A Chinese Ghost Story (1987)

There’s a timelessness to A Chinese Ghost Story. Sure, it has stop motion skeletons, 1980s synthesizer music and a Taoist monk who sing/rap fights, but there’s something about love stories that never go out of fashion. A Chinese Ghost Story is a love story. Sure, it’s also a fantasy bedtime story with spooky spirits and sweet puppets, but it never loses sight of the love, and that’s what’s most important in a story like this. Puppets are a close second though.

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Demons (1985)

In another last minute entry, I give you Shocktober’s fourth Italian movie in a row and third to include Dario Argento. In this case the Pope of Giallo—my own coined nickname—acts as the producer and co-writer to the 1985 splatterfest Demons. Directed by Lamberto Bava, the less talented son of Italian Horror legend Mario Bava (Black Sunday, Black Sabbath), Demons is 1980s horror in a nutshell. Everything you would hope to see in a trashy retro Euro-Horror film is here; shitty metal music, gross out makeup effects, really bad characters and even worse dialogue. It’s great. Not because these ingredients somehow make it work, rather this film is so insane you can’t help but smile.

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Tenebre (1982)

Though I had a good time participating in Shocktober for the first time last year, most of the movies I reviewed were immense pieces of crap (like Kingdom Of Spiders) or reintroductions to films I already knew I was a fan of (Eraserhead).  However, the one real discovery last year was the film Deep Red, directed by Dario Argento, which featured a potent mix of Hitchcockian craftsmanship, pulpy violence, and funky ’70s tunes via horror-rockers Goblin.  And considering John got to review both an Argento movie this Shocktober (and last), I feel like we’re both having a pretty good time discovering the work of this essential Italian horror director, and the man perhaps most associated the giallo subgenre.  After venturing into somewhat less giallo-y territory in the late ’70s, 1982’s Tenebre saw the director returning to his gory murder-mystery roots, and in the process proving the ‘ol bloodhound still had it. Continue reading →

Beyond the Darkness (1979)

Some of these films are hard to find, which is why some of these reviews are late. Some of them never happen at all. I wanted to follow up my review of Cat o’ Nine Tails with the 1973 Italian-slasher flick Torso. No dice. They probably have it at Scarecrow Video for a $500 rental by approval deal, but nothing on them internets. Scurrying to find any other foreign language horror movie from the 70s wasn’t easy. Aside from Suspiria, Deep Red, and House (all of which have been reviewed on the blog) it was slim pickings. Therefore, I went back to good old dependable Italy. It’s like the Italian horror industry exploded in the ‘70s, literally, with blood. Dario Argento, Lucio Fulci, and Mario Bava were all shocking audiences with extreme violence and funk rock soundtracks. Though one name often overlooked among these splatter autuers, like the kid on the playground that eats worms, is Joe D’Amato.

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Cat o’ Nine Tails (1971)

The more Dario Argento films I see, the more I believe Argento was the successor to Hitchcock. There were other worthy heirs to the throne of suspense. Brian DePalma’s string of ’70s thrillers is undoubtedly Hitchcockian. Though I find myself more attracted to Argento for his stylish cinematography and ability to weave a dense web of murder and lies. Like Hitchcock, most of Argento’s best films are tightly plotted with mystery, intrigue and enough red herrings to choke a river bank. Though Argento isn’t afraid to show extreme violence when necessary. He makes smart decisions, right down to his eclectic funk soundtracks from Goblin, or in this film’s case Ennio Morricone, the greatest Italian film composer of all time. The more I see, the more I’m drawn to his work, like a bug drawn to a zapper. So beautiful on the outside, but deadly as you get closer.

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Hour Of The Wolf (1968)

Remember when a couple posts ago I mentioned that Ingmar Bergman is one of my favorite directors ever?  Well, Hour Of The Wolf is a pretty good example of why, since it is by no means one of his best films (I’d categorize it as third tier Bergman), and yet is both reasonably thought-provoking and an unmistakable product of this director’s consistently helpless vision of humanity.  It also felt more like a horror movie than I was expecting (even if it falls into the category of psychological horror), and thus helped point out that due to the overwhelming grimness of a lot of Bergman’s films, you only need to tweak them a little bit over the edge into bonkers-ville in order for one of them to qualify as a horror movie. Continue reading →