31 Days of Horror 2025 Day 31 The People Under the Stairs

 

TITLE-The People Under the Stairs

SOURCE-Scream Factory Blu ray

Fool lives in  the ghetto. His mom is dying from cancer,and his family is about to be evicted from their apartment. Local rumor is this one house in  the area has a huge collection of gold coins. So Fool along withVing Rhames and another dude plot to break into the house steal the coins and not only pay the back rent they owe but get Fool's mom fixed up.

Once in the house they learn  shit is fucked. The entire house if boobytrapped. Their a pile of cannibals living in the basement. And the brother and sister,that call each other Mom and Dad, have a young teen girl named Alice. They refuse to let her leave the house.

Ving Rhames and the other guy get killed fast and the rest of the film is Fool trying to escape and find the gold. Assisted by Alice and Roach,a guy that lives between the walls.

Gory and dark and full of craziness this was way way better than I remembered. Sure I had seen it a few times back in  the day. Just been so long since I saw it I had forgotten huge chunks of the film.

Like how the brother spends a good part of the film runnign  around in a leather gimp outfit. Or how the Sister looks so much like my crazy aunt we don't talk too.

Feels like this is a forgotten  Wes Craven film. Sure his Elm Street films get talked about a pile,same with Last House on the Left and the Hills have eyes. But The People Under the Stairs I never seen much chatter about.

This blu ray is packed with extras. Looks great decent sound and I'm kind of glad I got it for a deal. 

The People Under the Stairs gets a B.

31 Days of Horror 2024 Day 29 Scre4m

 

TITLE-Scre4m

SOURCE-Anchor Bay DVD

The first Scream hit at an odd point my life. Coming out right before Xmas in 1996 and it wasn't until late January 1997 that we went to a theater to see it.

Was the old Silver Screen theater over in Biloxi. Loved the movie and as soon as it hit VHS I rented it and made a copy.

Not long after seeing Scream major changes happened in my life. I packed up most of my stuff and moved two states to the west.

When less than a year later Scream 2 hit theaters I went Xmas day to see it and well it was just ok. By the release of Scream 3 I waited for home video to see it and hated the film.

Which is why when Scre4m ,the clever name they came up for this un needed sequel,hit theaters I knew I would just rent it in a year from Netflix. Then rented it watched it. Thought this is a pile of crap. 

Wasn't until last year or the year before when I watched Scream 6 that I realized I remembered nothing about part 4. Not even who the killer/killers are.

Found part 4 cheap,you can see the Dollar price written in  sharpie on the walmart sticker. And now have seen it twice off that dvd.

Set years after the last film,we met the next generation of high school teens in the main town of this series. Ghostface starts killing them and after many red herrings,and some actually nicely done kills,we get our reveal of who the killers are.

The good stuff,well the kills are damn good. The cast that comes back from the previous 3 films do fairly well in this 4th film. Really that is about it for good in this turd sandwich.

The bad stuff.....First off the killers' have the dumbest motive. The female killer wants to be famous. The male is just a simp. The cast that wasn't  in the previous films is either ok at best to WHY THE HELL WERE THEY HIRED Bad. The story is too complex for it's own good. 

My next two gripes might just be a bad transfer on the DVD release. There are scenes where the film grain can be seen. And it looks like it should. Then other scenes where it appears so much DNR has been applied that people like Alison Brie look less like herself and more like a cheap wax dummy. And there is this urine yellow hue to the entire film.

Sadly this was the final movie directed by Wes Craven. This might be his worse film. If not it is just barely better than The Hills have Eyes 2.

Maybe the blu ray isn't DNRed to hell and back and isn't piss yellow all the time. If so that would raise this film up a tiny bit but not enough to make it worth it for me.

Scre4m gets a D+

31 Days of Horror 2022 Day 23 Deadly Friend

 

TITLE-Deadly Friend

SOURCE-Warner Brothers DVD

Oh man the kind of forgotten 80s Wes Craven film. The story about the making of this film is almost more entertaining than  the actual film.

Originally conceived as a Sci Fi film. And filmed with that in mind. Then a horrible response from a test audience,who wanted more gore and violence since the film was from Wes Craven not long after Nightmare on Elm Street was a huge hit. So reshoots happened and we got the muddled mess of a film we got.

But back in October of 86 when this came out I knew none of the above. Just new it was  a new horror film from Craven and I had to see it. After seeing it I was a bit disappointed. And just kind of forgot about the film until the early 2000s. When I was trying to watch every film Craven directed. On more viewings I started to enjoy the film more. 

Paul and his mom just moved to a new town. He is a teen genius and quickly becomes friends with the neighborhhood paperboy and the cute teen girl next door. Samantha is played by Kristy Swanson,back when she was  mostly known for Flowers in the Attic,and Samantha's father is a horrible abusive  drunk.

Paul has built a robot named BB. Who sometimes shows signs of having AI. The robot gets destroyed and while drunk Samantha's father accidently kills her. So Paul puts his robot's mainframe into Sam's body. And she comes back  but now has super human strength and kills.

Even people that haven't seen this film know the infamous gif from it. In this gif Samantha uses a basketball to kill Anne Ramsey.  The head explosion when the basketball hits is great. Back in 2000 Swanson told Maxim in an interview that the fake head of Anne Ramsey that was destroyed by the basketball was filled with legit cow brains. That might be why that one scene looks so real. It really stands out in this film. A movie that really with some tiny cuts could be a PG 13 horror film marketed to kids and teens.

Sure Deadly Friend isn't top tier Wes Craven. But it isn't bottom tier,that is saved for tripe like Cursed and My Soul to Take. It is a perfect middle of the pack Wes Craven horror film. And one of the few Craven films you can show to kids and teens that isn't packed with gore and violence.

Deadly Friend gets a B-.

31 Days of Horror 2022 Day 21 Nightmare on Elm Street 3 Dream Warriors

 

TITLE-Nightmare on Elm Street 3 Dream Warriors

SOURCE-New Line Cinema DVD

With 8 or 9 entries in the franchise,depending  on if you considered Freddy vs Jason as an entry,the Elm Street series of horror films is one I have enjoyed since I saw the first movie close almost 40 years ago. And while I do love that first film,it has always been the 3rd film that is my favorite of the run.

Set in a mental hospital we get Nancy coming  back,now grown. And teaming up with what is left of the Elm Street teens to fight off Freddy.

This was the film in the series that established that in the dream world some people will have super powers. Like the Dream Warriors mentioned in the subtitle of this film. Like Kincaid in  this film is super strong in the dream world or the one guy who in the real world is stuck in a wheelchair but in the dream world is a powerful wizard. This aspect of the series is something that was kept around from this film forward.

Look at the cast of this film. So many people in it that at the time were not big stars yet. Like Patricia Arquette. Honestly this is the first thing I saw her in. She is our lead and shows in  this film why she has had a long long career in the film/tv field. Then you have Laurence Fishburne as one of the orderlies. Sure he had done stuff before this like Death Wish II. But this was for me the first big break out role for this really good actor.

For a long time this was also the Elm Street film I had seen the most. All because while I grew up in an area with out cable I had an Aunt that would record films off HBO for me. We would go see this Aunt,who was my dad's oldest sister,usually every few weeks. And I would go through her HBO guide and circle all the movies I wanted to see. Next trip to Aunt Dot's place she would have 4 or 5 tapes full of movies for  me. So  late 1987 or might have been early 1988 I got a tape from her that had Munchies,Morons from Outer Space and Elm Street 3. And I know the first week I had that tape I watched Elm Street 3 at least 4 times. Not that many years ago I was going through a box full of old "blank" VHS and found the tape I had Elm  Street 3 on it. For shits and giggles I tossed that tape into my trusty VCR and was shocked that the tape was still in ok shape. Sure it looked a bit grainy and fuzzy but it was over 30 years old. Sadly right before the film was over my VCR ate the tape. I managed to get the tape out of the player and back into it's case. But it was badly damaged.

For me this film is the  perfect blending of the horror and the  comedy of Freddy Kruger. Unlike the later films Freddy isn't totally a stand up comedian yet. But he still managed to crack a few good jokes.

And the kills.... So many good ones in this film. The puppet kill is one I have always loved. One of the teens at the hospital makes puppets. So Freddy uses this kids veins as strings and puppet masters this kid to his death. Another stand out death is when one of the teens can't sleep. So she is staying up late  watching a late night talk show. Freddy appears on the TV and this girl walks over to the TV. This TV has Freddy's head coming out the top and arms on the side. And Freddy grabs the girl and slams her head first into the TV.

Also I love how you can watch this movie without seeing any of the previous ones and not be lost. Fairly quickly early on in the film we are told who Freddy is and what he has done. 

Now I might have my timeline wrong,not sure on this and too lazy to look it up,but it feels like this film was the start of Freddy being marketed some to kids. IIRC it was after this film that the Freddy action figure was released along with Freddy themed kids PJs. Not sure how many people born after 2000 know this but before then most movie theaters rarely checked or asked for ID when buying a movie ticket. So way before I was 16 I was buying tickets to R rated films like Elm Street 3. There was piles of  80s era films that were R rated and still marketed to kids. Like how Robocop was this film so violent they had to cut stuff out to avoid getting the dreadded X rating. But you had Robocop action figures and comic books. Speaking of comics I thhink it was around the time Elm Street 3 came out that Marvel Comics published 2 issues of the magazine sized B/W Nightmare on Elm Street comic. 

So if you haven't seen Nightmare on  Elm Street 3 Dream Warriors go see it. It  is the best of the Elm Street films to be released in the 80s. 

Nightmare on Elm Street 3 gets a A.

31 Days of Horror 2016 Day 25 Swamp Thing

Title-Swamp Thing
Source-Uncut first release MGM DVD

Yeah I know the cover above isn't the cover on the DVD,but it looks so much better. I got lucky 6 years ago and got the uncut first release of the film for $5. The first DVD release in the States was of the R rated cut,which mostly got the R cause of a few instances of nudity. Some parent complained,cause the back of the DVD case said PG.

Alec Holland is a scientist way out in the swamps of Louisiana. And he is working on a top secret new chemical. He finishes it about the time Alice Cable comes to visit. When Anton Arcane shows up. He wants the formula. A fight breaks out and Alec ends up covered in the new chemical and out in the swamp. And it is assumed he has died.

But he didn't. He comes back as the plant creature Swamp Thing. The rest of the film is Arcane trying to capture Swamp Thing,and Swamp Thing and Alice falling in love.

Now I remember this film kind of bombing,but it did good enough to get a sequel years later, Then a TV series that lasted 3 or 4 years on USA. One good thing that came out of this film was with a Swamp Thing film in theaters DC wanted a Swamp Thing comic on the stands. So the Saga of Swamp Thing title started. Which in a bit less than 2 years later got taken over by Alan Moore and became one of the best comics to come out from the big 2 in the 80s.

Swamp Thing gets a B-