31 Nightmares: Honorable mentions · 6:40pm Nov 2nd, 2014
Now a little bonus for you all, the following are movies, books, music and games that I considered writing about but did not for some reason.
Films:
Alien: I love both this movie and its sequel Aliens. Sadly everything after those two is either crap or painfully mediocre. Really the only reason I didn’t write up Alien was because my DVD of it is badly scratched and I have yet to replace it.
The Host: No, not the terrible Stephanie Myers adaptation, this is Korean monster flick that is goddamn wonderful and you need to see it.
Silence of the lambs: These movies are brilliant and wonderful, at least up to Hannibal, and you should watch them… but I’m not certain that this is actually what I’d call a horror film so much as a really, really dark police procedural. None the less, these movies are excellent and so is the recent tv series based off of them.
Nosferatu: The first film adaptation of Dracula and still one of the best ever made. Count Orlok is one the best vampire’s I’ve ever seen and honestly has a better chance of seducing my ass than Edward of Twilight does, but so does literally any form of sapient life ever born. Seriously though, Max Shreck could do whatever he wants to me.
Shadow of the Vampire: What if good ole Max was really a vampire? And then that premise was made into an awesome movie. Watch it, it’s on Netflix streaking.
Vampire’s Kiss: Two words motherfuckers: Nicholas Cage. Not enough you sons and/or daughters of bitches? Nicholas Cage thinking he’s a goddamned vampire! I fucking love this movie more than I love most people.
Friday the 13th : Here we go people, this is the legendary slasher series, the one that gives us the definitive image of the unstoppable death incarnate mass murderer. Honestly I love all these movies for being either genuinely good or laughably bad. Skip the remake though, its shit.
Blackula: Blacksploitation was an interesting film model, and one I’m a fan of because of the delicious seventies funk. Some blacksploitation films are genuine gems that perfectly mix cool, wit and good acting. Blackula is one of these if you can get past the silly title.
Ringu/The Ring: I have yet to see the Japanese Ringu, but I have heard it is superior to the admittedly quite good American version. Too bad about the shit sequels.
Ilsa: She Wolf of the SS: Ahhhh… Nazisploitation. These are movies that make one ask “what the fuck is wrong me?” and Ilsa is the undisputed queen of this subgenre, primarily because of the sheer savage, busty charisma of Diane Thorne, the titular She Wolf. These movies truly revel in gore and sleaze in every fashion.
Death Bed: The Bed that Eats: Ok, this one is just plain silly. Half art film, half sexy exploitation and just fucking weird throughout. It features an utterly incomprehensible plot and some creative if not perfectly executed FX.
Nekromantic: This is a movie about a love triangle between a dude, his girlfriend and a rotting corpse with a pipe for a penis that both enjoy boinking. Yeah. Check it out if you’ve got the stomach for it since it is pretty good but I can’t blame anyone for being put off by the premise.
Cannibal Holocaust: I briefly touched on this film earlier. To reiterate my point this is not a horror movie. This is horror itself on film.
Candyman: WATCH THIS FUCKING MOVIE. Based on another Clive Barker story, this story mixes slasher horror with dark romance and some meditation on American racism that is far more elegantly done than many “legitimate” films on the subject. Also while all the acting is competent and all, Tony Todd eats them all alive. God I love that man.
Event Horizon: The unofficial prequel to the Warhammer 40k universe. I love this fucking movie, its does an amazing job at hinting at the horrors that befell the crew without ever giving you too much.
Here are some books that I adore and considered writing about in the spirit of the season.
The Dresden Files: Ok, technically these aren’t horror stories but they do make use of lots of horror trope in increasingly spectacular ways. READ THEM. READ THEM NOW! WHY AREN’T YOU READING THEM YOU BASTARDS?!
Carpe Jugulem!: This is a novel of the Discworld. It is also a pitch perfect parody of the Twilight series written years before those books blighted the world.
Books of Blood: A collection of Clive Barker’s short stories. The quality is mixed but delightfully bizarre throughout.
The Graveyard Book: Neil Gaiman wrote a children’s book and it is amazing.
Necroscope: A tale of cosmic horror, vampires and speaking to the dead.
And now some video games.
Resident Evil 4: This game is like one of those amazingly bad films that thrives in the bizarre and ludicrous. It was the last truly great Resident Evil game. Recently it received a spiritual successor in The Evil Within, a game which met with mixed reviews but I feel that tonally at least it measures up.
Minecraft: This game is very, very effective at getting under your skin in single player mode. You’re there… alone underground, the darkness closing in claustrophobic and then… a sound. A creak, a chitter or even god forbid a hiss…
Silent Hill 2: Here we have the horror game of horror games. This thing is legend to the point that nothing has ever quite lived up to its legacy.
Outlast: A simple and effective set up. You are alone and helpless in an insane asylum over run with psychotics. Brutally violent, claustrophobic and darker that the darkest black times infinity.
Amnesia: Here we’ve got a nice helpless bit of cosmic horror for you all. Ordinarily I despise amnesia as a plot device but here it is actually pulled off quite nicely.
Lone Survivor: How do you make a side scrolling pixel based game terrifying? Play this game to find out.
Doom: The classic and still king of all first person shooters. The noises of the demons still haunt me and will for the rest of my life. My advice is to get Doom 2 on steam and then get yourself the Brutal Mod to turn the gore up to a million.
Binding of Isaac: A top down rogue like by the genius behind Super Meat Boy. You play as Isaac a young boy trying to survive the violent insanity of his super religious mother, and on the way you’ll find yourself getting all sorts of delicious body horror. The remake comes out on Tuesday, so check it out.
You have given me a massive motherfucking list of to-dos over the last month, mein freund.
Is Event Horizon really a prequel to WH40K?