Prom Night (2008)

Nelson McCormick’s “Prom Night” is not even technically a remake, at all. In fact most of the film doesn’t even take place during prom night. After drudging through an endless array of teen melodrama that was obviously only a lead up to the killing, director Nelson McCormack’s thriller seems to actively work at not being scary. Perhaps it’s to keep from offending the young audience to which this PG-13 snooze fest was touted to, but “Prom Night 2008” lacks any of the inherent terror the original film possessed, however minimal it is.

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El Camino: A Breaking Bad Movie (2019)

Vince Gilligan’s “Breaking Bad” ended beautifully with Walter White embracing death finally, and Jesse Pinkman tasting freedom after being chained up and dehumanized for such a long time. I was happy with the ending Vince Gilligan gave us. What I loved about “El Camino” is that it doesn’t try to be spectacular, nor does it open the door for a new series. It’s merely the epilogue of the “Breaking Bad” saga where Jesse Pinkman has to fight one last time for his freedom.

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Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children (2016)

Tim Burton hasn’t been delivering on quality as he once was, so it’s become a rare occasion that he’s able to deliver on something genuinely entertaining. “Miss Peregrime’s” is one of the darkest Burton films ever directed, and while it’s touted toward children, it definitely skirts the edges quite often. That’s mainly due to the creepy villains that make a point of eating children’s eyes, amounting to some of the most horrific material in an otherwise darkly fantastic drama.

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Shorts Round Up of the Week: Halloween Horror Month Edition

It’s October once again! Finally! It’s our favorite time of year, a time where we can drown in horror and genre cinema without coming up for air. For the return of “Shorts Round Up of the Week” I bring you the Halloween edition, where I review short films of the horror, thriller, and dark fantasy variety. Hopefully we can dig up a second edition of this column before the month is up.

If you’d like to submit your short film for review consideration, submissions are always opened to filmmakers and producers. 

Happy October, boils and ghouls.

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C.H.U.D. (1984)

I’ll plead guilty in admitting that I’ve never understood why “C.H.U.D.” is considered a horror classic. The title is great, as it completely lays the cards out on the table for the audience. The concept is golden, as underground mutants that eat random people in the big city is ripe for a great monster movie. But when you get down to the actual movie itself, it’s a romance drama, mixed with a political thriller, with man eating underground mutants that kind of sort of appear in the finale for a bit here and there. You go in to it expecting a creepy monster film, but what you get is “The China Syndrome.”

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The Omen Collection: Deluxe Edition [Blu-Ray]

After the release of the 2008 “The Omen” Collection, Shout Factory brings fans a brand new exhaustive release of “The Omen” movie saga in a pristine new box set. There’s even wonderful new art for fans. If you’re a hardcore fanatic for “The Omen,” this is about as great as it gets, and it doesn’t satisfy your appetite for Damien Thorne and his grand master plan to take over the world well then, you’re very hard to please. In either case, this is a set that every horror buff must own, as it’s pretty fantastic and brings together every single “The Omen” on Blu-Ray. I would have loved to see the pilot for “The Omen” as an extra, but hey, I admit that that’s merely nitpicking.

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Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer (1986)

John McNaughton’s horror drama is a pitch black film that managed to raise so much controversy upon its release and to this day is still a very polarizing work of art in the horror genre. Like “Texas Chainsaw Massacre” it centers on a point of humanity and pure evil that is irredeemable and absolutely impossible to rationalize. “Henry” is that kind of movie without a single bright spot, a tale about a shapeless person indulging in sadism and murder who thinks of snuffing out human life as a mundane hobby that he revels in indulging in.

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