Scary Stories (from a Dark Allie)

Okay, so I looked back at my rating for the original movie and now I feel like my rating system means nothing. “Pleasantly surprised at how much I enjoyed it” with an “interesting” story and “believable” acting gets only three stars? LIN SHAYE only gets three stars? I thought I was MORE generous back in 2016 but it seems like I’ve just always been inconsistent.

So, as you’ll learn later this week, I’m going to be watching a LOT of Friday the 13th movies. A LOT. And this movie really feels like it’s trying to be an entry into that franchise, only with Johnny instead of Jason.

This wasn’t terrible, but it wasn’t impressive. I don’t think it’s a story that needed to be told (again). But in the midst of all of these horror remakes and reboots, I can see why someone thought it was necessary.

Okay, this is another older scary movie that I can definitely understand gaining a cult following. I’m not quite sure I can fully count myself among them, but I get it.

Okay, have I mentioned Garth Marenghi’s Darkplace here yet? It’s an amazing British TV show with only 6 existing episodes, and if you haven’t yet seen it, you absolutely must as soon as possible. I love it so much. I think that show, along with a fundamental agreement of “no babies” is what solidifed the beginning of my relationship with my husband.

I guess it’s a little bit ironic, then, that I’m watching a movie with (and BY!) Alice Lowe, who played Madeleine Wool/Dr. Liz Asher, about a murderous pregnant woman? Well, whether it’s ironic or not, I wanted to like this one much more than I did.

I think how I feel about this movie might actually be a reversal from how I’ve felt about many other movies this month. That is to say, I remember NOT being impressed with this one the first time I watched it, and I have a new appreciation for it this time around.

Today is my dad’s birthday, so I’m watching this…in his honor? That’s maybe a little weird, I know. But I do love Elijah Wood (even more so since he showed up for season 2 of Yellowjackets!) and Stephen McHattie, so this movie already had that going for it.

Okay, I’m not at all sure why I put this on my calendar. It’s a two and a half hour film by Lars Von Trier, who also made Melancholia, the worst movie I have ever seen (which is saying something, especially for a film with Kirsten Dunst AND Kiefer Sutherland).

This might be my absolute favorite Alex Garland work. He wrote it, and Danny Boyle (28 Days Later) directed it, and it’s very good.

Sometimes I worry that I’m too Americanized and I only like heavy Hollywood horror…but then I watch things like this that have at least a little more subtlety, feel a little more “indie” (or at least, not full-on Hollywood), and I remember what I like about them.

This is a fairly standard slasher film of the 1980s. The story isn’t very original (group of folks around a campfire discussing an urban legend no one believes in), the acting isn’t great, and the “madman” isn’t super terrifying.

So, I’ve had some trouble with horror-comedy films this year. Several of them haven’t been great on either the horror OR the comedy side, and they’ve been kind of a slog to get through. I’m happy that this month seems to have redeemed the horror-comedy genre a bit for me.

I had a lot of fun with this one! I didn’t know much about it going in, which I think helped, as I didn’t really have any hopes or expectations. And it was a lot of fun!