Spooktober 2023 🎃🎃

Black Cadillac (2003; John Murlowski)

Revenge is in the driver's seat. - Lame tagline alert!

Cheap rip-off of Duel and Joy Ride with a trio of obnoxious young blokes chased by the titular roadster. Before we get to the actual car chase part one has to endure the mind-numbingly dull introduction of our heroes who are partying at some sort of remote roadhouse before falling foul of a group of local bullies. On their flight from the establishment they pick up Randy Quaid's sheriff who's having some car trouble. But just when they thought they had made it a sinister black cadillac appears behind them. ...
What ensues is ten per cent badly staged car chase action and 90 per cent dialogue scenes consisting of the characters talking boring gibberish. It's all about how horny they are and how they managed to get laid. Why would anyone want to spend time with a bunch of pathetic tossers like that?

The wintry setting could've provided some sense of terror and claustrophobia, with them stuck in the car with only wilderness and chilling cold outside, but the background looks like the worst kind of greenscreen, or a poor matte painting: artifical and monotonous.

There's a late twist too, but since it's pretty much telegraphed early on it's about as surprising as a Tesla's battery catching fire after a crash.

3/10

47. Freddy vs Jason (Ronny Yu, 2003) 7/10
The kills are plentiful and fantastic especially asshole boyfriend bed splat. I like most of the characters especially Charlie. But most of all it just looks friggin' stunning. Dark rainy streets, dark lakes, autumn leaves everywhere, corn rows party etc.

Freddy’s comedy is good when it lands but when it doesn’t, it’s painful dad jokes all around but thankfully, Freddy recovers as the film moves on. Jason’s kills are hysterical. He is both brutal and nonchalant. He’s a great contrast to Freddy. He’s also just at the center of funny occurrences, getting a cigarette flicked in his face, sprayed with beer etc. Plus his cornfield massacre is the best ‘horror’ scene in the whole film.

The fight scenes between Freddy and Jason are highly entertaining. Freddy’s elbow drop on Jason had me cracking up, guess he was on the wrestling team in high school. As a Freddy fan, I was happy to see him hold his own even though we all know he’s no match for Jason at least in the real world. Nobody is scared of Freddy anymore; Jason is superior and Freddy is a little bitch boy.

Pure dumpster fire MAGIC.







48. Jason Goes to Hell: The Final Friday (Adam Marcus, 1993) 5/10
Creighton Duke is the reason to watch this film, I wish there was more about his origin story and could see him in other installments

The gore in this film is pretty great, I just wish I could have seen more Kane Hodder and a storyline that tried, in the slightest, to work with prior Jason mythology. The only film in the series that I barely got any enjoyment out of.






49. Jason X (James Isaac, 2001) 6/10

"I want him soft." ~David Cronenberg

A solid slasher with a lot of dumb behaviour from the characters, so much silly sex, and one incessantly dragged out ending, this film goes bananas fast and just heaps them on as it goes. If it weren't for how stupid the characters get, it'd be not just enjoyable but also good.






50. Friday the 13th (Marcus Nispel, 2009) 7/10
An attempt to reboot the series, but it ended up being its killer. I do have an affection for it, and I've liked this installment fine this first time I've seen it. None of the kills would ever make a top 10 of the series, but there are a couple of really good ones. I like fast, angry Jason, clearly taking notes from Part 2, the best one in the series. The film moves nicely and is actually reasonably scary.

51. The Return of Swamp Thing (Jim Wynorski, 1989) 4/10

It is all so very silly and dull, but I guess that was this movie's intention, so I won't hold it against it. Didn't enjoy it, tho.




52. Frankenhooker (Frank Henenlotter, 1990) 6/10

Frankenhooker should have been exactly my thing, unfortunately I feel like the movie tries to be desperately funny, which doesn't work for me. I kept it for a long time and was somehow disappointed. Even the nice ladies don't comfort me. Patty Mullen is an icon.

54. Bird Box: Barcelona (David Pastor, Àlex Pastor, 2023) 6/10

Don't understand the low ratings and poor reviews Bird Box Barcelona has gotten so far. For me, this sequel shows that the Bird Box lore can be expanded and can be taken into different directions. Now it feels like we’re just scratching the surface. I was a big fan of the original and while this pales in comparison, there are some interesting ideas at play as well as a competent cast.

Give me Bird Box Paris, Bird Box Berlin, Bird Box Tokyo, Bird Box Amsterdam, and more! Different places, different cultures, different languages - one killer entity. Let’s travel the world! Let’s go!

55. No One Will Save You (Brian Duffield, 2023) 9/10

Genuinely unnerving and a solid companion to Nope, with even more mysteries and surprises and a lot of the same stomach-churning dread. This one wound up being a lot more than I was expecting — not just a home-invasion thriller, or a rundown of artfully stitched-together alien movie tropes, but a full-on shock. It really is one of the best horror movies of the year, hands down.

Kaitlyn Dever stars as a young woman who is besieged by alien invaders in this new straight-to-streaming release. As much as that puts an asterisk next to the title, it's really really good. It also has a gimmick that might kill it with general audiences: there's almost zero dialogue. In total, one actual line in the picture. I loved that. It gives the film a clever twist and forces Dever to communicate almost solely with her facial expressions. And it's an excellent performance! Generally the story works well with that gimmick, too, in that it's mostly about a solitary woman fighting for her life.

Now the final act is really something else. I like the final scene and what it implies but how we get there is really strange. It should be the tensest part of the film and it so much is, extremely engaging and haunting due to how bizarre it is.

This film is the alienification of Signs, The Machinist and A Quiet Place. And Kaitlyn Dever is a babe, big fan of her since Justified and especially Dopesick btw.

57. The Last Voyage of the Demeter (André Øvredal, 2023) 7/10

I truly enjoyed this film - from start to finish it was dripping with gothic atmosphere. Rolling fog, cobwebs, dark shadows are all on display within the cramped, isolated interiors of the Demeter.

The production value is absolutely the star and something to be admired. The sets are hauntingly gorgeous, the score is eerie - it’s a slow burn immersive horror with solid performances all around and some great practical fx work.

Exactly what I was hoping it would be. Pleasantly brutal, Dracula is just a giant bat freak. It has that gloomy, macabre ambience you want from a Dracula film… and it’s just beautiful to look at.

59. Beau Is Afraid (Ari Aster, 2023) 10/10

This is fucking insane, a surreal anxiety-inducer. Every twenty minutes I had to check in with myself to be like “How did we get to this point” because it’s non-stop psychotic thing after psychotic thing. This movie is balls-to-the-walls (literally at times!) Ari Aster insanity. Disgusting, hilarious, heartfelt, traumatic and most importantly: unique. No wonder it took him ten years to make this.

The first act is very funny, but it gets more contemplative and dreamlike as it moves along. It's a very drawn-out film, but I liked the time it took, and its often silent moments. For those who thought Everything Everywhere All at Once was too nice in allowing its mother character to redeem herself, this is your film! This one is downright hateful towards mothers, and it puts 100% of its blame on Patti LuPone, who plays Beau's mommy. Joaquin Phoenix as the titular character is of course great, though he's the reactor here. Also excellent are Parker Posey, Amy Ryan and Nathan Lane. Great to see them get such fine roles. I don't think I've seen either in a while.

Is it self-indulgent? Yes, it's basically a three hour therapy session about Ari Aster's relationship with his mother, replete with free associations and stream-of-(sub-)consciousness storytelling, but no matter how particular it gets, there's enough here to make it relevant and relatable. It comes in a long tradition of hot young directors coming off success being allowed to do whatever they like and coming up with something very uncommercial, think Under the Silver Lake or Southland Tales.

Hollywood gets a bad rap these days, but as long as there are people insane enough to throw money at something this singular, this personal, and, let's face it, this commercially unviable, there's still hope. Can't wait to watch this again at some point as I'm pretty sure I won’t stop thinking about this one for a while.