Kategoria: Mystery

#1840 Halloween 2023: The Attic (1980)

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The Attic is probably the first movie this Halloween that takes an effort to be an actual movie. You know, one with story, building up characters and all that.

And it was a nice surprise! Carrie Snodgress who was earlier unknown to me creates a wonderful character of an old maid librarian living with her tyrannical father, and it’s easy to grow attached to her, her fears, self-doubt and small scale dreams to have the courage to take a possession of her life.

Ray Milland as the father and Ruth Cox as the unlikely young friend and confident both make for interesting, multi-faceted characters. Director George Edwards holds up the horror elements to the last minutes of the film – but they feel even more impactful at that point.

80s-o-meter: 70%

Total: 84%

#1826 Halloween 2023: Buried Alive (1989)

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Buried Alive is such incoherent mess that I’m really quite not sure where to even start. There’s some juvenile delinquent schooling centre with just girls in it, run by lunatic personnel and with a new teacher being dropped in the middle of all of this.

The movie draws random horror movie elements from left, right and center and nothing of it really seems to fit together. There’s disappearance of the girls, a murky basement, visions of tormented people and people being trapped behind brick walls. And if all of the previous sounded cool, I assure it was not.

The movie is shot in South-Africa with some veteran actors like Robert Vaughn, Donald Pleasence and John Carradine hired just for their name and I can’t help but to think that three gentlemen would have come up with a much better horror movie brainstorming just 15 minutes together.

80s-o-meter: 80%

Total: 31%

#1825 Halloween 2023: The Kindred (1987)

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On her deathbed, a scientist urges her son to destroy her lab notes from her experiments. As the son visits the her mother’s ancestral home, he uncovers the existence of a lost brother, and the horrifying secrets of genetic research gone wrong.

The Kindred is a horror creature movie whose strongest suit is by far the uncovering of the mystery and typical to the monster movies, the creature itself feels almost underwhelming compared to the mighty fine atmosphere the movie manages to create completely without its monster fx. In other words: here as well it’s more scary what you don’t see than rather than what you do see.

Also typical to the similar movies, it turns from a mystery horror thriller to a pretty standard action movie without managing to capitalise the original eery atmosphere. Still, there’s a lot to be liked here and The Kindred is a fine example of a horror movie done mostly right.

80s-o-meter: 85%

Total: 75%

#1737 Wicked Stepmother (1989)

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I must shamefully admit that the actress Bette Davis was previously only for me from Kim Carnes’ song, and I did not recognise her at all before seeing the movie’s poster. Here in Wicked Stepmother she plays the alternate form of a witch that has married a neat and tidy couple, and it’s especially her younger form (played by the fabulous Barbara Carrera) that she occasionally takes that has a way of wrapping people around her fingers.

The movie is harmless fun, and most of the events don’t really make sense at all – like her having to swap bodies with an older and younger version of the witch using a cat, and especially her plan to get rich by marrying men, wising them up and putting them to win big time in a game show before taking the money and shrinking the whole family makes less sense than anything I’ve encountered in ages.

Wicked Stepmother starts strong with an interesting premise, but I wish the writing was a bit more intelligent as I feel there could’ve been a good supernatural horror comedy buried somewhere in this pile of nonsense. For what it’s worth, I was happy to see the always funny David Rasche (of the Sledge Hammer! fame) in the lead role.

80s-o-meter: 92%

Total: 70%

#1719 Sleepwalk (1986)

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Done with every Jim Jarmusch movie of the 80s? You might then be interested to check out Sleepwalk, directed by Jarmuch’s partner Sara Driver that feels like having fallen from the same arthouse tree.

Sleepwalk presents us with an interesting concept – a woman is hired to transcribe an ancient Chinese manuscript, after which she slowly starts to discover the manuscript has powers that begin to take over her life. This is where the movie goes off the rails and wanders deep into the world of nonsense. The events that follow in the movie are interesting and visually appealing to watch, but totally disconnected from the main story line.

If you can accept that not much of the movie even tries to make sense, you might find Sleepwalk enjoyable piece of experimental, surrealist cinema. It just isn’t for everyone – nor does it try to be.

80s-o-meter: 65%

Total: 55%

#1683 Halloween 2022: Beyond Dream’s Door (1989)

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Horror as a genre is something that seems to attract indie movie makers, and the results are often more clumsy and weird rather than scary.

Beyond Dream’s Door, a brainchild of an Ohio based director/writer Jay Woelfel is interesting due to its team of unknown actors and inexperienced crew being able create something that looks and feels like an actual movie. Woelfel’s directing is surprisingly solid, and the camera drives never feel odd or off, but rather professional throughout. The movie’s story of nightmares coming alive and haunting is interesting, and as the reality and dream world get mixed up together, the movie manages to capture the weird atmosphere it was going for in the first place.

But the story gets far too convoluted for its own good, and the monster effects – as nice as they are for an indie movie – must’ve worked much better in VHS tape hooked up to a CRT television rather than modern high resolution TV sets.

80s-o-meter: 81%

Total: 60%

#1669 Apprentice to Murder (1988)

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A US-Norwegian-Canadian co-production Apprentice to Murder portrays of Pennsylvanian folk healer and his apprentice getting far too deep into dark powers of their craft in a story that very successfully blurs the line between real and make-belief, wrong and right, and good and bad.

I was surprised to learn the movie was shot entirely in Norway, so my hat is off to the production team who very skilfully concealed this fact, and totally sold me the location of 1920s Pennsylvania.

Although shot in mainstream Hollywood fashion, Apprentice to Murder (apparently based on a real historic event) is a very untypical movie but in a good way. It boldly goes quite deep into religious fanaticism, dark sides of human psyche and superstition.

80s-o-meter: 11%

Total: 72%

#1668 Agnes of God (1985)

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Agnes of God presents us with an enigma of a young, eccentric nun giving a birth, insisting the now dead infant was a result of virgin conception, but it never really gives a solid answer to the actual events, or who was the culprit behind it all.

It’s an interesting concept, but the movie never manages to tell it in an interesting way. The same dullness continues in the cinematography and the locations, and the movie is never quite entertaining to watch.

The most prominent feature of the movie is seeing the 80s fitness idol Jane Fonda smoking a truckload of (fake, as it turns out) cigarettes, lighting one up in pretty much every scene she is in.

80s-o-meter: 15%

Total: 31%

#1440 Black Rainbow (1989)

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If you’re going to introduce supernatural nonsense into your movie, you better back it up some how.

I was waiting for Black Rainbow to come up with a good explanation how Rosanna Arquette as a medium with a great showmanship suddenly begins channeling grim predictions of the future and foreseeing deaths to the tiniest detail, but the movie provides none of that. As the movie closes it manages to leave one confused, with less clear picture of the character and her powers one had just 30 minutes ago.

Black Rainbow is a mishmash of a movie that had a nice premise for a movie, but would’ve needed much, much snappier writing in order to pull it off.

80s-o-meter: 87%

Total: 59%

#1438 The Morning After (1986)

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Not to be mixed up with The Day After, a 1983 made for TV movie about nuclear war (I know I keep mixing these up all the time), The Morning After is a thriller about a has been actress who keeps on drowning her sorrow to the wine and finds herself blacking out often, only to one day wake up and find herself laying next to a man, stabbed to death.

After the interesting start The Morning After does not provide anything substantial and plays until the end without much surprises. The chemistry and eventual relationship between the leads Jane Fonda and Jeff Bridges is a hard sell, and it’s mostly Bridges’ typical enjoyable screen presence that carries the movie until the finish.

80s-o-meter: 84%

Total: 60%

#1413 Appointment with Death (1988)

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A pretty tame whodunnit even in Agatha Christie’s scale, Appointment with Death is a Hercule Poirot story that brings the very familiar elements of aristocrats, murders and exotic locations to the table.

For anyone accustomed to thrillers of this decade, Appointment with Death will feel excruciatingly slow, but the fans of the classic Christie novels will probably feel at home.

Travel and exotic locations have always been the salt and pepper of Christie’s murder mysteries, and the biggest drawback of Appointment with Death remains its cinematography and directing that fails to capture the magic of the faraway spots that end up feeling dull and unexciting.

80s-o-meter: 0%

Total: 37%

#1401 Halloween 2020: Prime Evil (1988)

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A satanic cult led by a charismatic priest hunt and kidnap victims for their sacrificial ceremonies in Prime Evil, a movie that ends up surprisingly tame despite the grim theme.

While it’s an ok break from the endless stream of slashers this year, it does not really spook or send chills down your spine, unless you are scared by people in robes, chanting in a basement.

William Beckwith performs well as the magnetic leader of the cult and Christine Moore whom I previously saw in the subpar Lurkers (coincidently also directed by Roberta Findlay) fares much better here as the target of the cult’s evil plans.

80s-o-meter: 84%

Total: 57%

#1389 Halloween 2020: Something Wicked This Way Comes (1983)

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A travelling circus appears to a small rural town out of thin air, and besides the entertainment it seems to have other things in mind for the town folk.

Based on the Ray Bradbury’s 1962 novel of the same name, Something Wicked This Way Comes came into form already in 1958 as a screenplay but failed to get backed up by the production companies, until getting picked by Walt Disney Pictures. The movie has a strong 60s Walk Disney Productions look and feel to it with the setting, characters and outdated special effects.

The concept of making pack with the devil here is actually pretty great and could have lent itself to looking ever more closely to the secret wishes of the villagers, and used more wisely towards the end, but what the movie provides in a form of hall of mirrors and a magic carousel did not grasp me at all.

80s-o-meter: 8%

Total: 51%

#1356 Endangered Species (1982)

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Funny how some things blend into one in your memory when you don’t put your thoughts on a paper right after seeing a movie. I watched Endangered Species about two weeks ago along with The Return and they’ve turned into one and the same movie in my head.

But I’m not completely to be blamed here as the similarities are many: both movies have a supernatural theme, take place in a small distant town and feature a liaison between a stranger coming to the town and a local law enforcement officer, with one of them battling alcoholism.

I can’t see myself watching either one again, but for the future reference, Endangered Species is the stronger one of the two, with a more solid and interesting story about government cover ups. But unlike The Return that went far too much into the supernatural, Endangered Species left me wishing it would’ve leaned even more to huge conspiration theories that its premise is built upon. Now it manages to build up the story and whet my appetite, but does not provide the big payback I so craved for in the end.

80s-o-meter: 81%

Total: 67%

#1183 Halloween 2019: Lurkers (1988)

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There’s something off with Lurkers throughout it’s running time. The picture angles seem odd, stylistic choices feel weird, pacing is way too slow and scenes are padded with unnecessary footage that should’ve ended up on the cutting room floor; it’s clear the movie wasn’t made by someone who knows their stuff.

The story only gets interesting towards the last 15 minutes, and even then it’s made for TV quality at best. Lurkers should’ve probably been a short movie as it doesn’t really carry through 90 minutes.

The movie was heading steadily to zero total scoring, but the twelve points I ended up giving to it are due to the last scene inside the house.

80s-o-meter: 71%

Total: 12%

#1024 The Private Eyes (1980)

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The Private Eyes presents us with a classic mansion whodunnit comedy that makes for a surprisingly entertaining watch.

It’s a slapstick comedy making a solid imitation of the similar movies from the famous comedic duos of the yesteryear, namely Abbot and Costello. Starring Tim Conway and Don Knotts who made a series of comedies together starting from 1975, The Private Eyes is their best known movie, and also their final full length feature film together.

The movie is made with the young audience in mind with spooky bits comparable to an episode of Scooby Doo. The jokes are somewhat tame and obvious, but performed in an entertaining way by the duo.

80s-o-meter: 41%

Total: 68%

#924 Cherry 2000 (1987)

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A white collar worker’s last of its line fembot – a Cherry 2000 – short circuits and ends up beyond repair. To find a replacement, he sets out to find a tracker to bring him one from the forbidden Zone 7, and soon unwillingly finds himself in the midst of an adventure.

Mixing various genres is always a huge gamble, but in Cherry 2000’s case the inventive forces behind it seemingly have a good time borrowing elements from sci-fi, cyberpunk, western and road movies and mixing them with elements of dystopian deserted world, 1950s and even some maniac campers. Unfortunately this lead to the movie ending hard to explain to the movie going masses and was deemed a straight to video instead of a theatrical release.

After its release the movie started gaining a cult following and has since inspired various movie and video game makers alike.

80s-o-meter: 88%

Total: 81%

#856 Young Sherlock Holmes (1985)

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I tend to dislike young or junior versions of already established franchises and it’s particularly because of this that I postponed watching Young Sherlock Holmes for so many years. Second reason is that I always mistook it for a british movie, thanks to the main character, location and the actors all being of british origin.

Directed by Barry Levinson, the movie carries a strong label of its executive producer Steven Spielberg. Although numerous – often somewhat clumsy – nods to the forthcoming Sherlock Holmes events are made throughout the movie, the end results resembles more of a Young Indiana Jones with big emphasis on effects, great set design and action and very slight emphasis on actual deduction and whodunnit.

The computer animations done by the wizards in ILM still fare amazingly well, outperforming much of the effects seen even in the 90s movies, and are alone a good enough reason to check out the movie.

80s-o-meter: 51%

Total: 72%

#842 Eddie and the Cruisers (1983)

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A tale of a reporter investigating steps that lead to the tragic disappearance of the leader of an iconic 60s rock band, Eddie and the Cruisers is told through numerous flashbacks – an approach that sort of works, but does make the end result a somewhat patchy.

But, when it comes to music, the movie more than delivers. Michael Paré possesses a true rock star quality as the head of the band and mouths all the heartland rock songs with a convincing intensity. Purely as a musical the movie is among the best, void of the cringeworthiness often associated with the genre.

This poetic and enigmatic journey to unravel the mystery of a lost rock’n’roll star earned a cult status already in the 80s, and spawned a follow-up, released in 1989.

80s-o-meter: 71%

Total: 80%

#712 The Ninth Configuration (1980)

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A fairytale-like action drama comedy war mystery movie, The Ninth Configuration is a genre bender if I’ve ever seen one.

The movie follows a crew of post-traumatic military personnel in a castle being used as an insane asylum. They are soon joined by Colonel Kane, an eccentric and grim psychiatrist who’s arrived to help the patients. The movie starts off as a farcical, even slapsticky comedy, but as soon as Kane’s brother arrives at the castle, the movie takes a turn to much darker waters and deals with themes like sacrifice and faith. This is the part of the movie that I much preferred. The act two culminates to the palm-sweating bar confrontation scene that’s a textbook example of building up a tension.

Even if its weirdness feels self righteous and artsy at times – especially during act one – a credit has to be given to the writer and director William Peter Blatty for creating something entertainingly different.

80s-o-meter: 58%

Total: 77%