Shocktober: Hokum

Hokum

While haunted houses are a prime location for many a horror movie, haunted hotels are not quite as abundant. While there are a few iconic creepy movie hotels that come to mind, such as the Overlook Hotel or the Bates Motel (if we’re including motels), but after that, there’s… the hotel from 1408 I guess? Because of this, I didn’t mind checking in for a short stay at the hotel in the woods at the center of Hokum, even if there isn’t inherently anything that exciting or novel about a movie set in one location where a bunch of strange things happen. While I can’t vouch as much for the strange things that happen, I will say that the hotel at the center of the film is a top-notch creepy destination, even if I could’ve used a few more answers about what happened within its walls.

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Shocktober: Lee Cronin’s The Mummy

Lee Cronin’s The Mummy

What does it take to get a director’s name above the title of a movie? One way is to become an overnight sensation. Think John Carpenter after the 1978 smash hit Halloween. Another way is based on reputation and years of success in the industry. Think Frightmaster Wes Craven’s New Nightmare (1994). Another way, though risky, is to put the director’s name above the title in the hope that this is the film that solidifies their status. This is what Lee Cronin’s The Mummy attempts. But does it earn it?

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Shocktober: Backrooms

Backrooms

As fun and exciting it is to celebrate Kane Parsons, who, at 20, became the youngest director to have a number one movie at the box offices, the question we really have to grapple with regarding Backrooms is: should we be adapting 4chan? I’m just kidding, I don’t care. I wish I had an interesting angle or any angle at all with which to explain the fascination with Backrooms but having watched it… I’ve got nothing. I dig the aesthetic. It was fine.

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Shocktober: Evil Dead Burn

Evil Dead Burn

There’s nothing harder than a death in the family. People are at their lowest and most volatile. The last thing any grieving family would want or deserve is a visit from their local deadite. It’s this setup that turned a lot of audience members off of Evil Dead Burn. “It’s too mean! Evil Dead movies are supposed to be fun!” Well, I’m here to say that Evil Dead can be anything it wants, as long as it has over-the-top violence, soul-sucking demons, and a special book written in blood and bound in flesh. And I ain’t talkin’ about the good book.

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Shocktober: Resident Evil

Resident Evil

Despite enjoying last year’s Weapons quite a bit, I was on the verge of skipping director Zach Creggar’s take on the Resident Evil franchise until the allure of a Shocktober review reared its head. This is probably due to the fact that my skepticism of video game movies pervades while my interest in video games in general is at an all-time low. Fortunately, this Resident Evil owes much of its premise to the games it takes inspiration from, but it also has plenty of appeal for lapsed gamers like myself as well as the franchise faithful. While it maybe runs into some limitations of being an adaptation that has already been milked dry by a critically derided film series and many video games, it still offers the kind of high-tension thrills that are still getting folks out to see horror movies these days.

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Shocktober: 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple

28 Years Later: The Bone Temple

January is a terrible time to release a movie. It’s cold, and we’re all trying to eat healthy. Everyone is miserable, trying to make up for what a piece of shit they were the previous year. If you’re a cinephile, you’re scrambling to figure out how and where to watch all of last year’s critical darlings. As someone who watches every Best Picture nominee, I can tell you that takes up most of my January moviegoing.

Long story short, people got shit going on. They don’t have time for summer blockbusters in the dead of winter. This is why 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple failed. There was no room to build hype for it over the holidays or during early Oscar season. It needed a big spot right smack in the middle of summer. And it’s a shame people didn’t go see it for two reasons: (1) it’s good, and (2) its box-office performance puts Alex Garland, Danny Boyle, and Co.’s 28 Years trilogy at risk. Because I doubt Sony is champing at the bit to lose another $29 million on another installment. No matter how many bones are in it.

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Shocktober: Obsession

Obsession

Given how much of our entertainment is about wish fulfillment or power fantasies, it’s kind of surprising how relatively few movies there are about good ol’ honest wishing. What was the last one, that Spider-Man “movie” where Dr. Strange ruins a boy’s life? These are always my favorite Twilight Zones, and, now that I think of it, this fascination goes way back to my childhood, when I countlessly watched the likes of Aladdin and DuckTales the Movie: Treasure of the Lost Lamp on repeat. Not only is it fun to see some lucky bastard get everything he ever wanted, only for it to blow up in their face; it’s even more fun to imagine your own wish, and how you’d legalese your way out of any monkey paw shenanigans. That’s especially true of Obsession, a movie where a bonehead thoughtlessly blurts out an ill-conceived wish and spends the rest of the movie making worse and worse decisions.

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