Welcome October Horror Movies

Last night we kicked off the month with the greatest TV holiday special of all time, Garfield's Halloween Adventure, which we own on DVD with his Thanksgiving and Christmas shows that I cannot recommend. Halloween is my favorite holiday next to Christmas Eve and I've been looking forward to it this year since June or so. Whereas Christmas in stores can be annoying, Halloween aisles improve stores. Pumpkins patches improve stores. Scary music gets you out of stores quicker. I don't think dressing up in costumes should be limited to one day a year, but I do want limitations imposed on Halloween: NO costumes without an element of horror.

If you don't know the history of the holiday, it's the last day on the pagan calendar and supposedly the spirits of the dead are allowed to roam free and the whole costume bit is supposed to scare them away. Ahem, ghosts aren't afraid of hookers. Ghosts aren't afraid of Disney princesses. Ghosts are definitely not afraid of babies dressed as food items. Go ahead, wear a football uniform, but be a sluggish, unpopular zombie football player. Wear a cheerleading outfit, but cover it in blood and vomit bits like a dead cheerleader in a DUI accident. I'm sure that 90% of all guys will dress like the Joker (from The Dark Knight) this year, at least they did at San Diego Comic-Con, and that's okay because it's kinda scary. Our son was going to be Lil' Frankenstein, but as shown to the left, he needs to grow into it.

As movies specifically connected to Halloween go (not just scary in general), our family favorite is Disney's Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad, narrated by Bing Crosby. This animated version of The Legend of Sleepy Hollow has a Halloween party in it, and Ichabod's fateful ride home from the party has some very creative visuals illustrating the suggestive power of imagination, scary and funny at the same time. My parents were in town this weekend, so we watched that right after Garfield's, and then we followed it up with a TV show not specifically connected to Halloween, but one of my favorites which they had never seen, Eerie Indiana. None of this should disprove that I know serious horror.

I want to take another look at my list of top ten horror movies to see how they fit with the definitions from my post last Monday on the differences between horror and suspense:

1. What Lies Beneath (2000) most people would put this as suspense/thriller and rightly so, according to the "main character is the threat or the threatened?" definition, but because of the possession and graveside assistance at the end, I'm calling it horror; the bathtub scene is the most tense movie moment I've seen

2. Predator (1987) as the title suggests, the main character has to be considered the alien because there wouldn't be much of a movie without him, but GREAT suspense, especially when the one guy turns from running to face the forest and waits to die

3. Signs (2002) the music on the opening credits alone is scarier than most supposed horror movies these days; call it suspense/thriller if you must, but the Brazilian TV footage of the alien walking past scares me no matter how many times I rewind it and watch it over, and I've done it many, many times

4. A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984) action over tension; an unstoppable threat that is the main character with an impersonal motive (pertaining to the teens, not their parents); plenty of gore; this is DEFINITELY a horror movie, and the idea of your dreams killing you is one that follows you out of the theater, into your bed, and never leaves for the rest of your life; for me, that's what horror is - anything that lingers after the end credits in your mind

5. Friday the 13th (1980) I don't think most people realize that this almost Jason-less (he does appear at the very, very end without a hockey mask) original is all about the mother and that it preceded Elm Street by four whole years; it seems to be regarded as the poor man's Halloween, which to me is a much, weaker movie; I saw the trailer for the upcoming remake at San Diego Comic-Con and even got a chance to confirm in Q&A that the origin of the hockey mask will be explained therein

6. Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974) when I was 14 or 15, my friend and I got all the scariest movies we knew of to watch in one night and I think this is the first we watched; because gore doesn't bother me, I just thought this movie was sick and wrong, not scary; I rewatched it after I saw the VERY scary trailer for the remake and I found horror in the question of what happens to hick towns in the Information Age; much like there are parts of cities you wouldn't drive through at night, are there stretches of highway you should avoid even in broad daylight?; how long would it really take to hijack your vehicle, strip it and you for parts, without leaving so much as a trace for state police?; the father figure in the original is so much scarier than the sheriff character in the remake OR Leatherface in either movie; the former LOOKS scary even from 50ft. while the latter just ACTS mean - HUGE difference; there's a scene in the original of the main actress sitting at the kitchen table just screaming for like five minutes while everyone else laughs at her; that's scarier than junior high

7. Lady in White (1988) much like Stephen King's writing, where there's a supernatural horror at the forefront, but the real horror lies within people; this could be considered a supernatural thriller, but there's a Halloween party and homages to the Universal monster movies at the beginning; I hate colorful, neon lighting in horror movies but I forgive the cheesiness in this one's chase scene at the end

8. Candyman (1992) Phillip Glass writes the scariest scores; the horror in this one is not the gore; it's the idea of being framed for murder by a ghost and then being on the run from both that ghost and the law; how do stop a force that's already dead?; now that's horror

9. Cry_Wolf (2005) say what you will about this tame teen slasher (a nice change of pace), but I liked the cell phone kill, the orange ski mask and the use of a sequestered private school for a locked room mystery; I still think about the ending, as I do about the ending on the similarly silly Skeleton Key, so there

10. The Tingler (1959) an old Vincent Price/William Castle gimmick picture where the mad scientist/main character discovers the physical incarnation of fear and removes it from a subject's body, and we see the possible inspiration for the creature in Sigourney Weaver's Alien movies; I hear this movie's getting remade

Alternates: the old preacher in Poltergest II: The Other Side (1986) is just plain scarier than anything in the original (regardless of the sequel's failings) and the preacher turned werewolf chasing a kid in a wheelchair in Stephen King's Silver Bullet (1985) adaptation is such a concept and the best werewolf movie out there