Dark Skies

I have loved horror for years now. I could talk for a while about what decades stand out for me in the genre, who's the best scream queen and why George Romero makes such good zombie films. The family idea and building a creepy and intense atmosphere usually work for me. Classical films like Poltergeist, Pet Sematary and Cujo are some of my favorites. Insidious from 2011 is the closest recent horror movie like this. Now in 2013, comes Dark Skies which is somewhat similar to Insidious though Dark Skies has a bit more sci-fi to it and is a bit more memorable.

In Dark Skies, a family is being haunted through many ways by a dark force which we later learn are aliens.
The film does center around a family but it does lack development between the family members but this is not terrible in itself. Dakota Goyo plays the older teenage son and delivers a fine performance just as he did in Real Steel, and his career certainly appears to be on the upswing. Kadan Rockett plays the younger son and plays this sweet young character very well for his age. John Hamilton plays the father and this is frankly the weakest character but you can still see that Hamilton is trying here. Keri Russel plays the mother and is perfectly casted and really carries this movie with her performance.

The plot is anything but new. Dark Skies rips-off Poltergeist, Close Encounters, E.T. and Paranormal Activity very liberally. In a strange way though, that is why I kind of liked the film so much. It reminded me of movies I loved from my childhood and could be considered a homage by director, Scott Stewart to those films.

With a somewhat ambitious and overdrawn plot, there are going to be some things missing inside. That said, the plot elements felt realistic. The film includes both children trying to fit in while Dakota Goyo is experiencing some negative peer pressure while also learning about the opposite sex. The parents are struggling with a serious money issue which brings tension to the film and could cause the younger audience to wonder if that could happen to them. These plot elements are not new but they bring the story just a little closer to home.

Of course in a horror/sci-fi movie, the money is in the scary scenes. The first scenes involving the aliens were a bit scary but the movie is more creepy than anything and is that way throughout. Characters run and walk around aimlessly outside in the middle of the night, experience mental breakdowns and unexplained nose bleeds along with body injuries in the form of marks and scars. The ending is one that we have seen before but it is set-up a bit differently and leaves you with an eerie feeling.

Dark Skies is a film that works on being something else than what you normally see today as it draws from movies from decades ago. As I mentioned earlier, it is a film that left me with a special feeling because of that. I recommend Dark Skies.

4/5

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Evil Dead

Kind of like the movie The Exorcist, if you have never seen Evil Dead, you get hounded. It is a film known and loved by many people and put director Sami Raimi on the map. The movie also has an "out of control" manner to it which I find appealing. I love this movie.

The plot revolves around a college student going to a Tennessee cabinet and as time goes on, learns of the demons inside. A film that could be now part Blair Witch Project, a little of the later sequels of Phantasm and also many voodoo films but at the time it was made, it was not like that. It was a film that is very different for it's time.

Evil Dead brings everything to the table. There are characters with depth and juice and includes the lead Bruce Campbell who put out a great performance that received a lot of attention. There are also great possession scenes with an Exorcist feel to them. Also included are killers spawned from demons and trees and all working on the same level. The guts and gore are put in their proper place with just the right timing.

This film also has great cinematography which is something you wouldn't expect in a movie like this. It has different aspects to it and adds tension with close-ups which add creepiness and much of this is unexpected.

As a person that grew up where Sami Raimi grew up and about an hour away from the college that he left to make this film, this helped me connect to this film which caused me to like it even more, That said, it is a film most people would probably like no matter where you live. Evil Dead is a film that pushes all the right buttons, makes all the right moves and eventually unspools into one little tight package that we now call a classic.


4.5/5

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Identity

It's a rainy night in the middle of nowhere and limo driver Ed Dakota (John Cusack) along with nine others find themselves stranded at a motel with a killer on the loose. Identity is a film from 2003 that has a lot of everything and mostly stuff we've seen before but the film  still deserves some attention and more than it received.


The plot is something of a mixed bag. There are a lot of great characters and the acting by Ray Liotta and Cusack leads the way. Identity also nicely works it's way through some interesting and various plot settings that includes rainy sequences, the desert and also the motel. The ending also has one of the best killers you might ever see. There is also a surprise twist here that is kind of confusing as to what it is and the ending does struggle to create interesting kill scenes for this killer.

There is a good mixture of creativity and style here but better ideas would have improved this movie. Identity is a decent psychological/horror film that unfortunately fell off the face of the earth as soon as it was released.

3.5/5

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Phantasm

 

During the 1970's, horror really seemed to be in a good groove. Of course, the genre started in the late 1800's with the classic novels of Frankenstein and Dracula but it really came into focus in the 1950's and 60's. After that, George Romero and Alfred Hitchcock started to make their mark with innovative films. Phantasm is one of those late 70's films that adds to a decade of classic horror films and pushed horror right into the 80's where it got even more special.


Phantasm has a plot that revolves around brothers trying to connect to the world and find themselves after the death of their parents and they meet a mortician and that changes things in some horrible ways. Actually this is not a very complete description but frankly it would be literally impossible to explain this movie in full detail.


This movie has references to another world and also there are many killers and also dwarfs. In short, this is one of the most interesting horror films around. It is very hard to imagine that anyone could think up some of this stuff. It is a mixture of many things and all very original stuff.

The movie has a very strange beginning and then gets very eerie with a strange mixture of characters. There is one killer named the Tall Man (Angus Scrimm) who doesn't do very much and one named Reggie Banister who does a whole lot of everything. Micheal Baldwin plays the lead character, Thomas who seems very out place in this world but works well with the other lead, Bill Thornbury for a breakout performance.


The direction here is a little questionable as the film lacks structure somewhat and at times it is hard to see where it is going. It also has an ending that raise many questions and seems a bit out of place considering what came before. That said, Phantasm is a film that was not going to be without flaws just because of what it is.


I don't really know a lot of what this film is and it is probably best described as a cult film. A cult film from the 1970's that made us look at horror films a little differently.

3.5/5

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Warm Bodies

As you might know, horror is my preferred genre. I find horror just more appealing than other movie genres and I watch horror movies practically daily. Warm Bodies kind of fits into the horror genre, well somewhat. It is a mix of everything and will appeal to the tweens and teen audiences in addition to horror fans. Well anyway, I liked Warm Bodies a lot.


The movie is based on the novel of the same name by Isaac Marion, and is set in the world after the  apocalypse. There are your typical zombies walking around but also boonies who are degraded zombies and are the most dangerous of them all. We follow a dead zombie character called R (Nicholas Hoult) who falls in love with a human named Julie (Teresa Palmer) and they both find a strange liking to each other and eventually find love between them.


As with any "love story", the performance of  the lead characters is crucial. Here, Teresa Palmer and Nicholas Halt who have both done their share of good work, provide just what  we want. They have a good, though different, chemistry with each other, and both are very hard not to like. The love story between them is easily watchable.

As I alluded to before, this movie is far from a love story though. Warm Bodies has a zombie plot but for some reason it is lacking in details regarding the recent apocalypse. The plot really picks up in it's last act with a pretty good zombie idea and this is where the movie really hits it's mark. With  the combined horror/zombie/love story theme, it contains a mix of little things to make it work. There is also a homage to the 80's through the music, a strong supporting cast that has Rob Corddry and David Franco and a lot of neat sets that are fun to watch as the story unfolds.

What likely might be forgotten in this movie is the well made-up zombies. They are all original, and done with a gritty style and the boonies couldn't be more cool. The zombies have a terminator-like gray color to them that makes some scenes very tense and makes the film as scary as it could possibly be considering the theme.


There is also a message to the film which might get lost with all the zombie talk and that is that in this world, everyone is kind of the same in a lot of ways and that love can happen in ways we can't imagine. The movie also suggests that the apocalypse might not be what we think it will be.

As a 16 year old, I was one of the few males in the theater and I noticed that there were mostly teenage girls around me. Warm Bodies might have a kind of  a Twilight feel to it but actually it is more like a sappy Shakespeare story with a cult feel. Warm Bodies is a film that probably should have had a bigger audience but it was released Super Bowl week so that was a limiting factor. Regardless, I recommend it to all.


4/5

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Teeth

As a horror movie fan who has watched close to one horror film a week for over the last five years now, Teeth takes it's place as one of the strangest ones I have seen. The plot follows around the character of Dawn (Jess Weixler) who finds teeth in her female parts and uses it to to her advantage. I will let you guess how she does it.


The plot starts out on a dry note with a useless beginning scene followed by scenes that are equally useless but once Act Two starts, it gets in the right groove. The action scenes that involves teeth are strange and are done very well. That said the scenes are lacking in that they do not reveal what happens to the victims or what is left of them.

Even though the movie is very strange, there is a story here. Teeth has an original and uncanny plot that is something we have never seen before that brings radical characters to the table, and also includes a very  good performance by lead actor, Jess Weixler.


Teeth is a film that probably could be better and in the end it may not be very memorable but it is still a noteworthy movie, and something only a die hard horror fan should catch.


3.5/5

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