194) Godzilla Minus One

"Why did I think I could dream again?"

Director
Takashi Yamazaki

Cast
Ryunosuke Kamiki - Kōichi Shikishima
Minami Hamabe - Noriko Ōishi
Yuki Yamada - Shirō Mizushima
Munetaka Aoki - Sōsaku Tachibana
Sae Nagatani - Akiko
Hidetaka Yoshioka - Kenji Noda
Sakura Ando - Sumiko Ōta

Kuranosuke Sasaki - Yōji Akitsu
Miou Tanaka - Tatsuo Hotta

🦎 Spoilers ahead🏯

I've been looking forward to watching "Godzilla Minus One" since I heard about its release back in 2023. I also heard nothing but good things about it. Finally, I watched it over the weekend after re-subscribing to Netflix. And I can't get my thoughts written out fast enough. 

I tried to see it in the theaters but didn't get the chance. However, I did get the opportunity to see "Godzilla X Kong: The New Empire" which was out in theaters around the same time. It was alright I suppose, but it's nothing when up against "Godzilla Minus One." 

The former is an American Godzilla release. The latter is from Toho Productions in Japan, the movie company that initially gave the world Godzilla.  

"Godzilla Minus One" is the 37th Godzilla movie ever since the first film released in 1954. That number includes the American Godzilla movies. Otherwise, it's Toho Productions' 33rd Godzilla film. Both numbers are just as ginormous as the "king of the monsters" himself. 

Toho's last Godzilla movie was 2016's "Shin Godzilla" also known as "Godzilla Resurgence" which I gave very positive reviews for back in 2020.  

But "Godzilla Minus One" is the best Godzilla movie I have seen since watching the Japanese version of the movie that started it all along with its 1955 sequel, "Godzilla Raids Again." 

While I watched and reviewed the first 15 Godzilla movies, also known as the "Shōwa era" (1954-1975) for the 2022 Halloween season, I have been wanting to get through the following eras ever since, but 37 movies are a lot of Godzilla to sit and watch. 

One of these Halloween seasons, I plan to get through the following Heisei era (1984–1995) which starts with 1984's "Return of Godzilla." 

Perhaps I'll tack on the Millennium era (1999–2004) to that. I don't know yet. 
Anyways, I mention all of this because watching "Godzilla Minus One" makes me want to jump back into the earlier movies. This latest movie, by the way, is the fifth movie in the Reiwa era which starts with "Shin Godzilla." There are some animated films in the Reiwa era, too.  

I mentioned the various periods of Godzilla films in my review of the '54 "Godzilla" but I could talk about this nerdy stuff for hours!

So, this movie takes place in 1945 as World War II is coming to an end. Kōichi Shikishima (Ryunosuke Kamiki) is a kamikaze pilot who lands on Odo Island for repairs at a Japanese base. The lead mechanic, Sōsaku Tachibana (Munetaka Aoki) suspects that Kōichi doesn't really need repairs. Rather, he thinks Kōichi is trying to escape his duties as a kamikaze. By the way, Odo Island is a significant location in the first Godzilla movie. 

Later that night, the base is attacked by Godzilla without any warning. Godzilla suddenly appears without any buildup. I suspect if Godzilla actually existed, this would be how his attacks would happen. Sudden and completely unexpected. 

Tachibana orders Kōichi to shoot the monster from his plane as it attacks and kills the men on base. Kōichi gets in his plane, but panics and doesn't fire. 

Godzilla rampages and destroys, and Kōichi passes out. 

He wakes up the next morning to discover he and Tachibana are the only survivors of the attack. 

And Tachibana is livid at Kōichi for his cowardice, blaming him for the deaths of all the men which he thinks could have been prevented if he just opened fire. 

Kōichi returns home to Tokyo, which is in shambles from an air raid. He's scarred by war, and consumed with guilt for being alive when he should be dead. He quickly learns his parents were killed in the air raid. 

Fortunately, his small home his still standing.
Later, he encounters a young lady, Noriko Ōishi (Minami Hamabe), who is taking care of a little orphan girl named Akiko (Sae Nagatani). Noriko's parents were also killed in the bombing, and she rescued Akiko who's now an orphan. 

Kōichi reluctantly allows Noriko and Akiko to stay with him, though he's worried the neighbors will think he fathered a child outside of marriage. 

They continue to manage well enough and Kōichi finds a job as a minesweeper out at sea.
Little does he nor anyone else know that Godzilla is gaining strength from nuclear tests at Bikini Atoll around the Marshall Islands conducted by the United States.

Godzilla ends up destroying some ships heading to Japan along with the USS Redfish. 

The Japanese government asks the U.S. to help save some decommissioned Imperial Japanese naval ships. But the U.S. and Russia don't like each other much, so the United States declines to help. 

Minami Hamabe in "Godzilla Minus One."

Japan is on their own. The government doesn't want to stir up a panic, so the people of Japan are kept in the dark. But Godzilla is making his way to the mainland. 

When Kōichi and the small crew aboard the minesweeping ship he's working on are commissioned to sail to the Ogasawara Islands to try and slow Godzilla down, they attempt to do precisely that by releasing a mine into Godzilla's mouth and detonating it. The ship's crew quickly learn that Godzilla can regenerate and heal himself almost instantly after the mine explodes and nearly tears his head in two.

Bigger ships try to attack Godzilla, but they don't really achieve that goal. In fact, they fail miserably. 

Finally, Godzilla reaches Tokyo and the hell of war breaks out again as the Japanese are still deeply wounded by the turmoil of World War II. 

Toho has a long-standing talent of including well-written, sympathetic or tragic yet relatable characters in a lot of their Kaiju movies. Kaiju, by the way, refers to Japanese giant monster movies. They're not necessarily limited to just Godzilla flicks. 

These Japanese monster movies invite audiences to become invested in the characters more than the monsters they're trying to survive in the story. Of course, the audience wants to see these monsters destroy and watch them fight other monsters. And Toho certainly delivers often in that regard. That's why Godzilla movies like 1968's "Destroy All Monsters" and 2001's "Godzilla, Mothra and King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack" were filmed. "Destroy All Monsters." by the way, is an early favorite of mine. And I mention the latter movie in particular because it has the best title of any Godzilla/ kaiju movie. It rolls off the tongue nicely and it speaks for itself. 

"Godzilla Minus One" wonderfully captures what previous Godzilla movies have done well, some better than others. That is, it centers on human relationships withstanding the most hellish and unbelievable chaos going on around them and having such chaos change people for the better. "Godzilla Minus One" nails this! 

I was completely captivated by this movie, its depictions, visual effects, camera work, emotion, acting, and what I walked away with after seeing it. 

By the second act of "Godzilla Minus One" the ending becomes obvious...sort of. In other words, the ending can go one of two ways. What direction it'll take, the audience has to wait until the end to find out. 

And the reasoning behind its conclusion is magnificent. It's a testimony to remorse for past actions and forgiveness when it's most difficult to give it. It's something I sincerely admire and appreciate. 

Godzilla rips through war-torn Tokyo in "Godzilla Minus One."

The visual effects alone are flawless! Absolutely flawless. Godzilla's appearance is superb. His presence on screen is stunning and believable.  

As soon as Godzilla suddenly shows up, the movie shifts. 

Altogether, it balances emotion with the intensity. It doesn't feel like just another Godzilla movie, yet it's a Godzilla movie right to the core! 

I was curious about the meaning of "Minus One" in the title. 

Director Takashi Yamazaki said at a 2023 press conference that, "The biggest [meaning] is how people rise up from a postwar Japan that is at zero, and then Godzilla arrives, making the situation even worse and more tragic.” 

Japan, a nation most familiar with the horrors of atomic catastrophes, gave rise to the King of the Monsters. 

Unlike the rest of the giant monsters before, namely crawling from the United States such as King Kong or the crab monsters or the claw, Godzilla is written as a dark allegorical social commentary. 

The first Godzilla movie is certainly a film that gives the world Japan's point of view when it comes to the horror of atomic warfare and the cataclysmic destruction it leaves behind. And "Godzilla Minus One" is a huge tribute to that 70 years later. Having the movie set in the aftermath of World War II was a fantastic and touching move.    

It's also a true nail-biting action-packed monster movie, and it still carries the true feel of a Godzilla movie down to the classic Godzilla theme. 

It's a perfect updated rendition of the idea of Godzilla and it's a awesome salute to the first film while not being a remake. 

"Godzilla Minus One" is the best Godzilla movie since the first film. That's not to discredit some of the other great Godzilla movies filmed in the last few decades. This movie is proof that science fiction/ horror can be something absolutely sublime, and that Godzilla, the King of the Monsters, endures! 

193) The Premature Burial (1962)

"Can you possibly conceive it. The unendurable oppression of the lungs, the stifling fumes of the earth, the rigid embrace of the coffin, the blackness of absolute night and the silence, like an overwhelming sea."

Director

Roger Corman

Cast
Ray Milland - Guy Carrell
Heather Angel - Kate Carrell
Hazel Court - Emily Gault
Alan Napier - Dr. Gideon Gault
Richard Ney - Miles Archer
John Dierkes - Sweeney
Dick Miller - Mole

Roger Corman's third Edgar Allan Poe movie, "The Premature Burial," which follows "House of Usher" (1960) and "The Pit and the Pendulum" (1961), is the first of two Corman movies that star veteran actor Ray Milland.  

Milland also plays Dr. Xavier in Corman's popular sci-fi movie, "X: The Man with the X-ray Eyes" (1963). C'mon...who hasn't heard of it? 

"Premature Burial" is also the first and only one of these Poe movies not to star Vincent Price. Bummer!  

In this movie, Milland plays wealthy aristocrat, Guy Carrell who mopes around his huge estate worrying about being buried alive. It's a fear that consumes his mind like a worm. 

He and his fiancée Emily Gault (Hazel Court) are going to marry soon. Before they do, Guy tells Emily that he, like his father, has a rare disease that can make people appear dead. So, they're relationship is off to a good start as far as communication goes. 

He shows Emily the family crypt and tells her that when was a kid, he swore he could clearly hear his dad screaming from inside his tomb. 

Emily doesn't know what to think about all this. Guy's sister, Katie (Heather Angel), doesn't think he really heard their father from the tomb all those years ago. She thinks it was his all in his mind, fueled by his deep fear of being buried alive. 

Regardless, Emily is eager to marry Guy despite his inordinate fear. 

And so, they do. 

During the wedding reception, Emily plays the tune "Molly Malone" on the piano. For some reason, this drives Guy into some kind of panic, which makes him pass out. 

Afterwards, his fear of being buried alive worsens. Guy's fear pushes him to build his burial vault with various devices to ensure he won't be buried alive. It's even equipped with a poisonous mixture that he can use as a final resort in case the other safety measures fail. 

This fearful fixation has Emily worried. His colleague, Miles Archer (Richard Ney) is also worried about Guy. And Guy is worried about himself.

So, he takes a walk along the moors with Emily where he hears someone whistling "Molly Malone" off in a distance. Terrified, he passes out again.

While he's passed out, he has a nightmare where he's
buried alive in his vault, and none of his preventative measures are working, 

When Guy wakes up and asks Emily if she heard the whistling, Emily insists she didn't hear anything. 

Well, she can't take this incessant fear of his. It's getting out of hand. She gives Guy an ultimatum. Either he gets over this out-of-control fear or she's walking. 

Much to her surprise, it works. 

Guy takes his super safe burial vault apart and comes back down to earth. 

And then Miles has to chime in and encourages Guy to open his father's tomb to see for himself that he was not buried alive. 

It turns out that doing this was a terrible idea. Seeing his father's remains causes Guy to pass out again...and not wake up this time. Do you see where this is going?

Emily's father, Dr. Gideon Gault (Alan Napier) examines Guy, and believes he died from a heart attack.

He can't move or speak, but he isn't dead. They just think he is. The audience can hear his thoughts as he hopes and prays someone figures out he's alive. 

Emily chooses to have Guy buried in the cemetery outside of his estate. 

Guy now finds his worst nightmare coming true. He's able to move his eyes. Since his casket has a window over his face, Guy prays in his head that someone notices his eyes moving as they lower him into his grave. But they don't. 

Shortly after he's buried, grave robbers dig up his body just as he is able to regain mobility. 

Now, back from the dead (figuratively speaking), Guy takes revenge on those who buried him alive. 

Like the previous Poe movies, "The Premature Burial" maintains a grand impressive, elegant,

Ray Milland in "The Premature Burial."

yet low budget Victorian era style, seen in his previous Poe movies that I find entertaining and amusing to watch. Its atmosphere and style remind me of Hammer Horror movies from the U.K. 

This movie comes across drier than it does horrific compared to the Poe movies before it. However, the fear factor picks up midway. Ray Milland is a fantastic actor with a lot of respected titles under his belt. I still miss Vincent Price in this picture. 

Milland plays a sympathetic character wonderfully well. When the horror finally turns on, he doesn't quite hit the frightening mark. He tries, but his performance in the scary half of the movie leans into the side of awkward. He has to carry the horror on his shoulders with his characters consuming fear of being buried alive. Milland has to bring the audience the fear and terror they came to see through his own expressions. And he works it, but doesn't quite make it there for me. 

But I still enjoyed watching this and found it worthwhile and entertaining. 

There's one line that cracked me up. I don't know if it was intended to be funny, but it had me in hysterics. 

In that scene, Emily asks her dad if he's enjoying himself during the wedding reception. 

He replies, "I never enjoy myself. I merely experience greater and lesser degrees of tedium, that's all." 

If I were Emily, I'd be sorry for asking. 

It's worth pointing out that Alan Napier is the same Alan Napier who famously played Alfred Pennyworth, Bruce Wayne's butler, in the TV series "Batman."

Despite its mild weaknesses, and slight underperformance, Corman maintains his haunting style with Poe's continuing theme of being buried alive. It's a theme seen in the previous movies, and other Poe tales. Watching "The Premature Burial" makes me anxious to get to his next movie in the series - "Tales of Terror." 

 

192) Hobgoblins (1988)

"The vault... I tried to warn you... those creatures... the vault... I tried... All my work! Thirty years, I have tried to prevent this from happening."

Director

Rick Sloane

Cast
Tom Bartlett - Kevin
Paige Sullivan - Amy
Steven Boggs - Kyle
Kelley Palmer - Daphne
Billy Frank - Nick
Tamara Clatterbuck - Fantazia
Duane Whitaker - Roadrash
Jeffrey Culver - McCreedy
Kevin Kildow - Dennis

Instead of watching the low-budget 1988 alleged "Gremlins" rip-off movie "Hobgoblins" on its own, I watched it on an episode of "Mystery Science Theater 3000" (MST3K). It's episode 907.

If it wasn't for MST3K, who besides a few basement dwellers who rented "Hobgoblins" on a whim from their local video store way back when on their mom's dime, would remember this lousy horror puppet show?

And it is a terrible puppet show. It's also proof that not everything from the 1980s is worth nostalgia. 

With that said, it's a real trip in the realm of lousy garbage movies to watch. It's quite a testament to sloppy movie making and careless writing. It's only thanks to watching "Hobgoblins" on MST3K that I thought to myself, "This is going to be great!" 

I mentioned "Hobgoblins" in my review of the 1987 creature feature, "Munchies" which I posted in 2022. It's a little monster horror film along the caliber of "Gremlins" and "Critters."

The movie begins as a guy named Dennis (Kevin Kildow), a security guard at an abandoned film vault, who goes exploring around the vault. 

He wanders into the vault area and a vivid fantasy falls on him as if enchanted by an otherworldly force. He imagines himself as a rock and roll star. In his mind, the fantasy is actually playing out in front of his eyes. He sees the lights and stage. But he doesn't seem to care that in his fantasy, the seats are empty. I don't know if that's a result of the movie's low budget, or what. 

Anyways, little does Dennis know that the fantasy is induced by a bunch of little creatures called hobgoblins. He doesn't know that he's about to be their next victim. Why they kill people, I really don't know. And honestly, who even cares?

His boss, Mr. McCreedy (Jeffrey Culver), finds Dennis's dead body. Instead of calling police or family, he closes it in the vault where the hobgoblins got him, 

Shortly after, a teenager named Kevin (Tom Bartlett) is hired to replace Dennis at the film vault. While showing him around the place he'll be guarding, Mr. McCreedy tells him never, under any circumstances, to go into a particular wing where the actual vault is. That means the audience knows he's going to go in there sooner or later. 

Kevin's one priority in life is to impress his girlfriend, Amy (Paige Sullivan). That's why he got a job in the first place.

After arriving home from his first day on the job, his pals Daphne (Kelley Palmer) and Kyle (Steven Boggs) are already at his house along with Amy. Spoiler - These are really useless people! 

Daphne is waiting for her boyfriend Nick (Billy Frank) to return any minute from the Army. 

When he arrives, Nick tries to show off by "demonstrating" weapons combat with Kevin using gardening tools. The scene is laughably drawn out, repetitive and completely pointless. But they go at it with gardening tools...for over two minutes! 

When Kevin is beaten by Nick, Amy is completely embarrassed and verbally berates him for losing at garden fighting. Again, it's all stupid. 

Nick's "victory" turns Daphne on, probably because he's failed at everything else in his useless life. Seeing him finally achieve something - anything - is just too mind blowing. So she and Nick hop in the back of his van for some...umm...celebrating. 

Then the movie shifts from this pointless moment to the following night as a burglar tries breaking into the film vault. 

Kevin chases the burglar inside and finds the forbidden vault. He goes in (everyone knew he would) thinking the crook is in there. 

He doesn't know until it's too late that the hobgoblins have been locked inside, and that's what he was really hired to guard. 

As expected, the hobgoblins escape, and some poorly written and non-sensical (in the truest and most literal sense of the term) events ensue.

Of course, the hobgoblins go straight to Kevin's house where his idiot friends are still hanging out. 

The usual gang of idiots try to fight them off. 

They attack Amy, and her imaginative fantasy leads her to a local hang called Club Scum. I can't make this stuff up. All the characters start having their own fantasies. Nick thinks he's back in the Army and starts throwing grenades around. He eventually catches himself on fire, only to return at the end with a few bandages and no burn scars whatsoever. Kyle is pursuing an adult telephone hotline worker who tries to push his car off a cliff with him inside. And Kyle is completely oblivious. Like I said... STUPID PEOPLE!

And the story goes from there. I really don't want to continue laying it out. 

All those classically bad decisions often depicted in horror movies only seem to fit in low-budget movies. This movie can't even get those right.

"Hobgoblins" is like a terrible homemade puppet show put on by immature teenagers with hardly any life experience. They got a hold of someone's dad's camcorder and filmed a movie just for something to do. 

Rather than make some sort of coherent horror movie, they amused themselves by inserting a bunch of titillating things, like babes and rock n' roll, that immature teenagers generally find chuckle at. And then they shared their little movie with all their buddies and high school crushes. Any coherency in "Hobgoblins" is likely accidental.

And the hobgoblins are as puppet-y as ever. They look like Mogwai's from "Gremlins" mixed with the metamorphized Gremlins. Regardless,  I've seen nearly empty milk cartons more frightening and concerning than these puppet-ty hobgoblins. 

The puppets from "Mr. Roger's Neighborhood" were more animated than these things.  

To ensure no one claims the movie is a Gremlins rip off, these creatures are attracted to bright light rather repelled by bright light as Gremlins are. But that doesn't stop them from escaping from a well-lit archive into the night. This minor plot points serves absolutely no purpose to the story. 

When it comes to low budget movies, being low-budget isn't necessarily a bad thing nor does it make a movie bad. In this case, Hobgoblins is hilariously poor quality. It takes its low-budget and just runs with it as though its reputation depends on it.

Hence the entire scene in "Club Scum." It's so on the nose and pointless. 

None of the actors even bother to try. If any of the characters are memorable, it's only thanks to their stupid decisions. 

Call it a gross oversight on the part of the director or just pure laziness. If I was around while "Hobgoblins" was being filmed, and I just wandered into frame, I doubt anyone would care. 

Aside from this movie, director Rick Sloan went on to direct "Hobgoblins 2" - a movie I didn't know existed until just now as I looked into what other movies he directed. 

Sloan also directed other such "cinematic masterpieces" like "Vice Academy," "Vice Academy 2," "Vice Academy 3," "Vice Academy 4," "Vice Academy 5" and I have to... HAVE TO... mention the crown jewel of his film menagerie, "Vice Academy 6." 

Some movies are so bad, they're good. "Hobgoblins" is just bad. There's no charm in it whatsoever. Checking out "Hobgoblins" via "MST3K" is the only way to see it. Watching it with Mike and his robot pals on the "satellite of love" is what I enjoyed most. The movie needed them to make it worthwhile. 

Not a Review Necessarily - My Nosferatu trailer reaction

The 1922 silent German expressionist vampire film "Nosferatu," directed by F.W. Murnau and starring Max Schreck as Count Orlock, opened the horror genre to vampire movies. 

Count Orlock was the vampire before Bela Lugosi established the quintessential vampire through his depiction of Count Dracula in 1931 with his sleek black hair, alluring Central European/ Romanian accent, debonair appeal, and mysterious and sinister darkness.

Count Orlock is a demon of a vampire both inside and out.

He has an otherworldly appearance, piercing glare, emotionless and unsympathetic demeanor, and his shadow is just as menacing as his person. 

I happened to watch the original "Nosferatu" a month ago and wrote some commentary about which I'll post in October. 

A trailer for "Nosferatu," a remake set to be released Christmas of this year, dropped on Monday. 

It's the second remake of Murnau's brilliant and truly horrific foundational film. The gothic horror movie "Nosferatu the Vampyre" was released in 1979 starring Klaus Kinski as "Count Dracula." He's called that rather than "Orlock" in the movie.

In 2000, the film "Shadow of the Vampire" was released which tells the backstage story about the filming of "Nosferatu." It portrays the suspicions that the film crew had about Max Schreck based on how seriously he took his performance as the vampire. Willem Dafoe plays Schreck in that initial remake.

Willem Dafoe in the upcoming movie, "Nosferatu."

I see "Nosferatu," and maybe Dracula in general, as an allegory for the deadly sin of lust - an enticing powerful emotion that kills love and the soul in the end. It's a vice that makes slaves out of those who give into its seductive allurement, and in most instances struggle all their lives to escape it. 

What person who indulges in lust can stand the sight of a crucifix? The guilt of what the lustful person does in the cover of darkness and secrecy is heavy. The fear of being found out and their secrets being brought out and exposed outside of that darkness is a nagging feeling. But the enticement of lust is too strong and appealing to resist. 

Only the unrepentant soul will cringe at the thought of being exposed, ultimately running away from God. On the other side, the repentant will glorify God for His infinite mercy. 

I worry this remake will get it backwards and glorify the demonic and the seductive while demonizing repentance and the religious which is what the vampire fears. 

It's much too common in Hollywood these days. Perhaps that won't be the case, but I'm not holding my breath. Too many remade stories and the morals they express are often flipped upside down by the progressive minds that run Hollywood. Regressive is more like it. 

"Nosferatu" is directed by Robert Eggers who directed "The Witch" in 2015. That movie does just that. The ending depicts gleeful women being elevated above the trees by demonic forces, no longer bound by the so-called patriarchal repressive powers of the Puritan society the movie takes place in. All the modern articles of the leftwing creed are there (patriarchy and oppression and hatred for religion). His movie "The Witch" is unashamed of depicting evil as a "savior" and good as an enslaver. 

To be fair, Eggers also directed two major hits after "The Witch." That is, "Lighthouse" and "Northman." I saw "Lighthouse" and enjoyed it, though I think I need to see it again because I'm sure I missed something. 

Looking at the trailer for "Nosferatu" I recognize the same storyline from the silent movie. I think the new film will follow that storyline at least. Still, as trailers can be deceiving, I hope the new movie respects the source material - namely the 1922 movie, and Bram Stoker's novel. 

Bill Skarsgård plays Count Orlock in this new remake which isn't a bad casting choice. 

In fact, I predict this will be a winning performance from Skarsgård. He killed it (no pun intended) as Pennywise the Clown in "It" and "It: Chapter 2" directed by Andy Muschietti and based on Stephen King's novel. His performance in both of these movies elevated Skarsgård to the lofty ranks of frightening and memorable movie monsters. His Pennywise will surely stick around for decades alongside Boris Karloff as Frankenstein's Monster, Bela Lugosi as Dracula, Linda Blair as Regan MacNeil, and Robert Englund's Freddy Krueger. With his boyish face and intense stare that fit Pennywise so well, I think he'll give Count Orlock that same staying power. In other words, he'll raise this vampire back into pop culture territory. I can see Skarsgård making Orlock his own.

Willem Dafoe also stars in this movie as Prof. Albin Eberhart Von Franz. He's a decent enough actor with a number of entertaining performances.
Nicholas Hoult will play Thomas Hutter - the Renfield of the story. Honestly, I haven't seen a Hoult performance that I found impressive. He was decent... just decent... in "Tolkien." He was well cast in "The Menu." He was boring as Renfield in "Renfield" (speaking of vampires). Basically, he's a mediocre actor from what I've seen of him so far, which includes his performances in the Marvel movies. Mediocre! So, fingers crossed he brings a decent performance.

The original "Nosferatu" is a nightmarish movie. Will this remake be scary? Maybe. There's no way it'll capture the brilliance and imagination of Murnau's film. But if modern ideologies can be left out, maybe this'll be a worthwhile remake. I can see Skarsgård carrying this entire thing on his shoulders.

I'll hold out a spark of hope that the movie will be a faithful retelling of the story. 

I get that impression from the trailer. So, I'm curious enough to see a new retelling. And stay tuned for my commentary of the silent movie this October... among another set of reviews for the Halloween season!

191) The Pit and the Pendulum (1961)

"...the agony of my soul found vent in one loud, long and final scream of despair."

Director

Roger Corman

Cast
Vincent Price - Nicholas / Sebastian Medina
John Kerr - Francis Barnard
Barbara Steele - Elizabeth
Luana Anders - Catherine Medina
Antony Carbone - Doctor Leon
Patrick Westwood - Maximillian
Lynette Bernay - Maria
Larry Turner - Nicholas as child
Mary Menzies - Isabella
Charles Victor - Bartolome

Ever since I started this blog, I've developed an appreciation for the works of director, producer, and actor Roger Corman. 

Among all his work, he stands out in my head as the guy who created "Little Shop of Horrors." 

The more I read about Corman, particularly his Edgar Allan Poe films, the more I wanted to watch them in chronological order. Of course, there's a list of other movies he directed in his long reign as the "King of cult cinema" which I hope to get to in the future. 

I was sad to hear of Corman's passing last May. He certainly has an amazing legacy in horror/thriller cinema. 

In March, I started watching Corman's Edgar Allan Poe series starting with the first film, "House of Usher" (1960). As I mentioned in my review, Usher is followed by "The Pit and the Pendulum" (1961). And that's followed by "Premature Burial" (1962), "Tales of Terror" (1962), "The Raven" (1963), "The Haunted Palace" (1963), "Masque of the Red Death" (1964), and "The Tomb of Ligeia" (1964). All of these films except "Premature Burial" stars horror icon Vincent Price.
I'll also mention again that there's a few odd balls in this mix. To begin with "The Haunted Palace" is actually based on H.P. Lovecraft's novella, "The Case of Charles Dexter Ward." However, the title belongs to Poe.
The 1968 British horror film, "The Witchfinder General," directed by Michael Reeves and starring Vincent Price, is based on Ronald Bassett's 1966 novel. When it was released in the U.S. by American International Pictures, it was retitled "The Conqueror Worm" in order to connect it to Corman's Poe films.

"The Pit and the Pendulum" continues Poe's obsession with premature burial. Like the other Poe films, this is loosely based on his works.

The story takes place in Spain during the mid-1500s. Francis Barnard (John Kerr), an Englishman, drops in on his brother-in-law, Nicholas Medina (Vincent Price) who lives in a huge castle overlooking the sea. Barnard is looking into the disappearance of his sister, Elizabeth (Barbara Steele).

Nicholas, who lives with his sister Catherine (Luana Anders), tells Francis that his sister died from some sort of blood disorder three months ago. 

As Francis presses for more details, Nicholas and Catherine seem reluctant to give him any answers. But Francis is determined to know what exactly happened to his sister. And he refuses to leave the castle until he knows the facts. 

John Kerr and Vincent Price in "The Pit and the Pendulum."

During supper one evening with the family physician, Dr. Leon (Antony Carbone), Francis asks again about Elizabeth. 

Dr. Leon informs him that Elizabeth actually died from heart failure. As he puts it, she "died of fright." 

Things turn stranger from there. 

Francis demands to see where Elizabeth is buried. Nicholas obliges and takes him into a torture chamber. He also reveals to Francis that Elizabeth became obsessed with the torture devices housed within. So much so that she locked herself within the chamber's iron maiden where she died after whispering the name "Sebastian." 

Francis doesn't buy it. In fact, he picks up on what seems like guilt from Nicholas. He shares his thoughts with Catherine. And she tells him of Nicholas's traumatic childhood experiences as his father was a Spanish inquisitor named Sebastian Medina.

Once during his youth, Sebastian snuck into the torture chamber with his mother, Isabella, and Sebastian's brother, Bartolome. While hiding, he watched as his father tortured Bartolome with a hot poker while shouting "adulterer" at him. 

Bartolome didn't survive the ordeal. And after he died, Sebastian tortured Isabella in front of Nicholas. 

Then, Dr. Leon lets the morbid ugly cat out of the bag. 
He tells Francis and Catherine that Isabella was buried alive behind a stone wall in the castle. 

This news leads Francis to believe the same fate befell his sister Elizabeth. Dr. Leon says that if Elizabeth is roaming around the castle, chances are it's her ghost that's doing the roaming. 

The idea of premature burial is Nicholas's most dreaded and traumatizing fear. 

Soon, all kinds of noises start coming from within Elizabeth's room. 

Everyone goes to investigate these noises, and find her room demolished. And the portrait Nicholas painted of her is torn and slashed. 

Nicholas is now convinced his wife's angered soul is truly haunting the castle. He also starts hearing the harpsichord she loved so much play in the middle of the night. 

Shortly after, he insists her tomb be opened. 

Francis opens her grave and finds her corpse frozen in a terrified position with eyes wide open and her mouth wide open as she died screaming. Scratches mark the coffin lid. Clearly, she was buried alive.  And the sight of her makes Nicholas faint. 

That night, Nicholas is bombarded with mental anguish. He can hear Elizabeth calling him. 

He follows the sound of her voice until he reaches her gravesite. There, he witnesses his late wife crawl out of her grave and follow him as he tries to run. Scared out of his wits, Nicholas falls down a flight of stairs. 

Just then, Dr. Leon appears on scene and confirms to Elizabeth that Nicholas is gone. 

But it doesn't end there!

Like "House of Usher," the horror and apprehension grows and grows in  this movie. The excitement intensifies all the way through.

It's horror that doesn't rely on blood and guts, or jump scares, or gnarly hideous zombies and monsters. This fear is pure mental anguish and anxiety culminating in a superb twist ending. It's a fear of a real possibility. The only way out of that fear, as far as the story goes, cannot be met without inflicting a permanent scar. Horror writer Stephen King applies such a technique for the endings of some, if not many, of his stories. 

Once again, Vincent Price is well cast and maintains himself to be the master of horror and the macabre. 

He conveys the terror within the plot remarkably through his face and reactions. It's in his eyes. Through his defeated, lonesome, fear-filled eyes, Price insights those same emotions to the audience with no need for exposition. 

The performances are brilliant all around, but Price carries the entire thing on his shoulders as though it takes no effort. Yet, it's full of effort.

For a low-budget picture, Corman somehow manages to put the audience in a dreamlike atmosphere while the thought of being buried alive where no one can hear you is forced to stay within the audience's collective imagination for sometime.  

Perhaps the term "horror classic" is thrown out loosely for most of my posts, but that term needs to be applied to Corman's "The Pit and the Pendulum." 

As much as I found "House of Usher" to be a well-made horror flick, "The Pit and the Pendulum" manages to earn a few extra points for hitting the right fearful spots, and for Price's continued impressive performance. I have yet to see Vincent Price performance I didn't like. 

190) The Pit (1981)

"They don't eat chocolate bars."

Director
Lew Lehman

Cast
Sammy Snyders - Jamie Benjamin
Jeannie Elias - Sandy O'Reilly
Sonja Smits - Mrs. Lynde
Laura Hollingsworth - Marg Livingstone
Richard Alden - Mr. Benjamin
Laura Press - Mrs. Benjamin
Paul Grisham - Freddy
Wendy Schmidt - Christina
Allison Tye - Alicia
Edith Bedker - Louise

You hear about movies with a cult following all the time. They're the failed movies that somehow earned a great deal of admiration and enjoyment over time. 

I've never thought of myself as a follower to a film labeled as having a cult following. 

I'm publicly declaring that I'm officially a part of this movie's cult following. 

"The Pit," released in 1981, is a Canadian horror flick that was actually filmed in Wisconsin. And things get weirder from there. 

The story centers on 12-year Jaime Benjamin (Sammy Snyders) who, to put it mildly, is an awkward kid. 

The movie starts with a scene that takes place later on in the story. 

It's Halloween night and Jamie is dressed in a not-so-well-executed ghost costume. 

He walks up to an older kid named Freddy Phelps (Paul Grisham). We see a quick cutaway of their initial meeting on the school playground where Jaime asks Freddy if he can join his club. Freddy, in front of his girlfriend, Christina (Wendy Schmidt), responds by punching Jaime right in the face. Christina starts laughing hysterically. 

Jaime says he wants to talk to Freddy in private and show him something. So, for reasons beyond reason, Freddy follows Jaime to some remote location out in the woods. Jaime says he has a big bag full of jewels and stuff worth millions, and he wants to give to Freddy!

When they get to the bag, it's near a huge gaping pit. Freddy starts searching through the bag while standing on the edge of this pit. Jaime sneaks up behind him and pushes him in. 

The movie then goes to the beginning of the story. 

Other people, kids and adults, around town are pretty mean to Jaime. His one friend is his teddy bear which he often talks to. The bear's responses are spoken in Jaime's voice. So, the audience is led to believe it's all in Jaime's head. Or is it?

You see, Jaime as at "that" age. Puberty. He's developed a creepy obsession with females. 

Sammy Snyders as Jaime in 'The Pit.'

Jaime is forced to stay after school and write lines on the chalkboard for bringing a book of nude photography to school. Not pornography necessarily. 

The front page is cut out. Jaime claims the book was in that condition when he checked it out from the library. 

His teacher brings it to the library and hands it over to librarian Marg Livingstone (Laura Hollingsworth). Marg doesn't need an explanation as to who had the book and cut out the front page. 

She knows without a doubt Jaime is responsible. 

Later, his parents take off on a business trip and hire a babysitter named Sandy O'Reilly (Jeannie Elias) to look after Jaime. She's an attractive psychology student whom Jaime takes a quick liking to. 

Once the parents are gone, Jaime wastes little time in bluntly asking if she has a boyfriend. 

He then does a bunch of other weird stuff like watching her sleep, and then admitting to it like it's no big deal. He also asks her if she'll help give him a bath. Though she thinks he's too old for that, she agrees anyways along as there's enough bubbles in the water to provide cover. It's awkward just mentioning it.  

During a conversation at breakfast, Jaime tells Sandy he has a secret he wants to reveal. 

He says that he found a pit in the forest with some weird goblin-looking creatures called trogs living inside it. Jaime calls them tralalogs. 

And he feeds these tralalogs raw meat. 

Jaime starts stealing cash from Sandy's purse to buy meat for them. Then he starts luring people who mistreat him to the pit where he then pushes them in for the tralalogs to feast on, including Freddy and his girlfriend, Christina, on Halloween night. We get to watch that scene play out a second time later in the movie. 

When he first tells Sandy about these creatures, she obviously doesn't believe him. 

Later, after she's had enough of his creepy behavior like his sneaking into the bathroom while she's showering and writing "I love you" on the mirror, she says she'll go see this pit if he cuts his disturbing behavior. 

They go to the pit, and Sandy is shocked to see these creatures are in fact real. She insists on getting specialists out to study these things - the discovery of some new species. 

Jaime doesn't care much for that idea, and after arguing about, Sandy accidentally falls into the pit. He tries to save her but can't, and she becomes the next meal for the tralalogs. 

Jaime breaks down in his room, convincing himself Sandy's death is not his fault. 

It's implied early on that his ragged teddy bear's responses are all in Jaime's head. But in one scene, the bear moves on its own. God knows what Jaime has put this bear through during his alone time.

Anyways, out of anger or frustration, Jamie lowers a rope into the pit to let the creatures out. Carnage quickly ensues as they start eating innocent people around town. 

Towners create a militia to hunt down the tralalogs. They round them up back to the pit and shoot them all. They tell everyone that these creatures are nothing but a pack of rabid dogs. 

After, Jamie's parents take him to live with his grandparents. Once he arrives at their place, he meets a girl his age named Alicia who suggests they should play together. Jaime is all to happy to have an actual friend, though he has kept his teddy bear. 

Alicia has him chase her into the woods where, behold, she has a pit of her own. 

This movie is bad. Yet seldom have I watched a bad movie with such a satisfying ending. 

The opening scene with the flashback of Jaime asking Freddy to be in his club, resulting in a punch in the face, leads the audience to believe Jaime to be a sympathetic character. That dissolves quickly.

Jaime isn't supposed to be a likeable character, nor is he meant to be sympathetic. Jaime is a disturbed kid whose actions go from creepy to outright disturbing and terrible. 

Once he crosses those boundaries way past adolescent curiosity in sex, he goes into the realm of murder and stalking, enjoying it all the while. Disturbed isn't a big enough word. 

Honestly, my first reaction after watching "The Pit" was to make fun of it, which is pretty easy to do. I have to applaud Sammy Snyders for his performance. That's not an attempt at pandering, either. Kudos to him for portraying an awkward kid so well that it makes the audience feel pretty damn awkward, too. 

For Snyders to portray such a twisted problematic kid whom the audience is meant to take a disliking to, and do it convincingly deserves recognition. By the third act of the movie, I couldn't blame Freddy for punching Jaime right in the face. I couldn't help laugh along with Christina, too. I don't encourage bullying, or anything like that. Nevertheless, that has to be the expected reaction after seeing what kind of kid Jaime is, and what he's willing to do to other people. In one scene, he calls Marg from a pay phone, and plays a pre-recorded message telling her that her niece has been kidnapped. If she wants to see her niece again, she has to stand in her front room window and remove her shirt. And she does, fearing the call is real. Jaime, meanwhile, is hiding in her bushes with a Polaroid. And when Marg is standing there, in walks her niece.  

A lot of the lines sound horribly scripted, many scenes are uncomfortable to watch, and other scenes get a laugh when that's not the intended reaction. Seldom have I shouted "you can't be serious" several times during one movie.  Still, it all manages to work in telling an entertaining horror story, which is weird for me to think since there's some creepy stuff in the movie, and I'm not referring to these tralalogs. But it really does entertain! I can see why "The Pit" has a cult following. I want to be among these followers, mainly for Snyders's performance.

The mystery behind Jaime's teddy bear has no explanation. Is there correlation between the tralalogs and this bear? Who knows? It's never explained. There are tralalogs living in a pit, and Jaime's teddy bear is alive somehow. 

I can't say "The Pit" is a good movie. It's not. For all the awful stuff in this movie, it's not forgettable. Again, my hat is off to Snyders for his truly and sincerely unforgettable performance! 

Not a Review Necessarily - My Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice trailer reaction

I have mixed feelings about Tim Burton's 1988 supernatural comedy, "Beetlejuice." 

Michael Keaton's performance as the titular character is one of my favorite performances of his. It's pure Michael Keaton all the way. He's a natural born comedian who's immensely likeable. He brings that likeability to this comically sinister "bioexorcist" character. 

Keaton is so at ease as Beetlejuice, with his class clown kind of humor and mannerisms. 

In my head, "Beetlejuice" is the most Tim Burton-y movie of Tim Burton movies. It's certainly one of a kind. I can't compare it to any other movie I've seen or know about. 

Some of the jokes in the movie work, and the gimmicky concept of the afterlife as being one big corporate system operated by the dead who appear just as they did when they died is hilarious. 

The set design is unique and unforgettable. It's like a dark ride version of Tim Burton's 1985 movie "Pee-Wee's Big Adventure." 

Beetlejuice, though, is more of a side character in his own movie. The story is really about the small town couple, Barbara (Geena Davis) and Adam Maitland (Alec Baldwin) who pass away and are stuck in their  house as ghosts. 

They have to get use to "life" in the afterlife while attempting to scare away the upscale eccentric Deetz family who move in from New York City. 

What makes Beetlejuice stand out, aside from his unkept hair, molding face, dark eyes, and cartoonish behavior, is how he contrasts with the story around him. 

Outside of the titular character, the movie has a somber tone within a surreal atmosphere. It's a weird mixture of small-town country style side by side with Tim Burton's dark and dreary ambiance sprinkled with awful looking gaudy kitsch artwork. That's part of the comedy, though. 

And Keaton's Beetlejuice contrasts with it all with his slapstick comedy. It's a movie that seems intended to a specific audience. Who that audience is, I have no idea. 

It's Keaton's likeability that surely kept Beetlejuice a pop culture staple ever since his 1988 debut. Though the movie is really aimed at adults, with its adult humor, it still managed to gain the attention and affection of kids. It even managed to get a Saturday morning cartoon that ran for four seasons between 1989 to 1991. I never missed an episode each Saturday morning.  

Thirty-six years later, in this cinematic era when long-awaited sequels come to fruition, a new Beetlejuice movie is coming out in September called "Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice." Rumors abounded for years of another Beetlejuice movie in the works. Now, it's a thing. 

Michael Keaton reprises his role as Beetlejuice 36 years
after playing the character in Tim Burton's 1988 movie, "Beetlejuice."

I think a sequel is manageable for the story. Afterall, Beetlejuice is dead, so he's not going anywhere. 

I'm curious enough to wonder what became of the oddball Deetz family. Has this upscale eccentric New York City family managed to adapt to country life in the rural town of Winter River, Connecticut? What became of the ghosts of Adam and Barbara Maitland? My guess is their number was finally called, and they moved onto the great beyond past the afterlife waiting room. 

Above all, what else is there to explore in the afterlife?

I don't get the impression, based on this trailer, that Keaton still has the same comedic energy he did 36 years ago. Then again, it has been a long time. How long is too long? Evidently, it doesn't matter since, again, this is the age of sequels intended to pump new life and interest (money) into older movies past their prime.

The heart of the original movie is the satirical treatment of the afterlife and all the weird dark spiritualism unfortunately associated with it, at least among people who think they know all about the unknown. 

"Beetlejuice" is a ghost story told from the ghosts point of view. The Maitlands are not only thrust into a completely unfamiliar domain that doesn't meet their expectations, they also have to figure out how to haunt their house. It's a clever scenario that's perfect for a comedy setup. There's a lot to do with a scenario like that. Hence, a sequel. 

So, now where does it go?

I bet "Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice" will explore the "other side" a little more. It looks as though since the happenings of the first movie, Beetlejuice has started working at a job inside the corporate processes of the afterlife. 

I think the inclusion of Jenna Ortega as "Astrid," who must be Lydia Deetz's (Winona Ryder reprises her role) daughter is a great casting choice. 

Ortega is masterful as Wednesday Addams in Burton's mystery series "Wednesday" based on the "Addams Family" series." I expect she'll be fantastic in this movie! 

Catherine O'Hara also returns as Lydia's mother, Delia Deetz. Again, based on this trailer, she seems to bring a more reserved demeanor with a sense of true sophistication. In the first movie, she's an impulsive and self-absorbed character. Surely that aspect of the character will carry on. I am really intrigued, based on the trailer, what Catherine O'Hara will do with an older Delia who's a grandmother. 

Above all, I truly appreciate Burton utilizing stop motion animation just as he did for the first movie. 

Despite the mixed feelings I have towards the first "Beetlejuice," I'm curious enough to see where Burton will take everything.

Most sequels that have come out years and years after the initial film are really just attempts to rehash old franchises and allow old timers to relive their old movie experiences. This, I'm sure, is following that trend.

There are a few callbacks seen in the trailer which is expected. I anticipate it'll be another attempt to capture the feel of the first flick. That's probably a no-brainer. 

By the way, I have to say, for a dead guy, Beetlejuice has certainly aged considerably.