2000s horror movies – Horror Ghouls

Final Destination (2000)

Posted on May 2, 2025 by HorrorGhouls

Alex Browning is a high school student who is going on a trip to Paris with his other classmates. He boards Volée Airlines Flight 180, but before the takeoff he has a premonition where he sees how the plane explodes in the air, killing everyone on board. He starts panicking, screaming that there will be an accident, and he is removed from the plane. Several of his friends and some other classmates follow him, including one of the teachers. They don’t believe him, of course,with the exception of one: Clear Rivers, who found his reaction so believable that she also decided to leave the plane before takeoff. Afterwards, they can see that the plane explodes shortly after takeoff. Huh! So Alex wasn’t just a crazy loon after all. Naturally, him predicting this beforehand makes him suspicious, and he is interrogated by the FBI. Suspicious or not, it’s pretty clear he doesn’t have anything to do with the accident, and he is just one of the lucky people to be alive. Or…that is, until the survivors keep getting killed in freak accidents. It seems Alex has disrupted Death’s plan, and the lives are now being claimed in the order they would have died if they hadn’t left the plane.

Final Destination is a supernatural horror film from 2000, directed by James Wong. The screenplay was written by Wong, Glenn Morgan, and Jeffrey Reddick, and it was based on a story by Reddick that was originally written as a spec script for an episode for The X-Files. The movie became a financial success despite receiving mostly negative reviews from the critics, making $10 million on its opening weekend. There has since been 5 other films made, with the 6th is heading to the theaters later this month.

What makes Final Destination, and all its sequels for that matter, so entertaining is it’s rather simple premise that still opens up for so many ideas. How many ways are there to die? More than we could possibly fathom. Everyday situations, household items, everything can literally turn into a death trap if the circumstances are right. And while the film series could have become too repetitive, it still manages to serve up so many inventive ways of how people could die in the most unexpected ways possible. In this first movie, the first death provides the classic formula for many of the deaths: several things happen which makes you constantly wonder how the person will get killed off, often with a few red herrings thrown at us as well. Many of the deaths are shown in a slightly cartoony way, sometimes with a bit of gore (although no excessive amounts). Storywise, the suspense mainly lies in how our protagonist, Alex, tries to figure out a way to beat Death while getting help from Clear, the only one who truly believed him right from the start.

Final Destination is a fun popcorn horror movie, where the many ways to die in otherwise normal, everyday situations is the fun part. And while this movie probably didn’t have the same effect as Jaws had on its beach-lovers, I can guess it at least gave a few people the jitters if they were traveling by plane shortly afterwards..

Director: James Wong
Writers: Glen Morgan, James Wong, Jeffrey Reddick
Country & year: USA/Canada, 2000
Actors: Devon Sawa, Ali Larter, Kerr Smith, Kristen Cloke, Daniel Roebuck, Roger Guenveur Smith, Chad Donella, Seann William Scott, Tony Todd, Amanda Detmer, Brendan Fehr
IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0195714/

Hide and Seek (2005)

Posted on April 11, 2025 by HorrorGhouls

David Callaway wakes up and finds the body of his wife Alison in the bathtub. Their 9-year old daughter, Emily, also comes in and witnesses her mother’s apparent suicide. As can be expected, this whacks a huge dent in the girl’s psyche. Who wouldn’t be a mess after witnessing a parent committing suicide? David is a psychologist so he should be well aware of some of the coping mechanisms, so when he decides to move to upstate New York and Emily starts interacting with an imaginary friend called Charlie, he doesn’t consider it much of a problem. Children always imagine things, and this imaginary friend could very well just be a way Emily deals with her grief. That is…until the actions of this “Charlie“ becomes quite sinister. One day David even discovers their dead cat in the bathtub, which Emily claims was killed by Charlie. Still, he refuses to get her help which should be quite apparent that she’s in need of right now. On top of that, something is up with David himself, where he keeps having nightmares about a New Year’s Eve party that took place before his wife’s death…

Hide and Seek is a psychological thriller from 2005, starring Robert De Niro as David and Dakota Fanning as Emily. It was directed by John Polson, and written by Ari Schlossberg. Originally, Albert Hughes was set to direct, but it’s said that he left “due to creative differences“. The movie grossed $127 million worldwide on a budget of $25 million.

As a psychological thriller, Hide and Seek works pretty fine. It’s mysterious, has a certain atmosphere, but never goes into actual scary territory. You keep wondering if Emily is just mentally broken, or if something else is going on. Whether it is something psychological, supernatural, or something else entirely, is kept a mystery for quite a long time without giving too much away early on, and the movie is also deliberately throwing a handful of red herrings at us. The movie is upheld by strong performances, and a young Dakota Fanning (who played the leading role in last year’s The Watchers by Ishana Night Shyamalan) plays her role as the disturbed child fairly well. There are some things about the character’s behaviour in the movie that, later on, feels quite illogical.. but that’s due to the script rather than the actual performances. It was also fun to see Famke Janssen in a minor role here.

The main problem with Hide and Seek is the nonsensical twist (yes, it’s one of those movies), where little actually makes sense, and it drags out a bit too much before wrapping things up entirely. Overall, though, it’s a fine and suspenseful thriller, it just happens to fall a bit apart due to a pretty muddled twist.

The movie was also given five different endings, and the one we watched was the US theatrical ending.

Director: John Polson
Writer: Ari Schlossberg
Country & year: USA, 2005
Actors: Robert De Niro, Dakota Fanning, Famke Janssen, Elisabeth Shue, Amy Irving, Dylan Baker, Melissa Leo, Robert John Burke, Molly Grant Kallins
IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0382077/

The Booth (2005)

Posted on April 1, 2025 by HorrorGhouls

Shogo is the star of a popular call-in radio show, who is forced to broadcast from the infamous “Studio 6“ which is a creepy and abandoned booth. The last time someone used it was several years ago, when the DJ there committed suicide. Yay. Shogo is also a prime example of the douchebag breed, and of course he’s got some skeletons in the closet. His crew isn’t exactly treated fairly by him, either. When someone on the line starts whispering “liar“ to him, he starts fearing that someone knows about his troubled past. Or maybe…the studio is cursed and the same fate that fell on the previous DJ will also fall upon him? Shogo keeps getting more and paranoid.

The Booth is a J-Horror movie from 2005, written and directed by Yoshihiro Nakamura. The leading role in the movie is played by Ryûta Satô, and this was actually his first leading role. He’s most known for his role in the Netflix movie Fullmetal Alchemist from 2017.

There are many early 2000’s J-Horror films that are little known. Some for obvious reasons, while others never got the attention they deserved. The Booth falls a bit into the latter category, as it’s a very decent mystery horror film. It’s mostly a one-location movie, which focuses on the tension built from Shogo’s asshole-behaviour and creeping sense of unease as he fears that his bad attitude has started catching up on him. As the film opens with the reveal of the DJ having committed suicide in the notorious Studio 6, we already know that there might be some supernatural influences here. Or is there, really? The movie offers so many twists and turns underway, some which you’re very unlikely to see coming.

Limited location movies often depend a lot on the leading role character, and Ryûta Satô does a great job performing as the arrogant and despicable DJ Shogo. All throughout the movie, you get snippets from his past and several misdeeds, and there’s especially one that ends up revealing quite the unexpected turn of events. You don’t root for this guy at all, so you end up looking forward to see him get a bit of karma teeth on his ass. Whether or not it’s a curse, supernatural forces of some kind, or simply his barebones bad conscience that catches up with him…well, that’s something the movie keeps as a mystery until the very end.

The Booth is an obscure, creepy little J-Horror film, definitely worth a watch if you’re looking for a claustrophobic horror chamber film that will keep you guessing.

Writer and director: Yoshihiro Nakamura
Original title: Bûsu
Country & year: Japan, 2005
Actors: Maiko Asano, Makoto Ashikawa, Mansaku Ikeuchi, Seiko Iwaidô, Hijiri Kojima, Masaki Miura
IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0760506/

The Collector (2009)

Posted on February 18, 2025February 21, 2025 by HorrorGhouls

Arkin O´Brien is a handyman who is working for the Chase family. He’s a former convict, and his wife is in debt to loan sharks who wants to get paid due by midnight. Arkin then desperately makes a plan: he decides to steal a valuable ruby from the Chase home. After all, the family was going on a vacation so the house would be empty, so this would be like stealing candy from a baby, right? No such luck, though. While there, he finds that someone else got there before him, and they’re not after the ruby or any other valuables…he sees the father of the family getting dragged down into the basement by a masked man. Not only that, but when Arkin tries to call 911, he discovers that the entire house has been booby-trapped and rigged with all kinds of deadly devices. Even the windows have been boarded up and lined with razors. When he finds out that the entire Chase family has been captured by this masked madman, he discovers that the little girl of the family has been able to hide. He decides to try and save her, despite feeling like a fly trapped in a spider’s dangerous net.

The Collector is a horror film from 2009, written by Patrick Melton and Marcus Dunstan, and directed by Dunstan. The original script was titled The Midnight Man, and was actually at one point considered a spin-off prequel to the Saw franchise as some kind of origin story of Jigsaw. Fortunately, as this movie stands very well on its own, this idea was dismissed by the producers and the script was re-written into an original story.

Despite the re-write of the script, the Saw/Jigsaw-esque traps are very prominent throughout the movie, and they are always sadistic and inventive. I also find the spider-like appearance and antics of the masked man to be quite enjoyable, making him stand out a bit from the all too generic slasher/serial killer villain by giving him some features of his very own. His victims are trapped in his spiderweb, so to speak, and you just gotta admire how the guy manages to put the most elaborate traps all over the place in no time. It’s like Kevin from Home Alone grew up to be a serial killer.

The kills are brutal and gory, delivering plenty of graphic moments. The serial killer comes off as mysterious and pretty creepy, with no background story or any actual motive or reasoning behind what he does. We do realize there is some kind of fascination towards bugs or especially spiders (there are also several spider shots throughout the film), and the black glowing contact lenses he appears to be using which makes his face appear more bug-like. He “collects“ one from each of his killing sprees, but for what reason, we can (at least for now) just speculate. In this movie the character was played by Juan Fernández.

While The Collector is, overall, a pretty fun time, you can’t really help but noticing a few puzzling and nonsensical things regarding the killer. Why take everything to such great lengths by booby-trapping the entire home, when he’d already captured the family and had them tied up? It wasn’t like he expected any visitors. Not to mention how fast he could put up all those traps…but hey, all of that is nitpicking for a movie that doesn’t really take itself all too serious to begin with. It is a fun home invasion/serial killer thriller, with a bit of Saw meets Home Alone.

Director: Marcus Dunstan
Writers: Patrick Melton, Marcus Dunstan
Country & year: USA, 2009
Actors: William Prael, Diane Ayala Goldner, Juan Fernández, Josh Stewart, Michael Reilly Burke, Andrea Roth, Karley Scott Collins, Madeline Zima, Haley Pullos, Daniella Alonso
IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0844479/

Sequel: The Collection (2012)

End of the Line (2007)

Posted on December 17, 2024 by HorrorGhouls

Karen is traumatized from some kind of horrible event on a subway train. We get to see a few flashback pieces from what she apparently went through, until we go all the way back to see what actually happened to poor Karen. We learn that she worked as a nurse at a psychiatric hospital, and on her way home she is approached by some weirdos on the subway train. What follows is a tension-filled ride where no one is safe.

End of the Line is a horror film from 2007, written, directed and produced by Maurice Deveraux. The film debuted to a limited release, received fairly positive reviews from critics and also won a few prizes a festivals. The film didn’t get a Blu-ray release until 2023, however, and have remained a lesser known movie.

Now, the horror genre has a lot of religious-themed movies (demons, possessions, cults and more), but more often than not the movie’s portrayal of such are often depicting them as the ones who are right, and sometimes ending up throwing away what could have been an excellent portrayal of religious madness (looking at you, Frailty!) in favor of a supernatural simplification. After all, there’s an even more unnerving horror behind the concept of individuals having such an unwavering faith in something that they would do “anything“ in the name of their god or savior. History has already proven how horribly that can go, and today is no different. The world is a place filled with people who would do pretty much anything for their faith, and would easily justify all means possible to achieve what they believe would be the “right“ thing. Religious fanaticism and the hypocrisy from therein is more than a good enough theme for horror movies, and End of the Line is a prime example of this.

While there are limited surroundings, the film doesn’t overstay its welcome and keeps everything at a decent pace. There’s enough tension to keep your attention, and it also keeps things behind a slight veil of mystery. There’s also some decent gore to appreciate here. While the crazy cultists are enough of a threat by themselves, there is of course a character that makes for a bigger villain than the rest: a guy named Patrick, played by Robin Wilcock. In many ways, this character works well in representing how cults and groups of certain types of people inevitably attracts those who join them not because they believe in their cause, but because they want to join in the mayhem and chaos they’ll evoke. Patrick isn’t a religious fanatic, but he finds himself attracted to the group as a means of doing what would otherwise be perceived as bad deeds but which he can now commit under the disguise of being “good“.

Other than knowing the obvious, that a religious cult is causing trouble at a subway station, I think this movie is best seen without too many spoilers, so I’m going to refrain from saying more. Overall, End of the Line is a fine low-budget thrill ride with some story aspects that easily ends up for discussion once the movie is over. What was really going on? Were the cultists right? While the film doesn’t give it away openly, there is actually a very clear answer to this which is shown early on during the film. I’m not gonna spoil, but I’ll give a little hint: muffin.

Writer and director: Maurice Devereaux
Country & year: Canada, 2007
Actors: Ilona Elkin, Nicolas Wright, Neil Napier, Emily Shelton, Tim Rozon, Nina Fillis, Joan McBride, Danny Blanco Hall, John Vamvas, Robin Wilcock, Kent McQuaid, Robert Vézina, David Schaap
IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0494224/

Arachnid (2001)

Posted on November 29, 2024November 29, 2024 by HorrorGhouls

Joli Mercer is piloting a stealth plane in the South Pacific, when a translucent spacecraft suddenly appears (in a scene with such godawful CGI effects it could have belonged in The Amazing Bulk). Poor Joli crashes with the thing as his plane begins to malfunction, but his bad luck doesn’t end there. He crashes on an island, together with the alien ship. He sees a desperate-looking translucent alien-thing which is suddenly attacked by a giant spider monster, which then kills Joli as well. Then, ten months later, Joli’s sister is on the search for him. She’s been hired to be the pilot of a medical expedition who are doing research after natives on the island have started dying from an unknown virus. Upon reaching the island, the plane starts malfunctioning and they need to do an emergency landing on the beach. From there on, they have to trudge through the jungle in order to reach their destination, and they discover that the insects around the area have mutated into large and more deadly creatures. One of the guys in the expedition gets attack by giant ticks that starts burrowing into his body, and a giant centipede is killing one of the natives. And no, they didn’t crash-land on Skull Island. Aside from all the horrible creatures, the biggest threat of them all is a giant spider: the killer arachnid from outer space.

You know a movie is a stinker when the director himself says he only did it for the money… “I basically did it for the money and it was a stupid script … I got to live in Barcelona for six months and, you know, they paid me well. Everything was good except I had to go to work everyday and shoot a dumb script. I haven’t seen that one since, you know, I made it. And some people say ‘Oh well, it’s actually better than you think’, but I basically tell people to avoid that one“ is what Jack Sholder (A Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy’s Revenge, The Hidden) said about this film. Alright, then, that’s a way to wash your hands clean of something. We all need food on the table and can’t always work on passion projects…

Arachnid was released in 2001, and was the second film to be released under the Fantastic Factory Label (the first one being Faust: Love of the Damned from 2000) which was created by Brian Yuzna (Society, The Dentist) and Julio Fernandez in Spain. It was written by Mark Sevi, and then re-written together with Yuzna. The main spider design and the other creatures that used practical effects, were created by Steve Johnson. The film received a very negative reception upon its release, and while it’s easy to see this is “one of those“ movies, it’s actually a bunch of fun, much thanks to the practical effects which are actually pretty decent and feels like a nice little throwback. Already from the funnily sloppy opening scene you know what you’re in for, so better brace yourself for leaving your brain on the shelf for a little while. As we get introduced to character by character, one more clichéd than the other, the killings and creatures are what’s the highlight of the movie. There isn’t a huge amount of gore here (which is a shame, really, as that could have added an extra spritz on the already goofy concept), but there’s still some nice scenes, especially the one involving the ticks that eat their way out. Yum.

What makes the movie suffer from being a truly fun B-horror movie, is that the pacing is a bit too slow and the characters feel a bit too dull. A quicker pace, more interesting characters and more kills could have lifted the movie up several notches. Yes, it would still have been a “bad“ movie, but a bit more enjoyable. Overall though, Arachnid is a fun enough creature feature B-movie with some charming old-school effects.

Director: Jack Sholder
Writer: Mark Sevi
Country & year: Spain, USA, Mexico, 2001
Actors: Chris Potter, Alex Reid, José Sancho, Neus Asensi, Ravil Isyanov, Luis Lorenzo Crespo, Rocqueford Allen, Jesús Cabrero, Robert Vicencio
IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0271972/

Trick ‘r Treat (2007)

Posted on October 31, 2024January 1, 2025 by HorrorGhouls

It’s Halloween, the best time of the year! Well, for us Horror Ghouls at least. And for Sam, a cute little trick-or-treater you’ll get to know better here in Trick ‘r Treat.

In the fictional town of Warren Valley, Ohio, several people are celebrating Halloween night. The stories here are told in a nonlinear narrative, and first we meet Emma and her husband Henry. Emma is a Halloween hater (yup, one of those), and blows out the jack-o’-lantern before midnight. This is not according to Halloween rules! And she’ll soon find out the consequences. Then we meet Steven Wilkins, who is a serial killer who sticks to his own rules and traditions on Halloween. Just a reminder to all the kids out there to check their candy. We later also meet a group of teenagers, who visits a flooded quarry where the urban legend of the “Halloween School Bus Massacre“ was supposed to have taken place. And then, we have a group of young women in sexy costumes, where one of them wears a Little Red Riding Hood outfit. Hmmm…I wonder if she’s going to meet any wolves tonight. Then, of course, there’s little Sam, who is always nearby. Some of the stories and characters have a relation to each other, and all will be revealed before Halloween night is over.

Trick ‘r Treat is a horror anthology film from 2007, written and directed by Michael Dougherty in his directorial debut. The film was delayed for two years, and only had a limited number of screenings at film festivals. It grossed only $27,909 on a budget of $12 million. Ouchie. Over the years, though, the film has since garnered a cult following. Fans have been teased with a sequel for several years but so far nothing seems to happen. Only time will show. In the meantime, Dougherty directed Krampus (2015) and Godzilla: King of the Monsters (2019).

If you’re a Halloween lover, like any horror ghoul with the slightest ounce of self-respect does, then this movie is certain to feel like a treat. Like many horror anthologies out there, including The Mortuary Collection and Tales from the Hood, all the stories are in some way interwoven with the rest. Aside from the aforementioned anthologies however, this one is told in a nonlinear way and mixes the stories a bit back and forth. It doesn’t require too much attention to get the coherence, so don’t worry about it being too hard to follow. There’s a little bit of twists and turns, including some characters appearing in one story only to prove a significance later on in one of the other stories. It’s all pure popcorn entertainment, never even remotely frightening but offers a little bit of gore here and there and a lot of lighthearted amusing fun. The cute little character Sam is derived from the word Samhain which is the ancient Celtic festival of the dead. It’s from Samhain that the modern-day Halloween is derived. In this movie they’ve taken the name a little further and turned him into the most adorable little deity. Just don’t be fooled by his cuteness, though, he sure knows how to play tricks on those who disrespect the traditions!

The actors playing the deformed children from the Halloween School Bus Massacre segment all had real disabilities or injuries, and they apparently had a total blast during the filming. And we also got one of those famous “gumball rolling down the stairs“ scenes, which is of course a nod to the excellent ghost horror movie The Changeling (1980), and the cameraman working on this sequence also filmed that exact scene in that film.

Trick ‘r Treat is a solid Halloween movie, with enough ghoulish pleasantries to satisfy the most. Happy Halloween!

Writer and director: Michael Dougherty
Country & year: USA/Canada, 2007
Actors: Dylan Baker, Rochelle Aytes, Quinn Lord, Lauren Lee Smith, Moneca Delain, Tahmoh Penikett, Brett Kelly, Britt McKillip, Isabelle Deluce, Jean-Luc Bilodeau, Alberto Ghisi, Samm Todd, Anna Paquin, Brian Cox
IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0862856/

Monster House (2006)

Posted on October 30, 2024January 1, 2025 by HorrorGhouls

It’s only one day before Halloween, and 12-year-old Dustin James (or D.J. for short) is busy spying on his creepy elderly neighbor, Horace Nebbercracker. He sees that the old man steals a little girl’s bicycle, and that’s a habit that’s been going on for quite some time. Whenever something enters Nebbercracker’s lawn, it’s his. This same day, D.J.’s parents leave for a convention, and the teenage girl Elizabeth (aka Zee) will babysit him. When Dustin and his friend Charles “Chowder“ play basketball outside, they end up losing it on Nebbercracker’s lawn. Ooops, we all know where this is headed. Still, D.J. tries to retrieve it before the old, cranky neighbor notices it, but too late. Nebbercracker comes out of his old house, furious like a bat from hell and wants to give these snotty brats a piece of his mind! He goes completely crazy, lifts D.J. up while shouting “you think you can just terrorize my lawn?!“ while the boy desperately tries to claim his innocence. Then the inevitable happens: the old geezer suffers a heart attack and is taken away in an ambulance.

That same evening, Zee’s boyfriend, Bones, pays a visit and starts talking about rumors relating to Nebbercracker, about how he supposedly cannibalized his wife. He also says that Nebbercracker once stole his kite. Later, when D.J. spies on the now empty house across the street, he notices that when Bones leaves the house, a kite is coming out of the front door of the old Nebbercracker house. Bones goes to retrieve it, and is then dragged into the house. D.J. starts to believe that the old house is now haunted, and the next day they save a candy-selling girl called Jenny from becoming another one of the house’s victims. No one believes them about the monster house of course, especially since today is Halloween, so it’s all up to them to stop the house from claiming more victims.

Monster House is an animated supernatural horror comedy from 2006, directed by Gil Kenan as his directorial debut. Originally, the movie was set up to be at DreamWorks, but one thing lead to another and he ended up having a meeting with Steven Spielberg and Sony Pictures Entertainments picked up the project. The movie was filmed using a technique called motion-capture, where the actors performed the characters’ movements and lines while they were being linked to sensors. And while there were a bunch of parents that got pissed off due to the movie’s horror elements and dark themes, it received generally positive reviews and grossed $142 million worldwide on a budget of $75 million.

Despite being an animated PG-rated movie, it’s one that can be appreciated by adults just as much as the younger ones. It does not only have an intriguing story and a creepy mystery, it also has very charming and likable characters where they’ve done a great job at matching the perfect voices. There’s a sense of both horror and adventure, with an 80s throwback style that fits so well with everything. This being a “children’s movie“ and all, the horror elements are still very prominent and there’s even some nods to Hitchcock’s Psycho and Rear Window. It’s got a predominantly dark theme, which gets even darker than you might initially expect, and kudos to them for having the balls to take it all out. The final part of the movie does go totally wild and proves that it aimed to live up to the title, and while this strays a bit from the more subdued horror elements from earlier in the movie where everything about the house was still a mystery, it’s a very fitting way to end it. After the final showdown we even get a cute little aww-moment.

Monster House is a great animated thrill ride for the young yet not-so-young audience, and I’m afraid this one was very much lightning in a bottle which we’ll never get close to seeing again. An animated movie filled with the sense of adventure reminiscent of what could be found in movies like The Goonies (1985) and filled with an actual horror story and horror elements, very much working as a perfect introduction to scary movies to a young audience…yeah, I doubt that’ll ever happen again.

Kenan later made the Poltergeist remake from 2015, and his latest release was Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire this year. There’s no doubt that Monster House remains his strongest entry into the horror genre. Even to this day it has kept its spooky charm, and I’m sure many of the children who were originally frightened by watching this one when it was released back in 2006, now remembers it fondly. Well, that’s at least how I remember the movies that scared me when I was a kid…

Director: Gil Kenan
Writers: Dan Harmon, Rob Schrab, Pamela Pettler
Country & year: USA, 2006
Voice actors: Ryan Whitney, Steve Buscemi, Mitchel Musso, Catherine O’Hara, Fred Willard, Sam Lerner, Woody Schultz, Ian McConnel, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Jason Lee, Spencer Locke, Kevin James
IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0385880/

Drag Me to Hell (2009)

Posted on October 18, 2024January 1, 2025 by HorrorGhouls

The year is 1969, and the young medium Shaun San Dena gets a visit from a desperate couple who wants her to save their son. After having stolen a necklace from the gypsies, he’s fallen ill and have started hearing evil voices. Before she can even start a proper séance, the boy is quite literally dragged to Hell to never be seen again. Then, we fast forward to present day in Los Angeles, where Christine Brown works as a bank loan officer and is hungry for a promotion to become assistant branch manager. Her boss gives her some advice: she will prove her worth if she can show herself as someone being able to make tough decisions. She gets her chance pretty soon afterwards, when an elderly woman named Sylvia Ganush asks for a third extension on her mortgage. Despite Ganush literally begging on her knees, Christine refuses her pleas because she wants to show off her “tough decision making“ to her boss. Promotion, here we come! Later, in the parking lot, the elderly woman decides to give Christine a payback for shaming her and denying her pleas for help, and after a long struggle Ganush rips a button from Christine’s coat and curses it. Uh-oh. Christine is soon haunted by a dark spirit, which is attacking and tormenting her. She decides to beg Ganush for forgiveness, but before she can do so she finds out that the old woman has passed away. Not only that, but the curse that’s been cast upon her will have her tormented by a powerful demon for three days, before she will be dragged to Hell.

Drag Me to Hell is a supernatural horror film from 2009, directed and co-written by Sam Raimi with Ivan Raimi. The film premiered at the Cannes Film Festival, and became an immediate success. It grossed $90.8 million worldwide on a $30 million budget, and won awards and received generally very favorable reviews. Originally, the story for the film had been written 10 years prior to the film going into production, under the working title The Curse. After finishing the script for the film, Raimi was busy with the Spider-Man film series so it took a while before the film could be pushed forward. Raimi wanted it to be a PG-13 film, with less gore than his earlier horror films, stating that this time he wanted to do something different. He wanted to make a suspenseful movie with wild moments and a lot of dark humor, and in all of this he definitely succeeded.

The movie starts with a punch during the opening scene, where a little boy is quite literally dragged to the depths of Hell itself to burn forever while his terrified parents can’t do anything but watch in horror. And all over a stolen necklace…not exactly eternal damnation-worthy, but curses aren’t always supposed to be fair. Seeing this we know what Christine is at risk of, which heightens the suspense. While the protagonist isn’t all that innocent (she could have helped the old lady, but she chose to focus on her promotion instead), her actions are still not so awful that we think she deserves to be cast into Hell. Yes, we root for her, but we also can’t help but watch in glee when things turn into total demonic frolic mayhem, with scenes that are both funny and delightfully spooky. While the film does have its cheesy moments, its all done with a lot of excitement and manages to blend the dark humor with the horror elements very nicely. It’s all done in a boisterous Halloween spirit, managing to be a great load of fun. The special effects used in the film is a good variation of different techniques: green screen, prosthetics, puppets and cgi, and different effect houses were utilized, including Phil Tippet‘s studio.

Drag me to Hell is a blast from start to finish, and a perfect watch during the Halloween season!

In early 2023, Raimi revealed that Ghost House Pictures was actively trying to come up with ideas for a sequel. Well…we’re now in the late part of 2024, and while Drag me to Hell 2 is listed on IMDb, there’s absolutely no info about this sequel at all. So I’m not holding my breath for that one.

Director: Sam Raimi
Writers: Sam Raimi, Ivan Raimi
Country & year: USA, 2009
Actors: Alison Lohman, Justin Long, Lorna Raver, Dileep Rao, David Paymer, Adriana Barraza, Chelcie Ross, Reggie Lee, Molly Cheek, Bojana Novakovic, Kevin Foster, Alexis Cruz
IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1127180/

Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon (2006)

Posted on October 15, 2024January 1, 2025 by HorrorGhouls

Have you always wondered why every damn serial killer in slasher movies tends to walk after their victims, like they’re about to shit their pants, rather than running? Well, Leslie Vernon (Nathan Baesel) is finally here to explain.

Being a top-tier serial killer like Freddy Krueger, Jason Vorhees, Michael Myers or Art the Clown, is not just about grabbing a weapon and going on a killing-spree, you see. A ton of preparation, planning and complex study of the chosen victims to “the final girl“ has to be examined to the smallest details. And be sure to eat well and do your cardio exercise regularly, cause this is not a job for out-of-shape lard asses.

A small group of young film students led by Taylor (Angela Goethals) has gotten the privilege to follow the aspiring serial killer Leslie Vernon. He’s a month away from his upcoming murder-spree where he’s planning to kill a group of kids while they are having a party in an old abandoned house, and the film crew are invited to document the whole process. Sounds like the standard slasher premise we’ve seen two thousand times already. Vernon looks like a little brother of Andrew Divoff and Michael C. Hall, and like his role models, he has a tragic backstory to paint his alter ego with. We get a never-seen-before glimpse of the secret underworld of serial killers when the film crew gets to meet Vernon’s best friend and colleague, Eugene (Scott Wilson). He’s a retired veteran and has learned Vernon some tricks. We don’t know much of Eugene’s many roles in the slasher arena throughout the decades other than there’s some theory that he’s actually Billy Lenz, the unseen killer from Black Christmas (1974). C o o l. He also shares his dark past and double-life in a happy marriage… while he sleeps in a tank under the ground outside the house.

We also met Dr. Halloran (Robert Englund), the film’s version of Dr. Loomis if you will, who once treated Leslie Vernon and now is on his tail to chase him down. I find zero joy in saying this, but it’s not wrong to point out that Robert Englund has appeared in a string of terrible dogshit films during the last 10, 15, 20 years or so, and this is one of the very few watch-worthy flicks he’s in, post Freddy. We see Zelda Rubinstein as a librarian, her final role before she passed away four years later, and wandered into the light.

The film is mostly presented as a raw, handheld documentary with segments that switch back and forth to conventional. This may take some of the edge off, but this is not a film to take seriously to begin with, and Behind the Mask is overall a clever and entertaining satire on the cheesy slasher genre that dominated the 1980s. It’s also, of course, a big plus if you’re a big fan of the genre and have seen most of the catalogs of slashers from that era and its resurgence after the mid 90s. If not, the inside-jokes and the references will fly over your head while you’re just sitting and waiting for the blood’n gore which there’s not much focus on.

And one thing is for certain: You’ll never be able to watch a body-count slasher in the same way ever again.

Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon

Director: Scott Glosserman
Writers: Scott Glosserman, David J. Stieve
Country & year: USA, 2012
Actors: Nathan Baesel, Angela Goethals, Robert Englund, Scott Wilson, Zelda Rubinstein, Bridgett Newton, Kate Miner, Ben Pace, Britain Spellings, Hart Turner, Krissy Carlson, Travis Zariwny
IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0437857/