Frightday Night Film Recommendations: Deadly Transmissions.

It’s Friday…

Ahem…

I mean Frightday…

And I have some recommendations for you to enjoy this weekend…

Okay…

This Frightday’s theme is…

Deadly Transmissions.

In 1982…

I became a fan of a film that I later discovered…

Approximately half of the freakin’ free world despised…

That film was…

Halloween III: Season of the Witch…

Now don’t get me wrong…

I love the Halloween franchise…

 

But I love John Carpenter even more…

 

And ol’ J.C. had planned to do a Halloween themed film…

That would be released…

Each and every year around Halloween…

And then…

That half of the freakin’ free world that I was just talking about…

With all their bitching and complaining…

Well..

They royally fucked that shit up for everybody…

 

Anyway…

 

One of the great things about this film…

Was the use of television airwaves…

As a delivery system…

For some seriously messed up, supernaturally-charged, bad mojo…

And this makes you fear not just the film you are watching…

Late at night…

On your T.V. set…

But it also makes you fear…

The next commercial.

So, let’s take a chronological look at the scariest, most messed up, and possibly even unknown to you, Deadly Transmissions Movies…In the years following Halloween III: Season of the Witch. 

 

Videodrome (1983) – In David Cronenberg’s cult-classic…We learned about all sorts of neato, super coolie things…Like snuff films…Mind control…And the true First Purge…James Woods plays Max Renn…The head of a Toronto based UHF station (Oh…Hey…Could one of youse guys come over here and explain to the millennials what a fuckin’ UHF station is? Hey, thanks…You’re a real pal)…Anyway…He discovers both a broadcast and a conspiracy that are equal parts dark, and disturbing…And he gets himself tangled up in it in ways that will leave him forever changed…I know a lot of you horror fans already have this one under your belt…This is, after all, a classic example of Cronenberg body-horror…But for the purpose of my list…It is most definitely a classic film about deadly transmissions…And maybe…Just maybe…Is a film that is long overdue for you to pay it another visit.

 

Terror Vision (1986) – I absolutely adore this flick…That tells the story of a planet in a distant solar system that disposes of a hangry alien by converting it to pure energy…That energy travels through space and blasts into the Putterman family satelite dish…Unleashing the alien and a non-stop cavalcade of slimy, gruesome hilarity…The cast in this film kicks ass as well…As the pater familias of the Putterman family…You’ve got the man, the myth, the legend…Gerrit Graham (Chopping Mall)…His wife was played by the amazing…Mary Woronov (Eating Raoul)…You even have Diane Franklin (Better Off Dead) and Jon Gries (Real Genius) playing a couple of stereotypical 80’s teenage lovebirds…The film is a real hootenanny and I highly recommend that you head out to the backyard…And turn your satelite dish ever-so-slightly…So you can receive this deliciously deadly transmission.

 

From Beyond (1986) – In the 80’s…Stuart Gordon was the man turning us all on to H.P. Lovecraft with his fun, freaky, and fantastically fucked-up adaptations of his work…It all started a year before this film was released with Re-Animator…And this one takes the screwy-louie Lovecraftian nightmare to another level…In this one…We have a scientist who has discovered a world of bizarre creatures…Living just beyond our perceptible reality…And although Jeffrey Combs, and Barbara Crampton are back, and there is another decapitation that results in another reanimated head…I assure you…This is a very different film than Re-Animator…But it is equally fucked-up and funny…And almost as awesome…So fire up your Resonator…Kick back…And let the Lovecraftian transmissions reach out and tickle your pineal gland.

 

 

They Live (1988) – Hands down my favorite deadly transmission film…This one comes from my film God…John Motherfucking Carpenter…And stars Rowdy Roddy Piper as a drifter/construction worker/gum chewer/ass kicker who uncovers not only a deadly conspiracy of the alien invasion variety…But also their intricate system, which is already in place…One that controls, manipulates and pacifies the planet’s population using subliminal transmissions…I watch this one a couple of times a year…Because it is a steaming pile of awesomeness…Maybe it’s the score…Maybe it’s the subversive socio-political commentary…Or maybe it’s the six-or-so minutes of lip-splitting, eye-blackening, trash-can eating that happens over not wanting to wear Ray-Ban knock-offs…Whatever it is…I love it…So throw on that pair of shades…Sit back…Consume…Conform…And enjoy the deadliest transmission yet.

 

Shocker (1989) – No this is not a film that tells the origin story of the disgusting hand gesture that has gained traction among college-aged, photo-bombing sexual predators…This is a Wes Craven film that tells the story of convicted serial killer, Horace Pinker, played by The X-Files’  Mitch Pileggi…Whose deal with the devil converts him to pure electricity following his turn in the electric chair…Now critics panned this film as a rip-off of A Nightmare on Elm Street…But to me that’s about as absurd as suing John Fogerty for ripping off his own goddamn song…But anyway…This film is outlandish, and over-the-top…And I love it! There was even a cool nod to the Nightmare franchise with a cameo by Heather Langenkamp as one of Pinker’s victims…In most of the films on this list…It is all about how the deadly transmission affects the people in the film…But with this twisted little number…It is the transmission itself that’s deadly…I guess that happens when the transmission  is the malignant, and malicious electronic spirit of a serial killer.

 

Pulse (a.k.a. Kairo 2001) – In this film by Kiyoshi Kurosawa (Cure)…We see the first entry on the list that uses the internet to deliver the deadly transmission…This movie was spooky as hell, right outta the gate…And it got under my skin so deep…That I was haunted by it for a few days…I dig when a flick sticks in my craw like that…And the idea of trapped souls freeing themselves and entering our world through an ethernet cable still creeps me the fuck out…I still haven’t seen the U.S. remake…Even though it was written by Wes Craven…Because…Well…Because I’m afraid that it’s going to suck so much that it might suck some of the awesomeness from this film…Who knows…One day I might just nut up and watch it…But for now…I think it might be time to revisit this dark, and dingy world again…I am gonna join you guys, tonight…And this will be the transmission that I tune in for. 

 

The Signal (2007) – The three acts of this wild and whacked out flick are separate, yet interconnected tales about a world where those who watch a bizarre television signal…Become psychologically unstable…The three separate acts are also helmed by three separate directors…The first transmission comes from David Bruckner, who created my favorite segment from V/H/S, Amateur Night…And also recently directed the Netflix original, The Ritual…The second transmission was directed by Jacob Gentry, who brought us the dark and twisted indie time-travel flick, Synchronicity…And finally, the third segment comes from Dan Bush, who recently gave us the horrifying heist thriller, The Vault…These directors work well together…So well in fact, that the three segments flow together seamlessly to make a truly coherent tale about a truly deadly transmission.

 

Beyond The Gates (2016) – Okay this one is about two estranged brothers who have to go back to their father’s video store and clean it out years after his disappearance…Graham Skipper (Mind’s Eye, Almost Human) plays Gordon, and Chase Williamson (SiREN, John Dies at the End) plays his brother, John…While going through the contents of the store, they discover a strange VCR board game that may hold the answers to their father’s disappearance…But to find those answers…They will have to play the game…And that’s when first time director, Jackson Stewart turns the fucked-up dial all the way up to eleven…I dug the original concept…The juicy practical effects…And the performances were solid…But what really got me was the nostalgia of it all…A good portion of the film takes place among the stacks and stacks of VHS tapes in their Dad’s video store…A friggin’ VHS board game is the chosen method for the deadly transmission…Horror icon and legendary scream queen, Barbara Crampton is the creepy AF host of the game…And even though the budget was low…The quality of this deadly transmission was high. 

 

Friend Request (2016) – I really dug this film…A film that I had planned on being the celluloid equivalent of a big, steamy dump…A big part of why it wasn’t dumptastic was the stellar performance of the lead actress, Alycia Debnam-Carey (Fear the Walking Dead)…Although her character of Laura, is a popular girl…There is a kindness and a warmth about the performance…Which lends credibility to the rare occurrence of someone in high social standing going out of their way to befriend an outcast…But when the outcast commits suicide…The film goes down a dark and scary path that will make her regret her act of kindness…The film owes a small amount of debt to Kurosawa’s Pulse…But the direction they took that use of the internet as the source of the deadly transmission…That’s what made this one stand out for me…Here’s hoping that you dig it, too.

 

Mom and Dad (2017) – This was a blast to watch…Brian Taylor the man behind the high-octane action franchise, Crank…And the man who developed the dark and twisted TV series Happy!…Wrote and directed this pitch-black horror comedy starring Selma Blair as Mom…And turning out a deliciously over-the-top performance that only he could pull off…Nicolas Cage is Dad…And when the weird static starts coming through all of the TV and radio speakers…The sounds that are emitted in this deadly transmission make the listener overwhelmed with the desire to murder their own children…And what makes this one extra freakin’ creepy…Is the calm, methodical, almost matter-of-fact way that the parents behave while trying to complete their task…They are not raging out like in 28 Days or Weeks Later…They are not killing machines hell-bent on killing all children either…It’s rather personal…This deadly transmission has them focused exclusively on the eradication of their own progeny…And as messed up as it sounds for me to say it…It was a fucking blast.

Frightday Night Film Recommendations: It’s a Parasite Party…And You’re The Host With The Most.

It’s Friday…

Ahem…I mean Frightday…

And I have some recommendations for you to enjoy this weekend…

Okay…This Frightday’s theme is…

It’s a Parasite Party…And You’re The Host With The Most.

Since I watched the 1975 film Shivers…

Or as it was called when I rented it from the video store…

They Came From Within…

I learned the lesson that David Cronenberg was trying to teach us…

The human body…

With all of its amazing gifts, talents and abilities…

Has a flaw in its design…

A flaw that serves any manner of invading parasite…

You see…

For them…

The human body is a perfect host…

And whether the parasite…

Is a benign symbiotic creature…

One that is perfectly content riding shotgun…

Or a malignant alien organism…

One that insists on taking the wheel…

Either way…

Think of yourself as sort of a biological taxicab…

A genetically hospitable Uber, if you will…

Which…

I guess…

Is no big deal…

Unless of course…

 

You happen to run out of gas.

 

 

So, let’s take a chronological look at the best, most frightening, and possibly even unknown to you, Parasitic Horror Movies…In the years following Shivers (a.k.a. They Came From Within). 

 

The Stuff (1985) – I love this subversive little ditty from Larry Cohen (Q: The Winged Serpent)…It tells the story of a strange substance discovered bubbling up from the ground…This strange substance contains no calories…But is delicious and highly addictive…And it’s up to a corporate spy, an ad executive, and a precocious little boy to put a stop to the invading parasite posing as a pint of frozen yogurt…This film has delicious social commentary about the nature of the American mindless consumer…Especially the mindless consumers of the 80’s…But it also has a great cast…And some kick-ass practical effects…This genuinely fun ride…Is one of my all-time favorite 80’s horror films…It is also one that stands the test of time…And that fun ride…Man…Let me tell ya…Is one that I highly recommend you take.

 

Night of the Creeps (1986) – Before paying homage to the Universal Monsters…With his film, The Monster Squad…Fred Dekker paid homage to those alien invasion movies of the 1950’s…In this film…Which takes place 27 years after one such event…Two fraternity pledges unwittingly uncover a cryogenically frozen host to a deadly alien parasite…And their campus becomes a fertile playground for these isidious creatures…Who slither from host to host zombifying everything from jocks to dead serial killers to house pets…This is an absolute classic…There’s a pretty good chance you’ve already seen this…But if you haven’t…Or maybe just haven’t in a while…It’s time to sit back and enjoy a horror movie made for horror fans…Keep a close eye on the names that Dekker chose for every character and setting…He pays homage to a ton of horror royalty here.

 

The Hidden (1987) – In this film…It’s parasites to the left of  me…Parasites to the right…It almost feels like a formulaic cop movie at first…But as the creepy alien parasite jumps from host to host…In a gory, ghoulish fashion…This film reveals itself to be so much more…And turning out a kick-ass performance as Special Agent Lloyd Gallagher…Kyle MacLachlan shows us exactly where he honed his chops for his run as Dale Cooper in Twin Peaks a few years after this film was released…This is a killer cat and mouse story with great special effects and a cast full of great 80’s character actors…I haven’t watched it in a couple years…So I tell you what…I think I’ll pop this one into the ol’ player tonight…And join in with the parasite party!

 

The Faculty (1998) – This film was written by Kevin Williamson…He’s the writer behind Wes Craven‘s game-changing meta-horror, Scream…And if that wasn’t enough horror street-cred…The film was directed by none other than Robert Rodriguez (From Dusk ’til Dawn)…And he’s also the man who created the ass-kicking El Rey Network… In this film about a unique extraterrestrial parasite that finds a home filled with hosts at an Ohio high school…There is an awesome Teachers vs. Students vibe…That’s a theme that reaches us all universally…Okay…Maybe not universally…I’m sure there’s at least a handful of people out there that didn’t spend those four years being mentally, emotionally, and physically beaten down by oppressive assholes posing as teachers…But fuck those little brown-nosing apple-polishers…As for the rest of us…It’s a blast watching the line that’s drawn between teacher and student…Become the same line drawn between life and death.

 

Dreamcatcher (2003) – Based on a novel from Stephen King who wrote this one…In cursive…On a hospital bed…High on Oxycontin…While recuperating from his near fatal accident in 1999…This trippy tale was adapted by Lawrence Kasdan and stars an awesome ensemble cast…Thomas Jane, Jason Lee, Damian Lewis, and Timothy Olyphant…Play four lifelong friends who by befriending and defending a child with special needs, named Duddits, when they were younger…They inherit some of this special young man’s supernatural abilities…Both Duddits and these abilities have come full circle…Now that the group of friends are adults and smack-dab in the middle of an alien parasite invasion…Those powers and their unique friend will be the only thing that might save the entire human race…Now when I first saw this years ago…My hair, which I still had, wasn’t that blown back…But after re-watching a few times…As I tend to do with Stephen King Movies…Each time I liked it better and better than the last…So if you tried it once and were a little meh…Give it another go…Would ya?

 

Slither (2006) – This film either pays homage to…Or outright steals from…The second film on this list, Night of the Creeps…I lean towards homage…Because James Gunn would have to have balls the size of casaba melons to not just borrow the premise…But to pull Dekker’s signature move and name the town deputies after horror directors…So under the assumption that the man has normal sized testes…I’m calling it an homage…The alien parasite in this one behaves similarly…But Gunn brings out some interesting twists once a person is infected…The body horror moves he pulls would make Cronenberg go…”Whoa…That was a little fucked up.” The cast was great as well…You have Nathan Fillion…Elizabeth Banks…And a most delightfully messed up performance from Michael Rooker…Who plays patient zero…The first person infected by this life-changing parasite…I know that most of you have seen this one…But maybe…Just maybe…You skipped it…If so, check it out!

 

The Ruins (2008) – This film…Was written by Scott B. Smith, the novelist behind this intense story…And also the one Sam Raimi brought to life in 1998, the crime thriller…A Simple Plan…In this one…We meet two couples on vacation in Mexico…Who meet a German tourist named Mathias, who is searching for his brother…Last seen at the site of some Mayan ruins…The two couples join the German and his Greek friend, Dimitri…And travel to the ruins in hope of finding his long-lost brother…What they find instead…Are a bloodthirsty and violent band of Mayans…That force them to retreat to the top of a Mayan temple…And that’s when things get weird…No…It wasn’t the murderous Mayans that made it weird…It was the bizarre parasitic vines that grow there…This is the first time that a plant freaked me out…Well…Except for that disturbingly phallic cactus that sat, semi-erect, upon the desk of my 8th grade history teacher…But besides that one…This one was by far the creepiest. 

 

Splinter (2008) – This movie opens at a rural isolated gas station, and once the remaining members of the cast show up…The film remains tethered to this remote and desolate location…Seth and Polly were on their way to go camping…But after being car-jacked by a couple on the run from the law…And can I just say…The incredible Shea Whigham, who plays the escaped convict/carjacker…Played the part to perfection…And after the two couples get a “splinter” in their tire…They are now trapped where a vicious parasitic entity is plaguing this podunk Oklahoma gas station…And this parasite kills you…Then re-animates you…And if you happen to lose a bit of yourself along the way…It will even re-animate your lost bits as well…This film has an original creature…With some awesome practical effects to go along with it…And the dread-laden pace moves at one speed…Constantly break-neck…I recently watched this one again…And it is for sure…One of my favorites on this list.

 

The Thing (2011) – I am fully prepared to catch a fairly large amount of shit for this one…I am sorry (not sorry)…But…I truly enjoyed this intense and well executed prequel to one of my favorite films…Joel Edgerton (It Comes At Night) and kick-ass scream queen, Mary Elizabeth Winstead lead the cast…In a film that tells the story of what happened in the Norwegian camp leading up to the opening helicopter sequence in John Carpenter’s 1982 remake…I dug the nods to Carpenter’s film…I dug the cold, isolation of the setting…I dug the bravery that it took to make a film like this…They weren’t dim-witted dullards who tried to remake an absolute masterpiece…And they weren’t short-sighted and greedy enough to make a substandard sequel that tells some cockamamie story like MacReady’s nephew…Twenty years later…Travels to Antarctica to find out what happened to ol’ Uncle R.J….That’s the kind of horseshit that Hollywood doles out all the time…This story actually could be…No, scratch that…It needed to be told…And for one…I’m glad they told it…Just for shits and giggles…Watch it right before you watch the Carpenter Cult Classic…For a seamless double feature experience.

 

 

The Bay (2012) – This film comes from director Barry Levinson, who is known for award-winning dramas like Rain Man and Diner…This is quite a departure for him…On two fronts…The first…Levinson has never directed a horror movie…And…The second…This is his first found footage style film…In my opinion…Levinson nailed it on both fronts…This documentary style found footage horror is exactly how you do it…The subject matter is relevant and plausible…And the cast is authentic and believable…It is presented as leaked footage that the government tried to suppress…About a mutated species of a parasite that attacks the members of a small Chesapeake Bay community…This parasite…Is a nasty little bugger…And the way the film shows us its increasingly aggressive and invasive life cycle…Is done in a way that is equal parts gruesome…And frightening.