Just watched Weapons. I thought it was good, but not as high on it as other seems to be. The final act was a lot of fun, though.
I was watching A Nightmare on Elm Street 2 and a random Gene Simmons cameo appears all of a sudden lol!
Finally got to the first Black Phone yesterday and wow I liked that so much more than I thought. Aaron's comment about the Stephen King of it all got me to throw it on and yeah that nails it.
This is sick It's funny, I remember not being super interested based on the Flanagan meets Stranger Things vibes, and then was very pleasantly surprised when it felt more like genuine King and less like either of those things. I am excited to see the second one now.
Night of the Reaper has some nostalgic charm, but has very bad writing and dialogue in the second half. Still fun for a slasher, though.
Finally watched The Faculty for the first time last night. I’ve been missing out. Immaculate 90’s vibes and much more violent/gruesome than I was expecting.
it's perfect. the 90s version of The Thing blood test scene being high school kids snorting drugs out of pens is so good. he's tweakin man LET HIM FUCKIN TWEAK
Is there a word for the era of mainstream horror we got in like the very late 90s-2006 or so? This is just a very undercooked shower thought I had inspired by a lot of the movies AMC and IFC and other channels show around this time of year from that time period, and it just felt like a lot of them had this same feel and look to them in certain ways and the way they’re shot, I’m thinking things like Ghost Ship, 13 Ghosts, Final Destination, House on Haunted Hill, etc. There’s just this certain feel and look they all have to me, I almost want to call them Pop Horror or something lol. But yeah those were my formative years and sure feels like we got a lot of mainstream horror in those years
Strongly recommend this book. It starts with the release of Scream in 1996, which reinvigorated the genre, all the way up to 2025. It touches on every movie you mention. https://rue-morgue.com/screaming-and-conjuring-book-takes-a-deep-dive-into-modern-horror/
I don't know if this helps but I call stuff like Freddy vs Jason, Alien 3, the Texas Chainsaw remake etc grunge horror. so many boiler rooms and brown tones, they just make you feel scuzzy watching. a great era
I got about 15-20 minutes into the new I Know What You Did Last Summer but turned it off. None of the cast were very interesting, it just didn't seem like any fun either.
Watched Last House on the Left (original) and The Monster tonight. Last House on the Left was definitely a very odd movie, but very effective for its time. The soundtrack definitely threw me for a loop. Made me feel like I watching a sitcom mixed with Deliverance lol The Monster ruled. Great practical effects and tension throughout.
X-Cops is such a good episode of X-Files. Basically a found footage film. I love the werewolf fake out and then the Freddy Krueger sketch.
Grunge horror is good, I was going to say nu-metal cinema based on the soundtracks and editing in movies from that era. Very music video-adjacent, simultaneously polished and ugly (not saying that as a knock)
I think I would separate Aliens3 and the TCM remake from the movies im thinking of, but it’s been so long since I’ve seen the TCM remake that it might have that same feel and look and I just forget lol Freddy vs. Jason definitely has some of that same feel. And yeah they do all have the nu metal soundtracks lol