood Psychiatric Hospital from GRAVE ENCOUNTERS, Alex and his friends agree to meet the blogger at the infamous hospital in hopes of learning what really happened.* To their horror, they quickly find themselves face-to-face with unspeakable evil. Realizing that they must be smarter and faster than Rogerson and his crew to avoid suffering the same fate, they use their knowledge of the original film to do whatever it takes to survive the sequel.
Yeah… I don’t think that last part’s gonna happen. Take a look at the first theatrical trailer for Grave Encounters 2 below!
Damn! What the fuck was that thing climbing out into the hallway from, well, whatever hole in the wall it came out of? I couldn’t even tell its gender (not that I am complaining, that creature is grotesque enough without having to see its junk). Bringing back the main character (and possible sole survivor) from the first movie has potential. Thinking back, I can’t even say for sure who got the worst death in the first movie. Many times after whatever monster/demon/ghost combo got ahold of someone (causing the other characters present to scream “WHAT THE FUCK?” “SHIT!” “FUCKING RUN!” at the top of their lungs while the footage got blurry or digitized as they either dropped the camera to come back for later or blunder quickly away from the scene) the poor bastard just …vanished. I don’t think vanishing after being suddenly yanked into a bathtub filled to the brim with blood means they got an easy death. So, that leads me to think…
(SPOILER ALERT FOR THE ORIGINAL GRAVE ENCOUNTERS – highlight the text below to reveal and read). Who knows if they’re in some kind of hell-dimension, or just dead? I think the guy who fell down the elevator shaft and died when he hit the ground probably had it the easiest. OK, now I’m getting too spoiler-y as far as the original. Anyway, we never saw him die… his character was the biggest douchebag in the movie, but he ended up having to catch and eat live rats, then got a lobotomy. The horrible old-school ice pick kind. OK, now I’m getting too spoiler-y as far as the original and wanting to veer off topic.
Check out the first teaser poster below—the tagline struck me as kind of lackluster, but the image sure as hell got my attention!
Some people are worried the movie is going to get too “meta”, which was a concern to me for the first 20 seconds or so of the trailer, when fans are recommending Grave Encounters as a great, scary movie to pick up a copy of and see, bla de-blah. After that, though, it starts to get interesting. Even though this trailer swears Grave Encounters 2 contains 2 X THE FEAR, 2 X THE INTENSITY, and 2 X THE ENCOUNTERS, I’ll just be happy if it’s up to par with the original. Also, I have a suspicion that I don’t really WANT to see a sequel twice as frightening as the original, since the first one already was scary enough to shoot my nerves to shit!
Most people (including me) seem to agree that if the sequel is as good as the first movie–or even a notch down– they’ll be in for a great, scary ride. Lucky Uncle Creepy, from my favorite horror news site Dread Central, has seen it and said it “could very well be the perfect sequel”. I pretty much trust him 100% – besides being just as passionate a horror fan as I am (probably more, since he devotes so much of his time to Dread Central he seems to be on it 24/7, unlike me) has yet to steer me wrong with a review of, well, anything as of this writing. Oh, and they also gave us a look at a second poster that’s hard not to get a big grin looking at:
Looks like we’ll get to find out for ourselves when Grave Encounters 2 is available On Demand on October 2nd (with a theatrical release and midnight screenings beginning on October 12 … right, like I have the willpower to wait for that**). Only weeks away; time for a new “Milestone” countdown widget! Now that I think of it, the release date is great timing for those of us who have been jonses-ing for American Horror Story: Asylum to start already, goddamnit! on October 17th. So, we’ll have GE2 to look forward to two weeks before the premiere, which should hold us over a bit longer.
Also, that buys me a little extra time on my article featuring a trilogy of my current favorite–and most terrifying– insane asylum-set horror movies (Session Nine, Asylum Blackout (nothing supernatural in that one, but JESUS it was terrifying) and of course, the original Grave Encounters). I’m also writing a piece that is in danger of growing to a novella-length essay on the history of the Danvers Asylum, which I’m fairly convinced was haunted, and I sure as hell want nothing to do with the Luxury Apartments built on the property after the Asylum was torn down. Fuck that! Would YOU want to live there?
Oh, and the “Collinswood Hospital/Sanitorium” (the setting for both Grave Encounters movies) is —unlike the aforementioned Danvers in Session Nine— is, thank God, completely fictional. But looking at this (fictional) atmospheric image of the exterior, you could have fooled me. Feast your eyes on the below…
It’s not often you see an image so spooky, yet almost breathtakingly beautiful. Now THAT takes some finesse from the production design team.
*visiting the ‘real psychiatric hospital from the original’ film: Bad Fucking Idea, or Big Fucking Mistake?
**I’ll end up being just about as patient as I was with REC 3: Genesis, Asylum Blackout, Piranha 3DD (and boy, was seeing THAT one in 2-D for less than ten bucks at home one of the best judgement calls I’ve made in the last couple of years) and V/H/S when they popped up in the “Just In” section On Demand before the official VOD date. Let’s see, here. So I can watch it starting in less than two minutes at home for $9.99 (sometimes less than that) instead of waiting several more weeks to see it in the theater for $12.50? Especially Though there’s nothing, and I mean nothing like the high of seeing a Midnight Preview or an opening night showing in a packed theater full of fans just as excited to see the movie as you are …DEAL! When I have a choice between INSTANT gratification or waiting (unless I know for sure it’s going to be showing here in the Emerald City –not in a theater that’s an area code or two away– and guaranteed a lively crowd, with the date less than two, three weeks tops from now) all my willpower instantly goes down the drain when it comes to a horror movie I’ve been all hopped up to see for months.
HORROR BOOM 