HAUNTED HONEYMOON (1986) An underrated horror-comedy (or comedy-horror?) about 1920s radio stars, Larry Abbot (Gene Wilder), and his fiancée, Vickie Pearle (Gilda Radner), who are invited to spend a weekend at Larry’s childhood home for a pre-wedding family gathering. Unbeknownst to Larry, the weekend is actually a set-up by his psychiatrist uncle (Paul L. Smith) to put Larry through a fear experiment in order to cure Larry’s phobias, which resulted from an incident at his mother’s wedding when he was a kid. That plan provides someone in the family the perfect opportunity: to use the ruse to murder Larry in order to alter the family will. There might also be a werewolf running around. Charming and funny, this works mainly because of its wonderful cast, including Dom DeLuise, and real-life couple, Wilder and Radner, both of whom had incredible romantic and comedic chemistry. Silly fluff that goes down like candy. B+
HOME SWEET HOME (1981) A ranting maniac (Jake Steinfeld), locked up for killing his parents, escapes from an institution, steals a car – running down an old lady in the process! – and heads to a nearby house, where a dysfunctional family is celebrating Thanksgiving. Not nearly as bad as its reputation suggests, this is goofy fun, but bogged down by limp direction and massive predictability. Colorful characters and splashes of humor help move the sometimes mundane story along, but don’t expect any surprises or suspense. Recommend only for fans of silly ’80s slasher flicks, and perhaps “Body by Jake” enthusiasts. Best scene: the electrocution of an annoying, rock guitar-playing mime. B–
POST MORTEM (2020) A truly unique horror film, Post Mortem is also a bit of a frustrating one. Set in Hungary after the first World War, the story follows Tomás (Viktor Klem), a former soldier whose near-death experience on the battlefield has given him an uncanny eye for post mortem photography. Asked to take photos of recently deceased persons at an isolated village ravaged by the Spanish Flu, Tomás encounters several unexplained incidents that lead him to believe the place is haunted. A good cast/likable characters and its early 20th century Central European setting create a nice atmosphere, which helps project its somewhat by-the-numbers story to greater heights. Ultimately, all of this gets swallowed in a very confusing plot that is, at times, very hard to follow and is further hampered by too many character hallucinations that are really just artsy, metaphorical, cinematic tricks detouring from the more simple haunting subplot. A beautiful-looking, but ultimately empty film, this gets extra points for several good scares. C+
TERRIFIER 2 (2022) Art the Clown is back in this overindulgent sequel. Teenage Sienna (Lauren LaVera) and her kid brother, Jonathan (Elliot Fullam), still reeling from their father’s recent death, are anticipating a harmless Halloween night of partying, but end up fighting for their lives against supernatural serial killer, Art (David Howard Thornton), who’s got a new bag of grotesque tricks up his sleeve. Stylized after the grindhouse flicks of the ’70s and 80s, Terrifier 2 offers the same geek show thrills that the movies of Herschel Gordon Lewis and Lucio Fulci brought to theaters over 50 years ago. As with the best of H.G., the ultra violence of Terrifier 2 is heightened by its obvious black comedic touches, specifically a scene where Art showers a maimed victim in bleach and salt for absolutely no reason. But, as with the worst of Lewis, when the gore isn’t dripping, Terrifier 2 is quite dull, with uninteresting characters filling long stretches of runtime, saying mundane dialogue – heck, even Jason got more personality out of his camp counselors in the majority of the Fridays. The film’s confusingly long 138 minutes is a big detractor. Maybe they’ll get it right with Terrifier 3? C