kindertrauma

Month: July 2009

The Orphan (2009)

Posted on By unkle lancifer

It's no secret that I love a good killer kid flick but with the exception of TOM SHANKLAND's THE CHILDREN (‘08), they have been pretty scarce of late. Kids do show up often in modern horror but for the most part, they have been hollow-eyed window dressing propped up to utter Cassandra-like warnings or just plain ineffectual, weightless ghouls. It's about damn time somebody stripped the supernatural out of the equation and introduced a killer kid who cuts through the bullshit and gets the job done. The tag line for THE ORPHAN may read "There's something wrong with Esther," but for those thirsty for a new horror icon, there's absolutely nothing wrong with Esther at all.

You might think reading this review on a website called Kindertrauma might mean that I was an easy target for THE ORPHAN and that essentially in my case, the filmmakers were preaching to the converted. There may be some truth to that, but let me say that after learning the film was being delivered by DARK CASTLE ENTERTAINMENT I was cautiously un-optimistic. DARK CASTLE has provided snippets of worthy horror but they usually have a chronic ability to screw up their films by trying way too hard. What should be a straight forward affair usually ends up a convoluted heap of kitchen sink half-thoughts resembling a late in the game KATAMARI DAMACY ball. THE ORPHAN carries little baggage besides a water cooler ready, ace up its sleeve, and it is all the better for it. God bless its adherence to the K.I.S.S. principle (Keep it simple stupid!) and its highly unfashionable patience.

Taking structural cues from domestic disturbance television flicks and early nineties usurper porn (a shout out to my peeps Peyton Flanders and Hedy Carlson!), THE ORPHAN bravely discards the typical pandering bells and whistles (AUNT JOHN SEZ: Do you mean ta-tas?) used to glamour (in the TRUE BLOOD sense) teenage boys and gets right down to some seriously trashy campadelic partying. That it is able to provide actual acting opportunities to its adult cast in the meantime is just that much more impressive. It's by no means a seamless masterpiece, and logic is not so much leaped over as jet-packed over, but there's no way around the fact that you get your money's worth here.

I don't care how much cash this baby hauls in or how many knee jerk, dismissive reviews it accumulates, even if it has to gain its reputation in the home market, I assure you that THE ORPHAN is here to stay, be it by go-to punchline, S.N.L. skit or SIMPSONS TREEHOUSE OF HORROR reference, Esther is going to wedge the heal of her Buster Browns into the public consciousness for good. Even if the general public turns their back there is no way the gays are going to drop this ball. Drag queens, practice your Russian accent, October is only a few months away!

P.S. Commit this name to your memory: ISABELLE FUHRMAN!

UPDATE: A little added incentive to go see THE ORPHAN while it's still in theaters…

Kindertrauma Funhouse

Posted on By unkle lancifer

UNK SEZ: It's Friday and time for a brand spanking new edition of Kindertrauma Funhouse! Here are ten random images from ten horror movies, how many can YOU identify?

Trog

Posted on By aunt john

trog!

Admittedly, your Aunt John has a relatively high tolerance for sub-par films, especially if the movie features an Oscar winning actress at the end stage of a long career, forced to work overseas with a heinous script opposite children, animals, or monsters. Honestly, there's nothing I enjoy more than a train-wreck of a movie, and in theory, I should have fallen crazy in love with director FREDDIE FRANCIS' infamous dud TROG, but sometimes even I have my limits.

trog!

Featuring silver screen legend JOAN CRAWFORD in her last cinematic outing, TROG kicks off with a trio of strapping spelunkers who stumble ass backwards over a pre-historic creature living in subterranean solitude somewhere in the English countryside. The misunderstood monster attacks, the townspeople get all in a tizzy, and an angry mob gathers. Enter respected anthropologist Dr. Braxton (CRAWFORD), who clearly wears the pantsuit in this hamlet. She basically swoops in with her tranquilizer gun, pumps the poorly made-up monster with sleepy-time darts, and then drags it back to her eponymous lab for further study.

trog!

Back at lab, CRAWFORD reminds us how she won that Oscar for MILDRED PIERCE by busting out her trademark, put upon reaction shots followed by bursts of volatile explosiveness when anyone crosses her. Weathering the brunt of hurricane JOAN is the titular Trog, who seems more terrified of CRAWFORD throughout the film than she is of him.

Aside from her occasional howls, CRAWFORD brings little else to the table. The film is set in England, and she can't even muster up the energy to do a British accent. And it's not like it is explained that she is some sort of ex-pat working abroad, for nothing in this movie is even remotely plausible. MICHAEL GOUGH tries to bring friction as the religious yin to CRAWFORD's scientific yang, but even he seems a tad relieved to be done with the film when Trog dispatches with him. The film just meanders along, cutting and pasting a poorly made pastiche of the most boring elements of THE MIRACLE WORKER, INHERIT THE WIND, and FRANKENSTEIN.

trog!

Okay, I take it back about the FRANKENSTEIN scenes where Trog escapes the lab and runs amok in the town flipping cars, murdering shopkeepers, terrorizing small children, and kidnapping a small girl. This montage is straight up hysterical! Sadly, it all comes a little too late to compensate for the insufferable courtroom drama sub-plot where JOAN takes the stand to defend science against religion. If the director had left that hot mess on the cutting room floor, and ramped up the scenes of the beast man going berserk, TROG could have been a B-movie classic instead of pitiful end note to CRAWFORD's cinematic legacy.

Name That Trauma :: Reader Rose J. on Another Raggedy Ann Cameo

Posted on By aunt john

Hi,

Thanks for the help with my last question! I tracked down a copy of A TASTE OF EVIL and it was the movie I was remembering! I thought it was great and I was reminded of another Raggedy Ann scene that stuck in my head, where the doll's eye is hanging by a thread from its face. I don't know if it was part of the opening credits. Apparently there were a number of traumatic scenes involving Raggedy Ann in the '70s? Any clues to this one?

Thanks,

Rose J.

UNK SEZ: I have not a clue on this, but I will state that Raggedy Ann is a menace to society. Did you know that little trouble maker appeared in the very first Kindertrauma post EVER? I say, something about that doll just ain't right. In fact, I found out she has a very traumatic origin story which can be read HERE. Plus, check out THIS GHOST STORY featuring the dreaded R.A. What more evidence do we need that Raggedy Anne is all types of loco?

Kindertrauma Jukeox:: MGMT – Kids

Posted on By unkle lancifer

UNK SEZ: I've been listening to MGMT a bunch in the back yard this summer (where I recently suffered a near fatal kitten attack!), but I had never seen any of their videos. That just changed thanks to my visiting fellow LOTT D blogger Brad's cool site I LOVE HORROR. Thanks Brad, for turning me on to this very kindertraumatic video! Kids, you can visit Brad HERE!

Official Traumatizer :: Reverend Henry Kane

Posted on By unkle lancifer

Isn't it time that the character of Reverend Henry Kane was made an Official Traumatizer? He has been spoken of several times before on these here pages (for example: THIS early traumafession from kinder-pal Ralphus), and he is likely to appear many times again. Not bad considering he owes his existence to one much maligned sequel (POLTERGEIST 2: THE OTHER SIDE) and one even more maligned sequel (POLTERGEIST 3.) Regardless of the end result of either movie, Kane persists and even those who talk smack about POLTERGEIST 2 have to admit that his presence, (especially the scene where he tries to gain entrance to the Freeling's home) is supremely memorable. His staying power is even more impressive when you consider that different actors portrayed the character in each film (JULIAN BECK in PART 2, NATHAN DAVIS in PART 3 with voice assist by an uncredited COREY BURTON.)

Undoubtedly, the more indelible take on Kane is the introductory one provided by poet/painter/theater legend JULIAN BECK in POLTERGEIST 2: THE OTHER SIDE. BECK was suffering from colon cancer during the filming, which might partially explain an authentic aura of illness and decrepitude that hangs over the character. Unfortunately BECK died before the film was completed and Kane's final assault on the Freeling clan was in the form of a special effects driven creature known as "THE BEAST" designed brilliant by H.R. GIGER, but poorly executed within the film. (Check out some of GIGER's amazing work for POLTERGEIST 2 HERE.)

POLTERGEIST 2 may have left some fans disappointed by replacing the original's roller-coaster vibe with a pungent cloud of morbid navel gazing, but it's not without its effective moments. One should not allow its corny "Grandma angel" conclusion to erase the well-orchestrated set pieces involving Kane. The reverend's shopping center overture towards the young Carol Anne (HEATHER O'ROARKE) is, quite simply, every parent's (and every child's for that matter) nightmare.

I've always been a bit confused by the term "interesting failure," if something is interesting then, in my book, it cannot be considered a failure. Take POLTERGEIST 3 for example; sure, it's a hot mess but I can't get enough of it. I know it's about as subtle as a Tourette's sufferer with a bullhorn and more annoying than a local theater production of ANNIE and yet I adore its over the top clumsiness and am fascinated with its physical effects and mirror-play. (Plus director GARY SHERMAN, DEAD AND BURIED, VICE SQUAD, just sort of rules.) Kane's presence here is more of a spectral trickster with the power to alter reality than the evil JIM JONES messiah of PART 2, but he is still a great stand in for the grim reaper and he can still work that hat.

NOTE: The above picture, which inspired this post, was sent by our pal Dave over at the exhaustively informative site POLTERGEIST III. It is from the originally filmed ending of PART 3 (notice a frozen Carol Anne in the background.) Check out Dave's awesome reconstruction of that lost scene HERE.

Reverend Henry Kane's identity as a horror icon was hard won but thanks to repeated television airings of the POLTERGEIST sequels, home video, DVD and the power of the Internet he has gained some pretty secure footing as a titan of terror. He has appeared on an album cover for the band ANTHRAX, made a cameo in the SOUTH PARK episode "Imaginationland" and even shows up to fight in the game MORTAL COMBAT. With his lanky frame, sinister persona and predatory disposition, he is the rightful heir to one point in a horror troika that also includes PHANTASM's TALL MAN and the ever popular FREDDY KRUEGER. His sickly, debilitated appearance gives rise to primal fears of aging and death, while his slithery soft tone and toothy grimace evoke memories of the candy-baiting creepy stranger we were all warned about in our youth. Upping the fear quotient further is the fact that Kane was once a beloved leader of a religious flock who twisted his disciples' faith to cause their own ruin. He represents the unrepentant fanatical zealot, a figure that can partake in evil and never suffer the arrows of self-doubt or feel remorse. He's not evil…YOU are! What's scarier than that?

If you are still not convinced that reverend Kane deserves the honor of "Official Traumatizer" imagine this; your doorbell rings RIGHT NOW, you open your door to find him standing there, smiling from ear to ear. He says, "Let me in." When you say, "No" he screams "You're all gonna die!" I don't know about you but, I just succeeded in creeping myself out. Now THAT'S a Traumatizer!

Traumafessions :: Reader FatherOfTears on Roddy McDowall as Satan

Posted on By aunt john

Well, I grew up knowing the legend RODDY McDOWALL as an ape in the whole PLANET OF THE APES movie series and that short lived T.V. show from the mid '70s. I rarely saw him without makeup. I did see him on a T.V. showing of THE POSEIDON ADVENTURE and I heard his distinct voice in a few cartoons. But asides from that I only knew him as Cornelius and Galen.

Then came his two appearances in FANTASY ISLAND as Satan. Oh boy! VERY creepy! Here I am used to him being the good ape and now he's the scary Devil! Asides from the end sequences of the two episodes he wore no makeup and wore a suit and look VERY convincing! Now, these clips are not out on DVD as of now. The first one is out on YouTube as a "minisode"…

O.K., I would see him again a bit later in LASERBLAST both in its original form and on MST3K, but his Devil was a good scary moment in my early teens!

Kinder-Flix :: Reader Turnidoff Presents DEMON DOLL

Posted on By aunt john

Hi!

I figured you guys might get a kick out of a home movie I did back in 1997 called DEMON DOLL!

I got my eight-year-old daughter to act in it and it's basically your standard "Girl finds doll, doll comes alive and tries to kill girl, girl kills doll with shotgun" type of story.

I don't think it "traumatized" her back then(she seemed pretty bored with her Dad telling her where to move and act) but, it might NOW that it's out in the public and she's 19. I'm so cruel.

Here's part 1:

Here's part 2:

and here's the action packed sequel!:

Kindertrauma Funhouse

Posted on By unkle lancifer


Here are ten random picks from ten different movies. I started out with a theme "local yokels," but I kind of sort of lost my fokels. I mean focus. How many of these ten random images can you identify?

Name That Trauma :: Reader Nicholas L. on a Scarecrow Snitch

Posted on By aunt john

I was very young when I saw this, in fact, I have told many people that it is my first memory ever.

It's a scene where a lady and a man are running from a large group of men. This is taking place in the woods (I think). The man and women come to a clearing and hide behind something. They notice a strange looking scarecrow with one eye and I think the eye is slightly looking at them. When the group after them comes to the clearing they are trying to find out which way the couple went. All of a sudden the scarecrow's eyes open wide and there is a ringing sound. I believe the scarecrow is pointing at the man and woman with both arms. The group sees them and the running continues.

To make everything a little more traumatic the scarecrow's face is very monkey-like. Could be a PLANET OF THE APES variation or something, but I have never been able to find it. I don't know what I'd do if you found it, but I know how amazing you are at finding this stuff.

Thanks for your time and efforts!!

UPDATE: NAME THAT TRAUMA SOLVED! Thanks to Reader Ab-Normal for solving it with LIVE AND LET DIE.