KILLER KILL OF THE MONTH!!!!!!

What's up, creeps?  The first KILLER KILL of the month is a delightfully funny scene from Friday the 13th part 5.  Each month I will be taking viewer submitted kill scenes at basementofterror@gmail.com and if I choose your video as the KILLER KILL OF THE MONTH you get a free tshirt.  That's damn cool in my book.  Check out this months tasty treat and let me know what you think!  "HEY, LANNNAAAAAAAA!!!!"

Remember, send your favorite kill scene to basementofterror@gmail.com for a chance to win your very own Basement of Terror tshirt.

Sinister Review

A box of home movies thrusts a true crime writer and his family into the path of supernatural evil in Sinister from director Scott Derrickson.  Derrickson you may remember as the director of Exorcism of Emily Rose.

Ethan Hawke stars as Ellison Oswalt, a down on his luck writer looking for his first best seller in ten years.  He moves his family to a new town and a new home where grisly murders took place.  He doesn’t tell his wife or kids though...but they learn about it at school anyways, and his wife is pissed!!!


Written by Derrickson and first timer C Robert Cargill it is really a story of a man neglecting his family for the sake of his career. Instead it felt like an exercise in how many times can we make a guy go look for a noise in the dark with nothing but a flashlight or a baseball bat.

The acting definitely helped propel the narrative with good performances by Hawke and Juliet Rylance, the actress who plays the wife.  As they discuss their marriage we feel like a fly on the wall that has heard this conversation a dozen times before.  This leads us to a method we have seen a dozen times before: found footage.  The format is used decently here, both in the home movies and his personal VHS tapes which seem to conjure up his own personal ghosts and disappointment.

We get good performances from the children, a standout performance by James Ransome as deputy So and So and a “cameo” by Vincent D’Onofrio.  He plays a professor from the local college who specializes in the occult.  Creepy kid, new home, child abducting maniac, occult expert...heard this before?  Yeah, it’s called Insidious.  

I found the sound design to be exceptional and there is a great scene with a lawnmower, but it doesn’t make up for the tired story line or the terrible ghost make-up.  Sinister is rated R for disturbing violent images and some terror, it has a run time of 110 minutes and it gets a 1 1/2 out of five stars on the gore score. The film is worth one watch for the gruesome kill scenes.  

DEAR HOT SLASHER BABE

The first HOT SLASHER BABE of the month goes to Debbie from Friday the 13th part 3 in 3D.  Each month I will write a letter professing my undying love to a horror movie starlet.


Dear Debbie, from Friday the 13th Part 3 in 3D,
      You were so beautiful with a smoking hot bod...why did the director think we’d actually believe you were pregnant?  Were you offended by that at all?  And why would you date a guy that tries to get you to eat weed and offers to go get you beers?

Also, what kind of friends would make you sleep in the room with the hammock?  You’re pregnant remember?  I guess it did make it possible to get a really cool updated version of the Kevin Bacon kill from part 1.

But, Debbie, above all your beauty and charming qualities lies the fact that you read Fangoria magazine...and you'll do it in a hammock.  Thanks again, Debbie, we all loved you and you will be missed.


Sincerely,
     Gory Gary

If you nerds have any hot slasher babes we should write letters to let us know and we will get right on it!  We?  Who am I referring too?  It is just me.

Chernobyl Diaries

Six twenty-somethings take an extreme tour to the Chenobyl nuclear reactor.  A day of sight seeing and romantic picture taking turns into a night of despair as the group realizes they are not alone.  Written by Oren Peli, creator of the Paranormal Activity franchise and directed by first timer Bradley Parker, the film takes us to a barren, creepy landscape that we have never seen before.  Unfortunately, the story doesn’t do the same.  We go to a foreign location, our car breaks down, there are things trying to kill us.  The great thing about this simple story line however is the fact that it gets us right into the action.

Oren Peli gives a nod to the found footage genre, having his characters document their trip with a handheld video camera.  This device worked well because it established the characters and got us into the story quickly.  The acting is good overall, there are some hot babes but I’m not sure the script offered much in character development.  Dmitri Diatchenko gives the most rounded performance as an ex special forces dude who is now a tour guide badass.  You can tell he really feels bad for the people that died at Chernobyl and in turn you really feel for him.

Director Bradley Parker is best known for his visual effects work on movies like Fight Club, Red Planet, and Let Me In.  He chose a minimalist approach to the gore and mayhem, letting us imagine for ourselves what lurks in the toxic darkness.  

Chernobyl Diaries is Rated R for violence, some bloody images and pervasive language and has a run time of 88 minutes.  It gets a 3 out of 5 on the gore score.  It’s not a great film but it’s definitely worth seeing.  The gore we do see is good, it’s got hot babes, had scary moments and overall kept me entertained.

PG13 Horror and why it SUCKS!! (Well most of it.)

PG13 Horror and why it SUCKS!!

You take a film like The Exorcist, arguably the scariest movie of all time.  What's it rated?  It's rated R of course.  Then you have PG13 movies like The Exorcism of Emily Rose, The Rite, The Last Exorcism and The Possession, which definitely have their moments of pure creepiness and fright, but let's face it, they ain't no Exorcist!  So why make PG13 horror?  Do they even stand a chance against their R rated counterparts?

The answer is yes!  But they must meet one seemingly simple requirement: have a fresh new idea we have never seen before.  What does Insidious, The Ring and Drag Me To Hell have in common?  Yep, they are PG13 but they also offer horror fiends like us new material to sink our teeth into.  They have different monsters, different stories, different angles and approaches to the genre which, if we're lucky, will even have some sequels for us to hate.

A PG13 movie about exorcism will never be as scary as The Exorcist because, well...we have THE EXORCIST!  It set the bar.  Unless movie producers make an R rated version of a story line we have seen a dozen times it will never compare, and thus will not be liked. 

The obvious reason for why they do it is because PG13 movies make more money because they appeal to a broader audience right?  WRONG!  Although the top three US grossing horror films of all time are PG13, R rated films make up 36 of the top 50. Let me reiterate: Of the top 50 US grossing horror films of all time 36 are rated R.  Let's be fair though, in general, PG13 movies make astronomically more than R rated films but that's for other genres like kid movies and romantic comedies.  This is horror and we want hardcore.

Until we stop paying to see the watered down PG13 rehashings of our favorite films, "Hollywood" will keep pumping them out because they know by the time we realize it sucks they've already got our money.  Let's put our foot down.  Hollywood, if you're going to make a movie about zombies, or demons, or slashers--story lines we have seen a hundred times--make it Rated R otherwise it will suck.

 Ever heard of a movie called The Sting with Robert Redford and Paul Newman?  Me neither, but in 1973 it made over 100 million more than The Exorcist.  Guess what it was rated?

What are your favorite PG13 horror films?

Revamped Basement Of Terror!!!

Ok so it seems strange revamping something that never really got off the ground in the first place.  When I started this blog I wanted to make it a horror review, viewer driven show where I reviewed films, showed funny clips and the viewers could email and skype with me during the show; you guys could tell me how much you hated me and I would deal with it live...it would have been awesome.  Here is a link to the killer intro I threw together:

I figured this would be a great venue for me: I have a degree in creative writing, I make and love horror films and I am extremely opinionated!!!  So I started writing and another filmmaker and I sat down and threw together ideas, bought set decorations and ultimately filmed the first few segments.  They turned out well but, like many collaborative endeavors, it didn't work out.  And to top it off I look really fat on camera.  I haven't given up on this idea though and am working out a way to film everything myself; I think a viewer driven show about horror films could be great.

So, where does this leave me?  Well, I still have my kickass writing and overt cynicism, both of which I have all on my own.  So that's what you are going to get: pure, unbridled writing on horror.  I hope I actually get some readers, otherwise I bought these sweet tshirts for nothing!!!  First person to email me or comment on this post gets a BASEMENT OF TERROR TSHIRT!!  That's right, your very own chick magnet just in time for the holidays.

Ok, well now that is off my chest and it is time to do some writing.  First you will get a blog post on pg13 horror and why we hate it!  That will be followed by my review of Chernobyl Diaries, the first film review I have ever done.  I know CD is old but, hey, the first episode was supposed to be done in October.  If you have any input on the show, feel free to shoot me an email at basementofterror@gmail.com.  Thanks for reading, dudes!!!!

GG