The House That Dripped Blood (1971)

Anthology films are often hit and miss.  Using 90 to 120 minutes to introduce new sets of characters and separate plots leaves a filmmaker - or filmmakers - with very little cinematic canvas to work with and, as a result, a miniscule margin for error.  To further complicate the construction, anthology films often utilize a framing plot to bridge the short films together, eating up further screen time to provide the narrative glue to a diverse set of stories that can, on occasion, embrace a wide range of aesthetic options.  Peter Duffell's The House that Dripped Blood (1971), a British horror anthology produced by Hammer rival Amicus Productions (who also produced anthologies based off of the EC Comics series Tales from the Crypt and Vault of Horror), is no exception to the hit and miss rule.  Yet, it comes in - for the most part - on the winning side of the equation. 

Fright Night (2011)

Tom Holland’s Fright Night (1985) is one of those films I’ve seen bits and pieces of on cable but I’ve never bothered to sit down and watch entirely.  After watching Craig Gillespie’s remake (2011), the cinematic equivalent to the contents of a pumpkin shaped trick or treat pail, I may need to remedy that blind spot.   Fright Night may not be F.W Murnau’s Nosferatu (1922) or Guy Maddin’s Dracula:  Pages from a Virgin’s Diary (2002) when it comes to great vampire movies but it is, like Sam Raimi’s romp Drag Me to Hell (2009), a hell of a funny, scary time. 

The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus (2009)

Terry Gilliam’s The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus (2009) is a difficult film to evaluate. Like Stanley Kubrick’s Eyes Wide Shut (1999) or Orson Welles’s The Magnificent Ambersons (1942), the film contains more than the usual quota of stunning images and inspired sequences. However, like the films by Kubrick and Welles, Gilliam’s is a film that cannot escape the shadow of its production history. As most readers are no doubt aware, Parnassus stands as the last film featuring the talents of the late Heath Ledger. Yet, Ledger’s death occurred before the film was finished shooting and Gilliam was forced to shut down production to contemplate a means of constructing a film without one of his key personnel. Eventually, Gilliam settled on re-casting the part with Ledger’s friends (Johnny Depp, Jude Law, and Colin Farrell) in his role over expensive CGI solutions. Unfortunately, while it was the most cost effective and arguably the most tasteful creative choice Gilliam could have made, the solution costs the film dearly.

Paradise Lost: The Child Murders at Robin Hood Hills (1996)

A week and a half ago, after serving nearly twenty years behind bars, Jessie Misskelley Jr., Jason Baldwin, and Damien Echols – also known as the West Memphis Three (WM3) - were released from prison after entering Alford pleas (a plea which allows the defendants to assert their innocence while acknowledging  the existence of substantial evidence that could be used for a conviction) with the Arkansas court system.  The release of the trio was bittersweet.  On one hand, three men who appear to be innocent are free to walk to the street.  On the other hand, three innocent men were convicted because their interest in Stephen King and Metallica made them different from the bulk of the West Memphis population and they lost almost twenty years of their lives.  Most significantly, the killer or killers behind the murders of three, eight year old boys (Stevie Branch, Michael Moore, and Christopher Byers) have yet to be found. 

Wet Hot American Summer (2001)

The always likable Paul Rudd hits theaters this weekend in Our Idiot Brother (2011) and, in homage, I decided to pop in one of my favorite Rudd comedies:  State member David Wain’s directorial debut Wet Hot American Summer (2001). The film, one of my favorite comedies, was what introduced me to the those cloudy bootlegs and cued my anticipation and interest in Reno 911! (2003-2009), Stella (2005), and the recent series Michael & Michael Have Issues (2009), the latter two series were short lived.  

The Iron Giant (1999)

It has been twelve years since of the release of Brad Bird’s animated feature The Iron Giant (1999). The film, as some of you may know, opened to rave critical reviews and won nine Annie Awards (the animation equivalent of the Academy Awards) yet floundered at the box office, earning only half of its $48 million dollar production budget. The poor box office performance of The Iron Giant, along with the failure of Osmosis Jones (2001) and Looney Tunes: Back in Action (2003), resulted in a scaling back and re-structuring of Warner Brothers Animation. Yet, one company’s loss was another’s gain as one admirer of the film, Bird’s former classmate and computer animation guru John Lasseter, hired Bird to work for Pixar.

The Way of the Gun (2000)

“There is a natural order. The way things are meant to be. An order that says that the good guys always win. That you die when it’s your time, or you have it coming. That the ending is always happy, if only for someone else. Now at some point it became clear to us that our path had been chosen and we had nothing to offer the world … So, we stepped off the path, and went looking for the fortune that we knew was looking for us. Once off the path you do what you can to eat and to keep moving.” — Mr. Parker in The Way of the Gun (2000)