Chain Reactions in 250 Words or Less

Anybody smart enough to sit Karyn Kusama down in a chair and have the Jennifer's Body / The Invitation director talk about horror movies is ace in my book. And cinematic documentarian Alexandre O. Philippe has now done it twice -- first in the terrific Lynch/Oz doc (where she was the stand-out) and now in Chain Reactions, which is about the towering legacy of Tobe Hooper's horror masterpiece The Texas Chain Saw Massacre here in the 50th year since its making. (For the record Kusama was also a talking head in Queer for Fear. Bryan Fuller's perfect docu-series.) 

Kusama is once again brilliant to listen to here, but it turns out that everybody Philippe assembled for this film is top notch and, even better, all of them are coming at the movie from totally different directions. Patton Oswalt's the fanboy, the great Alexandra Heller-Nicholas's the critic, Stephen King was Hooper's friend, and Takashi Miike is... Takashi fucking Miike! (Turns out he's an incredibly thoughtful man for being such a maniac.) Fifty years on it's damned near impossible to find new things to say about a film as discussed & dissected as TCM has been, but the terrific Chain Reactions does a bang-up job doing just that. And Philippe's very much got a very specific thing going on with these essay movies, but this is truly his best one to date. I look forward to whatever blast of nastiness finds itself under his microscope next.

Chain Reactions is screening as part of the "Scary Movies" series 

here in NYC this weekend. Check the entire line-up right here.

5 Off My Head -- Scary Movies To Swallow Us Up

To my fellow horror-hounds of the Big Apple, a heads-up -- FLC has brought back their much beloved "Scary Movies" series this year and it kicks off tomorrow!, running through the 21st. You can check the entire line-up at this link but I thought I'd highlight some, uhh, highlights in case you're overwhelmed by the week's worth of creepy cool choices that they've curated -- for real out of the ones I've already seen there's not a bad bugger in the bunch. They do such good work with this series every time. Now some of these I'm planning on reviewing in the next week so I'm going to keep it mostly brief for now. But I give you...

5 Movies Not To Miss At "Scary Movies XIII"

The Wailing (dir. Pedro Martín-Calero) -- A tremendously accomplished and stylish scare flick from Spain (the director's very first feature!) that I saw at Fantasia earlier this month and reviewed right here. It fucking rules. And when I tell you something reminds me of Luca Guadanino's Suspiria you should listen! (And obviously take it as a good thing since Luca Guadanino's Suspiria is revelatory, of course.)

Rabbit Trap (dir. Bryn Chainey) -- a Folk Horror flick from the UK starring Dev Patel? Who's gonna miss that? Nobody wants to miss that. If you're not in NYC for this series you don't have to wait long for this movie though as it's being released in theaters on September 12th. But if you are in NYC treat yourself and see it ASAP. I'll be reviewing it for its theatrical release but it's a definite rec.

Good Boy (dir. Ben Leonberg ) -- Another one I saw at Fantasia and reviewed (right here). My feelings were mixed, it's true, but it's a horror movie starring an adorable doggy -- everyone should still see it even if I don't think it quite entirely works. And I'm fairly lonesome on that island as most people seem to've adored it. Make up your own minds! Support Doggy Cinema!

Chain Reactions (dir. Alexandre O. Philippe) -- The latest essay film from the director behind Lynch/Oz and Leap of Faith: William Friedkin on The Exorcist and several other single subject cinematic studies of note, Chain Reactions is all about Tobe Hooper's masterpiece The Texas Chain Saw Massacre here for that film's 50th anniversary. I will also be reviewing this soon so mum's my word til then but, uhh, do go see it. Really superior group of voices gathered.

It Ends (dir. Alexander Ullom) -- This is tomorrow night's Opening Night movie and it's already sold out so just put a pin in this one! Likewise any more thoughts from me on it since I'm planning on reviewing it. But I will say that it's about a group of teenage friends who find themselves trapped on an endless road that winds through the forest forever and god I felt that. 

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They're also screening a couple of classic horror movies like m-f'ing Daughters of Darkness which is never to be missed on the big screen, so make sure you peruse the entire line-up. I'm hoping to check out a couple of the other titles that I haven't myself been able to see, so maybe I'll see you there! Or maybe not! I'm a shy hermit who barely leaves the house, so

Thursday's Ways Not To Die

Sometimes I wonder if there is still magic to be discovered in this world, but this morning I am here to tell you kiddos that yes, there is -- there is still magic! Look no further than me discovering in the year 2025 that Texas Chain Saw director Tobe Hooper made I'm Dangerous Tonight, a Made-For-TV thriller in 1990 about an evil red dress possessed by Incan Devilry that starred Twin Peaks actress Mädchen Amick, Psycho star Anthony Perkins, E.T. & Cujo icon Dee Wallace, and... R. Lee Ermey? Because why not?

You'd think I'd have read something about this movie when my beloved Peter Strickland's killer red dress classic In Fabric came out in 2018 but if somebody did mention it it completely slipped past me -- only this week did I learn of its existence when Letterboxd made a list of movies about "Cursed Objects" (thanks to the release of Oz Perkins' The Monkey) and mentioned this film. Obviously I had to watch it immediately -- I couldn't even wait for the blu-ray to arrive in the mail, I watched the shitty quality copy that you see in these gifs. And it was worth every second of squinting!

Tobe clearly knew he had to lean hard into the camp, so this thing is soapy, it's stupid, it's trash, and I loved every fucking second of it. But let's get to this death scene here --  Mädchen's sex-obsessed cousin Gloria (Daisy Hall, chewing the walls themselves) steals the dress from Mädchen and upon putting it on immediately goes into a slutty rage. Her ten foot tall actual linebacker boyfriend obviously never stood a chance! Hit the jump for the rest of the scene...

Everything You Ever Need To Know About Life...

... you can learn from:

Heat (1972)

Sally: And you're NOT a lesbian. 

I mean, everybody has girlfriends. 

Men have friends, women have friends. 

That doesn't make you a lesbian. 

Do you sleep in the same room with her?

Jessica: Sure. How else can I be a lesbian?

Sally: Where does Mark sleep?

Jessica: With us.

Sally: In the same bed?

Jessica: In the same bed.

Sally: Is that a way to bring up a boy? 

He'll be a lesbian!

Today is the 100th anniversary of the one-of-a-kind Sylvia Miles! I just saw Tobe Hooper's The Funhouse at MoMA a few weeks ago and my god she walks away with that entire film in her two scenes. What a goddamned treasure she was. The movies lost one of its brightest and most shining stars when she passed in 2019. If you've got any tell me your favorite Sylvia Miles movie moments in the comments!

10 Off My Head: Putting the Wild in Wild Life

So who went and saw Cocaine Bear this weekend? I did, I did. It was fine. I'm surprised I can't rave more about a movie where Margo Martindale gets her ass gnawed on but the movie really needed some punching up, I thought -- it came up slightly short on everything it was aiming for. It wasn't scary enough, it wasn't funny enough, it wasn't camp enough. It was a little bit of those things, and it had moments. But there was a tension in the film between how straight director Elizabeth Banks wanted to play it and how far off the deep-end she wanted to go and the movie never quite resolved that.

Still I'm glad it exists (PS hey Alden Ehrenreich's biceps in that last scene) and I hope its success at the box-office sets off a "When Animals Attack!" craze, because that's one of my favorite sub-genres of movies. Indeed for no other reason than I felt like thinking about these movies this morning, here is a list of ten of my totally random favorites, all of which totally get the balance right between bonkers and bite, and which are all streaming right now. Cuz why not? it's Monday dammit.

10 of my Favorite "When Animals Attack!" Movies

Slugs (1988) -- streaming on Tubi

I've posted about Slugs on this here website more than Slugs could possibly deserve, but it was partially filmed in my hometown when I was in Junior High; how could I not be obsessed with it? I didn't see it until I was adult though and thankfully it's a blast -- over-the-top gross and totally knowing about how ridiculous it is. You'll never look at chopped lettuce the same way again!

Day of the Animals (1977) -- streaming on Shudder

Not only does this movie star 70s horror icons Christopher George and his lady Lynda Day George -- the royal couple of Pieces, wherein she delivers the greatest line reading in the history of cinema -- but this movie also features Leslie Nielsen playing a wicked creep who dies topless wrestling a grizzly bear in the pouring rain. Look up "cinema" in the dictionary and it is just a photo of that. 

Frogs (1972) -- streaming on Pluto

Sam Elliot. Versus frogs.

Rogue (2007) -- streaming on Prime

This was director Greg McLean's follow-up to his masterpiece Wolf Creek and I feel like I remember it undeservedly falling through the cracks at the time and you never hear people talk about it anymore, but god it's a blast. Definitely tilts toward the scary side over the funny side, but Greg McLean does scary really well! I haven't seen this in awhile, I think I might revisit it myself. 

Food of the Gods -- streaming on Plex

With these older ones you do have to warn people about real animal cruelty happening on-screen, and yes this movie does kill a ton of rats on-screen in its big finale. But it's still one of my faves -- gigantic chickens and mosquitoes, man! You can't go wrong. 

The Uninvited -- streaming on Shudder

This is a recent acquisition unto my heart -- I only saw it for the first time a few months ago, thanks to its presence on Shudder. But as that gif above tells you,  I have chosen my heart's path wisely. About a cute little kitty-cat who gets exposed to radioactivity and then starts puking up a demon cat that kills a bunch of basic bitches (and George Kennedy!) onboard a yacht, this movie completed me.

Squirm (1976) -- streaming on Tubi

We've reached the point in the proceedings where I just feel the need to gesture wildly at the images and say, "LOOK! LOOK AT THAT! HOW COULD YOU NOT WANT TO WATCH THAT MOVIE???" But seriously. I don't remember much about Squirm's plot -- I should say "plot" -- but do I remember the scene pictured above? You bet your bottom dollar I do. You don't forget mountains of earthworms swallowing people up easy. 

Razorback (1984) -- streaming on Apple

I could have filled this list with nothing but movies from Australia, land of the demon animals -- indeed 1978's Long Weekend isn't on this list today but it's a must-watch and not just because its leading man wears the shortest-shorts I have possibly ever seen on-screen. But Razorback is also a classic and it's FINALLY getting a big blu-ray upgrade in just a couple of weeks -- this movie didn't have to go as hard as it does, but it's absolutely gorgeous in that very specific 1980s way and I can't wait to watch the upgrade to relish in its weird beauty.

Eaten Alive (1976) -- streaming on Shudder

Speaking of going hard -- Tobe Hooper's wackadoodle gator-romp fever dream sure is something else, innit? Set at an isolated swamp hotel that's as artificial looking at anything in Querelle this movie has wigs popping off and swamp-hookers and the most annoying dog ever put on-screen. It's about as bonkers as these movies go, and covered in that sleazy gunky feeling that only Tobe could muster. God I adore it.

Black Sheep (2006) -- streaming on Tubi

I gave this movie about deranged people-eating sheep a mixed-review when it came out in 2006 but I've been dying to re-watch it and haven't gotten around to it, so me including it here is really just me reminding myself to re-watch it. But I bet I'll be more forgiving of what bugged me about it now than I was then; I didn't used to be as delighted by goofiness + gore as I am today -- obviously I've regressed as a human being, but time will do that to you. 

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So what are your favorite Animal Attack movies?

Nights Of Frights

It's October! We should be getting our bodies ready for Halloween, shouldn't we? The second I'm done with NYFF (in about a week) I'll feel better situated to get myself spooky (and the Brooklyn Horror Fest kicking off this weekend should help) but for now I do have some spookiness to share -- for Mashable I made a list of "The 11 Scariest Movies Streaming For Free," go check it out right here. I went through all of the streaming sites and found the scariest titles and lemme tell you what -- narrowing it down to 11 from the over 100 titles I started with was a chore. But I did it. I cut off slivers of flesh like some Seven shit and I did it. I mixed genre classics with personal faves -- they just had to be movies that legitimately scared me. Lord knows different things scare different people but I made this list so these scared me! I think it's a good list though, if I do say so myself, so go check it out.

Little Green Men, Big Fancy Package

I was tempted to just post that photo as one of our "Today's Mood" posts because I can't imagine a better fit for how eird I feel today, but let's elaborate a bit since this is information worth sharing -- that is a still from William Cameron Menzies' 1953 sci-fi classic Invaders From Mars, which 1) I have somehow never seen, (sidenote: I don't think I have ever seen Tobe Hooper's 1986 remake either!) and which 2) is getting an ultra-fancy 4K blu-ray release on September 26th! No i don't know how I've never seen this movie before either but here's an excellent excuse to fix that if ever there was. It's coming from the fine folks at Ignite Films and you can pre-order it right here. I mean take a gander at the trailer and see what wondrous work they did making this thing look spiffy:

That looks like a big blast of old-fashioned fun, don't it? 

I've got the press release with all the details after the jump...

Which is Hotter?

Netflix is dropping a new Texas Chainsaw movie on February 18th and after the poster and trailer dropped last week (watch it here) a bunch of Horror Film Twitter seemed to take it as a challenge to rank and/or re-watch a bunch of the Texas Chainsaw movies. And weirdly, as much as I adore Tobe Hooper's original, this is a franchise I'd seen very little of? Until this week I'd only seen four of the nine films -- besides the original I'd seen its sequel, and then I'd seen the 2003 remake and its sequel. In both instances the diminishing returns had turned me off keeping going with the franchise, so I'd never seen the two films from the 90s...

... which famously have Viggo Mortensen (in the third) and Matthew McConaughey and Renee Zellweger (in the fourth) -- nor have I seen the 2013 3D film or Leatherface from 2017. Anyway last night, inspired by everybody's talk, I did go back and watch the 1990 film (called Leatherface: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre III) and the 1994 film (called The Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Next Generation) and I tweeted some about it...

Although my bf gave me a seriously hard glare when I said we're doing this I have finally fallen prey to all y'all's ghastly influence and I will be watching the third and fourth Texas Chainsaw movies tonight, neither of which I've seen before. I imagine I will tweet about it! pic.twitter.com/UFNoxLq1Yl

— Jason Adams (@JAMNPP) February 9, 2022

... although not as much as I expected to, because that third movie is some soul-slashing dreck and put me in a most foul mood indeed. The fourth film, the one with McConaughey & Zellweger on the other hand, is a hoot -- nobody leaves any scenery un-masticated, but besides that it's got an actually funny script with some swell zingers, and it's mostly not just a tired retread of the original's beat-of-beat, which is what kills the Viggo movie dead. Next Gen eventually falls prey to some of that -- does every single one of these have to lead to a dinner scene with the kooky meat-lovin' clan??? -- but it zigs more than it zags. Anyway I saved the important question for last...

web survey

13 Rats of Halloween #13

Where else could my "13 Rats of Halloween" series of posts for this here Plague Year of the Rat ultimately take me besides right to the infernal king of the scuttling befanged beasts himself, the nightmare turned flesh Nosferatu. Twas always eventual! Whether it's Klaus Kinski for Herzog or...

 

... Max Schreck for Murnau, the scariest of all the vampires has always been associated with rats. It's been ages since I actually sat down and read Bram Stoker's book of Dracula (which of course Nosferatu ripped off and almost got erased out of existence because of) so perhaps one of you more literate types can remind me if rats play much of a factor in the original text? I assume so, I just don't feel like googling it. I do know that Stephen King, when he wrote Salem's Lot...

... he removed a truly disgusting sounding scene from its earliest draft where a character is eaten alive by rats. King's (and Tobe Hooper's) Mr. Barlow of course being a direct descendant of the horrifying Nosferatu lineage of vampire.

Of course as classic as Murnau's plague scenes are I think the best plague sequence belongs to Herzog -- I consider the fancy people eating their fancy final meal together at that table in the public square that's literally swarming with pestilence to be one of the singular images of Horror Cinema. And you can tell I'm being very serious, because I busted out the word "cinema"! That means I mean it! Art! Hey... did you ever notice if you rearrange the letters in "Art" you get "Rat"? Just sayin...

Happy Halloween, everyone!

Everything You Ever Need To Know About Life...

... you can learn from:

The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 (1986)

Drayton: It's a dog eat dog world and from
where I sit there just ain't enough damn dogs!

The great Tobe Hooper would have turned 75 today.

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Everything You Ever Need To Know About Life...

... you can learn from:

Poltergeist (1982)

Diane: You were saying about poltergeists. 

Dr. Lesh: Poltergeists are usually associated with an

individual. Hauntings seem to be connected with an area.

A house usually. 

Marty: Poltergeist disturbances are of a fairly short duration. 

Perhaps a couple of months. Hauntings can go on for years. 

Diane: Are you telling me that all of this could 

just suddenly end at any time? 

Dr. Lesh: Yes, it could. Unless it's a haunting. 

But hauntings don't usually revolve around living people. 

Diane: Then we don't have much time, Dr. Lesh, 

because my daughter is alive somewhere inside this house. 

Beatrice Straight, who won an Oscar for her minuscule role in Network in 1976, was born on this day in the year 1914. She's even better in Poltergeist, if you ask me, although she always gets overshadowed by the more colorful Tangina (played by the more colorful Zelda Rubenstein). We posted about our love for Dr. Lesh before right here.

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Great Moments in Movie Shelves #107

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One of my favorite movie libraries is in Kiyoshi Kurosawa's 2001 horror film Kairo (aka Pulse), which is getting a big fancy blu-ray release from the ever-amazing Arrow Video on July 11th... just in time for my birthday! The character of Ryosuke (played by Haruhiko Katô) is doing what horror movie characters since time immemorial have done - going to the library to figure out what in the living (or I should say not living, in this case) fuck is going on.

There's some subtle comedy involving him attempting to find the exit - that sign seen above, supposedly pointing towards a way out, is actually pointing nowhere, which is both funny and totally on message for the hopeless and despairing mood of Pulse as a whole. 

The funny thing about this ghost town of a library is that it is perhaps the most crowded location in the entire film - there are several "people" seen milling about, all in the distance, just seen as indistinct brownish shadows of movement. Ryosuke does manage to bump into a friend, and what book is she reading?

Of course!  
Pulse maintains its mood like few others.

His friend takes Ryosuke to a computer station (in case you've never seen the film the gist is that there's no more room in hell so the dead are now entering our world via the internet) to show him this weird spectral glitch, and then Ryosuke goes to do some reading of his own. At which point...

... one of my favorite shots in the entire film happens.
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Jinkies! Kiyoshi Kurosawa clearly understands the way every library feels haunted by the dead - dusty books piled up, walls upon walls of the voices of the long gone speaking to us from the past. History is a ghost story.

You should definitely snap up a copy of Pulse when it hits blu-ray next week - the transfer is beautiful and the extras are first rate; there are two that I want to draw special attention to. There is a long talk with Kiyoshi Kurosawa about his career leading up to Pulse and the making of the movie that's ace - I learned he's a huge fan of Tobe Hooper! (Excellent taste, Kiyoshi.)

And there's a really fascinating and insightful interview with the film-making duo of Adam Wingard & Simon Barrett (behind You're Next and The Guest and the latest Blair Witch movie) who are huge nerds for the movie and really get it. If you want a list of all the special features on the disc hit the jump...