Dahlia DeWinters - Author

Quirky Heroines, Happy Endings

Blogtoberfest – Five Scary Movies – Mya Lairis

My top five scary movies are: 

 

1. Trilogy of Terror– is my all time scary movie. There is just something about that damn doll, like maybe it gnawed my ankles off in a past life or something but I have only watched this film once. Trying to get up the nerve to do it again, but…that doll!

2. Squirm– I have no issue with snakes, at all…they are tasty in fact but earthworms, shrieking, no-eyes having, able to be cut into pieces and still live, burrowing under the skin…Hell naw.

3. Event Horizon– When I first saw this film it scared the crap out of me. Dimensional terrors usually hit home with the terror mark in me and that the space ship had breached the dimension to Hell and was inescapable…yeah. I have been able to watch this a few times however and still, its a shitty deal for those on board.

4. Evil Dead Remake– This was an excellent remake and one that I winced a couple of times at but enjoyed all the same. That razor blade though….

5. Beloved– Yup, actually now that I think about it, this could be one of the scariest films I’ve ever seen. The notion of slavery is frightening enough but this film did emotional damage to me as it made me question the notions of anger, vengeance, and self. Creatures are scary and all but the human psyche can be far worse.

Bio: Mya Lairis is a monster and kaiju  fanatic who writes paranormal romance and erotica but who reads mostly extreme horror and heart racing cyber punk sci fi.

Website: www.myalairis.com

 

 

Horror Movies-Original vs. Remakes – Battle One

So, you call yourself a horror movie fan?  Well, even as a middle of the road fan, meaning I won’t watch them at night, and if something is too gory or too much, I will turn it off to preserve my sanity.  Given that, I’ve seen a lot of scary movies, but even I was surprised to find out some were remakes. Let’s take a look, beyond the obvious.

 

Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?

Yep, this sister vs sister thriller/horror was remade in 1991 starring real life sisters Vanessa and Lynn Redgrave.  John Glover plays the part, I think, that Victor Buono played in the original.  I’ve seen it, I’ve noted it, I’ve blanked it out.  Nuff said.  Here’s the trailer.

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The Crazies

Timothy Olyphant, who I will always forever see as sexy salesman Danny Cordray on The Office, and Radha Mitchell do a great job in this remake of the 1973 classic.  I don’t mind telling you, the trailer scared me.  The image of people enjoying a nice day at a baseball game as a huge, zombie-like dude marches across the field carrying a bloody weapon….that’s horror, where the ordinary go so wrong, so fast.  I haven’t seen the original, so I’m not sure how it measures up, but I can say it sure scared me.

Last House on the Left

As an exercise in 70s horror, I watched this.  It was an awful experience because the movie was so good at being awful.  The feeling of dread, of hopelessness and fear exudes from the screen after the two fun-loving girls meet up with that terrible crew.  Once seen, it is not an experience I’d want to repeat, because the movie did so well at making its audience feel terrible.  I won’t watch the remake.

The Fly

David Cronenberg is a body horror master.  In The Fly, he lets it all hang out.  Ugh.  I’ve seen both, but the remake is more stomach turning, and probably realistic than the original.  Both movies, however, do have good points.

The Blob

Yes, Steve McQueen was dreamy as a 40 year old high school student, but let’s be real.  The original Blob depended more on suspense than gross out scenes.  In the remake, it was a disgusting thrill to see the dude sucked down the drain by the blob.  The telephone booth scene was also a good scare.  Again, with what they had to work with, the original Blob was pretty good, but the remake’s special effects made a scary story much better.\

 

 

So what’s your vote?

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Horror Movie Review – Grave Encounters 2

 

Title:  Grave Encounters 2
Genre: Horror, Found Footage
Director: John Poliquin
Writers: The Vicious Brothers
IMDB Link:  http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2231554/

NO SPOILERS

PLOT SYNOPSIS: (imdb.com) A film student who is obsessed with the movie Grave Encounters sets out with his friends to visit the psychiatric hospital depicted in the original film.

We’re back!

After seeing Grave Encounters, I just had to see if there were a Grave Encounters 2.  And, lo and behold, it was!  I quickly queued it up and sat back, prepared to be as scared as I was with the first one.

Alas, this was not the case.  Now, this is not to say the movie wasn’t pretty good. It just took a bit of a time to get to the point.

Don’t go into this expect a retread of Grave Encounters.  The screenwriter and director  went in a bit of a different direction, which saved the movie from being a boring retread of the first movie.

A film student who is obsessed with the movie Grave Encounters sets out with his friends to visit the psychiatric hospital depicted in the original film.

I will say the characters are a little less likable in this movie than they were in the first one.  They skewed younger and were less the “seasoned professionals” of the first movie and more snot-nosed college students.  Being a woman of a certain age, their antics grated on me a bit, but I was eager to see what the asylum would do with them.

And the haunted asylum didn’t disappoint.  

Things are not what they seem at the old homestead and the place starts acting up right away.  We, the audience, know what they’re in for, having seen the first movie, we’re just waiting to see how the asylum plays with the new crew.

There’s shouting, there’s yelling, there’s running. There’s spooky stuff afoot and a surprise.

Watch it, if just to have the story continue. Grave Encounters 2 is not as good or as chill worthy as Grave Encounters, but it’s still a pretty good ride. 

My advice:  Push through the annoying college age antics at the beginning and stay for the scary parts.  There is some lore added and maybe a door opening for Grave Encounters 3.

Here’s to watching horror movies in the morning!

Dahlia

 

5 Fandom Friday – 5 Films I'm Excited for in 2017

If you’ve been reading my blog for any length of time and followed it through all its iterations, then you know how much I love movies.  Not just horror movies, but movies in general.  Usually these movies are a couple years old, if not older, but today you have a special treat.  Since I’m doing Five Fandom Friday, come with me to the future as I discuss the films I’m looking forward to this year.

 

Get Out

From Wikipedia: A young African American man visits his white girlfriend’s family estate where he learns that many of its residents, who are black, have gone missing, and he soon learns the horrible truth when another frantic African-American warns him to “get out”. He soon learns this is easier said than done.

Written and directed by the Jordan Peele, the shorter half of the comedy duo Key and Peele, this film truly presents an interesting premise. What is happening to the Black residents of this town?  And will our protagonist be able to fight against it?  What is IT anyway? I can’t wait to find out!

 

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Alien: Covenant

 

From Wikipedia:  Bound for a remote planet on the far side of the galaxy, the crew of the colony ship Covenant find what they believe to be an uncharted paradise. What the crew discover is a dark, dangerous world, inhabited by the “synthetic” David (Michael Fassbender), the sole survivor of the doomed Prometheus expedition, and monstrous creatures that are hunting them.[3]

 

Okay, so Prometheus was a mess.  Even when I watch it again, I am amazed at the actions of the characters, especially the scientists in the cave.  I mean, I don’t bend over to put my face in a strange dog’s face, and I like dogs, so for those who saw it…yeah.  Don’t do that, stupid.  However, the movie had great special effects and Idris Elba, so there you go. Ridley Scott is directing, so it can’t be all bad.  Can it?   We shall see.

 

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John Wick 2

From Wikipedia:  Legendary hitman John Wick is forced back out of retirement by a former associate plotting to seize control of a shadowy international assassins’ guild. Bound by a blood oath to help him, John travels to Rome, where he squares off against some of the world’s deadliest killers.

Oh, my goodness. Keanu Reeves, guns and a gray pit bull?  How does it get better than that?  I loved the crazy shoot ’em up of the first John Wick and am looking forward to this one. And Laurence Fishburne too!

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Kong:  Skull Island

From Wikipedia: In the 1970s, a team of explorers and soldiers are brought together to venture deep into an uncharted island in the Pacific Ocean – as beautiful as it is treacherous – unaware that they are crossing into the domain of monsters, as well as the mythic Kong, the “king” of the island.

I just realized that I dig monster movies, Godzilla, King Kong, Gamera, Rodan…I’m looking forward to this one.  It takes place in the 70s too, which is reminiscent of the times I’d watch all these films on the 4:30 movie. John Goodman! Sam Jackson! Tom Hiddleston! Also, King Kong himself!!

 

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The Dark Tower

From Wikipedia: Jake Chambers (Tom Taylor) is a young 11-year-old adventure seeker who discovers clues about another dimension called Mid-World. Upon following the mystery, he is spirited away to the land Mid-World where he encounters the lone frontiersman knight Roland Deschain (Idris Elba) who is on a quest to reach the “Dark Tower” that resides in End-World and reach the nexus point between time and space that he hopes will save Mid-World from extinction. But with various monsters and a vicious sorcerer named Walter Padick (Matthew McConaughey) hot on their trail, the unlikely duo find that their quest may be difficult to complete

 

I never read The Dark Tower series by Stephen King, but just the fact of Idris Elba in a long, black trenchcoat sporting a pair of revolvers is enough to see this film.  I’m also intrgued by the fact that it’s a sci-fi, western, fantasy.  You really can’t get any better than that.

Roland Deschain (Idris Elba) in Columbia Pictures’ THE DARK TOWER.

 

So there you have it!  The films I’m excited about for 2017!

What are the movies you’re most anticipatign for this year?

 

Peace, Love, Unity.

Dahlia

 

Blogtoberfest – Stephen King's Pet Sematary

Horror is different for everyone.  I don’t think the “experts” can agree on what horror is and thus there are tons of movies and books that represent the horror

Cover of "Pet Sematary (Special Collector...
Cover via Amazon

genre, as it should be.

I also believe that horror is different depending on where you are in your life.  What’s represents horror for a twenty-year-old might be old-hat to a forty year old. Books that resounded for me in my twenties are just “eh” now that I’m a lovely seasoned woman of a certain age.

But Stephen King’s Pet Semetary broke that mold.  It’s just as frightening now as when I first read it many years ago.

Here’s the blurb

“Sometimes dead is better….”When the Creeds move into a beautiful old house in rural Maine, it all seems too good to be true: physician father, beautiful wife, charming little daughter, adorable infant son — and now an idyllic home. As a family, they’ve got it all…right down to the friendly cat.

But the nearby woods hide a blood-chilling truth — more terrifying than death itself…and hideously more powerful.

 

SPOILERS  SPOILERS   sort of SPOILERS sort of  SPOILERS  SPOILERS 

My goodness, what a story.  It runs the gamut from the “real-life” horror of the death of a child and the grief that follows, to the otherworldly horror that awaits when the family tries to alleviate the grief that follows the death of a family pet.

The first time I read the story the scene on the hill wasn’t so horrifying.  You know why?  Because I didn’t have children of my own.  I think I was more touched by the death of the pet than I was by the other.  However, when I read it now, that scene on the hill makes my gut twinge and jump.  After reading it, I had to go “check on the children”.  Having children of my own makes the following scenes more poignant and so much more touching.

Sympathy turning to empathy.

SPOILERS END (they were half-assed anyway)

My theory of horror if you’re “just watching” it makes it a lot less scary.  “This could never happen to me because blah blah”.  When an ordinary situation turns into a “horror” situation, something that could happen to anyone, something that is plausible (with a little “what if” thrown in)  that’s when the true terror begins.

Pet Sematary is about grief, loss and at its core, the horror of not letting go and where it can get you.

 

 

 

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