Archive: Author: Admin

by Ben Bussey

It’s no accident that the words ‘cheap’ and ‘nasty’ so often go hand in hand. Horror is perhaps the one film genre which can be done on an ultra-low budget without damaging its chances of reaching a wide audience (well, there’s also porn, but let’s not get into that now). Indeed, it can be argued that the roots of most modern independent cinema are in horror, with the likes of Night of the Living Dead, The Evil Dead and more recently The Blair Witch Project providing not only a creative template but also a business model for generations of cash-strapped filmmakers. However, this has long proved to be something of a double-edged sword. Many inexperienced filmmakers do not approach the genre as fans, but simply as an access point into the film industry. Certainly, there are instances when this approach has paid off – by all accounts Sam Raimi didn’t like horror at all before making The Evil Dead – but more often than not it results in tedious, formulaic dross, the likes of which so often threatens to drown the marketplace. Too many filmmakers and distributors seem to view horror as nothing more than a licence to sell crap, and by extension view genre fans as uncultured, undiscerning numbskulls who’ll happily snap up anything with a bit of sadism in it. (And that perception extends into the popular consciousness, as demonstrated recently by a jawdroppingly awful excuse for journalism at a supposedly upmarket website, which I will not deign to link to here…)

As much as I hate to say it, I can’t help feeling things have only gotten worse this past decade. The digital age has of course brought many tremendous advantages, allowing fledgling filmmakers to massively reduce their budgets and production time, and Blair Witch, 28 Days Later and Paranormal Activity proved that films shot that way can make crazy money. But – and this a big but – the aesthetics of DV leave so much to be desired. The debate rages on as to whether shooting on film will soon be a thing of the past, and I’m sure it will continue to rage on for some time; I look forward to seeing Keanu Reeves’ new documentary on the subject. I’m nowhere near technically knowledgeable enough to contribute to that debate, but so far as I’m concerned one simple fact remains: unless you’re using the absolute top of the range stuff, digital simply does not look anywhere near as good as film, and I get the feeling that’s not going to change.

Then, of course, there’s that key underlying problem with how DV enables anyone with access to a camcorder and a PC to create their own films: the fact that a great many so-called filmmakers don’t have the first clue what they’re doing. I don’t wish to seem elitist or undemocratic, but seriously – a lot of the people out there making films today are simply not cut out for it. I think I can speak for just about everyone in the horror critic community when I say there are few moments I dread more than when the latest no-budget screener lands on my doorstep. Nine times out of ten it’ll have some mindnumbingly prosaic title, and a logline cut-and-pasted from Chain Saw/Dawn of the Dead/I Spit On Your Grave/Blair Witch/delete as applicable. Before you’ve even hit play every fibre of your being is warning you that it’s going to be beyond awful, and very rarely does that feeling prove wrong. A small part of me is tempted to name and shame every bargain basement abomination I’ve had to endure in my tenure at Brutal As Hell, but I’m not sure I have the emotional strength to undertake such a task. And anyway, believe it or not, I don’t write about films because I want to bitch about how terrible everything is; I do it to share with others my own excitement when I happen upon something cool.

And this is the problem with modern microbudget horror: once we’ve endured more than a few of the aforementioned festering piles of elephant shit, it can result in a knee-jerk reaction when approaching other digitally-shot films. It can become hard to see past the wobbly camerawork and flat sound mix, and to appreciate those comparatively rare occassions on which a microbudget horror film actually brings real skill, passion, intelligence and wit to the table. Every once in a while, if you look hard enough, you might even find they’re doing something genuinely new and different. Isn’t that what we look for in independent film overall: a unique perspective and aesthetic that we don’t get from the glossy, overpriced mainstream?

With this in mind, here are what I consider to be some of the best digitally shot microbudget horror films of the past five years, listed in descending order of production cost. They stand as proof that even in the cut-price section we can find real filmmaking craft and ingenuity. None of them are flawless, and certainly none of them will be to all tastes (as if any horror film ever has been); but all of them are different, and anyone looking to pick up a DV camcorder and get to work on their own macabre masterpiece would do well to take note of them all. 

Absentia (Mike Flanagan, 2011)
Production budget: $70,000

This one was a really pleasant surprise earlier this year. Funded through Kickstarter, Mike Flanagan’s low-key supernatural chiller works for the simple fact that it has good actors, good writing and good direction. The premise may be reminscent of J-horror, but the film is wise enough not to ape that style, doing its own thing in a simple and understated fashion. Low on special effects and obvious scare tactics, Absentia’s most powerful attributes are Katie Parker and Courtney Bell, whose brilliant performances drive the film. And Flanagan clearly knew the film needed these actresses above all else, as he rejigged the script to work in the fact that Bell was heavily pregnant at the time of shooting; a wise move indeed.

Read my full review here.

Blood Car (Alex Orr, 2007)
Production budget: $25,000

Proof positive that it is possible for a modern horror film to be largely based around environmental and political concerns without being all preachy, po-faced and humourless about it. In fact, it’s possible to do that and still deliver all the schlock, gore and gratuitous nudity that genre fans know and love. Yes, Alex Orr’s film has its cake and eats it too. It’s helped considerably by above average performances from Mike Brune, Katie Rowlett and Anna Chlumsky, but the wit of the direction and writing really lifts it above the pack. The practical gore ain’t bad either.

Read my full review here.

Small Town Folk (Peter Stanley-Ward, 2007)
Production budget: £4,000 (approx US$6,500)

At a glance, Small Town Folk seems like nothing more than another backwoods hillbilly horror, but it takes the concept in a really quite unexpected direction, giving that time-honoured Hills Have Eyes set-up a surprisingly upbeat, action-adventure flavour. And on a microbudget, no less. Peter Stanley-Ward’s film is also particularly noteworthy for making a real virtue of its lo-fi aesthetics; much of it is shot in the Sin City style on blue screen with digitally imposed backdrops, which lends a suitably otherwordly, cartoonish feel to proceedings.

Read my full review at B Through Z.

Dead Hooker in a Trunk (Jen & Sylvia Soska, 2009)
Production budget: $2,500

I rather doubt this film or its writer-directors require any introduction at this point. However, I’ll be the first to admit that on seeing the film at its world premiere over two years ago, I was initially dismissive of it, owing largely to that knee-jerk reaction to DV that I spoke of earlier. It was only when I took a step back that I realised just how much Dead Hooker In A Trunk breaks with conventional wisdom. Where so many first-time filmmakers restrict their action to a single location and a minimal cast, the Soskas keep things moving at all times, hopping locations as gleefully as they cross genre boundaries. Once again, good writing and acting really saves the day, but it certainly doesn’t hurt that there are stunts and special effects which are significantly above average for films made at this budgetary level, not to mention how good CJ Wallis’ soundtrack is.

Read my full review here.

Cockhammer (Kevin Strange, 2009)
Production budget: $500

Given that the very first shot of this film is a woman’s naked breasts, and within two minutes said woman is being bloodily beaten to death, you’d be forgiven for thinking Cockhammer was just another sick, juvenile piece of trash. Well… actually, Cockhammer is another sick, juvenile piece of trash, but it also sports some of the sharpest, funniest and most mind-bogglingly verbose writing I’ve come across in recent years. It’s no mean feat to get an amateur cast to deliver this kind of ridiculously overloaded, expletive-ridden dialogue at a machine gun pace, without faltering or corpsing – sample line: “I swear to God Gert, I don’t know what’s worse, sitting here in this cold damp room waiting to be butchered on film by a fucking lunatic, or the fact that I haven’t had a hard dick in my ass, mouth or vag in hours!” – but Kevin Strange and his ensemble manage to make it seem effortless. Even if you don’t care for the ultra-low brow mish-mash of weed, dick and fart jokes, you have to acknowledge the skill with which it is executed.

Read my full review at B Through Z.

Colin (Marc Price, 2008)
Production budget: £45 (approx US$70)

Few films of recent years have surprised me as much as this one. First of all, it’s hard to believe there haven’t been more zombie films in which the central protagonist is a zombie; secondly, when you hear a film was made for such a pittance, you certainly don’t expect something as intense, atmospheric and artful as Marc Price’s film proves to be. Colin is another film which makes a virtue of its lo-fi production value, boosting the sense of intimacy, and demonstrating that you don’t need to go the found footage route to justify shooting on DV (a lesson that should not go unheeded). And the most vital thing Colin can teach any would-be filmmakers: if you’re going to cast your friends, try to have friends who are as good at acting as Alistair Kirton. Great performances, great scripts: the cheapest special effects of all.

Read my full review here.

By Nia Edwards-Behi

Caution – as with most retrospectives, expect strong spoilers.

The year is 1972, and the ideals of the Summer of Love already feel like a distant memory. It is three years since Woodstock; four years since the assassination of Martin Luther King. Hippies are on the wane and anarchy is on the up. Though the United States military will soon end its involvement in the Vietnam conflict, the country and its citizens have been constantly reminded of this war since the escalation of American intervention started in the 60s. 1972 is also the year that the film which began life as Sex Crime of the Century is released in the USA, beginning its decades-long journey toward becoming a cult classic that is still loved and reviled forty years later.

The film was initially envisioned as a hard-core exploitation picture, but as its production progressed it became a less explicit, though no less effective, film. Partially inspired by Ingmar Bergman’s The Virgin Spring (1960), in the film, soon-to-be 17 year old Mari and her supposedly wayward friend Phyllis head into town to attend a rock concert, while Mari’s parents prepare a surprise birthday party for her at their rural home. While looking to buy some marijuana, Mari and Phyllis are kidnapped by a gang of escaped criminals: Krug, Weasel, Sadie and Junior. The next morning they drive the girls to the woods, where they subject them to physical, psychological and sexual torture. Phyllis runs away, as a distraction, so that Mari can escape. Phyllis is eventually caught by Krug and she is killed and mutilated. Krug rapes Mari, before killing her too. Krug and company’s car breaks down as they attempt to make a getaway, and unbeknownst to them they seek shelter in the house of Mari’s parents. Mari’s mother uncovers the truth about their guests, and the dead girl’s parents exact a violent revenge on the criminals in their home. Last House on the Left is significant in a multitude of ways, but perhaps the two most notable ways are because it launched the career of one Wes Craven (as well as Sean Cunningham), and due to the intense controversy, and in some instances, hysteria, its shocking content caused.

It would be fairly easy for me to rehash these same discussions. We all know that Wes Craven went on to make The Hills Have Eyes, and Nightmare on Elm Street, amongst other films, establishing himself as one of the most notable horror auteurs of recent decades. We all know the film was central to the video nasties debacle in the UK, remaining banned until 2003 and only certified for sale in the UK as uncut in 2008. I don’t want to focus on the things we already know. There are times when the things around a film are remembered and talked about more than the film itself. I think this is the case with Last House on the Left. While indeed most of the video nasties would have sunk into obscurity if not for the controversy attached to them, Last House on the Left deserves attention, appraisal and, for me, plaudits. I think it’s too readily lumped together with pure exploitation flicks that may well be fun, but have a lot less to say and a lot less skill in their making. So, let me tell you why I love The Last House on the Left.

I won’t try to convince anyone that the film is perfect. I am probably a lot more tolerant of the film’s comedy cop duo, but even I will say that it would be a superior film if the ‘Ada’s chickens’ sequence was dropped. Regardless, even in its crudeness and its naivety, it is powerful. It’s easy to forget, I think, that this was Craven’s debut film as director. Given that this project began as a hardcore exploitation-by-numbers piece, at the request of the film’s financiers, it is all the more impressive that the resultant film is so enduringly powerful. There are undeniably tonal issues with the film – I like the contrast between the girls’ kidnap and Mari’s oblivious parents, for example, but the shifts between parallel scenes are indeed heavy-handed and at times jarring. However, I do believe that they are demonstrative of technical inexperience rather than lack of purpose. Those shifts in tone are there for a reason. The cops aren’t there to be comic relief, as such, they’re there to say something, even if inexperience muddies the message somewhat.

What is that message? It’s certainly not my place to ascribe One True Meaning to a film, but there are clear influences behind the violence of Last House, and what that violence is passing comment upon. Absolutely a product of its time, Last House is the result of counter-cultures, war and upheaval. As violence was broadcast daily into the homes of millions from the conflict in Vietnam, and as it spilled on to American streets through clashes of cultures, beliefs, and generations, its depiction in mainstream film became increasingly, obviously, sanitised, safe and unreal. As Craven has stated, Last House does not “play by the rules that had been established for handling violence” (Szulkin, 15). If films from the previous year had already rocked the boat with regard to the cinematic depiction of violence, then Last House went further. A Clockwork Orange is shocking but it is detached, abstract and stylised violence at its core. Straw Dogs portrays violence in a balletic, choreographed way, albeit more subtly than in Kubrick’s film. Utterly conversely, Last House does not offer stylisation, or choreography, or distance. Violence happens and we see it all. A single knife wound does not kill a person, and a fist fight doesn’t end after a couple of punches. Last House grabs you by the neck and rubs your face in violence, tells you it’s real, it exists, and it’s horrible.

I won’t be the first to write of the clear Vietnam commentary that exists in Last House – it suffuses David A. Szulkin’s excellent making-of book, and is fantastically theorised and reasoned by Adam Lowenstein in his book Shocking Representation. Lowenstein notes that not only does the film wear its anti-Vietnam sentiments plainly on its sleeve, but that it equally notes the failure of the flower power movement. Mari and Phyllis are hippies going to see a band called Bloodlust, after all. Most interesting of Lowenstein’s arguments, for me, is his claim that the aesthetic of Last House reflects that of war photography. In particular he notes the striking resemblance between the image of Phyllis used on the original publicity of the film and that of the famous image of Mary Vecchio taken at the Kent State Massacre. As such, Lowenstein notes the use of the frightened, teenaged female body as representative of the film’s reflection of a feminised, vulnerable nation.

Granted, Lowenstein is writing in a specific, academic way. This reflection of Vietnam trauma is clearly visible throughout the film, not only in its aesthetic. Although more direct references to the war were cut from the film in pre-production stages, for me the character of Dr. John Collingwood, the family patriarch, very clearly represents a character deeply militarised, if not directly or specifically associated with Vietnam. Early in the film, as Mari justifies her lack of bra and transparent top, he shouts at her: “Tits? What’s this tits business? It’s like I’m back in the barracks!” Though Mari’s response turns this into a figuring of her father as a dry, medical man (“Okay, mammary glands,” she mocks), Dr. Collingwood’s simple line of dialogue is revealing. He does not want to be back in the barracks. The language of the barracks does not belong in his home nor in the mouth of his daughter. However, that is the position he finds himself in and it’s a position he’s essentially helpless to do anything about. He does not want to be the ‘tits’ man, he wants to respectable, decent Dr. Collingwood. However, this military legacy returns at the film’s close. He silently rigs his home full of traps designed to incapacitate Krug. A wonderful moment occurs on the soundtrack as brief drum rolls undercut the by now familiar music. We see Dr. Collingwood become a tactician, making use of his environment to trap his enemy. He becomes both military man and guerrilla warrior, while Krug, the original guerrilla, finds himself in the position of strength. Facing Krug with fists alone and Dr. Collingwood is helpless, but given tactics and lethal weaponry, he’s unstoppable – the commands of authority, the consistently incompetent police, don’t even make him hesitate in eviscerating Krug at the film’s climax. Is this a subtle comment on military atrocities that took place in Vietnam? Not necessarily, but it certainly could be.

As I mentioned, though, it’s not only military or institutional violence that’s criticised here. The alternatives are equally as futile. In their final confrontation, Krug tells Dr. Collingwood that Mari “was a lot tougher than you, doc.” If Mari represents the flower power generation, and that she was tougher than her father, she still ultimately fails and dies. The military institution and hippy counter-culture are not the only failed ideologies in the film, though. Krug himself represents an aimless underclass of some sort, swaying from anarchist to beatnik, and is – significantly – allowed to air his views despite being the film’s primary, heinous villain.

For me, personally, Sadie represents the most interesting and complex ideological cypher in the film. At several points she attempts to express herself in feminist terms, failing miserably at getting them right – “chauvinist dog!” and “Sigmund Frood” notable examples. These moments are played for laughs in the film, and they are funny, down to some wonderful line-delivery by Jeramie Rain. These moments, though, are more than a few jokes at the expense of a would-be feminist. The character of Sadie isn’t a feminist, naturally, but for me there is significance to the fact that she tries to be – that she wants to be. Her jokes don’t work unless we already know what a ‘puh-hallus’ is, or its significance to Frood’s theories. Sadie is allowed to recognise that she needs “a couple more chicks round here” but she can’t do anything about it, as she’s not ‘her own woman’ as she claims. Sadie is significant as a misuse, or a misappropriation of feminism, either through a lack of education or a lack of support around her. It’s notable that Junior repeatedly states “she’s right, Krug,” but is so controlled by his father that his objections are useless. There’s a brief, brief moment at the film’s end when, confronted by Mari’s parents, Sadie turns on Krug. Junior has done the same, only to be so overwhelmed by his father that he shoots himself. Sadie, in essence, escapes. Although it is again, brief, she turns away from Krug’s control. Yes, she faces her punishment at the hands of Mrs. Collingwood, but for me her brief freedom is significant. It is also in this moment of betrayal that Krug looks his most distraught. Not when he’s talking his son into killing himself, not when he has just raped and murdered two girls, but rather when ‘his woman’ finally turns on him. Subtleties like this are easy to miss in the film, and I’m sure many would dismiss them as coincidental rather than intentional. However, I fully believe that moments like this are down to the talent of Craven and his cast.

Indeed, this talent underscores the film’s notability for me. I can go on about what the film’ is trying to ‘say’ until the little-cows-looking-for-some-grass come home, but film isn’t all about ideology and messages, of course. Even with its flaws, Last House boasts some superb stylistic and narrative moments. The dinner sequence, for example, where Krug and co. feign bland normality to fit in with the Collingwoods, takes place against a completely black backdrop. It’s the film’s most abstract moment, and it deftly underlines the complete artificiality of not only that particular moment, but of forced middle-class domesticity as a whole. Another wonderfully weird moment in the film comes in the form of Weasel’s dental nightmare, which is more than just an effectively cringe-inducing sequence. It provides fantastic foreshadowing for Weasel’s demise at the hands – or rather the teeth – of Mrs. Collingwood. It’s always struck me that the acting is criticised in the film, given as there are some truly fantastic performances. Yes, they’re amateur performances in many instances, but that works within the film’s style and indeed its intent. Bizarrely there are some ‘nice’ moments in the film which boast the actors’ talents – one of my favourite scenes is that between Sadie and Junior early on in the film, as Sadie takes a bath and asks Junior if he’s glad his dad is “finally out of the clink.” It’s a quiet, narratively unnecessary moment, but it’s one of my favourites due to just how bizarrely normal it is.

It’s impossible to talk about the performances in the film without paying homage to the wonderful David Hess. Terrifying throughout, Hess is at his most intense during the ‘blow your brains out’ scene as he remorselessly coaxes his son into shooting himself. Likewise, it’s impossible to talk about David Hess without paying due respect to the film’s soundtrack. A mad combination of comedic songs about criminals (Water Music), abstract sleaze (Phyllis Spills Her Guts), and gorgeous folk songs (Daddy Put Your Coat of Many Colours On) there is something quite special about Hess’ music for the film.

Unlike the film it’s inspired by, there’s no redemptive happy ending to Last House. Unlike the films it spawned, there’s no satisfaction in vengeful carnage. It doesn’t tell us that revenge is good, or forgivable, or conclusive. If there is one thing that bothers me about the film, it’s the lack of acknowledgement, sympathy or vengeance for Phyllis. Phyllis suffers at the hands of Krug and co before Mari, she comforts Mari through her ordeal, and she dies trying to help Mari escape. And yet her death is not remembered, nor avenged. Mari’s parents have already shown their disapproval of Phyllis at the very start of the film, and not once is there an indication that they spend a single second wondering what might have happened to Mari’s friend, and nor does Krug ever mention her. Given how downright heroic Phyllis has been, I find it quite upsetting, and yet, in-keeping with the film’s utterly bleak conclusion, that Phyllis is forgotten almost as soon as she dies. The Collingwoods have taken their vengeance but gained no closure, but somewhere Phyllis’ parents are wondering where is, and with such incompetent police around, will her body be found? Any witnesses to the crimes committed against her are dead – victim and criminals alike. While discussing this point, our own Keri made a wonderful observation that brings me right back to the reflections of Vietnam found in the film. The average age of an American soldier in the conflict was 19. If the deaths of Mari and Phyllis – both 17 – can be criticised as pointless or exploitative, then it’s a harsh and wonderful comment on the countless deaths of drafted teenagers in Vietnam. This view also brings meaning to the fact that the film seems to forget about Phyllis. Not all of those young soldiers were recovered, or mourned, or brought home, no matter how heroic they may have been. Surpassing the broad politics of the conflict itself, Last House on the Left ultimately takes a very human stance on the pointless slaughter of teens (abroad and at home) and the pure horror of violence.

Many might think that speculating so much about a fictional character in a film such as this is pointless or foolish. It’s only a movie…or is it? For me, there’s nothing ‘only’ about the movies, especially not ones as powerful as Last House on the Left. For a film to have started life as a cynical, money-grabbing venture to endure four decades of criticism and censure and to emerge as a powerful testament of its era, and for it to remain as impressive as it does is a huge achievement. I count Last House as not only one of my favourite horror films or genre films, but as one of my favourite films full stop. Happy fortieth, Krug and co.

by Ben Bussey

I should forewarn you that what follows will not be a standard retrospective. You see, today marks 25 years since The Monster Squad was first released to cinemas, and while I’ve no doubt that doesn’t mean too much to a lot of people, let me see if I can give some indication of what it means to me.

Follow me on Twitter and you won’t see a picture of me. You’ll see the victorious grin of Van Helsing, thumb held up high as he drags Dracula to Limbo. Visit my profile page, and you’ll note my backdrop is The Monster Squad’s British VHS sleeve. Likewise, friend me on Facebook and again it isn’t my face you’ll see, but that of Rudy, sunglasses on and cigarette in his lips, and for my cover photo you’ll see the scene at the top of this page: the midnight riverbank assembly of Wolfman, Gillman, Mummy and Dracula right before they resurrect the Frankenstein monster. On top of that, you may notice my FB address is facebook.com/kickhiminthenards. My first ever article published online, back at good old B Through Z? yep – it was on The Monster Squad. It was even in part the subject of my MA dissertation.

Yes, I love The Monster Squad. And not in some hipster ironic way. I truly, madly, deeply love every second of this silly little 1987 kiddie horror movie. For better or worse, it made me the person I am today. So if you need someone to blame, direct your hatemail to Fred Dekker.

So, how to adequately express this love? How to sum up just how great I think the film is, and just how great its personal impact on me has been? I don’t think I can within the confines of a single article. Why, I could write a book. In fact… I’m in the process of doing just that. A slow, faintly torturous process, but a process nonetheless. 

For the time being, though, I don’t think I can sum it up much better than I did five years ago on – God, was it that long ago – my Myspace blog. What follows is an abridged version of a blog post I made in July 2007, just prior to the film’s 20th anniversary and its release on DVD from Lionsgate. Once again, I warn that this is not a basic review, so anyone with an aversion to long-winded, overly personal, syrupy, touchy-feely emotional content may want to look away now. What can I say; I’m just a sensitive, sentimental kinda guy. Hence I write for a site called Brutal As Hell.

(…) Two big things happened to me when I was nine years old. I found out there was no Father Christmas; and I saw The Monster Squad.

Okay – event number one. (I’m fuzzy on the chronology; this may have happened second. But let’s assume it didn’t, for the sake of convenience. And to support my upcoming argument. Teeheehee.)

Now, I’m curious about this. Am I right in thinking that nine is quite a late age to learn the truth about Santa? A lot of people I speak to seem to have either been aware, or figured it out on their own by then. Not me. I was a dedicated believer. I don’t know what it was, but I was adamant that Santa Claus absolutely had to be real. Now, I never harboured any delusions that there was an Easter Bunny. (Over there, that’s just a guy in a suit!) With the Tooth Fairy, initial belief gave way to a comfortable realisation that it was my parents. But Father Christmas… he was just too big, too significant to be a lie. And not just because he made a movie with Dudley Moore and John Lithgow.(…) So when the fateful day came that my mother sat me down and gently told me the truth… it was a strange moment. I didn’t cry. I didn’t get angry. I just kind of went… “Oh.”

I went “Oh” because on some level I had always known. I went “Oh” because I knew that as much as I had been deceived by my parents, and all the other grown ups in the world, I knew that I had also been deceiving myself.

(…) Onto event number two: The Monster Squad.

As a kid, I hated horror. Tick me off on the list of people born into the eighties who hid behind the sofa during the Thriller video. Anytime one of the Jaws movies came on TV, I ran screaming. (Not such a bad thing with the sequels…) Sure, I loved Ghostbusters and Gremlins, but – like Steve – they didn’t count. (…) Why anyone would voluntarily sit down to read or watch something with the specific intention of getting scared, I could not for the life of me fathom. So sitting down one Saturday night with my brother and cousin to watch a film they’d picked out at Pharaoh’s Video that evening – a film that featured a werewolf, a mummy, the Creature from the Black Lagoon, the Frankenstein monster, and Count Dracula – it was a pretty big step for me.

And you know what? I loved it. Loved it, loved it, loved it.

The living skeleton attacking Van Helsing, in the wake of the whirlpool mouth of Limbo; Dracula dissolving to bat form, and escaping the plane (in broad daylight, mind you!); the sudden flash of Dracula’s skull in the lightning; the monsters congregating at the misty lake to resurrect Frankenstein; Wolfman’s exploded remnants whooshing back together; Dracula, electricity flickering over his shoulders, beating his way through cop after cop without breaking a sweat, taking out Scary German Guy with a thunderbolt from his palm, and picking up Phoebe by her cheeks: “Give me the amulet you bitch!” (Seriously, has Dracula ever had as much bad-ass power as he does in this film?)

All these moments and more flashed before me like a dream – and in an instant, I got it. I understood why people watched horror movies. Monsters were cool! And being scared – sure, Monster Squad isn’t all that scary, but still – I suddenly realised how alive it made me feel. How being afraid and being excited weren’t really all that far removed. Thinking about it, it was probably that same year that I plucked up the guts to go on ghost trains and rollercoasters for the first time.

Over the next couple of years, I saw The Monster Squad every opportunity I had; eventually I got my own ex-rental VHS copy, which I still own, and I watched it over and over – at least once a month, probably until I was fifteen. Watching it again a few weeks ago, for the first time in a while, I still found myself mouthing along to pretty much every line of dialogue, and every beat of music. (Though I still can’t quite make out all the lyrics of ‘Rock Until You Drop’…)

So – what, you may ask, did those two utterly commonplace childhood events have to do with one another? Why do I feel the need to go into detail on both of them in this manner? Because when I learned there was no Father Christmas, I stopped believing. And, as feeble an example as it may seem, when I stopped believing, I got my first little taste of despair. That’s where horror movies came in.

My mother didn’t encourage my new-found interest in horror movies. Sure, she and Dad would buy me books – all the Shelley, Stoker and Stevenson classics – but they wouldn’t let me rent any Nightmare On Elm Streets or Friday the 13ths. All those nasty things that Mum in particular had shielded me from in my earlier years, I was suddenly anxious to see, and I don’t think she was too happy about it. She didn’t want me having nightmares.

It was she, of course, that broke the news about Santa.

This was my revenge. This was my rebellion. This was my punk!

Maybe I couldn’t rent the tapes I wanted, but, unlike my mother, I knew how to work the timer on the video. ITV still showed Hammer movies most Saturday nights; I taped them all. Every so often I’d even get some more recent ones: Lost Boys, Fright Night. Then, most importantly, I made friends with a kid called Paul, whose parents let him watch absolutely anything… soon enough I was up to my eyeballs in Critters, Freddy Krueger, and George A. Romero.

And yeah, there were a few nightmares along the way.

Just to make it clear – I love my Mum! I’ve got a kid of my own now; I understand how powerful the instinct is to protect your child, how desperate the desire to shield them from any pain and distress. But we all know how it goes. There comes that moment when you’re growing up when the parents become the enemy. They’re trying to keep you down; they don’t want you to grow up. And, as my parents have told me since, in a way that really is true! God, when I try to imagine my little baby boy growing up, reaching puberty, going beyond my control… it’s a bloody scary thought. I don’t want him to be at risk. I don’t want him to suffer. Above all – I don’t want him to not need me anymore. But that day is going to come, whether I like it or not.

Remember that scene in The Crow? Michael Wincott’s holding his snow globe with a graveyard scene inside, remembering his father giving it to him and telling him, “Childhood’s over the moment you know you’re gonna die.”

Every once in a while, we start debating the significance of horror. The 70s, as anyone who’s seen the marvellous documentary American Nightmare can tell you, were all about ‘Nam, Watergate, and the assassinations of King, Malcolm and the Kennedys. Today? Well, it’s obviously 9-11 and the War on Terror, right? Sure, but…

Here’s what I think. Remember what I said, about how the non-existence of Santa was my first taste of despair? Horror will always be appropriate, always of popular interest, as long as there is cause for despair. And we all have cause for despair, and always will. Because we’re all going to die.

The motivational speaking of Mr Benjamin Bussey, ladies and gentlemen; coming to your town soon. Book now.

The Monster Squad started it all for me. It established my enduring love for classic supernatural horror in particular. It made me doodle spiders with human heads when I was supposed to be paying attention at school. And you know what? It holds up as a movie. It grips you from the opening scroll, and doesn’t let go. It’s funny and it’s thrilling; and today, when blockbusters seem to be getting more and more overblown, and moviemakers are so anxious about protecting the young that shotguns are digitally altered into walkie-talkies, it’s so refreshing to see a film clocking in at not even 80 minutes, where kids swear like sailors and are placed in genuine peril.

So when I got my e-mail from Amazon.com this morning, informing me that my copy of the brand-new Monster Squad DVD had been shipped… I got excited.

And, as you’ve probably guessed, more than a little reflective.

***

Five years on, my feelings haven’t changed, and rest assured, I have plenty left to say on the subject. Now, back to my place for some pie.

by Stephanie Scaife

Caution: spoilers ahead…

1987. Regan is President, the Cold War continues, Thatcher is re-elected Prime Minister, the first ever episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation airs on television… and on 31st July Joel Schumacher’s teen vampire flick The Lost Boys was unleashed on US audiences. 25 years later and it has found mass cult appeal, thanks in part to being one of Warners’ best selling VHS tapes ever released and that for my generation it offered something new – vampires as young, beautiful, immortal rock stars, not pasty old loners holed up in castles or creeping around foggy cemeteries.

I’m almost certain that I’ve told this story before, but way back in the late 80’s when my mum bought a VHS player the first two videos she bought were Blade Runner and The Lost Boys, and for the longest while they were the only videos that we had, resulting in them being watched ad nauseam, and for me as an adolescent The Lost Boys had a profound effect. As we’re seeing today, the allure of the teenage vampire can be very popular with young girls; I’m just glad that for my generation this included sex, violence, rock ‘n’ roll and some pretty fucking awesome 80’s hairstyles. Not sparkly, chaste, vegetarian vampires…

I really wish that I could say it was the rather awesome Kiefer Sutherland as David, the leader of the vamp gang, that piqued my interest, but sadly no; I was 8 years old and I was in love with the two Coreys. This was in the days before the internet, and it’s not like I could start an appreciation Tumblr or write slash fiction; instead I had scrap books, and I’d spend hours cutting out pictures from teen heart-throb magazines and hand-writing fan letters whilst listening to the soundtrack on vinyl. Not to mention sitting though such gems as License to Drive and Dream a Little Dream as a consequence of my obsession, in-between repeat viewings of The Lost Boys, which I think I must’ve seen over 50 times in my life and could probably recite the entire script backwards. To me this almost seems rather quaint now in a world where you can gather every piece of information about your idol online and millions can be made from publishing your poorly written fan fiction.

As it happens The Lost Boys wasn’t intended to resemble anything like the finished product. Instead it was originally about 8-9 year old vampires in a more literal rift on the Peter Pan reference of the title. What Schumacher did was envision the film with teenagers with the aim of making it cool and sexy, and certainly not the kids film that the studio had wanted. He took a massive risk making such an of-the-moment-film, full of unknown actors that blended the near impossible to pull off combination of horror and comedy. But against all odds he managed to succeed, not least because of the fantastic cast, a great soundtrack and cinematography by the legendary Michael Chapman (Taxi Driver, Raging Bull). The Lost Boys is knowingly kitsch and it almost takes itself too seriously, but I think it pulls it off by being scary enough, sexy enough and cool enough to appeal to a vast audience, and I think that it still stands up today, although that may just be my nostalgia talking. It may also be my poor taste that thinks although it’s very certainly the 80’s it still looks great and any hipster on the streets of Williamsburg would probably kill for Sam’s wardrobe.

Following on from The Hunger (1983) and Fright Night (1985), The Lost Boys continued to up the ante in making vampires contemporary. Vampires have never been the stereotypical movie monster, although they are traditionally male they are often times handsome and alluring, not like Frankenstein’s Monster, The Mummy or The Wolfman. But whereas Dracula or other similar gothic incantations saw themselves holed up in faraway castles, these contemporary vampires were far more sociable, not to mention oozing in sex. In The Lost Boys, David (Kiefer Sutherland) and the rest of his family are portrayed as mysterious, a thing apart from normal life and so hip and cool that everyone around them yearns to be like them; including Michael (Jason Patric) who is immediately taken with the only female member, Star (Jami Gertz).

Michael is part of another, altogether more typical dysfunctional family consisting of his teenage brother Sam (Corey Feldman), his recently divorced mom (Dianne Wiest) and his eccentric taxidermist Grandpa (Barnard Hughes). They have recently relocated to Santa Carla, CA – or “the murder capital of the world” as it’s known in the film – from Phoenix, AZ. Santa Carla is a Boardwalk town full of misfits, transients and punk rockers – a world away from the landlocked Phoenix, enabling for classic fish-out-of-water narrative devices, especially in regards to Sam who is portrayed as a sort of fashion victim more comfortable hanging out at the mall than on the beach, and Michael who tries desperately to impress Star by saying he wants to get his ear pierced. However, each brother goes in a distinctly different direction in their bid to become accepted in their new surroundings.

Sam meets up with the Frog brothers, Edgar (Corey Feldman) and Alan (Jamison Newlander), two kids who run a comic store on the Boardwalk, that are self-proclaimed vampire hunters. Schumacher had asked Feldman and Newlander to study Stallone and Chuck Norris movies and to become that kind of 80’s action commando-type character and to also take themselves very seriously indeed, which effectively adds a great amount of humour to their roles. The Frog brothers give Sam horror comics to read, which they seem to take as gospel and use as self defence manuals, and although initially humouring them Sam quickly gets sucked in, especially as he starts to see vampiric traits from the comics appear in his brother Michael.

Michael on the other hand is quick to ingratiate himself with David and the others, initially due to his attraction to Star, and later as he is seduced by the danger and mystery of this gang of teenagers seemingly unhindered by responsibility and any sort of adult supervision. In one of the most infamous scenes in the film David tricks Michael into believing that he’s eating maggots and worms instead of Chinese take-out so as to easily coax him into drinking blood, hence turning Michael into a half-vampire, only to become a fully fledged vampire upon committing his first kill.

During the 1980’s with the increased press coverage and growing fear surrounding the official recognition of HIV and AIDS, the vampire story started to take on a whole new meaning. Vampires after all are all about sex and blood and the popularity of certain film genres, horror in particular, has a tendency over the years to reflect the socio-economic climate of the time – from the cold war politics and racism of the 1960’s in Night of the Living Dead, to the 1970’s backlash against the Vietnam war in Last House on the Left, to the vampire films of the 1980’s like The Lost Boys and Kathryn Bigelow’s Near Dark where we see young, sexually active people being afflicted with vampirism transmitted through penetration both sexual and as a means to consume blood. So after being tricked into consuming David’s blood and consummating his relationship with Star, things start to go all sorts of weird for Michael. He sleeps all day, wears sunglasses indoors, he smells bad, so wait… is he a creature of the night or is he just a teenage boy?

Meanwhile, oblivious to all of this, their mom Lucy has found herself a job at a local video store and is dating the manager Max, who just so happens to be the mild mannered middle-aged head vampire! In another of my favourite scenes (that also offers somewhat of a plot hole) Max comes over for dinner and Sam along with the Frog brothers try and catch him out by spiking his food with garlic and seeing if he glows in the dark, however we learn that by inviting a vampire into your home it renders you powerless against them. Although, as we’d seen earlier in the film Michael fails to cast a reflection in his own home but Max on the other hand clearly has a reflection in the mirror Sam plants in front of him. Perhaps being the head vampire gives you extra inexplicable powers, or perhaps by now I should’ve learned to stop questioning horror films.

Once the cat is out of the bag the final third of the film turns to fairly standard genre fare as our protagonists battle against the vampires, and although the events that transpire are more than a little predictable there are a few memorable death scenes that remain unparalleled even today – my little 8 year-old mind was pretty much blown as we see “death by stereo,” toilets exploding with blood and Kiefer Sutherland impaled on a mound of taxidermy deer antlers. Even today you’d struggle to find such imaginative ways of vampire disposal and I think that is one of the many reasons why The Lost Boys still stands up today. Yes it’s cheesy and yes it’s very clearly set in the 80’s but it’s still a funny, scary, sexy movie that will continue to inspire both fascination and nostalgia, depending on your age, for years to come. Something that not many recent vampire films could lay claims to. Let’s just not mention the 2 straight to video sequels.

It takes a certain kind of film to inspire the sort of following that The Lost Boys has, and even now all of its primary cast are associated with this above anything else that they’ve done in their careers. Perhaps that’s not too much of a stretch with Jami Gertz, but when you look at actors like Kiefer Sutherland it definitely says something about the power of the film; that this is the one he continuously gets quoted back to him and is constantly flagged as a favourite amongst his fans. I think ultimately The Lost Boys was a combination of being in the right place at the right time to capture the imaginations of a disenfranchised generation looking for some escapism and its longevity is proof that although it’s hardly Citizen Kane (and in fact it’s not even as good as the lesser known Near Dark which came out later that year), there is something very special about The Lost Boys. In another 25 years time I’m sure I’ll still be watching it at least once a year and quoting lines back with my friends, so just remember: “They’re only noodles, Michael.”