I love fall, with its changing leaves, colder temperatures, and shorter days. However, Halloween holds a special place as one of my favorite holidays. The joy of dressing up, staying out late with friends, indulging in copious amounts of chocolate, and watching scary movies have always been some of my favorite memories. While I may not stay up late consuming large quantities of chocolate in my thirties, reminiscing about the days of trick-or-treating with friends and horror movie marathons on AMC makes me nostalgic for the spooky things I used to enjoy as a child. Since I was young, I have been captivated by spooky stories, evident from my early ventures into writing, creating deranged killers and strange alien creatures. One of my early successes as a young filmmaker was a short horror story about a psychotic killer creating his own doll collection out of women. Reflecting on my horror influences, I attribute much of my love for the genre to R.L. Stine, whose Goosebumps series served as a gateway to my early reading habits. Stories like “Stay Out of the Basement,” “A Night in Terror Tower,” and “The Night of the Living Dummy” were among my favorites, with "The Haunted Mask" being particularly memorable. Especially the TV episode. In fact, it instilled a fear in me that lasted for years, deterring me from wearing masks, afraid they would get stuck on my head forever!
As I delved deeper into horror, I discovered my affinity for slasher films, especially classics like John Carpenter's "Halloween" and "Halloween 2," the latter being a personal favorite of mine despite Carpenter’s apparent dislike for it, admitting once that he was mostly drunk while writing it. Perhaps this is a technique I should employ?
Another influential film for me was "Scream," which cleverly incorporated pop culture references to other horror films and contained self-aware characters navigating basic horror movie tropes. Things like don’t do drugs or have sex, don’t run upstairs, and never say, “I’ll be right back.” This dark comedic element of "Scream" inspired concepts in my own creations, such as My Love Lextacy, and even sparked an idea for a crossover with Scooby-Doo and the gang.
For this month though, I thought it would be fun to share some of my favorite scary movies with you all in the hopes that if you haven’t seen any of these before, you’ll consider giving them a try this year!
Starting off this list is "The Thing," a classic science fiction horror film from the '80s that never fails to evoke terrifying reactions, just ask my sister about the blood test scene for more! “The Thing” takes place at a desolate outpost in Antarctica, where a group of men discover an alien lifeform that can imitate them, causing the members to turn on one another as they fight to figure out who among them is still human, and who isn’t. Next up is “The Legend of Hell House” starring Roddy McDowall and the stunning Gayle Hunnicutt. This creepy 70’s atmospheric horror film is about a group of scientists and mediums trying to prove the existence of ghosts through science. The sets are gothic and dark, and the cinematography does a great job of making you feel claustrophobic and uneasy. The story is a slow crawl toward absolute chaos as a deplorable and sexual deviant presence pushes everyone to the brink of madness. Of course, I mentioned earlier that “Halloween 2” was one of my favorite slashers, and it’s a film I’ve traditionally watched almost every Halloween for nearly fifteen years. I love the atmosphere of a creepy hospital, and that it ramps up the killings from the first one. The original “Halloween” is obviously amazing, but it’s also Michael Myers standing around in the bushes for a lot of it. “Halloween 2” starts with a bang, picking up right where the first one left off. If you ever do a Halloween horror night, this is a must in the lineup.
This next one I’d like to talk about is “Silent Hill.” The first thirty to forty-five minutes of this movie is horror gold. That bathroom scene when the contorted janitor crawls across the rotted tiled floor is nightmare fuel. I’m sure some of you reading this remember how chilling the video game was, and I think the movie does a great job capturing the essence of what made “Silent Hill” so enjoyable. Then, of course, we have the “Blaire Witch Project,” a horror movie that was heavily debated upon its release because no one knew whether this movie was real or fake. I think that’s why I still love this one. There was so much lore behind it and the conversation of whether this movie was real or not only added to the fun. I also did a lot of camping around my neighborhood, and we were always a tiny bit scared that the Blaire Witch was out there somewhere and that we’d become trapped in the woods. But the scariest found footage movie I’ve probably ever seen was something called “Hell House LLC.” Dear God, that was terrifying! “Hell House LLC” is a low budget horror film where a group of documentary filmmakers investigate the unexplained deaths of multiple people who died in a horrific accident at a haunted house attraction. We are shown the footage of those who set up the attraction as they prepare for Halloween, and it is downright chilling. If you’re terrified of not only clowns but mannequins…this is not the film for you.
I’m biased, but the 90’s was a great time for pop culture. Not only did we get Jurassic Park, Forrest Gump, Pulp Fiction, and Toy Story, we got some great horror too. We got “Scream”; a slasher film that not only resurrected the genre, but it also improved upon it. Slashers had started to get campy with Jason going to Hell and New York, Freddy Kruger acting more and more like a clown, and Michael Myers being driven by ancient curses. “Scream” wasn’t corny, it meant business, and let you know that from the start when it killed off one of the biggest stars in Hollywood at the time. It was back to the basics, a crazed killer lurking just outside the house; a killer who called to taunt his victims. It made you think to yourself, “this could happen to anyone…”
I had a friend back in the day who was an avid horror fan like me, and I’ve never heard any man scream like he did during “The Descent.” This is one of my favorite scary movies because everything about it is unsettling. I couldn’t imagine anything more terrifying than exploring a cave, and in this movie, a group of women descend through a series of narrow passages that collapse behind them, trapping them in the dark with cannibalistic monsters. It’s an amazing film with a truly unforgettable ending. If you’ve never made the descent, it’s time you should! But there was one movie that did get me to jump out of my skin and that was “Insidious.” There is so much I love about this film. Mostly it’s the practical effects. The ghosts aren’t CGI, their actors in makeup and I think that’s far creepier than any CGI ghost could ever be. I also love its fresh take on the haunted house story. In this one, it’s not the house that’s haunted…Plus, Tiny Tim singing “TipToe Through the Tulips” can instantly make anything a thousand times creepier.
But I think my most favorite horror film of all is “The Shining.” Not only is this probably one of the greatest films ever made, but it’s a fantastic book written by the master himself, Stephen King, and it remains one of the only books to ever scare me. The Overlook hotel is one of the most cleverly crafted evil entities in all of horror and the fact that there are so many videos on YouTube breaking this movie down only shows you how special “The Shining” is. I heard a theory once for why it’s so unsettling and I think it’s because it’s essentially a story about a man choosing to murder his family. There’s something about Jack Torrence choosing to harm those he’s supposed to be protecting, but it’s also something that happens every day in the real world. How many times do we hear stories of husbands murdering their wives in the news? It’s also unnerving because instead of your typical horror movie where you’re trying to escape some deranged killer, or flee the clutches of an alien creature, it’s the hotel that’s evil and therefore its presence eludes us yet is always there as the characters move through the lonely halls. We don’t see the kind of maddening effect it has on Jack until it's too late.
But enough about that.
In closing, the month of October has been a good one. I started the month off with a great book signing at Beow’s Books and Brews in Raleigh, and really enjoyed getting to meet everyone there. Thanks to all those who came out and to everyone who might be joining us for the first time, welcome! I’m also happy to report that I’ve really kicked it into gear on some new and exciting writing projects that I can’t wait to share with you as they get more developed. But thank you for reading. I’d love to hear what some of your favorite horror movies are. I hope you had a great and safe Halloween, and I hope you have a great Thanksgiving. See you again in a month!
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