It Came From the Stacks of North Campus: Searching For the Ultimate Horror Movie

Any Columbus horror fan will tell you that North Campus Video is the only place to go for movies about slashers, monsters, zombies, and cannibals. Many of the local Blockbusters have gone so far as to eradicate the horror section altogether, peppering the Drama and Action sections with whatever lonely vestiges remain from the erstwhile genre (it's always strange to see a stately snoozer like House of Sand and Fog buttressing a glorious atrocity like House of 1000 Corpses). Lucky for us, North Campus is here to supply the goods to horror aficionados across central Ohio.

But despite the store's fine collection of mainstream, cult, and foreign horror movies, it's always a challenge to find a winning film beyond the universally-appreciated Horror 101 classics (The Exorcist, Night of the Living Dead et al). Critical hivemind sites like Metacritic and Rotten Tomatoes can be helpful when selecting a good documentary or independent film, but since critics are usually woefully off-the-mark when it comes to horror, trial and error is the only way to separate the wheat from the chaff. To make matters even worse, an alarmingly high percentage of horror movies are terrible and only a small number of those are so terrible that they're actually good.

So every time I rent a semi-obscure horror movie from North Campus, bad or good, I'm going to write a quick review of it in hopes of building a solid catalog of the scariest/funniest/weirdest horror movies. We'll start with a French repulser called Frontier(s) that came to me via my friend John Liberatore, a veritable guru of disgusting shit. Sadly the movie was not very good. And your guess is as good as mine in regards to the parentheses.

Director: Xavier Gens

Sub-genre: Torture/Slasher

Pedigree: Selected as one of 8 Films to Die For at Horrorfest 2007 but removed from the slate due to its NC-17 rating.

Synopsis: Four young Parisian robbers exploit the confusion of a political protest gone awry to pull off a heist. They retreat to the countryside to hide out for a night at a secluded hostel run by people who I can only assume are France's equivalent to American white trash (I'm not sure if "French hicks" actually exist, or if the filmmakers just wanted to make sure their film bore as many misguided similarities as possible to Texas Chainsaw Massacre, a movie the vast majority of their intended audience has already seen). The backcountry hostel owners (who are later revealed to be neo-Nazis) attempt to torture, kill, and eat the photogenic urban protagonists with varying degrees of success until, after 108 minutes and 20 gallons of blood and entrails, the film mercifully ends.

The Good: Fans of pure gore won't be disappointed as Frontier(s) is the kind of movie that wears its NC-17 rating as a badge of honor. Also, the opening Parisian riot sequence is an interesting attempt by Gens to address the civil unrest beneath the surface of France's faux-idyllic baguette-noshing culture.

The Bad: Both the concept and the plotting owe way too much to Texas Chainsaw. The only major difference is in setting and let's face it: a European hostel isn't exactly the most original venue for a horror movie these days. Even the gore itself is little more than an extension of Eli Roth's Hostel (the most cringe-worthy scene involves a couple severed Achilles tendons). And as for the director's stabs at social commentary, what arch message is Gens trying to impart? That you can complain all you want about police brutality and urban strife, but count yourself lucky that you don't have to deal with all those farmboy psychos in the countryside? If we're to believe that Gens really aspires to address legitimate socio-political concerns, then the film is practically an endorsement of fascist cops as the lesser of two evils.

Verdict: Even horror fans who judge their movies largely on how many buckets of blood are spilled can probably avoid this one. There's nothing here in terms of gore, narrative, or theme that hasn't already been covered by Hostel, High Tension, The Descent, or Texas Chainsaw Massacre.

D -

Another entry from the FilmSlash Stash: Zack and Miri Make a Porno

If history remembers Kevin Smith’s new movie (note: I wrote this review months ago) Zack and Miri Make a Porno, it probably won’t be as a chronicle of the U.S.’s current financial crisis, although the film’s snowy Pennsylvania setting, which is framed as an economically depressed wasteland where strip malls go to die, does provide a timely and empathetic backdrop for the film’s financially strapped characters. Instead, Zack and Miri’s claim to cinematic immortality is that it’s probably the raunchiest movie ever shown in a multiplex alongside fare like High School Musical 3 and Madagascar 5. Without the support of box office king Seth Rogen, I can’t see how the movie could have squeaked by with an R-rating, with its graphic scenes of thrust and awe that are just a shade bluer than your average late-night Cinemax offering. Taking a love interest to see it is just about tantamount to Travis Bickle’s idea of a first date.

In Smith’s latest foray into the dirty minds of romantics, Rogen and Elizabeth Banks play lifelong friends and roommates who share a rapport that, in movie terms at least, can be immediately recognized as platonic (I can’t image Spencer Tracy’s first lines to Katherine Hepburn in a movie being, “I told you to close the door when you’re taking a shit!” but that is exactly how the audience is introduced to the chummy friendship between Zack and Miri) After a high school reunion that brings their monetary woes into sharp focus, Miri wistfully observes that “These are the type of circumstances that drive people to do pornography,” a prospect that, to Zack, seems less like a death knell than a lofty achievement to work toward. Before long, Zack and Miri are holding auditions, rounding up props, and brainstorming titles for their home-made porno that include “Fuckback Mountain” and “Star Whores.”

Despite the blunt puerility of their porn title ideas, the scenes where the characters prepare for or perform sexual acts on camera are in fact a breeding ground for the film’s funniest moments, as Smith celebrates the same exuberant do-it-yourself spirit seen in last year’s excellent Be Kind Rewind, particularly during a “Star Whores” costume montage that is as hilariously nerdy as it is salacious. It’s unfortunate then that Smith continues to lose his edge as both a writer of characters and a purveyor of jokes that reach beyond the realm of hand-jobs and Han Solo for inspiration. For example, Craig Robinson is wasted in a role that’s memorable only because the actor dead-pans his way through lines that sound as if they were written for a “token black guy” in a Michael Bay movie (perhaps Robinson attempted to bring some irony to a character that offered little more than painfully simplistic racial humor).

Even worse is Robinson’s wife, a role that works under the conceit that shrill black women screaming at their husbands are an inherently hilarious stereotype worth wasting a ten minute stretch of terrible jokes on. And despite the indomitable charms and effortless chemistry effused by Seth Rogen and Elizabeth Banks, Zack and Miri’s relationship arc rings predictable and stale, as Smith once again fails to approach the romantic elements of his films with the same vibrancy and originality he brings to his sex jokes. The most striking revelation here is actually Jason Mewes who effectively shatters the “Jay” identity he cultivated in earlier Smith flicks to play a reserved amateur porn-star whose mid-coital musings elicit the movie's biggest laughs.

The film loses much of its steam near the 90-minute mark when the principals abandon their pornographic endeavors due to the inevitable awkwardness that ensues when Zack and Miri finally share their big moment on camera. At this point, the movie hits a deeply saccharine note that is both incongruous to the flighty tone of the rest of the film and unjustified by Smith’s simplistic treatment of his lead characters. Although the director raises some interesting questions about the strange brew formed when sex and friendship are mixed, he rushes Zack and Miri through a third act plot-line involving faux betrayals and misunderstandings that would be better suited for shallow romantic comedy archetypes, not the real, relatable characters his protagonists potentially could have become at the mercy of a smarter script.

Nevertheless, it’s hard not to root for Rogen and Banks, who elevate the material with their winsome comic personas. And while Zack and Miri isn’t quite deep enough to warrant the gravitas Smith forces upon his characters, the film showcases the talents of not only trusted performers like Rogen and Banks, but also old Kevin Smith mainstays like Mewes and Jeff Anderson. And besides, what better antidote is there to a case of wintry economic blues than a hearty dose of good clean porn?

C+

Film Review: Gomorrah

Most mob movies can't help but glamorize the gangster condition. Even films that tend to highlight the more grotesque elements of life in the mob (the decapitated horse from Godfather immediately comes to mind) make it difficult for the viewer to resist the alluring sense of danger and excitement embodied by stories of organized crime. Heck, even the gritty and disturbing Brazilian crime epic City of God indulged in exhilarating worldbeat-infused action sequences that made sprinting through the slums of Rio with a handgun look like every kid's dream (Slumdog Millionaire suffered from similar excesses that threatened to undercut that film's attempts at social commentary). Although these films are almost always cautionary tales espousing "crime doesn't pay" messages, gangster movies generally keep the viewer at a safe distance from the carnage by emphasizing style over realism.

Now don't me wrong: movies like The Godfather, GoodFellas, and City of God aren't required to be realistic. They more than make up for a lack of naturalism in ways that have been well-documented elsewhere. But it's refreshing and even startling to see a film like Gomorrah approach a potentionally sensational subject (the Naples-based Camorra, one of the world's most deadly crime organizations) with stark realism and a pointed lack of romance. Through the use of digetic music, understated hand-held camerawork and naturalistic dialogue, director Matteo Garrone does more than merely immerse the viewer into a world of fake tans, tacky euro-thug couture, and horrific bloodshed. His primary concern, true to Robert Saviano's groundbreaking book of the same name, is to expose the personal and global ramifications of the Camorra's relentless evisceration of poor communities in Naples. As a result, the crime syndicate comes off as a monstrous and chaotic network of destruction that feeds on anything and everyone it can, including its own members. Like television's The Wire, Gomorrah documents organized crime's easy infestation into poverty-stricken corners of the world effectively forsaken by more legitimate agents of change.

A-

DVD: Let the Right One In

I wrote a review of this unsettling vampire flick a few months back for FilmSlash, but it was never published (unfortunately that site is, at best, on indefinite hiatus and, at worst, totally defunct. More details on that as they come in). With the film now on DVD however, the review is worth revisiting. Be careful though; according to an article posted yesterday on the AV Club, first pressings of the DVD featured subtitles that were "dumbed-down" from the ones used during the film's original theatrical run (follow this link to find out how to tell between the new-and-improved 2nd edition and the much-maligned first version). Anyway, here's the review:

Among the criticisms leveled at quasi-vampire movies like 30 Days of Night and I am Legend is that these films emphasize only the feral, animalistic tendencies of vampires, down-playing the more human attributes that arguably make them so scary in the first place. While sharp teeth and inhuman strength are clearly redoubtable traits, it’s the seductiveness and feigned innocence of the vampire that is most threatening (after all, according to many histories of the monster, a vampire can’t even enter somebody’s house unless invited). This last bit of peculiar lore provides Let the Right One In with its title and also hints at the film’s subtext. Its story is a wintry gothic love tale that recounts the friendship between a tirelessly-harassed schoolboy named Oskar (Kare Hedebrant) and a centuries-old vampire named Eli (Lina Leandersson) stuck perpetually in her eight-year old form. Their strange union is forged by varying degrees of affection, loneliness, and mutual necessity, and under the subtle direction of Tomas Alfredson, the audience is left to determine themselves the extent to which each of these elements makes up the basis for Eli and Oskar’s relationship. Meanwhile, Eli herself will surely meet the approval of more reactionary fans of the vampire genre as she is capable of both gentle coyness and ferocious violence. With her saintly Anne Frank resemblance and sober demeanor beyond her years, Leandersson provides an added edge to this methodically paced, slow-burning chiller that recalls the prickly storytelling of another classic of modern European horror, The Devil’s Backbone.


“Squeal pig, squeal,” are the film’s first words and they come from Oskar as he toys with a knife and imagines torturing the bullies who regularly assail him with physical and verbal barbs (this unsettling combination of whimsy and sadism continues throughout the plot’s fanciful yet disturbing twists and turns). That night, new neighbors move in next door and the audience is introduced to Eli and her mortal caretaker, Hakan (Per Ragnar), who collects fresh blood for his thirsty young companion with the gloomy efficiency of an adept deer hunter who’s also a closet animal lover. Both outcasts in their own way, Eli and Oskar become fast friends, absconding each night to the frigid yard surrounding their apartment complex to play with Rubix cubes and discuss retaliation against Oskar’s tormentors. Paradoxically, Eli’s presence is calming to Oskar even as she encourages and prods his secret violent tendencies. The nature of her influence is ambiguous; Oskar’s own taste for blood is evident before he even befriends Eli. And although she is the first to suggest a counterattack, the deafening blow Oskar lays on one of his cruelest classmates is largely a manifestation of the newfound confidence he receives from her companionship. Nevertheless, as her own personal bloodmaid Hakar becomes less and less effective with age, it is difficult to deny the incentive for Eli, under the guise of her affectionate precocity, to unleash Oskar’s darker side.


Beyond the director’s intricate focus on Eli and Oskar’s unconventional friendship, Alfredson also proves to be a skilled purveyor of horror-show thrills, indulging in jump-out scares and even a few scenes of reasonably nauseating gore while never letting these haunted house conventions overwhelm or cheapen the power of the story. When Alfredson’s not decapitating his characters, having them spontaneously combust, or disfiguring their faces with acid (in a scene that makes Two-Face from The Dark Knight look about as scary as, well, Two-Face from Batman Forever), he employs a quiet and reserved approach. At times, the pacing is so diligently slow, lingering on long shots of wintry night skies and snow-blanketed expanses, that Alfredson seems to intentionally dampen the drama of the story for the sake of cultivating realism and emphasizing the film’s fiercely unexpected climax.


Though firmly rooted in the traditions of classic vampire cinema, there is little else you could call conventional about Let the Right One In. The film is predominantly concerned with presenting the joys and perils of intimacy, as Oskar risks both body (the explicit danger posed by Eli as a vampire) and soul (the implicit threat of making sacrifices for a love that may or may not be pure). The film is no more certain of Eli’s intentions than Oskar is, but Alfredson bracingly puts the audience into Oskar’s head as the director charts the boy’s leap of faith into the arms of a possible fiend. Let the Right One In merges the thrill of falling in love with the thrill of our worse nocturnal fears, creating a dark and exciting vision that will please hard-core horror fans along with arthouse moviegoers. And if you’re both of these things? Well, it doesn’t get much better than this.

A -