The Shining is a film that has steadily grown on me over time.  When I first saw it, I remained unimpressed, dumbfounded by the hype surrounding it.  It wasn’t until recently that I started to understand The Shining rather than just simply watch it.  This film means to hurt its viewer and it does so on simple terms.

Menacing, stressful, bleak, and disturbing are all words that aptly describe Kubrick’s successful foray into horror.  The Shining is a wonderful film to look at.  Kubrick’s filmmaking is at its finest, complete with long, winding shots that never allow the viewer to stray.  The Steadicam technology allows for a complete tour of the shifting Overlook Hotel.  Lacking any sense of spatial grounding, Kubrick’s Overlook Hotel never stands still, denying its own reality with a labyrinth akin to the hedge maze at the film’s climax.  This technique denies the viewer any permanent attempt at familiarizing themselves with the setting, which makes it all the more unsettling.  Each door could hold something new and even more terrifying than winding corridor before it.   Much of the visual prowess is augmented, if not acheived, by The Shining’s abrasive and edgy score.  Making even the most relaxed scenes an endeavor, you are constantly white knuckled, overtaken by the film’s foreboding nature.

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Just when you thought Hollywood ruined vampires, Swedish director Tomas Alfredson gives us this tender and dark masterpiece.  Full of gripping exposition, Let the Right One In only whispers the fact that its a vampire film, demanding its viewer to figure it out for themselves.  Filmed in a seemingly endless winter, the film has a constant calm air to it and really only in the tasteful finally does it ever reach a truly brutal pace.  The two young leads, Oskar (Kare Hedebrant) and Eli (Lina Leandersson), are exceptional in their roles, both for their age and the gravity of their characters.  You feel for these kids and their predicaments, especially Oskar.  Alfredson presents us with some down right beautiful storytelling and visuals.  On top of that its set in 1982. Vampires? 80′s setting?  I’m sold tenfold.

One of the things that makes Let the Right One In is its respect for vampire lore and all the more respectable is how gently it handles it.  In a time when vampires have been reduced to being kitschy mockeries of what they once were, I found the film to be the complete antithesis of that.  It even defies the beloved cult vampire films of the mid 1980s.  As if to directly contradict that period, the film is drowned in 80′s visuals and sounds.  The film is devoid of all camp and takes it subject matter seriously and with deft precision.  Never once does the narrative incite even a snicker.  Let the Right One In never spits in its viewer’s face by mocking them with annoying self awareness.

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Horror has stagnated.  The usual horror film of late is some squeaky clean bloodbath or a remake lacking anything that made its source material so good.  Development, plot and character, has gone the way of the dodo bird.  Not to say that horror is complete shit, but the generic popcorn flick is, no pun intended, horrible.  Now here we have The House of the Devil.  Everything that the last twenty years killed is suddenly resurrected and walking around like its new.  Director Ti West shows obvious reverence for the films of yore, with the film taking nods from such classics as Rosemary’s Baby and Black Christmas while finding a kindred spirit in its contemporary Let the Right One In.

Right from the get go this film grabbed me.  Call me nostalgic, but most things 80′s win me over.  Satanic cults? Sold. Traditional doe eyed female protagonist lured to her potential doom?  Got me.  Devil has all the trappings of some of the most celebrated horror films of the 70′s and 80′s and it does this without actually feeling like a “new” movie.  Even more interestingly is that it doesn’t feel like the homage that it is.  To the casual viewer it could very well be a hidden gem from those decades.  To a viewer aware of its intention it still feels like a Generation X obscurity.  Granted, Devil does have its time period hiccups, but those are lost in the 80′s heyday at hand.  I was very comfortable watching this.

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It’s taken me quite a long time to gain a liking for Rob Zombie’s Halloween films, especially this one.  I’m quite the stickler for the traditions set in place by the original series.  A silent Michael.  An adversarial Loomis.  A survivalist Laurie.  Rob Zombie’s H2 presents us with the literal polar opposites of their predecessors.  Michael makes noises, walks around without his mask on, and is loud and almost completely lacking in silent hunter quality of the Shape.  This is not the Shape.  Malcolm McDowell, though a fine actor, is the antithesis of Donald Pleasence’s Loomis.  Whereas the original Loomis was a man concerned with stopping Michael, this one is nothing short of a pompous asshole.  Neither of these variations hold my ire like I do Scout Taylor-Compton’s Laurie Strode.  I could forgive her for her role in Rob Zombie’s first Halloween romp, but this, this is just too much.  She’s a victim who doesn’t try being anything but.  H20 explored a similar theme of Laurie coping with the events of Halloween and Halloween II (1981) and while she was clearly traumatized by it, she chose to face it.  Remake Laurie chooses to drown her spiraling psyche with pills, booze, and a bad attitude.  As said by Danielle Harris’s Annie: “I am not impressed.”

Don’t take that opening tirade as my whole opinion of the movie, in fact this is one of my favorites in the series as a whole, far superior to the first remake in almost every way.  The movie is thick with atmosphere, an achievement not done well since the original Halloween.  The majority of the film has a very open air, autumn quality to it and is interestingly almost devoid of the John Carpenter theme that permeated every film that came before it.  Originally this was a point of contention for me, as the theme is a classic and chilling piece of work.  However the music that the film does utilize succeeds fantastically.  I can’t help but enjoy the music that plays as Laurie escapes the dream hospital, a frenetically repeating cacophony that goes hand in hand with stressful mood.  The most common piece used is a series of spread out, single piano strokes followed by a droning arrangement and is a perfected set up to the quiet scenes that quickly descend into madness.  The score overall is sparing, restrained, and accommodates every scene perfectly.  Halloween II, unlike Rob Zombie’s firs take, isn’t muddled down with an overuse of rock n roll tunes, and when songs are used it is both tasteful and complimentary to the corresponding scene.

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