31 Nights, 31 Frights: The Exorcist III

I was never a fan of the original Exorcist. Bereft of any real terror, it instead opted for high-octane shocks, predicated mostly on the concept of a fourteen-year-old actress displaying hideously vulgar behavior. The less said about its even more absurd follow-up the better. Part three is the only one in the series worth noting.

31 Nights, 31 Frights: Night of the Living Dead

'Night of the Living Dead'

Few living director’s can lay claim to inventing a movie genre, but that’s just what George A. Romero did with this unsettlingly lurid social commentary. Confining the action to a few rooms in an abandoned farmhouse, Romero creates a siege mentality meant to emulate the struggle in Vietnam at the time.

31 Nights, 31 Frights: Scream

Drew Barrymore in 'Scream'

Following on the heels of his very-meta New Nightmare, horror veteran Wes Craven serves up a reflexive revival of the diluted and nigh-dead slasher subgenre. With Scream, he reinvigorated the conventions of horror even as he simultaneously skewered and savored them.

The Disquiet Man

In counterpoint to the sound and fury that signals summer’s end, Dutch director Anton Corbijn serves up a quiet meditation on the loneliness of vocational murder in The American. If The Expendables is a callback to 1980s muscle-man pics, and…

Everything old…

Never let it be said that Sylvester Stallone doesn’t know his audience. After railing against the ascent of what he calls “velcro muscles” that he claims have defined action movie stars in the last two decades, Stallone resurrects the big-muscle…

How Acronyms Ruin Movies (HARM)

You can blame the Internet. You can blame cell phone texting. You can blame email. Thanks a lot, king of the world I blame James Cameron. Once upon a time, Mr. Cameron made a little film called Terminator 2: Judgment…