Scary Stories (from a Dark Allie)

I wasn’t expecting too much out of this one so it was a pleasant surprise to find that I rather liked it. Sure, it could just be the British accents. I do love a British accent.

But really, this was a horror comedy that did pretty well on both fronts. After a few bad attempts at this genre I’m happy to have found a new one to recommend.

The music is a bit much at times and there are definitely parts that drag on, but for the most part this is a cute, clever little black comedy that I really enjoyed.

Having seen all of Degrassi: The Next Generation, I had a pretty good idea of what Kevin Smith thinks about Canada going into this. And yep, that’s essentially what this movie is about: what Kevin Smith thinks about Canada.

Sadly this was another mediocre film. At best.

But it did have Kevin Pollack and Katheryn Winnick so it had that going for it?

The music is overbearing, the pacing excruciatingly slow, and the story altogether a bit boring.

I’d skip this one unless you can’t avoid it. It’s good background noise. At best.

Unsurprisingly, this movie didn’t really add anything to the franchise so (again unsurprisingly) I don’t have much to add about it. It felt like the most unnecessarily gruesome and graphic of the lot so far, though.

On the plus side, there’s only one left! They say all good things must come to an end…hopefully all not-so-good things must come to an end as well.

(Okay, spoilers ahead) Seriously, though, just when I thought that jackass was going to get what was coming to him, it looks like he’ll be back for next week’s finale. Sigh.

This movie is sitting precariously just at the edge of being a good movie but I don’t think it quite makes it. It’s well acted and the camerawork is great but the story doesn’t have enough substance to hook its audience.

I liked the characters from the start – the main group are all sympathetic relatable characters for the most part (at least as far as the audience knows at first) and the dialogue flows nicely. The group chemistry seemed complicated but realistic so my favorite scenes were the ones where Jay and Gal or Jay and Shel were just having a normal conversation.

Overall, I like this one. It’s not too graphic (though I’d hesitate to recommend it if you’re squeamish around bugs) and it’s well acted with an interesting story. Not the most original of stories, but an interesting one nonetheless.

Jodelle Ferland plays the creepy little girl just so damn well. But let’s be honest – if you name your daughter Lilith, you’re kind of asking for evil demon trouble, aren’t you? I can never tell if I like Renée Zellweger or not and this one definitely didn’t make the decision for me. She was okay, but I just wasn’t feeling it – I have to assume it’s partly because her character is kind of an idiot in this.

This is another movie I liked more than I really feel I should. It definitely didn’t earn it.

Seriously though, where has this movie been hiding from me? No wait, don’t answer that, I already know – 1995. This movie is all ’90s, through and through.

The first clue? Scott Bakula is first billed in the cast. Don’t get me wrong, I like Scott Bakula, I just…haven’t seen him as a leading man since the ’90s.

I like this one, but I don’t really have a good reason to. The story is interesting (if a bit convoluted and contrived) but that’s about all this really has going for it.

The pacing is all over the place – at times things feel busy and hectic and the action happens at a mile a minute, while at others the film seems to drag on endlessly while the characters prattle on about one thing or another.

It’s almost like I can’t get enough of Joel Schumacher or something!

Sadly I don’t have too much to say about this one. It had an okay concept but the cast was weird and the group chemistry was off.

On the other hand, I really liked the soundtrack. And Lynn Collins as a (suicide) blonde.

Yes, this is kind of a weird movie. But it’s a Sam Raimi movie, so kind of weird is to be expected. I’d be worried if it weren’t kind of weird, in fact.

And I like it. It’s not the scariest movie I’ve seen, but it does have its moments. I mean, Justin Long as a professor? Terrifying!

But all joking aside, there’s a lot of joking in this movie. It’s silly and irreverent and overall is just good entertaining fun.

Sadly, this was another uninspired entry in this franchise that certainly hasn’t inspired me to write anything.

Oh, but it did have Julie Benz, so there’s that.

This was a silly movie. And not the good kind of silly.

Which isn’t to say it was all bad – it did have its cute moments and some of the jokes were okay.

Mostly, though, it seemed like a bunch of racist (or racist-adjacent? they were at least questionable) jokes and a mediocre cast.

I actually thought it was reasonably interesting until it was three-quarters of the way finished and nothing remotely scary had happened.

On the surface this has all the makings of a good movie. It’s a Joel Schumacher horror film starring Michael Fassbender (with Henry Cavill and Dominic Purcell thrown in as well).

Sadly it just didn’t grab me the way Schumacher’s other films have. It was about halfway in before I felt it even got interesting.

It definitely wasn’t Michael Fassbender’s fault, though. That man can be seriously creepy when he wants to be, and he definitely wanted to be in this one.