By the time Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter hit theaters on April 13, 1984, the whole slasher horror craze was entering its great downfall. Critics hated them and the big names refused to acknowledge their existence except to condemn and degrade them. At the time, most of them had been filmed in Canada asContinue reading “Fourth ‘Friday The 13th’ Is Too Entertaining For Its Own Good”
Category Archives: Flashback Friday Frights
Why The ‘Ghostbusters’ 2016 Remake Really Failed
Jean-Luc Godard famously quipped: “The best way to criticize a movie is to make another movie.” I don’t know what anyone would have against the 1984 original Ghostbusters. The movie seems to be one of those rare lightning in a bottle movies where everything worked. Even the casting of Ernie Hudson to replace Eddie MurphyContinue reading “Why The ‘Ghostbusters’ 2016 Remake Really Failed”
‘The Cable Guy’ Pretentious Comedy Dud Or Hidden Dark Comedy Gem?
A movie like The Cable Guy was doomed to fail before the first scene was shot. In the mid-1990s, Jim Carrey became one of the biggest stars of the time thanks to movies like Ace Ventura: Pet Detective, The Mask and Dumb and Dumber. You can’t blame someone who grew up with parents struggling financiallyContinue reading “‘The Cable Guy’ Pretentious Comedy Dud Or Hidden Dark Comedy Gem?”
‘Alien’ Remains Iconic Horror Flick Many Decades Later
What’s crazy about the original 1979 Alien that like a lot of horror movies from that decade, it was originally intended to just play as an exploitation drive-in movie. With another Alien movie, Alien Romulus, in theaters, let’s look back at the movie that started it all. The late Dan O’Bannon who had worked withContinue reading “‘Alien’ Remains Iconic Horror Flick Many Decades Later”
‘Conjuring’ Movies Helped Redefine Horror For Modern Times
Horror movies are usually the red-headed stepchild of filmmaking. They’re hated most of the times by movie critics. Parental groups despise them so much they’ve been successful in getting them removed from theaters, which was the case in the original Silent Night, Deadly Night. And the Academy Awards have pretty much refused to acknowledge them,Continue reading “‘Conjuring’ Movies Helped Redefine Horror For Modern Times”
How ‘The Blair Witch Project’ Helped And Hurt The Horror Genre
In the past 25 years, filmmaking has gone through many changes. But the one that, for better or for worse, owes itself particularly and almost entirely to one genre is the found footage horror. The idea wasn’t new when The Blair Witch Project opened in the summer of 1999. Cannibal Holocaust had done the sameContinue reading “How ‘The Blair Witch Project’ Helped And Hurt The Horror Genre”
‘North’ At 30 Is Still Nightmare Fuel
There’s three reasons a movie like North is still remembered. One, it’s the first movie featuring Scarlett Johansson in all her young cuteness as a child. Second, it features Brynne Hartman in her only movie appearance. She would go on to gain infamy four years after this movie was released as she would murder herContinue reading “‘North’ At 30 Is Still Nightmare Fuel”
‘Shaun of the Dead’ At 20: How A U.K. ZomCom Reanimated The Subgenre
By the dawn of the 21st Century, the zombie subgenre of horror was, for a lack of a better word, dead. Scream helped breathe new life into the slasher subgenre and it seemed Hollywood was also in love with remaking Japanese horror movies into The Ring and The Grudge. But across the pond, something wasContinue reading “‘Shaun of the Dead’ At 20: How A U.K. ZomCom Reanimated The Subgenre”
‘Death Wish’ At 50 Still Touches On Topics Open For Much Debate Today
When it was released in July of 1974, Death Wish struck a nerve with audiences. By the 1970s, the war on drugs seemed to have created more crime in metropolitan areas. Brian Garfield had wrote the novel after his wife’s purse was stolen. Last House on the Left had been released the same year asContinue reading “‘Death Wish’ At 50 Still Touches On Topics Open For Much Debate Today”
‘Shark Attack 3: Megalodon’ Bites
In 1997, Steve Alten, a science-fiction writer, published his first novel Meg: A Novel of Deep Terror and Hollywood came calling. However, the movie almost immediately found itself in another deep terror that of Development Hell. This gave Nu Image Films, a low-budget production company known at the time for making schlocky direct-to-video movies youContinue reading “‘Shark Attack 3: Megalodon’ Bites”
Zane Says 