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tlbodine · 5 years ago

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A Decade of Horror Recommendations

With 2020 approaching, we’re reaching the end of a decade that has been uncommonly good to the horror genre, especially the last few years. Here’s an overview of some of the stand-out titles and my recommendations. Feel free to ask me about any of the titles on this list and I’ll happily share my more in-depth thoughts on them!

Note that, of course, I have not seen every movie that’s come out in recent years, so I’ve probably missed some titles -- feel free to jump in with your own recommendations!

Also this post is really long and has gifs, so I’m putting it under a cut. Sorry for the dash spam, mobile fam. Tell Tumblr to fix their shit.

2010: Supernatural Horror Starts Making a Comeback

Some stand-out films:

Insidious: An important film for modern horror history, helping to usher in the new wave of paranormal/hauntings/demon films. It lays the tropes for a lot of the films that would get big in upcoming years. I thought it was pretty solidly decent.

Devil: A clever script about being trapped on an elevator with the devil. It’s a bit too ambitious and doesn’t quite live up to those ambitions, but it’s solidly decent and refreshingly original. A hidden gem for the year.

Black Swan: Maybe the height of Darren Aronofsky’s career as a household name. Not my favorite of his movies, but a pretty solid psychological suspense.

Frozen: No, not that one. This is a clever movie that embraces a narrow scope: some teenagers get stuck on a ski lift and have to endure the elements and some hungry wolves below. Not a great movie, but worth watching as a study in what you can do with limited resources.

Black Death: Quick shout-out for a dark and grisly historical horror involving witchcraft and torture. It’s not a fun movie to watch, but it’s got Sean Bean and Eddie Redmayne, and I feel like both original screenplays and historical horrors are rare enough to warrant support.

2010 also had its share of predictable franchise tie-ins (a Saw movie, a Resident Evil movie, remakes like I Spit on Your Grave and The Crazies, etc.) The Horror Renaissance was a few years in coming.

2011: The Year of the Predictable Remakes

So many franchises getting flogged to death this year -- tripe like SCRE4M, Final Destination 5, Human Centipede 2, a Hellraiser reboot literally no one watched, and Paranormal Activity 3. Blech. BUT. 2011 also brought us a couple of my favorite movies ever:

You’re Next: I would credit You’re Next with re-defining the “final girl” in horror. Also it’s a damn good home invasion movie with buckets of gore and a smart script.

Cabin in the Woods: This one’s a bit divisive -- some folks really hated it I guess -- but it’s such a loving deconstruction of horror, and it’s wholly original even while being comfortingly familiar. Also it’s hilarious.

2012: A Few Important Titles

I feel like 2012 was full of movies nobody has actually ever seen or talked about. But some of the good ones that I’d recommend:

Sinister: Like Insidious in some ways, but maybe better. Also, “Snakes don’t have feet.” Honestly just a very good, solid demon/haunted kid movie.

V/H/S: A must-watch for horror buffs. It didn’t invent the found footage genre, but it did refine it and really show off what it could do best.

Smiley: OK so like. This is not really a great film, but I think about it a lot and recommend it a lot. It’s stuck with me quite a bit somehow, and in some ways it feels very much ahead of its time as a creepy prediction of what internet culture would be like at the end of the decade. “We did it for the lulz.” Seriously, watch this movie today, and remember that it was made eight years ago, and see if it gives you chills too.

I guess I should also mention Prometheus here, which lots of people liked. I was not one of them, but it was a heavily talked-about film I feel like and of course an Alien franchise tie-in.

2013: The Year the World Remembered It Liked Horror

This was a big turning point year, launching some new franchises instead of just re-treading old ones:

The Conjuring: I personally hate all of these movies, but they are huge and you can’t swing a dead cat in the modern horror fandom without encountering one of them. The first Conjuring film was at least decent. For extra credit, watch it as a triple feature with Insidious and Sinister and do a compare/contrast.

The Purge: Not only the start of a successful franchise but also a pop culture phenomenon and a damn good movie to boot.

Mama: I love this movie. I have this movie on DVD. It’s kind of bittersweet and may not completely follow through on all of its promises, but it’s still quite good and has some lovely performances.

Warm Bodies: Not really a horror -- kind of a romance -- but it warrants mention here because zombies were a hot item in 2013, and that’s a current special interest of mine on account of having a zombie book of my own coming out that is more than a little influenced by this story. (the film is a pretty good adaptation of the book, although honestly you could just skip the movie and read the book and get a better experience.)

Willow Creek: I feel like I recommend this movie a lot, but that’s just because I think it’s very good and a very smart use of its own resources. A found footage mockumentary that actually manages to make Bigfoot frightening. Totally worth the watch.

Mr. Jones: Here’s another hidden gem, also in found footage style (I feel like that was a prevailing theme in the years after V/H/S) but it’s surprisingly fresh. It’s a folk horror piece that doesn’t go at all where you might expect despite its thoroughly well-trodden ‘couple in secluded house’ setup.

A bucketful of remakes and sequels this year too, including an Evil Dead reboot, V/H/S sequel, Insidious sequel, etc. I should also probably mention World War Z, which was not actually very good and also had nothing in common with the book of the same name, but does mark an important moment in the mainstreaming of the zombie revival, especially considering it came out the same year as Warm Bodies.

2014: Fuck Yeah People Actually Like This Shit Let’s Make More

I feel like maybe our current horror renaissance started this year. Some recs:

The Babadook: No surprises to anyone who follows my blog, but I love The Babadook and I will defend it to the bitter end against its detractors. It is one of my favorite horror films of all time and one of the best of the decade.

It Follows: Ok confession, I actually did not like this movie at all. I thought it was ridiculous and over-hyped. But it makes the list because a lot of other people really, really loved it, and I accept that they saw something in it that I didn’t. Watch it and make up your own mind (and report back with your findings).

As Above, So Below: This may be the most claustrophobic film ever made, and it deserves to be studied on that merit alone. It’s also pretty creepy and I suspect a lot creepier for folks who are unnerved by Christian horror/mythology (I am not, but I know lots of folks really are).

Housebound: A hidden gem from New Zealand, this one is worth a watch because it takes a familiar haunted house premise and gives it a surprising and honestly delightful twist.

Jessabelle: Not a great movie, but deserving of a spot here because it’s a Southern Gothic and features a main character in a wheelchair, which I think is neat.

13 Sins: I feel like I’ve written about this movie for the blog before, and I recommend it a lot. But it’s clever and is a great early example of the “killing game” genre that has become increasingly prevalent (I mean, aside from the Battle Royale/Hunger Games version).

It was neat to see so many original horror stories (as opposed to reboots/franchises) coming out, and that’s a trend that would continue (and is something that makes horror one of my preferred genres - there are more original stories in it than in many other types of film).

2015: Hell Yeah Let’s Ride This Horror Train

So many excellent movies this year! Ahh!

Crimson Peak: Guillermo del Toro’s love letter to the Gothic. What I love about this movie (aside from Tom Hiddleston) is it plays all the tropes straight. It’s not trying to be a new spin or reinvent the genre or break all the tropes. It’s just a gothic horror story, told exactly like what it is, by a guy who makes damn good movies. I felt like that was really brave and surprising at the time.

The Visit: M. Night Shyamalan had basically made a joke of himself after a string of awful movies, but this movie was enough to earn back a bit of respect in my book. It’s a clever premise and a smart use of found footage.

The VVitch: Creepy-ass slow-burn supernatural historical horror, sign me up. I actually don’t like this movie as much as a lot of people (see above: religious-themed horror doesn’t push my fear buttons much) but it’s beautifully made, thoughtful, and artistic in a way that makes people sit up and pay attention to just how good the horror genre can be.

Krampus: This movie is extremely silly and I love it. A holiday favorite I watch every year now. It’s hilarious, and imaginative, with some really creepy visuals and a thoroughly satisfying conclusion.

The Invitation: For me, some of my favorite horror movies are the ones where the film is uncomfortable to watch before the actual horror stuff starts up. This one has an almost unbearably tense build-up and pays off in an incredibly satisfying and creepy manner.

2016: Horror Goes Hella Mainstream

I feel like 2016 was another year of just...lots of kind of fun unique premises tossed out like spaghetti to see what would stick. And I am here for it.

Don’t Breathe: Home invasion gone wrong is a great trope, and this one gets extra points for having the single most disturbing sequence utilizing a turkey baster I’ve ever seen in film.

Hush: Speaking of home invasions. This one is pretty standard fare -- homeowner fights back! -- but the deaf main character is a neat twist.

Lights Out: It’s pretty cheesy at times and the plot sort of falls in on itself, but the opening sequence is genuinely frightening and the movie almost literally killed @comicreliefmorlock so that’s a commendation I guess?

Train to Busan: An Asian take on the zombie survival story. It’s a really good movie (if horribly bleak) and it does such an excellent job of making you genuinely care for all of the characters.

The Autopsy of Jane Doe: A really neat premise with some wonderful slow-build horror. The storyline kind of goes off the rails, and it asks a lot of questions it doesn’t answer, but it’s quite good regardless.

The Forest: I was disappointed with this one -- it just failed to live up to my expectations -- but it’s decent, and it’s a good attempt at capturing the creepiness of Japan’s Suicide Forest.

Before I Wake: This one was sad more than scary, I thought, but it fits so neatly into a certain aesthetic that I am always a sucker for -- dreams and nightmares bleeding into reality, yes please.

Split: Say what you will, I thought Split was amazing, and James McAvoy deserves a goddamn Oscar for his performance in this movie.

The Monster: A hidden gem that’s worth watching to see how well it delivers on its premise: two characters stuck in a car with a monster outside. It’s not amazing, but it’s neat, and sometimes it’s nice to have just a straightforward creature feature with a bit of emotional heft for good measure.

2017: Did Somebody Say Blockbuster?

In hindsight, they’ll probably say 2017 was the start of the horror renaissance, but we’ll all know they’re a few years too late. Still, this was another great year:

Get Out: Funny, dark, deeply uncomfortable and with some real meat to it -- Jordan Peele knows how to make a great movie. This absolutely deserves all the awards.

It: Not a perfect movie, but a good adaptation of a difficult-to-adapt book. The kids are great. Pennywise is menacing, but that fucking flute lady is the scariest part.

It Comes At Night: I didn’t like this one much, but a lot of folks did so it makes the list. See above re: It Follows.

Gerald’s Game: Everything that’s wrong with this movie (ie, the ending) is wrong in the original story, so where this movie fails it’s a matter of sticking too close to its source material. But the premise is truly, genuinely horrifying, and the degloving scene almost made me vomit. So that’s cool.

Happy Death Day: Another horror-comedy, with a healthy dose of self-awareness. It doesn’t take itself too seriously, and that’s what allows it to be fun.

The Babysitter: This movie is hilarious. It’s also super bloody and clever and clearly made by people who love slashers, and the affection shows.

The Ritual: So-so in the acting and pacing, but the creature design is A+ and the concept is really neat. Seriously just watch this one for the monster, it’s super cool looking.

I should probably mention Mother here, but I can’t speak for it as I haven’t gotten around to watching it yet. It’s a very divisive film. One of these days I’ll watch it and let you know.

2018: There’s More Where That Came From

If 2016 was the year of filmmakers just trying stuff for the hell of it, 2018 was the year of talented filmmakers and studios realizing that, oh shit, you can make really good horror movies with mass appeal.

A Quiet Place: I’m glad I caught this one in theaters, because it really deserves to be watched in a dark, quiet room where no one dares to make a sound. The ending left a lot to be desired, but it was a clever premise.

Hereditary: The best horror movie of the year imo. Painfully uncomfortable - I’m not sure I could watch it again - but highly recommended.

Apostle: Watch this one in a triple-feature with The VVitch and Hereditary. A really good period piece with a character you actually want to root for.

Bird Box: I didn’t like this movie much, but it was hugely popular. I bought the book recently and suspect it is much better. Still, it’s worth a mention for its impact on mainstream viewers (lots of people who don’t like horror really liked this movie). I won’t budge from my initial opinion that it’s just A Quiet Place meets The Happening, though.

What Does 2019 Hold?

We’re only halfway through the year, so we’ve got some time to see what is coming down the pipe. Lots of things to look forward to! But some solid titles so far this year that I’d heartily recommend:

Us: Jordan Peele is at it again. It may not be as good as Get Out -- there’s some plot holes where the internal logic of the world is at odds with the message it’s trying to send -- but it’s thoughtful and gives plenty to chew on. And there are places where it’s just unbearably tense and creepy.

Brightburn: I had high hopes for this movie and was not disappointed. This is a super (ha, ha) good film.

The Wind: A Gothic on the American frontier. It accomplishes what I think It Comes At Night was supposed to do, but more effectively (for me anyway). Bonus points for being written and directed by women. Double bonus: Caitlin Gerard, the main actress, is also the lead character in Smiley.

I have not yet watched Velvet Buzzsaw, Ma or Midsommar this year, but I really want to. I’m also looking forward to the Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark film despite having some reservations about the whole concept.

#horror #horror movies #horror movie recommendations #movie recs #long post #gifs #horror by the decade

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aion-rsa · 3 years ago

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Ghostbusters: Afterlife Easter Eggs and References Guide

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This article contains Ghostbusters: Afterlife spoilers.

The dream of ever getting a Ghostbusters 3 faded long ago. There were false starts and rumors throughout the 1990s—and the 2000s too—that a sequel was this close to materializing. And yet, by the time Harold Ramis tragically passed in 2014, the likelihood of ever seeing the four original Ghostbusters standing side by side seemed impossible.

Which is one of the reasons Jason Reitman’s Ghostbusters: Afterlife is such a surprise. Very much the closure longtime fans of the first two movies craved, as well as a possible backdoor opening to a larger Ghostbusters cinematic universe, the film comes from a talented filmmaker determined to honor his father’s most beloved work. It also seeks to serve that movie’s most ardent fans.

Hence Ghostbusters: Afterlife being stuffed up the proton pack with homages, easter eggs, references, and various other assorted nods to the original flicks. There are demon dogs, ghost traps, and even one exceedingly familiar flattop haircut on display here. So without further ado, here is a guide that tries to catch all the free-roaming vapors.

Ghostbusters: Easter Egg Guide

-The first easter egg we see does not feel like a callback to Ivan Reitman’s Ghostbusters. Rather it appears to be an homage to another early modern blockbuster which clearly had a significant impact on Jason Reitman. As we witness supernatural activity occurring above a mountain in the American heartland of Oklahoma, the spectral ghost cloud which gather looks quite a bit like the extraterrestrial airspace created by UFOs over Devils Tower in Steven Spielberg’s Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977). This is an early suggestion, perhaps, that Jason is going to take this material in a different direction.

-We still quickly get a slew of Ghostbusters nods in the opening prologue as as we watch a man who is meant to be Egon Spengler reach his lonely farm and hold up a rusty ghost trap. But when his larger plan to capture the incoming demonic entity fails, he returns to the house and pulls out his old PKE Meter for a loving extreme close-up. It’s not clear why he does this other than to anticipate exactly when his fate will come…

-When the spectral form of Zuul kills Egon, the smoke invades beneath the door, and the demonic come out of his chair’s armrests. This recreates the scene where Dana Barrett is attacked and possessed by the same demonic entity in 1984. Although a CG Zuul face coming out of the smoke is a new touch.

-It’s also revealed in the opening that when Zuul has not possessed a human, it flies around as one of those reddish-pink spectral dots first established in Ghostbusters after the ghost containment unit meltdown at the firehouse.

-When our central family of Callie (Carrie Coon), Trevor (Finn Wolfhard), and Phoebe (Mckenna Grace) reach their inheritance on Egon’s dilapidated plot of land, they see Egon has scared off locals by spray-painting ominous passages from the Bible’s Book of Revelations, 6:12: “And I beheld when he opened the sixth seal, and, lo, there was a great earthquake; and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair; and the moon became as blood.” This references one of the creepier moments in the original film where Ray Stantz (Dan Aykroyd) and Winston Zeddemore (Ernie Hudson) debate whether Christianity is a mythology, and if the Bible predicting the dead rising from the grave has anything to do with their peculiar line of work.

-Inside of the “Murder House,” Phoebe and Trever seem to ignore the stack of books that goes up seven or eight feet in the background. This calls back the first bit of evidence of a haunting the guys found in the New York Public Library back in ’84, although Bill Murray rolled his eyes at the time and then snarked, “You’re right, no human being would stack books like this.”

-When the three younger Spenglers are forced to hide under a kitchen table due to an earthquake, the shot looks intentionally reminiscent of Ray, Egon (Ramis), and Peter Venkman (Murray) also hiding under a table from ghosts in the courtroom scene of 1989’s Ghostbusters II.

-It should go without saying, but Annie Potts is a welcome presence in everything she does, including her cameo here where she reprises the role of Janine Melnitz. Apparently, she and Egon resumed their flirtation from the first film some time in the ‘90s or 2000s since she’s no longer with Rick Moranis’ Louis, and it’s hinted she lived for a long while with Egon in this house.

-This might be tenuous but introducing Mr. Grooberson (Paul Rudd) as a bad teacher by having him show his middle school class Cujo (1983) seems like a nod to the fact that Mr. Grooberson (like certain other characters in the original film) is going to be attacked by a monstrous dog. Cujo also starred Dee Wallace, who played the mother in E.T. (1982), another seminal Spielberg blockbuster of the same era as Ghostbusters, and that one was about a family without a father getting involved in otherworldly adventures….

-When Podcast (Logan Kim) takes Phoebe on a walkabout around their supposedly boring town, the kids pass a sign for the discontinued Shandor Mining Company. This is the first clue that the cult responsible for the Gozer attack in the 1984 movie also had something to do with this town. Indeed, a man named Ivo Shandor was the leader of that cult who designed the evil building on Central Park West.

-The art-deco inspired hieroglyphs that Podcast shows Phoebe on the mountain recreate in two-dimensional tableaux the layout of statues on top of Dana Barrett’s apartment building from the first movie.

-After Egon’s invisible ghost leads Phoebe to his full ghost trap, she brings it to school to show Podcast and (inadvertently) Mr. Grooberson. He uses this opportunity to then teach them about the forgotten history of Ghostbusters from ‘80s New York. Afterlife then amusingly inserts a lot of unused and/or deleted footage of extras and even Aykroyd and company as if it were news reports from the time.

-Grooberson shows the class that day the film Child’s Play (1988).

-When Egon’s ghost leads Phoebe to his secret lab, she discovers the entrance requires sliding down a pole, just like the firehouse in the original movies.

-The hidden lab includes Spengler’s original jumpsuit and a number of spares. His lab also features the red and mysterious piece of lab equipment we saw the Dean order be removed from Columbia University at the beginning of the original movie.

-In the background of the same scene, you can spot several old 1980s television sets with the same inexplicable green geometric graphics and obsession with expanding brain activity which decorated Egon’s lab in the 1984 movie.

-Phoebe discovers how to call the living Ghostbusters by watching their oily salesman commercial from the first film. This one is actually a nice touch. It’s all too common that cheesy TV ads like this from yesteryear would be saved 40 years later as a bit of kitsch on YouTube.

-When Phoebe and Podcast first try out the Proton Packs she says “switch me on,” just like Ray did to Peter when they go on their first ghost hunt.

-During this same scene Podcast is wearing Ray’s ghost goggles. To this day, their purpose has never really been explained, but I can attest that as a child of the ‘90s, I thought they were the coolest damn thing in the world and always wanted a pair. Looking good, Podcast.

-The entire presence of Ecto-1 is an “easter egg” of sorts to the original film. But the real kicker is that when the main kids are pulled over in it by the cops, they open the glove compartment to find the car’s registration. Instead they discover Egon’s last Twinkie. It’s one of the better nods, homaging Egon’s infamous “Twinkie Theory” about the end of the world.

-Meanwhile one of the film’s most groan-inducing callbacks happens in the next scene when the local sheriff (Bokeem Woodbine) quotes the Ray Parker Jr. song and asks, “Who you gonna call?”

-In the film’s most overt homage to Ghostbusters II, Phoebe uses her one phone call to dial that number from the ’84 commercial on YouTube. In 2021 it goes to, of all things, Stantz’s dubious “Ray’s Occult Books” shop from the sequel. More than 30 years later, he’s still trapped at the same bookshop which is looking a lot more tired on the other side of the internet revolution. He’s even using the same phone. It’s fitting but depressing for poor Ray.

-In the scene Ray alludes to both original films when he cracks, “In the slammer, huh? I’ve been there once myself.”

-Ray also has “Revelations 6:12” tattooed on his arm. Apparently in the nearly 40 years since the first movie, he’s become a believer.

-I don’t know if this counts as an homage, but the joke that Pete Venkman, of all Ghostbusters, was able to succeed at reentering academia by becoming a professor of advertising is kind of delicious.

-Ray waxing nostalgic about the “Reagan years” is a bit amusing since the original film has been criticized (even sometimes by members of the cast) for being in retrospect an ’80s fantasy where smug American academics go into the private sector to start a business and immediately get rich despite the best efforts of an intrusive EPA.

-The extreme close-up of stone work collapsing and a red Zuul eye glowing is an obvious redo of the shot of Zuul escaping its statue in the first film.

-Paul Rudd’s character ending an awkward date night by buying a pint of Baskin Robbins is a double whammy of product placement by offering (likely pricey) advertising of 31 Flavors and also calling back to Rudd’s previous shameless plugging of Baskin Robbins in Marvel’s Ant-Man (2015) where his pre-superhero characters is introduced as working at Baskin Robbins. He then gets fired, but the screenplay continuously name drops the company throughout the rest of that MCU flick as a “joke.” But the ice cream franchise only gets one shoutout here.

-Rudd’s Mr. Grooberson sadly doesn’t get to enjoy his ice cream because he is soon beset by mini-Stay Puft Marshmallow Men who look like the giant monster from the ’84 movie but are now the size of actual marshmallows. It’s shameless fan service but is admittedly one of the funnier sequences in the film. You can love the little guy who keeps walking on the grill even as he melts so much you might not even stop to wonder why Stay Puft would keep the same mascot after it attacked the Columbus Circle.

-Grooberson finding Zuul eating dog food is a nod to Louis initially thinking someone brought a dog to his party in the first film. And Zuul causing Gary’s tires to deflate before consuming him is an awkward attempt to callback how the patrons of Tavern on the Green watch Rick Moranis get devoured by a demon dog and return to their meals nonplussed.

-Trevor mocking Podcast and Phoebe for saying “I did some digging,” feels like a general tweak on how dated that line is from many old movies, including Ghostbusters, since now everyone can do similar bits of broad “digging” on Google.

-When our core Scooby Gang returns to Shandor Mining and go into the abandoned interior, they find an art-deco like statue of a very familiar looking flattop. Why hello, there, stone Gozer.

-Inside the mine, they also discover Ivo Shandor’s tomb—although he doesn’t look quite dead does he? At first, I thought this was an error since his grave says he died in 1947, and the first film told us he didn’t begin believing humanity was too sick to survive until after the First World War. But technically he could’ve started his secret society in the early 1920s and still lived on to ’47. In any event, having him here feels a bit perfunctory since the film does nothing with his reanimated corpse (or getting J.K. Simmons to play him).

-On the wall, the kids find etched in stone various dates related to catastrophic disasters throughout history, including the Tunguska Blast of 1908. It’s believed in that fateful year that a meteor airburst over the plains of Siberia caused 830 square miles—and 80 million trees and an unknown amount of people—to be obliterated. It’s also mentioned by Ray (inaccurately) as being a 1909 inter-dimensional event in the ‘84 movie.

-When the kids get home and find their mother sitting in her chair, she has the same possessed heavy-breathing as Dana did when she was possessed. She also paraphrases the famous line by rasping in a demonic voice, “There is no Mom, only Zuul.”

-After Demon Mom escapes, the kids come up with a game plan and don the Ghostbusters’ flightsuits. In this scene, Podcast finds and wears the same goofy brainwave equipment adorned by a possessed Louis in ’84.

-Demon Mom putting on a gold dress as she consummates her relationship with the Key Master (Demon Grooberson) echoes the red number worn by Demon Dana.

-After getting freaky, Demon Mom and Demon Grooberson arrive at a temple under the mine which looks exactly like the one on top of Dana Barrett’s building from the first film. They eventually also turn into Zuul dogs like Dana and Louis did. Their union brings back Gozer in the flesh while the same evil pink entities we once saw swarm over NYC now blast past the prairie.

-In the montage of hauntings around town, the only overt repeat I caught was the decayed corpse-ghost of a local resident showing up at the diner. At first I thought it was the same creepy cab driver from the ’84 movie, but the handlebar mustache suggests he’s a local… from maybe a century ago.

Movies

Ghostbusters: Afterlife Ending Secrets Unpacked

By David Crow

Movies

Ghostbusters: Afterlife’s Jason Reitman Wants ‘Marvel’ Like Shared Universe

By David Crow

-The climax begins in earnest when a discombobulated Gozer comes out of the cornfield to attack the main characters who’ve retreated to Dirt Farm. The appearance of Gozer emerging from the crops feels like a subtle nod to another ‘80s touchstone about ghost fathers and their adult children, Field of Dreams (1989).

-As all hope appears to be last for Phoebe and the Scooby Gang, and their plan to use grandad’s glitchy giant ghost trap seems to go up in smoke, a ray of sardonic sunshine comes through when we hear the words “Hey Flattop!” This is an overt wink, wink to Ray saying, “Aim for the flattop!” in ’84.

-Meanwhile Ray gets a repeat of his confrontation with Gozer 40 years ago where he refers to her as “Gozer the Gozerian” and demands she “depart this world immediately.” Clearly remembering these old-timers, Gozer asks in a more sneering fashion now if Ray’s a god. Somehow, even with four decades to think about his error, Ray still hesitates to give the correct answer until Winston reminds him what he said last time: “When someone asks if you’re a god, you say yes!” And so he does, although not in a particularly convincing manner.

-The OG Ghostbusters try to beat Gozer the same way they did last time by crossing the streams of their weapons. But that strange little Checkov’s proton pack trick doesn’t work this time. Maybe because they were aiming it directly at Gozer instead of her temple/doorway to another dimension?

-In what might be the ultimate easter egg from any film—and one of questionable taste—a digital recreation of Harold Ramis’ Egon Spengler appears to help his granddaughter and three old partners win the day. And even Peter’s dry but understated, “I thought you might show up,” seems to be an acknowledgement of Bill Murray and Ramis’ estrangement, which was reconciled on Ramis’ deathbed.

-Podcast being covered in vast amounts of marshmallow goo inside the Ecto-1 is a callback to how all the Ghostbusters (sans Murray) looked at the end of the first movie.

-When the ending credits begin, Ghostbusters: Afterlife uses the original 1984 movie’s title card.

-The first post-credits scene features Sigourney Weaver returning for a cameo appearance as Dana Barrett. Still enjoying her character’s taste for flannel from Ghostbusters II, she appears to be happily married to Peter, however unlikely that sounds.

-Peter and Dana are also playing with Pete’s old electroshock device and ESP-testing cards. Peter even confesses he used it to only shock the guys while leaving the thoroughly psychic-free girls alone so he could date his students. Yeah, Dana, he does deserve another shock for that.

-The final post-credits scene begins by reminding viewers (or showing to those who never watched DVD special features) that there was a deleted scene in the original film of Janine giving Egon a souvenir medallion from the 1964 World’s Fair in Queens. We cut to the present and she’s still holding the other one she had.

-Janine carries the coin with her into her meeting with Winston, who really has done well for himself. Janine gets him to admit that he’s paid to keep the lights on in Ray’s bookshop all these years. But he confesses it’s because while he became a rich man in the ‘90s, he never enjoyed life more than when he was a Ghostbuster.

-Winston paraphrases a line he said when they (wrongly) thought they beat Gozer back in ’84. “I had the tools and the talent.”

-We also see Winston seemingly dream about reincorporating the Ghostbusters in earnest when he tours the abandoned old firehouse from the original films. And downstairs it appears the ghost containment unit has been on this whole time. Its blinking light promises new adventures (and possibly familiar dead faces?) down the road as well. If there’s another movie, I would bet the farm that Slimer’s in there.

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tinymixtapes · 6 years ago

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Music Review: Thom Yorke - Suspiria (Music for the Luca Guadagnino Film)

Thom Yorke Suspiria (Music for the Luca Guadagnino Film) [XL; 2018] Rating: 3.5/5 “When you dance the dance of another, you make yourself in the image of its creator.” – Madame Blanc Although it’s a stale, “get off my lawn” sort of take (recently achieving peak snub by being mocked in a recent SNL bit), it is nonetheless worth insisting that the remake/reboot trend has gotten decidedly out of hand. Greenlight bets are so hedged now that the marketplace of ideas has been subsumed by the plain old market. That the main target demo is the Comic Con obsessive who’d be most likely to bemoan the trend is especially frustrating. When it becomes about wanting to see what a renowned auteur will do with a genre classic, as is the case here with both film and soundtrack creator, we are ignoring and negating the very possibility that these heralded progenitors might have something fresh and lasting to offer us. Of course, if the remake makes money, they might then have the resources/freedom to go forth and create that new staple. It’s nice to think that the gloriously batshit mother! might’ve been possible thanks to Bible thumper money, but Noah wan’t exactly God’s Not Dead. I’m sure those weird helper-giant creatures Noah enlisted for Ark-building had even more impressionable Christians double-checking their Book of Genesis. Point is, it’s a legitimate gripe. At least to this media fiend. And that’s regardless of whether or not we’re supposed to move on in the face of the cutthroat circus that showbiz is and always has been. The massaged notion of the reboot as generational collaboration is reassuring — that is, until we realize it’s a sort of cashing out on the future. Rather than carrying a torch, art patronage has increasingly succumbed to stultifyingly obvious business model imperatives, even daring to call it “inclusive.” And the best these second passes can offer (though it’s decidedly rare) is improvement. In the case of IT, we’re talking God’s work. In the case of Suspiria, I fear for the deserved reverence for Argento’s singular, if imperfect, vision. Sometimes conversations around this cannibalizing of genre greats feels overeager and almost nihilistically dismissive. Hell, even if last year’s IT remake is both better and more expansive than the original TV movie, its eclipsing snuffs out an iconic (arguably superior) performance by Tim Curry as Pennywise. In this light, despite the promising trailer, one partly hopes Luca Guadagnino’s remake comes up short. But going on this soundtrack from raffish up-and-comer Thom Yorke, it might just be something completely different. That is, it might be the best witch-themed film since 2016. Clearly it will be slicker than its namesake, for better or worse. But where Goblin’s soundtrack is all raging menace and badass prog, Yorke’s is (surprise!) mournful balladry and icy, texturally rich reverberations. Discordant horror strings may be old as Vlad, but they retain their potency here. And while this record has a lot of appeal for Radiohead fans, the more song-oriented material never feels out of place from the creepier passages. There are also subtly grooving segments that recall bandmate Johnny Greenwood’s elevating score for You Were Never Really Here. And the repeated waltz theme (“Suspirium”) has the feel of a Moon Shaped Pool track, but in its recurrence accumulates a staying power that was absent for anything on that release. All told, Goblin’s soundtrack works better as an album. It is decidedly more singular, concise, and fun. At a staggering 25 tracks, Thom Yorke’s seems a likely candidate for digital dismemberment. As gorgeous and misstep-free as it is, the soundtrack risks a bit of that souvenir, collector’s item feel native to score-based soundtracks. That being said, it’s nowhere near as padded-out as those typically are. While melodies and tones recur, track to track, it plays out with an ear toward immersion (which advocates against streaming, wherein the transitions get butchered). Especially having not seen the film, this release comes across as an enthralling journey unto itself, ultimately dodging obligatory companion piece status. It’s solid enough that Guadagnino could only disappoint. In that sense, fans of eerie mood music and Yorke alike can’t really lose here. Two-minute songs that you’d expect to be slight present unexpected turns that make them feel epic. Only a few tracks contain movie-sourced sound, and — running against the grain of that sort of thing — the samples are not dialogue centered. While it could be tempting to call nepotism on the maestro featuring his son’s drumming in “Has Ended” and “Volk,” his contributions are superb (especially the staggered fills on the former). It’s impressively laid in the cut, particularly given the high-stakes stoicism of the surrounding material. The proper vocal tracks (the vox for the deep dive of “A Choir of One” are just layered moaning intonations), which retain the vital quality of the best Yorke/Radiohead compositions, stick out a lot more. But they work well, like gulps of waning daylight in a vast, inky oubliette. If I had to guess, these songs are used diegetically or just in the closing credits. Much remains to be seen, but there is the auspicious sense that this was more than just a gig for Yorke. He is dancing outside of Argento, rather than of him. If Guadagnino, for his part, is doing likewise, then the Giallo legend’s masterwork of extraordinarily garish sight and sound is all the better for it. And if Suspiria is as much of a distinct entity as this soundtrack suggests, it’d be nice to see the notion of “fuckin’ shit up from the inside” of a bankrupt industry actually pan out for once. http://j.mp/2EIBwJ7

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