Summer nights filled with horror

Hey, everyone! The Summer of Slash returns tomorrow. I've got some good ones lined up for this year. To get you in the appropriate mood (and to tease what I'll be posting tomorrow), please enjoy the following trailer...

Read More

0 comments

John Carpenter: Village of the Damned

I knew coming into this retrospective that Village of the Damned was going to be the shortest review of this series because I had already seen it, already knew that there was nothing to talk about, and already knew that there is nothing in the film that would tell you it’s a John Carpenter film. I was hoping a second viewing would change my thoughts on the film, but alas, there just isn't, well,  anything to say substance to say about the film . Even Elvis, the most banal of Carpenter’s films, inspired me to write something because at least I hadn't seen that film before, and it was of some significance considering it was Kurt Russell’s first film with Carpenter (not to mention it killed in terms of TV ratings). Village of the Damned, though, nothing. It’s about as dull as a film calling itself a horror film can get. I have no idea what possessed Carpenter to make the film — audiences in 1995 weren’t necessarily breaking down theater doors to get to horror films — or why he would even begin to think that a remake of the 1960 film (of all the films to remake?) was a good idea.

Read More

0 comments

John Carpenter: In the Mouth of Madness

There is a general belief among fans of John Carpenter’s work that In the Mouth of Madness is the American auteur’s last movie worth a damn. Allow me to get this out of the way: that’s so, so wrong. But before I get too far ahead of myself, let me finish my thought: There also seems to be a general belief that In the Mouth of Madness is the best horror film Carpenter made since The Thing. A few things: the first issue raised here saddens me because it seems that even many of Carpenter’s most ardent fans dismiss Carpenter’s 1987 Prince of Darkness, a film that is vastly superior to In the Mouth of Madness, when mentioning the best horror films of Carpenter’s career. The second issue: I think that not just fans of Carpenter but the fans of the horror genre really, really overrate In the Mouth of Madness. Oh, that’s not to say it isn’t a good horror film — and sometimes an even great horror film — it's just that the film doesn’t live up to the reputation given to it by its supporters. It’s a self-aware, postmodern horror film that isn’t even the best self-aware, postmodern horror film of the mid-90s (that would be New Nightmare). But, it does show Carpenter, just as he did with Prince of Darkness, dabbling in the outré and making a horror film that, good or bad, goes for something different and certainly stands out as a stark contrast to his earlier horror films.

Read More

6 comments

John Carpenter: Body Bags

Just as he did after the deflating experience working for the studio on Big Trouble in Little China (not to mention the equally deflating returns at the box office), John Carpenter would once again, this time after the disaster that was Memoirs of an Invisible Man, return to the safety of low budget, independent horror. In 1987, this return to small horror resulted in one of the American auteurs best films, Prince of Darkness. In 1993, however, things were a tad different in regards to theatrical horror films. Unless you had Freddy, Jason, or Michael Myers, it was unlikely that a horror film in the early ‘90s was going to have a lot of success with audiences. It was a dying genre (and even returns for those films were dwindling with each unnecessary sequel). So, Carpenter, returned to television for his next project, which was never intended to be a Portmanteau horror film but rather a television series made for Showtime in order to rival HBO’s “Tales from the Crypt.” However, the series didn’t get picked up after Showtime backed away from their initial plans to turn it into a series, and the final product turned into Body Bags — an extremely entertaining horror anthology in the vein of the EC Comics that inspired Carpenter as a kid and the Amicus productions of the ‘70s. Body Bags showcases a great horror director riffing and having fun with the genre, free from the shackles of the studio system.

Read More

0 comments

John Carpenter: Memoirs of an Invisible Man

After the back-to-back success of his smaller projects, Prince of Darkness and They Live, Carpenter found himself — like he was post-Halloween and The Fog — once again intrigued by the prospect of working within the studio system. With a better, less naïve, understanding of how making a movie for a big studio works, perhaps Carpenter felt that he could try his hand at it again albeit with a more carefree, detached approach that wouldn’t leave his confidence in shambles this time around. Unfortunately, Carpenter was assigned a film that was losing proposition from the onset. Like Starman, Memoirs of an Invisible Man shows Carpenter at the helm of another studio film with an interesting premise that begins promisingly enough but ultimately tapers off, becoming something uninteresting and tiresome.

Read More

1 comment

John Carpenter: They Live

John Carpenter’s deconstruction of the American action hero was never more honed than it was in his 1986 film Big Trouble in Little China. Kurt Russell’s portrayal as Jack Burton was filled with all kinds of wonderful moments of bumbling bravado — the perfect satire of the Rambo prototype littering theaters in the late ‘80s. In Carpenter’s brilliant, politically charged science-fiction film They Live, he offers up another ‘80s action hero prototype for deconstruction in the form of a drifter named Nada. Nada is the “Man with No Name” prototype (and in fact is never mentioned by name in the film) and is played by professional wrestler “Rowdy” Roddy Piper. Nada, in a lot of ways, is the quintessential Carpenter action hero: quiet, terse, intense, and bound by a code of ethics akin to the old gunslingers of the wild west. A mix of catchphrase espousing Burton and the brusque Snake Plissken without the cynicism, Nada is one of Carpenter’s most memorable heroes, making They Live one of my absolute favorite Carpenter films.

Read More

5 comments

John Carpenter: Prince of Darkness

Carpenter’s disillusionment and frustration with the major studios after their constant over-the-shoulder producing and general overall interference on the set of Big Trouble in Little China is quite known by now. Because of this, Carpenter swore off the studio system he so badly began his career wanting to be a part of and instead went back to basics. In 1987, Carpenter returned to his independent and horror roots with Prince of Darkness, an extremely underrated horror picture that is often seen as a throwaway entry in the American auteur’s oeuvre. But Prince of Darkness, as “silly” as Carpenter claims it to be, isn’t a throwaway picture in the least — the film is one of Carpenter’s most atmospheric and satisfying efforts — and in the opinion of this humble blogger fits perfectly in slot number three of Carpenter’s best horror films right underneath Halloween and The Thing.

Read More

12 comments