John Carpenter's The Fog

Hey folks. I wanted to do a passage on the Funhouse for the passing of Tobe Hooper but I think I will have an audio review for that. So instead let's have a terrifying legend.  A ghost story of a town's past and how it effects the present. This is The Fog.

Our master of horror, John Carpenter (Halloween, The Thing, They Live, Prince of Darkness, Village of the Damned and Vampires) gathers us around a fire to tell tale of sailors that gone on the high seas. I mean we open with an eerie piano score and a quote from Edgar Allen Poe.

Well that could be anyone in all that fog. Cub Scouts probably.

Set in North Cali, in a little fishing village called Antonio Bay the town preps to celebrate in centennial as the mayor's aide and official busybody about town, Kathy Williams (Janet Leigh of Touch of Evil, Psycho, The Manchurian Candidate, Starman, Murder, She Wrote, The Twilight Zone and Halloween: H20) has managed to get the whole town in the swing of the upcoming festivities.

The local parish is looking to find records from that time in 1880 on the founding of Antonio Bay. Father Malone (Hal Holbrook of Wild in the Streets, The Brotherhood, The People Next Door, The Great White Hope, Magnum Force, All the President's Men, Lincoln, Midway and Creepshow) is digging into the archives. Meanwhile at night, a strange glowing fog seems to almost engulf the town. With fishermen out to sea and no one has heard from them since they had a near collision with another vessel. 

A pickled preacher and some vino. What could go wrong?

 During all this, the new DJ Stevie Wayne (Adrianne Barbeau of Maude, Creepshow,Swamp Thing, Escape from New York, Diagnosis Murder, The New Batman Adventures and Mad Max) is giving it her all to make your mornings bearable as the piece of driftwood her boy gave her seeps water and speaks through her 8-track and tape deck announcing" Six Must Die," in a ethereal voice.

With more crazy in the night, horns honking, Tvs turning off and on, windows shattering. Da works. Only one thing to do with this level of strange, make like Nick Castle (Tom Atkins of Halloween, Escape from New York, Maniac Cop, Halloween III: Season of the Witch, Night of the Creeps, Lethal Weapon, A Stranger Waits and Drive Angry) and pick up a hot hitchhiker like Liz Solley (Jamie Lee Curtis of Halloween, The Fog, Terror Train, Prom Night, Halloween II, Trading Places, Perfect, True Lies and NCIS) whose only crime is wanting to get to Vancouver. Sad really.

 The twosome got a little froggy in the night and then got bombarded by more bizarre phenomena. All this nuttiness started after the stroke of midnight, but our heroes don't need to know that.

Hey!  I never get a hitchhiker that hot. I cry foul.

Nick and Liz charter a boat to hit the Sea Grass and see if they can't find out where the hell all this fog originated. No sooner are they at the vessel it just looked trashed. Like it fell under a tidal wave and all the plankton, moss and water logging could happen, did happen. They also find the crew in mass levels of decomposition that occurs in weeks not hours.

With familiar faces and voices like Charles Cyphers (Assault on Precinct 13, Halloween and Escape from New York)and Darwin Joston (Assault on Precinct 13, Eraserhead, The Fog, Wild at Heart, Hill Street Blues, Coast to Coast and Gunmen's Blues) so I was safe. Best part is both these men could provide exposition and plot point drops and not feel like it got shoe horned in.

A dark ghoulish story of a town wanting nothing to do with a leper colony leading that ship to the jagged rocks leaving them to drown and die.

Sounds pretty damn festive to me. Our collective townsfolk must try to break this horrible curse before all 6 descendants die. Who knows if this even frees their souls? Maybe it will allow them to torment the town for decades to come.

With director/writer John Carpenter tipped his hat to references to Waitely Point and Arkham Reef both used by H.P. Lovecraft in a fair number of his tales. Primarily it was the influence of the The Creeping Eye that helped him pen this dark tale. Still love that the town doctor is named Phibes. Any Vincent Price fan I am aware of has seen The Abominable Dr. Phibes and Dr. Phibes Rises Again. While the main leads Curtis and Barbeau never share screen time with each other, it is rare a male writer knows what the hell to do with an actress aside from making her the femme fatale or clinging love interest. John has shown time and time again, that it isn't that difficult.

My God! She has a cigarette!! Horror movie confirmed!!!

Phantoms of the Year: Terror Train

Welcome one and all to Day 5 of Phantoms of the Year and let's end this week on... yet another revenge film for something physically or mentally scarring so we must wait 1-15 years to get revenge on those that wronged us blah blah blah. Kind of the standard vehicle for most slasher movies don't you think? Well with that, we at least have a capable director Roger Spottiswoode (Shoot to Kill, Turner & Hooch, Air America, Tommorow Never Dies and Ripley Under Ground) at the helm. This is Terror Train.

Laurie's vacation from Haddonfield goes as planned.

Three years ago, shenanigans were held by 6 college students on a prank that may have backfired causing a student miss his graduation because he had to be shacked up in the wacko basket... I mean the sanitarium of movie cliches. After graduation happens the kids get together for one last hurrah which is a costume party on-board a train. Sounds fun? Everyone will be there of course. Why, there's David Copperfield, Laurie from Halloween, Vanity and even Ellis from Die Hard! Looks like this tubular party is swinging into high gear with this gang until unbeknownst to the party goers a crasher has joined and he/she is on a mission of revenge.

The death scenes are elaborate and no two are alike as they point to other people giving the effect that it is someone in the party that is doing this. Now I know you are all thinking this sounds vaguely similar to that stink bomb of a flick Steel Trap and you would be right with a few moderate exceptions. One, the characters of this movie speak like actual human beings. Two, they have background, regrets, hopes and dreams. Three, um... not German?? Four, our killer seems intelligent and crafty on a vehicle rather than a building that was lined with traps, false walls and crappy mood music.

Ohmigod, the killer is... Groucho Marx??

Interestingly enough, character actor Ben Johnson (Have Gun, Will Travel, The Monroes, Hang 'Em High, Chisum, The Wild Bunch, The Last Picture Show and The Getaway) almost fills Donald Pleasence's Doctor Loomis role of Halloween on this movie is the train's conductor and gosh is aided by Jamie Lee Curtis (Halloween, The Fog, Terror Train, Prom Night, Blue Steel, True Lies, Halloween: H20 and NCIS) as they try and find the lunatic before it is too late.

We have very brief nudity, story focus and a mystery to be solved. Well okay, not much of a mystery that the Scoobies couldn't solve it under 20 minutes but a mystery nevertheless.

With a standard 35mm Spherical, the train is shot giving this very claustrophobic effect, coupled with the fact you cannot simply just leave the premises as it is moving at a very fast clip. What blew me away was Oscar award winning cinematographer John Alcott (2001: A Space Odyssey, Barry Lyndon, A Clockwork Orange and The Shining) was the man behind the lens giving the film scope (pun intended) and bringing a sense of movie magic to the film. From a great mood brought to use by the musical score gives it a nice creepy element to the chase sequences as well.

Of course there is the factor of Jamie Lee Curtis commonly the good girl was even in on the prank three years prior. The rest may not have brought her in on it and it shocked her as well but why would she still be friends with these people that abused a guy that was different? Kinda lessens her good girl street cred there. Don't worry folks, I am sure there is a remake, re-imagining or blatant rip-off in the wings that of course will have hip young kids, a kick ass metal soundtrack and some of that 3-D you kids love so much.

Remember kids, never give John Wayne bourbon and beans around a campfire.  Phew!

600th Blog!!! Halloween Resurrection

Happy Halloween everyone and welcome to Day 5 of Halloween Week. This marks two impressive moments. One, this is my 600^th blog! Yah!! Two, we have a Halloween movie for Halloween!!! That being said, why in the seven hells did I have to review piece of flotsam??!!! Yeah, folks I am not thrilled to be tackling this particular sequel of the substantial series. For those of you that disliked Halloween H20, really despised this fun filled pile of scum. So let's roll up our sleeves, stretch the muscles out and go out swinging. This was Halloween Resurrection.

Gonna get his... oh I don't even care.

Three years after H20, Laurie Strode had been sent to the whacko basket, I mean a psychiatric hospital as (SPOILER) she had lopped the head off of a paramedic and not her brother Michael in some costume switcheroo cliche. Myers apparently attacked this poor paramedic by crushing his larynx and swapping his uniform for Myers' jumpsuit and mask. While the poor lad got beheaded, Myers has snuck away into the woods and either went into hiding for the next three years. Back to the nuthouse, Laurie is prepped for Michael's arrival and has gone full Home Alone with the hospital to do the old boy in but to no avail. Yeah they greased Laurie. His 20 year mission is at an end. So end of movie right? WRONG! Sadly that was only the first 15 minutes and maybe 10 to 12 snippets of dialogue from Laurie. So glad we drug Jamie Lee Curtis back for that.

A year later we are having a reality show in Michael Myers' house for six college students must spend a night in the house that brought forth evil and figure out what caused he to go completely crackers and start up his killing spree. I figured it was the tacky wallpaper but that was just my approximation. Our six contestants decide in the ultimate wisdom to split up and search for clue, Scooby teen gang style. Zoiks! No sooner do these collective bags of hammers separate it would appear that Michael starts systematically wiping them out. Who could have seen that coming?

Duhhhhhh....

Yes this is what the saga has be reduced to, the slaughter of Laurie with a year's follow-up of wacking people in his childhood home. Thank you Dimension Films for dragging us through all that for this half-assed collection of gore scenes with next to no plot. When writer of The Drifter (Larry Brand of Backfire, Masque of Red Death, Till the End of the Night, Paranoia and The Right Temptation), a vastly underrated thriller starring Timothy Bottoms and Kim Delany was transcribed to write this end of an era I figured I was well onto the summing of a final chapter. Laurie finally defeats him and can breathe again... instead I get catch phrases that are dated, Busta Rhymes throwing cowboy with Myers and Tyra Banks not voting off models.

Let's take wacky facts about the flick now. Just for the sake of ending this review and I can go on to watch better horror movies. Jamie Lee Curtis agreed to reprise her character Laurie Strode so she would NEVER EVER be back for yet another sequel. Long time Halloween producer Moustapha Akkad made it sound during the theatrical release that Curtis was so impressed with the screenplay and could hardly wait to be a part of the legacy when actually she was under contract. Yeah lot of sunshine shot up the collective sphincters there, huh?

Director Rick Rosenthal was brought back to direct this festering boil on a dog's anus after 21 years prior bringing us the vastly superior Halloween II in 1981. While our body count seemed extremely light at a whopping ten I suppose you could count the some of the bodies from the flashback sequence so giving it a tally of 14.

Still love the fact we skipped Tyra Bank's death scene but you get to see the aftermath in said van. So basically it was almost stating she wasn't deemed worthy of an on-screen death. What crap was that? Too pricey an effect??? Anywho, this was one that clung to the bowl no matter how many times you flushed. With this being the final nail in the original series' coffin, it is another 5 years before Rob Zombie picks it up from the ashes and starts anew. 

 Now normally I am not one for reboots but honestly I dug that he expanded beyond Carpenter's original path of pure evil, gave him a dark childhood and slowly warped him. Just a different take on it and it does not detract the folks from the originals at all. Resurrection however could convince you to Google Rick Rosenthal's home address just to egg it, his car and maybe even the family dog.

(sigh) It's a living.

Halloween Week: Halloween: H20

Hello there all and welcome back to Halloween Week. Well it is time. The time in which I speak of is to basically ignore all avenues of 4, 5, and even 6 as they did not appear relevant in regards to this upcoming chapter in the Myers saga. Now that the pesky Jamie has been removed from the franchise... horrifically I might add, we get back to the lone survivor of the first two Halloweens. Laurie Strode. "But Jake, she died in a car accident leaving Jamie all alone to fend for herself against her insane uncle,." Nay, horror fan boys and girls, for it appears in the grand scheme of plot point that she faked her death in order to hide from Michael and raise her other child. This is Halloween: H20.

Yarrrgh, there be a slasher on port!

Marion Chambers (Nancy Stephens of Charlie's Angels, Barnaby Jones, Panic in Echo Park, Halloween, Halloween II and A Time for Dancing), the late Doctor Loomis's nurse and colleague has had her house in Illinois broken into as her neighbors' kids go and search the house to find nothing but a few things trashed. Satisfied with that respond she goes and sorts what happened as her medical files have been rummaged through, specifically Laurie Strode's old files. When she goes to check on the hockey hooligans they are all sprawled dead on the couch and she herself gets her throat slit by Michael.

Since 1988, Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis of The Fog, Terror Train, Prom Night, Halloween II, A Fish Called Wanda, Forever Young, True Lies and NCIS) has hidden herself and her infant son of one year after Jamie was born in California. With accredited academics and forged documents she has re-emerged as Keri Tate, a respected headmistress of a posh private school in California where she attempts to keep her life together for the sake of her son John (Josh Hartnett of The Faculty, Blow Dry, Pearl Harbor, Blackhawk Down, 40 Days and 40 Nights and 30 Days of Night) who has grown distant from her as he does not approve of her functioning alcoholism and prescription pill popping. As this is a result of surviving that Halloween night of more than 20 people butchered at the hands of her brother, you can understand how she may be a little edgy every Halloween but the boy wants to hang with his girlfriend on the camping trip. 

 When that is a bust the teen gang decides to remain on campus for a private party of their own. Molly (Michelle Williams of Dawson's Creek, A Thousand Acres, Dick, But I'm a Cheerleader and Me Without You), John's girlfriend agrees with a couple other friends that they will sneak around to the campus and get their drink and fornication on!!! Hey, trying to keep it PG-13 here.

Tee hee, we're toast.

With everyone away for the holidays, out on the camping trip and in general enjoying time away from school the campus is as still as a tomb. Laurie/Keri thinks she is hallucinating as she swears she saw Michael stalking her throughout the day. Confessing to her colleague/boyfriend Will (Adam Arkin of Chicago Hope, 8 Simple Rules, The West Wing, Baby Bob and Hitch) that she is not who she claims to be, about Michael and all the horror of that night, he takes it surprisingly well. Me, I think I need more than a fade wipe to mull my thoughts over this new info.

No sooner as the night fallen that Michael is on the prowl, dispatching a few guards, groundskeeper and personnel left and right that Laurie must dig down deep and take Michael head to head for the sake of her son's life and possibly her sanity. Will Laurie defeat Michael after so many have tried and failed? Will she ever have a normal life again? Will John be as messed up as anyone else associated with the Myers bloodline?

A few comments of trivia about this film in a moment. I had a slight rant to this particular film. While this screen treatment feels like you should be ignoring anything that happened from 4 and on they really kept pushing the envelope in reminding you of the first two films with lifting dialogue uttered by Donald Pleasence during the latter opening credit sequence after the first 4 deaths to using the line, "Well it's Halloween. I guess everyone is entitled to one good scare." My biggest bee in my bonnet (Other than what ass put me in a bonnet) is the lack of continuity already established by the last three movies and how this film seemed almost like we should sweep those movies under the rug. Other reviewers speculate it is a divergent or alternative timeline from the other movies. Frankly, just point out Laurie wanted a boy and not a girl, faked her death and went off to live out the days with her son. See? No mystery and maybe a bad parent story line in the wings.

So we have cliches' like horror movie characters watching a horror movie during our film, reminding you there may be better flicks out there I am guessing or that this is all Sam Raimi and Wes Craven's fault for starting this trend in horror movies. Initially, Jamie Lee Curtis wanted to work with John Carpenter for H20 but he declined due to lack of interest in the existing project any longer. Of the unmentioned alumni of this movie I must not forget the original scream queen Janet Leigh, L.L.Cool J, Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Jodi Lyn O' Keefe. Not a bad flick but I have to say not one of my favorites of the franchise.

Ever been with a scream queen, baby?