The Douche Who Cried Axe: #ChadGetsTheAxe (2022)

#ChadGetsTheAxe (2022)

Rating: ***1/2

Starring: Spencer Harrison Levin, Michael Bonini, Taneisha Figueroa

Personally, I see fame as more of a bother than a benefit. Sure, you get the riches and recognition, but it comes with the pressure of meeting people's expectations and this often comes with the price of one's self-respect and decency. When fame becomes an obsession for clout, this need for attention can spiral towards notoriety and you'll become trouble. Or be troubled.

Though, I don't believe getting troubled by an axe-wielding maniac is something a fame-hungry moron would need to worry about. 

That much.

Based on a 2019 short film of the same title, #ChadGetsTheAxe (2022) follows vlogger "Spicy Steve" (Michael Bonini), couple Jennifer and Spencer (Taneisha Figueroa and Cameron Vitosh) of the beauty blog 'Spennifer", and uber-popular prankster Chad Ryan (Spencer Harrison Levin) plan a collaborative urban exploration video and stream for the weekend. The place they'll be exploring is one Devil's Manor, a dilapidated backwoods property near a swamp, which is said to be the hotspot of supposed cult activities around the area as a Satanist named William Burrows did have a mass murdering spree there many years ago. The night goes as you would expect it being populated by social media celebrities; they explore the manor while responding to comments, advertise their merch once in a while, and do obnoxious dares whenever their view count reaches a certain number. (One of which echoes the real life sickening stunt influencer Logan Paul did during his visit to Mount Aokigahara)

The fun times could only last long before things start to get unnerving; when one of them gets attacked, it's very well clear then that somebody else is inside the manor. Someone masked up, wielding an axe and not too pleased to have these people roaming around. Chad, unsurprisingly, is ready to dismiss this as a prank plotted by fellow pranksters until, that is, more of his friends disappear and all that's left for the mysterious masked maniac to hunt is him...

Shot through the rarely used Screenlife format, wherein we see the action unfold through the screen of a device via apps and sites (think Unfriended (2014), Spree (2020) and Deadstream (2022)), #ChadGetsTheAxe (2022) gets the benefit of being fun by satirizing the many stereotypes of click chasers while delivering a good dose of creepy imagery and set-pieces. It doesn't waste time getting into the main event, almost immediately throwing the streamers into the supposed haunted manor and simply letting the story develop as it goes by, showing us just what kind of people behind the camera phones are as the situation gravely escalates, as well as the reaction of the community they are catering to. The direction is pretty spot on to what we would normally expect from a weekend night stream hosted by an appalling content creator, pure unhinged and aggravating debauchery, and director Travis Bible practically knows we're here to see these idiots get their comeuppance for giving in to the almighty viewer count at the cost of common sense and a soul. Happy to say, we get what we came to see!

One by one, our streamers are picked off, a few clearly axed dead. Whenever #ChadGetsTheAxe (2022) slides in a creepy scene and build-up, it's all done with a straight face that's greatly effective. The villain doesn't ham it up, making their murderous assaults often jarring, even more so when the story finds opportunities to shed a sympathetic light on the victims, such as moments of clarity among the creators when some of them recognize how messed up the gags and situation are becoming, or slices of commentary on the unhealthy relationship between creators and their fanbases. It's not overly scary, per se, as the film still has its focus more on humor than frights, but it's a satisfying watch as the stalk-and-hunt onslaught with Burrows and his axe add weight to the horror side of this horror-comedy. 

This all leads to a third act where the story puts the hurt on Chad as he becomes an unwilling final boy dodging a masked killer's axe swings. He gets stalked through the woods, his means for escape repeatedly thwarted, and his cries for help dismissed by most of his viewers as either a joke, or just something they can cruelly exploit for fun. It's both cathartic and pathetic, impressively working both in a balance as we see this guy who spent most of his onscreen time being noisome reduced to a helpless whelp, more so on the movie's final act as a good twist reveals a hopeless situation hinted in a blink-and-you-miss moment in the chat. The end result is a grimly satisfying end full of desperation, axe falls and blood flowing on a live stream.

#ChadGetsTheAxe (2022) can be a little rough on the edges, but it understands the culture of online clout and the toxic people surrounding it. It uses those to its advantage, crafting a smart, funny and creepy backwoods slasher that shouldn't work, but did! Chad got the axe and I'm glad to have seen it!

Bodycount:

1 male body found rotting

1 male hacked with an axe

1 male hacked with an axe

1 male killed offscreen with an axe

1 female hacked with an axe

1 male killed offscreen with an axe

1 male hacked with an axe

Total: 7

A You'tombed Prank Video: Milk & Serial (2024)

Milk & Serial (2024)

Rating: ***

Starring: Curry Barker, Cooper Tomlinson, Adlih Alvarado

It all started as a Youtube video for a channel called "Prank Bros", wherein social media personality Seven plans to pull a birthday prank on his roommate, bestfriend and creative partner, Milk. After acquiring a gun from a shady arms dealer and getting an acting class friend to agree playing the part of a terrorizing crazed gunman, Seven's gag goes swimmingly well with Milk laughing it all off once he gets past the initial shock, even admiring the elaborate planning that went into making it.

Funs and games continue for the party until an odd fella who claims to be Seven and Milk's neighbor arrives to complain about the noise. Creepily. Milk, thinking the guy is a part of an ongoing prank by Seven, antagonizes him, resulting to stranger things happening in the following days after the party. Things involving deadly secrets, manipulations and harrowing deaths.

Written, directed and starring actual Youtuber Curry Barker, despite being advertised as a slasher, Milk & Serial (2024) has more common grounds with a serial killer thriller, one that's done as a twisty, hour-long $800 found footage free to watch on Youtube. It may not sound much, but the film does surprisingly succeed in places one wouldn't expect from a micro-production like this, mainly the acting and the grounded tone its working with. The mystery as to what's going on after the surprise birthday prank could've been a lot better if some of its twists weren't so obvious (the movie is called Milk & Serial and its poster features a creepy blonde man in a transparent mask. Guess who's nicknamed "Milk" and also happens to be blonde?), but the sinister downward spiral to escalating horrors still makes this little passion project a captivating watch for how fluid the direction can get, plus Curry Barker and Cooper Tomlinson play their roles of Milk and Seven respectively with such an impressive range, it's hard not to feel a bit invested to where the plot is leading to. (Overlooking the odd nicknames, of course)

Seeing there's more emphasis here on a nightmare situation brewing than the hands-on handiwork of a masked killer, Milk & Serial (2024) is a little low on the creative kill count and splatter. The most brutal this film got is a savage neck stabbing, but apart from that, it's mostly gun kills and one beating that's mostly offscreen. This is likely not going to serve well passionate gorehounds expecting the typical bodycounting affairs, but if you're in it for unsettling creepiness and distress, then this may not be that big of a set back. 

Though far from reinventing anything, Milk & Serial (2024) shows quality you don't typically find in a lot of do-it-yourself horror titles and that's a respectable feat. Nothing too fancy, but a slight step above low-budget shlock, it's a creeper of a movie that's good enough to try!

Bodycount:

1 male shot

1 female brained with a brick, beaten to death

1 male knifed in the neck

1 male shot

1 male shot

Total: 5

Astral Pain: Host (2020)

Host (United Kingdom, 2020)
Rating: ***1/2
Starring: Haley Bishop, Jemma Moore, Emma Louise Webb

During 2020's COVID-19 pandemic, six friends choose to spend some time under quarantine performing a seance over Zoom,  a cloud-based video conference service. With the help of a medium they invited, it's all fun and games until one of them went a tad too far poking fun at the session, somewhat angering an otherworldly force that wouldn't hesitate to haunt and hunt them all down.

Running only under an hour long, Host is a relatively modest techno-horror feature from director Rob Savage, basically a haunt movie with a bodycount and a "Screenlife" format similar to the likes of the Unfriended series, wherein we watch the entire spooks and carnage through a single computer or phone monitor. Story-wise, the film isn't doing anything far different from the classic supernatural horror plot, with the group dabbling into the unknown with little regards to the possible dangers they're putting themselves in, until that is people starts dying and they're desperately struggling to stay alive. 

It's scene after scene of horror trappings, particularly of the paranormal found footage variant with its share of eerie focus on darkened rooms, things moving on their own in the background and the generous helping of jump scares. Of course, this style and direction wouldn't work for everyone; some might find the movie's video conference-style pretty restricting or that the gimmick is nothing more than an evolved take on the found footage style, not really offering new aside from a more digital perspective. Others might see its quick pacing has a tendency to go over decent character or warranted plot development, but I personally don't mind any lack of depth in a movie's writing and/or scripting so long as it entertains. And Host entertains. 

With a group of decent actors doing a splendid job immersing themselves in the movie's horror and a talented director crafting the scares wonderfully with good timing and setup, Host boasts some genuinely impressive set-pieces from both its fright and murder sequences, some getting quite brutal and intense even without spilling a shocking amount of blood. (Though one did get awfully bloody. Like really bloody) Its cool practical stunt work and the creepy make-up and visual effects used for the villainous spirit and their rampage also further heighten the chill factor of these scenes and the fact that all of this was shot through and presented as a Zoom meeting calls for some ingenuity, at least in an effort to make this film a tad more memorable, relatable and fun as a quickie horror flick that plays around the creepy voyeuristic factor of the horror "Screenlife" approach. 

Best watched with a pair of headphones on and with the lights off, Host has the right amount of unnerving content and engaging character to make it slightly more than just another footage horror flick. As cheap and easy as it can be at times, it has its occasions that guarantee goosebumps and a good watch.  

Bodycount:
1 male dropped dead from a ceiling
1 female killed, method unknown
1 female beaten to death against desktop
1 female had her neck snapped
1 male set on fire
1 female tossed from a window, crashes into a table
2 females attacked, presumably killed

Total: 8

How To Erase People From The Face of The Earth: Vlog (2008)

Vlog (2008)

Rating: ***

Starring: Brooke Marks, Denyce Lawton, Skyler Caleb 

Vlogger Brooke Marks (played by, huh, Brooke Marks?) mostly enjoys two things in life: sharing her insipid lifestyle to the rest of the internet world for their enjoyment, and a love life in which she can find the right one through a succession of boyfriends ala trial-and-error social experiments. She made mistakes, mainly dating a guy with an annoying quirk or two, but it's mostly problems young adults like herself can handle on their own.

That is until Brooke starts receiving videos from an anonymous website, showcasing mysterious recordings of her friends and exes being brutally murdered by someone obscured. Rightfully disturbed, she goes to the cops fearing for her life, but would their involvement be enough to protect her from being the next victim of this random psychopath?

I stumbled upon this movie not really knowing what I'm getting myself into apart that this might be another one of those "Reality TV"- style slasher flicks like WatchUsDie.com (2001) or Girl House (2014). In a way, I wasn't far off, but unlike those movies, Vlog (2008) focuses on the exploits of a single girl rather than a group and it's mostly done with a mockumentary vlogger direction so it has a lot of distinctive styles going for its many scenes, mimicking the flashy and gimmicky editing of an everyday video blog. That said, it can get a tad dialogue-driven as the first half of the film have Brooke sharing to us her thoughts concerning the men she dates, as well as what she expects the world wanted to see more from her content as a mean to establish our lead's personality, albeit in a very testy way. 

Fortunately, Vlog (2008)'s recognizably short with only an hour and something minutes of running time if we're not to including the ending credits, hasten by a steady and speedy pacing that soon transitions to the shockingly brutal murders that really came out of left field. This last half is strongly the better part of the movie as the effects team really went all out on putting the grue on gruesome, highlights including a slow decapitation and a rather comical-looking explosive-laced bong. The ending is a little hobbled by its twist reveal, though. Something that could actually work better if they didn't dwell on it too much and kept it simple and quick. 

Not too shabby for a horror quickie, Vlog (2008) is an easy viewing sided with a good concept, sleek visuals and juicy gore. It may not make itself to be that great of a title (Like, really. It's another slasher about snuff films and/or internet red rooms. It's not like My Little Eye (2001) hadn't done that already), but it is good. And sometimes good is all you could ask for from a horror movie!

Bodycount:

1 male slowly decapitated with a cleaver, dismembered

1 male electrocuted in a bathtub with a rigged lamp

1 female decimated with explosive chemical powder

1 female knifed on the gut

Total: 4

Through The Eyes of Moros: The Burningmoore Deaths (2010)

The Burningmoore Deaths (2010) (AKA "The Burningmoore Incident", "Reality Kills")

Rating: ***

Starring: Tim Gallin, Joe Pallister, Tony Guida

Presented as a true crime mockumentary, The Burningmoore Deaths (2010) centers on an elusive killer named James Parrish who, three days before Christmas in 2005, murdered his entire family in cold blood before disappearing into the night, never to be seen from that day forth. With no clear motive to go by, authorities are left baffled by the sudden psychosis that befell on James and they can only suspect the possibilities behind the killings. 

Moving forward a couple of years, the film crew of an upcoming reality TV show Gettin' Hammered set their eyes on renovating an old waterfront New York home into a fancy Bed & Breakfast. After preparing the house and setting up cameras all over to document their misadventures, the crew and their hired contractors head forth to give the house a proper makeover for the show's pilot (given they're not busy smoking weed or ruining shots by playing rock music at the background), unaware that a certain Mr. Parish has been squatting in the basement all this time and is now prowling around the premises since they stepped foot, waiting for the right moment to strike.

The movie's formatting, despite being anything but new or original in this day and age, is probably most the notable aspect as its gimmicky style of hybriding recovered footage and cold case TV programming elements still holds a bit of hammy charm to it for how much work done to get that authentic feel, or how stylized yet bloody the killcount will get, regardless whether the direction goes with it or not.

For the first twenty or so minutes, Burningmoore Deaths (2010) fills us in with a retrospective of Parish's crime, fitting the mockumentary bill well enough for the detailed crime data and realistic interviews played in, thus giving us that nostalgic cold case docu-drama feel ala Unsolved Mysteries while introducing to us the basics of our villain. Once we get to the reality show footage, though, this is when the film curveballs away the documentary approach and more or less drop off any attempt to work any realism, simply diving ahead as a bonafide slasher.

Seeing the rest of the film is shot as a lost document of an supposedly unaired pilot, this meant that the remaining run is light on plot and lacking of solid characters to focus on since a good bulk of the action focuses on the sometimes-funny-sometimes-not exploits of the crew, as well as their eventual deaths. Writing around this part is a lot to be desired (How long does it take to notice three of your crew is missing for the next hour or so?), so those looking for anything deeper of a story than random people getting mass slaughtered by a maniac may not enjoy what they'll be sitting through. (Or at least not as much as the next guy)

For the kills, the factor that static cameras were placed in every room meant that the murders do get to be witnessed, but likely due to budget constraints and/or visionary flair, most are either obscured in shadows or happen just about off screen so while bloody, it's far from excessive and just about right on the blood quota. The editing and soundtrack done for these murders are a fair work, too, with composed pieces that have its creepy moments and some editing elevating the simpler murders into something more unconventional, at times borderline cheesy in a passable way.

Its absence of a deeper plot or shortage of blood-wet body bags may put off a few, but for fans of reality documentary filming and open slasher junkies, The Burningmoore Deaths (2010) packs enough craziness and bloodshed to be quite an interesting watch, albeit not looking much. A certified rent, or a guilty pleasure keep!

Bodycount:

1 female had her throat cut with a knife

1 male stabbed with a knife

1 female and 2 boys found slaughtered

1 male found hanged

1 female strangled to death with a power cord

1 male brained to death with a wrench

1 male pushed to a fuse box, electrocuted

1 male hacked to death with an axe

1 female knifed to death

1 female strangled

1 male bled out from a knife cut on the neck

1 male eviscerated with a circular saw

1 male attacked, killed offscreen

1 male thrown through a window, falls to his death

1 male found injured from crash, implied dead later 

1 male found murdered

Total: 18

Glitchy Bloody Poltergeist Footage: Paranormal Demons (2018)

Paranormal Demons (Germany, 2018)
Rating: **1/2
Starring: Sascha von Hinrichs, David Brückner, Ildiko Preszly

Paranormal Demon's quote-unquote tagline basically sums up what to expect from the movie; it's a found footage supernatural horror ala the Paranormal Activity franchise, with a climax introducing a masked killer wielding a halberd to do murder like them Friday The 13th movies. Nothing beats a straightforward marketing I guess, especially since there's really nothing else going on for the movie save for that plot.

In that sense, the story is mostly predictable in its flow, starting with a pair of college kids filming a documentary project about disproving the supernatural and the main focus for their claim of falsehood is a particular footage of a supposed demon attack they found lurking around the web. Seeing the location of the attack happens to be just a car ride away, the duo recruit some help (Or as I like to call them, bodycount fodder!) and plan on driving there so they can investigate and prove that the footage was faked. But not before stopping by your usual doomsayer (or two) who warns them not to go to where the "Devil" lives. Can you guess if they listened?

A sizable chunk of this first act is where the supernatural aspect of the film makes its rounds with varying levels of subtlety, yet still trapping itself with as many paranormal cliches you probably have come across other titles dealing with hauntings, like seances, poltergeist activity and, seeing this is a found footage film, glitchy camera distortions. Noticeably, however, this is all what Paranormal Demons has to offer in regards of "spooky ghostly visuals", just repetitive flickering effects edited to suggest the otherworldly and gimmicky camera work that is an insult to the word inept, so it isn't hard to feel very little investment to the supernatural threat or the scares it is suggesting.

This, in turn, makes the movie feel padded out, more over considering in between these uninteresting scares are cringe-worthy scripting and bland characters that failed to grasp some suggested opportunities the story could have used for conflict, making itself at least a worthwhile watch. But, instead, the intention appears to be cheesing up these characters to near laughable exaggeration before ending them in gruesome ways, thus the slasher element of the last act surprisingly felt natural in its stride. A confused, yet satisfying turn that is overall welcomed.

Now, this isn't to say that the slasher elements were handled the best here in Paranormal Demons. In fact, the killer's design is average and the killcount is hardly that high nor is it creative (plus there is the nagging matter that this is footage captured by a guy who wont stop filming, even if the people in front of him were getting their heads torn off!) but I would say that it is, at least, watchable for how gory it can be and how well some of the found footage elements were used to make the kills and stalk-and-hack sequences that more entertaining. The finale it all leads to, sadly, lacks any real punch to it, but for what it's worth, the whole thing could have ended worse.

Honestly, I can't entirely put down this film as a waste of time since I did enjoy the cheesier side of its direction and, again, the bodycount heavy last act catered well enough to my inner gorehound. So, I guess what I'm saying is that this isn't for everyone, but those in the mood for a guilty pleasure, Paranormal Demons (2018) is a good candidate for a rent and a watch.

Bodycount:
1 male had his throat cut
1 male killed, method unknown
1 male hit by an incoming car
1 male had his head torn off
1 female gutted with a sickle
1 male hoisted from the neck, disemboweled
1 male stabbed with a halberd
1 male slashed with a halberd
1 female dragged away, presumably killed
Total:  9

Kill Or Be Killed For Our Entertainment?: Keep Watching (2017)

Keep Watching (2017)
Rating: *1/2
Starring: Bella Thorne, Chandler Riggs, Ioan Gruffudd

So this is technically Unfriended (2014) if it was a home invasion slasher movie and minus the supernatural hoo-ha and dark satire on cyberbullying. I fail to see the part where I should be ecstatic.

A string of gruesome home invasion murders is getting streamed to the unknowing public by a masked group of maniacs, randomly targeting families apparently via social media.

For this run, their new target is Jamie Mitchell, a moody teenager returning home from a 10-day vacation with her family, consisting of her father Adam, her young stepmom Olivia and her younger brother DJ. Unbeknownst to them, their entire house was scouted, rigged, and left with other unpleasant surprises, for what will be a full night of unexpected terror as the masked killers make their way in, to stalk them inside their own home and stream their struggles to survive for the unsolicited entertainment of millions.

I can make the argument that Keep Watching (2017) has potential should it have played the right cards; the factor that the murders are being broadcasted online may not be new seeing other titles like the cyber-thriller/torture porn hybrid Untraceable (2006) already did this in a much more creative execution (and then some), but I cannot deny that there's still enough life to kick out of this old horse especially with our time's fascination for online culture. Instead, however, the movie decided to with the skeletal route, ditching the potential satire it could have dwindle on regarding modern computer ethics and violence in media by focusing more on the home invasion bodycounting aspect of the plot with little regards on development, coherence and character.

Normally I have no problem with plotless slashers considering I'm a fan of movies like Stagefright (1987) and Wrong Turn (2003), but with its tired pacing and lackluster motive behind the killings, Keep Watching (2017) becomes quite a chore to watch that eventually gets worse when the supposed "fight to survive" was more of watching our protagonist and her family wander around in a dark house for a lengthy (and I mean lengthy) amount of time while our villains toy with them with camera footages and odd noises before killing a few of them and then racking up the killcount through random boyfriends, last minute additions and some of the killers biting it. Add the matter that our main family is so underdeveloped that I find it hard to care about their fate, as well as the kills themselves being rarely creative, and you have this unengaging piece of retreaded horror tropes done and done over.

Exhausting, predictable and an overall disappointment, Keep Watching (2017) just fails as a genre movie in terms of scares and thrills. Ditch it like how the film ditched potential.

Bodycount:
1 female attacked, murdered offcamera
1 male strangled
1 female murdered offcamera
1 male drowned
1 male suffocated with a plastic bag
1 male had his head bagged and a water hose shoved down his throat, drowned
1 male hacked with an axe
1 female stabbed in the neck with a drumstick
1 female found murdered
Total: 9

An Evidence of A Slasher: Unlisted Owner (2013)

Unlisted Owner (2013)
Rating: **1/2
Starring:  Chris Ash, Levi Atkins, Chloe Benedict

So...cops edit crime scene footages to make horror movies? 

What we have here is yet another found footage slasher flick, one of many that's been popping in and out through out the years, most of which remaining unnoticed and Unlisted Owner (2013) kinda fares no better. Not with its micro-budget and faux document format that's overly familiar by now. Still, does it deserves to be left in the dust? Or does it, perhaps, earn more of our viewing for how on the nose it is on following the slasher format?

Unlisted Owner (2013) opens with a clunky yet light home video of a family moving in to their new house before the footage takes a grimly dark turn as we suddenly scratch-cut to one of the household’s daughters sobbing, claiming that an intruder is in their house. Next thing we know, we get a shot of the father dead in a basement and the entire family of five turns up murdered just hours after settling in.

From here, we then follow another set of footages shot by a group of friends who live in the same town as the murdered family. The gang was originally planning on spending the night camping and getting shit-faced in the woods, but with the murdered family's house being just a few miles away, the temptation to break in and document the crime scene of the now dubbed "Owner Killings" is just too much to ignore. Unfortunately for them, who or whatever is responsible for the slayings is still in the house and has now set their eyes on ending them, one hapless victim at a time.

As a slasher and found footage hybrid, Unlisted Owner (2013) does the remarkable job of bringing the best of both sub-genres, boasting a hefty kill count while using the stylized psuedo-documentary camera work to boost the creep factor of the murders, which certainly helps the matter that the kills are mostly offcamera, giving them that near-authenticity. The backstory behind these killings is also delivered interestingly as a brief interrogation of a side character edited randomly towards the mid-beginnings of the movie, a spin on your obligatory campfire tale told to give us a bit of an idea on who or what will be killing our victims, as well as to why? (And, I guess, this can also be considered as this movie's doomsayer character as the interrogated will never make another appearance through out the rest of the film...)

The only downside of this is that all it'll take about 40-some minutes for the movie to get on these gritty bits after the eerie opening murders, which means we have to deal with a group of obnoxious “friends” whose main traits seem to be to argue and shout at each other over trivial things. In a way, it does make them more organic than your dead teenager movie stereotypes, but the lack of likability from these characters and the matter that they're hardly developed at all warrant very little reason to invest in them, making their demise anticipated and appreciated but tedious for lacking depth or care.

Still, I find the effort put into Unlisted Owner (2013) deserving of some attention, especially if the final product halfway works as a slasher hybrid. If only the middle run wasn't so rude and prude all the way, or perhaps splatter a bit more of the red stuff here and there to make up for putting us through the torture of observing drunken teenagers being themselves, I would have liked this film more but for what it is, I say it could be worth a rental's night or two.

Bodycount:
1 female killed, method unknown
1 male killed, seen with a large gash
1 boy and 2 females mentioned murdered
1 male slaughtered offcamera, blood seen
1 male murdered offcamera
1 male killed with a sickle
1 female found slaughtered
1 male hacked with a sickle
1 female killed offcamera
1 male killed offcamera with a sickle
1 male attacked, presumably killed
Total: 13

HAPPY 2018 HALLOWEEN! (AKA What Am I Watching this year?)

Welp, it's October 31st here in the Philippines! That means-

Absolutely nothing unless you're age 10 and below. In case you are, then it means candy and a week off school. But for me-

IT'S HALLOWEEN!

And as someone who's practically an adult living in a country that doesn't recognize Halloween as a holiday, I mostly celebrate this by runecasting at a nearby church watching spooky movies from years old and new! So today, I decided to share with you my picks for my annual Halloween viewing! From a children's flick about evil witches to a hospital raided by eldritch entities, let's begin my picks with:

Gon-ji-am (2018) (AKA "Gonjiam: Haunted Asylum") - A very recent horror movie from South Korea following a group of Youtubers livestreaming a documentary style urban exploration of the titular asylum. Shot in a Found Footage format, the film isn't shy on tackling classic tropes and trappings of both Asian ghost flicks and mockumentary films, but what makes this film stand out is that the premise itself help elevate the sense of dread and nightmarish imagery that eventually starts haunting our crew, which includes effective jumpscares and loads of creepy imagery.

The Witches (1990) - Based on a children's book by Roald Dahl, this 90s fantasy horror "family" picture tells the story of a young boy named Luke who, after being orphaned, finds himself under the loving arms of his grandmother who appears to know a lot about what true witches are like. This odd knowledge soon comes in handy when the hotel they are staying at for a vacation turns out to be the meeting place of all the witches in England. It's now up to our two unlikely heroes to stop these hags from executing their plans on murdering hundreds of children with candy, so long as they don't become victims of these witches' wicked spells and potions themselves.

A little dated on some department, but nevertheless enjoyable on a darkly humorous way, The Witches is a fun little devious addition to this year's fright and gore heavy viewing. But I like to balance out the horror and fun in my movie lists and this one titles is fun enough for the dark holiday!

The Blob (1988) - I could have gone with the classic 1958 version with its funky opening music and cheese, but the matter of the fact is that the monster there is hardly threatening. Memorable, yeah, but its fear factor dwindled down when you realize how slow that blob is and you can simply just walk five feet away from it and blast it frozen with a fire extinguisher with some ease. The 1988 version, however, is a predatory monster with a limitless hunger that not only can squeeze into places to reach you, but squeeze, crush, bend and/or obliterate you so you're that much easier for it to eat, all in glorious glorious old fashioned practical effects!

The movie is your classic midnight monster genre with a comet containing the titular creature crash landing on a nearby town, releasing it with nothing in its nature but to eat, absorb and grow. In typical 80s monster movie fashion, it's up to a pair of teens who encountered and survived an attack from the blob to warn the townfolk of the danger, given they're not too late.

The Void (2016) - A modern day cult classic follows a strange night in a hospital where a cop, the hospital's staffs and patients are held inside the building by a cloaked cult-like figures. Little do these trapped individuals know is that there's something sinister happening within the hospital as patients start to go deformed and murderous, leading to horrific monster attacks and what could be an Apocalyptic end to all.

Kinda underrated but well worth the look, especially if you're into raw horror aesthetics like amazing practical and make-up effects, gory kills and Lovecraftian themes. It's basically a horrorhound's wet dream, given that you don't mind the attempted cerebral horror that appears to coat the story.

Trick 'R Treat (2007) - This is basically the horror movie to rival John Carpenter's Halloween as a holiday classic. Trick 'R Treat follows five gruesome tales within a small Ohio town during their annual Halloween celebration night as child murderer tries his hardest to cover his track, a girl in a Red Riding Hood costume gets stalked by a masked man, a group of kids visits a supposedly haunted quarry, a bitter young wife gets a painful lesson for breaking a Halloween rule and an old man is visited by who could be the spirit of Halloween itself.

Chock full of monsters, ghouls, scares and lots of nasty treats, done in a lush production value and colorful band of characters, Trick 'R Treat is one horror movie that understood the dark nature of Halloween and twisted it enough to give us this energetic, eerie and often darkly funny anthology movie.

WNUF Halloween Special (2013) - A definitive midnight movie, this is a cult classic that takes the mockumentary sub-genre into the limelight as it features what look like a news program special focusing on Halloween and a planned event by the station wherein one of their reporter follows a priest and a pair of occult experts inside a supposedly haunted building. What follows is a lot of tracking, vintage commercials, and a slow yet satisfying build to a messed up ending that's definitely shocking.

If you hadn't seen this one, then I really recommend hunting this film down especially if you love a good old-fashioned scare and a bit nostalgic just like me. I cannot stress enough how one should see this from beginning to end coz the pay off really sticks as one of the chilling final scenes in a horror flick that starts out like a joke.

~~~

And there you have my list of watchables this year! Really wish I could do more for Halloween this year but it falls on a workday and with the recent storm brewing, I guess being cozy at home while it rains outside doesn't sound too bad!

 What else can I say but have a Happy Halloween and watch out for monsters!

Something Something Something Jump Scare: #SCREAMERS (2016)

#SCREAMERS (2016)

Rating: **

Starring:  Tom Malloy, Chris Bannow, Griffin Matthews

Let me get this out: I have a love-hate relationship with jump scare tactics. 

If done right, the gimmick can be a fun way to get my heart pumping and send me into giggle land, but overuse and/or badly timed jumpers can get really annoying and lower the standards of whatever horror-themed genre using it. For a while, #Screamers seems to understand this but all good things can't last...

Shot in a mockumentary/found footage fashion, the movie centers on the entrepreneurs and staff behind an internet media company called Gigaler.com as they try to contact an anonymous poster who shared a popular viral "screamer video" at their site in order to strike a deal with them. The problem with this, however, is that the poster appears to be connected to a girl who have been missing for two years, prompting our main crew to track them down and investigate in hopes of making a name for their site. That is, of course, if they all will make it out alive...

With a running time of approximately 80 minutes, #Screamers mostly filled this space with a tech-oriented mystery surrounding the strange nature of an equally strange viral video, as well as lengthy expositions about why Gigaler is so innovative and daring for a website company and the drama that goes behind the computer screen which I guess was supposed to build character. It's a move that I can learn to like or at least be patient with given that the payoff at the end will be worth the trouble and the walk down to said payoff is interesting to say the least. I admit in this case that the early banters between the staffs and their bosses were some of the funnest aspects of the movie and the titular screamer videos were decently fun for a quick jump scare. Still, one can only go so long without seeing good horror in a horror film and this is where #Screamers failed.

After so much drama and intrigue shoved down our throats for the first quarter or so, you expect #Screamer will finally pick itself up and lead us down the path of workable thrills and bloody spills like any good slow burn horror movie. And, to be fair, it did exactly that at the last 20 minutes or less, but the problem here is that the plot still tries to tediously build some more tension and possible red herrings within this short span. Whether this is to unnecessarily fatten up an already cluttered story or not, all I know is that it turned the movie's slowburn direction from engrossing to downright annoying, further shooting itself in the foot when the resulting horror scenes end up feeling rushed, dull and kinda annoying.

That creepy grinning figure that is this movie's villain? Barely lives up to its unnerving look; apart from possibly being named "Francis" (Not that it's a terrible name. Just a terrible name for a villain, even after that little red herring they threw in about Francis Tumblethy, a Jack The Ripper suspect. Now I know why a certain Deadpool (2016) bad guy preferred to be called "Ajax"...), the killer "murders" his victims strangely and annoyingly by simply lunging/charging at them, shrieking his "screamer video" scream and "offscreening" them into nothingness one by one. It does this for the last few minutes of the film, jump scaring almost everyone to an off-camera death before giving us one last heartstopper that we more or less saw coming. Let how lazy that finale sounds sink in for a moment...

I was really hoping this movie would do okay just for the premise itself, but apart from an kinda inspired backdrop behind the found footage horror format and hints that "Francis" is supernatural, #Screamers misses its goal as an entertainment piece was too far out of line thanks to its desperate attempt to do something different. I admire the effort, but if the motive behind said effort was either lost or barely reached, what exactly was the point of all of this? I suggest skipping this unless you really wanna subject yourself to a mystery with a lackluster outcome.

Bodycount:
1 male jump scared, killed offcamera
1 male jump scared, killed offcamera
1 male killed offscreen
1 female jump scared, killed offcamera
Total: 4

A Slow Night for Bodycounting: Munger Road (2011)

Munger Road (2011) (AKA The Wrong Road)
Rating: **
Starring: Bruce Davison, Randall Batinkoff, Trevor Morgan

Back at my late high school years, my mum watched Fingerprints (2006), a movie about a mystery tied to an urban legend where ghost kids push cars to safety should the vehicle stall in the middle of some train tracks, leaving little creepy fingerprints behind as proof they were there. (Hence, Fingerprints) Knowing I'm a big horror junkie, she heartily recommended it to me, but me being more in touched with my nerdy side (and zombie flicks) at the time, I didn't think care about seeing a ghost movie as those are rarely scary and/or entertaining for me. (And they still rarely do) Out of respect, though, I told her I will try it and simply left the copy sit in my room to collect dusts until we sold it during one of our yearly garage sales.

Moving forward to the years I was re-discovering slasher flicks, I found out Fingerprints (2006) was actually one-part slasher and I figuratively started kicking myself in the balls for missing out on it as, based on some reviews, it's supposedly good. I eventually got to see Fingerprints (2006) no soon after and, like what the reviews said, it is quite fun! And I am sharing you this story because not only does Munger Road (2011) tackle the same urban legend, but I actually saw it at my rentals multiple times and dismissed it coz, well, I thought it was a ghost movie when, in actuality, it's one big piece of slasher. If there's a hate crime involving certain horror sub-genres, then I'm guilty of it more than once apparently.

(To be fair, it's not like I would have missed anything fun, though...)

In this film, four teenagers drive up to the titular road hoping to test out their local urban legend of helpful ghost tykes, while a duo of cops check their sleepy little town for an escaped killer priest who have done away six children some time ago. The further the night evening goes, the more the two plots slowly (and I mean slowly) coincide as the killer the cops are after may have found their way to the teens, now stranded and being picked off one by one.

From where I stand, Munger Road (2011) can't seem to make up its mind with what it wanted to be as it tackles the supernatural, cop thriller, teen slasher and even a bit of found footage all in one roll. It's done in a slow burning direction that's supposed to create tension and atmosphere, but more likely have caused more tired groans and bored shrugs. It started out okay with the characters going on and about with their plans that night, to be disrupted by something unexpected like being stuck in the woods or the sudden escape of a notorious child killer, but you can only go so far with sticking to these scenarios and not do anything save for bookmarking each events with something stupid or repetitive, like the slasher cliché of dumb decision making (Even though one of them teens repeatedly suggests the smart move of sticking together!) and false scares.

And yet, this is exactly what this movie did; kids get too antsy being in the woods alone so one of them gets out to look for help while the others wait, only for another one of them to get antsy and going out on their own looking for help as well? Wash. Rinse. Repeat. Cops bust in a possible hideout to find something or someone else that isn't our killer, only to learn another possible place for them to start checking? Wash. Rinse. Repeat. It's not until the last act that the film finally got to go somewhere, but even by then, Munger Road (2011) fails to deliver anything spectacular with its dry-as-desert offcamera kills and an anti-climactic open ending that I'm sure is as good to happen as that promised Scalps (1983) sequel, Scalps II: The Return of DJ (spoiler alert, it never did!), a damn shame considering how much I wanted this movie to work.

Personally, I like Munger Road (2011)'s concept of steadily merging two seemingly unrelated plots into a bonafide slasher finale. The relatively small teen casts actually looked and sounded decent until the script has their characters turn into dumb and distressed victims the moment they got stuck, but I always loved the chief-deputy duo here played by Bruce Davison and Randall Batinkoff respectively, with their father-and-son type partnership that made their side of the movie more fun to watch and easier to root for. Heck, I would even say that the snail-pace wait was worth it if this film ended up with a proper massacre, but its small budget may have prevented any of that from happening and the producer's plan to do a bigger film may have cost this movie a real ending. (From what I read, the sequel was written first but due to budget restraints, producer Kyle Heller decided to do a smaller movie as their debut before working their way to the sequel. Munger Road (2011) was said smaller movie.)

While I don't dislike Munger Road (2011) for its good bits, its flaws are overwhelming and murk whatever positives this movie can offer. That said, can't really recommend it, but if you want to see it? Go for it, baby. It's your time you'll be wasting next...

Bodycount:
1 female attacked, presumably killed
1 male killed offcamera, method unknown
1 skeleton found
1 male bludgeoned to death with a wrench offcamera
1 male mentioned hit by a truck
Total: 5