{"id":2069,"date":"2023-12-01T13:00:00","date_gmt":"2023-12-01T13:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.gatecitygaming.com\/?p=2069"},"modified":"2023-12-01T08:45:30","modified_gmt":"2023-12-01T08:45:30","slug":"monthly-movies-with-the-doomsayer-october-edition","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.gatecitygaming.com\/index.php\/2023\/12\/01\/monthly-movies-with-the-doomsayer-october-edition\/","title":{"rendered":"Monthly Movies with the Doomsayer – October Edition"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Moving is hard, even when you live in a cardboard box.  Thank goodness there are movies.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

The Exorcist (1973)<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

This year marks the 50th anniversary of The Exorcist<\/em>, a film that laid a lot of groundwork for modern horror movies.\u00a0 With a cinema near me playing the film to honor the anniversary, I felt it was time to cross this classic off my backlog.\u00a0 I also wanted some reference material for when I eventually saw Exorcist: The Believer<\/em>.\u00a0 As always with these classic films, I instantly recognized moments I have seen parodied in other films, looking at you, Scary Movie 2.\u00a0 Yet I was thoroughly impressed by how patiently the film paced itself.\u00a0 Yes, there are plenty of scenes of Regan being creepy, but it is immediately followed by a concerned priest or doctors completely dumbfounded by the situation.\u00a0 It is such a shame most horror filmmakers learned the wrong lessons; The Exorcist<\/em> is remembered for its superb pacing, not its gore and effects.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

The Witch (2015)<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thankfully, I feel like Robert Eggers was one of the few who learned that lesson.\u00a0 The Witch<\/em>, much like The Exorcist<\/em>, is a slow burn about a family in 1630s New England struggling to survive.\u00a0 As misfortune befalls the family, rumors of a witch stalking them in the nearby woods begin to grip the family in terror.\u00a0 Mistrust is sown amongst the family until tension boils over.\u00a0 If you are looking for a haunting tale to watch while cowering under a blanket at 2 AM, then I highly recommend The Witch<\/em>.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

When Evil Lurks<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The wildcard of the month.\u00a0 With the movie being entirely in Spanish with only English subtitles, I was a bit unsure if When Evil Lurks<\/em> would be able to draw me in.\u00a0 I honestly read at a glacial speed; I have no doubt there are young children who probably read faster than me.\u00a0 As a result, when English subtitles move too fast I am reminded I am just a guy sitting in a movie theater instead of getting immersed in the film\u2019s world.\u00a0 Thankfully When Evil Lurks<\/em> is a horror movie relying on its dark visuals rather than a whirlwind of dialogue.\u00a0 In a small village in Argentina, brothers Pedro and Jimmy discover a man pregnant with a demon.\u00a0 Fearing the birth of the demon, the brothers attempt to dispose of the man, but this only worsens the situation.\u00a0 When Evil Lurks<\/em> feels like the love child of The Exorcist <\/em>and Silent Hill.<\/em>\u00a0 If you were itching to see The Exorcist: Believer<\/em>, you should honestly check out this film instead.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

The Royal Hotel<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I went into the Royal Hotel<\/em> hoping it would be similar to Get Out<\/em>, a movie that excels at showing a different life perspective while being a terrifying horror film.\u00a0 Royal Hotel<\/em> is about two Canadian girls, on vacation in Australia who run out of money.\u00a0 In order to continue their vacation, they take jobs at a bar in the middle of nowhere.\u00a0 Prime opportunity to put us in the shoes of girls frightened by drunk locals.\u00a0 Unfortunately, I think my expectations were in the wrong place.\u00a0 I certainly wouldn\u2019t want to go through what the girls went through, this is more of a drama piece rather than horror.\u00a0 It\u2019s not bad, but I wanted something more frightening than grounded.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

House of 1000 Corpses (2003)<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Another anniversary celebration as House of 1000 Corpses<\/em> turned twenty this year.\u00a0 This time for Rob Zombie’s House of 1000 Corpses.\u00a0 <\/em>A horror movie in the vein of Texas Chainsaw Massacre <\/em>as a group of young adults stumble upon a murderous family in the backwaters of Texas.\u00a0 I will admit the film is more goofy than scary, but I feel that’s part of its charm.\u00a0 Captain Spaulding had me grinning from ear to ear and it wouldn’t surprise me if the Firefly family inspired the Bakers in Resident Evil 7.\u00a0 <\/em>All in all, it is a fun campy horror film for those who enjoy the silliness of Halloween rather than the heart-pumping fear.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

The Fall of the House of Usher<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I see you hooligans getting all worked up.\u00a0 Doomsayer watched The Fall of the House of Usher, <\/em>surely he\u2019ll watch this three-hundred-episode series that I love.\u00a0 Unless Mike Flanagan is directing it, I am not interested.\u00a0 Why, you ask?\u00a0 Mike Flanagan has this uncanny skill to take a horror property and remix it so it feels both fresh and authentic to the original.\u00a0 Today on the chopping block are numerous poems from Edgar Allen Poe.\u00a0 With the poem The Fall of the House of Usher<\/em> serving as the show’s overarching plot, Flanagan crafts the deaths of all the members of the Usher family based on other Poe poems including Black Cat<\/em>, The Tell-Tale Heart, The Pit and the Pendulum, <\/em>and many others.\u00a0 I wish this show was around when I read Poe in seventh grade; I would have given Poe more of a chance, unlike my angsty thirteen-year-old self.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Under the Skin (2013)<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

A ten-year-old art house film most well known for getting Scarlett Johansson to be the leading lady.\u00a0 With minimal dialogue, the film has Johnanson drive around Ireland, pick up men, and lead them to her apartment.\u00a0 From there the men fall into this silver goo where their organs are harvested.\u00a0 However, halfway through Johansson feels guilty over trying to capture a disabled man, and runs away from the whole operation.\u00a0 Lost in a hostile world, Johansson\u2019s character has gone from predator to prey.\u00a0 Leaving the theater unsure of what I was supposed to take away from the film, I did some digging.\u00a0 I learned the film is based on a book about trying to sympathize with a very unsympathetic character.\u00a0 I can\u2019t really say I felt for Johansson’s character overall.\u00a0 The film tries to be minimalist with very little dialogue so it feels very hard to feel something for Johansson\u2019s character.\u00a0 Kinda feels like Under the Skin<\/em> missed the mark from the source material.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Flashback<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

A short snacky piece I found on Netflix of all places.\u00a0 After her boyfriend is killed in a home invasion, a yoga instructor uses breathing techniques to go back in time to try to save her boyfriend.\u00a0 It is very much in the vein of those homemade horror videos you find on YouTube.\u00a0 My biggest complaint was that the sixteen-minute run time was not enough time to explore all the concepts that they wanted to explore.\u00a0 A criticism I lay squarely at the feet of Netflix.\u00a0 I know you have the funds to help these creators create something amazing.\u00a0 If this is some sick game to see if creators can make movies without a budget, it isn\u2019t funny.\u00a0 PAY CREATIVES!!!\u00a0 I better see Flashback 2<\/em> in your menus in a year or two.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Soul Mates<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The trailer sold me on this one.\u00a0 A pair matched through a dating app have to survive Saw<\/em>-like puzzles potentially strengthening or weakening their bond.\u00a0 An interesting idea that I am sure will be copied in Saw 11<\/em>.\u00a0 Unfortunately, Soul Mates<\/em> leans a little too hard into the dating gimmick.\u00a0 One of the so-called traps is a karaoke event where they need to sing their partner\u2019s favorite song or one of their family members gets sniped.\u00a0 It was desperately missing that Jigsaw charm that the Saw<\/em> movies have marinated in for the past few years.\u00a0 If Jigsaw was in charge of this trap, he would have speakers planted in the family house that would cause them to go deaf if he deemed the singing inadequate.\u00a0 Probably better to skip this one and wait for the Saw sequel that does this concept right.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Malibu Horror Story<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The perfect evaluation of the found footage film.\u00a0 The movie starts with a film crew making a documentary about a mysterious disappearance.\u00a0 After the team fails to communicate with one of the ghosts, they review their cut of the documentary created so far.\u00a0 Here we get the story of four High schoolers who venture into the mountains of Malibu and disappear.\u00a0 We get cuts of found footage of the teens beginning to be haunted by the Native American spirits who died in the mountains before the film crew is attacked by the same spirits.\u00a0 This setup is brilliant because it uses enough found footage to hook us.\u00a0 The found footage has enough room to breathe and create suspense but doesn\u2019t have it fill the dead air.\u00a0 Meaning there is minimal time when the camera is staring at the ground.\u00a0 It also allows the film to have a more traditional finale rather than twenty minutes of unwatchable shaky cam footage.\u00a0 If you are a fan of found footage, I highly recommend Malibu Horror Story<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

The Exorcist: Believer<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Blumhouse, I beg of you to stop giving David Gorden Green and his team money.\u00a0 This team made a two-hour Halloween<\/em> movie where Michael Myers has about twenty minutes of screen time.\u00a0 Green and his team do not know what they are doing, and it shows with The Exorcist: Believer<\/em>.\u00a0 This is plagued with cheap jump scares and buckets of fake blood.\u00a0 The movie is filled with too many half-baked ideas like the father having to choose which girl to save or different religions having their own rituals for exorcisms.\u00a0 However, none of these ideas are fleshed out.\u00a0 The father doesn\u2019t have to choose which girl to save and the religions work together as if there isn\u2019t historical tension between them.\u00a0 The film also wastes way too much time with a subplot involving Chris MacNeil for purely nostalgia bait.\u00a0 Overall, this film is just plain boring and Blumhouse should require Green to direct his own original movie before being allowed to plunder more horror IP.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I am back. Here are some movies I want to talk about.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":2082,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2069","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-opinion","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gatecitygaming.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2069","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gatecitygaming.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gatecitygaming.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gatecitygaming.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gatecitygaming.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2069"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.gatecitygaming.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2069\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2083,"href":"https:\/\/www.gatecitygaming.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2069\/revisions\/2083"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gatecitygaming.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2082"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gatecitygaming.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2069"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gatecitygaming.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2069"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gatecitygaming.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2069"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}