stonepicnicking_okapi | Entries tagged with okapi watches scary movies in the dark

I like horror movies. I have borrowed plots from different horror movies for fic through the years. I prefer older films or the first of the franchise. This Christmastide I watched:

1. Jack Frost (1997). I enjoyed this. It was so camp, so ridiculous, so cheesy. I recommend it if you want a laugh. So the van carrying a serial killer and a van carrying Secret Stuff collide on a snowy night and the serial killer becomes a snowman. And (spoiler) there is a scene of the sheriff and the serial killing snowman wrestling in a truck bed filled with antifreeze. Crack-tastic.

2. Black Christmas (1974). I will probably watch this again. There are some cringe moments (the Margo Kidder character is an ugly drunk) but there were elements of it that are still pretty awesome. A killer haunts a sorority house at Christmas. And it's the origin of the phrase 'the call's coming from inside the house.'

3. Silent Night Deadly Night (1984). This was the first horror movie I ever saw and the only part I remembered was the best part (in my opinion). The killer grabs a half naked girl and impales her on the antlers of mounted deer. My uncle has/had A LOT of mounted animals around his house (deer, turkey, and other antelope, kudu, and horned animals he shot in Africa) so that made that part very memorable to a young okapi. But in general it's just sad. A traumatized orphan is abused by nuns and grows up and is forced by an employer to trigger himself at Christmas and goes on a spree with an axe. It was just sad (except for the chick impaled on the antlers).

4. Silent Night Bloody Night (1972). This is a bit contrived but very atmospheric. If you watch it at night with the lights out, you could probably scare the shit out of yourself. A man dies and leaves a house where a lot of tragedy has occurred, and a developer comes to town 15 years later to sell the house. And a killer is on the loose. There is a lot here about 'crazy people' i.e. people committed to mental institutions getting loose and being extremely organized and violent. That rankles. But it was scary in a retro way.

I really like the idea of BBC Sherlock getting an evil advent calendar from Moriarty.

Title: The psychopath's advent calendar, Day 1
Rating: Teen for implied violence/dark themes
Length: 500
Fandom: BBC Sherlock
Prompt: Listen
Summary: Sherlock receives a sinister Christmas gift from Jim Moriarty (inspired by Black Christmas).

( Read more... )

( The list )

I am reading The Amityville Horror by Jay Anson and it's scaring the shit out of me. It's non-fiction! About a family's experience in a haunted house in Long Island. It seems so plausible, so realistic in the sense that it might happen. I am loving it but I have to read it in small doses for the sake of a decent night's sleep.

I listened to HG Wells' The Invisible Man. It isn't a horror story in the same sense Frankenstein isn't a horror story (though the images of both have been appropriated by the horror world). It's a cautionary tale about the dangers of human pride.

My final horror film of the scary season was The Lost boys (1987). I watched it for the first time and I LOVED IT! Funny and creepy and so, so, so nostalgic. Corey Haim and Corey Feldman! Kiefer Sutherland in a long coat! Gosh, remember Tiger beat magazine?!

( full 2023 list--appropriately 13 films! )

Spook Me always does an Inspiration post. I am always too stressed about finishing my offering to look at them until November but they are always some amazing things: short films, music, images, etc. https://spook-me.dreamwidth.org/21078.html

And in the comments section is Cyberiad Queen has shared their own list so it's an embarrassment of spooky riches.

( previous 5 films )

6. The Uninvited (1944) Meh. I didn't care about the characters, any of them
7. The Others (2001) I liked this but I have seen too many ghost movies not to guess what was going on pretty early. Nevertheless as far as atmosphere, this is one of my favourites. Definitely watch it on a big screen in the dark to get Full Effect. I finished it the following day in daylight and it wasn't the same. It also made me say 'gosh there's a lot of Whitey here,' but Nicole Kidman has that effect on me.
8. Dark Water (Japanese, 2002) Solidly creepy, but I felt bad for the mom too much to be too scared. (Just like my reaction to The Exorcist). I want a haunted house/scary movie that ISN'T a metaphor for bad motherhood.

9. Nightmare on Elm Street (1984). Johnny Depp is in this??!! And Freddy is a bit more gross than I imagined. Like tongue through the telephone. I was a bit disappointed that all she had to do was not BELIEVE to make Freddy go away but they fooled me! Ha, ha! That ending got me good! I love being surprised.
10. Friday the 13th (1980) Kevin Bacon is in this??!! I liked this. I really liked the scene of the girl in the canoe waking up in the middle of the lake after it's (almost) over. Excellent surprise there. And she cuts the killer's head off with a sword. Nice.

I don't know what to watch next...let me know if you have recommendations.

I just returned from the cinema to see "A Haunting in Venice," which is a modern adaptation of Agatha Christie's Hallowe'en Party. I know Hallowe'en Party intimately because I did an adaptation myself in fic form in the Jeeves & Wooster fandom called Boo, Jeeves! so I was interested to see what they would do with it.

I originally thought it was on Netflix, but I was happily corrected and able to get to the cinema before the boys' father left. (I suppose I could go to the movies while the boys are at school but it would make me nervous).

I enjoyed it. Kenneth Branagh will never be Poirot to me but I still enjoyed it. It is set in Venice and it is good to see that on the big screen. The scenery and setting were suitably atmospheric (there is a horrible storm). There is still a children's party. There are ghosts. It's interesting to see how the first victim (Joyce Reynolds) is transformed from her book version and I think it makes sense. I really liked Tina Fey as Ariadne Oliver. You need someone with comedic timing in that role.

If you are a veteran mystery reader, then you will guess one of the plot points early on. And if you've read any Christie at all the murderer won't come as a surprise. But I enjoyed myself.

[I had a side plot in the theatre as I kept feeling something tapping the top of my right shoe. At first, I thought something had slipped from my lap, then I thought something had rolled under the seat, finally I concluded there was a leak in the roof--unless it was GHOSTS!]

To get me in the mood for writing scary Hallowe'en stories when it's 100 degrees outside, I've taken to watching scary movies. So far it has been old Hollywood movies from the 1930's and first of the modern franchises from the 1970's. I will post in October my thoughts for Fannish 50 but so far I've watched.

1. The Invisible Man (1933) zany and harsh, the old lady steals the show
2. Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1931) fucked up. Hyde keeps a prostitute as a sex slave.
3. Halloween (1978) I had to remind myself that this is where a lot of the tropes (and parodies) come from
4. Frankenstein (1931) The creature looked wonderful, makeup, lighting, etc. my favourite part
5. Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974) again, one that spawned a lot of others, but whoa a gore fest, family of murderous cannibals, and leatherface, and I couldn't help wonder about the guy in the wheelchair, I wonder what the authors who wrote all those essays on disability I read for the book bingo would say about him

I am open to suggestions of movies to watch!

I watched The Innocents [1961] which is in black-and-white and stars Deborah Kerr. It is a movie adaptation of Henry James' The Turn of the Screw which tells the story of a governess sent to a house in the country to care for two children possessed by ghosts of former staff persons (the former governess and a valet).

This movie was scarier to me than The Exorcist, probably because the children were a little less 'real.' Not super scary but Deborah Kerr sells the role. She's very good and believable in the role.

So every year for Spook Me, there's a compilation of spooky stuff (vids, photos, songs, etc) and I am have started going through it and DAMN do the Japanese know how to scare the shit out of you. This is only 12 minutes long but it scared me more than anything I've watched so far, and there isn't anything violent or gory. It's called 'My house walkthrough.' The summary is: My house walk-through. This is not horror video. This video was created simply by filming inside my house. Like if you could write this in story form, you'd be the Scream Queen Supreme.

Watch on YouTube

I watched The Exorcist for the first time last night and discovered that being a Mom kind of sours the cinematic experience in some cases.

The first half of the movie is Reagan's mom trying to figure out what's wrong with her. When Minor was 2, he suddenly loss the use of his limbs and speech. It took 2 months living in two of the best children's hospitals in the world to diagnose him with Anti-NMDA encephalitis and another 4 months of treatments and rehab to get him back to where he was. The beautiful thing is that he made a full recovery. But having a Really Sick Kid puts you in a club with other parents who are not so fortunate. So, you know, it cut too close to home what her mother went through.

And the older I get the more I see things I never saw before. Just like some movies are cop propaganda, this one is definitely priest propaganda. I do remember going to confession when Minor was sick (I was still a practicing Roman Catholic then) and the boys' father was still traveling and I had to take extended leave from my nursing job to basically live in the hospital, no support anywhere, and the priest said 'we should do something for you' and that was all he ever said. Thoughts and prayers. Crickets. So the idea that someone could get a priest to make a house call only shows it was a 1973 film.

Also a Mom thing.

Projectile vomiting.

Ever mom has been hit at least once. Usually square in the chest of a nightgown or pajama top. It's not fun but it's not horror either.

I don't know. It wasn't particularly scary. It was sad and then a bit over the top. The only moment I really liked is when Damien figures out the demon in Reagan is talking backwards. That was kind of a cool 'ah-ha' moment from the linguist specialist. Otherwise, meh.

It's the spooky movie season.

Last night, I watched Don't Look Now (1973) which I'd never seen. Summary:

A married couple travels to Venice (Italy) following the recent accidental death of their daughter, after the husband accepts a commission to restore a church. They encounter two sisters, one of whom claims to be clairvoyant and informs them that their daughter is trying to contact them and warn them of danger. The husband at first dismisses their claims, but starts to experience mysterious sightings himself.

I liked it. The city of Venice is a character in and of itself, and it was my favourite character. I've been to Venice, and it was nice to see it and all its unique sense. It was very Hitchcockian. The 2022 me with modern sensibilities can't help but think the end (the danger at the end) is wrong in many ways, and I didn't find the explicit sex interesting (fanfic will do that to you, two, thin, white, young, pretty--except for the 70's moustache--married people having heterosexual sex on a bed, yawn). But the imagery and symoblism was cool, and the scenes of Venice.