I used to hate westerns. My great-grandfather was obsessed with them, and as I kid I never understood why. They bored me to tears. It seemed like every single film in the genre had the exact same plot, the exact same characters, and the exact same showdown at the climax. To younger me, if it didn’t have lasers, aliens, or explosions, then it wasn’t worth … Continue reading It’s Cowboys vs Cannibals in ‘Bone Tomahawk’
I love horror. It’s a fantastic genre, full of a wide-ranging plethora of different flavors and styles of filmmaking. There’s so many unique and fascinating subgenres and breeds of horror films that odds are, even the staunchest critic of the genre can find something that suits their interests. But that isn’t to say that it isn’t without its flaws. Chief among these is the way … Continue reading Distressing Damsels: The Ass-Kicking Leading Ladies of Subversive Horror
Horror and comedy are inherently symbiotic. They’re balancing forces to one another, helping to lower and raise tension and mood so that scares hit harder, and laughs come easier. Jokes calm the nerves, making a jump scare all the more unexpected and effective, while a good fright makes a comedy bit land way better as a palate cleanser than it ever would as a standalone. … Continue reading Frights and Funnies: The Best of Horror/Comedies
Before I get into the topic at hand today, first we need a quick history lesson: In the early 1980s, a wave of reports swept the United States, Canada, and many parts of Europe, alleging supposedly occult explanations and causes for a wide range of different crimes and abuse scandals. Dubbed the “Satanic Panic” by the media, largely in retrospect, this rise in religious hysteria … Continue reading ‘The House of the Devil’: Satanic-Panic in Style
Today, we’re going to take a slight detour from our regularly scheduled programming, and step away from the in-universe appeal of horror films. Instead, we’re taking a step back behind the curtain, behind the scenes, and dedicating a bit of time to the cogs and pieces that make these films work so well, even after all this time. Today’s topic: Horror documentaries. The general rule … Continue reading Behind the Masks: Horror Documentaries
Last Week, I gave some suggestions for horror movies that are a little lighter on the violence and brutality than is normally part-and-parcel with the genre. These are movies that still deliver on the scares, but don’t necessarily make you want to avert your eyes in disgust. But some of you sickos don’t need the soft stuff. You guys are the veterans, the iron stomachs. … Continue reading Not for the Faint of Heart: Hard-to-Watch Horror
You know, it’s a shame that it’s taken me so long to talk about ‘The People Under the Stairs’, considering that it’s the film that this site is literally named after. But since I’ve been cranking out so much content in preparation for Halloween this year, I figured I really have no excuse at this point. And, frankly, the film is as topical now as … Continue reading ‘The People Under the Stairs’ and its Complex Legacy as a White-Helmed ‘Urban’ Horror Story
Sometimes, a movie is just too much of a commitment. You’re tired, you’re distracted, you’re unfocused. You want to watch something, but you also don’t want to have to devote your attention to a full-length, two-hour story. You want something snappy, something quick and punchy, something that can keep your interests in short, controlled bursts. I understand this feeling all too well. I love movies, … Continue reading Spooky Segments: The Best of Horror Anthologies
Slasher movies are a bit paradoxical by nature, in that they are, on the whole, some of the most ridiculous films in the horror genre, and yet they seem to take themselves so deathly seriously. It’s a counterintuitive and incongruous tonal clash that often makes these films seem overly cheesy or cheap, as the corny acting and the nonsensical, soap-opera plots undermine and invalidate what … Continue reading ‘Sleepaway Camp’, and the Power of Weirdness in Horror
Horror movies can be… intense. I’ve been watching them for as long as I’ve been watching, well, anything, and even I can get a little overwhelmed at times. Especially now, in the wake of the “torture porn” wave of the early-to-mid 2000s which saw the rise of franchises like Saw and Hostel, violence and gore in horror movies can make some films downright inaccessible to … Continue reading Bloodless Terror: Horror for the Squeamish
The Blogger Under the Stairs 