Well, I'm about horror-movied-out after this month but I feel like I cleared out a lot of my queue doing this and found a few gems in the process.
Frontier(s) – Amazon – A gang of young thieves flee Paris during the violent aftermath of a political election, only to hole up at an Inn run by neo-Nazis. The Europeans keep on outdoing us when it comes to horror and this is no exception. This movie reminds me a lot of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, only located in Paris and the family of hillbilly psychopaths also happen to be Nazis. Once this movie gets to the neo-Nazi inn it really takes off and never stops. It’s gruesome, has great characters, and I haven’t rooted so hard for Nazis to die in a movie since Raiders of the Lost Ark. Great, great flick.
Bad Ben – Amazon Prime – A man buys a house with the intent to flip it but instead is terrorized by a spirit. Sounds like every other modern haunted house story but this one does it well despite some flaws. There is only one character in this movie and some parts are curiously slow (we get about 5 minutes of watching the guy mow his lawn and do gardening right before the climactic ending, WTF?). It also suffers from the cardinal found footage flaw of making you wonder why the guy is filming all this in the first place. At one point he even uses a selfie stick to record himself blessing the house. That’s a first. That said, the movie gives you that same sense of suspense and fear of not knowing what is going to happen next that Paranormal Activity had, so on that level it works and to me that is what these types of movies are supposed to be about. There are a couple of well-placed jump scares but they are not overused. Bottom line is if you are a fan of the original Paranormal Activity movie, you will like this. If not, you probably won’t.
Cropsey - Amazon/Shudder - A documentary about the Urban Legend of Cropsey in Staten Island. I love crime documentaries and this one having the horror/serial killer slant gave me high expectations that were more or less met. While the documentary doesn't really answer any questions, it's incredibly creepy and also sad throughout amplified by the fact that the murders and kidnappings were real.
Light's Out - Amazon - A woman and her family are terrorized by an entity named Diana that only manifests in the dark. I did not have high expectations with this one but quite liked it. The nature of the story makes the whole experience pretty tense, and you'll quickly find yourself looking in every dark spot on the screen for Diana, whose incredibly creepy silhouette makes numerous appearances. Worth the watch.
when I was a kid
