On 10/13/2024 8:21 AM, Ian J. Ball wrote:
On 10/13/24 1:30 AM, Ubiquitous wrote:
What did you watch?
I had to spend much of Saturday doing chores and grading an exam, so all
I got through were soaps, and a horror movie later Saturday night:
soaps:
GH - Wed's & Thur's ep's. I guess it's measure of these ep's that I don't remember much of what happened. Josslyn comes across Lucky after
he trashed the cafe, and lays him out for it, but expresses guilt to Dex later when she realizes that Lucky trashed the place because he can't be Lulu's donor. Molly yells at Anna for not going after Sonny for Cates' murder, and then later comes across Dex and Joss (they are really
hinting at Molly and Dex getting together!). Kristina almost confesses
all to Anna, but Michael stops her. Laura reunites with Lucky. (Zzzzz) Felicia lets Carly know that she's being tailed by a PI.
DOOL - Thur's ep. EJ threatens to charge Sarah with perjury if she withdraws her ID of Brady as the driver who hit her. Eric questions
Fiona, and then goes to confront Sarah, as Eric's basically figured it
out - that Fiona was the driver who hit Sarah, and was drunk at the time.
Haunt (Prime - it's also on The Tubi!!) - A 2019 horror flick starring
Katie Stevens (The Bold Type). I've been meaning to get to this for a
while, and finally got to it last night.
I never realized until this movie that Stevens has so many facial... "imperfections".
Anyway, this was, I thought, surprisingly decent for the "haunted
house attraction turns out to be a *murder* house" subgenre of horror
films (and I have seen more than a few films in this subgenre!). In
fact, I wasn't sure that I hadn't seen this one before, until they went through the tunnels and weren't stabbed through the walls! (that must
have been from one of the "Escape Room"-derivative flicks I have watched!).
Gist: Stevens plays a college gal (I think they specifically ID them
as being Univ. of Southern Ill. students), who of course has a traumatic
past and is pretty antisocial as a result. But she's talked into going
to a Halloween party by her friends (primarily Lauryn McClain), and the friends eventually decide to try the fateful "haunted house" attraction
out in the boonies.
Among the friends is Andrew Caldwell, whom I wasn't expecting to see
in this - I was also surprised that Caldwell hasn't done much since
being the scene-stealer in "The Matrix Resurrections" in 2021.
Anyway, of course, the terrible stuff they are seeing in the
"haunted house" turns out to be real.
Sounds a little like "House of 1000 Corpses."
And then they start getting attacked.
This one is good at building atmosphere and dread, and has a decent enough payoff, esp. for the "final girl" (Stevens).
I also very much liked the ending of this one, which played against type, dispensing with the usual, cliche "hopeless twist" for something
more satisfying.
What did you watch?
I cracked open another 4K box set and watched:
Hellraiser (4K disc) 1987 horror movie written and directed by Clive
Barker. The plot follows a young woman (Ashley Laurence) who discovers
who wicked stepmother (Claire Higgins) is murdering men in order to
bring back to life her uncle so the two can continue their affair.
Andrew Robinson also costars as the clueless father.
I watched with a new commentary track. It was an OK commentary with
various bits of trivia. One thing I didn't know was Hellraiser II was
greenlit before Hellraiser I was released. And at the time no one had
any idea the cenobites were going to be fan favorites. The original
plan was for Claire Higgins' character to be the ongoing villain of the franchise.
Hellraiser II (4K disc) 1988 sequel which finds Claire Higgin's
character returning from hell to cause more trouble. Until it was
pointed out on the commentary, I never noticed Claire Higgins, is in
fact the main villain in both movies. Pinhead made such a huge
impression everyone thinks of him as the main villain, but he's hardly
in either movie.
On the Hellraiser II commentary they were discussing the actors and
mentioned "William Hope" was the hero in Aliens. I thought to myself,
what? Looked up at the screen and for the first time recognized the
actor (Lieutenant Gorman) from Aliens. He has a lot more hair in
Hellraiser II. The buzz cut in "Aliens" made him unrecognizable. But
now that I know, I can't unsee it. The hero doctor is Lieutenant
Gorman. Another detail they pointed out that's easy to overlook is
because the second movie was greenlit before the first movie was
released the trigger mechanism that sets off the plot in both movies is
not the box, but the bed. And but for the surprise popularity of the
cenobites it would have been the bed in the other sequels too.
Hellraiser III (4K disc) - 1992 sequel which finds Jadzia Dax battling
Pinhead. This may not be a popular opinion, but I have always really
liked part 3. This was a new unrated cut of the movie. I didn't
realize until watching, but I've never watched the unrated cut before.
It was new for this box set release. The same guys did the new
commentary for Hellraiser 1 - 3. They talked more about how the
franchise was originally not meant to focus on Pinhead. Clare Higgins
who was the female villain in the first two movies was supposed to
return for part 3 as the villain again, but she didn't want to return
which is one of the reasons Doug Bradley / Pinhead was bumped up to lead
in part 3. While now in hindsight it might be obvious that Pinhead
would be the lead, when 1 and 2 were made his character was not the lead
and was killed off at the end of 2. Another amusing bit of trivia is
one of the guys on the commentary worked on all three movies. He was
very annoyed with how the credits were handled in the first two movies
so he gave himself a promotion to do the credits himself for part 3. He
said that's why all the names are spelled correctly and why Ashley
Laurence has a special credit to honor her for returning.
Hellraiser: Bloodline (4K disc) 4th movie in the franchise and final
movie that wraps up the original story. This one tells the backstory of
how the box was created and follows the cursed bloodline of the creator
in the past, in the present and in the future where the creator's
descendant battles Pinhead in space.
While the worst movie of the original 4, this one was by far the one I
was most looking forward to watching. In addition to this new 4K print,
for the first time there is a commentary track. To my surprise the guys
who did the commentary tracks on the first three movies came back for 4
and brought with them the writer, Peter Atkins. The guys said up front
this was the first Hellraiser movie they didn't work on which is why I
guess they got the writer to join them for the commentary. Although the
writer said, "30 years and I haven't watched this film since." The
commentary went deep into the making of the movie and how it crushed the director's soul, and he never directed another movie again. Plenty of
stories about studio incompetence. This mess of a movie was definitely
the studio's fault! The guys also asked the writer a ton of questions
about the differences between the workprint version and the released
version. Also included for the first time ever the disc included the "workprint version" allowing people to finally see what the movie was
going to be before the studio hacks got their hands on it and turned it
into an "Alan Smithee" movie.
I then watched the "workprint" version of Hellraiser: Bloodline. It was
found in the attic of one of the guys who did the commentary. The
picture quality is full frame VHS with a timecode running at the bottom
of the screen. Yes, I know I swore I would never in my life watch
something of that quality. But it's the "workprint" version of
Hellraiser: Bloodline! This version is a completely different edit.
SPOILERS!
The release cut jumps around in time. This version is more linear and
fills in a plot holes from the theatrical cut. Probably the biggest
change is in the theatrical cut at the start of the movie a demon named, "Angelique" (Valentina Vargas) is introduced. Her character is
responsible for rescuing Pinhead from being entombed in the building
from part 3. Her character disappears from the movie then the next time
we see her she has been turned into a cenobite. There's no explanation
and her character only has a couple of lines from that point forward.
In the workprint version she is shown to be very clearly plotting
against Pinhead for control of hell. And there's even a fight between
the two of them where she almost kills Pinhead until he gets the upper
hand. The segments in the future are also expanded and her character
has a slightly bigger role and seemed to be waiting for her chance to
take on Pinhead again. Why would they cut this from the movie?!?
Another huge difference is the ending. In the theatrical cut the hero
kills Pinhead and escapes. In the workprint version Pinhead still dies,
but he manages to kills the hero too.
To be clear the workprint version is only an hour and 20 minutes long,
and probably 85% of the footage in the workprint is in the theatrical
cut. It didn't suddenly turn a bad movie into a good movie. But I
always found Hellraiser 4 marginally watchable, and this is version is definitely an improvement over the theatrical cut. It's mind-boggling
anyone would think the changes they made improved the movie. On the
commentary they point out that one of the complaints about the workprint version it took too long for pinhead to show up, yet in the workprint
version Pinhead shows up about 10 minutes sooner than the theatrical
cut. The guys doing the commentary couldn't make any sense of it either!
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