My favourite horror film. Against an idyllic backdrop of summer camp countryside, Jasons mom exacts bloody revenge on the camp councillors who let her only son drown. The ingenious kills, including an arrow through the neck from under the bed, were designed and executed by legendary make-up artist Tom Savini.
Directed by ‘the Godfather of Gore’, Herschell Gordon Lewis, this tells the story of a proud Southern town settling old scores with unsuspecting North American visitors. They think they’re guests of honour at centenary celebrations of the American civil war yet it’s their own violent deaths which provide the entertainment. Watch out for the ‘barrel roll’ in which one guy is persuaded to lie in a wooden barrel as 9 inch nails are hammered through the sides, it’s then sent hurtling down a hillside!
Unlike many exploitation films around at the time, Maniac attempted to get into the head of its killer rather than present him as a lifeless, zombie-like presence. Joe Spinnel, as the maniac, is a photographer by day and a serial killer by night who has sex with low rent hookers before slowly and graphically scalping them. Like Friday 13th, the special effects in Maniac are handled by Tom Savini and are arguably his best work. Especially gruesome is the moment where the maniac jumps onto the hood of some guys car and, through the windscreen, blows his head apart !
Unrelenting and claustrophobic, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre is an exercise in terror. The lead actress and the films only survivor was cast due to her ability to scream violently for sustained periods and once she’s captured that’s basically all she does. Athough made on an incredibly low budget, the film boasts some of the best sets ever designed (whole interiors created from different animal and human bones) and, in Leatherface, one of the ultimate modern horror icons.
Often cited as the original ‘slasher’ film, Halloween laid out the blueprint for countless inferior imitations. Directed by John Carpenter (who also created the classic score), the film introduces Michael Myers, a psychopathic escapee from a mental institution in which he’s been held since a young child for murder with a carving knife. Lent an air of quality and authority by the casting of Donald Pleasance as the psychiatrist on the trail of Myers, Halloween remains a benchmark horror film.
As movie studios tried to cash in on the slasher craze, British director Kevin Connor was given a relatively big budget to make a no-brain gore fest. Instead he came up with an intelligent black comedy and an unsung classic. Based very loosely on the story of Sweeny Todd, Motel Hell sees Farmer Vince making good money from his ‘special meats’. The films climax presents one of the most remarkable images in horror history as Farmer Vince dons a pigs head and goes on the attack with a chainsaw.
Big budget and at times a little overblown, this is still a great movie. The basic plot involves a US ambassador and his wife whose still born child is switched at birth with the devil incarnate. A few years later he makes his move… Throughout the film there are some genuinely unsettling moments such as the grave of Damiens ‘mother’ being prised open to reveal a decomposed goat, and his birthday party where, in front of loads of little kids eating cake, his nanny jumps from the roof of the house and hangs herself with a dirty rope. Heavy.
Truly bizarre, Phantasm is the tale of Jody, a teenage boy who notices strange goings on at his local mortuary. On further investigation it becomes apparent that beings from another dimension are harvesting humans, shrinking them down to half size and sending them through a portal to work as slaves on some distant red planet. Phantasm is an example of what can be achieved with a small budget and a big imagination.
Another great film by John Carpenter. It opens at night around a glowing campfire where an old sailor is spinning a tale of terror and revenge. As the fog rolls slowly into the bay it brings with it vengeful ghosts, indignant victims of a century old shipwreck who have come for what is rightfully theirs… Beautifully shot and boasting great special effects. Halloween gets all the applause I think The Fog is better.
On a mission to explore the rings of Saturn, an astronaut is contaminated with some weird solar virus which, on his return to Earth, causes his body to slowly melt. Only by eating the flesh of other human beings can he prevent his complete disintegration. With the exception of the stunning, state of the art make-up effects, this may not be the most accomplished movie on the list but it brings back great memories for me and was one of my favourites as a kid.
01. Friday 13th - Director Sean Cunningham
02. Two Thousand Maniacs - Director Herschell G. Lewis
03. Maniac - Director William Lustig
04. Texas Chainsaw Massacre - Director Tobe Hooper
05. Halloween - Director John Carpenter
06. Motel Hell - Director Kevin Connor
07. The Omen - Director Richard Donner
08. Phantasm - Director Don Coscarelli
09. The Fog - Director John Carpenter
10. The Incredible Melting Man - Director William Sachs