Tag Archives: Halloween

Writing

Thanksgiving by Eli Roth

Leave a comment

INTRODUCTION: So about 14 years ago, a movie came out called Grindhouse. It was making fun of 70s/80s exploitation films of the past. Not a bad couple of flicks in Tarantino later, but far from his best. The best part of the whole double feature billing was the faux trailers during it. Thanksgiving was one of those trailers that really stood out besides the Rob Zombie one and the other from Shaun of the Dead director Edgar Wright. So, all these years later and this movie is a trailer no more. What to make of it?

PLOT: Thanksgiving is upon Plymouth Massachusetts and there is a killer on the lose. Oh noes!!!!!

CHARACTERS: Not bad, but a tad bit more development would have been nice.

ACTING: Very strong given the source material was a joke, throw away thing.

DIALOGUE: Excellent

STYLE: Excellent

FX: Very good

SUBTEXT: Zero

CONCLUSION: I normally hate everything Eli Roth has ever done. Hostel sucked, Cabin Fever sucked, everything but this trailer sucked. Incidentally, this movie, trite in certain ways though it may be, really worked. A few jump scares got me and Eli finally struck a nice balance between gore/fx and nuance. There only a couple small flaws, but otherwise this is a horror movie and I would love a sequel.

3.8 out of 5

Writing

Kageoween: The Thing, 1982, movie review.

Leave a comment

INTRODUCTION: As I stated in my previous review, 2023 seems to be the year of John Carpenter. Sadly, the same could not be said, 41 years earlier, when Mr. Carpenter released The Thing to cinemas. So how good is this movie?

PLOT: A group of scientists fight a Ailen. No, you’re it wrong, that is the plot to Ailen (1979) as well.

CHARACTERS: Not bad. I mean, the star studded cast makes up for weak character development. These dudes are basically hibernating alcoholics, that already seem depressed as fuck, making the “threat” seem like a mercy killing. A tad bit more, upbeat characters and some banter between them, that suggests they’re at least friendly would of been nice. Not in this film though.

ACTING: Excellent! They all do a great job here. Granted it isn’t award winning, but given the material they have to work with, the fact they did their job seriously and not typical b movie, phone it in, is excellent.

STYLE: John Carpenter at his best. The visuals are stunning and a nice tidbit, the blue lights, which unbeknownst to scientists back then, for preventing suicidal tendencies, adds an accidental layer of depth to these men’s plights and isolation they’ve going through, making this choice very ahead of the curve.

DIALOGUE: Good

PACING: Typical slow moving pacing, which is nice, but doesn’t give us enough to make use of it, as it tries to be face paced with the sequences we’re seeing, making it awkward as to if it’s supposed to be an action or a horror movie that adds tension.

FX: Excellent, especially given how old the movie is. They hold up exceptionally well. Minus the early moments of the movie showing the space craft.

CONCLUSION: This movie bombed at the box office and is one of John’s biggest laments. It’s not a bad movie though, I think it suffers due to coming too soon on the heels of Ailen. It’s basically the same movie, but starring Kurt Russell. It some ways, that makes it better, in other ways it suffers for it. Had this movie been made in the 90s, 20 years after Ailen, I think it would of been a smash hit, especially post Ailen Reserection, given that movie sucked by most people standards, except me, who liked it. Sadly for John, it came 3 years after the 70s classic and didn’t add much new to the genre. This movie could beat be summarized as Evil Dead /Ailen hybrid, so much in fact, that I’m shocked they never showed the necronimicon. Despite its flaws, like needing more details about the Ailen and its purpose for possession of humans and it’s weak ending, it is still a very good movie and one I prefer over Ailen.

3.5 out of 5

Writing

Kageoween: John Carpenter’s Suburban Screams, 2023, review

Leave a comment

INTRODUCTION: So JC at one point said something to the effect of “I put my hand out and there’s a pay check in it, I’m happy” well, who can blame him? I love having money in my hand as well, but this isn’t a pay day for an old movie getting a remake based on his characters, rather it’s a sale of his name to another true crime series, the world doesn’t need.

PLOT: Maybe real crime stories re-enacted by actors that even porn would reject for their horrible acting.

CHARACTERS: What characters? I think they’re supposed to be based on real people, but the episode never mentions the crime that this is covering.

ACTING: This makes pornography actors seem like Kate Winslet.

VISUALS: Dated, retro and not in a very good way.

FX: Mid card as fuck!

CONCLUSION: This show is one more in a genre that’s done to death, no pun intended. JC doesn’t have much to do with this show, except in name only. It’s fine if he wants to milk his name for all its worth, but a little bit of editorial discretion as to what your name is on, would be a nice touch. Much like John Carpenter, I too placed my hand out, only I didn’t get a pay check, I just got a headache.

1 out of 5 stars

Writing

Kageoween: Clash Royale, app game.

Leave a comment
Quick view at gameplay. I won this one, thankfully to a crazy start.

INTRODUCTION: Normally this time of year I focus on Horror reviews, I mean it is Halloween time after all. While couple of those may be coming this month, I want to focus on this game as it has a Halloween theme this month so it fits right in.

GAME: Simple game. It’s like Infinity Wars, meets WWE Supercard with a bit of Magic:The Gathering sprinkled on. The concept is capture the flag like. First person to destroy all three castles or the major one wins. Seems super simple and in a small part it is, but it can be challenging and rewarding.

GRAPHICS: Remember Advanced Wars for the Nintendo Advanced? Yeah, these graphics were on point 22 years ago, but it suits the games cartoon like aesthetic.

PRICE POINT: Free to download but in app purchases. You can play without making a lot of purchases and this game does not seem like a pay to play. It balances everything out.

OVERALL: This game can be a time sap. My brother has been playing for over a year and I’ve been playing for three days, but it has its moments. I think it’s worth a gander.

4 out of 5 stars

Source:IMDB.com
Horror, Movies, Reviews

Halloween: A movie review of Blumhouse’s H40

Leave a comment

Introduction

I don’t want to start off with the typical cliché of the fact that the Halloween movies are 40 years old at this point and go through all the old bullshit about how so many movies have been made, including the remake and all that other fun stuff. I’m going straight to the point and talk about the fact that this is the movie people have a wanting for a long time.

Synopsis / Plot

Michael Myers breaks out of sanitarium, terrorizing Haddonfield, 40 years to the day of the original babysitter murders.

Characters

The characters are only kind developed but once we get into the bottom below where I praise the acting you can find yourself being like well, the acting makes up for only so-so character development.

Acting

I think it’s spot-on even from the most bit characters, which is a new trend in Hollywood that has been happening the last couple years, which I find to be an extremely interesting and very much a pleasurable thing. Backround characters are treated as something of note. The annoying aspect of background characters being bad actors always make for a weak movie and this is definitely moving in the right direction from all those old sequels.

Kills

I highly enjoyed all of the kills. Now, none of them are particularly interesting, you’ve seen things like this before but I enjoyed that because lately, especially with the Saw movies, Hollywood has been getting very over-the-top with their kills in horror movies and it’s ultimately destroying the entire horror industry. None of it is scary, and it’s absurd as I pointed out. This movie got it right! it had some up front and personal kills mixed with the Quentin Tarantino aspect of shying away from showing everything but letting you build it up in your mind. This is the right way to do a movie! Afterthought on this: a lot of people complained about the infant crying after his mom was killed was a missed opportunity. I disagree, it was more brutal than a kill would of been. A newborn left to fend for itself is 10x more evil than stabbing it.

Subtext

None of note but we don’t need that in this movie.

Conclusion

Most of her critics were completely wrong about this movie. I find the gripes to be unfounded. A lot of people came away from this with a version of the Mandela effect because they aren’t remembering it correctly. They still entitled to their opinion but they really should have bothered to have paid more attention in my mind. The acting was superb, the Kills were nothing new but still decent, the characters were okay but the acting more than made up for it, the tension was there, which lately is a new trend, is actually great. My only real gripe is super nitpicky, with one exception, most of the actors in this movie are hot but just kind of mediocre looking. Not a single one is overly photogenic, which is weird for Hollywood, but I don’t see anything wrong with hiring Hot or ugly people, even in horror movies, provided they can act. it works because all these people can act even if they’re not all Brad Pitt and I’m okay with this trend overall. Ultimately Halloween hits on all the right notes and is really done a great fan service 40 years later. In my mind Laurie Strode was done well, so much better than H2O or Halloween resurrection. This is the movie that I’ve been waiting to see since I was a kid.

Over all this movie gets 4 out of 5 stars and I hope it gets a sequel ASAP.

Books, Review, Uncategorized

Halloween Movie Novelization Book Review

Leave a comment

INTRODUCTION
When I was a child, almost all movies had a novelization. Why? Most likely because Hollywood wanted to make more money and much like a McDonald’s Happy Meal toy, this was one more worthless item to shill to kids or fans of popular novels. Sadly, the novelization was almost always terrible prose, aimed at the lowest common denominator and forgotten about with glee, shortly after you bought it. Remember the heyday of these is pre-DVD, when extras weren’t as easy to come by via VHS and some audiences were clamoring for more of these favorite flicks, so you cannot really blame anyone for giving them a gander, as they weren’t all terrible, but they weren’t very good, either. My reason for buying these as a child, they often could give more insight into scenes that were cut from the movie, as well as hopefully develop characters past the confines of the movie, whilst giving us more depth in general as well. Few ever lived up to that, that is until Halloween 2018, went retro and made a novelization for its movie and that is one reason for me to buy it, as I am waiting for the DVD or a Double feature of this and the original 1978 classic to finally see it. So is this little gem worth it?

SYNOPSIS
Jason Micheal is accidentally released back into Haddonfield on the eve of his transfer, exactly 40 years to the day of the babysitter murders. Laurie, estranged from her family, finally gets a chance to end her nightmare that started back in 1978. Who will rise victorious? (Hint: it’s Hollywood, it’s almost never the bad guy.)

PROSE
Finally, a novelization that does prose well. Holy shit! Not only is this guy hyper competent, but he adds a bit too much description. There is very little errors within this book, minus like one that you can discover for yourself should you read this. Not only is the description spot on, but the word use makes this one of the smartest novelizations ever. Mea Cupla for instance, is Latin. That is high brow for this type of book and I am very happy to see such. It also adds a bit of physics and quoting of Nietzsche. If all this sounds right up your alley, you will love this.

CHARACTERS
They’re developed enough, but not really in a memorable or you will care sort of way. Most the cast is simply there.

SUBTEXT/THEME
Not much, but they occasionally add a tiny insight when it comes to evil in the word and like I said, it’s a novelization.

CONCLUSION
While this book is sadly just relaying the movie with no real additions via different scenes or extrapolation to the world that is Haddonfield, the myth of Michael or developing the characters more, it still one of the better efforts that a novelization has ever undertaken, even if it lacks suspense, has kills which are weak and is longer than it should be. Overall, I think this and the movie are going to be worth your time.

3 ½ out of 5