A solid classic thriller in the vein of Hitchcock, Dead of Winter regrettably doesn’t rely on the working setup it has established, but a bit needlessly overcomplicates the plot as the movie progresses.
Category: Horror
#267 Halloween 2015: The Fly II (1989)
The Fly II replaces the whole team from the first movie, and succeeds to stand on its own for awhile – but ultimately takes too many wrong turns to be rememberable.
#266 Halloween 2015: The Fly (1986)
David Cronenberg’s great interpretation of the 1958 movie easily outshines the original and the eccentric scientist is role Jeff Goldblum was born to play.
#260 Cujo (1983)
While the plot isn’t anything special, Cujo pulls off the almost impossible task of turning a lean shot-in-the-daytime saint bernhard into a vicious killer in a scaringly convincing way.
#241 Christine (1983)
A movie about a demonic killer car, Christine’s story is literally so unbelievable that not even Carpenter’s convincing direction can make the plot feel plausible.
#238 Once Bitten (1985)
Young Jim Carrey performs so-and-so in Once Bitten, a vampire comedy with a lousy script, kept afloat by some truly funny small gags, awesome soundtrack and one hilariously campy dance-off.
#234 Cheerleader Camp aka Bloody Pom Poms (1988)
Cheerleader Camp marries an early 80s style slasher with Porky’s style humor. There are no strong points here, but given the weak premise this B-movie surprisingly makes for an ok one time watch.
But just one time.
#228 Q The Winged Serpent (1982)
A monster movie very much in the vein of Godzilla and King Kong, Q The Winged Serpent is an unique experience that succeeds to make the best out of its low budget and the shoddy manuscript.
#215 The Monster Squad (1987)
White The Monster Squad owns a lot to The Goonies, it manages to find its own angle by successfully amping up on gore, profanities and the overall bad-assness.
#208 Dead Heat (1988)
An action horror comedy on steroids, Dead Heat is a wickedly funny movie to watch, especially with some friends – and about as much an eighties movie as they come!
#203 Parasite (1982)
The settings and gory effects of Parasite have some strange, videogame-like charm to them, but the movie itself is far too glitched and slow paced to keep you on the edge of your seat.
#200 The Lost Boys (1987)
Like The Goonies but with scary bloodsucking vampires, The Lost Boys soon became the definitive horror movie amongst us ten year olds upon its 1987 release.
It’s a theme park ride like adventure made for the MTV generation, and the cool band of misfits led by Kiefer Sutherland really resonated with us and the lead Jason Patric’s temptation to join the gang is not that incomprehensible. Secretly we wanted that ourselves.
Fortunately the goodies’ side is cool as well with Corey Haim and Corey Feldman leading the adventure to free the fictive coastal town of Santa Carla of the blood sucking freaks – and it was easy to feel part of that posse as well.
Out of all of the Vampire movies, The Lost Boys is by far the most 80s, and the call of the Lost Boys still feels strangely inviting.
Come on, be one of us.
80s-o-meter: 97%
Total: 91%
#155 Night Train to Terror (1985)
Everyone likes a good horror anthology so I did not initially mind firing up Night Train to Terror. The movie’s setup and premise is an interesting one: God and Satan are on board of a train on its way to eventual destruction, having a conversation and sharing stories. Also on the board is some sort of pop band, whose dull performances we are subjected to watch throughout the movie – the first shortcoming of the movie in the long list of forthcoming faux-pas.
Instead of being a real horror anthology the movie presents us with three full length movies – some previously unreleased – cut down to short story form. Although many of the horror movies I’ve seen to date would’ve worked much better in a shorter form before turning repetitive, here the end result is just odd, with the plot becoming really hard to follow. To overcome this the director had to resort to dubbing in a narrative voice, which is always something of a panic design choice.
Out of the three segments the first one is totally unwatchable mess, second one has an interesting premise of something of a suicide club, but tries to cram in far too much content into its short running time. The final part is the least outrageous, but also seems to be the best movie of the bunch and is cut in a way that still seems to make sense.
The main effort in the cutting room has seemed to gone into including all the gory special effects – and admittedly they are the best aspect of this uneven mess of a movie.
80s-o-meter: 80%
Total: 38%
#140 Nightflyers (1987)
Based on a novel by now world famous George R. R. Martin, Nightflyers has a lot going for it: A nice poster, a really solid set design, well executed special effects and an atmospheric soundtrack.
Too bad something went very wrong along the way. In fact, things went south so badly that when the movie was released, the director Robert Collector (Red Heat, Memoirs of an Invisible Man) opted to use a pseudonym instead of his own name.
And bad it is: 30 minutes into the movie it becomes painfully obvious the only event worth looking forward here are the end credits.
There aren’t many reasons to bother with Nightflyers. If I was really pushed to come up with one, it does feature the notorious 80s baddie Michael Des Barres (Murdoc of the MacGyver fame) in one his rare eighties feature film roles.
80s-o-meter: 77%
Total: 28%
#118 The Stuff (1985)
As a movie The Stuff itself remains a bit too rough around the edges to really get into and enjoy, but one has to applaud their effort managing to make a can of yogurt menacing.
80s-o-meter: 72%
Total: 48%
#105 Leviathan (1989)
Although somewhat rightfully dubbed as an rip-off of Alien and The Thing put underwater, Leviathan is still not a movie to be underestimated as it will keep you thrilled and entertained all the way until those end credits finally roll.
80s-o-meter: 88%
Total: 84%
#96 An American Werewolf in London (1981)
Apart from the some of the imaginative makeups, An American Werewolf in London feels extremely outdated and dull and does not live up to anywhere near the hype.
80s-o-meter: 46%
Total: 29%
#87 Moontrap (1989)
Pavel Chekov of the original Star Trek fame stars in Moontrap, his own scifi horror title that laughs in the face of logic, common sense and scientific facts, making it a strange, puzzling experience.
80s-o-meter: 48%
Total: 42%
#86 Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer (1986)
What could be the worst first date movie ever, snuff-styled documentary-like Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer will leave you feeling unsettled for a long time after the end credits have scrolled.
80s-o-meter: 58%
Total: 72%
#83 Pandemonium (1982)
Pandemonium wouldn’t be such a bad effort overall but it just tries much too hard to be funny and packs in too many failing gags to make the experience enjoyable.
80s-o-meter: 68%
Total: 47%