Tag: Canadian horror

Really Awful Movies: Ep 368 – The Brain and Dark Night of the Scarecrow

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On today’s episode, a demonstration of just how diverse the horror genre is. You can’t get any different properties than The Brain, a low-budget sci fi creature feature horror and Dark Night of the Scarecrow, a from beyond the grave revenge thriller that has more in common with Of Mice and Men than it does with say, The Changeling.

If you love horror like we do, you love all kinds of horror and that includes Canadian tax shelter films from the 80s, but also made-for-TV horror like Dark Night of the Scarecrow. And look at just how awesome these posters are. So sublime. Dark Night almost conjures up The Town that Dreaded Sundown…

The Brain is about a mad scientist (duh, right?) who runs a popular TV show. He is experimenting with mind control, via some tentacled alien creature holed up in a lab. Dark Night of the Scarecrow, meanwhile, is about a dimwitted farm hand who is summarily hunted down and executed for mauling a young girl, a crime he resolutely did not commit. And he torments his tormentors…in mysterious ways!

Really Awful Movies: Ep 359 – Fractured

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On this episode of the Really Awful Movies Podcast, the very capable psychological thriller, Fractured. It’s directed by Brad Anderson, who’s done movies we’re quite fond of, including The Machinist and the somewhat underrated Session 9.

Here, a family returning from a Thanksgiving road trip runs into trouble at a Minnesota rest stop. And the dad has to seek medical attention for his young daughter. What happens next, is a true healthcare horror.

He faces a Byzantine scenario at a rural hospital, in which twists and turns prevent him from checking in on his daughter, who is admitted for a CAT scan.

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Really Awful Movies: Ep 349 – Black Summer and Adoration

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Back in business! This week, after a bit of a summer hiatus, The Really Awful Movies Podcast is back.

On this episode: Black Summer, a Walking Dead-like US TV series currently streaming on Netflix, and also Adoration, a small, quirky, Belgian-lensed and French language thriller.

Black Summer, filmed in the Calgary, Alberta area, has all the hallmarks of a zombie series: the macho alpha leader, the meek/hesitant sidekick, the concerned mother, the practical nerd, the gutsy do-it-yourself. And of course, the breakdown of social cohesion, not to mention the rampaging undead, make this must-see material if you’re into that kinda thing. There are tonnes of characters, lots of running, hissing zombies, militia men, evildoing civilians, the works.

By stark, stark contrast, Adoration is as small and character-driven as you can get. It’s slow, meandering, and psychologically-driven and muted in parts. A teen helps another escape a remote sanitorium.

The theme for both vehicles: running away from things! I guess there is a connective thread.