Doing this now for the third year in a row, should be wee buns since I'm currently "between employment" so have the free time to do this. Thought it might be fun to post here about it and update the list through the month as I go. Anyone else feel free to join in.
No real rules, just 1 movie per day on average of Horror, Spooky or adjacent media.
1. The Transfiguration - Mubi. Like the film Martin but also a hood movie? Fine for what it is, not enough bite for my tastes tho.
2. Mad God - Shudder. A 90s alt-metal video, all bleakness and stop motion grim looking wet puppets, but feature length.
3. We're all Going The The World's Fair - Shudder. I hear our May is in this, will be looking out for you a chara (and not just so I can do a "Di Caprio Pointing at Screen in OUATIH"-meme face). - just watched it now and she was indeed, all to brief of a cameo but good to see. This was great, maybe not for everyone but I really liked it.
4. The Gate - Physical. 80s childrens horror. When I started watching it I thought I hadn't seen before but bits of it rang a bell with me. I think I must have saw it as an actual child myself. This was amazing. Good one to watch with children if you're babysitting over halloween or you want something to scare younger relatives with that's not too fucked up (or just watch The Fly, as one of my mates Grannies did with her when she was 8).
5. The Snake Girl and the Silver-Haired Witch - Shudder. Another children's horror film, but its Japanese so its pretty messed up anyway!
6. Hausu - BFI Player. Rewatch. Yeah if you know of this film its as bat-shit as you've heard. Had forgotten how much of a weird unspoken sexual undercurrent there was to everything. If you've never seen it, I would heartily reccomend, its just good.
7. Bug - Physical. William Friedkindoing a slow burn psychological horror about a very different type of possession. This kind of defies genre, if you liked Killer Joe this shares a lot of simmilarities.
8. Hellbenders - Shudder. Weird little indie horror made by a family who seem to do everything in house with just a couple of outside collaborators. It's good, I liked it a lot.
9. Vampire's Kiss - Prime. 80s Nicholas Cage MF'ers!
10. Uncle Sam - Shudder. Wow, the anti-militarism subtext in this isn't remotely subtle, and I love it!
11. Leprechaun - Prime. It has been brought to my attention that there are loads of these and most of them are available on streaming for free. Am I enough of a masochist to actually watch all of them? How bad do thse things get and how much will they grate on my sensibilities as a some time Irish folklorist? Will I need to get the 'Ra on somebody by the time I'm finished or wha? There's only one way to find out.
12. Leprechaun 2: LA Leprechaun - Prime. Excrement mostly. Some great moments though and it did make me laugh a bit more than the first one.
13. Leprechaun 3: Las Vegas Go Bragh! - Prime. The worst one yet. They change writer and director each time so far and the lore and rules of what a Leprachaun is / does varys and has to be restablished film to film. The last one they seem to have at least consulted a reference book as to what the original fairy lore was but that's all gone out the window. The tone is remarkably consistent though which I feel we can put down almost exclusively to Warwick Davis's performance. This one sucked because its attempts at humour fumble hard, there were a few clever and genuinely humourous touches in the last couple that made them at least entertaining are just gone. The potentially funny but where they rip off a scene from Faust (weird dark superhero thing from Yuzna, would love to see that get a big DCEU/MCU expensive CGI adaption) would have been better if they'd gone all in, they pussy out of other stuff but that's the most egregious. Most people stop at this point but I can see why, but the next one he's in space, then the next two are in "da Hood", and those are the one's I'm here for.
14. Leprechaun 4: In Space - Prime. Getting well into the "so bad they're good" region, this is as ridiculous as the title would suggest. Dodgy PS1-cut scene CGI, nonsensicle script, again changing the lore, but again held together barely by Warwick Davis haming the absolute balls out of it and the film leaning into its own silliness.
15. Taking a break from the Leprechaun franchise to watch the new Hellraiser - Hulu. I liked it. The first films were about ilicit sex, this was very much using the lore of the franchise to talk about addiction. I liked how the main baddie amongst the humans was a Jeffery Epstein character, like lets face it Epstein Island definitely had a room with a bunch of those puzzel boxes in it.
16. Leprechaun 5: In Da Hood - Prime. Jesus Ice, money's money but fucking hell like. He's about the only good thing in it and all his scenes really pop, the rest of it? That finale? Like I'm no one to judge if its too daft to be actually transphobic or if its just really really transphobic but its definitely, something... I'm kind of sorry I started this now.
17. Malevolent - Netflix. I needed to give myself a break from Leprechaun, life's too short. This has been on my Netflix list for a while. I thought it was good, funny to see Imelda Staunton playing against Florence Pugh before she blew up. Nicely creepy where it needed to be. Solid.
At this point I watched Shock Treatment for the first time, the Rocky Horror Picture Show sequel. It was good, the girl from Phantom of The Paradise who plays Janet in it in particular. but it is not in any way Horror / Spooky so I'm not counting it.
18. The Sadness - Shudder. That one went hard.
19. Saloum - Shudder. Oh thanks be to god, glob and baby jesus, Leprechaun Back 2 Tha Hood is not on streaming and this can finally end now. When I do this I usually like to hit each continent at least once, Europe and Asia generally being very over represented. This is a recent one from Africa, its on Shudder and its good. Set up better than the pay off / horror stuff, though the monsters were good and the SFX used to put them together was unique. Could have been a bit scarier but it wasn't bad.
20. Livid - Physical. Creepy gothic fairytale horror, from the people that did À l'intérieur, though it isn'y nearly as gross or squicky as that one.
21. Slugs - Shudder. I am low level phobic of squiggly things, worms, slugs, snails, leeches etc, since childhood. A couple of halloweens ago I went on a quest to fins something that could still effect my jaded sensibilities, watched August Underground and a bunch of New French Extremity I hadn't seen before, watched some good and interesting stuff but aside from August Underground trilogy I didn't see much that really got to me. This film is squicking me out hard, this might be the grossest thing for my set of triggers I've seen since then. Well done.
22. The Similars - Physical. Latin America this time, a particularly Mexi take on a classic Twilight Zone episode. Leans right hard into its own sillyness. Good but more fun than disturbing.
23. Burnt Offerings - Prime. Interesting take on the old dark house yarn. My primary interest in this was that it starred Oliver Reed and had Bette Davis and Burgess Meredith in supporting roles. They were all pretty good in it, but the film itself was hokey and predictable.
24. Barbarian - Cinema. Have been told this is one of the best horror films of the year and by golly it did not dissapoint. Based social commentary, but a light touch with all that stuff. Good seat-of-your pants thrills too. 2022 has indeed been as good a year for horror as one could expect considering the state of the world. Just seen that the director was one of The Whitest Kids You Know, cool. Bit of a departure but it tracks. Fingers crossed for Sex Robot the movie.
25. Night Of The Demons - Shudder. Its like the platonic ideal of a halloween horror film. Very silly but quite a lot of fun. Great 80s Carpenter-but-EBM soundttrack.
26. Terrifier - physical. Shite. Good creepy clown and a very memorable kill before the half way point but that does not a good horror make. Feels quite mean-spirited and mysoginistic for a 2017 film.
27. Pearl - exclusive private showing. Amazing. Loved X, always liked Mia Goth but absolutely feeling the love now. One of the better things I've watched so far.
28. Wendell & Wild - Netflix. Absolute banger spoopy thing to watch with younger relatives or just in general because its awesome. Definitely in the same league as Nightmare Before Christmas and Coraline. Good film, boss soundtrack as well. Also, this is some of the most based stuff I've seen commited to film since the last Ken Loach. Zombie capitalsim, prison-industrial complex, corruption and collusion - there's a lot in there.
29. Suicide Club - Physical. One of the few formative J-Horrors millenium wave that I haven't actually seen. Probably fair enough that this isn't in the conversation as much as Ring, Pulse or The Grudge, oits not quite as ood as any of those, but it is interesting. It's the same type of horror, the horrors of new media, this time the source of the horror seems to be a meme, though at the time of production no one would have been using that word. Shame because that understanding might have brought focus to a film that's main flaw is losing focus in the third act. Worth a watch.
30. Braindead - physical. One of my favourite films ever, stone col classic, haven't seen it in ages. Holds up like it was cast from gold. The practical effects, especially the forced perspective shots with the Zombaby (getting practice in for Lord Of The Rings) are an absolute delight, as is the script and the visual gags with said baby and the greaser guy's innards which spontaneously achieve independent sentience. Would love Jackson to go back to his roots and do one more like this for the fans like me who've been with him since pre-hollywood, I doubt he will.
31. Well, last day last film, my Shudder sub is about to die so I probably should watch something off it before it goes. But, no... oh god, oh jesus Christ WTF is this blu-Ray that's just appeared in my living room next to the Playstation? Oh fuck me no....
31. Leprechaun, Back 2 Tha Hood - Physical. I don't want to but I am compelled. Its going in. It's playing. Oh Jesus, why are they retconning the Leprechaun's continuity. The fight with the preacher guy didn't happen in the last film? Why call it Back 2 Tha Hood if they aren't picking up from the end of the last one. This is horrible. The weed jokes are shit, like you'd really have to be very stoned to derive any enjoyment out of this. Warwick Davis looks so fucking tired I feel bad for him.
32. Leprechaun: Origins - fuck I dunno, it just started playing after the last one. No, Stahp.
33. Leprechaun Returns - .... Y U do dis....?
34. Leprechaun Vs Candyman... ... ...
35. Leprechaun - The Directors cut... Oh god. I can't stop it. The Leprechaun has taken over. This is my life now. Fucking Leprechaun movies on a loop. Forever and ever.......
