The Silver Screen Oasis

Not a bad movie at all. Quite well acted, especially by Burstyn. But the book is sensational. One of the most exciting shockers I've read.

I saw The Bride of Frankenstein today on American Movie Classics and its so good and quite stunning in visual images, scenery, and its wonderfully scripted as well. It's an enduring legend that came out in 1935. I haven't seen this movie for so long and its brought back memories of why I like these movies so much.

Images of The Bride of Frankenstein ... 1935 Movie

Libby had her friends around today and wanted to watch Frankenstein, unfortunately the monster didn't show up quick enough and they gave up. How fickle are children.

Mom, you should have fast-forwarded the DVD to where the Monster was being raised up through the roof. Aaah kids...they'll never know what they missed. But hopefully your daughter will come back to it.

I'm that way with books. I read every thriller on the market. But I can't sit through Henry James! Don't have the patience.

Given quieter circumstances I think she'll come back to it. they were thrilled to be watching a film older than Grandma, it qualifies as ancient in their minds. I like ancient movies.

A lot of young, female superheroes trick-or-treating last night, with the majority of boys being zombies. In honor of that, last night I re-visited Lucio Fulci's classic Zombie. (The idea of re-watching Supergirl was too horrifying.)

While not for the squeamish, Zombie is one of the best post Romero zombies-eat-people zombie movies. I think it's the only one that pits a zombie vs. a shark (while unclear which wins, clearly the zombie would have if he'd had a hand) and the bare-bones plot provides just enough forward momentum to keep the zombies fed. While Mia's sister, Tisa Farrow is okay, it's really Olga Karlatos you want to keep your eye out for.

[b][u]charliechaplinfan[/u][/b] wrote:Given quieter circumstances I think she'll come back to it. they were thrilled to be watching a film older than Grandma, it qualifies as ancient in their minds. I like ancient movies.

I like ancient films as well Charlie. Hmmm...Think I need Noxzema. (That's an American cold cream product).

MichiganJ wrote:A lot of young, female superheroes trick-or-treating last night, with the majority of boys being zombies. In honor of that, last night I re-visited Lucio Fulci's classic Zombie. (The idea of re-watching Supergirl was too horrifying.)

While not for the squeamish, Zombie is one of the best post Romero zombies-eat-people zombie movies. I think it's the only one that pits a zombie vs. a shark (while unclear which wins, clearly the zombie would have if he'd had a hand) and the bare-bones plot provides just enough forward momentum to keep the zombies fed. While Mia's sister, Tisa Farrow is okay, it's really Olga Karlatos you want to keep your eye out for.

Zombie AKA Zombi 2 was Fulci's biggest moneymaker. With the Giallo genre on the wane in the late seventies, he transitioned to gore (influenced by Argento's Suspiria [1977]) and is probably best known in the U.S. for this film and a handful of others (City of the Dead [1983], The Beyond [1981], House by the Cemetery [1981]). As mentioned, plot is often thin in these films, but Fulci usually provides interesting social perspectives behind the movies, while resolving them in unusual ways that often lead one to say, "I never saw that coming!"

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Zombie vs. shark...So zombies swim? Do they have diving gear? My expertise is more in the area of vampires and their effect on Lincoln's presidency. Zombies and sharks...

I thought I was going to like 28 DAYS LATER. Halfway through the film, it was suspenseful, atmospheric. I was impressed. Then somehow, it just stopped. No more story. No revelation. Just blood. Lots of blood. It was as if the writers walked out in the middle of the show! Perhaps this explains the need for a shark!

RedRiver wrote:Zombie vs. shark...So zombies swim? Do they have diving gear? My expertise is more in the area of vampires and their effect on Lincoln's presidency. Zombies and sharks...

I thought I was going to like 28 DAYS LATER. Halfway through the film, it was suspenseful, atmospheric. I was impressed. Then somehow, it just stopped. No more story. No revelation. Just blood. Lots of blood. It was as if the writers walked out in the middle of the show! Perhaps this explains the need for a shark!

I guess the question every viewer must ask is: Does this film actually have something to say? I'm personally not a fan of explicitly violent, or gory movies, but I'm willing to watch such things if I find substance within them.

RedRiver wrote:Zombie vs. shark...So zombies swim? Do they have diving gear?

This depends on the film's definition of zombie: Is it living or dead?

The zombies in 28 Days Later harken back to the old days of zombie-hood, in that they are living people that are infected. (While early zombie flicks like White Zombie (1932) use hypnosis, those zombies are still living people.) But unlike the zombies of old, the living 28 Days Later zombies also enjoy dining on human flesh, like Romero's Living Dead zombies. The 28 Days zombies have also added considerable speed, which is a relatively new phenomena in zombie-hood.

The zombies in Zombies of Mora-Tau (1957) are resurrected dead sailors, who don't seem particularly hungry but can "live" underwater, so perhaps could have had an off-screen encounter with a shark. Thus, Fulci's zombie, being a resurrected dead, can "live" underwater and fight sharks, while those "alive" zombies in 28 Days later would probably just drown unless they had the diving gear.

Nearly all of the modern zombie films, while gory, offer some interesting analogies to the spread of infectious disease, among lots of other things.

I saw a little of "NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD" during TCM's Hallowe'en fare. I saw the last twenty minutes straight through. (I have seen the movie in its entirety many times before). What an incredibly sad and pessimistic film. I don't know if the actor playing the sheriff was an actor or not...but I do laugh and wait for him to say "Oh, they're all messed up." But seeing the hero live out through the night, making the hard but self-preservational decision to shoot his housemates at the end there, who are now living dead (a great oxymoron) only to be shot in the head himself. Nooooooooo!! The dread Romero drudged up when I see the men coming with rifles. The shot. Being placed on the funeral pyre...the documentary-type footage of the photos at the end of the movie. The photos made me think of Lee Harvey Oswald. It was an incredibly sad ending.

Kudoes to Romero. It's a tough movie for me to watch from the beginning...knowing what the end will be. He has created an imaginative bonafide classic horror film.

Personally, my favorite George Romero film is "Martin," his late Seventies movie about a vampire (or a guy who thinks he is a vampire. The film is ambiguous.) I find the characters far more compelling in that film, especially the grandfather, and the plot holds together better.

MikeBSG wrote:Personally, my favorite George Romero film is "Martin," his late Seventies movie about a vampire (or a guy who thinks he is a vampire. The film is ambiguous.) I find the characters far more compelling in that film, especially the grandfather, and the plot holds together better.

Indeed! I added Martin to the Vampire Films thread recently for many of the same reasons. It's an intriguing movie that can be deciphered in many different ways.