What would your vote be for most horrific film ever?
Some might mention the charming snuff/baby-rape/necrophilia of A Serbian Film. Others would baulk at the thought of Tom Six’s Human Centipede 2, with its barbed wire penetration a particularly traumatic memory. Still, the smart money, as far as this reviewer’s concerned, is with Kill Keith, Swap Shop star Keith Chegwin’s cinematic debut.
Examine, if you will, the evidence. A new, ultra low-budget take on the Shaun of the Dead vein of romantic horror comedy, Kill Keith sees Cheggers play a fictionalized version of himself who chooses to eliminate his daytime TV rivals, including Joe Pasquale, Russell Grant and Tony Blackburn, to boost his career. Though this downright bizarre curiosity wins in terms of originality (there’s surely nothing else quite like this), the joke doesn’t quite last long enough to save Kill Keith from the scrapheap.
Speaking of comebacks (tenuous link alert), this month sees a timely first DVD release of Stephen King’s early nineties TV movie semi-classic Sometimes They Come Back. Telling the tale of demonic bikers who have come back from the dead to haunt horror stalwart Tim Matheson, this tale of little America with big problems ticks all the standard King boxes but is well worth a glance.
Undead bikers again pop up in Michele Soavi’s downright odd (yes, even odder than Kill Keith) Dellamorte Dellamore, A.K.A The Cemetery Man.
Starring a young Rupert Everett, continuing the great tradition of British stars cast in Italian gorefests, The Church director Soavi’s film bridges the gap between zombie pic, epic romance and slapstick comedy. With Everett as a young cemetery manager tasked with killing his clients again before they come back to life, this wacky, avant-garde eccentricity is either brilliantly obscure or proof that it’s not cool to be weird. You decide.
Sticking with this month’s theme of silliness, Douglas McKeown’s 1983 homage to ‘50s B-movies, The Deadly Spawn, takes a thoroughly unexpected bow on DVD. Ultimately, it’s unclear whether or not this film is intentionally rubbish or just plain bad.
Still, it’s obvious McKeown had affection for his subject matter (penis-like alien leeches take over a basement) and with some lovingly crafted effects worthy of Little Shop of Horrors’ Audrey II, The Deadly Spawn has the old-fashioned charm Maniac Cop, also out this month, lacks.
William Lustig’s 1988 horror, about a cop returned from the dead (a maniac, no less), to the eyes of an impressionable kid seemed like the coolest film you couldn’t see. Viewing as an adult, you see a dull supernatural killing spree (those words really shouldn’t go together) that somehow manages to waste the talents of Bruce Campbell, Richard Roundtree and even John Carpenter favourite Tom Atkins. No mean feat.
Bringing us back down to earth, we have the understated A Horrible Way to Die. Adam Wingard’s film follows a young alcoholic woman fleeing her ex-boyfriend, a notorious serial killer, who has inconveniently just skipped prison. A mix of Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer and more standard slasher flicks, such as Mattias Olof Ek’s unbearably generic Deliverance-with-girls Break (also out this month; don’t watch), AJ Bowen is convincing as a morally conflicted murderer in this thoughtful, satisfying take on the genre.
Finally, we end on a high (or more accurately, low), with Urban Explorers, the quality cautionary tale set below Berlin. We all know what happens when a group of pretty young things go somewhere they shouldn’t, don’t we?
Anyway, German director Andy Fetscher taps a rich vein of nasty possibilities in the trend of hipsters investigating derelict buildings. With a striking turn from crazy-faced character actor Klaus Stiglmeier (never has brushing your teeth looked more menacing), Urban Explorers well deserves its numerous awards.
What’s the best horror movie you’ve seen recently? Let us know below…