Sinister Saturdays- The Boogeyman 2023

Title: The Boogeyman
Director: Rob Savage
Starring: Chris Messina, Sophie Thatcher, Vivien Lyra Blair
Distributed by: 20th Century Studios
Running Time: 1hr 38m

Based off the 1973 short story by Stephen King, I found this one on Hulu the other night. I hadn’t read the story before, so I thought maybe it would be a paranormal movie, but it kinda turned into a creature feature. For anyone new to the lore, a Boogeyman is predominantly North American mythos of a hellish creature that hides in closets, under the bed, or other dark creepy places and eats children who misbehave, or in this case, are just unlucky.

A recently widowed psychologist Will Harper (always solid Chris Messina) and his two daughters, teen Sadie (Yellowjackets star ingenue Sophie Thatcher) and young Sawyer (very talented Vivien Lyra Blair) are still reeling after the unexpected death of the mother, when the youngest girl suddenly finds stalked by the Boogeyman. It’s a little unclear how the creature came to find young Sawyer, maybe the family’s collective grief invited the Boogeyman into the home.

Or it could have been this sad welp below, who lost his family in the movie’s opening scene.

Lester Billings (played by my new favorite character actor David Dastmalchian) shows up in doc’s office, totally unannounced, without an appointment, and talking about the creature that comes for your kids when you’re not paying attention. Dark stuff and the doc Harper agees, there’s something off about this dude. For some creepy reason, while Harper is in the next room calling 911, Lester decides to check out the families’ closets and quickly finds out the Boogeyman eats adults too. Btw, the Boogeyman is also an extreme multi-tasker because it manages to haunt two families at the same time.

Now about that Boogeyman, filmmakers kept all the traditional tropes to make their monster feel familiar to audiences, hiding in the dark, afraid of light, mimicing voices, fast traveling like ghosts or a spirit, but, then, they also smartly added some new characteristics to unnerve and surprise filmgoers, moving away from a paranormal entity to a more corporeal physical creature.

It was ugly, had tentacle-like appendages walked on ceilings, moved in all directions, making it near impossible to outrun.

Monsters are not all powerful though. In fact, they have a lot of limitations, and Sadie and Sawyer turn out to be two smart cookies, who manage to defeat the Boogeyman, for now at least. People should probably still check under the bed and in the closet.

I found this PG-13 horror thriller to be a short enjoyable romp. The film relies on the creeponess of the dark, jump scares and the anxieties of a grieving family to scare audiences. Much like Lake Mungo, a film I reviewed earlier this month, grief is a powerful negative emotion that really opens you up to supernatural. Since there’s no gore, sex, and only mild use of drugs and bad language, The Boogeyman is probably good for families looking to introduce older kids into horror.

Scariest scenes: When young Sawyer rolls her lamp ball under the bed to reveal the Boogeyman for the first time and another jump scare moment when the Boogeyman suddenly appears and grabs Sadie.

Thursday Terror – Dr. Jekyll and Sister Hyde

Hammer’s unique story mash up between Burke and Hare cases, legendary serial killer Jack the Ripper, and Robert Louis Stevenson’s Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde is a mesmorizing gender-bender thriller.

Set in infamous Whitechapel at the height of Jack the Ripper’s murderous spree, Dr. Henry Jekyll (Ralph Bates) hell-bent on his quest for immortality, crosses moral barriers with his experiments.

At first, the young doctor pays a local mortician to acquire body parts of newly-deceased women who end up in the morgue, but when supplies run low, the doctor enlists the grisly services of two lowly gentleman, Burke and Hare, who indiscriminately kill unsuspecting victims and bring their dead bodies to Dr. Jekyll.

But Dr. Jekyll’s serum has unintended consequences, when it transforms his own body into the body of a beautiful woman, who he eventually names Mrs. Hyde (Martine Beswick). He tells his noisy neighbors, including his admirer Susan (Susan Brodrick), that the alluring woman now living with him is his recently widowed sister.

Between The Ripper and Burke and Hare, the city of Whitechapel is gripped by fear. Someone eventually finds out about deadly duo’s murderous deeds and they succomb to the town’s pitchfork. This leaves Dr. Jekyll at a disadvantage, just as he was making progress with his serum.

Sister Hyde quickly realizes her demise is tied to Dr. Jekyll’s research, so she begins stalking the dark alleys of Whitechapel herself for young female victims to murder in the name of science.

Back in 1971, the idea of a man transforming into a woman was really taboo stuff. For some moviegoers, that in of itself was the horror. Despite the obvious misogynistic horror trope of making every other woman who appears on a screen a victim, this film really pioneered LGBTQ and woman empowerment themes.

Martine Beswick really stands out here with her cutthroat and sensual performance as Sister Hyde. She’s one spooky bitch, and probably deserves a little more attention in the pantheon of horror villains. If you’re new to Hammer Horror, definitely give this wickedly smart thriller a watch.

Thursday Terror – The Satanic Rites of Dracula

Part spy thriller, part goth horror, all parts 1970s grooviness, complete with sherpa vests, The Satanic Rites of Dracula takes place two years after Dracula, A.D. 1972. An undercover cop for Scotland Yard barely escapes the clutches of an evil mysterious cult in London.

In his dying last breaths, the agent recalls witnessing the horrifying bloody ritual sacrifice of a beautiful young naked woman, seen in secret photo evidence that he smuggled out of the compound.

With their colleague dead, Inspector Murray and Scotland Yard are at a loss for answers, so they call on Professor Van Helsing and his scholarly granddaughter Jessica to help decipher the satanic symbols and identify cult members.

While Inspector Murray, Jessica, and others go to the compound to dig around, Van Helsing reaches out to an old friend he recognized in the photos, with hopes of infiltrating the satanic cult made up of government officials hellbent on destroying the world and bringing back the Prince of Darkness.

Christopher Lee returns for his 7th and final performance as Count Dracula for Hammer Films. Also reprising their roles, Peter Cushing starring as Professor Lorrimer Van Helsing (a descendant of Dr. Abraham Van Helsing) and Michael Coles as Inspector Murray; and a young and absolutely fabulous Joanna Lumely shines brightly as Jessica Van Helsing, the woman Dracula hopes to make his new bride.

A heavily edited version of Satanic Rites of Dracula was redistributed in the U.S. in 1979 as Count Dracula and His Vampire Bride. You will find it streaming under that name on Plex, a free streaming service with an overwhelming ton of ads.

Sinister Saturdays- Lake Mungo Review

Title: Lake Mungo
Director: Joel Anderson
Starring: Rosie Traynor, Talia Zucker, David Pledger, Martin Sharper
Distributed by: Arclight Films
Running Time: 88 minutes

Since its release in 2008, the psychological thriller Lake Mungo consistently shows up in peoples’ top scary movies you’ve never seen lists. This was originally a movie that I skipped back in the day because it was a found footage horror like mega-hits The Blair Witch, 1999, or Paranormal Activity, 2007. Although hugely popular, I thought slow-burn, hand-held shaky cam stylized horror films had oversaturated the market in the 2000s and I grew tired of them. The only found footage gem to come from that era was the 2007 Spanish zombie film Rec.

Instead of in-your-face jump scares, slow-burn horror movies move at a snail’s pace and build up all the tension up front, usually for an hour and a half, all for one big giant scary payoff at the end. It’s a film technique that flat-out doesn’t work for some horror fans, particularly any with attention deficit disorders. After finding Lake Mungo on good ole Tubi, I decided to give it a try. After getting over my usual gripes about slow-burn, found-footage films, I began to appreciate Lake Mungo for what the film was really selling, death and existential dread.

The movie starts with a typical Australian middle-class family living in Victoria suburbia of Ararat, explaining through documentary-style interviews and shared family and police photos and videos, how the recent mysterious loss of their teenage daughter Alice has devastated their family.

Watching a family grieve is never fun. Audiences are immediately thrust into one family’s nightmare scenario and it’s here where the excellent casting becomes one of the most brilliant things about Lake Mungo. Thanks to these strong unassuming low-key performances, the beginning is utterly depressing. It feels like you’re watching a documentary about a real family mourning their daughter, sister, and friend, a beautiful, cheerful girl living what we think is the perfect life. The painful agony of tragically losing a loved one hits hard, yet, boredom might set in for anyone who hasn’t experienced any such loss.

Eventually, evil starts to seep into the family’s photographs and found footage as the movie progresses. Through police photos, we learn what Alice’s father Russell saw when he identified Alice’s body but Alice’s mother June couldn’t bring herself to look, which leads to her not finding closure. Later, a particularly agonizing stunt pulled by her grieving son Matthew, who is also dealing with his sister’s death in a different way, prompts June to begin questioning whether her daughter is actually dead.

In her quest, June meets a psychic Ray who may hold the key to understanding Alice’s untimely demise. June and the family uncover truths about Alice’s double life and clues leading them back to the source of evil at Lake Mungo.

In his feature-length writing and directorial debut, Joel Anderson makes all the smart choices in mixing documentary-style interviewing, showing photographs, and found footage video to tell his story. While some shots are repeated, and there are a few red herrings, no scene is wasted. You’re constantly fed new information and you’ll start scouring the screen looking for ghosts or signs of the paranormal. The tension towards the end is agony because you know something is not right, but you’re not sure what it is. Be sure to watch through the credits as the extra photos confirm paranormal evidence.

Scariest scene:
Near the end, the big reveal of what Alice saw at Lake Mungo. It’s a subtle scare, one that takes a while for you to get creeped out.

Thursday Terror – Brides of Dracula

Legendary screen actor Peter Cushing reprises his role as Professor Van Helsing in Brides of Dracula, a sequel to the popular Hammer film, Horror of Dracula.

Count Dracula is dead, but his disciples live on, terrorizing Transylvania, all thanks to a young school mistress Marianne Danielle, played by Yvonne Monlaur, traveling to a small village to teach girls French and etiquette.

After her stagecoach mysteriously rides away leaving her stranded, Marianne meets the Baroness Meinster and agrees to stay the night in her castle.

Marianne sees a strange man in the chamber across from hers. In the middle of the night, she sneaks over and finds that the man is actually the Baroness’ son and her host keeps him locked up.

Ignorant to the dangers, she helps Baron Meinster escape and unknowingly releases a monster.

The undead Baron wrecks havoc on the local village, but thankfully, infamous vampire hunter Van Helsing, who has been called upon by a local priest, is back to save the day!

Released in 1960, Brides of Dracula was directed by Terence Fisher, a frequent collaborator and director of Hammer films. Despite losing the charismatic Christopher Lee as the titular character, Hammer had vision to expand the vampire universe and this was their first film doing so. I’ve read online that the production was plagued with problems, but totally worth it, as this is one of best Hammer films I’ve seen.

Brides of Dracula is now streaming on Prime Video with paid subscription.

Of Beaches and Monsters

‘Ber months may start tomorrow, but Summer isn’t over just yet. There’s still 23 days left to celebrate Summerween. I couldn’t decide which is scarier, horror films featuring spooky cabins or mysterious beaches. So, here’s a double list with the best of both worlds. From creature features to crazed killers, you can find all of these films streaming somewhere. Let me know which list you think has the scariest movies.

American Ghoul – Ten Best American Zombie Films

As July ends, so does our tribute to the red, white, and ghoul. Many of us wonder what we’d do in an apocalypse. How long would we survive? Would we lose our humanity or becomes the heroes we crave to be? Truth is, we’re already creating a nightmare dystopian society, casting aside freedoms and replacing them with fearmongering, discrimination, intolerance, and violence.

Back in 1968, George A. Romero foresaw this great nation descending into chaos as gun culture and extremist ideals gained more popularity because of easy access to guns and lack of education. He saw a nation at war with itself long before the monsters showed up. His movies often contained scathing critiques of class warfare, over-militarization, moral corruption, and empty consumerism, all of which Americans still suffer greatly today.

Dawn of the Dead, 1978

Romero may have been psychic, as he didn’t think adding zombies would really change the American landscape all that much and I tend to agree. If we continue down this treacherous path, we won’t have much further to fall. The day Americans unite may very well be the day they drop the bomb.

George A. Romero

There’s one thing for certain though, you can count on the fight in America. Even the quietest, most gunshy American has a sense of revolution instilled in their soul. Communists, terrorists, extremists, zombies, we’ll fight them all! We’ll never lose that pursuit of life, liberty, and happiness. It’s truly the American way.

Zombieland, 2009

With that in mind, here are my picks of the best ten American zombie films, showing the world our American fighting spirit!

Night of the Living Dead, 1968
Dawn of the Dead, 1978
Day of the Dead, 1985
Land of the Dead, 2005
Dawn of the Dead, 2004
Return of the Living Dead, 1985
Zombieland, 2009
Planet Terror, 2007
Warm Bodies, 2013
Maggie, 2015

Best Nautical Horror Movies

Happy Summer! Tis the season for visiting the beach and taking boat rides across the seven seas. The theme this month has been June Doom and as recent events has shown us (orca boat attacks, lost Titanic sub, etc.), the ocean is still the Earth’s most dangerous playground. But, for as much as I love Jaws, shark horror is a dime a dozen, so I decided to go in a slightly different direction by sharing my picks of the best nautical horror that doesn’t involve sharks. From vengeful spirits to alien creatures hiding in the depths of the trenches, this list will give you plenty of reasons to stay on dry land. Check them out and leave me comment here or on Instagram to let me know what you thought.

It Came From Beneath the Sea, 1955
The Fog, 1980
Deep Rising, 1998
Leviathan, 1989
Deep Star Six, 1989
Below, 2002
Ghost Ship, 2002
Underwater, 2020

My Favorite Mutant Monster Movies

Speaking of mutations, a recent bout with Covid has been keeping me down, so I wasn’t able to write a proper movie post this month. I may still sneak one in.

Just trust me, this is a great list of the best mutant monster movies you’ll find on streaming.👾🕷☢️

Best Horror Anthologies for Halloween

In celebration of the halfway point to Halloween, I’ve decided to share a list of my favorite horror anthologies that are perfect to watch on Halloween night.

Most of these movies are pretty gory and violent, so make sure the kids are in bed or definitely preoccupied with their candy haul in another room. The 70s are long gone and responsible parenting is in, so, don’t scar your kids for life with things they can’t unsee. Although, the worst that could happen is they turn into lifelong horror fans like us.

*****

Trick-‘r-Treat, 2007 – Directed by Michael Dougherty. With his directorial debut, Dougherty gave the world the terrifyingly cute Halloween mascot Sam, a trick-r-treating demon with a simple list of rules that must be followed on Halloween night. This cult-favorite film never saw a theatrical release because Warner Bros. supposedly didn’t know how to market the film. I think it was mostly due to the violence of and to the children in the film’s stories. Whatever the case, this is as perfect as an anthology film can get. Great acting, great storytelling, art direction, costumes, and cinematography are all on point, and then, there’s the birth of a Halloween icon, Sam. Films that spawn multi-dollar merchandising opportunities are pretty rare, but the fact that it all grew into a worldwide fan favorite without fancy marketing and a normal production release, absolute kismet! Earlier this year, rumors spread that a bonafide sequel was in the works, but there have been no other details. Fingers crossed that Dougherty’s magic casts a second spell over the horror lovers.

The Mortuary Collection, 2019 – Directed and written by Ryan Spindell. Shudder produced this slick original anthology with a framing story more interesting than the shorts. As a big fan of Clancy Brown, I was delighted to see him starring as the eccentric mortician in the small town of Raven’s End. When a young woman answers the “Help Wanted” sign, the mortician decides to test her resolve and recounts several macabre stories of death cases he’s encountered over the years, but, as it turns out, this secretive new employee has a tale of her own to tell. The acting, score, and production quality here are all top-notch and the short stories are pretty much classic horror, with one freshly woke tale guaranteed to make men squeamish.

Creepshow, 1982 – Directed by George A Romero. In this early 80s horror-comedy, legendary horror icons, Romero and Stephen King, who wrote three stories specifically for the movie, collaborate together for the first time. The good friends really knew how to speak each other’s language and produced a classic campy fun spooky anthology of five stories which really helped make horror anthologies appreciated in the same vein as horror films. Despite the Creep feeling awfully familiar to the Cryptkeeper of Tales of the Crypt fame, the Creepshow Magazine framing story is a solid tale of an abused boy named Billy, who just wants to enjoy his comics, but his father decides to throw his beloved magazine out instead. Creepshow was a perfectly executed anthology series, starring a lot of well-known Hollywood celebrities of 1980s respectively. With special effects and monster creations done by longtime Romero friend and collaborator Tom Savini, the film paid homage to old 1950s horror and sci-fi comics and movies. My favorite short, They’re Creeping up on You, starred EG Marshall, as a bigoted, racist germ-freak tycoon who gets his comeuppance in a creepy way.

Creepshow 2, 1987 – Directed by Michael Gornick. After George A. Romero wrote the screenplay for Creepshow 2, he stepped aside to allow the cinematographer of the first Creepshow movie, to wear the director cap, in this second film collaboration with Stephen King. Even with only three stories, this quintessential 80s horror outshines its predecessor and features fine performances from more Hollywood legends, like George Kennedy and Dorothy Lamour, and Tom Savini, who played the storytelling Creep and helped again with special effects. The stories are Stephen King’s classic tall tales come to life, with The Raft and The Hitchhiker being the best of three but I really did enjoy the outlining story involving the same bullied comic-reading hero Billy from the first film. Much like the first film, Creepshow 2 simply reminds us of why some of us fell in love with horror in the first place.

All Hallow’s Eve, 2013 – Directed and written by Damien Leone. What an introduction to the brutal sadistic horror villain Art the Clown. In his first feature-length film, Art terrorizes a babysitter on Halloween night, when she finds an old VHS tape containing three horrifying stories. One of the creepiest things about Art the Clown and why he’s become such a popular horror villain, is we just don’t know why he’s doing all this. It harkens back to the early days of Halloween’s Michael Myers, before the armchair psychologists showed up and ruined him. The boogeyman doesn’t need a reason.

V/H/S/94, 2021 – Directed by various directors. Does anyone even know or remember what VHS tapes are? All the Shudder’s V/H/S movies are great, but in ’94, I really enjoyed all the shorts and the framing story about a group of swat officers who raid the compound of a cult only to discover body parts and disturbing videotapes playing in each room. The Subject directed by Timo Tjahjanto was my favorite. What a gruesome action-packed delight. This is a perfectly cast and executed production of cyborg horror with a fantastic story and a hero which I hope we haven’t seen the last of. (I’m still waiting for cyberpunk horror genre to take off, now that we have the technology.) Fingers crossed someone gives Timo some money and lets him make a sequel or prequel.

Black Sabbath, (I tre volti della paura, ‘The Three Faces of Fear), 1963 – Directed by Mario Bava. The legendary Italian horror maestro teams up with horror icon Boris Karloff to tell three terrifying tales. This is mostly a thriller, light on actual scares, except for the last story, A Drop of Water. Now this is a horror classic that will haunt you. Bava stole from the best to bring these creepy tales to life and has found a cult following since its initial release, which was considered a bomb. I guess Kaloff’s star was fading by then. Thank the horror gods for DTV and streaming.

Tales of Halloween, 2015 – Directed by various directors. This Netflix production of ten separate horror stories, all taking place on Halloween night, is a lot fun and a great film to put on in the background of your Halloween party. After a long animation montage of the short’s titles and credits, we jump right into the action. There’s no framing story, just horror legend Adrienne Barbeau lending her smooth voice as a local DJ to set the mood for the evening. While not as scary as some other anthologies on this list, the Halloween vibe is strong and some shorts are really amusing and filled with dark humor. My favorite story was Friday the 31st which I found quite humorous and a real treat for those who like twists.

*****

There’s no real order to this list. I think every anthology series has merit and should be seen by horror fans. I can’t guarantee every story will tickle your fancy, but enough of them will. If you’re looking to have a spooky good time on Halloween night after the trick-or-treating is done, these are timeless horror classics that get the job done.