Horror by Harrison

  When I started this blog my first review was on the 2006 remake of The Hills Have Eyes , a film that has a very special place in my heart. Now, one year later, I’m celebrating the anniversary of the blog by revisiting the original for the first time in ten years. Let’s dive in, shall we? The Hills Have Eyes was written and directed by Wes Craven ( Scream ) and was released on July 22nd, 1977. The film was made on an estimated budget of between $350,000 and $700,000 and ultimately grossed $25 million. It received largely positive reviews upon release. The Hills Have Eyes (like its remake twenty-nine years later) follows a family on a cross country roadtrip who run afoul of a family of cannibals in the hills of Nevada. Having seen the remake before I ever saw the original, and forming an emotional attachment to it, it was inevitable that my initial viewing of The Hills Have Eyes would be colored through that lens. Indeed, when I finally watched it all those years ago my re...

  Originally I was scheduled to cover Nia DaCosta’s Candyman sequel (for the second time ) but its release date was pushed back to the end of August. Barring any further delays I will finally be covering it on September 3rd. In lieu of this new release, today I’m following up on my Alien review with Aliens . Aliens was written and directed by James Cameron ( The Terminator ) and was released on July 18th, 1986. Aliens was made on a budget of $18.5 million, made $10,052,042 upon opening, and went on to make $131,060,248 worldwide. The film received critical acclaim upon release and even garnered Sigourney Weaver ( Galaxy Quest ) the first of her three Academy Award nominations. Following the events of the first film, Ripley’s (Weaver) shuttle is picked up by a deep space salvage team. Upon awakening, Ripley discovers that she’s been lost in space for fifty-seven year and that LV-426 (the planet where the Nostromo picked up the alien) now has a human colony on it. Despite her warni...

  “What’s your favorite scary movie?” With the ring of a telephone and that one iconic line, a phenomenon was born. While the early 90s is often noted for its dearth of quality horror (though there are some gems to be found if you know where to look), Scream came along in ‘96 to revitalize the genre for a new generation. Scream was written by Kevin Williamson ( I Know What You Did Last Summer ) and directed by Wes Craven (A Nightmare on Elm Street ). Scream was made on a budget of $14 million, made $6,354,586 upon opening, and went on to make $173,046,663 worldwide. It was released on December 20, 1996 to positive reviews and a sequel was greenlit while it was still in theaters. One year after the brutal murder of her mother, Sidney Prescott (Neve Campbell, Party of Five ) and her friends begin to be stalked by a masked killer with a love of horror movies. Meanwhile local reporter Gale Weathers (Courtney Cox, Friends ) teams up with police deputy Dewey Riley (David Arquette, Ei...

  This is one of my favorite X-Men films. Okay, maybe that sounds a bit snarky, but I think it’s a fair comparison. This is the one with a bunch of teens who discover their latent super powers (dream powers, anyway) to fight back against the forces of evil. A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors (from here on out referred to as Dream Warriors ) was written by Wes Craven ( A Nightmare on Elm Street ), Bruce Wagner ( Maps to the Stars ), Frank Darabont ( The Shawshank Redemption ), and Chuck Russell ( The Blob ) and was directed by Russell. Dream Warriors was made on a budget of roughly $4.4 million, made $8,880,555 upon opening, and went on to make $44,793,222 worldwide. Dream Warriors was released on February 27th, 1987 to generally positive reviews. Dream Warriors is set one year after the previous installment, and six years after the original, and sees Nancy Thompson (Heather Langenkamp, A Nightmare on Elm Street ) guiding a group of teens who are being hunted by Fred K...

  Here we are on the fifth Monday of the month, which means that we’re stepping out of the horror lane to discuss a different genre. This week we’re discussing the 1950 show biz comedy All About Eve . All About Eve was written and directed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz ( The Philadelphia Story ) and based on the short story The Wisdom of Eve by Mary Orr ( Diamonds in the Sky ). All About Eve was made on a budget of $1.4 million and grossed $8.4 million. It received overwhelmingly positive reviews and was nominated for fourteen academy awards, winning six. All About Eve is the story of Margo Channing (Bette Davis, Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? ), a beloved and talented actress who meets her biggest fan, Eve Harrington (Anne Baxter, The Razor’s Edge ). She takes in Eve as her protégé, but Eve soon takes over every aspect of Margo’s life, using her to rise to fame. All About Eve is a nearly perfect film. The cast is uniformly excellent, Davis is (no surprise) a powerhouse and Bax...