October 31st: Extraterrestrial (2014, Netflix)

This film is directed by the Viscious Brothers, a group reponsible for Grave Encounters and its sequel.  I didn't realize that going in and expected just your run of the mill "people find aliens and aliens go bwah!"

I was so wrong.  I'm so glad that I'm reviewing this one for the actual day of Halloween becuase it is actually just such a shocking movie.  Not in any way that you go "OH MY GOD!" but in the way that at the end you utter to yourself "oh...wow."

In it, a group of horror tropes go on a booze and drug filled trip to a cabin in the woods, a classic set up.  That classic setup is used as the backdrop of characters that we learn to care about, learn to loathe and learn to go "oh shit!" when something happens.

The aliens in the movie seem almost completely omnipotent, with mind control powers, the ability to cut down trees in perfect places and survive .20g shotgun blasts.  

It really is one of those films that draws on every trope you can ever imagine, but still manages to shit on every trope ever imagined.  By the time you end the movie, you're so hopeless and just exhuasted that you can't even keep going.  And you thank the movie for ending.

This is an example of the Viscious Brothers' great direction and writing and I REALLY hope to see more from them in the future.  I still remember being exhausted by Grave Encounters and its sequel the first time I saw them.  This movie is no different.

October 30th: Undying (2009, Netflix)

Ok, so, maybe this is more of a romance murder movie than a horror movie.  I don't know.  It's totally in the air.

It's a movie about a woman who moves into a house haunted by a Confederate soldier and is a doctor as a hospital where a guy got into a bar fight and was put into a coma.

Put two and two together.  That's what happens.  Her new beloved Confederate soldier boyfriend put into the body of a bar fighter becomes both.  It's just... what was supposed to happen???

Her boss tries to cover up for the fact that she stole a body from the hospital (not to mention the houndreds of thousands of dollars worth of machinery that keeps him alive!!!!!) and uses it as leverage to try and rape her.  And then flashbacks.  And then someone a pepperbox pistol from the 1860's in the house still works.  I have nothing.  Don't bother.  People!  JUST SKIP THIS!!!!!  WITH A PASSION!!!!

October 29th: Grave Encounters 2 (2012, Netflix)

Being a huge fan of the first entry in this two-some of films, I expected a lot out of this one.  I really wasn't let down.

What I'm going to say isn't going to bring down or drag down or spoil anything too much for people watching this film: it's meta.  100%  The whole concept behind Grave Encounters 2 is that Grave Encounters was a real supernatural encounter that took place and was turned into a film to make money off of it.

That's the entire first act of the film.  It explains that.  You really won't miss that much with that spoiler.

This film differs from its parent film buy explaining a lot more about what's going on and by making the supernatural presence much more palpable.  The final scene of the first movie plays heavily into this one puts a character into the film we didn't expect to see.

I thoroughly found this to be a more terryfing film than the first one, given that I cared much more about many of the characters and a the story seemed to make a lot more sense than the first one.  I give this film a great big old "GO AND SEE IT!"

October 28th: The Haunt (2013, Netflix)

I had seen this one a while ago and forgot that I had.  From what I was aware of, it was actually a pretty good movie.  So, I let it play out.


The movie opens up with the awesome idea of a ghost box, which is a fascinating concept to me.  Communication through the ghost box quickly leads to the man's possession and demise.  It gets a little strange when an old woman starts a voice over about ghost stories and how she's going to tell hers and then cuts to a family moving into the same house as in the prologue.  I guess we know what's going to happen.


Haunt tells not only a pretty cool ghost story, but a sort of "coming of age story" of the protagonist.  It's a fairly tame ghost movie, as far as that goes, but it's pretty entertaining to watch a battered Samantha take solace in the home that our protagonists' family moves into.  Especially once the true haunting is exposed.


Teens do what teens do in this film an Anne Veal's mother and her husband are incredibly accepting parents of this, letting the two of them sneak in and out of the house and telling them it's just their imagination when they hear voices.  Little kids do what little kids do, as well: talk to the ghosts that no one else can see..... WOAH!


This film actually has a lot of really cool and powerful images and uses a lot of different horror movie tropes, but in really refreshing ways.  I wasn't once bored by this movie, nor did I ever predict anything aside from the occasional jump scare that takes place.


I think my favorite line from the movie comes from the little daughter in the family "if there's a ghost in Evan's room, why doesn't he just make friends with it?" or the ghost box warning that "she's coming" and suddenly saying "she's hear" and going silent.


I highly recommend this movie to anyone who likes the good old haunted house movies.  It is a beauty. 

October 27th: Entity (2012 Netflix)

Making a horror movie based around a ghost hunter team or paranormal TV show seems to be extremely popular in the 2010s.  It feels like you can't take a piss without it splashing back at you by the pile of movies that new genre makes.


This movie is no different, but it does a really good job of separating itself from the footage and TV show theme better than other movies of its contemporary.  The film is about a British television crew on the search for a supposed mass grave in the woods of Russia.  The crew finds the grave and it quickly becomes more about the ghosts than the crew trying to survive jump scares.


When the film moved on from the mass grave to the final location, it really got great.  The medium that was hired in by the film crew is a real deal medium and actually sees the Russian prisoners' ghosts and even witness the murder of those prisoners at the hands of Russian soldiers.


This movie actually is what I wished Chernobyl Diaries was.  It's all about Russian experimentation on people and what it does to their souls.  And it truly creeps out, unlike others like it.  It lets go of the idea that it's "found footage" pretty quickly, although the characters require their gear to see from time to time.


I highly suggest this film, it's a winner on most accounts and I even want to watch it a second time.

October 26th: Mockingbird (2014, Netflix)

This was a strange one.  Not Dead Girl strange, but strange.  The premise is that an unknown and unseen force sends cameras to three unsuspecting people and use the people by means of psycological torture, a scavenger hunt and threatening children.

It's a solid effort at a unique movie, but it ultimately left me unsatisfied.  I found a lot of points of the movie to be more confusion than anything and had no connection to any of the characters.  Tom & Emmy love their kids and are driven insane by the outside force.  Leonard is a loser who dresses up like a clown and is sent on a scavenger hunt.  The last character I can't even recall a name, but she was a sad and isolated college student.

Through a series of increasingly bizarre requests, demands and videos: all three groups meet up.  I honestly feel like that is the best I can describe the film.  I had fun with it, I enjoyed it, but I wouldn't go out of my way to see it.

October 25th: 100 Ghost Street: The Return of Richard Speck (2012, Netflix. Also known as Paranormal Activity 4: The Awakening)

Ah, The Asylum.  A studio known specifically for making B movies and Mockbusters.  One thing their movies don't have is subtlety.  Or good acting.  This movie doesn't wait too long to introduce strange noises or even the death of an unnamed extra by the ghost of a seriel killer.

This movie's got it all!  People being decapetated by serial killer ghosts, girls standing in the corner of a room facing the corner only to turn around screaming a random set of boobs for no reason and people being left alone in strange rooms to be ghost raped!  It's amazing.

This movie isn't a bad movie, but is is be no means a good movie.  Like most of the films from this studio, it's a good movie to watch mindlessly.  I enjoyed my time with it, but there's not much more to stay about it.