The Top 20 Horror Films of 2016 Pt.2 10-1

Uhhh....I'm up, I'm up!

In Part One I discussed the upswing of the genre and detailed movies 20-11 on my top twenty list, ranging from anthology films, Mother/Daughter bonding time, Cops against weirdos, and closed-door suspense thrillers.  I don't have much more to add, so we'll jump back into it.

10. The Autopsy of Jane Doe

Some movies work based entirely on setting and atmosphere, even though the story isn't exactly the strongest element around.  Autopsy does an excellent job at utilizing technique, character, and performance to gloss over some of the films weaker elements to create a thoroughly strong little horror film.  Occasionally it DOES overreach, but when this film works it works extremely well.  Brian Cox gives an excellent and relatively subdued performance as an aging, repressed Mortician who, along with his son, performances the titular autopsy and finds his beliefs and repression challenged.  It's a strong performance within a strong, if not a little overdone, horror film.

9. Demon

I was saddened to learn that Marcin Wrona committed suicide sometime after the completion of Demon, primarily because it grieves me to know that we'll never see if he could manage to follow up this really intelligent little horror flick with anything better.  What makes this film tick is a tricky element: using a ghost/possession story as a metaphor for deep seated cultural issues.  To reveal what that issue is would be something of a spoiler, but to see this film so expertly ford the rough waters of a society deciding to focus on celebration and revelry instead of confronting its own history.  There are scenes in this movie that I don't think I'll ever forget, such as a group of drunken revelers stumbling happily but shamefully past an aghast funeral procession.  It was truly haunting stuff.  But don't let that give you the wrong impression: in the midst of all this cultural commentary, it's also pretty funny.

8. Hush

The second of Mike Flanagans two efforts this year, Hush proves to be one the strongest home invasion film of the year (of which there were many, with mixed results), and provides a star making performance by a very talented actress in the form of Kate Siegel.  Siegel plays a deaf Woman living alone in a country home after a breakup, who finds herself menaced by a masked man whose only ambition is to ruin peoples days.  What ensues is a highly suspenseful and, most importantly, intelligent film.  The heroine is resourceful, the story doesn't gloss over minor (and very real) details, and the villain is bone chilling.  It's available as a Netflix exclusive, so do yourself a favor and check it out.

7. Nina Forever

This horror comedy combines deep seated emotional and psychological issues with strange tongue-in-cheek surrealism to wonderful effect.  A young woman becomes enamored with a troubled young man reeling from the death of his girlfriend, and begins a relationship with him...however, every time they attempt to make love, the aforementioned dead girlfriend squirms her way up from the mattress...usually to mock them.  It's not the most subtle metaphor, but it's deeply effective and well-played.  It has a sense of depth that bores its way into the mind rather quickly and stays there.  It's something special.

6. Under The Shadow

This Iranian horror flick does something that I feel is very important in todays world: reminds us Americans just how lucky we are.  While the ghostly elements of Under The Shadow are fairly hit-or-miss, the psychological bits of personal stress combined with the constant threat of having a bomb literally fly through your ceiling at any moment, and your safety being conditional upon how your own Government sees you (as one memorable scene shows: our heroine flees her tormentor only to be arrested because she didn't put her Hijab)...it's really haunting stuff. 

5. Train to Busan

Just when you thought the Zombie subgenre was dead (and it is, really), South Korea comes along and makes a Zombie movie that thoroughly and thoughtfully reminds us why the genre really exists: to discuss the selfishness and selflessness of the human condition.  Some excellent character work puts the icing on the cake, making the entire piece a very moving study of strangers going from being in it for themselves to forming a makeshift family in the face of unending pressure and tragedy.  It's a story of nobility from the most unexpected of sources, and a morality tale.

4. The Eyes of My Mother

This artsy, stark nightmare of a film was one of the most effective and unsettling films released this year in any genre, telling a sobering story of psychological damage and the banality of violence from the perspective of the one doing the violence.  Told in three acts, Eyes details the personal history of a character that is a person first, and a psychopath second, utilizing a fascinating amount of restraint (we see almost no violence whatsoever in its short running time, only the outcome of that violence), and a dizzying variation of intimacy and distance, both visually and emotionally.  What ostensibly occurs is a movie that provides us with a point of view that is both disturbingly familiar but morally alien.

3. The Neon Demon

Nicholas Winding Refn is something of a polarizing filmmaker, and his 2016 horror outing The Neon Demon is no exception.  Stunningly and hauntingly beautiful, confusingly surreal and disquieting, the film shows us a shifty, squirmy peak into a world of ambition, objectification and jealousy, all with an unbelievably intrusive (and beautiful) synth score.  It's a very quiet, slow movie, but if you give it the chance and keep an open mind, it will likely slime its way right into your frontal lobe, and stick with you for weeks.  

2. The Witch

I was incredibly torn on where to put The Witch.  My heart told me it was meant to be number one, but ultimately my brain won out and I put something else there, but you may as well consider this as the OTHER number one horror film of the year.  There hasn't been a movie like this in quite some time...actually, there may have never been a film quite like this before.  The most interesting element of this film is how you could set it in the modern era without changing anything outside of superficial details, which is exactly the point: the themes of religious intolerance, coming of age, freudian family dynamics, and even the high anxiety of trying to survive in a world you're not quite prepared to thrive in, for any reason.  The creepiest stuff in this film comes from those themes far more than it does from any witchcraft, with the titular monster being far more representative of a hostile environment encroaching upon those who arrogantly presume superior knowledge. 

1. The Invitation

Few films put me on the edge of my seat quite like The Invitation, and as such I chose it over The Witch, which was not an easy decision.  The ensemble cast is very game, with a quiet sense of menace being expertly presented by director Karyn Kusama. A man, who isn't exactly the picture of health, accepts an invitation to a dinner party hosted by his estranged ex-wife and her new husband.  Upon arriving he finds himself beset by the demons of his past and a very off-setting question: is his ex-wife and her Husband up to something sinister?  Is he being paranoid? Combined with those excellent mysterious elements, performances and a highly pressurized atmosphere (asking just how much weird would you put up with to be polite), there is a sense of progressive social ideas presented as well.  It's a truly stunning work, and is my favorite of the year...and believe me, that was NOT an easy choice to make.

So, there you have it.  Some good recommendations for you to check out.  It's been a great year.  I can't wait to see if 2017 can raise the bar.

The Top 20 Horror Films of 2016 Pt.1 20-11

Black Phillip says you're wicked.  He also welcomes you to this blog.

It goes without saying that 2016 hasn't been a particularly great year for most of us.  Me personally: ton of medical issues, financial problems, tons of anxiety about the future, loneliness and rejection...y'know, hilarity. For the rest of us: tons of icons from film, television and movies passed away, Brexit and, of course, a Trump Presidency.  Racism, sexism, homophobia have become dangerously normalized, and the threat of War and ruin looms above us all.

So, is it really so surprising that 2016 has been a particularly fantastic year for the Horror genre?  Not only have the films been excellent (which is, of course, the reason that you're reading this), but TV shows like Ash Vs The Evil Dead, The Exorcist, and even a particularly strong season of American Horror Story have graced the small screen.  Things are really looking up for the genre.  The reason for this sudden upswing in excellence is, in my estimation, a direct result of the political and social unrest that has been gripping the world: I think it's always true to say that as society suffers, art excels. On top of this, the horror genre has always been an outlet for our fears and anxieties, so it only makes sense that the genre would start representing some of those issues, while also throwing out a bunch of escapist scary stuff to keep us occupied.

In that spirit, I've expanded the list to Twenty films over last years Fifteen. This may seem arbitrary...and it kind of is...but it's to reflect the rise in quality that the genre has begun to exhibit this past year (not that last year was a slouch) and will hopefully continue to exhibit.

So, let's get the honorable mentions out of the way and get on with it, won't you?

Honorable Mention:

The Conjuring 2: Good, not great.  First one was better.

Green Room: Solid suspense outing, just not terribly engaging.

Phantasm:Ravager: Not the best film, but brought a cult favorite franchise to a close with dignity.

Last Girl Standing: Very good,just not QUITE good enough for this list.

20. Carnage Park/Darling

 

 While Darling is the better film, it's actual release date is kinda debatable.  It's not, for instance, on any critics top lists this year, but was on a few last year...while it was on the festival circuit last year, it got released to the public in early January.  So, even though it's an excellent film with an amazing performance by Lauren Ashley Carter (whom I adore), it may not be relevant.  So, in its stead, I've selected Mikey Keating's other effort this year. Carnage Park.  While she's no Carter, Ashley Bell is a very fine actress (best known for her turn as Nell in the underrated The Last Exorcism films) and gives a lot to enjoy here as an innocent girl who goes from being kidnapped during a bank heist to being hunted by a psychopath in the desert.  As a movie about isolation, hopelessness (Bells character is going through a tough time even BEFORE her ordeal) and helplessness, it hits home in a big way with a fantastic, though occasionally plodding, cat and mouse game.  Keating proved with these two films that he is definitely a talent to watch in coming years.

19. Southbound

One of the first horror flicks to be released this year (and quite possibly the first good one), Southbound manages to reclaim anthology based horror cinema from the disgusting, filth-encrusted hands of projects like ABC's of Death with an ambitious and surreal journey through hell.  While, as is the curse of all anthology films, not all stories are created equal and sometimes the movie finds its special effects marred by a lack of financial resources, some of the stories have a unique sense of danger and cleverness (the best of which being a Young Woman who ends up in a weird house when she and her friends van breaks down on the highway), while managing to keep everything moving forward nicely...and a connection between everything that is really interesting.  

18. Baskin

A gory, psychotic Turkish import about a group of Cops finding themselves dealing with a hellish nightmare.  While the characters feel somewhat shorted as the movie moves on (which, to be fair, is mostly caused by them being fully eclipsed by the films shocking and extreme imagery), it's still undeniably effective.  I'm not usually super into gore/torture flicks, but something about the horrific events performed in this film are hypnotic and, occasionally, beautiful.  It's one of this years weirder movies, and definitely one of the hardest to sit through (especially for the uninitiated or squeamish), but it's a really fascinating piece.

17. The Monster

Every once in a great while a film comes along and reminds me how effective simplicity can really be.  While director Bryan Bertino is something of a mixed bag as a director (what with the suspenseful but deeply stupid The Strangers and the cinematic stress headache that is Mockingbird), The Monster feels like his most mature and well conceived project to date.  The story revolves more on character than threat, focusing specifically on the dysfunctional but heartfelt relationship between a precocious and scarred little girl and her alcoholic, petulant and even more scarred Mother.  While the horror elements work well enough, it's the emotional moments that land the best, being moving without necessarily being too melodramatic.  Zoe Kazan gives an excellent performance as the Mother.  It was one of the biggest pleasant surprises of the year.

16. Creepy

Anyone who knows me knows that I've never been a huge supporter of Japanese horror: it isn't that I think it's bad, it just rarely ever works for me the way that, say, Chinese or Korean horror tends to.  With that in mind, know that I genuinely loved Creepy.  What impressed me to the most about it was the level of restraint it ultimately chose to exercise: considering that the film focuses a lot of psychological and emotional manipulation performed on Women by a sleazy psychopath, it never pushes the physical elements that an America film version certainly would have.  The general premise (an ex-cop and his Wife move next door to a dangerous, manipulative psychopath who manages to convince others to do his bidding) had me nervous about a rape sequence for most of its running time...and it never came.  This does nothing to diminish the films sense of tension or terror, though: the movie is without a doubt a hair raising ball of suspense.  On top of this, the performances are excellent, and some highly intelligent casting choices (the two men, the cop and the psycho, are played by polar opposites: the cop is one of the most handsome men I've ever seen, and the psycho looks like a Frog) make it a very effective thriller.

15. Ouija:Origin of Evil

One of two films featured on my best of list by director Mike Flanagan (Absentia, Oculus), who has become one of my favorite modern horror filmmakers, this one would have easily been one of the films this year I would have expected to be a pile of garbage but turned out to be a very effective film that performed a rare (but not unexpected, really, considering the source) feat: it outdid the original.  Again, this wasn't hard, seeing as how a kick to the face would likely be more entertaining than Ouija, but it still doesn't happen often.  And, more importantly, it's beyond being better than the original: it's actually Good. The performances are strong, and the story manages to be effective and even occasionally scary despite the handicap of being handcuffed canonically to an inferior film.  Annalise Basso, who had also performed in Flanagan's excellent Oculus, gives a teenage girl performance that feels very real instead of generic, and seems poised to be a legitimate star.

14. Evolution

I'm fairly certain that Evolution is the weirdest film on the list this year (well, close anyway), and that's a pretty big compliment.  Very sparse, very quiet, and undeniably creepy, Evolution challenges the viewer to piece together the information themselves, never succumbing to the urge to offer exposition OR denouement.  Never does the film explain its imagery, but that doesn't mean there aren't answers hidden within this bizarre little story of a Young Boy trying to figure out why the entire population of his home (or is it...) island is entirely populated by Women and Young Boys.  What any of it means tends to come second to the breathtaking, hazy and dreamlike cinematography that keeps things engaging.

13. 10 Cloverfield Lane

I really wanted this to be higher on the list, but its final twenty minutes feels so awkward and tacked on that I just couldn't justify it any higher despite its extraordinary qualities.  Easily one of the most suspenseful films of the year, with one of the strongest ensembles and fantastic set pieces, 10 Cloverfield Lane went from being a suspected joke to one of the best respected films of 2016.  While all the players are excellent, this film belongs to John Goodman who, with no doubt in my mind, is THE scariest horror movie villain of the year.  It's a performance that needs to be seen to be believed.  Extraordinary film, mediocre ending...but everything leading up to the end is a thing of absolute beauty.

12. Scouts Guide to the Zombie Apocalypse

The best thing about this buddy comedy/horror film mashup is how effortlessly and specifically it subverts expectations and tropes.  Any other film likely would have leaned even further on stereotypes when presenting its characters (especially in the main characters chubby, super-scout buddy, who is allowed to be a full-fledged character with thoughts and feelings instead of a walking punchline), which results in an overwhelming sense of honesty and charm.  While the comedy doesn't ALWAYS land quite right, and neither does the horror for that matter, the charm and sentimentality always does, leading it to be in the top movies of the year, and quite likely the most uplifting of the bunch.  

11. The Wailing

I've been a believer in South Korean horror films for quite some time now, so I was definitely excited at the opportunity to see this cop-drama/horror mashup.  A lazy, mostly ineffective police officer finds himself having to rise to the occasion when a series of strange deaths begin to rock his community, which might have something to do with the strange Japanese man who has moved in recently.  While a film of this kind usually would play itself painfully straight (and wouldn't be blamed for doing so, nor would such a choice damage the film in any way), The Wailing instead mines its premise and characters for just as much comedy as pathos, with extraordinary effect.  While it IS funny, the movie doesn't go full comedy, either, instead weaving the humor and drama together into a very honest slice of life: no matter how scary or funny things are, life always moves on.  While some of the story elements get muddy and obscure (even now I'm only half sure what the mystery amounts to), it's an excellent film.

On to Part Two!

The Neon Demon (2016)

Cast: Elle Fanning, Jena Malone, Bella Heathcote, Abbey Lee, Karl Glusman, Christina Hendricks, Desmond Harrington, Keanu Reeves.

Director: Nicholas Winding Refn.

Well, I'm back.  No record was set (obviously) but this blog can be salvaged by getting back on the horse and just doing what I do best: talking about movies, without any time constraints, greater ambitions or what have you.  So, that's what I intend to do, starting with Nicholas Winding Refn's newest effort, The Neon Demon.  I liked Drive well enough, even if I wasn't as blown away by it as a lot of others seemed to be, but Refn's minimalist grunge-glamour hybrid style is definitely fascinating to watch.  Plus, y'know, synth scores kinda rule.  I missed his other flick, Only God Forgives but heard and read good things...as for this film, I know little about it beyond the cast list, so, with that, might as well get on with it.  Gonna avoid spoilers as best as possible.

Refn certainly has a way with interesting color usage and composition...opening with huge splashes of reds and blues, then one of the most gorgeous dead body shots I've seen outside of an Argento film: placing a woman with a bright blue dress, a pool of blood, a puke green couch and a silver background all together into a stage-like set...beautiful.  Blue/Red contrast is clearly going to be a big deal here.

I'm not sure anyone could do that grunge/glamour mash-up like Refn does.  Even in the earliest scenes, he manages to make things look filthy and sticky, but brightly lit and colorful.  Portraying two Women have a vaguely flirtatious (and mildly predatory) conversation as an actress scrubs fake blood off of her, the dressing room filled with pinpoints of light...the only weakness to this style is that the imagery overpowers the sequence: I barely even registered that Jena Malone was on screen, because I was so distracted by the shiny.

The metaphors here aren't exactly subtle...in fact, the dialogue feels a little rough.  Again, though, the scene playing out under neon lighting (again, I feel like this is very Argento...whether or not that's a bad thing remains to be seen) with reds and blues mixing together into this washout effect...it's stunning. 

Very nice contrast moves made visually...this is obviously going to be a visual film.  Cutting from more flashing colors against black to the rather drab apartment of the lead is a nice smash cut.  Elle Fanning is doing some good performance work here, especially with the visuals making her seem so out of place against backdrops of cities (smothered by smog) and the dominating presence of the great Christina Hendricks...again, it's not subtle.  Every conversation the lead has creates a sense of predator and prey: Fanning is prey, while these other women regard her as something of a meal.  It's an interesting dynamic, ostensibly cutting the "male gaze" out of the situation (at least overall, besides sequences of Fanning with photographers...).  

I want something else to comment on other than visual flourishes, but it really is that kind of movie.  Another brief pseudo-seductive moment between Fanning and Malone that works quite well, but it really is brief...then there is a gorgeous and surrealistic sequences on a photoshoot set where we get to some male gaze stuff...it's a strange and difficult scene, but its worked rather expertly.  It's surreal, and creepy, and it feels dangerous but somehow transcendent, almost clinically un-erotic...feel like this movie is going to test my vocabulary in more than a few ways.  Desmond Harringtons complete lack of emotion seems to present an almost sociopathic approach to the world of modeling: that there is no feeling beneath it, just that clinical precision...its strange and beautiful, and almost anti-beauty at the same time.  A cold, unfeeling approach to beauty.  

I'm still trying to get a handle on what this movie is actually about, other than the (again) rather straightforward metaphors about predatory instincts and the superficial and soulless approach to mass-produced beauty industry...there's a little commentary on the average being unique in a conformist world(quite a bit of it actually: Elle is presented as stunningly ordinary but everyone reacts to her as if she is the most beautiful thing ever), but there's still not much of a plot in sight.  This movie brings to mind Argento, Black Swan and a little Mulholland Drive but, as I said earlier, I'm not sure yet if that's a blessing or a curse at this point.  Those comparisons are extraordinary, but it remains to be seen if that comparison will ruin it as a whole.  Will it just be a comparison film, or be a unique work of art....

Keanu Reeves is doing an excellent aggressive performance...he's playing it completely disgusting but it has a comedic effect while being undeniably menacing.  It's a fascinating little role for him to be playing.  Not sure this movie needed male roles at all, but their minimalist caricature presentations (scum bag, nice guy, unfeeling artist) is at least marginally effective.   I wish the story gave a little bit more to it, though...most of the interactions she has with other models are so obvious in their opinions that it feels almost comical.  But then, as soon as it jumps back into a long, visually gorgeous scene with a low key synth score all of that wishy washy dialogue stuff mostly melts away.

I'm wondering if the shallow dialogue and obvious metaphorical pretension is deliberate, as a meta example of the shallow lack of personality in the world of modeling?  Like, all this beautiful imagery ultimately means nothing because it lacks substance and reality?  It's difficult to say.  I really can't tell if it's that or just poorly written.  Representation of shallow subject matter, or shallow representation of subject matter?

I've thoroughly enjoyed all scenes between Fanning and Malone: they are so unusual, so predatory and...just very strange.  Ethereal would be a good word for them. The film is at its best when its attempting wordless transcendence, visual representations of identity, and being nigh incomprehensible.  When it attempts any sort of landing, or attempts to be grounded, it sputters and flops.  I'm not sure I've seen a film that can only handle the big stuff but not be able to handle fundamentals. It's a fascinating exercise, at any rate.

Hmm...not sure if the movie jumped the shark or reached its most brilliant height...at any rate, it went weirder than ever, in an entirely different direction.  Malone is kinda nailing it, though.  I won't give anything away, but...shit just got real.  It's odd that more menace wasn't quite utilized in the build up to the climax, it just sneaks up on the viewer suddenly without warning.  Again, I'm not sure its ineffective...or if it's a strong choice...I'll need to take a few minutes to do the math on it when it's over with.  In the meantime, I'm gonna watch this very...unusual creative move happen.

Final Thoughts: I feel like I can say without hesitation that The Neon Demon is one of the weirdest films I've seen in awhile, and I'm going to go out on a limb and say that that is a good thing.  Visually the film is almost beyond reproach: contrast, composition, color, lighting, and staging make it on par with anything I've seen.  Earlier, I compared it to Argento, Lynch and Aronofsky, and wondered if that was a blessing or a curse and now that the credits have rolled, the movie has ended and I've stepped away for a much needed cigarette and a good think, I have decided that it is a positive one.  The movie belongs in the sort of artistic category of films like Suspiria, Black Swan and Mulholland Drive, even if it doesn't quite reach the heights those films did (two of them being among the top five horror films of the 21st century) but it's close.  While the dialogue occasionally is choppy, the metaphor unsubtle and overall production uneven, it's difficult to condemn it for that...as I mentioned earlier, I'm not so sure the shallowness of everything isn't a specific choice made to underscore the greater themes of coveted beauty, lack of depth and the sucking of soul from beauty.  

At it's best, it's a weird, slightly uneven art piece, at its worst a beautiful disaster, and either of them aren't necessarily a detractor.  Whether or not the films weaknesses are expertly disguised strengths or not, the film is undeniably a hypnotic, engaging viewing experience that confounds most conventional logic and taste.  

Final Rating: Y'know what?  Gonna go with Four Stars.  While I find myself unable to commit to loving or hating it, I cannot deny its effect.  Solid work.

Movie 161: Slaughter High (1986)

 Starring: Caroline Munro, Simon Scuddamore, Carmine Iannaccone, Donna Yeager, Gary Martin.
Director: George Dugdale, Mark Ezra, Peter Litten.

Well, it's April Fools Day, technically, and Slaughter High was originally titled "April Fool's Day" and takes place on the titular day as well, so it seems like a fitting beginning.  We'll follow up with other April Fool's films tomorrow, but for tonight(well, this morning) we'll focus on this little gem from the mid-eighties slasher craze.  If memory serves, it's actually a rather fun little film with a lot of charm, but it's been a long time since I've checked it out.

Hey, we have a score from Harry Manfredini...and, wait, three directors?  I seriously had no idea about that, and I usually know that kind of thing.  Caroline Munro, I know, though...a scream queen in her own right with huge...tracts of land.  Anyway, we have a pretty simple set up here: nerdy Marty is lured into a prank by Munro under false promises of locker room sex, and hilarity ensues.  Marty, of course, is really exceptionally lame: I wonder if the prank would have been satisfying to this group of "cool" kids if Marty acted like a human being instead of a cast-off from Revenge of the Nerds.  Anyway, Caroline convinces Marty to get into the shower, turns it on...gets him naked and the group of punks throw open the shower and take a picture of him naked, spray him with soap, rub him down with a sponge, and give a swirley...all on the guys birthday.  Only Caroline shows even the slightest amount of remorse...the coach comes in and finds this all occurring and forces all the punks to go the gym and run laps...and, of course, our bullies blame Marty for this punishment.  I was bullied in High School but never to this level of cruelty.  The Coach gives it to 'em pretty good, though...except two of the punks have skipped the punishment to further torment Marty...and Marty hasn't figured out that Caroline led him into a trap.  So he accepts a joint from his tormentors that makes him sick, and while he's throwing up, the ringleader screws with Marty's chemistry experiment that then blows up and hideously scars his face.  Ha ha.  April Fools.

I mean, I think even I would have picked on Marty.  I'm not proud of that, but anyone THIS ridiculous would be way too easy of a target.  Not that I would have ever gone as far as these assholes did...but, yeah.  To be fair to the jerks, they clearly didn't really mean to create a situation that would hideously scar the guy...but, three pranks in a row is still pretty excessive any way to slice it...also, screenwriting wise, it's really a long way around.  It's taken an absurdly long time to get to this accident that assuredly creates a super villain.  Anyway, the jerks witness Marty's start of darkness and are understandably feeling kind of bad about it...at least to the point that Caroline Munro wakes up from a nightmare about it years later.  Not sure if waking up is an improvement, though: she lives in one of the ugliest apartments I've ever seen, and apparently she's an actress.  So, living nightmare.

Also, in a pretty clumsy transition: Caroline is going to her High School Reunion.  Off she drives in her Voltswagon Beetle to her surprisingly secluded, countryside high school.  Oh, no, wait, sorry: the beetle belongs to Skip or whatever...the ringleader captain of the team/class clown(somehow that combination occurred)...anyway.  Seriously, this is one secluded high school...and apparently it's abandoned?  How does a high school get abandoned?  And did these characters not keep in touch with anyone outside their immediate group of friends?  No one else?  It gets dark and they don't go back to town, instead deciding to break into the dark, clearly abandoned high school.

At least with Harry Manfredini doing the score we get a Friday the 13th music sting when one of the dolts jumps out with a Jason mask on.  He even makes a direct reference to the film...which makes it even odder that these guys are wandering into a horror film scenario.  They find a room with decorations and Marty's old yearbook, and there's some exposition and the janitor shows up...and then he gets killed.  The characters play some jokes on each other that are...well, a little funny, anyway.  The bit where they bet Skip that he couldn't drop a quarter into a funnel stuck into his pants and then dumped water down it is pretty good.

The first of the characters that isn't a lowly janitor is killed during the party scene when one of the randos drinks an acid beer...and his stomach inflates and explodes in a big gooey mess.  The rest of the party bolts for it, only to find they're locked in and can't escape.  The stomach burst effect was actually pretty solid...looked good.

Know what's never a good idea?  Full black on screen.  Eventually the guy manages to show up under some lighting, but it takes a minute or so to get there.  I never really bought the "killer in the car" gag under these circumstances: the guy runs out with the keys to Carol's car, and Marty is inside.  How did Marty know which car the guy would go for?  Or, did he see him and instead jumped into it while nobody could see him?  I guess that's possible.

One of the dingbats decides to take a bath, which I'm not even sure where she'd find a bathtub in a high school, but somehow Marty rigged the plumbing to dump acid into the bath, and she melts.  Actually, right up until the last moment where her face dissolves in a time lapsed claymation effect, the death looks pretty good again: her body is covered by burns and stuff, and the girl has quite the pair of lungs on her.  Her scream is among the best.

Marty must have been worth a fortune...in order to fully rig this old abandoned school with death traps, electrified windows and such...I can't imagine how much that would cost.  Apparently being a hideously scarred psychopath pays really well.

One of the girls is married to one of the dolts...and was sleeping with one of the other guys, and apparently she and the other guy have a child that the husband-dolt thinks the kid is his.  Classy folks.  And then an impotence joke.  Hilarity.  I can't think of anything more inappropriate than having sex after two or three of your friends had died horribly...in typical horror film fashion, they're murdered in the middle of the act by an electrified bed.  Again, Marty really has his shit together.

Seems like we're already down to three: Skip, Caroline and the hippy girl whose name I didn't catch. Skip starts demanding that Marty show himself, yelling threats and the like...maybe not the best way to approach the situation.  But, considering that Skip asks "what do you want from us" and doesn't seem to understand that all Marty wants is their untimely deaths...I dunno, maybe try saying sorry?  Do they make a "sorry we inadvertently scarred you horribly" hallmark card?

Oh, Nancy is the hippy girls name...Nancy blames Caroline and Skip for all the carnage(which isn't entirely inaccurate, since they were the primary offenders) but quickly backs down.  Skip is convinced that Marty will leave them along after mid-day, which makes absolutely no sense.  I don't think time factors all that much in Marty's psychotic plan to exact murderous revenge.  Wait, April Fools ends at noon?  Where did that come from?  Hmm, research says it ends at Noon...in the UK.  I don't think this movie is supposed to be taking place there, though...Nancy is clearly cracking, Skip appears to have been hung.  Caroline is the only one keeping things together.

Marty furthers the mind games by playing the video of him being pranked, and Nancy runs for it.  Apparently Nancy succeeds where everyone else has failed and manages to get outside in no time...only to be herded into a pit full of hot mud or something.  Nancy almost makes it out, but Marty shoves her back in...which is apparently fatal.  Now Caroline gets to do the final girl panic and run around finding corpses, which is always fun, especially with the Manfredini music.  He really is one of my favorite composers.  Caroline wacks Marty with a bat, but then she, uh, drops it...and all the light bulbs burst(really, where did he get funding?!)...y'know, the photography isn't bad, either.  The simplistic, maze-like set design actually creates a sense of disorientation when combined with the narrow focus camera shots and steady-cam moves.

Adding to my "Caroline's life is actually a waking nightmare" thesis is her outfit. It looks like she made her own outfit out of bedsheets...parachute pants, big cumbersome belt over her stomach.  It's kind of awful.  So I'm not sure being attacked by Marty is even the worst thing to happen to her.  Did I mention that Marty has a jester mask, and that it's actually kind of cool?  I probably should have.  Oh, it turns out Skip wasn't dead...well, until he staggered in front of Caroline and she embedded a hatchet in his head. Oops.  April Fools, dude.

Despite having a run in with a strange death trap in the locker room the first time she was in there, Caroline runs back into it a second time anyway, hiding in the shower where she pranked Marty the first time.  Marty follows her in...takes off his mask, and plunges a spear right into her chest.  Marty then celebrates in crazy person fashion...until he hears the voices of his victims taunting him.  Actually, according to my research, the April Fools tradition they were citing earlier actually suggests that anyone who performs a prank after mid-day is the actual April Fool, so considering that he killed Caroline after noon might be why the ghosts of his victims are harassing him.

Except they aren't, because in another variation on the April Fools theme, this movie is an April Fools on the audience themselves:  the whole movie has actually been the fever dream psychotic fantasy of Marty in the hospital, apparently shortly after his accident.  For whatever reason, even though the alarm is going off, the Doctor takes his time responding, opting instead to finish his paperwork.  Marty kills the nurse, throws on her outfit, kills the Doc and starts ripping his own skin off as the movie draws to a close.

Final Thoughts: There's a clever element to the "all a dream" thing, considering that the movie was originally supposed to be called "April Fools Day" and playing with that concept.  It's not necessarily a great idea-and was done considerably better by April Fools Day-but there is an intelligence to it that is admirable.  For what is ostensibly a pretty straight-forward 1980's slasher flick, this works pretty well.  Some of the deaths are admittedly inventive(well, somewhat, anyway) and the effects are mostly well done, and the killer has a pretty striking look that even plays off of the absurdity of the entire scenario and the personalities of his victims.  It's pretty standard stuff, but there's a sense of charm here.

Final Rating: Two and a Half stars.

Movie 160: Leprechaun 3 (1995)

Starring: Warwick Davis, John Gatins, Lee Armstrong, John DeMita, Caroline Williams, Michael Callan.

Director: Brian Trenchard-Smith.

I have no idea how Leprechaun became an actual franchise that sustained as many films as it did (I'm stopping before I get to anything involving him hanging out with rappers, because even I have my limits), but somehow it became an actual thing that spanned six films and a (loose) remake.  I kind of get having a part two but...six movies?  Anyway, let's just keep going.  Think this one takes place in Las Vegas which...well, okay, that makes sense.

The fact that I'm sitting here watching Leprechaun 3 just fully settled on me and for one terrifying moment I questioned my entire worth as a human being.  I broke into a cold sweat, staring around the room, wondering if my entire life has been a waste, whether or not THIS was IT.  What if I die tonight, and the last thing I did was watch this series?  Have I accomplished anything of note in my 34 years of life?!

Then I realized that I've probably seen a lot worse.  I have sat through Demonic Toys 2 and Ten after all.

The movie opens with some derelict guy dragging a statue of the Leprechaun with a medallion over its neck to a pawn shop.  The guy gives him twenty bucks, complains about the medallion being fake(as he puts it on?) and the statue comes alive and attacks the pawn shop guy.  No pogo stick, though...instead he bites the guys toe off...

Oh, young lady, you don't want to be hitchhiking in Las Vegas.  You might end up attracting our creepy nerd of a lead character.  Anyway, he offers to explain to her what's wrong with her car: she breezes out and he says "You don't want to know this, do you?"  She says no.  I riff: "Learning how to help myself is dumb."  He agrees to give her a ride...the Leprechaun realizes he dropped a coin in the pawn shop.  Why does he keep carrying his gold around anyway?

Our blonde female star is apparently a magician...well, she's an assistant but wants to have her own act.Then we keep cutting back to our "foreign" stereotype pawn shop who looks at a cheap internet site to learn about Leprechauns, finds the coin and grabs a gun planning to kill the little bastard.  But, um, dude: the Leprechaun literally ate your toe.  Why would even assume a gun would work?  It's a magical creature.  I'm not sure why the pacing is so weird: it seems like the pawn shop story should have been your opener(and several minutes shorter) and then have the two leads do their little "meet-cute" nonsense, then tie the two together.  Instead we bounce back and forth.  It's irritating, but not as irritating as Scott, our lead: this nerd is supposed to be small town naive but, seriously: how can someone be so completely blown away by seeing gambling?  It's a casino, not the grand canyon.

Unsurprisingly, the magician Tammy works for is a total tool, and the...Jesus Christ Scott's parents gave him a check for $23,000?  That's bonkers.  Anyway, what I was I going to say?  Oh, right, something about insulting gender roles and a lot of obvious "wishes" our cast of characters are going to make...and Scott has just thrown down all that cash on a single game of roulette?  That's so painful I almost want to shut the movie off.  But, we're back to the Leprechaun/Pawn shop owner story for some reason.  Why hasn't this ended?  We're back to the kid losing all twenty-three grand which is utterly terrifying and almost entirely impossible.  Nobody is actually that dumb.

For the love of all that is holy why is this pawn shop story STILL HAPPENING?!  Scott should have ended up with that gold coin like twenty minutes ago.  Can we get on with this?  Okay, finally, Scott has entered the pawn shop to sell his watch so he can STILL GAMBLE, and then he uses the gold coin to make a wish to be back at the casino on a winning streak...apparently the coin grants the wishes without the actual power of the Leprechaun?  The video did suggest that, in this film, the Leprechaun's power comes from the gold and without it he's useless...oh, well.  Doesn't really matter, since we just have the Leprechaun making puns about the names of casinos, which just kind of irritates me.

Scott might be among the most irritatingly stupid characters I've seen in a film.  This movie is making me really, really mad.  The Leprechaun having a sight gag with an Elvis impersonator did not improve my mood.  At all.

This is supposed to be funny but it's just putting me on edge.  Everyone is trying to steal Scotts money and it's a farcical attempt to riff on "Midsummer Nights Dream" or whatever, with everyone looking for the coin and getting wishes and sexist and stupid stuff.  And now Scott is going to become a Leprechaun and...oh, why am I bothering?

A man was just electrocuted to death by a boob robot, and the Leprechaun beat up two loan sharks with a shaleleigh. Then he causes a Woman's butt, boobs and lips  expand to horrific sizes and...she explodes.  It wasn't really horrfying in the horror movie sense, but in the "geez, that's ugly and sexist and insulting."  

Final Thoughts: I had designs on doing the fourth film in the series but I just don't think I can bring myself to go ahead with it.  This third film was so awful that I think it actually threw my back out somehow.

Final Rating: One Star.

Movie 159: Leprechaun 2 (1994)

Starring: Warwick Davis, Charlie Heath, Shevonne Durkin, Sandy Baron, Adam Biesk, James Lancaster.

Director: Rodman Flender.

I don't remember the last time I watched Leprechaun 2.  I probably saw it once...pretty sure this is the one with the girl who would become the titular monsters bride if she sneezed three times or something?  Probably the only really interesting thing about any of these films is the general assumption that every single Leprechaun is basically identical.  There's no continuity to speak of so there isn't really a reason to believe that he's the same exact dude.  But, anyway, there's a movie happening.

A thousand years ago the Leprechaun had a slave and the Leprechaun says that it's Saint Patrick's Day and, as such, he is going to chose a bride.  If a young woman sneezes three times and nobody says "Bless you" than she is forced to marry the little shit and the slave goes free.  The slave is all on board until he finds out the girl in question is his Daughter.  So he says "bless you" and the Leprechaun places a curse on the family line: in a thousand years the Leprechaun will marry his descendant, which really probably shouldn't concern the slave too much since he'll likely be dead by then.

A title card reading "ONE THOUSAND YEARS LATER" made me laugh, I have to admit.  Then there is Clint Howard and Kimmy Robertson being suckered by a guy who does a haunted hollywood tour...apparently he's the boyfriend of our pretty blonde lead...whose accent is kind of odd...?  Anyway, the tourists apparently are totally willing to wait around for an hour while the kid goes and gets his boss who is enjoying all-day happy hour and is not particularly appealing.  

I'm glad they're showing me this kid taking a group of tourists on a crappy haunted hollywood tour.  I really feel like that was a good use of screen time, especially when that transitions into a drunken bum sleeping next to a tree on Harry Houdini's property that happens to be the home of the Leprechaun.  Because the tree has a sign on it that says "a gift from your friend in Ireland" which...uh...what?  

The Leprechaun comes out of the tree with the bums bottle of whiskey and takes a swig.  He then spits it out, complaining that it's a bottle of Canadian Whiskey.  "The only whiskey is Irish whiskey" The Leprechaun exclaims.  No argument here, Leprechaun.  Kind of wish I had some of that.  

Anyway, our two leads go to the go-kart track (because that's what adults do on dates...but they may not be adults?  Later the kid is only able to be released by the police to his legal guardian?) and the girl is delighted when her friend at the track notices that she changed her hair and finds someone to cover his shift so they could hang out...I think we're supposed to be on the side of the boyfriend(which, I mean, a guy has to make a buck so I wouldn't necessarily blame him for still making sure the tour goes on), but the other guy does seem nicer...well, okay, guess not.  Ian is being an asshole.  Calls her a tease and a stuck up bitch because she won't put out after he took the night off and bought her chili dogs.  Classy guy.  Glad the Leprechaun is about to kill him.  Wait, why did that scene need nudity and porn music?  I mean, she has nice breasts I suppose, but...anyway, it's weird. 

Warwick Davis being genuinely amused by his own antics tends to help: when he rips off a business man's finger and licks it, shouting "finger licking good" and basically convulsing with his own laughter...it's actually kinda funny.  He does it again when our lead opens the door and sees a man hanging there: the Leprechaun thinks this is unbelievably funny, like he literally forgot he put the corpse there.  

There's some creepy sexist things happening here: the Leprechaun places a collar on the girl, and immediately seeks out sex and talking about changing her body and face to carry his litter...I mean, he IS the villain so I guess that makes sense but it still is creeping me out in a not-so-fun way. I'm really uncomfortable now.

Apparently the Police (who spontaneously appeared for no reason) think our lead male, Cody, is responsible for killing the douche from earlier and possibly for kidnapping Bridget because they found flowers from him?  Not super bright cops.  Then Cody reads a bunch of stuff about the Leprechaun's powers and weaknesses (he can be hurt by rot iron)...and he has a gold coin so the Leprechaun is hunting him.  There's some mildly amusing dialogue from Morty, Cody's friend.

Oh, movie: now a black man dressed as a leprechaun hanging out chocolate gold coins?  At least it's brief.  I actually do kind of like the drinking contest scene, though: they had established that the bartender had a "red special rye" bottle (which was soda and seltzer), and so Morty uses it as a decoy, goading the Leprechaun into drinking actual whiskey while he drinks the fake booze.  I could have done without all the dwarf actors chanting "one of us" the whole time...but Davis has fun with it.  Even the music starts being off kilter as the Leprechaun is drunk.  It's actually a pretty good scene.

Morty fell for the oldest trick in the book: had the Leprechaun dead to rights and wishes for the pot of gold without thinking about adding conditions.  So the gold gets teleported into Morty's stomach.  Then Morty uses his other wishes to basically release the Leprechaun and die.  But that's irony for you.  Why the Leprechaun didn't just do that forty minutes ago (pretty sure Cody would have given up the gold if he was rotting from the inside out) is beyond me....

"Have you had your iron today?"  Ouch, that line was really bad.

I think we're coming up on the climax: Cody has entered the Leprechaun's lair, Bridget is trying to escape, etc.  Bridget looks pretty good in her red dress and slippers...even if it's all kind of demeaning.  Again, he's the villain so that's a thing but it's still creepy.  This finale really is taking it's sweet time, though: fighting skeletons and getting wrapped in brambles which just go away...and Bridget could just pick the lock to remove her magic collar thingy?  Seems like that could have happened awhile ago, too.

Cody outsmarts the Leprechaun and the Leprechaun explodes after being stabbed with rot iron which, again, probably could have happened twenty minutes ago, really.  

Final Thoughts:  Davis has a bunch of energy that is somewhat appealing, and there's one or two good scenes in there.  But mostly it's...well, it's not good.  Still, you could make an argument that it's a better movie than, say, Boondock Saints.

Final Rating: Two Stars.

Movie 158: Leprechaun (1991)

Starring: Warwick Davis, Jennifer Aniston, Ken Olandt, Mark Holton, Robert Gorman.

Director: Mark Jones.

It's St.Patrick's Day, so...well, this should be a no-brainer, right?  I'm old enough to remember thinking "the girl from Leprechaun is super gorgeous" before knowing who Jennifer Aniston was, so there's that.  Before her famous hair and massively successful television show, she was the star of a crappy horror flick about a hammy Warwick Davis...which goes to show you that anyone can blow up under the right circumstances.  These days Aniston is so big she wouldn't even notice stepping on everyone involved in this film long enough to scrape them off her shoe.  But everyone starts somewhere.

We open with an aging Irishman fulfilling various stereotypes as a half drunk man who apparently stole the pot of gold from a Leprechaun, and his Wife mocks his story.  She then falls down the stairs fleeing from Warwick Davis, which seems even more unbelievable than the actual existence of Leprechauns.  The Leprechaun fears four leaf clovers and...well, bullets make him sleepy or something?  The old Irishman shoots him a couple of times and apparently incapacitates him and tosses him into a crate, but as soon as he's in the crate he wakes up and mocks the guy for a bit...then the guy has a stroke and dies before he can set the crate on fire.  The Leprechaun finds this amusing, even though he's stuck in a crate for basically forever.

Ten years later and here comes Jennifer Aniston with her Father...apparently this is North Dakota.  Aniston is a high society girl who wishes she was in L.A.  She's super likable, obviously...well, no, she isn't.  Sarcasm doesn't translate to the written word well.  She runs into hunky Nathan(I fully approve of the name), who basically tricks her into agreeing to stick around by challenging her sense of female equality...it'd be a weird scene if it weren't deliberately meant the way it is.  Nathan obviously ISN'T sexist, and she sticks up for her gender pretty quickly.  

Nineties fashion was pretty fantastic: Aniston rocks jean shorts with floral patches and L.A. Looks Sneakers.  It's really great.  She warms up pretty quickly once she starts hanging with Nathan, and her natural charisma starts to shine through.  Meanwhile, mentally disabled Ozzy ends up running into the Leprechaun and, because mentally disabled, nobody believes him.  Despite the Leprechaun really wanting his stuff back, he decides to be subtle for awhile...makes a lot of sense.  Ozzy sees a rainbow and runs off to look for the end and annoying little brat Alex follows after him.  Ozzy swallows a gold coin and Alex is hoping to hide the gold to pay for an operation to make Ozzy smarter.  Meanwhile the Leprechaun grabs Jennifer's leg.  She thinks it's Nathan and kind of likes it, then the Leprechaun scratches her.  The only thing good to come of it is this exchange:

"Something was touching me.  I thought it was Nathan feeling my leg."

Nathan, with a grin: "You'd let me?"  

Anyway, Leprechaun injures Aniston's Dad, so they go into town to take him to a hospital.  Alex leaves a coin with a pawn broker.  The Leprechaun shows up after Alex and Ozzy have left, popping out of a safe.  The Pawn Broker gives the coin back, and then something truly magical happens.  The Leprechaun shows up with a pogo stick.  The Broker screams "NOOOOO!  NOOO!" and then the Leprechaun jumps up and down saying "This old man, he played one, he played pogo on his lung" until the guy is dead.  I think Mark Jones should have been involved in the space program or some sort of humanitarian effort because any man who could write a scene about a dwarf killing a man with a pogo stick could probably solve all the worlds problems.

I don't know if it's me or the movie, but I don't seem to be making any momentum with this post.  It's probably both the movie AND me but...well, it's not like there's a lot to analyze or discuss with this film.  I mean, what is there to really say about it?  Warwick Davis has a lot of energy and borders on entertaining?  Jennifer Aniston is really lovely and has a lot of charisma(which is obvious because it's why she became a mega star)?  I mean, both of those things are true but are also self evident.  Actually, I might add that Ken Olandt as Nathan isn't so bad, either...there's occasionally some interesting uses of handheld camera work.  The trouble is that the film isn't really scary or funny, and it desperately wants to be both of those things.  Not sure the addition of an annoying would-be Feldman and/or a mentally disabled guy as central cast members was a particularly wise choice, either.  

On the plus side, though: The Leprechaun just made a weaponized vehicle out of a lawnmower and a pitchfork.  And then used it to knock over a pickup truck.  So, well, there IS that.

Y'know, it's interesting that the Leprechaun basically has seemingly unlimited power but still spends time to chase people down and bite them.  He literally has shown the ability to teleport and use telekinesis at least, it seems like physical encounters would be entirely unnecessary.  I mean, there's the throw away lines of his powers not being at their peak without his actual gold, but that doesn't seem to be holding him back much.  It's like if Freddy decided to instead kick people in the balls while they were awake, or Pinhead getting into boxing matches.

Okay, so old man O'grady from the beginning is still alive.  I think he miraculously recovered when the screenwriter realized the film needed some stretching...well, okay, also O'Grady knows how to kill a Leprechaun.  Ozzy probably could have just as easily related that information, though.

Unlimited power but the Leprechaun can't seem to handle wearing roller skates, or prevent himself from crashing into a fence.  Then Aniston enters the old folks home or whatever and sneaks past the sleeping guard(who has a badge?) instead of say getting his help like she was trying to do ten minutes ago.  She...oh, boy, this all just came together and it's so badly written it makes me want to punch myself.  Tori drove her jeep to town to get info on how to kill a Leprechaun but didn't, say, go to the police and send an ambulance for Nathan and the others?  Why didn't she use that jeep forty minutes ago?  

Hey, one genuine laugh!  Ozzy makes the heroic gesture to save Alex (and gets cut the fuck up as a result: seriously, respect), and the Leprechaun chases after him.  As he runs past Nathan, he utters "How's your leg?" and smacks the guys knee.  It's actually kind of funny.  Also funny: The Leprechaun crawls out of the well half melted and reiterates that he wants his gold: so Nathan runs over and hits the shell of a Leprechaun in the face with the butt of the rifle and then blows the well up with gasoline.  

Final Thoughts:  I don't think there's much else to add.  It's pretty terrible, other than some of the nicer things I said throughout this blog.  

Final Rating: Two Stars.

Movie 157: A Nightmare on Elm Street (2010)

Starring: Jackie Earle Haley, Rooney Mara, Kyle Gallner, Katie Cassidy, Thomas Dekker, Clancy Brown, Connie Britton.

Director: Samuel Bayer.

I didn't really mind the remake of A Nightmare on Elm Street the way many people did.  I've discussed my general mindset on reboots and the like before on this blog, and nothing has changed:  I see them as no different than making another adaptation of Shakespeare.  It's a piece of fiction being redone in a new fashion for a new audience.  It's fine.  But, even for remakes, I found this one to largely be mostly watchable.  It certainly is better than Freddy's Dead at any rate.

I made a few allusions to a greater mindset on the remake and fan response to the sequels and how it all tied together.  My general thesis statement on that score is this: the remake is basically the movie the fans said they wanted, and they rejected it.  Over the years people complained about the franchise softening up on Freddy: he wasn't as "dark" as he used to be, and they needed another movie where he became scary again.  The trouble with this is that, even back in Craven's original film, the character was hardly dark.  The concept was a dark, but the character's most frightening and resonant trait was how amused he was by everything.  It was never about "dark", really, it was about gallows humor.  In addition to that, Craven was smart and educated enough to realize he was making direct allusions to trickster Gods from ancient myth, but that's for a much larger piece on the series.  

My point is that the fan base was seeing something that wasn't there.  But they said they wanted dark.  So, the remake comes along and this thing is dark as fuck.  The fan base claimed they wanted the molestation angle brought up again, and the remake did it.  Jackie Earle Haley plays the character as a molester, a rapist, a monster...his makeup is horrific, his stance is highly aggressive.  In short, he drops Englund's hammy performance.  He and the movie are "dark."  And yet, everyone hates it.  Be careful what you wish for.

Anyway, we get a quick introduction to the concept and characters: Katie Cassidy is our decoy protagonist (taking the Amanda Wyss role of Tina from the original, though she's called Chris here), witnessing the death of her friend at a diner.  Working at the diner is Nancy, our actual star, played by Academy Award Nominee Rooney Mara (shortly before her star making turn in the remake of Girl with the Dragon Tattoo), and Quentin has a crush on her.  Then TV star Thomas Dekker plays Jesse, Chris's ex boyfriend.  Her friend dies at the diner, and Chris attempts to confide in Jesse that she thinks something horrible is going on.  Nancy agrees with her.  Nancy's Mom is played by Connie Britton, who is also now famous after turns on American Horror Story and Nashville.  Clancy Brown shows up, too.  It's a good cast.  I love Katie Cassidy (but I'll try not to retread that subject, I did it enough when I did Black X-mas), and I'm psyched that she's out decoy protagonist at the start.  Even though she wears Uggs. 

There are things I could do without in this film, though: my earlier statements about the miscommunication between fans and the creators should not be misconstrued as a total endorsement of the film.  I certainly don't think it's a great flick by any means.  I think it's mostly merely okay.  The first real scare of the film goes to Freddy being surprisingly quick and violence, pinning Chris to the ground and growling "Remember me?"  It actually isn't bad.

I really do think Jackie Earle Haley did a strong job as the character, and the makeup effects on him are very decent.  He may not be Englund, but that isn't necessarily a bad thing.  As I said earlier, Englund had a very specific vision for the character: it was pretty hammy and humorous.  That was fun, and he was great, but it isn't necessarily the ONLY read for the character.  Haley brings some of that humor to the role, but mostly seems pre-occupied with being evil and aggressive, and I think it actually works really well.  Different doesn't mean wrong, and hell: there are eight movies with Englund performances in them, and they'll always be there.

Thomas Dekker does okay with his role, even if he does seem a little young to be dating Katie Cassidy.  Honestly, really, expecting me to believe that Katie Cassidy is a high schooler is a bit odd.  She gives a good performance, but it really is kind of absurd to tell me she's a teenager.  His character is a little uneven, too: we don't know much about him besides being Chris' ex, and he's kind of a jerk.  

I think the main issue with this film is that it's a little by-the-numbers.  Chris' nightmare goes in some okay places, but the whole blue filter look mostly feels a little cliched at this point.  Haley gives some good creeps as Freddy throughout the dream, especially when Chris wanders around an abandoned elementary school as she hears him count down for hide and seek.  Then they do a halfway decent catapult nightmare misdirect, which I enjoy.  However, this film falls prey to problems that a lot of remakes do: the line between strong referencing and adaptation and direct lifting for the source material is a very fine one, and I'm not sure this film walks it properly.  I feel like it's either the Shakespeare thing(basically always the same with a few tweaks) or complete reinvention.  When you try to have both, things tend to get messy, and this film lands there more often than not.

Jesse, locked up for murdering Chris, suffers from a dream while inside that ultimately gets him killed.  I read somewhere that actor Dekker purposefully wanted to "scream like a girl" to buck traditional gender roles in horror, which is pretty cool of him.  The sequence itself is appropriately dingy and colored with reds, yellows and oranges, making it look hot and sweaty and hellish.  The CGI blood effects don't do it any favors...and Haley once again gives some strong moments.  Haley plays the character with a lot of anger, too...he's a ball of rage.  It's an interesting take.

Meanwhile, Nancy and Quentin continue to have virtually no chemistry...I'm not sure whose fault it is, either.  Don't get me wrong, I actually think Rooney Mara is incredibly talented.  This movie, though...well, she seems to be playing aloof or detached a little too much, to the point where she isn't making enough of a presence of herself.  Kyle Gallner more or less falls under the same category.  Though it isn't really fair of me to assign "fault" and I apologize for that.  Chemistry is it's own strange alchemy and some actors just don't have it together.  Mara and Gallner don't have any together.

The revisiting of the bathtub scene really wasn't super necessary, but that isn't really the movies fault.  I was making an argument just the other day about this film in a discussion over the inherent self-referential nature of remakes, and on "fan service."  The argument I made was that fans have made fan service an unfortunate given: people complain when remakes aren't "true to the original" and, as such, filmmakers feel compelled to throw in scenes that are directly lifted from the source material.  Unfortunately, film makers are generally too afraid to let remakes be themselves.

There are some very lovely dream images in this film when allowed to do it's own thing, though; when Nancy returns from her bath and finds it snowing in her room, it's some strong set dressing and effects work, especially as she moves through the room to the elementary school from Chris' dream earlier...actually, that whole sequence was really well done, right down to her encounter with Freddy.  Interestingly enough, Mara and Haley DO work well together.  And, again, Haley brings that creepy, dark, sexual predator energy to the party.  It's creepy stuff.

The flashback is, again, suitably upsetting: the "Freddy is molester" element that was simply hinted at in the original roars its way to the foreground here, to the point that I feel like this movie is allowed to get TOO "dark."  Like, the fantastic elements of the series which ultimately make it moderately harmless and fun are superseded by a really unpleasant element that is, again, what a lot of fans said they wanted.  I think it works better as an insinuation than it does as a full fledged plot element, even if it does offer a fairly interesting misdirect: that Freddy may have been innocent of his crimes which, while interesting, definitely had me worried for awhile.  Had they really played that card, I would have been quite irritated.  The directness of the molestation element does provide suitable motivation for the parents to lynch the guy, it's just...unpleasant.  

I always found it a little odd how readily they wrote themselves into a corner in regards to sequels.  Nancy's research finds that she and Quentin are literally the only ones left, which means that sequels would have basically been impossible.  

Not sure how I feel about the "Nancy and Quentin look like junkies" thing.  It makes enough sense, it's just not super effective.  I DO like the Pharmacy scene with Nancy drifting in and out of the market and the dream world.  It's a pretty impressive scene production wise.  Again, when this movie does its own thing with the dream stuff, it's capable of going to some decent places creatively and visually. Rooney is doing some better work, too, as time goes on.  The script doesn't always give her the best dialogue to work with, and she still has very awkward chemistry with her co-star, but she's cutting a more final girl figure as things move along.  I am a fan of Rooney Mara.

Once again, the climax keeps proving a lot of my point:  there's a lot of good stuff going on throughout this sequence except when it feels the need to directly point out that it's a remake.  Nancy confronts him, hides in the closet...and then she sinks into ground and Freddy makes his own real one-liner, and it's ripped off from Part 4.  Then things go back to being unpleasant again as Freddy basically dresses Nancy up in little girl clothes and makes some pretty upsetting statements on what he wants from her...like I said, TOO dark.  Haley is playing the role very well, and Mara is giving as good as she gets, but the content just gets a little too intense to be much fun.

CGI blood effects are the worst.  So is the "You're in my world now, bitch" line.  Mara doesn't even seen comfortable saying it.  The last scare looks terrible.  Meh.

Final Thoughts:  It's not a great film, but for what it is...well, this isn't so bad a film.  I'd argue that it's actually quite good when it's being allowed to do what it wants to, which is be it's own film.  The Nightmare sequences, performance ques and dialogue that isn't ripped from the original series mostly are pretty well done.  The film does get too "dark" for it's own good, though: too often does it get carried away in trying to be edgy to the point of no longer being any fun whatsoever.  Seeing a young woman weep over finding nude photos of her five year old self really isn't the kind of thing a film about a dream monster with knife fingers should probably be about.  Between that and awkward fan service moments, things never quite reach the heights they probably should.  Still, enough of it is decent enough that it's not a total loss.

Final Rating: Two and a Half stars.