By Chris Haberman
Classic horror movies for Halloween hangovers
By Chris Haberman
Staff Writer
Christmas doesn’t hold a candle to the delight of All Hallows Tide, better known in this day and age as Halloween. It’s phenomenal to witness society break the rules for one magically bizarre and wonderfully eerie night. People decorate their houses to appear frightening and foreboding. Almost everyone buys candy to distribute to the same hellions in their neighborhood that refuse to stop climbing their fences and screwing with their mailboxes. And in a beautiful leap of faith for society in this questionable day and age, parents allow their children to wander the streets dressed as creatures and ghouls, collecting treats and gifts from random inhabitants of their little corner of suburbia.
It gives me both chills and a smile to think of such a tradition surviving in an increasingly dangerous and paranoid world. October 31 allows us to grin wickedly like the jack o’ lanterns that reside on everyone’s doorsteps. Sure, it was last week, but what do you do when you want to have that “Halloween feeling” all year round? Watch scary movies, of course!
Scream is director Wes Craven’s horror-comedy take on the horror movie genre itself. The movie was simply made for Halloween viewing. The killer wears a “ghost-face” mask, a long time standard of many a trick-or-treater. The killer is also a prankster, delighting in calling victims to play a game of cat and mouse in which the victim must answer the killer’s horror movie trivia questions to live. The movie is fast-paced, chilling, and a hell of a lot of fun.
John Landis is best known for his work directing the hysterical Animal House. In 1981, he completed a project that he’d been daydreaming about for years, which combined his knack for comedy with unrelenting terror. An American Werewolf in London is a wild story about a young American named David who is traveling through London with a friend. While walking across the moors one misty night, they are attacked by a werewolf, leaving David injured and his friend dead. As his friend haunts him throughout the film and warns him of the next full moon, we believe David may be going crazy… until the full moon finally does arrive. The transformation scenes created by award-winning effects and makeup artist Rick Baker place their collective foot so far up any CGI effect’s ass to grace the big screen in the past 10 years, it’s not even funny. Definitely worth rewinding and hovering over the pause/slow motion button.
The Return of the Living Dead is Alien director Dan O’ Bannon’s perspective on the zombie genre. He created a charming atmosphere in which several good ol’ fashioned punk rockers go to battle with a legion of the brains-hungry undead. The entire film is exciting, funny, and filled with action and suspense. The finale alone validates viewing, due to the nuking of our beloved city at the film’s climax! That’s right; in case you didn’t know, the entire film, although not shot here, is set in Louisville, Kentucky. Be proud. In terms of splatterpunk cinema, we’re in one of the better locales!
I implore you to watch any of the following three films in their entirety, alone, and in the dark. The 1982 remake of The Thing, The Exorcist, and Hellraiser are three of the most dreadful and soul-impressing movies ever filmed.
John Carpenter’s remake of The Thing is a story of scientists based in the wastelands of the Antarctic who discover that an alien life force has invaded their camp. Once they realize the damn thing can shape shift to look like any human or animal it desires, all hell and paranoia breaks loose as one of the most frightening and impressive movie monsters ever created takes the stage.
A tip to those chuckling to themselves over how funny they think The Exorcist is: if you don’t just fast forward to the “cool parts,” you will discover a movie that runs very deep into the darkest fears the human condition is capable of maintaining.
Lastly, Clive Barker’s fiercely original Hellraiser is a ghastly trip into a world populated by demons thirsty for your soul. It is a very bleak and bloody film, but it is wildly imaginative and entertaining for the more intelligent horror/thrill seeker not only concerned with sex and machetes.
