National Horror Movie Day is back to haunt your TV.
Begun in 2023 with a simple objective: Go enjoy a good horror movie. And Oct. 23 was chosen because it is filmmaker Sam Raimi’s birthday.
They recommend celebrating in the following ways:
*Plan a horror movie watch party with friends and family. Pick a new movie every night starting October 23 through Halloween.
*Throw a costume party in celebration of the Halloween season and have guests dress up in their favorite horror movie character. Remember to prepare your food and drinks around horror movie inspiration.
*Attend a horror movie convention or film festival, you’ll experience love and acceptance unlike any other place.
*Visit a haunted house and see how many of your favorite horror movie characters are scaring the jeepers out of you.
*Read a horror book that has been adapted to the big screen. Authors like Stephen King are favorites among readers and horror movie buffs.
*Support independent horror by watching an indie horror film or short horror movie created by independent filmmakers. Independent horror often brings fresh and unique perspectives to the genre.
*Share your love for horror movies by connecting with others who love horror, too. Share your favorite films and horror movie party ideas on social media using #NationalHorrorMovieDay.
Halloween Every Night put together this year’s list of nine great horror films — all celebrating big anniversaries in 2024 — that give viewers a classic to watch each night until Halloween. Settle in, enjoy … and don’t look behind you.
●Nosferatu (1922) …. Just two years after The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, German filmmakers showed they clearly had a leg up on American filmmakers when it came to horror.
Maybe the main creepy appeal of Nosferatu, like Caligari, is that it’s a foreign film. The sets, locations, actors, and cinematography of filmmaker F.W. Murnau are all different than that of Hollywood films of its day and it keeps us off our feet and out of our element.
This is Murnau’s attempt to tell the Dracula story in all but name (he couldn’t get the film rights), and twisting the villain into a more bizarre and rat-like creature remains surprisingly effective a century later. Some film historians have tried to assert the depiction of the vampire was in goose step with antisemitic caricatures of Jews in Weimar-era Germany, but Murnau was a gay man with many Jewish friends and that caricature seems unlikely.
●Gojira (1954) … The original uncut Japanese version of Godzilla (or in Japanese, Gojira) is a grim allegory on the ghosts of the A bomb that still lingered over the country. It gave a cinematic sense to the real-life horrors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, as well as the struggle with a level of guilt the country felt about its role in World War II, but it also reflected growing anger and anxiety about nuclear proliferation in the 1950s. The black and white cinematography might have been a budget concession, but it adds to the mood and tone of the film.
Two years later, the American cut of the film — released as Godzilla, King of the Monsters! — removed most of the subtext and cut in Canadian actor Raymond Burr (Rear Window) to make it sellable to North American audiences of the 1950s. The original Japanese version would not be seen in the U.S. until 2004, when it received rave reviews.
●The Last Man on Earth (1964) …First of the three notable attempts at putting Richard Matheson’s I Am Legend on screen and probably the best. Truly undervalued, not only for Vincent Price’s lonely, despairing performance, but the story. Even if Matheson later disowned it.
●The Wicker Man (1973) … The first great folk horror film is a slow-boiling tale of a devoutly Christian police officer pitted against pagan villagers while investigating the disappearance of a young girl. Led by Christopher Lee’s and Edward Woodward’s strong performances and smart production design, the film was only a minor success on its release, due to the film being cut multiple times. Fortunately, director Robin Hardy released a restored cut of the film in 1979 to critical acclaim. It has since come to be known as one of the greatest horror films ever made, while Lee said it was the best film of his career and Woodward said it was his best role.
●Young Frankenstein (1974) …Writer/director Mel Brooks spoofed the Universal classic franchise and makes a classic of his own. Well written, well acted with a stellar comic cast, and shot in beautiful black and white, the film is one of the greatest horror comedies ever made.
●Alien (1979) …Ridley Scott’s Alien is a haunted house movie in space. But Scott’s visionary direction re-writes the rules of both the haunted house and space monster sub-genres. An excellent cast, iconic cinematography and production design launch a franchise, and the film’s success make Sigourney Weaver a star.
●A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984) …Wes Craven gives the slasher film a more ‘80s music video look and new anti-hero with a film loosely based on the true story of a string of Southeast Asian immigrants mysteriously dying in their sleep. But the film also famously explores the teenage struggle to distinguish between dreams and reality. The film was added to the Library of Congress’ National Film Registry in 2021.
●Body Double (1984) … Brian De Palma continues to show his obsession with Hitchcock in a film that mixes Vertigo, Dial M of Murder and Rear Window together in a modern (1980s) stew with some extra spices. Pushing the boundaries on screen violence and sex, De Palma also pushes a wry satire of Hollywood and media culture and how society’s obsession with image can blur our perception of reality.
●The Blair Witch Project (1999) … Though it isn’t technically the first, this is the film that kickstarted the found-footage sub genre of horror and did it in a big way. The story of three college students struggling to make a documentary about the legend of a local witch, and consequently their footage found after their disappearance seems pretty much like the definition of found footage.
The film was also introduced via an inventive promotional campaign that treated the story, with tongue-slightly-in-cheek, as real. Also not the first time in film history, but well executed at the dawn of the internet age. The film was a hit, but its cultural ripples, of fiction credibly presented as fact, loom large to this day.
