Tag Archives: 1970’s

#320- Don’t Look Now

Quick recap: After losing his daughter in a drowning accident, John starts to have visions which may or may not be trying to warn him of danger.

A big fat nope that scene was

Fun (?) fact: Julie Christie ( who plays Laura) and Donald Sutherland ( who plays John), had never met before shooting the film and the first scene they did was the infamous sex scene.

Look it up yourself if you are dying to see this man naked

My thoughts: Although my primary goal in Horrorfest is to work my way through the list, my secondary goal is find something terrifying. Save for some recent horror films ( shout out to It for still giving me nightmares in my 3os), I haven’t found much in this book that really got to me. Don’t Look Now was supposed to be that film. Real life situations scare me (versus monster movies) but those involving dead children go straight to the top of my list.

I want to go ahead and mention that there is a twist of sorts at some point in the movie and though the film is over 40 years old, I don’t want to spoil it for anyone who might want to watch it. I knew what was going to happen thanks to gifs I’ve seen and I think that took away from the horror a bit. There were still a few creepy scenes though, that got me going. I posted one above that occurred within the first 10 minutes of the film and I thought was a great way to portray the death. There are several parts of the film that are like this: utterly creepy without overdoing it. Many refer to Don’t Look Now as ‘gothic horror’ and I tend to agree with the label. There aren’t any things that jump out or do anything horrifying. It’s more of a sense of dread throughout the movie and a reticence to find what might happen next.

Overall, though, this movie just didn’t do much for me. Maybe it was the slow moving plot, the droning on and on about the same things, the weird sex scene, or maybe it was just that I couldn’t keep this gif of Donald Sutherland out of my head:

Whatever it is that did it, I’m disappointed. After doing some research I have a better appreciation for what the film did and I especially love all the symbolism. The fact that so many well known people love this movie also speaks to its greatness, but it just wasn’t my cup of tea.

Final review: 2/5

Up next: one more movie left in Horrorfest!

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#319- Young Frankenstein

Quick recap: Young Frankenstein is nothing like his grandfather, until he becomes him completely.

Fun (?) fact: Steven Tyler, of the band Aerosmith, wrote ‘Walk this Way’ after watching a screening of the film.

My thoughts: After my experience with Blazing Saddles, I was a little weary going into Young Frankenstein. I think Mel Brooks does great work and I can see how his gags are considered funny, but it’s just not the humor for me. However, I already have a director beef with Robert Altman so I think I need to tone down my feuds a little. Bill Paxton can remain, however. He may have passed on but I still wish I could’ve punched him in his face just one time.

Young Frankenstein was a family viewing event because my husband assured me it was totally appropriate for children. Like, squeaky clean entertainment. Considering he said the same thing about the Hamilton soundtrack, I should’ve known better. Thankfully, almost every innuendo went over our kid’s head, except for the last scene with Inga in bed and she starts singing. That was a fun one to tiptoe around. Anyway, I think my son mostly enjoyed the film, although later he admitted that he didn’t find it as funny as we had built it up to be. I agreed with him because gags just aren’t really my thing, although this is just personal preference. Honestly, my lack of love for this film comes down to the Princess Bride effect, something I just this second made up. The Effect is that had I watched this movie when I was younger, I would’ve embraced it completely but since I’m seeing it as an adult, I am only meh.

All that being said, I loved the concept for the movie and it makes me long for more like it. The humor was clever, although overwhelming at times with jokes being lobbed left and right. And of course Gene Wilder was wonderful. If anything, this list has taught me to appreciate his work even more than I did before.

Final review: 4/5

Up next: Hopefully more Horrorfest!

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#314- Grease

Quick recap: A movie made in the 70s, set in the 50s about a bunch of 18 year olds played by 30 year olds. And there is a lot of singing.

wrong grease, but best Simpsons episode

Fun (?) fact: Because everything has to be a conspiracy now, someone from Tumblr theorized that Sandy had a near drowning experience on the beach at the beginning of the movie and the resulting scenes are all hallucinations, ending with the ascent into the sky.

My thoughts: Look, I don’t HATE Grease. Hate is such a strong word. And you could even say I mildly enjoyed it this time, compared to when I watch it in high school (strange, I know). But it definitely didn’t endear itself to me by any stretch of the imagination and I’ll be perfectly satisfied if I never have to watch it again.

When I watched Grease the first time around, I originally disliked it because everyone else loved it, kind of like my feelings toward Amelie. Not that I’m all that well versed on musicals, mind you, but Grease is still beginner level to me. This time around, I couldn’t really find anything that stood out as the reason to dislike the movie, except for Olivia Newton-John. My money was on hating John Travolta, but he grew on me, and I daresay I even liked him by the end. But Sandy? Nope. She was too goody-goody, but even worse, she played it up so the audience would think she was just sweet. That doesn’t work when you are already 30, though. Olivia Newton-John and her character were just trying too hard and it annoyed me. The other characters annoyed me as well, except maybe Frenchie, whom I was rather fond of.

The music was catchy enough, but I was surprised that it didn’t stick in my head the next day. I’m the kind of person who gets songs stuck in my head often. Hell, I wake up every morning with the Double Mint jingle running through my head so you’d think Summer Nights would get in there at some point, but no. I really did enjoy the numbers as well as the dancing but for whatever reason, it just didn’t do anything for me. As mentioned before, everything just annoyed me. It was like everyone really wanted to capture the ‘real’ high school experience in the least real way possible. I can say I’ve evolved to no longer outright disliking the movie, but it will forever be a ‘meh’ in my book.

Final review: 3/5

Up next: the Ice Storm

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#296- Blazing Saddles

Quick recap: A politician is out to destroy a western town so that he can take over their land. He sends them the scariest thing he can think of- a  black guy.

Biden always knew how to cheer Obama up

Fun (?) fact: At the end of the movie, when the crowd pours out of the studio lot, a random guy in a sweater can be seen just standing there. He wasn’t supposed to be in the movie but director Mel Brooks couldn’t get him to leave. He finally gave up, gave the man a waiver to sign and let him stay.

and there’s Trump and Bannon. god, this movie is more topical than I realized

My thoughts: You know what kinds of movies I hate reviewing? Classics. And do you know what is even worse than a classic movie? A comedy classic, which Blazing Saddles definitely is. Add to that the untimely death of Gene Wilder and you’ve got the perfect combination of a film I wouldn’t touch with a 10 foot pole.

So, since I went ahead and lowered expectations for this review accordingly, I can freely say that I didn’t think Blazing Saddles was all that funny. I’m not really sure why. I sound so old saying this but I just don’t think vulgarity for the sake of vulgarity is all that funny. There’s that one scene when Hedley gets so excited he starts humping a statue and I’m sure people fell out of their seats when they saw that, but it just didn’t do anything for me. Trying not to sound too much like a school marm, I will say that the dialogue was snappy and there were some silly moments that made me smile. Not laugh,mind you, but smile. Also, Gene Wilder was wonderful.

I think some of my hesitation from this movie comes from all the racist stuff. I know it’s supposed to be satire but that’s kind of become a big deal again lately and seeing a bunch of white people hating a black guy just wasn’t the humor I wanted. It hit too close to home. It’s not like I can look at those scenes and laugh and think, ‘oh those silly people back then in the west. They were so backwards!’ because that’s literally what’s going on in this country right now. Not everyone, of course, but enough that watching Blazing Saddles just made me uncomfortable. That’s certainly not Mel Brook’s fault and if anything, I applaud him for thinking that we’d be able to watch this movie in 2017 and look at how silly everyone was.

Final review: 3/5. Sorry

Up next: A Night at the Opera

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