Oculus

It is not often that a horror film causes restless nights for me, but after seeing Oculus on Thursday, I'm still thinking about it.

The Quiet Ones: Quite Fun

The latest film to come out of the revamped Hammer production company is a supernatural experiment based horror. The film is based on a Canadian experiment done in the 1970s called The Philip Experiment and stars Sam Claflin (Hunger Games: Catching Fire) and Olivia Cooke (Bates Motel)

People Who "Don't Like Horror Movies"

Whenever I tell someone that I love horror movies often they will say something along the lines of "Really? Personally I don't like horror movies." Yet if we end up really discussing it, they usually reveal that the blanket statement they made is not all that true. I only started noticing this trend as recently as this summer when my mother visited and she agreed to come to The Conjuring with me when she realized it wasn't a gory movie, but a ghosty movie. Apparently all this time that I had thought she hated all horror, it was just the blood and guts she wasn't a fan of, ghosts and demonic possession were a-okay for her. Heck she even enjoyed the movie.

Fright Nights Commercial Creepiness

Who says you can't make money doing what you love? Well I certainly don't. Back in September I had an awesome opportunity to be on set doing what I do best, being creepy. I was working on this year's commercial for Fright Nights at the local amusement park called Playland. The commercial is now airing on some Canadian tv channels, so I suppose this is the first time folks will get to see me on their television sets in character.

Here is the 30 second version of the finished product:

It was my second night shoot and resulted in spending over 40 hours being awake with about 1.5 hours sleep, turns out I can function rather well without much sleep. The set was one of the actual haunted houses at the park as well as some outdoor parts that were more on the sinister side.

There was also a blow torch on set to "distress" some of the set dec brought in for the production. I had to keep telling myself "fire bad". Of course I ended up spending quite some time in the make-up chair and loved every minute of it.

They didn't even get my good side.

I was so happy with how I looked I even took a few selfies to show all boys just how pretty I was.

Wanna date?

Of course I wasn't the only one to get all dolled up for the camera.

He's a vegan, because there's no cruelty to animals in cannibalism.

Then it was time to get my tree witch on for my second character in the commercial. Tree Witch twerks ensued, but this was before a certain celebrity made it uncool.

Forget #SplitsOnTrees now it's #SplitsOnMees

Then of course the evening ended with clowns, because no one likes clowns except for their fear inducing qualities. My parents were convinced I was one of the clowns in the commercial. They were wrong.

Ya want a balloon animal?

As more photos from behind the scenes come I'll be adding them to this post, so look forward to more!

Insidious: Chapter 2

You've gotta love a free movie right? Well once again I won myself some tickets to the pre-screening of a James Wan film, this time Insidious Chapter 2. When offered a free movie even the most petrified of friends will join you for a horror movie, in this case it was my friend Mark. I must say when you are going to a sequel horror film, always bring a scaredy cat, it will make the experience fun no matter what, just make sure they prepare their underpants.

The Conjuring: It All Started with a Dead Baby

Thanks to a contest at Rue Morgue this Wednesday I was able to go to the advance screening of The Conjuring. Now my mom has been visiting me and because no one else was able to come she offered to join me when she learned the film wasn't a "gorefest". We went into it knowing nothing about the people behind the true story and after researching them after the film I'm glad we did. Read on if you are ok with perhaps a couple of smaller spoilers in a film that already had the ending spoiled by being a true story.

Got a free copy of the poster, no biggie.

DEDfest Part 3: V/H/S BC Premiere

If you have been wondering why it has been taking me so long to pump out these mini reviews, it's because I've been distracted by a little thing called my Halloween costume (photos to come before Thursday). Anyhow next up is the BC premiere of the first Bloody Disgusting (produced?) film V/H/S. Read more to see my review.

I actually found a poster for the festival!

Children's Horror Part 1: ParaNorman

Well it is officially Autumn and that means that people aside from me are going to start getting excited about Halloween. With this comes movie channels gradually moving to horror movies 24/7 until the wonderful month of October is over. It also means that children's channels will start showing Halloween and junior horror films. What is a junior horror film you might ask? Well there aren't as many good ones to point to in recent history, but if you are around my age you might remember a few. To me a good junior horror movie has 1. a real monster, 2. a combination of jump scares and humour 3. a lack of real blood and gore so parents don't feel they are corrupting their children & 4. at least a couple of jokes or moments only the adults being forced to watch these with the wee ones will get. A prime example to me are the Scooby Doo movies of the late 90s where there are real zombies & a twist I didn't see coming as a kid and in the other they solve a mystery of a fake witch only to have it turn out there is a real witch's curse that gets released by a Stephen King wannabe. Another would be Beetlejuice, I mean come on who doesn't love Beetlejuice? I'd watch Beetlejuice anytime of th- OH SHIT I said his name three times!

I hope you now understand what I mean when I say junior horror because this is the first in an ongoing series of articles basically about modern junior horror . And for our first instalment for your reading pleasure is my observational review of ParaNorman. If you don't want any accidental spoilers than please watch the movie, then read this. Otherwise click on to read more.

On Friday the 13th I Took a Shining to you.

HEYO! So did you have a great Friday the 13th, because I certainly did. The evening started off with catching up on the episodes "Deathday Cake" and "Two Girls One Tongue" of Todd and the Book of Pure Evil. And I'm not just talking about this show because it is Canadian, I am talking about it because it bleeds pure awesomeness like a slain Dragon of Awesometude pierced with a battle axe of badassness. Just to prove that they go the extra mile "Two Girls One Tongue" was even a ROCK OPERA! Yeah, they went there, and with great success.

Girl on the far right, that's how I get my hair cuts done. I call it the Jenny.

After I caught up with my favourite students at Crowley High I continued on to meet up with some friends and go to a midnight showing of The Shining. Now while this wasn't my first time seeing this classic film it turns out I had never seen it in it's entirety, that could have been easily predicted since the first time I saw it was on TV and usually that never bodes well for a quality screening. So it turns out I had never seen at least the first 15 minutes of the movie and I was more than just a little embarrassed about that, but not as embarrassed as I was by the fact that it took until a couple months ago to see the original Dawn and Day (you know the ones I'm talking about).  Our cinematic experience started off with a one man show with an invisible typewriter which was very well rehearsed and highly entertaining. That was followed by some trivia, where I learned a new fact. Did you know that it took 3 takes to film the scene with the blood spewing from the elevator? Well now you do, and knowledge is power. And if you want knowledge of what happens in this movie continue reading, otherwise BE GONE!

My Macabre Mind (4Villains & American Horror Story)

Who wouldn't trust evil faces like those?

Ok so an awesome new website just premiered this month. It is called 4Villains and is for the upcoming interactive web series by the same name. The first episode of the series will be coming out sometime after Christmas this year and you will be able to see your's truly kicking some supervillain butt. On the website you can create a super villain or hero, join groups, earn infamy points and acheivements, read the 4Villains webcomic and watch 4Villains once it premieres as well as the side series Hench'D20 which has already had its online debut. There are even going to be opportunities for fans to be mentioned or featured in episodes, therefore become a resident of Viktem/Victory City and use your superpowers for good or evil.

Is it wrong I still find him attractive even in this makeup?

In other news I have now become, well I don't want to use the word obsessed, so I'll say addicted, to the new tv show American Horror Story. It is about a family who moves to Los Angeles to fix their family, but unbeknownst to them their new house still has many former residents remaining and has been dubbed by the community "Murder House". My favourite character would have to be Tate, played by Evan Peters. I was thoroughly frustrated looking it up on google image search because half the images were of the cast of glee attending the premiere. Seriously? Just because they are created by the same men that created glee, doesn't mean that the unrelated cast deserve more coverage than the people actually starring in the series. Until I found out they had the same creator I was just left wondering when I was going to see Rachel or Finn get chopped up, cooked and fed to the Harmons by their neighbour.

Watching this show has also caused me to come to a realization. If you have to have a supernatural boyfriend, go for a ghost. Here are just a few reasons why they make better boyfriends than say a vampire or werewolf:
1. You can take them out in the sunlight
2. If things get a bit on the kinky side and you get bit you aren't turned into one of them
3. They aren't sustained by what keeps you alive (your blood or flesh)
4. Generally they are stuck in the place they died at, so if you have a fight or just want some alone time you can just go somewhere else
5. No STDs
6. Most would agree there is no chance of pregnancy, although some stories would beg to differ.
7. They can actually disappear in an instant, no need for doors or windows, so parents can't walk in on you.
8. You can trick your friends into thinking you have telekinesis.
9. If they want you to become one of them, you just have to die. Its not like you are becoming some half alive half dead thing that has to kill others to survive.
10. They can walk through walls
11. Halloween becomes really special because it is the one day of the year they can take you out on the town for a date.

So keep your Edwards and Jacobs, ghosts are where it's at.