In Search of Darkness Part II: The Journey Into '80s Horror Continues

This is the follow up to In Search of Darkness and it adds more great horror flick clips and interviews. It was awesome to see Nancy Allen from Dressed to Kill and Robert Englund and Robert Rusler from the Nightmare on Elm Street franchise being added to the mix of interviews. There's also excellent coverage of many great horror films that you've probably never heard of. This time around, the interviews seem more sincere and toned down which is a good thing. Definitely worth the watch. Catch it on Shudder as of July 2021.

This isn't interesting enough to watch in one sitting. The info has already been put out there and it's a bore to watch former horror actors and directors inject modern politics into the genre. I don't mind pointing out how modern groups take a series and identify with it, but we all know that these guys didn't consider this stuff while making the movies at the time.

It's a lot of back slapping and self aggrandizement in an overlong clip show.

Unfortunately, part one is not currently available in any format, so I can't compare. But part two is a sweeping review of the horror genre year by year through the 80's. It's got lots of actors and directors giving their commentary in the genre and the decade, which is fantastic. It's also interesting that they didn't just scratch the surface, they dug deep into a reflection on many aspects of the genre, including exploitation and representation, and it's not nearly as one sided and simplistic as it could have been and as many outsiders would believe in that regard.

The mainlet down is the structure. Who is going to sit down and watch a documentary (or anything) this long in one sitting??? Why didn't they cut this into a mini series? You can literally watch 3 or 4 classic horror movies in the time it takes you to watch this. It's already got title cards and is broken into sections, so why didn't they just take that added step?

In any case the last thing to note is that they seem to touch on so many movies, a lot of these are going to be ones you've never heard of. That can be a good thing! It means I came away with a big list of new movies to watch, not that I needed that, but hey maybe there will be a few gems in there... New household favorites even. Who knows. That's the beauty of exploring the past. It does however also mean that they spend at most 5 minutes on any single film. Which is enough time to give a great overview and context, but not enough to delve deep into any single film. They do spots that occasionally go over films again as a part of some larger topic, like discussing a certain director, which is nice. But the overall cohesiveness of the documentary is lacking. Nothing feels connected or driven by a unifying narrative. This isn't a huge flaw if all you're looking for is a huge survey of the genre over a whole decade. Just be aware, they aren't going to guide you through it all or talk purposefully about how this or that movie changed the genre. That sort of thing comesup in the interview clips, but never as a clear historical narrative baked into the documentary itself. You may prefer that, or not, but it's something worth knowing up front. This literally just consists of hours and hours of title cards and interview clips stitched together with film clips added in and overlayed throughout.

It does beg the question... With so many films discussed, where is this or that film? Did I just miss it or forget they talked about it? Was it in part 1? There's a part 3. Confusingly, you might think since part 2 is the 1980's, that part 1 was everything pre-1980's and part 3 would be post 80's, right? Nope. Part 3 is... Exactly the same as part 2, just more movies. They even start back at 1980... odd. I have no idea what part 1 is because it's completely unavailable at the moment for me, so who knows.

Overall definitely worth seeing for any genre fan.

In Search of Darkness: Part II might not offer much to the more seasoned horror fan, but it's entertaining nevertheless. It offers a nice array of talking heads to discuss a select group of popular (and not-so-popular) horror films from the 80's. The films included seem to have been selected randomly and some are discussed for a good chunk of time and some seem to only be talked about for 30 seconds. It can get a little frustrating at times, but this is a film made with a lot of enthusiasm and love and you can't fault them for something like that.

I enjoyed this a lot I don't think I did myself any favors by watching it all in one go Jesus Christ, but I really found it to be quite an improvement over the first one, it didn't get to feel so monotonous, they noticeably seemed to put more effort into going into the hows and whys of why we love horror movies and some of what the many people were saying was quite thoughtful and even heartfelt at points. I liked how they talked about a lot of smaller movies that I love like Cellar Dweller and Dead and Buried, but it wasn't all just endless quick movie reviews, they broke it up really well by also talking about horror movie based video games and concepts for alternate versions of famous horror movies that never got made and I really enjoyed when some beloved horror actors like Nancy Ellen and Robert Englund and Linea Quigley, who is such a cool sweetheart of a lady, talked about themselves and their place in eighties horror movies and it was cool how this documentary branched out a little in how they approached talking about the genre. I liked it a lot in fact the only thing I think is really wrong with it is of course that it's obscenely longer than it perhaps needs to be, it's downright absurdly long, crazy long! There fifteen minutes of end credits!! Also I don't know what it is, as he's quite fun to listen to on his own online horror movie related show The Kill Count, but as he talks on here, James A Janisse is irritating as hell! Good program, don't know if I'd buy it or anything but definitely worth a watch for the reminiscing and interesting nostalgic anecdotes and stories that the actors reveal about the movies and the times back when, don't miss when Nancy Ellen says something very kind and sad about the late Heather O Rourke... On that cheerful note it's a good show just make sure you break it up into segments as you watch it! X.