Movies

Wherein I continue my slow, shambling stroll through the classic Universal Monster movie catalog. Or should I say, my slow, uncoordinated swim through the Creature from the Black Lagoon series, of which there are only really three entries and a massive trail of failed remakes and reboots. Naturally, there are tons of Gillman-like creatures peppering the pop culture landscape. Most recent and notable is Guillermo del Toro’s Oscar Winning The Shape of Water, itself a failed reboot concept that del Toro was able to wrangle into something slightly different. Now that the whole Dark Universe concept has floundered, who knows when we’ll see the next iteration of the Creature. But I suspect we will, someday. In the meantime, let’s dive into the sequels:

• Creature from the Black Lagoon (trailer)
• The Lagoon Creature’s Name (Robot Chicken)
• The Shape of Water (trailer)
• Revenge of the Creature – Another trip to the Amazon, another encounter with the Creature. This time, the Gillman is captured and transported back to a water-themed amusement park, presumably to be trained in dumb show tricks like jumping through hoops and kicking footbals or something. Naturally, the experiments go poorly and the Gillman escapes for the inevitable rampage. Lots of underwater photography (I want to say more than the original, though its been awhile since I watched it) and the Creature hiself looks as good as ever.
  

  Storywise, there’s not really much here. The love triangle is not especially romantic and perfunctory at best, and the characters strike me as less effective versions of the same types from the first film. The Creature kidnaps our heroine not so much because of story reasons, but because that’s what happened in the first film. The aforementioned inevitable rampage isn’t particularly rampagey, and the Gillman seems a bit less badass in this sequel. Even the thematic component lacks here, with the broad ecological concerns of the first film replaced with the idea that animals don’t like being in zoos (which is fine, but a step backwards for the series). A paint by numbers sequel that entertains well enough but doesn’t really push any boundaries. I think the most interesting thing about this movie is that it features a very early appearance of Clint Eastwood as a scientist who forgot he has a mouse in his pocket. Which is cool, and all, but it’s only about 30 seconds of screen time. **

• The Monster Squad (trailer)
• Creature Nightlife (Robot Chicken)
• The Host (X-Files)
• The Creature Walks Among Us – Another expedition, this time to the everglades, where they quickly find the creature but accidentally light him on fire. The third degree burns have mostly burned off the Gillman’s scales, revealing what appears to be human skin, prompting questions about biological transformation and evolution. Credit where credit is due – this is not a tired retread of the previous two films, and indeed, it makes some interesting choices. In fact, the Gillman is notably less aggressive in this film, especially after his transformation (this despite appearing to be surprisingly jacked in his more human form).
  

  There is, of course, the requisite rampage towards the end, but besides the two main villains of the piece (a serial harasser and a cowardly, abusive scientist and husband that are both real turds, especially with respect to their treatment of our female hero), the Gillman’s ire is mostly reserved for inanimate objects like gates and stone pillars. The ending is surprisingly affecting, with the Gillman, suffering from several bullet wounds, instinctively trying to retreat towards the water, a place where he can no longer survive. **1/2

I’ve been traveling, so this week’s posts have been a little lighter than normal (actually pretty surprised I managed the two scheduled posts, even if they’re not up to normal standards). I’m back now, so regularly scheduled 6WH activities can resume in full force. At this point, I’m not sure what the coming week will hold for me, but I have some ideas, so stay tuned!

There’s a phenomenon known as Twin Films, wherein two films with suspiciously similar plots are released around the same time by two different studios. Canonical examples include Deep Impact and Armageddon (well, for people my age, I guess) and Dr. Strangelove and Fail Safe (to give a much earlier example).

In the midst of preparations for the 1978 Project, I noticed one such pair of films, this time concerning killer bees. Combining the 70s penchant for disaster films with the general fascination and panic around the Africanized Honey Bee, these are only two examples of many others tackling the vaunted killer bee (there’s even another one from 1978, a TV movie called Terror Out of the Sky). I’m guessing they were also trying to capitalize on the When Animals Attack trend ignited by Jaws and its many imitators. But wait! There’s more! The 70s also saw the rise of the eco-thriller, and these movies certainly glommed onto that trend as well..

• Nicolas Cage: No, not the bees! (clip)
• Animals Attack Trailers
• A Message from the Bees (Robot Chicken)
• The Bees – As killer bees migrate through South America and eventually reach the United States, researchers seek to understand and end the threat before the swarms attack high population cities. But the bees are changing, becoming more intelligent. Will our intrepid heroes figure out a way to defeat the vicious, unstoppable bees and their blasphemous hive minds? This one has a really poor reputation, but it showed up on Shudder last year and I caught the end of it, which made me want to revisit it this year. It’s… not a good movie, but I suspect its blatant anti-corporatism and eco-thriller elements would go over reasonably well with certain audiences these days. I mean, this is some truly hamfisted stuff, but it sorta rockets past unbelievable and pedantic into so-bad-it’s-good territory. Genre mainstay John Saxon (Black Christmas, Nightmare on Elm Street, Enter the Dragon) anchors the cast, delivering his hammy lines with the proper amount of authority. John Carradine lends some gravitas to the proceedings as well, and Angel Tompkins holds her own too (though at first, she’s saddled with an… unlikely relationship partner). The plot gets more ridiculous as it goes on, mostly reserving its ire for greedy corporate types but also putting the United Nations and general governmental bureaucracy on full blast. By the time Saxon figures out the mutated hive mind’s hyper-intelligent plans and starts relating it to the United Nations, it’s almost laughable, though again, I feel like today’s general climate of environmental advocacy might actually get an earnest kick out of this sort of wish fulfillment. Of the two movies in this post, this is clearly the lower budget take. Apparently it was completed first, but Warner Bros. paid the distributor to postpone the release to allow more room for The Swarm… I don’t think that has any real impact on the legacy of either film, really, but it’s interesting and does prove the Twin Movie theory (some things labeled as Twin Movies have more dubious connections). **
• Does God Hate Bees? (Robot Chicken)
• The Killer Bees: Home Invasion (SNL)
• The Burns and the Bees (The Simpsons)
• The Swarm – Producer/Director Irwin Allen led the charge on disaster films in the 1970s. After his initial successes, he announced a slew of projects, including this one, which lingered for years and eventually came out in 1978. It flopped hard and pretty much signaled the end of the disaster movie era. It’s a lavish production though, featuring a star studded cast (including Michael Caine, Katherine Ross, Richard Chamberlain, Olivia de Havilland, amongst many others), lots of special effects and explosions. But it’s also incredibly bloated and sloppy, with a sprawling but rather silly narrative about a scientist overseeing a military effort to combat the bees (this is basically the same thing as the other movie – deadly new strains of Africanized honey bees are coming to America and must be stopped!) Caine is always fun and does his best with poor material here, quickly flying off the handle every time he has to justify himself to the military. There’s some pure entertainment value here in terms of spectacle, and the higher budget definitely helps, but the overlong running time really sinks this one. Both of these killer bee movies have a degree of sensationalism and panic about them that is fun, but the svelt 90 minute The Bees never really overstays its welcome the way that The Swarm does… *1/2

When I was a young, I distinctly remember seeing a sensationalist documentary about how the killer bees were gonna get us all, but we’re still here, so I’m guessing we did something right. Anyway, stay tuned, for we’ve got a Creature Double Feature coming on Sunday… if I can find the time to write it, as I’m traveling at the moment (i.e. it may come a bit late).

Here’s the thing. I’m not very kind to sequels. I enjoy novelty and originality, and sequels are almost by definition not doing that sort of thing. Now, this isn’t to say that everything has to be groundbreaking or transcendent. A formulaic but well executed film works great for me; witness my love for the hallowed and well established conventions of the slasher film! Sequels, though, tend to have additional constraints that are difficult to overcome, namely their tendency to repeat themselves and to suffer in comparison to the original. There are exceptions, to be sure. For instance, my favorite Friday the 13th film is Part VI: Jason Lives! (the whole Friday series actually does a decent job introducing new elements into the relatively strict slasher formula, actually, but there’s also an element of nostalgia that distorts my impressions that should be taken into account).

Given my general distaste for sequels, I naturally decided to spend all weekend watching sequels to utter classics that couldn’t possibly live up to the expectations set by their predecessors. By most accounts, these… are not great movies. I may not have thought this through.

• The Omen (trailer)
• Lucy, Daughter of the Devil (short)
• Horror Movie Daycare (short)
• Damien: Omen II – The antichrist is growing up! Now thirteen years old, living with his aunt and uncle, and attending a military school. Occasionally, someone will catch on that Damien is evil… and then they fall prey to some sort of crazy accidental death (or, at least, one that appears to be so). And that’s pretty much it for the plot here. Basically a retread of the first film, but this time Damien’s innocence and vulnerability are lessened. There’s a nugget of a cool idea here, which is a sorta coming of age story for the antichrist, but the film does not go into a lot of detail about that. A couple of times, I thought they would have Damien struggle a little more to come to terms with his destiny, but it’s mostly just surface material. The accidents are more over-the-top (with the exception of the beheading in the first film) here, with the most notable set piece being a most excellent elevator gag.
  

  The cast is actually doing pretty good work here too. William Holden and Lee Grant do well as Damien’s aunt and uncle, Lance Henriksen shows up as a military instructor who helps awaken Damien’s latent antichrist powers or somesuch, and Jonathan Scott-Taylor presents Damien as the potentially evil little shit he is. It’s repetitive and hokey, but I kinda enjoyed it for what it was. Nothing special, for sure, but if you liked the first, you won’t have any real issues with this one. **1/2

• Psycho (trailer)
• Here’s Your Problem… (Robot Chicken)
• American Psycho – Hip to be Square (clip)
• Psycho II – 22 years after the events of the first movie, and Norman Bates is being released from the mental institution. He moves back to his infamous motel and takes a job at the local diner. Nothing could go wrong here! Soon, a coworker moves in and he starts to get mysterious phone calls from what appears to be his long dead mother. Is Norman Bates still crazy!?
  

  Look, nothing can really compare with the original, and to be sure, I think this movie makes an admirable attempt to progress the story. It’s actually a decent character-based drama. Director Richard Franklin does good Hitchock pastiche, and Anthony Perkins is still great reprising his role as Norman. There’s a bit part for sweaty Dennis Franz that’s fantastic, and some other supporting characters are well done. The second act is a little flabby and the movie is a bit too long, but there are some good twists and turns later on that keep things interesting. Like all the sequels in this post, this is completely unnecessary and pales in comparison to the original, but it has some redeeming factors and is maybe even a tad underrated. **1/2

• The Exorcist (amazing banned/unreleased trailer)
• Repossessed (trailer)
• The Simpsons: Treehouse of Horror XXVIII: The Exor-Sis
• Exorcist II: The Heretic – Four years later, Regan MacNeil doesn’t remember the events of the original film, but she does have disturbing dreams that indicate her exorcism may not hold. A Vatican investigator and a hypnotic research specialist team up to see if they can free Regan from the demon Pazuzu once and for all. As a sequel to The Exorcist, well, it’s bad. Taken in context of director John Boorman’s filmography (nestled between Deliverance, Zardoz, and Excalibur), it looks better. There’s some really bizarre choices on display here, and a lot of the film centers on weird shared-hypnosis effects and, um, locusts.
  

  Boorman’s got a keen eye and I like a good freakout as much as anyone, but the special effects struggle. There’s goofy giant locust composite shots that don’t work, a couple of people burn alive in strangely unconvincing shots, and there’s a car crash that’s just kinda sad. The plot isn’t particularly coherent and goes down some rather strange avenues. Richard Burton’s histrionic performance as the priest suits the film though, and Linda Blair does decent work as the troubled Regan. Both are asked to do ridiculous stuff, so their performances standout all the more because of that. The film certainly has its defenders (including, apparently, Martin Scorsese, though even he admits that the execution is lacking) and has garnered a bit of a cult following, and I can kinda see it, though it’s not a cult I’ll be joining anytime soon and the general reception remains one of profound disappointment. I can appreciate some of what’s going on here, but it ultimately doesn’t work. **

Phew, that was interesting, but I’m not rushing out to watch more sequels (though I remember The Exorcist III being pretty great – dat nurse scene!) I’ll be traveling this week, so posting/watching will be light. If I find time, I might still get a couple posts up and I’m loading my laptop with stuff I can watch during the flight, but who knows how much I’ll actually want to do…

I was pleasantly surprised by what is now referred to as It: Chapter One a couple of years ago. That film arrived in the midst of a semi-revival of Stephen King adaptations and its success (currently the highest grossing horror film of all time, though Jaws might take it if you adjust for inflation) guaranteed more King and, of course, the exciting conclusion to the It story, It Chapter Two. Unfortunately, by “exciting conclusion”, what I actually mean is… “repetitive slog”.

I have not read Stephen King’s novel, but as I understand it, part of its power comes from its structure. Basically, he’s telling the same story twice, in parallel, with the occasional interlude from Derry’s history to break things up. The dual narrative concerns a group of kids confronting a demonic clown, and the grown up versions of same, fighting same. The first movie broke out of that mold by necessity, and it was probably the right decision. However, in the process of doing so, they were setting the sequel up for failure. I suppose the writers of this could have really strayed far from the source material to provide something more original, but it’s not like that sort of approach is guaranteed either. And let’s not forget that King’s reputation for great setups leading to bad endings (actually a pretty good recurring meta-gag in It: Chapter Two, including a cameo from King himself). It’s not that King’s lazy or just couldn’t think up a better ending; he seems to genuinely write himself into corners. Whatever the case, the filmmakers opted for a more straightforward adaptation of the Losers as adults returning to Derry to face off against Pennywise, so it’s quite repetitive.

Like the first installment, this is a slick movie with great production value, fabulous casting, and generally good performances. Unlike the first movie, the scares here feel muted and perfunctory. The problem is that the kids at the end of the first movie figured out the trick to defeating Pennywise, so all the scares in this second installment are just going through the motions. The first movie relied a little too heavy on jump scares, audio stingers, and CGI, but ultimately worked because of the approach and good execution. This second movie leaned into all of those things people didn’t like, but the approach isn’t novel anymore and the execution is sporadic, so it all sorta falls flat.

The child actors in the first movie had a great chemistry together, and it really felt like you saw the bonding experience as it happened onscreen. In the second movie, all of that is gone, explained away by the conceit that when you move away from Derry you “forget” what happened there. What’s more, it takes forever for the characters to get back on the same page, and the plot quickly separates the characters before they can reestablish any rhythm. The whole approach reminded me a little of a video game sequel where your once powerful protagonist has to start over and rebuild all their strengths and abilities. The second act of this movie is essentially a fetch quest, with each character going off on their own to find some sort of talisman, which naturally leads to encounters with Pennywise (which, again, generally feel muted because we’ve seen all this sort of thing before). Some of these segments are more successful (Bev’s visit to her old apartment) than others (the one bizarrely goofy needle drop during what I think was supposed to be a jump scare?), but they take up way too much time and don’t get us where we need to be.

The actors are all doing their best, but the material is holding them back. Bill Hader’s deadpan humor is great. James McAvoy could have chewed up the scenery with his character’s stutter, but wisely kept those hammy impulses in check. Jessica Chastain is always fantastic, but again, she’s not given much to do here. Bill Skarsgård’s portrayal of Pennywise is still a highlight of the film… when they’re not CGIing him to death (and honestly, he’s pretty good even then). The other actors are all doing good work here too, but the structure of the film is letting them down. They never manage to reestablish the chemistry present in the first film, and when the film really tries to do that at the end, it somehow feels rushed and incongruous. The film does feature lots of flashbacks to the characters as kids, which you’d think would help given the aforementioned chemistry and bonding, but it only serves to further highlight the flaws in the current day portions of the film.

The plot also includes a few other encounters with Pennywise that are experienced by folks around town. Some of these are straight from the book, such as the gay couple getting attacked by local homophobes and then literally becoming a meal for Pennywise. Others I’m not sure about. While some of this stuff is well done (and better executed than the stuff featuring the adult Losers, perhaps because these other characters don’t know what they’re up against), it’s all completely superfluous. In a movie that’s nearly three hours long, that sort of thing should have probably been minimized in favor of keeping the story moving.

Then there’s the plan to defeat Pennywise. Despite having already figured out the secret to fighting Pennywise in the first film, the crew devises this elaborate scheme based on an old Native American ritual… that makes no sense. One of the Losers has done a bunch of research on the town and discovered this ritual that was used to fight Pennywise when he first arrived a couple hundred years ago… but no one seems to point out the obvious, which is: if this is what they used to fight Pennywise before, but Pennywise is still around, then the ritual clearly doesn’t work. Again, the crew has already fought Pennywise as kids and figured out the secret (Pennywise ran away at the end, so I guess that wasn’t entirely successful, but they figured out what was needed). The writers further rush the Losers into the confrontation in a way that feels contrived and clunky.

Speaking of Pennywise, one of the minor complaints from the first movie was that the extent and degree of his powers were unclear at best. This movie only further leans into this lack of clarity, which is part of what drives the lack of genuine scares in the film, and also makes the ending feel facile and unconvincing. On the other hand, the ending does kinda sorta make sense. I mean, it’s essentially the same as the first film and I don’t know why we had to wander through three hours of film to get to essentially the same place, but it works better than, say, a giant space turtle saving them (a probably exaggerated paraphrase of the book’s ending, which, again, I have not read).

Perhaps I am being too hard on this movie. It’s indulgent, bloated, and overlong, but it didn’t feel like three hours either? There’s some weird contradictory feelings this movie brings out in me. It’s clearly too long, but it also feels like there’s stuff missing? This is a repetitive story, but it doesn’t work here while it did in the first movie? Ultimately, I did not particularly like this film. I’m always tough on sequels to start with, and this one was primed to annoy me with its inherently repetitious plot and general sense of just going-through-the-motions. None of this is a particular surprise, but while the first movie would up greatly exceeding my low expectations, this one couldn’t even manage to clear the low expectation bar. Count me interested in whatever director Andy Muschietti tackles next though. The guy’s got some chops, for sure, and to be fair, this second It movie may have been an insurmountable challenge to start with… Anyway, stay tuned, for on Sunday, we’re going to post about more (probably disappointing) sequels to good movies.

The weather is turning, wind is blowing through leaf piles, wicker baskets are filled with mutant squash, people are mutilating pumpkins for fun, yards are filling up with cemetery furnishings like tombstones with ironic inscriptions, decorative corpses, and ornamental cobwebs, and of course, the pumpkin spice must flow. These and other nominally ghastly traditions suddenly becoming socially acceptable can mean only one thing: It’s Halloweentime! Yes, it’s the best time of the year, and to celebrate, we here at Kaedrin watch a crapton of horror movies over the course of the next six weeks. Why six weeks? Well, it used to be a lot better than most normal people’s four week marathons… but now everyone else seems to have caught on and started in with the Halloween jam starting in September. These days, Pumpkin beer shows up in July. Not that I’m complaining (I mean, the start of summer is at least partly great because by then we’re well on our way to Halloween).

This year’s marathon starts off with a trio of silent horror movies. I tend to find these movies a tad staid, but it’s always an interesting experience and often illustrates a direct line of influence to current horror trends. The excessive focus on visuals over all can also lead to indelible imagery that can’t quite be replicated by sound films (not that they don’t have their own visual impressiveness, it’s just different). Don’t worry, we’ve got plenty of time to descend into the more schlocky gore and so-bad-it’s-good zaniness. But for now, let’s strap on our monacle and observe some historically important cinema!

• Don’t (fake trailer)
• The Simpsons: Treehouse of Horror: Bad Dream House
• The Cabin in the Woods (trailer)
• The Bat – A violent criminal dressed up like a giant bat terrorizes a family renting an old mansion in search of a banker’s hidden loot. Or something like that. Despite mostly taking place in one location, the plot is sometimes a bit hard to follow. Adapted from a play (which was itself adapted from a book), it’s clear that the silent era constraints on this one were insurmountable (director Roland West would later remake the film as a talkie in 1930; apparently a more refined take, and there’s also a 1959 remake starring none other than Vincent Price). That being said, there’s a lot of interesting stuff going on here. The transfer I watched wasn’t great quality, but the visuals were well done and memorable. It doesn’t quite capture the the extreme angular German expressionism of the era (typified by The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari), but some of those elements are well represented nonetheless. The intertitles (while perhaps not up to the task of encapsulating the plot) are mostly on point and even quotable (the winner:”For twenty years I’ve stood by you through Socialism, Theosophism and Rheumatism – but I draw the line at Spookism!”) It’s an early example of the “old dark house” tale (though The Cat and the Canary did it better just a year later), complete with all the requisite tropes: dark shadows, silhouettes, mistaken identities, hidden passageways, red herrings galore, a screaming, slapstick maidservant, a racist portrayal of a Japanese manservant, a sassy, drunken aunt, and a dude running around in some sort of elaborate costume. In this case a bat, which apparently was one of the inspirations for Batman (indeed, there’s even a sequence with a bat-signal).
  

  At first shrouded in shadow and silhouette, The Bat is great looking, and even once you get a closeup look of the costume, it’s pretty neat. It’s also something of a precursor to the slasher and its various influences (i.e. Giallos, Krimis, etc…) The visuals do create a nice atmosphere, but it’s not especially scary. Some of the humor works well enough, but it’s also quite broad and sometimes incongruous with the generally dark tone (I kinda loved the whole bear trap gag though). All of which is to say that, while interesting, there’s not much here that hasn’t been done better elsewhere, even if this may have done some things first. Worth it for students of cinema to see how it influenced later works, it’s not really a movie for the normals. Still, I got a kick out of seeing all the tropes in their larval form. **

• The Phantom (Robot Chicken)
• The Phantom of the Opera’s Girl Problems (short)
• The Phantom of the Opera (1962) (trailer)
• The Phantom of the Opera – I’ve obviously seen the famous reveal from this film and countless imitations and remakes and parodies over the years, but this is the first time I’ve watched this one from start to finish. Set at the famous Paris Opera House, allegedly haunted by a Phantom who leaves notes making demands of the new owners about who should be performing what and when. The Phantom clearly has a thing for one of the ingénues and promises her fame and fortune, whilst sabotaging her competition. Watching this one made me realize that the pacing of The Bat was actually pretty good, as it’s much slower here. The shots are static and longer lasting, even the intertiles stay up on the screen for a beat or two longer (to my modern, continuous partial attention addled brain, it’s a bit much). On the other hand, the clarity of what’s going on is much better here, and of course there’s some all-time classic moments. Notably the aforementioned reveal of the Phantom without his mask, which really is something, even today.
  

  I can’t imagine what the crowds of the day thought of this reveal, but it must have been wild. The film has a few other standout visuals as well. The Paris Opera House is lovingly captured here, and there is one sequence in which the Phantom dressed up in red at a sorta costume ball descends the staircase that is quite memorable (the Amazon Prime version I watched featured the red color, which really makes it stand out in the otherwise black and white film). The film has its baffling moments (apparently the result of studio meddling, which is not just a modern phenomenon) and while the story is simple and clear, it doesn’t entirely hold together on its own. But Lon Chaney’s performance keeps the entire affair humming. While menacing and mean-spirited, he sometimes manages to imbue the Phantom with a sadness that would be worthy of pity if he wasn’t constantly trying to kill people or kidnap women. His exaggerated physical movements and dramatic poses manage to imbue the film with a sense of dread that probably wouldn’t be present otherwise. If this were to come out today, I think it would be a boon to the the hot take industrial complex and movie twitter would be unbearable for a while. Or not. Whatever, it’s worth it for Chaney’s performance alone and could serve as a decent introduction to silent film. **1/2

• The Grimmest Reaper (Robot Chicken)
• The Chickening (short)
• Final Destination 2 (trailer)
• The Phantom Carriage – In Swedish folklore, there’s a legend that the last person to die on New Year’s Eve, if they’ve lead a wicked life, is doomed to drive a spectral carriage, collecting the souls of the dead for a whole year. This film opens with a Salvation Army nurse on her deathbed, asking for a local drunk she’d been working to reform. Said local drunk is hiding out in a cemetery. When he refuses to visit the ailing nurse, his friends beat him up and leave him for dead, whereupon the Phantom Carriage arrives. There’s a real Dickensian feel to the whole affair, as the drunk reflects on his life and bad decisions, and spoiler alert, what at first seems like it will be a really dark ending turns saccharine as the drunk repents and goes through a Scrooge-like transformation. It feels a bit rushed, I guess, but considering that this is a 1921 film, I’ll cut it some slack. The whole holiday redemption theme works well enough, and it’s got some great visual moments, including the spectral Phantom Carriage, which shows up translucent on screen and features the unsettling and now iconic image of the grim reaper, wearing a hooded robe and carrying a scythe.
  

  This movie was Ingmar Bergman’s favorite film and clearly inspired his The Seventh Seal, amongst countless other films (notably including Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining, which directly homaged the shot of a man chopping through a wooden door with an axe). Really glad I caught up with this one, and the Criterion Collection presentation is great. ***

I must admit that I cheated a little by starting this year’s marathon early. I was away this weekend without access to the internets, etc… and I have another trip coming up that will probably cut down on the number of movies I watch this year (and I may skip a post or two). Otherwise, full bore til Halloween! Coming up: Tackling a current release and a trio of sequels to classics (that are, eh, not classics in themselves)…