Creepshow (1982)
To this day I remember one of the most insightful observations ever made by one of my tutors at college, namely, that there was no rational link between eating and going to the cinema to watch a film. Why was it, he continued, that the two had become so intertwined in the collective conscience that eating popcorn was now seen as an indispensable element of the cinema-going experience? Over the years I have come to agree with him more and more, especially as cinema menus have expanded to encompass a wider range of annoyingly noisy foods. Read more
The Evil Dead Trilogy (1981-1993)
The Evil Dead trilogy confounds expectations in all sorts of ways. At the most basic level, it’s not really much of a trilogy: an original film, a remake of that film and a third instalment that wilfully contradicts the first two. But it’s worth considering all Evil Dead, Evil Dead 2: Dead By Dawn and Army of Darkness for two important reasons: firstly, all three represent important milestones in Sam Raimi’s bizarre journey from video nasty director to Hollywood maven, and secondly, I watched all three in one sitting, so I’ll damn well write them up in one. Read more
Shaun of the Dead (2004)
I was expecting good things from a movie which no less a critic than George A. Romero unashamedly promotes at any opportunity as one of the finest zombie films he’s ever seen, but even I wasn’t prepared for the quality of Shaun of the Dead. My eyes tend to glaze over when I am confronted with a piece of recent British film-making, which is a real arse as some of my favourite films hail from these very shores (I have only to mention The Wicker Man as proof). I blame it on too much box office success for Richard Curtis and his insidious ‘rom-coms’, which have somehow distracted the cinema going public’s attention from the fact that Hugh Grant a) cannot act and; b) is a tosser. I thus made every effort to avoid Shaun of the Dead at the time of its release in light of reviews describing it as ‘the first romantic zombie comedy’ – no thank you. With several friends recommending it though I finally bit the bullet (having first been assured that Grant was nowhere to be seen) and can only apologies for every shrug of indifference I affected when being told to go and watch it at the cinema. Read more
Ed Wood (1994)
Is Ed Wood a horror movie? Strictly speaking, no, but it earns its place in the Black Lagoon through its illuminating and moving depiction of one of the genre’s most notorious - and intriguing - partnerships. Read more