31 Horror Movies in 31 Days: Quarantine

Quarantine (2008)

Directed by John Erick Dowdle

Starring Jennifer Carpenter, Jay Hernandez, Columbus Short, Greg Germann, Steve Harris, and Dania Ramirez

            A small crew for a late night magazine show is working on a piece about firemen.  The anchor, Angela, and her cameraman are longing for something to spice up their story when the fire house gets a call.  The crew accompanies the firemen to an apartment building.  The firemen, the police, and the residents of the building are concerned with the noises coming from their neighbor’s apartment.  When the police approach the woman in question, she pounces on a cop and takes a bite out of him.  The bitten man quickly turns into another vicious berserker, infecting more people.  As the apartment building is covered by a quarantine tent and surrounded by the CDC, it becomes clear that they have no intention of letting these people out.  While the residents and responders battle for their lives against the rabid infected, the camera captures everything that happens.

            Incase you did not know, Quarantine is a remake of the Spanish found footage film [REC].  I have not seen [REC], so I do not know how the two compare.  What I do know is that Quarantine is a fine movie that is more polished than many others in this genre.  For a found footage movie, it is kind of impressive how many recognizable character actors are used.  Jennifer Carpenter does a good job carrying the movie and serving as the viewer’s guide to the madness.  Steve Harris makes the most of his role of the cameraman.  He acts as the viewer’s eyes and ears, at times even voicing our concerns.  For a movie like this, all the actors involved do a wonderful job making these characters believable.  Also, it is pleasant seeing a few familiar faces show up in the found footage genre. 

            The makeup is fairly minimal, but effective.  For these zombie-like victims, it is just some bloody faces and bulging veins.  Since the whole cause of this situation is a fast acting virus, the infected look appropriately sick.  For fans of fast zombies in horror movies, Quarantine makes them look good.  They have bloody, gnarly scream and sprint like Olympic track stars.  It is unnerving and gets in your face immediately, making for some good scares. 

            If you have not seen this or are interested in how the remake handled the material, Quarantine is a worth watching.  I cannot speak to how it compares to [REC], but I can say that it is a good movie in its own right.  It also has the pleasure of being a found footage film that is tense, well acted, and expertly shot.  For this genre, that is not always easy to come by. 

8 out of 10

31 Horror Movies in 31 Days: Alien

Alien (1979)

Directed by Ridley Scott

Starring Sigourney Weaver, Veronica Cartwright, Ian Holm, Harry Dean Stanton, and John Hurt

            Look, there is not a thing I could say that has not already been said about Alien.  It is a classic for a reason.  Alien is essentially an old dark house movie with elements of a creature feature and a slasher flick.  The character work is strong and memorable, giving us the greatest screen heroine in horror and sci-fi.  Dan O’Bannon wrote a solid screenplay that is filled with memorable lines.  The creature design by H.R. Geiger is out of this world.  Ridley Scott is a fantastic director that can take all these elements and put them together without conflicting with each other.  If you have not seen Alien, you should view it now.  It will enrich your view of film and terrify you at the same time.  Like all who see it, you will come to admire its purity. 

10 out of 10

31 Horror Movies in 31 Days: The People Under the Stairs

The People Under the Stairs (1991)

Directed by Wes Craven

Starring Brandon Adams, Everett McGill, Wendy Robie, A. J. Langer, Ving Rhames, and Sean Whalen.

            A little boy everyone calls Fool lives in a rundown apartment with his family.  His mother is sick and they are about to be evicted.  His sister’s boyfriend, Leroy, offers to help Fool make their rent money.  He takes him under his wing and tries to teach him about burglary, starting with the house of Fool’s landlords.  The Robenson’s are wealthy from generations of family ventures and shady business practices.  Leroy, his partner Spencer, and Fool case the home.  After Spencer gets in as a gas company worker, Leroy gets suspicious of the time he is taking.  Fool and Leroy break in to find the house is filled with locked cupboards, spooky noises, and no sign of their rumored fortune.  But when the Robenson’s come home, they will find that there are worse things than getting caught stealing.  Fool and Leroy are hunted by the family and pursued by a strange person living inside the walls.  When Fool gets to the basement, he will meet the Robenson’s greatest secret.  There are people living in their basement and what they look like does not bode well for Fool.

            Bill Cobbs and Ving Rhames have some minor roles that they fill quite nicely.  Rhames especially does well with Leroy, Fool’s less than altruistic mentor.  The duo of Man and Woman are played frighteningly over the top by Everett McGill and Wendy Robie respectively.  They both commit to the characters and their insanity, bringing them close to being a caricature without quite going there.  Brandon Adams and A.J. Langer are the real treasures of the movie.  They have the most screen time and waste a minute of it. 

            The scares are surprising and potent.  The horror does not just come from the stakes of Fool’s robbery; it also comes from the implications of the Robenson’s activities.  They keep a basement full of cannibalistic feral boys that have “had the bad parts cut out”.  They destroy families financially and horde the money.  They act like a married couple but are very much siblings.  This is a family like the one from The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, but with the power and invulnerability that wealth can buy. 

            The little artistic choices are enjoyable as well.  The Robenson man does not just hunt intruders; he hunts them in a bondage suit.  There is a fine layer of dust on nearly every surface of the house.  The only place with any kind of color is Alice’s room.  And most of the movie takes place during the day, with light pouring in from every window.  It means that Craven has less chance to hide things in darkness, so all that is shown has to be good. 

            As far as Craven films go, The People Under the Stairs is one his betters ones.  It is not anything close to his Elm Street films,  but it is far better than Shocker or Vampire in Brooklyn.  Give it a try and you will not be disappointed. 

8 out of 10

31 Horror Movies in 31 Days: The Funhouse

The Funhouse (1981)

Directed by Tobe Hooper

Starring Elizabeth Berridge, Cooper Huckabee, Miles Chapin, Sylvia Miles, William Finley, and Kevin Conway

            After an opening that rips off the opening to Halloween, we find that nobody is getting murdered.  It is just a brother and sister making each other miserable.  The older sister, Amy, goes to a rather sordid carnival against her father’s wishes.  She goes with her boyfriend Buzz, her friend Liz, and Liz’s boyfriend Richie.  They smoke pot, ride the rides, go to the carnival strip show, make trouble for a fortune teller, and visit the sideshow freaks exhibit.  The group is having a ball when Richie gets an idea: stay overnight in the funhouse.  Their night takes a decidedly downward turn when they witness the deformed ride assistant, Gunther, proposition and murder the fortuneteller.  Before doing the smart thing and running, Richie steals Gunther’s whoring money.  With Gunther enraged and his father not too far behind him, Amy and her friends have to escape a family that kills plenty of strangers in their funhouse. 

            The characters are your standard teenage slasher-fodder, carny stereotypes, and dysfunctional families.  None are particularly interesting, but the actors do their best with what they are given.  The creature is the real center of the movie, presented as both monstrous and mistreated.  The first appearance of Gunther is him in a Frankenstein suit, which really sets the tone for his arc.  Conrad, Gunther’s father and the carnival barker, has the queasy charm of a cult leader.  The pair make for good antagonists that you love to despise.  Unfortunately, no other character has that kind of forethought put into them. 

            The makeup and overall design of Gunther is fascinating.  He is deformed and fanged, with wisps of white hair going everywhere.  He drools near uncontrollably and has a harelip that seems to go into his forehead.  And even though it is just a mask and some makeup, those bright pink eyes are unsettling and emotive.  The kill makeup gets the job done, but the real cool thing is how amusement rides are used.  The teenagers are systematically dispatched with props, rail cars, and all manner of funhouse paraphernalia.  It adds some welcome dark humor to the movie, especially since you probably have not been taking it seriously. 

            Hooper is a talented director and that does show through in The Funhouse.  He knows how to make a slow burn feel like no time at all.  The first half of the movie is spent following the teens around the carnival and taking in its seedy wonders.  The people who go there do not seem right, the barkers are a little too pushy, and the sideshows are genuinely creepy.  By the time the group gets to the funhouse you feel ready for anything.  Even if you know Hooper’s filmography, you are not expecting a family relationship straight out of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre.  From there, the movie lets you see some truly nasty work.  And then there is that fat, laughing lady animatronic outside the funhouse.  That thing is just disturbing. 

            Overall, The Funhouse is an enjoyable little flick.  It is not the best Tobe Hooper movie, nor is it the best horror movie about carnivals.  It is a good choice if you are brave enough to try something new the next time you are on Netflix. 

7 out of 10

31 Horror Movies in 31 Days: Prince of Darkness

Prince of Darkness (1987)

Directed by John Carpenter

Starring Donald Pleasence, Lisa Blount, Victor Wong, and Jameson Parker

            A priest invites a group of graduate students and professors to help him investigate an old church in Los Angeles.  Specifically, the priest needs help understanding an artifact in the basement.  It is a large, ancient cylinder filled with a churning green fluid.  The students settle in and start running tests, the priest and professor discuss religion, and a swarm of homeless people surround the church.  As people leave, the hobos are led by one of their own (Alice Cooper in a cameo) to kill those who try to exit the grounds.   The contents of the container make its intentions known when it opens of its own accord and attacks a grad.  Those who come into contact with the liquid become possessed by an otherworldly force.  Meanwhile, the team experiences the same odd dream when they sleep.  They see a message from the future showing a dark figure leaving the church.  The scripture left with the cylinder reveals something disturbing: the green fluid is Satan and he is trying to bring something more evil into this world.  It all comes to a head when the infected corner what remains of the team and put their plan in action.  Their lord will come and the church shall be his entrance. 

            The second film in Carpenter’s Apocalypse Trilogy, Prince of Darkness is a flawed wonder.  It showcases Carpenter’s ability to create atmosphere and maintain it, adding to the tension systematically until the climax.  But, it is also filled with logistical and aesthetic choices that really hinder the enjoyment of anyone paying attention.  For every one thing this movie does right, it does three things wrong. 

            The story is a mixed bag, but mostly the mix is good.  There is a heavy influence felt from Quatermass and the Pit and Lovecraft stories.  The unknown evil that infects man and turns him against himself is a big part of this movie and it is terrifying.  What the movie gets most right is that sense of something greater than our heroes’ comprehension actively working to set itself free.  The art design and the special FX help sell the mood.  The mysterious fluid is shot convincingly, never quite becoming unintentionally funny.  The early kills are also executed well, with some painful looking stabbings and bug bursting.  Carpenter regulars Donald Pleasence, Victor Wong, and Dennis Dun all put in fine performances.  Pleasence could add class to anything and he plays the priest with a profound sense of religious terror.  Wong is cooky but authoritative with Prof. Birack.  And Dun is annoyingly smug, which works well for the comic relief character. 

            Not everything in Prince of Darkness works, if at all.  The dream sequences seem to be shot on VHS and purposefully grained.  For a dream from the future human resistance, you have to ask why it had to look like a poor quality broadcast.  It totally takes you out of the movie when this signal from the future looks like someone accidentally taped over the movie.  When the possessed people spit demon water out of their mouths, it is unfortunately funny.  With every infected shooting an evil squirt gun from their mouths, it gets hard to take anything else seriously.  The antagonizing infected people switch half way through the movie and not for the better.  After having some creepy possessed homeless people in the beginning, having some grad students is a real let down.  Finally, there is the issue of Carpenter’s story itself.  He chose to combine quantum physics and religion to derive the source of evil and create an overly complex mythology.  The mixture comes off as haphazard and pointlessly confusing.  Once people start talking about God and the Anti-God as aliens, the story takes a sharp dive in quality. 

            If you are going to watch Prince of Darkness, be prepared to have mixed feelings.  There are some great parts that chill and thrill with the best of Carpenter’s filmography.  And then there are parts that clearly needed more time and thought put into them.  This one is only for the Carpenter fans and enthusiasts of the genre. 

6 out of 10

31 Horror Movies in 31 Days: Dead Alive

Dead Alive (1992)

Directed by Peter Jackson

Starring Timothy Balme, Diana Penalver, Elizabeth Moody, and Ian Watkin

            The year is 1957.  On the infamous Skull Island, a man is attempting to smuggle out some unstable cargo.  This man procured the wicked Sumatran Rat-Monkey, a creature of terrible legend.  When he is bit by the caged specimen, his local guides cut him up to stop the rat’s evil from spreading.  The guides do, however, collect the money for delivering the cage to a waiting airplane.  The monkey is the newest attraction at the Wellington Zoo in New Zealand.  Meanwhile, Lionel Cosgrove is in a bad spot.  His authoritarian mother controls his life.  This makes it hard for her when Lionel starts seeing the local shopkeeper’s daughter, Paquita.  Lionel and Paquita are followed by Mrs. Cosgrove on a date to the zoo.  While spying on the couple, Mrs. Cosgrove gets bitten by the displayed Rat-Monkey.  She immediately takes ill and physically falls apart.  When she dies, Lionel does not know what to do.  When she comes back from the dead, Lionel is even more lost.  As he hides his mother’s new condition, it gets harder to keep the secret from his friends and neighbors.  To make matters worse, Lionel’s sleazy Uncle Les starts going after the estate.  Soon enough, Mrs. Cosgrove breaks loose and spreads her disease to some random folk.  As the infected numbers grow larger, Lionel will have to finally stand up for himself and stop his mother from controlling his life. 

            Before Lord of the Rings and Peter Jackson’s assent into mainstream movies, he made some pretty twisted flicks in New Zealand.  Of all these tasteless, deplorable, and sickening films, Dead Alive is probably his best known early work.  It was released under the title Brain Dead and then Dead Alive in North America.  This movie manages to blend slapstick comedy and buckets of gore better than Evil Dead 2.  Like a deranged Buster Keaton routine, there are some hilariously horrific moments in Dead Alive.  There is a scene involving Lionel and an undead baby-monster in a park that is laugh out loud funny.  The gore is way over the top, with sentient intestines chasing people and heads splitting open.  The battle scene in the main hall of Lionel’s house is one of the bloodiest bits of film I have ever seen.  If you ever wondered what a weaponized lawn mower could do to a crowd of zombies, this movie is for you. 

            The actors all make fine work of the lunacy that is this film.  Timothy Balme does a fine job of playing Lionel.  You can see the conflict in his face when his responsibilities to his mother get in the way of a normal life.  Elizabeth Moody has the part of overbearing mother down and has fun twisting it while undead.  The true scene stealer is Stephen Papps as Father McGruder.  Papps has a fight scene that is unexpected and extraordinary.  This movie has a lot of those kinds of moments.  Little things build up to create a series of scenes that are hard to forget, with the ending toping it all off.  The final confrontation between Lionel and his mother could make a Freudian scholar spontaneously combust.  It is too good to spoil here. 

            The effects are creative and wonderfully icky.  The humor is decidedly devilish and drenched in blood.  The enthusiasm for this project can be felt in every frame.  Dead Alive is the hidden gem of Peter Jackson’s career.  Go find it and take it in, then spread the disease and show it to your friends. 

10 out of 10

31 Horror Movies in 31 Days: Dead Snow

Dead Snow (2009)

Directed by Tommy Wirkola

Starring Charlotte Frogner, Stig Frode Henriksen, Bjørn Sundquist, Ane Dahl Torp, Jenny Skavlan

            A friendly bunch of Norwegian medical students goes to the Alps for some drinking, skiing, and debauchery.  They are busy getting down when a mysterious hiker knock on their door.  He tells them about this mountainside’s history.  Nazis occupied through WWII, taking the precious valuables of all those who lived there.  The Nazi's greed is said to be so great, people still see them looking for all the gold the residents hid from them.  The students brush off the crazy story and get back to their partying.  Everything is fine until they find a box of gold hidden in the floorboards.  When the riches are discovered, all hell breaks loose.  The cabin is beset by undead Nazis, working as a unit to take down their meager defenses.  These friends will have to start fighting back or face the wrath of a long dead evil. 

            Nazi zombies, much like werewolf cowboys and vampire investment bankers, are the stuff of horror gold.  It is that perfect combination of antagonistic forces into one supreme monster.  Any movie with Nazi zombies, no matter how terrible it may be, gets brownie points for picking their source of terror.  The look of the aforementioned baddies is lovingly detailed.  The uniforms look authentic and authentically worn out.  The zombie makeup makes frostbite and rot look good.  And even though they look great, some of the scariest moments are when we do not see them.  The first fourty minutes or so treat the zombies like the shark in Jaws: we only see hints of them in the cold darkness of night.  Wirkola and company understand the inherent scares that can spring from the idea, but also see the wonderful comedic opportunities that it brings.  People cauterize wounds only to find undead things gnawing on sensitive areas, or have a prolonged fistfight end with a regiment of zombies waiting.  While not as slapstick as Evil Dead 2 or Dead Alive, Dead Snow has a wickedly dark sense of humor that never stops abusing its subjects. 

            The character work in Dead Snow is top notch.  These people are likeable and intelligent, recognizing early on that these things attacking them are zombies.  This inspires them to follow the movie rules and come up with some rules of engagement.  All the actors do a fine job, but Jeppe Laursen nails it as Erlend.  The movie nerd of the group, Laursen’s Erlend is both endearing and hilarious all the way to his horrific end.  Plus, he wears a Brain Dead t-shirt and that counts for something.  A word of warning to any potential viewer; Dead Snow is brutal with its characters.  It is not too much of a spoiler to say that things do not end well for anyone involved.  However, the ways these characters meet their ends are astounding.  The practical effects are nothing short of jaw dropping.  They are both a pleasure to watch and difficult to sit through. 

            Dead Snow is a new classic.  It is unrelenting, mildly disturbing, and amusingly twisted.  For the horror fan with a taste for the nasty, check this out and brush up on your Norwegian death-screams.  

9 out of 10