A Vintage Horror Trio
by Kristin Battestella
Step back in time to the retro decades
of yore for this classic trio of steamy slashers, epidemics run amok,
and high school old school horrors.
Peeping Tom – Director
Michael Powell's (The Red
Shoes) initially colorful,
pleasant mid century movie soon switches to reel perspectives,
stocking seams, and ladies of the night for a 1960 two quid bargain.
The camera cuts away from the unseen weapon only for our voyeur to
replay the black and white action – creating a snuff film meets
noir mood as our unassuming photographer Carl Boehm (Sissi)
films police at the crime scene and claims to be from The Observer
Newspaper. He moves closer rather than zooming in and wipes the sweat
from his brow as he watches. His materials are hidden in his secret
dark room, but the seedy fishnets, corsets, near nudity peeks, and
cheeky dialogue are risque for the time without really showing the
audience anything super saucy. Retro film sounds, old fashioned
cameras, picture plates, clapper boards, large spotlights, and red
lighting emphasis the illusion as our polite killer offers a guest
milk before filming her watching his childhood movies – bizarre
pictures made by his extreme scientist father in a study of fear. He
describes his constant reliving of past trauma as sequences,
successors, out of focus, and for the camera in meta before meta was
Inception parallels
as the audience tries to separate the repeated outtakes, set within a
set, and redhead lookalikes. Coaxed stand ins doing an audition
become photographing you photographing me ruses, with the
orchestrated life imitating art captured on camera as simmering
murder pieces wink at the nature of cinema itself. The orchestrated
impalements and elaborate trickery, however, are not without dark
humor, as newsstand pornography schemes and bodies on set add to the
morbid fascination – our stalker knows he's being tailed by police
who know they are being watched. This topsy turvy mirroring, layered
voyeurism psychology, and potential therapy cures bridge the horror
genre between Psycho
and Mario Bava's giallo flair. The stylish suggestion remains
sophisticated, and that may seem ironically tame in our era of
scandal as status quo. We live in an open curtain social media glass
house for all the world to view how we turn the lens on ourselves,
but this is just a film isn't it? This unobjective camera making his
masterpiece and our subjective interpretation of seeing that fear
accomplished is worthy of repeated viewings and carefully study
indeed.
Prom Night – Talk about kids being cruel! Morbid child's play
leads to deadly chases in this 1980 slasher – complete with one
brat making the others swear to never tell, pathetic still seventies
dudes, ugly vans a rockin', station wagons, transistor radios,
drive-ins, and obscene phone calls. Remember those? Although a few
silly voiceovers could just be said out loud and some of the intercut
flashes dump information in a quick reset, we know who is who for
this eponymous anniversary vengeance. Six years later the killer has
the names on his list and he's checking them twice amid whispers of
neighborhood sex offenders, creepy janitors, and mirrored innuendo.
There's terrible matching stripes, flared bell bottoms, knee socks,
feathered hair, and side ponytails, too – not to mention escaped
mental patients and a fatherly cop not telling the locals what's
afoot. This all must seem like Halloween deja vu for
twenty-two year old high schooler Jamie Lee Curtis! Disco ball glows
and red lights add flair, and there's a sardonic humor with principal
dad Leslie Nielsen (The Naked Gun) so awkward on the lit up
floor before the big dance off, oh yeah. If there was going to be a
Saturday Night Fever nod,
they could have at least sprung for Bee Gees music instead of generic
disco that's honestly a little late. The prom king and queen
ruses are i.e. Carrie as
well, however these snob teens deserve what's coming to them. How can
a guy say he loves a girl when he helped kill her sister? We may
laugh at some of the sagging datedness or bemusingly preposterous –
violence in the gym showers and nobody in the school gives a hoot?
However, a lot of horror movies and teen flicks are still using these
borrowed staples. There's a sense of small town swept under the rug
paralleling the prom and sex calm as the ominous school
hallways escalate to bloodied virgins in white dresses, lengthy slice
and dice chases, rolling heads, light show disasters, and fiery
vehicle attacks. This isn't super gory and there's no groundbreaking
horror effects, but the well filmed checklist vignettes and shrewd
cut corners editing build suspense alongside the red herrings and
obvious killer guessing game. This isn't super intellectual on the
mentality of the killer or the full psychology of the crimes, either,
but the misunderstood whys and psychosis seeds suggested continue the
conversation long after everything plays out right on the dance floor
with a power ballad topper.
Rabid
– Vintage
motorcycles, wild car crashes, and explosive accidents open this
1977 outbreaker written and directed by David Cronenberg (Eastern
Promises).
Good thing that radical
plastic surgery clinic is nearby with its old school ambulance, retro
medical equipment, and rotary phones! Life saving surgery is the
perfect opportunity for experimental skin graphs, morphing tissues,
and prophetic talk of neutral cells as in the embryo here at the
beginning of the AIDS epidemic. Gore, striking reds, and blood
against clean white mar the vain facade of cosmetic bandages, white
gloves, mirror obsessions, and beautiful patients. Of course, there's
nudity – it wouldn't be a Marilyn Chambers (Behind
the Green Door) movie if
there weren't boobs. Unfortunately, the naked woman is after the warm
man for sinister reasons, escaping in the rainy night for some animal
horrors and icky vomiting. This unnerving experiment was done to our
Rose, making her sympathetically trapped by her condition and aware
she is becoming a seductive predator attacking her men and women prey
be it in the hot tub or at the adult theater. She does indeed have a
new vaginal like orifice in her armpit with a phallic looking thorn,
and there are consequences to this reverse woman queen bee with a
penetrating stinger and the appetite to use it. The doctors think
this is nothing that can't be fixed, but the titular anarchy and on
the road ghoulish quickly spreads – reminding us why the term
“viral” really isn't a good thing. Quarantines and pursuing
authorities can't keep track of the infected on the loose expanding
to the big city and congested subways. The zombie twists move fast
without major spectacle for a surprisingly realistic turn of events
with martial law, failed vaccinations, I.D. badges as proof of
health, babies in danger, and hazard crews on the streets like
regular trash trucks. Mall shootouts at Christmas, ineffectual
medicine protocol, and governments desperately trying to keep control
add to the jaded irony for today's viewer. We know this won't end
well, and that's the most frightening thing of all.
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