The October 2015 Horror roundup thread

Movies
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Wherein we can discuss horror movies that came out in 2015, or October 2015, and whether they are worth seeing.

So what has come out this year that’s worth seeing or is worth telling people to avoid? I’ll be honest I haven’t kept up like I ought to have (mid year job change and lots of distractions before and after)?

It Follows came out this year and has gotten a lot of love here and critically. I recommend it to everybody I talk to. I love this movie. There’s a thread in this very forum I am too lazy to link to.

Monsters Dark Continent also got it’s wide release this yer. I do not recommend this one to everybody I talk to. Or anyone, really. I would recommend it for matters of science™ to people who like to watch horror movies after explaining that I liked the first but did not like the second. Visually it was pretty but it didn’t really go anywhere and it was an extra let down after the first film, I felt.

The Atticus Institute appeared this year as as well. I had mixed feeling when watching this on some movie channel a few months ago. It shows up every 3-4 weeks on one of whichever channel is hosting it I would like to watch it again. Interesting premise and approach (it’s done documentary style) but ultimately a pretty by the numbers script and I felt like these things clashed a bit, or at least the latter ultimately undermined the former. I think I want to like this more than I do.

Wyrmwood - Tom’s review here. Different, fairly well done zombie movie from those crazy cats down under. But not different the way 2003’s horror comedy Undead was. Worth seeing, I think.

Turbo Kid - Tom did not like it. It’s a movie I intend to see.

Unfriended - Tom liked it. Critics were somewhat mixed (61% RT with a lot of reviews). I have an aversion to this movie for no reasons I can explain whatsoever. Not in the “wow that triggers something I am fraid of, like spiders, only less so” sense. But just an irrational “I refuse to see this for no discernable reason”. I will try to talk myself into it.

Man, that’s way too few horror movies to see in a year. I haven’t watched any of the “series” releases like Insidiously Sinister X or whichever Paranormal Activity we’re on (that may not be out yet not that I think about it. Wait, is there a Paranormal Activity coming out? I don’t even know). I skipped the Poltergeist remake because duh. I could not bring myself to see The Visit , a movie that has launched M. Night Shyamalan’s comeback tour (such as it is).

Qt3 Hall of Famer Larry Fessenden isn’t writing or directing any movies that came out this year. But he acts in We are Still Here, which has gotten some critical praise (and is 32/2 on Rotten Tomatoes). It’s out on DVD now I think, I should see if I can get it on demand.

What else is there? What’s coming out we should care about (sadly The Witch is getting released in February 2016 after really making a stir on the festival circuit early this year. I can’t wait to see it). Blue Warrior needs food badly.

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Seen the ads for crimson peak which looks interesting

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Saw a preview for Crimson Peak before The Martian last night - not real big on gothic horror but I’ll see just about anything del Toro makes.

I like this thread but if we’re sticking to 2015 movies I’m out - haven’t seen anything made this year.

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Great thread idea, peacedog!

Larry Fessenden is one of the writers on Until Dawn, an adventure game for the PS4. I quite liked The Hybrid, from Billy O’Brien, who did the awesome Irish dairy farm horror movie Isolation. The Hybrid is on Netflix. I sort of liked The Visit. The Babadook opened this year and I’d put it up there with It Follows as one of the best recent horror movies.

As far as recent releases, The Boy isn’t a horror movie so much as, uh, I guess you could call it Arizona gothic? There’s an Irish folklore horror movie called The Hallow, but it’s exclusive to DirectTV until next month, so it won’t make a wider release until after Halloween. I didn’t care for it. Goosebumps opens this month, but, well, it’s a kids movie. Still, from the trailer, it looks like it has a giant preying mantis. There’s another Paranormal Activity, of course. This one is subtitled “The Ghost Dimension”. I didn’t care for Cooties, a kids-as-zombies zom-com. But I’m holding out hope for The Scouts Guide to the Zombie Apocalypse, which is probably also a zom-com. It’s from a Paranormal Activity alum named Christopher Landon. Eli Roth has two horror movies out this month. In Green Inferno, cannibals eat NGO workers. I haven’t seen it yet. In Knock Knock, Keanu Reeves gets home invaded by hot chicks. It’s kind of nuts, but Eli Roth doesn’t have the chops to follow through on its creepy opening.

And, yeah, a Guillermo del Toro horror movie is sort of a big deal. His name has been on some real stinkers lately as a producer or writer – Mama, The Strain, Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark – but this is the first horror movie he’s actually directed since Pan’s Labyrinth. In case you guys don’t know, del Toro’s roots are in horror and not in kaiju or Hellboy. He cut his teeth on Cronos, a vampire movie, and Mimic, a killer cockroach movie. I’m psyched for Crimson Peak.

-Tom

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Great thread idea, peacedog!

Larry Fessenden is one of the writers on Until Dawn, an adventure game for the PS4. I quite liked The Hybrid, from Billy O’Brien, who did the awesome Irish dairy farm horror movie Isolation. The Hybrid is on Netflix. I sort of liked The Visit. The Babadook opened this year and I’d put it up there with It Follows as one of the best recent horror movies.

As far as recent releases, there’s an Irish folklore horror movie called The Hallow, but it’s exclusive to DirectTV until next month, so it won’t make a wider release until after Halloween. I didn’t care for it. Goosebumps opens this month, but, well, it’s a kids movie. Still, from the trailer, it looks like it has a giant preying mantis. There’s another Paranormal Activity, of course. This one is subtitled “The Ghost Dimension”. I didn’t care for Cooties, a kids-as-zombies zom-com. But I’m holding out hope for The Scouts Guide to the Zombie Apocalypse, which is probably also a zom-com. It’s from a Paranormal Activity alum named Christopher Landon. Eli Roth has two horror movies out this month. In Green Inferno, cannibals eat NGO workers. I haven’t seen it yet. In Knock Knock, Keanu Reeves gets home invaded by hot chicks. It’s kind of nuts, but Eli Roth doesn’t have the chops to follow through on its creepy opening.

And, yeah, a Guillermo del Toro horror movie is sort of a big deal. His name has been on some real stinkers lately as a producer or writer – Mama, The Strain, Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark – but this is the first horror movie he’s actually directed since Pan’s Labyrinth. In case you guys don’t know, del Toro’s roots are in horror and not in kaiju or Hellboy. He cut his teeth on Cronos, a vampire movie, and Mimic, a killer cockroach movie. I’m psyched for Crimson Peak.

-Tom

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Definitely interested in Crimson Peak as well. Have been trying to get some vibes about it, while avoiding spoilers for the last few months.

Also, apologies to folks who were hoping for a front page thingy this year. Or, I should say, apologies for me not being involved in anything! I thought about it over the spring but couldn’t think of any sort of “hook” (to use a word…) to hang an October Halloween movies series on and get enthusiastic about. I also ran into time constraints in September that didn’t help.

So yeah, this thread is an awesome thing! Going to be watching It Follows soon (I’ve been deliberately holding it in reserve to watch with some friends next weekend!)

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Forgot about The Boy and I’m intrigued in it.

Not a Roth fan so I have been sort of ignoring Green Inferno except to note it got a lot of bad reviews. Shocking.

The Hybrid is now on my list. And I am not familiar with Isolation so that’s on my list now too.

The upside of no front page Horror Movie stuff this year is that the next time it happens it will just be that much more special!

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I thought about doing 30 Days of Bad Horror as takedowns of crappy horror movies. But, really, that’s just shooting fish in a barrel. And I’m trying to get back into the groove of posting more game reviews, so it would have been a substantial distraction.

I’ll be curious what you think of Hybrid, peacedog. I might be crazy to recommend it. I watched it on Netflix on a whim before I knew it was Billy O’Brien. You know how that works, right? You’re just paging through a genre and you click on something based on the title or cover image to sort of half pay attention while you’re doing something else. I was assuming it was going to be godawful and that certainly seemed to be the case as it got underway. When it wasn’t, and when it started to do a couple of interesting things, I was all, like, hmm, who directed this?

And, yeah, Isolation is an overlooked gem with an awesome cast. Essie Davis from The Babadook and Sean Harris from movies with Sean Harris? Ruth Negga, John Lynch, and Marcel Iures are also great in it.

-Tom

“In the North Sea, they’re cautious when they recover a drowned body–”

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I keep forgetting I need to see the Babadook; it’s so bad I forgot to mention previously that I keep forgetting that I need to see the Babadook.

What were we talking about?

Now that Fear the Walking Dead and The Strain - two of the finest TV shows ever produced and I cordially invite everyone to partake in their excellence - are gone I’m going to start catching up on Horror movies late Sunday afternoon/evening. But I can’t tonight sadly. I am going to watch Hybrid this week. For sho.

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If you’re looking for a date night horror film from 2015, check out Spring. I enjoyed its mash up of Lovecraftian horror and boy meets girl romance.

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Please tell me this is sarcasm. My detector is broken so I can’t tell if you are serious or not!

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Ok, if the picture on “The hybrid” on Netflix is a fucking spider thing I going to write you a letter Tom. A strongly worded letter.

Consider yourself warned.

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I saw The Green Inferno, and I ‘liked’ it. This is definitely a movie for fans of the genre only, it has no other redeeming qualities. Even then, fans of this niche won’t necessarily like it, but that’s who it’s aimed at. The biggest plus is that the movie is very well made for this type of material. There’s a plot, and characters, and even a couple of good performances. There is even an attempt made at blurring the line between who the good guys are and who the bad guys are. It has an amazing gore set piece, but unfortunately it’s not a nonstop gorefest. So be aware of that if a gorefest is what you seek. I’ll say this, it has a great moment of “Oh man, they are so f’ed!” in it, one of those moments when you get a sinking feeling.

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The hybrid was a kinda strange (but not overly so) but ultimately interesting movie. I don’t think any of the individual bits are compelling on paper but they all fit together well. “Gwenneth Paltrow’s cheaty boyfriend from Sliding Doors is a mercenary captain guy who periodically noms on a sandwhich”. “His best and most loyal friend is the creepiest guy in the group, played by the mad monk from King Arthur”. “They travel through strife-ridden Russia and there’s a biker with a creepy mask and booby traps and shit”. “There’s, like, a whole shitload of tunnels - truncated down because we have a run time to get in under - and it will shock you to learn there are things in them”. And then you get beyond the tunnels. Certainly, it requires you to accept certain things as part of the reality the movie takes place in. I didn’t have any problem with ET building a sub-space communication device out of saw blades and Reese’s though, so I had no problem with the thing built from the thing. In fact it felt like it fit right in with the weirdness of everything at the end of the tunnels.

I can’t say for sure it was responsible for the dream I had last night, but it seems like it contributed pretty significantly.

Aiste Gramantaite - the Brains of the above ground operation, clearly - is the Lithuanian Kaitlyn Dever (though I guess that should be reversed as the former is like a decade older).

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The Canal - David, a film archivist deals with the aftermath of his wife’s death. The police think David may have killed her. He thinks there’s a supernatural relationship between his house and the nearby canal that may have had something to do with his wife’s death. Throughout it all, he must also try to comfort his toddler son and keep him safe. Slow burn until the last 20 minutes or so when shit gets absolutely crazy. Lots of Catholic guilt wrapped up in this Irish ghost story.

Housebound - Kylie, a directionless twenty-something, is sentenced to house arrest in her mother’s house after she gets nabbed for an attempted robbery. Kylie’s confinement forces her to learn about her mother as a person and not just an impediment to her adulthood. Strange things are afoot in her childhood home, and soon enough blood starts getting spilled. Is it a haunting? Is her neighbor a serial killer? New Zealand wackiness and horror combined. Some of it misses the mark, but Morgana O’Reilly puts in a really good performance as a young woman coming to grips with what a shitty kid she was to her parents.

Starry Eyes - A young would-be actress works at a Hooters knock-off while auditioning for various gigs. During one audition, she fails at first, but gains the casting director’s interest when she starts pulling her own hair out in frustration. As she continues the audition process over the next several days, she is asked to demean herself in increasingly disturbing ways until she “transforms” for the part. She eventually quits her job, distances herself from her friends, and descends into madness. It’s all an obvious metaphor for the sacrifices people make for stardom, but it’s well done.

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My delight in leaving things like this vague is just business. That’s important to remember.

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I love me some horror.

I really torn on my thoughts on this movie. I found it really started with a bang, but never got back to that same level of tension.

This was actually a nice surprise. As you say, it’s a ‘by your numbers’ show, but it works with the documentary style.

So good as a zombie fest.

[/QUOTE]

Dear God…this movie was just so bad. Don’t bother. It’s utterly painful for the first 30-45 minutes which is all I could make it through before I turned it off (and I watch terrible horror movies all the time!)

My contributions (I watch a lot of horrors / thrillers…these are some special mentions

Dark Summer (2015) - A little slow, but creepy. Boy being haunted while under house arrest.

Demonic - Surprisingly alright (which is a good review for a horror). Cross between found footage and live action.

Hidden (2015) - Solid, if slow moving movie. It really works to build an atmosphere of ‘them versus us’. Worth watching, but recognize that there is a lot of character building during the first 30-40 minutes which is saved by good acting.

Dude Bro Party Massacre 3 (2015) - Okay, this is more of a comedy, but it’s still technically a horror. I quite enjoyed it, but I also loved Kung Fury ;)

Insidious Chapter 3 (2015) - More Insidious. Go watch it.

The Asylum (2015) - All you really need to know is: abandoned mental hospital, teenagers, and demonic possession. Worth watching.

Special mention of 2014 movies worth checking out:

Altar

The Quiet Ones

Jessabelle

From the Dark (2014) - Good monster horror movie. Interesting turns of events, strong female lead, a little predictable, but still good. One of those movies where there isn’t a lot of talking after a certain point.

…actually, I have a ton more favourites from 2014, but I’ll hold off on them. That was a good year for horrors, though…

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Do a 2014 thread. I’m thinking that when 2016 rolls around I am going to create a thread for it and keep the OP for listing all the movies that come out, with links to reviews/discussions here/etc. Also where to watch. Just for fun.

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Crimson Peak reviews starting to trickle in:

Fans expecting wall-to-wall gut-bucket phantasmagoria may be surprised to see how much time del Toro gives to the love triangle and to the slow accumulation of the film’s creepy atmosphere. While the digital effects are undeniably contemporary, “Crimson Peak” is otherwise a period homage that mostly plays like a period film, rarely giving in to contemporary notions of pacing and payoff.

When the scares do arrive, however, they’re effectively unsettling. Only once or twice does the film indulge in cheesy jump effects, where the audience flinches because of a sudden LOUD noise. Instead, you can feel the director savoring the anticipation and then resolving it skillfully and grandly. The result is del Toro’s best film since “Pan’s Labyrinth,” one that should rightly become a staple for many Halloweens to come.

Ok, I’m intrigued… however:

Guillermo del Toro tries his elegant best to shake the cobwebs from a musty old genre but still ends up telling a very traditional and predictable haunted house yarn in Crimson Peak. The gifted fantasy/sci-fi/horror specialist has made a film that’s very bloody, and bloody stylish at that, one that’s certainly unequaled in its field for the beauty of its camerawork, sets, costumes and effects. But it’s also conventionally plotted and not surprising or scary at all, as it resurrects hoary horror tropes from decades ago to utilize them in conventional, rather than fresh or subversive, ways. It’s a thousand times more elaborate and sumptuous than the most recent demented domicile tale of note, The Babadook, but not an ounce as frightening or disturbing. Still, on the basis of anticipated scares and del Toro’s following, Universal should get some potent pre-Halloween business out of this beautifully bedecked Gothic-style melodrama.

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Yah, I’ve done that on another site I frequent. I’ll pull over some 2014s I have. The key is the ‘where to watch’ option which can make it easier to find a movie. Hint: Netflix set to Chile is a gold mine :P