Sober Horror Fan

Day 150 of Sobriety. I had been looking forward to seeing Possum for a while, and finally caved in and bought it on blu-ray , as that is probably the only way I will ever get to see this independent British production. It was directed by Matthew Holness, who is familiar to some of us through his work on British TV, notably his Channel 4 horror-comedy Garth Marenghi’s Darkplace and his brief appearances in Ricky Gervais’ The Office as Simon, the obnoxious computer technician. Around the time Possum was released, I read an excellent interview with Holness on the wonderful Haunted Generation hauntology blog. In the interview Holness discusses his various inspirations, many of which are hauntological in nature, such as the British public information films of the 1970s, and also his love of Hammer films. So much of what he said resonated with me that I couldn’t wait to see all of those influences manifest themselves in his first feature film: Possum .   Unfortunately, upo...

Day 142 of Sobriety.      So, I had heard a little bit about Tusk before I watched it, and I had gathered that it was a strange and divisive film, despite having quite mainstream credentials—it was directed by Kevin Smith who made Clerks (1994) and the Jay and Silent Bob films, among others, and it co-stars Johnny Depp. I was curious about Tusk because it is distributed by A24, and I tend to really like A24’s horror output.   The bizarre plot follows an obnoxious, arrogant podcaster who travels to Canada to conduct an interview for his show. In Canada, he happens to meet an eccentric retired sailor, who he believes will make excellent subject matter for his podcast, which seems to focus on jeering at eccentric people. Unfortunately for the podcaster, the sailor has his own sinister plans for him, that involve his obsession with a walrus who once saved his life.   The film is part comedy, part horror (with the body-horror element being particular...

Day 140 of Sobriety. It has bothered me for a while that I have never really seen any of the iconic Universal Classic Monsters films, even though they are a key component in the heritage of the horror films that I love. I’m pretty sure I saw Dracula (1931) at some point, but for the most part, the Universal films are so old and omnipresent that I never felt the urge or need to actually sit down and purposefully watch them. Deciding to rectify this, I recently bought the “Complete 30-film collection” blu-ray box, and have embarked, at least initially, on watching the films in their order of release. The Mummy is the third film that I have watched from the set, following on from Dracula and Frankenstein (1931). The set itself is pretty nice, but it does have a few issues. For one thing, it is not really “complete,” as promised by its title. It doesn’t include several of the classic Universal horror films, with The Black Cat (1934) being a notable omission, and several f...

Day 140 of Sobriety. I came across The Pact when I found it included on a list of “atmospheric horror films.” The list included a number of my favorite films, such as Mandy (2018), Hereditary (2018), and The Shining (1980), plus a few that I’d never heard of, including The Pact . Since it was in such good company, I thought I would check it out. The story is about a young woman (Annie) who travels to her old family home in the San Pedro area of Los Angeles following the death of her mother, at the same time her sister (Nicole) and cousin (Liz) disappear under mysterious circumstances. Annie tries to find out what happened to them, while trying to come to terms with her family’s dark past. One thing that distinguishes The Pact from most of its neighbors on the “atmospheric horror films” list that I saw is that it is clearly a low-budget, independently produced work. It looks to me like it was shot on video, and has that slightly flat “TV soap opera”-ish look. That’s a ...

Day 131 of Sobriety.   This was an odd one. I’m still not quite sure what to make of 1972’s The Possession of Joel Delaney , perhaps because it was so different from my expectations, which were based almost entirely on seeing a trailer for the film a while back. Based on that trailer, I had expected it to be a film about demonic possession of the type that proliferated somewhat in the early to mid 70s, but with a more pronounced period modishness than its contemporaries like The Exorcist (1973) or The Omen (1976). I guess it kind of was, but it was also pretty different in approach and feel to those other movies, of which it is generally regarded as a precursor.   The plot revolves around a wealthy Manhattan divorcee (played by Shirley MacLaine) who comes to believe that her brother is possessed by the spirit of a deceased serial killer. One of the things that distinguishes it from other possession-based films of the period is that, unlike the generally Christian-based notio...