Parents, Puppet Master, Rabid Grannies, and Rawhead Rex
PARENTS (1989) Committing to neither the horror nor comedy aspects of horror-comedy, Parents is a curious movie that skates the border of its genres by being consistently weird. In the 1950s, a morose kid, Michael (Bryan Madorsky), moves into a…
Ghostwatch, The Vampire’s Ghost, and White Zombie
GHOSTWATCH (1992) Before The Blair Witch Project came this superlative journey into home video horror, in which the crew of a BBC television series airs a live show from a reportedly haunted house in North London. Real-life TV personality, Sarah…
Evil Dead Rise, First Man into Space, and Uncle Sam
EVIL DEAD RISE (2023) Another Evil Dead reboot to emerge after the 2013 remake failed to reignite the franchise, this appropriately gnarly reimagining of the original 1981 horror classic moves the action to Los Angeles, where the teens of a…
The Pope’s Exorcist, Scream VI, and Son of Frankenstein
THE POPE’S EXORCIST (2023) Taking a stab at the “based on real case files” scenario The Conjuring made popular ten years earlier, The Pope’s Exorcist delivers a “true” chapter out of Father Gabriel Amorth’s (Russell Crowe) book of paranormal activity.…
Antibirth, Doom Asylum, and Nightwish
DOOM ASYLUM (1988) Friday the 13th by way of John Waters, this garish—but quite funny—comedy-horror centers on young Kiki (future Frankenhooker Patty Mullens) and her quartet of cartoonish friends who take a day trip to an abandoned hospital where the…
The Blood-Spattered Bride, Don’t Torture a Duckling, and Nomads
NOMADS (1986) An interesting, if not fully successful, tale of a French anthropology professor (Pierce Brosnan) who passes his life force (I think) to a medical doctor (Lesley-Anne Down) right before he dies in an L.A. hospital. Soon after, the…
Cocaine Bear, Dead Silence, and A Nightmare on Elm Street (2010)
COCAINE BEAR (2023) Cocaine Bear is superbly silly hokum that works surprisingly well. In 1985, after a massive grizzly bear sticks its snout into a bag of raw cocaine (which fell out of an airplane during a failed drug swap),…
Edge of Sanity, Martin, and Pet Sematary Two
EDGE OF SANITY (1989) Before Anthony Hopkins was Hannibal Lector, Anthony Perkins was the modern face of evil thanks to his unforgettable turn as Norman Bates, and here he’s well-cast as a serial slasher in this colorful but garish variation…
Dead Ringer, Hostel III, and The Witches of Eastwick
DEAD RINGER (1964) Bette Davis fans will get a kick out of watching her play twins in this post-Baby Jane chiller, but everyone else will most likely be bored. Penniless spinster, Edith (Davis), finds out her lost love of 20…