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breserker · 11 months

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mystery horror theater bre-thousand 1

because if i go on another movie binge without filling this out first i'll have defeated my own purpose

THE OTHER DAY i watched three filmmmsssssss if you can call it that -- Smile (2022), Day of the Reaper (1984), and Savage Weekend (1978). this is my first time doing this under a name and i guess i should give them number ratings but what i may rank very high might get me slaughtered on sight, you'll see what i mean

SMILE (2022) (TW: Suicide, self-harm, THE CAT DOES NOT MAKE IT)

At the behest of a friend, I jumped in to watch this movie -- I enjoy doing that, very little fucks me up and I like keeping an eye out for people horror-wise. Overall? It was incredibly good. It had the tense anxiety of Invisible Man (2020), where there's a lot of focus on the mental deterioration of a woman in a world that doesn't believe her, surrounded in a blanket of the first scene of Midsommar (2019) where it shows a pretty ugly side of certain traits of mental illnesses such as mania and psychosis. And it should, the main character works in a psychiatric emergency hospital, and does so to the point of detriment that I would call self-harm. I've been there, working so hard you wreck yourself, y'know?

By about halfway through it became obvious that was also a monster movie, and while I can see some people turning their nose at that, I think I really needed that aspect to follow through with the movie without feeling beaten down with misery and anxiety. The monster in question operates similarly to It Follows (2014) but instead of being passed on by sex it's passed on through sharing the trauma of witnessing a suicide. The monster itself reminded me a lot of BOB from Twin Peaks, there is a beautiful scene recreating BOB scaling the couch while smiling. It's then that I realized that the first person to die was named Laura. Yeah I see you...I see you...!!!

The theme in the movie is the chain of trauma passed from person to person and viscerally affecting those already with past traumas. I deeply enjoyed its execution and how this was a monster movie...I do wish, however, it ended a little bit differently. While the message that trauma never truly leaves you is there, I was hoping for a different, bittersweet ending instead of the bad end the movie provided. It felt tacked on or changed at the last minute. 4.5/5

DAY OF THE REAPER (1984)

buddy oh man oh MAN BUDDY IF YOU LOVE REALLY SHITTY INDIE HOME FILMS SHOT ON A SHODDY SUPER 8 CAMERA WITH THE WORST ADR DUBBING YOU'VE EVER HEARD IN YOUR LIFE, with every treat a bad movie has to offer, THIS IS YOUR FILM and you can watch it FOR FREE on YouTube RIGHT NOW and then come back and punch me in the face. I was HOWLING with laughter. I got a friend also enthusiastic about bad movies to watch it and HE loved it TOO. i have to gather more people to watch this gem, and if you stick with it and think it's boring keep going because the conclusion is so wildly out of this world and so strangely done that it'll hopefully bring glee and joy to you too. CLEAR AND AWAY 5/5

SAVAGE WEEKEND (1978)

I was running out of steam by this point because laughing at Day of the Reaper put my lungs in a state, but this is a slasher from the years in between Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Friday the 13th. I've seen many many slashers that follow the tropes of horny teens boning it in woods (but strangely a white girl usually dies first! I donno where the Black guy trope comes from--but then they're rarely in these films ANYWAY so whatever). But here, it's a bunch of really messy adults with crossed desires, separation/divorcees not knowing what they want out of love at this point, horny adult looking for any tail they can get, et cetera. It honestly was a refreshing break from all of the giggly teen stuff--I'd be far and away more interested to see more like this in the future.

The editing was cut really quick in a lot of areas and the film's pacing at times makes it feel like a rushed project, it needed a finer tooth comb on both fronts. The quality wasn't great but I was pleased to see a flamboyantly charming Christopher Allport give the nasty queer bitch role his all. The twist was pretty meh, I wish there was more fallout action between Mac and the divorcee (just get nasty with it! it's the 70's let's go!) I might be interested to see this again but probably not, it gets this score just for the novelty of horny adults with horny adult problems in a slasher film: 3/5

#mystery horror theater bre-thousand #smile 2022 #day of the reaper 1984 #savage weekend 1978 #suicide cw #self harm cw #horror movies

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