Category Archives: You Have to See This!

You Have to See This! Freaked (1993)

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I would call “Freaked” a spoof, but a spoof of what?

All I know is that it is something of a cult film and simultaneous antidotal piece of good old fashioned schlock in a decade that took movies very seriously. Even horror was somewhat stern for a long time until Wes Craven injected some humor in to it. “Freaked” feels like something out of 1987 that crept in to 1993 and it still rings as truly one of the more fascinating cult films I’ve ever seen. My memory with “Freaked” goes back to 1994 when my dad rented a copy for me. Little did he know what the hell we were in for, as “Freaked” teeters between completely surreal black comedy and an acid dream splashed on to film.

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You Have to See This! The Midnight Hour (1985)

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Only in 1985 could a movie like “The Midnight Hour” have been created. This is the decade of Michael Jackson and music videos. This is the decade of MTV. This is the decade where one of the goofiest Halloween movies ever made has a musical number that breaks the fourth wall because… well, Michael Jackson, and Madonna! Duh. Seriously, it’s a shame that “The Midnight Hour” has been so hard to find and out of print for such a long time, because it’s such a ridiculous eighties gem that I figured people would be watching it during Halloween parties and laughing their asses off.

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You Have to See This! NY77: The Coolest Year in Hell (2007)

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“New York wasn’t burning. It was burnt!”

Director Henry Corra’s exploration of what New York was in 1977 is quite fantastic and a surprisingly rare chronicle of the political and economic turmoil that ironically bred timeless art and music. As a born and bred Bronxite, 1977 is a mythical year, and a period of the decade that I’ve heard about very often from elder family members. In particular, the night of the infamous black out of New York, my mom and uncle were stuck in the edge of downtown Manhattan and had to brave their way home during the mass looting and rioting. “NY77” garners a very unique tone that balances out the inherent importance of the year, the depressing living conditions of the city, and the obvious fun that was had by most, who managed to endure poverty with laughs and creativity.

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You Have to See This! Summer School (1987)

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As a kid I spent many a day watching movies on television edited for content. I spent most of my time watching WPIX Channel 11 in New York which was then considered “New York’s Number One Movie Station.” Every ad for movies they aired always garnered my attention, save for a select few here and there. A lot of those films became future favorites like “Animal House” and “A Christmas Story.” Like clockwork about every four months the channel would air the television trailer for 1987’s “Summer School”, and every time I avoided it like the plague. It just never seemed all too funny, especially in the light of films like “Fast Times at Ridgemont High.”

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You Have to See This! The Guest (2014)

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Adam Wingard is one of my favorite filmmakers working in film today and he almost always works alongside Simon Barrett, a cuttingly funny and witty man who knows how to churn out a damn good script. Wingard and Barrett pull off some amazing feats together, and “The Guest” is another notch in Wingard’s belt that oddly enough doesn’t get as much mention as his banner horror film “You’re Next.” Granted, I love “You’re Next” and have seen it at least two hundred times since it arrived in theaters, but “The Guest” is such a unique horror thriller with a premise that’s very socially relevant without ever being preachy.

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You Have to See This! Waxwork (1988)

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Anthony Hickox’s “Waxwork” is a delightful mess. It’s a fun and awfully interesting distraction that gets you to the finish line thanks to its tongue in cheek humor, and in spite of its uneven tone. Sometimes it’s a dark comedy that celebrates horror tropes, and sometimes it’s a stern horror movie with Zach Galligan jumping from douche bag to protagonist over and over. Seriously, his establishing scenes in the movie literally made me think “Is this really the movie’s hero?”

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You Have to See This! The Gate (1987)

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There were a lot of movies about suburban unrest and the darkness of the suburbs in the mid to late eighties, and one of the most underrated is “The Gate.” I did not see “The Gate” when it originally appeared in theaters (I did see the sequel though!), but I did finally get to see it when it premiered on network TV in the early nineties. Back in the early nineties my family was much too impoverished to get a luxury like cable, so a lot of my time was spent watching network televised movies. The network I always watched was WPIX Channel 11 in New York, and it was once considered “New York’s Movie Station,” allowing me to see a diverse library of movies made between 1980 and 1991.

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