Carnival of Souls - 8/10
The film worlds of David Lynch and George Romero collide in this harrowingly surreal cult classic from the 60's. A group of young people (played of course by actors in their late 30's - and you thought today was bad!) go racing and one car crashes over a bridge. One girl somehow comes out of the water in what seems hours later. She's disoriented and has no recollection of what happened, and continues with her life as if nothing happened. She begins having visions of dead people as she begins her new job as a church organist. The organ music in the film adds to the impact, and the film's black and white photography looks beautiful on the Criterion DVD. The whole thing is quite bizarre and there seems to lack a point. A twist ending that makes zero sense, yet isn't at all surprising after having seen Jacob's Ladder and Soul Survivors.
The Changeling - 5/10
My interest in this film began when hearing interviews with Neve Campbell for whichever Scream film saying that this was her favorite scary movie. The film contains some great moments of terror, yet downtime is a definate bore. The story setup is fairly cliche (man loses family, man moves into house, creepy things happen.) George C. Scott is really good.
The Haunting - 8/10
Far more a character study than the fx-driven remake, I think this is one of the best written ghost movies I've seen. Amazing is that the film was made in the early 60's and has a major lesbian subtext in it. The remake made it more blatant, taking away something. The actress who plays Nell was great in the role.
John Carpenter's The Thing - 8/10
Carpenter's work of late has been slightly lacking, so its best to go back and discover the classics. I was a tad bit disappointed that Carpenter didn't do the score for this one, though. His scores for The Fog and Halloween are excellent. This film became a benchmark for makeup effects in its day, and while looking slightly silly now, they all are effective. And quite gross. You like people exploding and alien people coming out (even better here than it was in Alien?) This is your movie. The film's only drawback is that its characters are almost all cliches. Surprisingly, that doesn't take away from the intense standoff toward the film's end. I would also like to mention the severe underratedness of Kurt Russell in the film industry. This is, I believe, one of three collaborations he did with Carpenter, the other 2 being the "Escape From.." films. I hope a fourth one isn't too far away.
The Witches of Eastwick - 4/10
How did I not like this movie? It features a cast that has 22 Oscar nominations and 36 Golden Globe noms between them. I liked the first 10 minutes but it was downhill after that. What happened? Well, I think the whole thing was very uneven. Jack Nicholson was typical Jack Nicholson and had fun with the role of the Devil - something the film never actually confirms. Cher and Michelle Pfeiffer were decent, but really had nothing to do. Susan Sarandon had the most fleshed out role and the only other time I've seen the master class actress this sexy and vivacious was The Rocky Horror Picture Show. As far as sexy witches in New England searching for a man go, I'll take Practical Magic.
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