Frightday Night Film Recommendations: Don’t Touch the Clickah, Kid…This Movie’s Wicked Pissah.

It’s Friday…

Ahem…I mean Frightday…

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

Okay…This Frightday’s theme is…

Don’t Touch the Clickah, Kid…This Movie’s Wicked Pissah.

In 1976…

Steven Spielberg sent the entire world…

On a terrifying trip to the fictional town of Amity, Massachusetts…

And it was the first time that a film showed me…

A freckle-faced seven-year-old kid…

Growing up in a microscopic town…

In rural New Hampshire…

A truth that I already knew…

And that truth was…

New England…

Can be scary as fuck…

And in this film…

And the other films that I am recommending to you…

New England…

Isn’t just a spooky setting…

It isn’t just a baleful backdrop…

It’s more like a shifty-eyed, creepy-looking extra…

That just so happens to be…

In every fucking scene.

Okay, kid…Let’s take a chronological look at the best, most underrated, and possibly even unknown to you, Wicked Pissah New England Horror Movies…In the years following Jaws…That you may not have seen…But should.

Ghost Story (1981) – Now this little favorite of mine…Was filmed not too far from where I grew up…And it captured the vibe of that part of New England perfectly…In fact…The wintry exteriors were equal parts picturesque and nightmarish…Which is an almost perfect way to describe New England in the wintertime…Growing up here…You sometimes take it all for granted…But even when a New Englander like me…Sees the ever-changing landscape that fueled not only my own nightmares…But the nightmares of horror legends like Stephen King and H.P. Lovecraft on the big, or little screen…I get the same spooked out, mega-creepy, about-to-shit-your-pants sorta feeling…That those of you who aren’t New Englanders get…And this film doesn’t just have an overflow of that vibe…It also has some incredible practical effects from Rick Baker…And folks…This film also had one more thing…That scared this New Englander…Even more than New England does…Yep…That’s right…You guessed it…Alice Fuckin’ Krige.

 

The Dead Zone (1983) – Sure…I could have filled this list solely with films based on Stephen King novels…But I decided to pick just one…I mean…It’s only fair…I gotta share the love…And if there’s one to pick…I’m going with the King adaptation that not only screams New England…But it also has enough of director David Cronenberg’s uber-creepy cinematic ooze plastered all over it…To make this film a haunting amalgamation of two great horror minds…All rolled into one…Like an eggroll filled with live cockroaches and tarantulas…And then there’s the actor responsible for bringing the amazing character of Johnny Smith to life…Christopher Walken…In one of the most haunted performances ever to be captured on celluloid…And man…Walken portrayed the torment…The anguish…The horror…Of living inside the skin of Johnny Smith…Like nobody could have…And the indelible mark that performance left behind…Firmly cemented this film…Into the annals of New England horror movie history.

 

Re-Animator (1985) – When Stuart Gordon brought H.P. Lovecraft’s version of the Frankenstein mythology to life…He also gave life to the iconic character of Herbert West…A mad scientist seemingly cut from the same genetic cloth as Ol’ Doc Frankenstein himself…And this utterly deranged role has been played to perfection over the years by Jeffrey Combs…Now Lovecraft knew about this New England being creepy thing…Long before I did…Hell…It was even long before Stephen King did…Lovecraft spent his entire life in New England…And many of the settings that he created were based upon actual places that he had seen…Even this one…Which takes place within the ivy-covered walls of Miskatonic University…A fictional prestigious campus on par with Harvard…Nestled in Arkham…A fictional Massachusetts town…And the shit that goes down in that creepy little burg…Is enough to make you lose your mind…And maybe even…Your head.

 

Beetlejuice (1988) – Far too often…People forget that this film’s dark underbelly is freckled with one of the most frightening depictions of the afterlife…I think folks sometimes forget that the stink of horror is all the fuck over this 80’s cult classic…And I betcha it is sometimes forgotten that this is a quintessential New England horror film…From the flannel-clad Adam Maitland…To his staycation-happy wife…To their Volvo…Hell…To one of the most memorable covered bridge scenes since Silver Bullet…This film captures the sunny, simple, quiet, and quaint side of a little New England village…Which is an ideal counterbalance to the twisted underworld that the Maitlands uncover…One filled with perpetually ineffectual, immortal public servants serving an equally ineffectual eternal bureaucracy…And if that wasn’t enough of a contrast…The Maitlands also have an unhinged, undead flim-flam man living in the cemetery of the scale model of their tiny New England town…The one that Adam built…Back when he wasn’t so…Well…You know…Recently deceased.

 

In the Mouth of Madness (1994) – In this Stephen King adaptation about a horror writer who writes about a fictional town in New England whose recent work causes the reader to lose his mind is…What’s that? What?!? What the fuck do you mean this isn’t a Stephen King adaptation? But it’s about a horror author…Yeah, but the town he writes about is in New England…What? Oh…It’s not Maine? New Hampshire, you say? Oh…Okay…My bad…Anyway…When we the audience follow John Trent, played by Sam Neill…Into the formerly fictional town of Hobb’s End, New Hampshire…His descent into madness is flavored with all of the selfsame creepiness that surrounded my New Hampshire home…This film is not only one of the last great scary stories to come out of John Carpenter’s filmography…It’s also a bonafide staple on any list of essential New England horror films…Especially mine.

 

Lake Placid (1999) – In this tongue-in-cheek monster movie…We travel to Maine…A place known to tourists as Vacationland…And word of this apparently spread to the giant saltwater crocodile community…Because one of their ranks decided to take some time off in Black Lake…This film is a ton of fun…I can’t get enough of it…Especially the perpetually profane performance by Betty White…Everyone knows the only thing better than a toddler swearing…Is a little old lady swearing…But what really does it for me…Is the fact that growing up…I swam exclusively in ponds and lakes that resemble the one depicted in this film…And the fact that every time I stuck even a big toe in those pitch-black, mirrored shores…I was always completely shit-scared for a few minutes…Because…All I could think about back then…Was what the fuck might be swimming around…Just below the surface…And those dark, foreboding bodies of water…Instilled an inherent fear that coursed through my veins…And left behind a gnawing chill that once it had crawled up the back of my neck…It stayed there…For years to come…And that’s what makes New England lakes like this one…Such a scary setting.

 

Session 9 (2001) – Directed by Brad Anderson (Transsiberian)…This dark and undeniably eerie film…Takes us to New England…For real…Anderson doesn’t sell the setting as a fictional construct…Instead he chucks us headlong through the front gates of the Danvers State Hospital…A now defunct asylum in Massachusetts…One that not only has a haunted past that is well known in these parts…But it was also the inspiration for H.P. Lovecraft’s Arkham Sanitorium…Which in turn became the inspiration for Arkham Asylum…The institution which houses a great number of baddies from Batman’s rogues gallery…In this tale…We meet a group of workmen who have one week to remove the asbestos from within the confines of the hospital…Let me tell you folks…This setting was already so fucking spooky…That the director did absolutely nothing in the way of set design…Everything that you see there…Was there when they arrived on set…The film reveals the mystery within…In a purposefully measured pace…Which only serves to ratchet up the tension in this already tense New England horror.

 

We Are Still Here (2015) – Okay here’s a supernatural slow-burn that takes place in the dead of winter here in New England…This film is the directorial debut of  Ted Geoghegan (Mohawk)…And it starts out like your typical New England haunting…Grieving couple Paul and Anne move into a quaint little home…In a quaint little town…Following the tragic death of their son…Anne is played by horror legend, Barbara Crampton…Who thankfully has had a resurgence on the blood soaked screen of horror movies, lately…And if that wasn’t enough genre film street cred…You’ve got Lisa Marie (Sleepy Hollow) and Larry Fessenden (You Don’t Know Larry Fessenden?!?)…Rounding out the cast…And as Anne and her husband begin to peel away the mystery of this haunted home…The truth that is revealed…Comes skipping down the hallway…Holding hands with the stuff that fuels our nightmares…The final act of this film is one of the scariest…One of the bloodiest… and contains some of the most original special effects…That I have ever seen in a ghost story.

 

Knives Out (2019) – Although not a horror…And believe me…I ain’t apologizing for that…This film represents the long awaited, and delightful return of the whodunit…This wonderful film comes from Rian Johnson (Looper)…And takes us inside the walls of a New England mansion…Filled with some of the most colorfully crafted characters to ever hit the screen…This was refreshingly smart…And loaded to the rafters with acerbic wit…And not to mention…A heaping helping of biting social commentary…The goal of which….Is to shine a spotlight on the vast chasm between the two remaining classes…In not only New England…But the rest of the country as well…The rich…And the poor…And the water found in the raging river flowing through that chasm…Is poisoned with toxic levels of misunderstanding and disdain…Which builds great tension…Delivers great laughs…And uncovers great truths.

 

Color Out of Space (2020) – Two things that haven’t happened for me in quite a long time…The first…Is seeing a film based on the work of H.P. Lovecraft…Which hasn’t happened for about ten years…And the second…Is seeing a film directed by the incredible Richard Stanley…A man who following a failed attempt at bringing H. G. Wells’ classic tale, The Island of Doctor Moreau to life…Got royally fucked over by the machine known as Hollywood…And ran screaming away from the director’s chair…Hell…It has been over twenty-five years since his last feature film was released…And those of you that were fans of his debut film…The sci-fi/horror cult classic, Hardware…Or his sophomore effort…The horror/western with its own level of cult status, Dust Devil…Fear not my fellow Fanleys…He’s back…And after seeing this delightfully surreal addition to the canon of Lovecraft adaptations…I cannot help but wonder what magically maniacal movies…Would have been crafted by this artist…In the past two decades…Had he not been royally corn-holed by a couple of narcissistic, over-indulged actors, and the short-sighted, small-minded studio executives that indulged them.

Frightday Night Film Recommendations: Crappy Mother’s Day!

It’s Friday…

Ahem…I mean Frightday…

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

Okay…This Frightday’s theme is…

Crappy Mother’s Day!

In 1976…

Brian De Palma brought to life…

Stephen King’s Carrie…

And this was the first time…

That I saw a mother on the big screen…

As scary as mine…

Especially when my mother wielded…

A wooden spoon…

Or a shoe…

Or a broom…

Or whatever the fuck…

Was within her reach…

You see…

The 70’s were like a zombie survival film…

All of us kids were cast as the zombies…

And the grown-ups were cast as the survivors…

And in order for them to survive…

They used anything they could get their hands on…

As a weapon…

Okay…

Pop quiz, hot shots…

Ever been smacked with a Sears catalog?

Ever been beaned by a beaded, brown leather handbag?

Ever discover which end of the vacuum cleaner hose…

Is the business end?

No?

Hey…

Good for you…

Because that means…

You’re probably way more normal than I am…

But a whole lot less likely…

To be able to take a punch.

So, let’s take a chronological look at the best, most frightening, and possibly even unknown to you, Crappy Mother’s Day Movies…In the years following Carrie.

The Brood (1979) – From the warped and wonderful mind of David Cronenberg…Comes a tale that whips up a bizarre mix of therapy…Motherhood…And body-horror…This film has Oliver Reed playing Dr. Reglan, a psychologist, who uses an experimental therapy…To help a former abuse victim, played by the mega-creepy Samantha Eggar…To learn how to deal with her demons…But he underestimates, not only the effects of his treatment…But also, what his patient does with those effects…What’s that?…I’m sorry?…What effects, you ask? Well…What this treatment does…Is give her the ability to give birth to her psychological demons…And then these creepy little homicidal inner-children…Are running around doing all sorts of horrible things on her behalf…And folks, let me tell you…There are some startling and disturbing images here…And those images will stain your memory of Mother’s Day…Forever.

 

Friday the 13th (1980) – In this franchise-creating entry in the masked slasher sub-genre…Director Sean S. Cunningham introduced us to a character that would live forever in both films and our hearts…But before he did that…He introduced us to the woman that gave him life…Well…the first time, anyway…Let’s talk about this film…And to be fair…It needs no spoiler alert…Because if you are reading this list of horror film recommendations…Then you must have seen this one…And when you did…You discovered that the strong, unbreakable, maternal bonds between a mother and her son…Can make a mother hack the shit out of anyone that she blames for the death of her child…As far as crazy moms go…And this list has a lot of ’em…When Betsy Palmer turned in her performance of Mrs. Voorhees…She donned a pair of the ol’ crazy eyes that would have made a Rabid Rottweiler tied out in the yard… Run screaming into the woods.

 

Dead Alive a.k.a. Braindead (1992) – Peter Jackson gave us this gift…I can only assume that it is because he loves us…In this film…Elizabeth Moody plays the crappy mother…And she does it with style…While stalking her son Lionel and his new squeeze…She gets bitten by a Sumatran Rat-Monkey…Now…Her story arc following this bite…Takes her from domineering mum…To a monstrous undead mega-beast…And trust me when I say this…I have seen a shit-ton of blood-soaked films in my day…This is hands down…The bloodiest film that ever came across any screen that I’ve ever sat in front of…Now, don’t let the gore scare you away…Wait, that’s not right…Go ahead and let the gore scare you…But remember…As scary as all that gore is…There’s nothing scarier than Lionel’s mum.

 

Mother’s Day (2010) – Darren Lynn Bousman directed this film…Loosely based on a true events…This is a story about three brothers who don’t realize that their family home now belongs to someone else…After the youngest brother gets shot in a robbery…They flee to that family home…Where Beth, played by Jaime King (Black Summer)…Is throwing a birthday party for her husband, Daniel…Played by King of The Purge film franchise, Frank Grillo…The brothers take the couple and their friends hostage while they wait for their crappy mother to arrive and give them further instructions…And oh….What a crappy mother she is…Good ol’ Mom is played by none other than Rebecca De Mornay…Who somehow manages to turn in a performance that makes her character from the Hand That Rocks The Cradle look all sweet and innocent…She is the stuff of nightmares, people…Seriously…I hadn’t seen her in anything for years…And when I saw her in this…Let me tell you…I was blown the hell away…She is the twisted…Crooked…Scoliosis-riddled backbone of this film…You gotta check her out.

 

Mama (2012) – Jessica Chastain (Stephen King’s IT) and Nikolaj Coster-Waldau (Game of Thrones)…Play a couple who take in their nieces…After they are lost in the woods…For far too long…Following a car accident…This one was produced by Guillermo del Toro…And within a few minutes…You can feel the influence of the horror master…So anyway…Five years later…After being found alive…They move in with this couple…Comprised of the twin brother of their deceased father…And his girlfriend…And for them…The feral nature of the children is the least of their worries…Seems that they weren’t truly alone out there in those woods…But maternal instincts are a running theme here…And Chastain was amazing in her portrayal…Of a woman who seems to be uncomfortable in such a maternal role…Yet…Is the one who develops a formidably fierce protective nature…And as things progress in the deeply swirling downward spiral of this film…It seems to me…That she is the only person in the film…Deserving of the title, Mama.

 

Stoker (2013) – In Chan-wook Park‘s American debut…He departs from the intense revenge flicks he’s become so associated with…And brings to life a slow-burning tale of family…Dysfunction…And mental illness…Quite a leap…From the visceral intensity of Park’s Oldboy…This film is atmospheric…And charmingly creeptastic…Top notch performances all around in this one…You’ve got…Mia Wasikowska as India…And Matthew Goode as Uncle Charlie…The way these two characters evolve at the same time…While still remaining intertwined…Is like watching kudzu growing on the side of a southern highway…Their relationship is…Well…It is unsettling to say the least…But in honor of Crappy Mother’s Day…The frosty performance of Nicole Kidman…As this film’s unhinged maternal figure…And the driving force in this film…Is the most unsettling thing of all.

 

The Babadook (2014) – Okay…Let me start with the fact that this was the first time in my life that a pop-up book made me shart myself…Okay, that outta the way…Here’s a story of a woman who in the deep dark depression that followed the passing of her husband, had a hard time mustering up motherhood. Her son suffers from what she believes is an irrational fear of monsters, that alienates them both from the outside world…Now…Noah Wiseman, is either an incredible child actor…Or he just might be the most annoying child on the planet…But that being said…It was pretty messed up…During the first and second act of the film…When his mom thinks he is full of shit…Because she isn’t exactly the warmest, softest place for a kid to land…It isn’t until she softens up a little…Shows a modicum of sympathy…And actually starts believing him…Cue the World’s Creepiest Pop-Up Book…And…That’s when things get really fucking messed up.

 

Goodnight Mommy (2014) – This Austrian film came into my life…About four decades after I had recovered from my traumatic twin experience with 1972’s The Other…And guess what, folks…It wasn’t nearly enough time…The twins here are Elias and Lukas, and they are kind of Yin and Yang at first, but as the darker forces of Lukas begin to have a greater influence on Elias…It’s all Yin and Yin from there on out…Elias, and his twin brother Lukas are focused…Or perhaps obsessed is a better word…On their bandaged mother…Who is home recovering from surgery…And as crappy as this mother is…She is not as bad as her kids…I think…I mean seriously…The mystery unfolds in a way where I genuinely didn’t know what the real story was…The tension ratchets up notch by notch in this film…Not just with the claustrophobic confinement that the country home provides…But the twins themselves create their own brand of tension…That will make the fucking hair stand at attention on the back of your neck…I found myself wanting to know the truth…And then immediately regretting that foolish fact-finding mission…And ultimately I spent the final act…Just wanting it all to stop.

 

Prevenge (2017) – Alice Lowe, who co-wrote and co-starred in Ben Wheatley’s 2012 pitch-black comedy, Sightseers…Takes the controls in this one…She wrote it…She directed…And she stars as, Ruth…A pregnant woman who after the loss of the baby’s father…Begins to take direction from her unborn child…These snarky requests from her thuggish fetus…Revolve around doing harm to the people…Who the unborn baby…Has deemed responsible for the climbing accident…That took her father away from her before they ever met…This unique slasher film is even more of a pitch-black comedy than Sightseers…And the hormone-fueled insanity of this main character…Our crappy mother-to-be…Could comfortably place her next to slasher icons of days gone by…But probably not…Most of those cats had some serious mommy issues…And this mommy…Would probably scare the ever-loving shit outta them.

 

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 a deliciously over-the-top performance from Nicolas Cage as Dad…And Selma Blair as the majorly maniacal Mom…Who went from being a normal suburban mother…That is…Until the weird static started spewing out of all of the TV and radio speakers…And anyone that hears it…Is 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 of the children out there, either…It’s rather personal…And that’s what makes this so scary…They are 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 to watch.