The Science Fiction Horror and Fantasy Film Review
This refers to films that are made to highlight makeup effects. That is to say films featuring physical transformations, Splatter and Gore and unique methods of dismemberment, icky meltdowns, physical creature effects and other forms of bodily transformation.
The Planet of the Apes films and The Exorcist (1973) led to a fascination with their effects. The late 1970s/early 80s brought a cluster of films beginning with Dawn of the Dead (1978) and Friday the 13th (1980) that highlighted a series of unique and protracted methods of despatch and these caught on with horror audiences of the day.
There was also the Air Bladder Transformation fad of the early 1980s begun with The Howling (1981) and An American Werewolf in London (1981) where we saw characters transform into werewolves in minute detail. Other films depicting similar transformations followed.
Horror magazines of the day, in particular Fangoria, treated makeup effects artists such as Tom Savini, Rick Baker, Rob Bottin, Tom Burman, Dick Smith, Stan Winston and Greg Cannom as superstars. The cult popularity of these artists became such that their names could be promoted on the poster of a film, while a number of makeup effects artists were even able to make their own directorial debuts.
The genre had largely died down by the 2000s where the replacement of physical transformations with more cheaply produced digital transformations and CGI gore has become the industry standard. Despite this, there are still a number of exceptions that rely on old-school effects.
Slick well made film that successfully transplants the vampire to modern suburbia. Made with a top-drawer arsenal of effects, including taking a leaf from An American Werewolf in London and showing a detailed man into bat transformation
Sequel to Fright Night, this basically rehashes what went before but introduces Jerry Dandridge’s sister. This does come with the benefit of some way-out stylistic effects from director Tommy Lee Wallace
After the cult success of Re-Animator, Stuart Gordon, Jeffrey Combs and most of the principals returned with a further H.P. Lovecraft adaptation. More outrageously over-the-top splatter effects but this is somewhat the lesser
Brian De Palma returns to psychic powers themes in this successor to Carrie, but this is a much more sprawling and often incoherent narrative with only occasional moments of De Palma’s directorial flourish
Made in the aftermath of The Lawnmower Man, this utterly ridiculous film has a serial killer uploaded to the internet. Written by people who know nothing about computers and filled with absurdly over-the-top effects
The fourth and final of the Ghoulies films. This one comes from B-budget hack Jim Wynorski who seems to not be taking any of the show seriously
A copy of Gremlins produced by Charles Band’s Empire, featuring much slime and cheap-looking creatures. A surprise hit on video shelves; three sequels followed.
Film about a series of gory deaths at a bowling alley, this really pushes an envelope of good taste. This gained attention for makeup effects artist Ryan Nicholson and was the cause of much censorship controversy
After being hired by The Thing remake and having his work replaced by CGI, makeup effects artist Alec Gillis made his own homage. With modest resources, he does a far better job of capturing the outlandishness of the original
A low-budget film about a university hazing in a haunted house that goes wrong. This overspills with genre tropes to eventually arrive at an appealing ridiculousness
The first of the Hellraiser sequels. This lacks Clive Barker’s original dark obsessive vision but is worthwhile in its own right, expanding the scope of the story out into a magnificent vision of Hell
Typical 1990s video release with mad scientist John Saxon creating zombie experiments amid entertainingly gooey meltdowns and a title intended to make you think this is a Hellraiser film
Unrelated in any way to the slasher film Prom Night, this plants tongue in cheek as it tries to imitate the A Nightmare on Elm Street films in its story of a vengeful undead prom queen
The Hellraiser sequels begin their descent to mediocrity. Clive Barker’s original vision of dark, forbidden pleasures has been watered down and the Cenobites become little more than campy variations on Freddy Krueger
The film that put the name of Clive Barker on the map. A work of considerable imagination where Barker delves into forbidden pleasures and fuses the film with S&M imagery for the memorable creations of the Cenobites
Sequel to the 2006 remake of Wes Craven’s Backwoods Brutality classic (not to be confused with the sequel that Craven made to his original), this is premised around a series of extremely gory set-pieces
Wes Craven’s Backwoods Brutality classic gets a gore-drenched makeover from Alexandre Aja. One of the better amid the 2000s fad for horror remakes where the original is dragged into the modern day in some interesting ways
Routine executed killer comes back from the electric chair film made to exploit the success of Wes Craven’s Shocker. In some places this was sold as another of the House films
The film that put the term Torture Porn on the map. Eli Roth determines to push boundaries with one of the most brutal films ever seen in mainstream release in the tale of tourists made prisoners at an East European hostel for paying clients to torture
Eli Roth’s sequel to his earlier hit, this emerges as a pallid copy of its predecessor, having merely changed the sexes of the protagonists and lacking the original’s gut-churning impact
Third in the Hostel series, an indifferent piece of formula hackwork minus Eli Roth where suspension of disbelief is constantly being disrupted by absurdly contrived scenes
Amiably silly haunted house film with William Katt fighting rubbery pop-up monsters. This doesn’t take itself too seriously. A minor hit that produced three sequels.
The first sequel to House, this is largely unrelated to its predecessor and plays itself with a sense of humour to emerge as the superior film. Now a skull opens doorways in the house into different eras
Despite borrowing the title, this has the no connection to the 1953 film with Vincent Price as a mad waxworks curator and is a modern slasher film. Nevertheless, director Jaume Collet-Serra does come up with some very inventive dispatches
The film that made the name of Joe Dante who fills it with a barrage of werewolf movie references and in-jokes. The film’s reputation rests on an amazing mid-film effects sequence where a man transforms into a wolf
The first of a string of bad follow-ups to Joe Dante’s classic. Sybil Danning plays the werewolf queen and displays her impressive chest measurements, while Christopher Lee was somehow persuaded to appear
The Howling was a witty and genre savvy werewolf film; this is one of several all-terrible sequels. The plot tiresomely rehashes the first film and the only point of note are the variably effective wolf transformation effects
A rather interesting horror film in which both the heroine and the heroine of the story she is reading are stalked by a disfigured madman, as the boundary between fiction and reality begins to dissolve
One of the key films upon which the Takashi Miike cult is based. Miike takes a nominal Yakuza plot based on a manga where he pushes the sadism and ultra-violence to a mind-boggling extreme
In one of his last really good films, John Carpenter pays homage to H.P. Lovecraft in this horror film that becomes an amazing blurring of the line between reality and fiction
Throwback to 1950s films like The Quatermass Xperiment with Alex Rebar as an astronaut infected with a condition that causes his flesh to melt. A B movie boosted by great melting effects from Rick Baker
From regular horror director Brian Yuzna, a sequel to the Christmas slasher films series. This is quite possibly not only the weirdest Christmas film ever made but the weirdest Christmas horror film ever made
John Landis sets out to do for the vampire film what he did with the werewolf film in An American Werewolf in London, giving us Anne Parillaud as a vampire who preys on Mafia
The second film adaptation of the H.G. Wells novel following The Island of Lost Souls. This has remade with a decent budget but the story’s primal charge has been cleaned up
A legendary cinematic train wreck filled with behind the scenes stories of fired directors and star egos. Despite all of this, this remake of the H.G. Wells novel emerges as a well made and watchable film
Jack Frost, not to be confused with the Michael Keaton film of the same name, was an amusing horror comedy about a killer mutant snowman. This is a sequel that takes Jack to a beach resort in Hawaii
A film about a killer snowman. Conceived as a one-liner spouting villain and outfitted with a series of novelty Christmas-themed deaths, this does not take itself too seriously with rather appealing results
The ninth of the Friday the 13th films and the most variant and fun of the series. This cheerfully turns expectations on their head and readily punctures the series cliches
The sixth and one of the better Friday the 13th films. This time the usual formula of the series is conducted with an undeniable sense of humour
The tenth Friday the 13th film. This tries to add novelty as Jason is thawed out in the future aboard a space station to slaughter anew. Featuring no less than David Cronenberg as a victim
A giddy madcap, frequently over-the-top and entirely ridiculous Spanish film in which Melinda Clarke’s tongue is possessed by an alien whereupon the tongue starts killing people
1980s makeup effects vehicle with students uncovering mad science experiments in an old house. The effects get the better of the cast, most notedly a horrendously over-acting Rod Steiger
Hilariously nonsensical horror film with Joanna Pacula as a sinister aunt. The plot throws in laughable novelty effects, including a killer cat, absurdly overwrought symbolism and some voodoo rationale
Obscure work of 1980s horror that involves a group of teens deciding to party in a museum and being slaughtered in a variety of ridiculous ways after an antique lamp is opened
A crazed Evil Dead-styled film directed by sf/horror writer S.P. Somtow about modern-day Aztec sacrifices, this makes a beeline for bizarrely over-the-top gore effects
An absurd film where angels conduct a war on Earth, which comes amid much in the way of gunfire and creature effects. Directed by a former visual effects supervisor.
The first in the popular series of films starring Warwick Davis as a malevolent leprechaun. Fairly cheesy and silly, mostly known today for featuring a pre-Friends Jennifer Aniston
The second in the Leprechaun series with Warwick Davis delivering a series of extremely silly novelty deaths accompanied by excruciating one-liners
Third in the series takes Warwick Davis’s Leprechaun to Las Vegas for a series of novelty deaths that have silliness that frequently defies belief
Fifth film in the series starring Warwick Davis as a malevolent leprechaun dispatching bizarre novelty deaths. In a bizarre novelty twist, this sets the leprechaun loose in the world of rap
Leprechaun was a hit of the VHS era. This, the eighth of the films, was made to celebrate the series’ 25th anniversary and contains many tributes to the original
Tobe Hooper’s space vampires film wildly divides audiences and was a flop for Cannon Films. You have to applaud its ambitious conceptual grasp even if it bites off more wild ideas than it is ever capable of coherently presenting
Third of The Howling films where director Philippe Mora travels to Australia to show us marsupial werewolves. A conceptually wild mix that fails abysmally due to cheap effects and Mora not taking things seriously
A B-budgeted hit from the video era concerning a possessed housewife. This is a film that has only ever been construed around the provision of cheap makeup effects at regular intervals, all of which hold an undeniable entertainment value in their cheesy ridiculousness
A sequel to Meatball Machine, the film that started the gonzo Japanese splatter genre, filled with wild mutations, over-the-top splatter, a surreal sense of humour and an obsession with schoolgirls in panties
An Italian exploitation film intended to take advantage of the 80s makeup effects revolution of the day as a scientist injects himself with an untested serum and transforms into a monster
This was the second film from Guillermo Del Toro, a modest and quite good Alien copy with Mira Sorvino hunting evolved insects in the New York subway tunnels
This was the first of two sequels to Guillermo Del Toro’s intelligent insect film Mimic, although this has now becomes more of a regular and unexceptional monster movie
Homage to David Cronenberg’s Scanners, albeit produced on an even cheaper budget than any of the sequels. Where the film almost redeems itself is when it goes to town with the various head-exploding effects
A ridiculously stupid giant bug film, albeit not unentertainingly so. This is a monster movie that has been premised solely on the provision of ridiculous creature effects every few minutes and very little else that one can take seriously beyond that
Anthology of three H.P. Lovecraft tales from directors Christophe Gans, Brian Yuzna and Shusuke Kaneko. For claiming such a quintessentially Lovecraftian title as this, you feel that it should have been more than it is
Very typical 1980s horror film steeped in an enthusiasm for the genre that makes a beeline for cheesy mutant monster effects
Film about a zombie-creating sexually transmitted disease that feels like it was made by a bunch of drunken adolescents trying to out-gross each other after an all-weekend beer party. A film that is readily ventures into bad taste and is prepared to offend
Sequel to a film that few people remember, this is all campy one-liners and gory set-pieces conducted with a silliness that boggles the mind
Another pointless remake of an 80s horror film. The original was a cheap Evil Dead ripoff driven by cheesy effects; this provides more professional effects but only becomes a slickly produced assemblage of cliches we have seen dozens of times before
Film concerning a warlock resurrected in the body of a scarecrow seeking revenge. This is conceived around a series of novelty makeup effects but director Jeff Burr treats the material seriously and with reasonable results
The second directorial film from Clive Barker is a hugely ambitious work concerning the discovery of a city of monsters – containing some extraordinary makeup creations – but proved a box-office flop
The point where Robert Englund’s Freddy went from a boogeyman into the equivalent of Wile E. Coyote, popping up like a malevolent jack-in-a-box to quip a one-liner and dispatch victims
Fourth of the A Nightmare on Elm Street films. Under Renny Harlin’s hand, the unworldly atmosphere of Wes Craven’s original is replaced by moments of incredible silliness
The first and worst of the A Nightmare on Elm Street sequels. The dream logic becomes incoherent, while the film is twisted out of shape to become a bizarre gay Coming Out parable
The fifth of the A Nightmare on Elm Street films offers up the same old thing but director Stephen Hopkins enters at an inspired level that transforms the set-pieces with a genuine weirdness
Riding on his fame as Freddy Krueger in the Elm Street films, actor Robert Englund made his directorial debut here but the film is lumbered with the lame concept of a demonic phone line
A sequel to 976-Evil, Robert Englund’s directorial debut about a demonic phone line. This is an almost entirely unrelated work that is now about a killer with astral projection powers
From cult director Roberta Findlay, this is a film about a haunted ouija board. What is going on doesn’t make a lot of sense but Findlay serves up a series of bizarre deaths that prove entertainingly absurd
The great and underrated Steven Kostanski makes another of his homages to the 1980s VHS era. This has a winning concept where kids befriend an intergalactic dark lord
Low-budget directorial effort from a makeup effects artist about a parasitic creature loose in a nightclub after hours
On the back of popularity of the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical and the Elm Street films, Robert Englund was cast in this version where the emphasis is on the slasher element, which works far better than you might think
Dario Argento takes on The Phantom and welcomely rescues it from musical romance and returns it to being a horror film. Despite a beautifully mounted production, Julian Sands’ Phantom is too weak and wimpy
One of the best and most underrated Dean R. Koontz adaptations, which creates eerie atmosphere out a town where the residents have disappeared due to what is revealed as a uniquely different creature
Another in the fad for 70s/80s remakes where Alexandre Aja for once captures the spirit of Joe Dante’s 1978 original by planting tongue in cheek and wading in with mind-bogglingly gory enthusiasm
Sequel to the Piranha remake. Much the same as before but up one cup size. Well not really, the sequel is more like a joke that was funny the first time that becomes belaboured in the retelling
Robert Rodriguez’s half of the Grindhouse double-bill where Rodriguez makes an hilariously tongue-in-cheek zombie film with great absurd comic energy and packed with witty cameos from various stars
Typical 1990s video-released effort that stands out by dint of a far-out idea – a cyborg werewolf – even if in the end the film does nothing with it and everything only boils down to a standard monster movie that takes everything from the Alien playbook
Makeup effects artist Stan Winston takes the director’s chair and creates one of the truly original monsters of the 1980s. Several sequels followed
One of the more likeable among the 2000s fad for low-budget CGI monster movies, this is aided considerably by a sense of humour and a line-up of oddball characters
Early Clive Barker adaptation made just prior to his gaining fame with Hellraiser about a the revival of a monstrous pagan pagan that suffers from shabby treatment and a rubbery monster
This was one of the classic 1980s splatter films. Stuart Gordon throws most of H.P. Lovecraft’s tone out the window and goes for hilariously black comedy served up with outrageously over-the-top effects
A film about a possessed refrigerator!
This is essentially a 1940s mad scientist film having been given a workover with an arsenal of gory and gooey 1980s makeup effects. The plot concerns an aging movie star who obtains a rejuvenation serum
This is a copy of Alien with a monster hunting people through darkened corridors and is generic in all regards, although you have to admit that Stan Winston creates an original monster and the film generates reasonable suspense
Alien scripter Dan O’Bannon jumps aboard the 80s/early 90s fad for H.P. Lovecraft adaptations is this directorial outing that eventually develops quite reasonable effect
Wes Craven’s adaptation of DC’s Swamp Thing was not a very good film. This sequel has been handed over to prolific B-budget hack Jim Wynorski who shows he is unable to take any of it seriously
Spinoff of Night of the Living Dead that emerged from a complicated copyright split with George Romero. Director Dan O’Bannon substitutes black humour to deliver an hilariously different take
Brian Yuzna’s entry is the only worthwhile effort among the sequels to Dan O’Bannon’s Return of the Living Deadwhere Yuzna adds an original plot about a zombie girlfriend and the film is spiked with perverse imagery
Shabbily made hanger-on to the 00s zombie fad that would have gained zero attention without its pedigree name. This completely misses the black humour of the original
Dan O’Bannon’s Return of the Living Dead came with a cheerfully black cynicism that was a wonderfully fresh alternative to George Romero amid the 1980s zombie fad – this sequel has a painfully unfunny lameness that could not sit at more removed extreme to that
Silent Hill was one of the best videogame film adaptations and created a genuinely uncanny atmosphere. That film’s director returns to the franchise here with more of the same but misses the mark
A British entry in the 1980s splatter comedy. An aimless comedy about idiotic hayseed yokels with occasional moments of bloodletting and a half-human, half-goat creature running about
Third of the sequels to Scanners, this stars Daniel Quinn as a police officer who discovers scanner abilities
The fourth and last of a series of low-budget sequels to David Cronenberg’s Scanners, also the worst of the bunch featuring a series of absurd head-exploding effects