Into the Woods

While Netflix Instant Watch’s selection of horror films seems to focus on newer releases, Amazon Prime has a mix of no-budget newbies and, well, fairly terrible no-budget older-ies from the late ‘70s and early ‘80s. Following The Boogey Man, it seemed more than fitting to tackle 1982’s similarly cheaply made, non-remembered backwoods horror The Forest.

Quick Plot: A pair of hikers are brutally slaughtered on your average sunny day. Unrelated--FOR NOW--in the civilized part of traffic-congested town, pals named Steve and Charlie decide to go camping to get away from the hustle and bustle of society. Their respective wives, Sharon and Teddi, go all “women can do ANYTHING! even if we happen to be idiots” on them and take their own trip a day earlier. 

FEMINISM, amiright?

Naturally, the ladies learn that camping is HARD. Like, just LOOKING at the stakes you have to use to set up a tent makes the soundtrack do a “wha wha whaaaaa” tuba cue to make sure we get the gist. 

If they were ill-prepared to manage their equipment, you can imagine their skills when it comes to warding off a homicidal mountain cannibal. A pair of echo-voiced children offer some assistance, as their husbands trail behind and squabble in their own elegant way.

Written and directed by Don Jones, The Forest is a pretty terrible little movie. The pacing is bizarre, the characters are bland, and the actual tension is about as tight as the tent the women can’t figure out. And yet...

Look: I, like many a blogger, am a Generation MilleXial weaned on a decade of feeling like the smartest person in school for watching Mystery Science Theater 3000. As a result, I love--nay, ADORE--watching movies like The Forest. Never is this more true than when we learn what drove our murderous cannibal to his ways.

In the most atmosphere-free flashback of all time, we meet our cannibal killer’s former wife, a woman who constantly slept with every mechanic, salesman, and census taker that dared to ring her doorbell while her impotent husband was at work. When our soon-to-be cannibal killer discovers this, he first reacts with apathy, leaving the serviceman to exit the bedroom AND THEN GO AND TRY TO FIX THE HOUSE’S HEATING UNIT. 

That in itself sort of made the movie for me. Because I am simple like that. 

High Points

Any movie--particularly one made in the 1980s--that includes an earnest original title song crooned out with pain will earn some bonus points

Low Points

Aside from the characters being bland and horrid and the action being silly and non-involving, nothing

Lessons Learned

The woods are filled with bears and rapists

Splitting up is usually not a good idea--bonus points for this being spoken by an actual character (who of course, immediately then proceeds to split up)

Never bring a broken bicycle to a pitchfork fight

Deer is always in season when you’re hungry

Wet dirt is occasionally called “mud”

The Winning Line:

“Are you crazy?”
“OF COURSE I AM!” says the man who killed his wife, moved his kids to the woods, and has been eating human beings for the last few years

Rent/Bury/Buy

The Forest isn’t good. That doesn’t mean I don’t recommend it. If you want something of a certain cheese quotient from this time period, you can do worse. 

A ringing endorsement if there ever was one!

She's Got Boogey Laser Eyes

Ulli Lommel’s The Boogey Man was one of those ‘80s VHS rentals that I always remembered in fragments. In an age before IMDB, trying to recall what “that boogeyman movie with a lot of mirrors” was called was a challenge that kept me up nights (or more realistically, occasionally really bugged me). Thankfully, there glorious era we occupy now not only lets me find that the boogeyman movie in question is indeed titled “The Boogey Man,” it also lets me rewatch it via Amazon Prime. 

Quick Plot: As children, Lacy and Willy watched their mother get it on with her boyfriend with a few too many giggles. As punishment, Willy is tied to the bed, leaving Lacy to free him with a kitchen knife and Willy to respond by stabbing the adults to death in front of a mirror. 

Twenty years later, Lacy and Willy are living on a sprawling farm with Lacy's in-laws and her young son. Willy, now a strapping young man in overalls, hasn't said a word since that fateful night, while Lacy has repressed the memories but is now suffering from horrific night terrors. Her husband convinces her to see a therapist, who hypnotizes Lacy into some sort of possessed state. Back home, Willy thwarts off a seduction by nearly strangling a horny neighbor, then proceeds to paint over every mirror in shame.

To get to the root of the problem, Lacy revisits her childhood home, now occupied by a pair of teenage girls and their younger prank-pulling brother (because it is the '80s and there was no other kind of kid brother in the horror genre). Convinced she sees the ghost of her stepfather, Lacy smashes a mirror hanging in the new occupants' bedroom.

Amazing death scenes commence.

Written and directed by the infamous Ulli Lommel, The Boogey Man is quite the product of its time. In her hypnosis, Lacy's a dead wringer for Linda Blair by way of Margaret Hamilton's vocal chords, while the main location may as well be located in Amityville, NY. Naturally, these kinds of time stamps are fairly endearing.

Half slasher, half ghost story, The Boogey Man is an oddly paced little thriller that doesn’t quite seem to understand its own story. We learn next to nothing about Lacy and Willy’s upbringing, including how the authorities dealt with a juvenile double murder. Why their mother’s boyfriend somehow turned into an Oculus channeling ghost twenty years after his death is never explained, which would be acceptable if the film didn’t spend so much time playing around with the mystery. At some point, the script all but throws nubile teenagers at the camera in order to up the death toll. Shakespeare, this ain’t.

But hey, poor storytelling doesn’t always result in an unwatchable movie. The Boogey Man is a mess, but it’s a neat one, especially if you’re harboring any form of nostalgia for late ‘70s horror tropes. 

High Points

Aside from the rather shocking youth massacre, the most unique feeling aspect of The Boogeyman is its super '80s, super synthy score, which casts a very offbeat yet welcome tone over the action

Low Points

So about that logic?

Lessons Learned

Always check your shoe for sticky evil mirror fragments

Never put your head under a window that doesn’t have a stopper, particularly if said window is in a room with sticky evil mirror fragments

Leave the split end trimming to the professional hairdressers, particularly if, you know, said split ends are in a room with sticky evil mirror fragments

Rent/Bury/Buy

As Netflix Instant seems to now focus most of its horror offerings on modern content, Amazon Prime has become a better source for earlier, easily-forgotten flicks. The Boogey Man is no classic, but it’s certainly not dull. Give it a go when you’re looking for some second tear ‘70s horror fun.