It's Almost Upon Us.

Here's the final edition of Boxtober. You can also click here to see last year's Halloween Coverbox Wednesday, which had more of a seasonal theme. All right, here we go.

Halloween Blu-es

I'll be serving up a bunch of Halloween posts this week, the first of which is this selection of recommended Blu-ray horrors, in case you decide to stay in this Hallow's Eve. Now, there are obviously a shit-ton of titles to choose from, but here are five I picked out for you today.

First up, is the quintessential horror film An American Werewolf In London. It just released on Blu-ray last month and it looks fantastic. All the special features from the Collector's Edition DVD have thankfully been carried over, along with a few other goodies. A few years ago, a young British cinephile named Paul Davis sought to film a short about the making of American Werewolf. When he managed to get director John Landis on board, the project ballooned and before Davis knew it, he had almost everyone involved with the 1981 film sharing their memories. Beware The Moon – now a full-fledged documentary – is included on this disc and worth the price tag alone. There is also an additional featurette with legendary special effects guru Rick Baker. The melding of comedy and horror has still never been as adeptly done as it was in this film.

Next, is David Slade's 2007 adaptation of the Stephen Niles comic 30 Days Of Night. What I love about this film is that – amongst all this Twilight nonsense – it gives the vampire its teeth back. And let's please ignore that Slade is directing the third entry in that series in 2010, shall we? Niles' vamps are ferral, unforgiving beasts who see humans as livestock and nothing more. 30 Days Of Night is one of the best comic-to-movie adaptations to date and the Blu-ray transfer is superb. The unique art of Ben Templesmith is captured beautifully and the gory bits are all left intact. For my original Blu-ray review, click here.

Sam Raimi's triumphant return to horror Drag Me To Hell hit store shelves a few weeks ago. Seeing this last May was one of the most enjoyable experiences I've had in a theatre for quite some time and none of this has been lost in its journey to Blu-ray. You could tell that Sam's first and perhaps only rule on this picture, was to have fun and it shows. Every scare set piece pays off gloriously, with a jump and a laugh. This is the closest we are going to get to another Evil Dead, so enjoy it!

My next pick is probably the best horror transfer I have seen yet. It is J.A. Bayona's The Orphanage. You can read my original Blu-ray review here, but this movie is spectacular in every regard and seeing it in Hi-Def just takes it to another level. I have shown this movie to countless people and the verdict is unanimous (well, almost unanimous, I do have one friend who inexplicably doesn't like this film – you know who you are!) I adore this movie and no matter how many times I watch it, there are still moments that make me hold my breath.

My last choice on the list isn't a particularly good movie, but I want to include it because of the unique experience that the Blu-ray disc offers. The movie is 2007's Return To House On Haunted Hill. It has a Choose Your Own Adventure feature, where at several points it will stop a give you a choice, like “Should Paul Run Away?” You select the outcome with your remote and the movie continues based on what you decided. It's quite a novel feature and I'm actually surprised I haven't seen any titles do it since. There are apparently ninety-some-odd scenarios, so I'm sure it could keep you and yours occupied for an evening. This disc was the first Blu-ray – actually one of the first movies period – I reviewed here at THS. Click here and here to read my before and after thoughts.

So, there you go. If you are part of the Hi-Def initiated, plop in one of these along with your usual late October viewings. From one couch to another, I salute you!

In The Doghouse

A movie that I had been waiting for – and had spoken of at length here at THS – was Jake West's newest project Doghouse. It released in the UK in June and I was sure that it would play at least one of the festivals around here. That never happened though, as After Dark, TIFF and most surprisingly Fantasia, all passed on it. So, having to take matters into my own hands, I finally saw it last week.

A bunch of men travel to the English countryside with their newly divorced friend Vince (Stephen Graham) for a guys' weekend. Once they arrive at their destination, they find a virus has turned all the female inhabitants into man-eating zombies.

It crushes me to say this, but the unfortunate reality of the situation is that Doghouse just isn't very good. There are points where it is clearly supposed to be a comedy, but isn't funny and conversely points where it is supposed to be horror, but isn't scary. I liken it to Dark Castle's 2001 effort 13 Ghosts. If the rest of the production was as good as its creature designs, then it would be something to behold. That's what drew me to the project – that and it was done by the director of Evil Aliens – in the first place.

As you can see, they are the best part of the piece. My favourite was The Snipper, played by Emily Booth. I really wish they'd given her more to do though. Considering the talent involved, with the likes of Danny Dyer, Stephen Graham and Noel Clarke, it is really surprising how many of the jokes fall flat. I KNOW these guys are funny because their antics in Severance, Snatch and Dr. Who respectively, gave me many a chuckle. So why didn't it work here? Your guess is as good as mine, but Doghouse is a definite swing and a miss.

Another negative is that I really didn't care about any of the characters. I understand that they are supposed to be a bunch of fuck-ups, but they are as such that I felt nothing when they started getting killed off. That can't be what West had intended. It really surprised me by how mundane it was. West's last theatrical feature Evil Aliens had the same – if not higher – level of absurdity, yet there was an energy to it, that was sorely absent from Doghouse. And the rotten cherry on top is that West decides to end his movie in the most ridiculous manner possible. I suppose it fits with the uselessness of the characters, but as a viewer it justs seems kind of retarded.

Doghouse was a disappointment, but considering how it had been ostracized from the festival circuit, I guess the writing was on the wall. It's not a total loss, for there were glimmers in it, but too few and far between. It's a classic case of the whole not being anywhere near the sum of its dismembered parts.

Don't Kill The Messenger XXXIV

There a lot of stuff I want to cover today, so I'll get right to it.

Muchacho Del Globo!

I love a good mashup, especially the ones playing with horror movie trailers. The latest, from early this week, remixes the upcoming [REC] 2 with a certain story that left CNN blowing a lot of hot air.



He's An Old Broken Down Piece Of Meat!

Also this week in mashups, is this Grindhouse-inspired trailer for Aronofsky's Oscar nominated film The Wrestler. Thanks be to DirtyRobot for the heads up.



A New Teaser.

A few months ago, I mentioned that my friend Serena Whitney had gone to Louisiana to film a short. Well, a teaser is now up and you can watch it below. Based On Actual Events will hopefully be coming early next year. Stay tuned to Killerfilm for more updates.



Sieg Heil.

Wow, Nazis sure are popular these days. First, we had the crowd pleasing Dead Snow and then Quentin Tarantino gave us his long awaited reimagining of the last days of WWII with Inglourious Basterds. Now, it looks like we have a Nazi-centric slasher on the way from Denmark. Check out the new trailer for Final Solution below.



More Fear.

My buddy Rob Mitchell finally uploaded more of his footage from the Festival Of Fear. Check out the vids below.







For more vids, check out Rob & Sheleigh's YouTube channel here.

Climbin' That Mountain.

Let me introduce you to ‘the pile’.

It exists on my coffee table. It’s where I stack my movies-to-watch. This ever-shifting mess of loaners, freebies, screeners and Zip.ca envelopes sits there mocking me every time I sit down on my couch. Until now. I’ve decided I’m going to make an concerted effort to chip away at it. First up, is Michael J. Bassett’s 2006 film Wilderness.

Now, I had originally planned to watch this before the Toronto Film Fest because Bassett’s newest film Solomon Kane was premiering there. Though I had seen his debut Deathwatch several years ago, I wanted to reacquaint myself with his style. Obviously, I didn’t get around to it. After seeing Kane – which as far as swashbuckling sword & sorcery movies go was a fairly entertaining effort – the completist in me felt obligated to take in Wilderness, if only to get my Zip queue moving again.

A group of incarcerated juvenile delinquents and their handlers are set upon by a maniacal survivalist, while on an island character-building excursion.

Wilderness is definitely my favourite of the three projects Bassett has made so far. There’s a lot to like about this movie. The setup is simple and things get moving quickly. The cast is great and stacked with recognizable British talent. Sean Pertwee, who always elevates the quality of anything he’s in and Alex Reid (The Descent) appear as the authority figures and Toby Kebbell – who I first saw in the fantastic Shane Meadows film Dead Man’s Shoes – excels here as the alpha male juvenile Callum. What put this movie over the top for me were the interesting dynamics. In addition to the perils of having a trained killer and his attack dogs (which are a force by themselves) on their tail, these kids also have deal with each other. With their supervising element removed, some of these delinquents are as dangerous as the person hunting them and things fall into chaos quickly. It is unsettling and not beyond the realm of possibility. I mean there’s still a helping of characters doing stuff they clearly shouldn’t like when Jo (Karly Greene) unnecessarily provokes her own undoing, but for the most part the script is fairly tight.

Pertwee put it best in the accompanying featurette, when he described Wilderness as a cross between Battle Royale and Lord Of The Flies. That’s some nice fucking company! Wilderness is also similar thematically to a lesser-known Canadian film from the seventies called Rituals. Unlike Kane and Deathwatch, Wilderness is devoid of of any supernatural elements, which maybe why it resonated with me more. There is also some well placed gore in this movie. It is rarely excessive and is used only to accentuate the brutality of the circumstances.

After watching Wilderness, Bassett has cemented himself in my eyes as a competent filmmaker. As I said, Solomon Kane was decent enough, but it’s the kind of thing that could become a franchise if it does well enough and I'd hate to see him get locked into one thing for an extended period of time. I find his ensemble character pieces like Wilderness – and Deathwatch to a lesser extent – much more appealing, so that’s where I hope his career leads him.

Another Round?

Welcome back for week three of Boxtober. Thanks for all the emails you have been sending in. It makes this little horror section all that much more fulfilling.

Another Trip To The Palace.

I took another trip to Trash Palace last Friday night, this time for an old Canadian ditty called The Little Girl Who Lives Down The Lane, which was another gem out of J.C.'s collection. Since it had been over twenty years since I saw it last, I figured it was worth a revisit.


Rynn (Jodie Foster) is an intelligent thirteen-year-old in lives in an old and secluded house. She says she lives with her father, yet no one in town has ever seen him. When the landlord comes snooping, Rynn goes to extreme lengths to keep her secret hidden.

Little Girl is a great little movie of a sort that are rarely made anymore. It is a tightly knit thriller that is basically just a sequence of dialogues between Rynn and those who attempt to invade the sanctuary she has built for herself. So much time has passed, it is sometimes easy to forget how young Foster was when she started acting. 1976 was a big year for her as she appeared in three other notable releases, the family films Freaky Friday and Bugsy Malone and Marty Scorsese's Taxi Driver - the film that cemented her status as one to watch. In Little Girl, Foster is front and center and delivers an admirable performance with an eloquence far beyond her years. And she is not the only fine performer here. Martin Sheen oozes sleaze as pervert Frank Hallet, who endlessly tries to get some alone time with Rynn. Also appearing as Rynn's love interest – yes, you read that right – Mario, is Scott Jacoby, who had coincidentally played a similar role to Foster's two years before in a lesser TV movie called Bad Ronald. The few exchanges between Rynn and her landlord Mrs. Hallet (Alexis Smith) are also deliciously venomous. It really is true that North American films seemed to get away with a lot more in the seventies. There are elements to this film that just wouldn't fly these days, like the sex scene – tame as it may be – between Mario and Rynn, and the more creepy advances by Frank upon Rynn.

Like reaaallllly creepy.

The Little Girl Who Lives Down The Lane is a solid little film. It may not be as extreme or genre specific as some of the other Canadian horrors of that time period, like Black Christmas, The Changeling and Cronenberg's early work, but it is certainly no less engaging. If you can find this on DVD, I suggest you give it a whirl.