As the leaves in the mountains start to turn beautiful oranges and yellows and the air grows a little crisper, it's time to make a cup of cider and put on a good scary movie—or a super cheesy one. This October, I will be watching 31 horror movies, including rewatching some old favorites and discovering new frights.
Dead of Night, dir. Charles Crichton, Robert Hamer, Alberto Cavalcanti, and Basil Dearden (1945)
This classic anthology film has been on my watchlist for ages. The stories are tied together when a group of people gather in a mansion. They each tell their own supernatural and strange experiences. The last short, which featured a ventriloquist being taken over by his doll, stuck with me the most and proved to be the creepiest and an excellent ending that overshadowed the rest of the film.
Bride of Frankenstein, dir. James Whale (1935)
As I strive to complete all the major Universal Monster movies this October, I turn to one of the earlier films. It's been a hot minute since I've watched the original Frankenstein and this movie picks up directly after the events of the previous one after recapping the original. While I understand the hype behind it, The Invisible Man still remains my favorite in the collection.
Ichi The Killer, dir. Takashi Miike (2001)
I wasn't really worried going into this film, but I had seen that a few of the people I follow on Letterboxd (an app for reviewing movies) say that they threw up during it. Still, I had some pumpkin cookies and hot apple cider, and I was ready to go. Yes, the gore is over the top and disgusting, but it's also a fantastic story, and when you realize half of the effects are early 2000s CGI, it's not very nauseating.
Pray, dir. Yuichi Satoh (2005)
This was another Japanese flick that I put on after finding Ichi The Killer so interesting and compelling. I had watched a few foreign horror films in my class on horror movies in college but since then I haven't watched many on my own. I have some lost time to make up for. Pray was a ghost story and usually those scare me more than slasher ones and this one kept me on the edge of my seat.
Invocation of My Demon Brother, dir. Kenneth Anger (1969)
This short film plays out more like a psychedelic music video than it does a movie. It rocks both figuratively and literally. A mess of images, which includes a live Rolling Stones show, and special effects accompanies the progressive rock soundtrack. I appreciate the weird and absurd and this fever dream of a movie was right up my alley.
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