Book Review - Doctor Sleep

Somewhere among my Top 10 favorite movies of all-time (probably later than number 6 but earlier than number 10) sits Frank Capra's slapstick comedy Arsenic and Old Lace. It is a silly film - full of murderers, lunatics, and one seriously confused Cary Grant - but it also contains a line of dialogue that has long stuck in my head as a bold moment of truth. The most murderous member of the film's family, who looks like Boris Karloff, has decided he wants to kill somebody and scolds his assistant (played by Peter Lorre) about what happens when he makes up his mind. Lorre's character, Dr. Einstein, responds with a sigh, saying "Yes, yes, I know. When you make up your mind, you lose your head."

This sticks with me because I think there's a type of personality that is explained by this statement, and I don't think it's just for murderers with the face of Frankenstein's monster. It's a great way to explain addicts. They're people who get attached to the idea of something - whether it be alcohol, drugs, food, or anything else - and who then find themselves trapped by their own desires as they chase what they are focusing on without regard for anything else.

What does this have to do with Doctor Sleep, the sequel to The Shining that Stephen King has finally offered readers? Well, I think that Doctor Sleep is a book by a person who makes up his mind and loses his head (or at least did, back in his drinking days), a book for people who make up their mind and lose their head (people like me, who avoided vices like alcohol and became junkies for horror stories instead), and - most importantly - a book about people who are dangerous because they can make up their mind and lose their head.

First and foremost among these people is Dan Torrance, formerly Danny, the child who survived The Overlook Hotel in the 1970s and who grew up to face everything else life had to offer. King presents Dan first as a defeated child - dealing with the ghosts of The Overlook while trying to get help from his mother and the cook who also "shone" - and then as an adult who hit bottom and had to fight his way back to the top. Dan's bottom - an AA term that King will explain, along with many other loving and accurate descriptions of Big Book meetings - is handled marvelously by the author, and this early book segment (which was suggested, according to King's post-novel notes, by his son Owen) really sets the tone for Dan's journey through the book. It's difficult to see this grown version of Dan Torrance - especially as the book covers more than 30 years of his life - and remember the little boy from The Shining (then again, everything about a 36 years later sequel is a little difficult), yet King does a good job of making Dan a new character while reminding us of his first journey into horror just often enough.

After he bottoms out, we're treated to Dan's search for redemption as he tries to kick his habit and use his gifts in a positive way. This is not an easy task for someone with his afflictions (physical, mental, and supernatural afflictions - if you're counting along at home), but he finds the motivation thanks to some help from his old friend Tony, some new friends in Alcoholics Anonymous, and (most notably) a young girl named Abra.

Little Abra Stone, much like Danny Torrance when he was a child, has the gift of The Shining. We meet Abra as she is born, and some of the book's best segments relay her developing talents as she grows up. Though she's still developing as a teenager when the book hits its dramatic and horrific high points, King shows us enough to make sure we know from an early age (including a bizarre sequence where King connects the infant Abra to the 9/11 attacks) that she has powers that surpass what we've seen from others in the book. Once we see everything Abra can do we realize that Dan and her are a dangerous combination when they get together. King plays upon this, making it easy for readers to get behind these two characters.

The antagonists that Dan and Abra must face are a group of nomadic, soul-sucking, vampire types called The True Knot, a somewhat silly concoction of ageless killers that feed on the essence - or "steam" - of children with Shining powers. The idea of The Knot doesn't really work too well, but is strengthened by its leader, a juicy villainess called Rose the Hat - thanks to her trademark top hat, which becomes one of the book's more enduring visuals. All the side members of the Knot are a little underdeveloped (one character gets a great introduction very early in the book and then becomes second fiddle for the rest of the journey, the rest are caricatures of horror sidekicks) but Rose the Hat is an imposing mental presence who is given a lot of depth by the author. King tries to build up Rose as a devilish talent for evil, yet some of the sequences where he shows us the insides of the True Knot camp and Rose's struggles to lead them are interesting because they make these character seem human. She's ruthless and murderous, but she's also confused and frightened of death - just like we are. Rose the Hat is one character from King's universe that I definitely want to see more of, if only because the author does such a good job of showing both her strengths and weaknesses. There's an argument that could be made about her and Dan being more similar than Dan and Abra are, but that's a much bigger discussion for a different day.

As you can see, there's a lot going on in King's book, and sometimes it felt like he left a storyline behind too easily to tell us something different. For example, I got to a point where I wanted more of Dan's struggles with alcohol and the ghosts of the Overlook, but then King offered descriptions of the Knot and their murderous acts. Or, I got to a point where I wanted to make sense out of Rose the Hat, and just then King dropped a newborn named Abra into the story. It was hard to keep track of where Doctor Sleep was going in the first few chapters, but once King started bringing things together - even tipping his cap to the theory of relativity in a not-so-subtle manner - it became obvious that all of these threads were about to come together.

Things start to clear up around the half way point of the book, but King still has some nice twists up his sleeve as he moves through the final act. Some of the major plot developments are blatantly obvious, but King finds neat ways to surprise us just when we think things are going the other direction. Characters who seem to be gaining power are abruptly killed off, schemes that are spelled out in one manner suddenly become something else, and even a few visitors from The Overlook Hotel make memorable returns. It all adds up to a wildly entertaining, if not ridiculous, final confrontation that wraps the story up rather quickly. It's a chaotic and unpredictable sequence - King even throws in an old man doing a cartwheel (I presume the kitchen sink was busy) - but it features some great moments that help make the ending work pretty well. The whole conflict is probably best summed up by the use of a character from The Shining in one crucial moment - don't worry, I don't dare spoil this one! - which is an out-of-the-blue idea that shouldn't work but had me pumping my fist and cackling like a madman because it was such a fun move by the author.

Doctor Sleep isn't a masterpiece by any means - there's too much going on (including a large number of distracting pop culture references, even for King) and very few moments that match the shock value of King's earlier work - but it works because the minds of the lead characters are opened up to us and because each of the main characters has the ability to surprise us. They are each powerful and unstable characters who could "lose their heads" at any time, which makes Doctor Sleep an interesting and unpredictable new addition to King's universe of horror.

V/H/S 2

(2013, Dir. by Simon Barrett, Jason Eisener, Gareth Huw Evans & Timo Tjahjanto, Gregg Hale & Eduardo Sanchez, Adam Wingard.)

Few things are more exciting to me than when I see young horror filmmakers advancing their craft, which is a big part of why I had a lot of fun with V/H/S 2. It is unfair to compare this film directly with its predecessor (V/H/S, which arrived on home video last year and offered a raw (and slightly immature) new twist on the anthology horror formula) because the filmmakers are different this time around, but it seems blatant to me that the returning producers and directors worked hard to clean up some of the more maligned aspects of the first film.

Critics of that film - which I enjoyed, despite some uneven moments - will probably be pleased with the extra layer of polish that seems to have been applied to this sequel. It's still definitely an independent and experimental picture - especially in the first and fourth segments of the film - and it still feels like the found footage it is supposed to be in most scenes. At the same time, the film seems to feel a little more mature and cinematic than its predecessor, striking a nice balance between the raw horror of the original and some more artistic horror films of the era.

The film's increase in quality over the original is most notable in the third segment of the film, which is entitled "Safe Haven" and is directed by Gareth Huw Evans & Timo Tjahjanto. Evans uses a mostly Indonesian cast, as he did in his action masterpiece The Raid: Redemption, to take us inside a "Jonestown" inspired cult where things are much more devious than they seem. I don't even want to go in to what occurs in this segment, but I will say that it has more pure shocks and disgusting surprises than 99% of feature length horror films out there. It's a truly nightmarish little epic - it feels like it's longer than the other three main segments of the film combined - that is good enough to make the whole film worth seeing.

That said, the rest of the film works pretty well too. I might even say that the lowest moments of this film (the wrap-around directed by You're Next and A Horrible Way To Die scribe Simon Barrett and the zombie segment directed by Gregg Hale and The Blair Witch Project co-director Eduardo Sanchez) are better than the least impressive parts of the first V/H/S film. Barrett's wrap-around seems fresher and less hectic than the sequence he and You're Next director Adam Wingard put together for the first film (plus it has a better payoff at the end) while Sanchez and Hale's first person zombie tale feels like a neat little short that could be expounded upon in a different film.

The two segments that bookend the proceedings both stand out by being manic in their attempts to surprise the viewer. The first, directed by Wingard and written by Barrett, stars Wingard as a man who is fitted with an experimental camera eye that just happens to see ghosts all around him. The tone of this film is probably closest to that of V/H/S (plus Barrett and Wingard both bring back the "random topless women" factor of the first film) and it manages to bridge the gap between the films while providing a few good scares. The film's last segment, by Hobo With A Shotgun director Jason Eisener, is even more hectic and bizarre and the title - "Slumber Party Alien Abduction" - tells you almost everything you need to know about it. This sequence has one of the film's most annoying tricks, when Eisener mounts the camera on top of an in film dog for several scenes, but it's also the most ridiculously fun and carefree piece of cinema in the film.

As a total film, I really respect the manic energy of V/H/S 2. Each section of the film has a different tone and a different pace, but the flow of the presentation is never interrupted. I thought the first film worked similarly, but had a few bumps in the road that derailed it from being the kind of movie that is perfect for a crowded Halloween party. I think this sequel avoids the same pitfalls and earns a place at that party; it's a crowd pleasing horror anthology that's here just in time for the holiday season.

Trailer for Curse of Chucky Released; Twisted Children of the '80s Rejoice

I don't consume alcohol or drugs or pop music or any of those other things that people get really excited about and then feel bad about later. But I imagine that the reaction people have to those intoxicants is similar to what I feel when I, as a super horror nerd, see a preview for something like Curse of Chucky.

What follows is the trailer for said film, a reboot of the Child's Play franchise that claims it will drop the self referential humor of the last two films and take the franchise back to its creepier roots. It looks the part, and I kinda dig the switch to a spooky old house setting. Will it be deep and meaningful? Do the special effects look good? Probably not on both accounts. But Brad Dourif and the change in tone actually makes me think this looks like a bunch of slashery fun.

Curse of Chucky will be released to DVD/Blu-Ray/Other-Home-Media-Formats-I-Don't-Know-Yet on October 8, so invite some friends over, get the popcorn ready, and wear ankle protection. Or don't. It's your achilles tendon.

Midnight Movie of the Week #182 - Hellraiser: Inferno

It feels a little like a stretch when I bring out the direct-to-video fifth film in the Hellraiser series and say this is a piece of genre cinema that you need to look out for. This series of films is one of the most maddening of all horror franchises, partially because the producers decided to abandon continuity (and numbers in the title) after the third film and partially because almost all of these sequels are really, really bad movies. But if you can sift through everything and find the right sequel - this one, which has Inferno as its subtitle and the only yellow tinted cover of the bunch (seriously, for years I would say "the yellow sequel is pretty good" because I couldn't keep track of this franchise) - you might be surprised to find a mature and sadistic horror film.

Hellraiser: Inferno tells the story of a corrupt police detective who comes into possession of the fabled Lament Configuration puzzle box and, after a trippy night with a dreadlocked prostitute, finds himself trying to unravel plenty of hellish mysteries. While most of the Hellraiser films that preceded this one - all of which had bigger budgets and theatrical releases - took their characters into hellish realities, Inferno keeps our lead character based in reality and brings hell into his world.

Compared to the rest of the series, a literal Hell comes slowly into this character's world - the iconic visage of Pinhead only appears briefly near the end and visions of some new cenobite characters are spaced out by real world drama - but Inferno always finds unique ways to surprise our shady lead character. He's played by Craig Sheffer, formerly a "future star" in films like The Program and A River Runs Through It and before that the star Hellraiser creator Clive Barker's awesome Nightbreed, who has always seemed pretty slimy to me and seems more slimy than usual as he carries this film. He's got a pretty good supporting cast around him, including Nicholas Turturro and the great James Remar, but it seems like most of the scenes in the film revolve around Sheffer looking angry and confused as he faces new and ridiculous surprises that come with the puzzle box he has opened. Does that sound like a bad thing? It does kind of sound bad, but it really isn't. Sheffer is a bit challenged in the charisma department...which is great when he's playing a doomed soul who the viewer doesn't have to like.

The film is co-written and directed by Scott Derrickson, who has gone on to make two quality Hollywood horror films, The Exorcism of Emily Rose and Sinister (and one terrible, terrible, completely terrible remake that I will not name here despite the fact that it featured Keanu Reeves speaking Chinese to James Hong). All three of Derrickson's horror films are about dudes who are actively pursuing a horror that has entered into their every day world, which makes Hellraiser: Inferno a bit interesting as a case study in how the director got where he is over the last 13 years.  Derrickson's characters are never sharp or punchy like so many modern characters in the post-Tarantino film universe, and there's something refreshing about his willingness to just make these characters feel like they came out of an older and more restrained cop drama. With the exception of their hairstyles, characters in the Hellraiser series have been best when they're normal looking, and Derrickson allows Sheffer to be average enough to keep the film feeling like it's more than just another cheap sequel.

The film feels interesting to horror fans like myself because creepy stuff and cenobites keep popping up throughout the film, but there's more to this plot than that. We don't travel into any hell dimensions like we did in the overambitious Hellraiser II, and Derrickson and Sheffer manage to keep the film feeling like a crime drama while they provide enough gory and unsettling images that make us squirm. Most of the creature makeup is top notch, and there are plenty of new and unique creations that advance the cenobites as a race and prevents the film from just rehashing what we've seen in the first four films. And, at the same time, the gritty plot could even be called "Hellraiser noir" as the seedy side of the detective's world mixes with the cenobites while the star's drab narration pushes the story forward. Like film noir, the lead character's existence seems to spiral downward rapidly through the film's finale, which attempts to push the legend of that little puzzle box and it's spike-headed friend to new places while dragging the corrupt man down into Hell. 

Hellraiser: Inferno never really manages to wow us, but at the same time it's one of those horror movies that's simply never dull. It feels unique, especially as an addition to a series that had been off the rails for a couple of films (and was about to derail once more), which helps make the blood splatter a little brighter and the grimy detective's plight a little more engaging. It might just be a case of being in the right place at the right time - this movie would be a disappointment in a better franchise but seems like a standout against some of the more awful Hellraiser sequels - but Hellraiser: Inferno has always managed to stick in my mind as one of those horror sequels that's good enough to make you not care you're watching something that's not that first thing that you loved. And that's enough for me to give this sequel a solid recommendation to horror fans.

(Usually the trailer goes here, but Dimension Films was god awful at trailers and spoiled like half the movie in their 47 second teaser for this one. Good job, doofuses.  Instead, here's a short Hellraiser "fan film" that I love which was made by special effects guru Gary Tunnicliffe...)

The Last Exorcism Part II

(2013, Dir. by Ed Gass-Donnelly.)

Ashley Bell returns to The Last Exorcism Part II, and by doing so she becomes the one great reason to see this film. The sequel to the 2011 independent horror sensation (which I pretty much love) seems like a studio cash in - especially after that film's much-maligned final twist - but with Bell leading the charge the film manages to pick up the pieces and run further into her character's battle against evil.

Both films are essentially about the damnation of "backwoods" teenager Nell Sweetzer, but the tone has changed from the first film to the second. In the first film, Bell's Nell was the innocent who has been possessed by a demon. Now, she's the survivor who's trying to move on with her life in a girls' home in New Orleans while dealing with young love, teenage girl drama, and the possibility that she's still the target of something demonic.  You could almost look at the film as a rape survivor's story - in fact, that is an accurate leap to make - but it's clear to us throughout this film that Nell Sweetzer is troubled by more than just human problems.

This Part II is most interesting when it allows Bell to fill the screen, because every trial she faces feels legitimate. The film does a fantastic job of showing things that are out of her control - like silent masked observers and middle-of-the-night terrors - to the audience while keeping the girl unknowing. The film is entirely about Nell's attempts to figure out what is happening to her - one character spells it out, saying bluntly that she needs to choose her own path - but the film gives more information to the viewer than it does to the girl. There's some unsettling tension to be had thanks to this, especially because the actress seems so pure.

Those who saw the first film have already seen Bell do and say a lot of shocking things, and considering this we shouldn't be so surprised by the actress' range here. But Bell manages to restore our faith in Nell in her new environment, and her ability to present innocence in human settings sets us up to once again fear for her when things get out of control. I truly believe her performance in the first film was worthy of Oscar consideration (as was the performance by Patrick Fabian in the lead, but horror never gets the love it deserves) and her ability to take the lead in this sequel only cements my belief that she's a talent to watch out for in the future. The 26 year old is willing to buy in completely to the role and everything it requires, and the range she shows lifts the film above a lot of its problems.

Those problems are numerous, unfortunately. The found footage aspect of the original film is gone, and without another strong presence across from her Bell often has to carry too much of the film's weight. Nell wanders through her bouts with evil without much guidance - save a few scenes from horror veteran Muse Watson (I Know What You Did Last Summer) and the returning Louis Herthum as Nell's father - and when she finally stumbles into someone who will help her it seems like the script is just jumping to a conclusion.  This leads to a final act that feels pretty forced, and some New Orleans-flavored voodoo takes away from the biblical battle that has been set up through the first film and a half.

The first film's ending was hated by many, but I've been impressed with its willingness to change directions and shuck audience expectations (while still making enough sense within the plot) since day one. Part II offers a similarly grand final act, but by the time it gets to it the twists that continue to one up each other have watered down the impact a bit. Also unfortunate is the cheap and ugly CGI work that bleeds into the conclusion. I shouldn't be so fickle, but the the final moments of the film offer fantastic ideas to think about and then distracts us from them by showing off some goofy developments that don't appear realistic in any way. I'm truly intrigued by the way the film wrapped up Nell's story (for now?), but the flaws in presentation take away from the effect that these developments have on us. If nothing else, the first movie got it right with its "less is more" approach to the climax.

I want to flat out recommend The Last Exorcism Part II, because I think Bell is that good in the lead and I think the story heads in a fascinating and engaging direction. The film had my attention piqued throughout and wasn't dull for a second, but it makes a lot of wrong steps that seem like shortcuts, particularly in the final act. Fans of the first film and Bell's performance there should at least get something out of this sequel, but I'm not sure viewers will be able to overcome all the little things that just don't feel right. Still, I'm glad I saw where Nell Sweetzer's story went, and if they brought Bell back for an (even more unlikely) Part III, I'd probably check in. This one's at least worth a rental for her work.

Midnight Movie of the Week #163 - Halloween III: Season of the Witch

When I was a teenager, I hated Halloween III with a pretty solid passion. Or at least I said I did.  I think I always kind of enjoyed the completely nonsensical film, but I was a Michael Myers fanboy extraordinaire, and I was all "OH MY GOD, I can't believe they tried to make a Halloween movie without Michael! How dare they mess with the integrity of Halloween II! As if!"  I was kind of a mix between Alicia Silverstone in Clueless and WCW superstar Lance Storm at the time, because I used "As if!" and took things way too seriously. Then I kept getting older and I lightened up a bit.

Nowadays, I look at Halloween III: Season of the Witch and I just smile.  I don't have disdain, I don't even laugh at it. Because the thing that confused teenage me is one of the most perfectly abstract and ridiculously nightmarish horror movies out there. Sure, there are so many parts of it that don't make a lick of sense, but that's the beauty of Tommy Lee Wallace's bizarre addition to the Halloween franchise.

I suppose I should back up and clarify, in case there are some uninitiated folks reading this: Yes, Halloween III is in no way a sequel to Halloween II, nor is it related to Halloween - although the 1978 film actually has a cameo in this film.  John Carpenter and Debra Hill, now producers to the series, would only agree to make a third film if it was not a direct follow up to the previous films, which led them to hire Hammer Films veteran Nigel Kneale to pen a new kind of thriller. Unfortunately for Kneale, and most likely the film's chances of being taken seriously, big budget producer Dino De Laurentiis wanted more blood and more gore, which resulted in Wallace scrambling to rewrite the script and Kneale removing his name from the film.

If you've seen the film and didn't know any of the information above - just like I did when I was younger - you would probably still figure out that all the cylinders weren't firing in the right rhythm as this film was made.  The plot can't be explained without spoiling many of the film's twists - so anyone who hasn't seen it and REALLY wants to be befuddled should probably stop reading now and come back later - because the film just seems weird before we learn about the killer Halloween masks and robohenchmen and possible connection to druid rituals and star worship.  (And when I say "star worship," I mean Ursa Major-style, not Bruce Willis-style.)  These developments in the plot only make the film weirder, and attempts to clean up the story are dismissed as the antagonist says things like "a great magician never explains."  It's a jumble of bad ideas, but it's a darn fun jumble.

The plot is all over the place, but it's not a big deal because the film has so much fun with it. Things are taken very seriously, as the musical score by Carpenter and Alan Howarth (which is seriously one of my favorite horror scores ever) pulsates throughout, keeping pace with the tension of the mysterious plot. The first act is full on murder mystery, and I can't imagine being in the audience with a blind eye when this one was released. This had to be a Psycho style shock to the audience, if not in quality then at least in ridiculousness, because there really isn't anything like this movie's plot out there. Considering it was billed as the follow-up to two of the prototypes for the slasher film - which had become a booming industry in the past five years - there had to be more than a few viewers completely taken by surprise when the mystical mask murder plot became evident.

For me, it's almost impossible to look at Halloween III and not think "What they heck were they thinking?"  But I'm so grateful that this mistake of a masterpiece was allowed to be.  As the film becomes a bizarre showdown between the overly manly Tom Atkins and the sardonic Don O'Herlihy, it becomes more and more noticeable that the talents involved in this film far outweigh the script's difficulties.  Halloween III doesn't make a ton of sense - heck, it's subtitled SEASON OF THE WITCH and the only witch is a Halloween mask - but it's a well made mess (by the way, it's also one of the best looking horror films of the '80s) with great actors and that musical score that alone is worth the price of admission. I see why young me hated it, and yet I see why new me recognizes that young me was a doofus. And I'm fine with that.

Midnight Movie of the Week #160 - The Brides of Dracula

Hammer Films' Dracula tales are most remembered as vehicles for Christopher Lee, so some people are surprised to find out that the first sequel to Horror of Dracula was a film in which Dracula is already dead, Lee did not appear, and a rather unintimidating little man named Baron Meinster serves as the main masculine vampire. Alas, it's all true. The film in question is Hammer's 1960 vampi-rama The Brides of Dracula, in which Peter Cushing picks up where the 1958 film left off and takes on a new vampire threat, none of whom are actually wed to the Count.

The film primarily follows the exploits of a French babe schoolteacher named Marianne (played by Yvonne Monlaur, who is actually the daughter of a Russian count), who takes a job in the Transylvanian countryside (because, well, WHO WOULDN'T?) and ends up spending the night in a big old castle where a mother has her son chained up by the ankle. To some that might seem like a relatively normal night in Transylvania - I've seen enough horror flicks to know someone is always chained up to something - but the pure and innocent Marianne is pretty freaked out and this, along with the craziness of the house's servant (Freda Jackson, getting to play what's basically a female version of Renfield!), convinces Marianne that she's safer booking it through the forest than staying the night.

And that's when the hero returns in the form of Doctor Van Helsing, as played by the great Peter Cushing. Cushing would play "Van Helsing" five times for Hammer, but it's worth noting that he actually portrayed three different characters in five different films in three different timelines during his time with Hammer. This is (at least in Hammer's universe) the only continuation of the "original" version of Cushing asVan Helsing, while his performances in the Dracula films of the 1970s are relatives of this character. So, next time someone tells you Cushing played Van Helsing five times, you can prove them wrong by saying he only played this Van Helsing twice. Isn't that a great feeling?

Now back to the film, which strikes me as one of Hammer's more beautiful vampire films.  The sets are pretty recognizable - we must remember that this was a relatively low budget studio and they did reuse plenty of their sets and props - but there's something vibrant and wonderful about their presentation by director Terence Fisher here.  Horror of Dracula was not a dull film from a visual standpoint, but it seems Fisher attempted to cover up some of this film's issues with a little more color and a lot of feminine beauty. That's not a bad choice for a film that loses Christopher Lee and gains a looker like Monlaur, and the director's vision of the film helps The Brides of Dracula keep our attention for 85 minutes.

The tone of the film loses much of the romanticism that carried Hammer's first Dracula endeavor, and The Brides of Dracula certainly feels like a cheesy spin-off at times. A few of the sequences with the vampire women - especially the ones in which they interact with Jackson's manic servant/familiar - play out in bizarre fashion, yet the film strides forward with confidence that the viewer will forgive some of the sillier bits.  There are moments when the film could have lost me - like an unconventional scene in which Van Helsing deals with a bite wound to his own neck - but there's something to be said for this film's slightly random, slightly nightmarish approach to Marianne and Van Helsing's battle against evil.

The Brides of Dracula isn't the most dramatic vampire film from Hammer studios, and it's not even close to being the most unique.  But it's an abstract vampire tale that hits me as a perfect diversion, a new chapter in a familiar story that enhances my appreciation of Fisher as a filmmaker, Cushing as an actor, and the whole of Hammer Studios as a titan of terror. The Brides of Dracula is widely forgotten, but it deserves more attention for its place in horror history and its unique relationship to the studio's other Dracula films.

The Mike's Top 50 Horror Movies Countdown: #8 - Dawn of the Dead

Previously on the Countdown: Number 50 - Happy Birthday to Me  Number 49 - Prince of Darkness  Number 48 - House on Haunted Hill  Number 47 - The Monster Squad  Number 46 - Hellraiser  Number 45 - The Fog  Number 44 - Creature From the Black Lagoon  Number 43 - Zombie  Number 42 - Tales from the Crypt  Number 41 - Bubba Ho-Tep  Number 40 - Phantom of the Paradise  Number 39 - Dog Soldiers Number 38 - Pontypool  Number 37 - Dark Water  Number 36 - Army of Darkness Number 35 - The Legend of Hell House  Number 34 - Poltergeist  Number 33 - The Abominable Dr. Phibes  Number 32 - The Phantom of the Opera  Number 31 - The House of the Devil   Number 30 - Evil Dead II  Number 29 - Dead of Night  Number 28 - Carnival of Souls  Number 27 - Nosferatu  Number 26 - Candyman  Number 25 - The Texas Chain Saw Massacre  Number 24 - Horror of Dracula  Number 23 - The Wicker Man  Number 22 - Suspiria  Number 21 - The Omen  Number 20 - Spider Baby or, The Maddest Story Ever Told  Number 19 - Rosemary's Baby  Number 18 - The Devil Rides Out  Number 17 - The Blob  Number 16 - Gremlins  Number 15 - Targets  Number 14 - Fright Night   Number 13 - Frankenstein  Number 12 - Alien  Number 11 - The Shining  Number 10 - An American Werewolf in London  Number 9 - The Thing

Dawn of the Dead

(1978, Dir. by George A. Romero.)

Why It's Here:

I could sit here and argue that Dawn of the Dead is one of the least horror movie horror movies out there.  We're talking about a movie that runs about 50 minutes longer than the average film of the genre and might not feature a single "jump scare" that would send a teenage girl soaring through the air.  But it also has to be the bleakest vision of our world ever filmed.  Four people, one mall that represents our old behaviors, and the kind of shambling terrors that modern TV shows wish they could create.  With top notch special effects and biting social commentary, it's pretty much a perfect film - that just happens to have zombies in it.

The Moment That Changes Everything:

The opening scenes in Dawn of the Dead are a lot different than what you see in most horror movies. A normal life? A simple life? A false sense of hope? Nope, you won't find any of those things here.  Instead, we walk into a chaotic news room where people seem to have written off any hope for society and a run down tenement in which dead bodies and undead bodies are everywhere. Within the first five minutes, we know for a fact that we've walked into a situation where there is no happy ending.

It Makes a Great Double Feature With:

I'm gonna tell you a secret. I don't really like Day of the Dead. Yes, Romero's third Dead film continues the complete dread that we get in this one, but all the cinematic aspects - from the acting to the direction to the script - feel wrong to me. A lot of people disagree with me, so maybe you want to put that one next to this one. Me, I'd probably say you could watch the 2004 remake alongside it. It loses some of the pathos of the original, but is a fast-paced blast with strong characters and plenty of gore.

What It Means To Me:

Dawn of the Dead has always been one of my favorite films of any genre, because it packs an apocalyptic edge that is unmatched in most of cinema.  It's fascinating in its bleakness, but it's also thoroughly entertaining and a bit humorous and there's even that Goblin musical score. Oh! That Goblin musical score. Man, I love that Goblin musical score. So good.

FMWL Indie Spotlight - Grave Encounters 2

(2012, Dir. by John Poliquin.)

Grave Encounters 2 - the follow up to a film that was one of the biggest surprises of 2011 for me - is one of the most bizarre sequels I've ever come across.  Making a sequel to a found footage horror film is never an easy task, and the folks behind Grave Encounters 2 - producers The Vicious Brothers and new director John Poliquin - show their intention to be self-referential throughout this film.  They have to believe in the first film - because this film insists that what we saw in Grave Encounters was real.

Of course, that's exactly what Grave Encounters insisted too, but the tone has certainly shifted over the past year.  Now we're supposed to believe that the thing which was presented as real was actually a lie, while this thing that's presented as real proves that the thing that was presented as a lie was actually real.  It's like we've gone one step further down the proverbial rabbit hole, which seems to be exactly where the filmmakers want us.  If you're confused by that, you're not alone. I'm right there with you.

Grave Encounters 2 follows student filmmaker/amateur YouTube critic Alex Wright - who doesn't appear to be related to the former WCW wrestler of the same name - who becomes obsessed with internet rumors that Grave Encounters was a real reality show in which real people were haunted in a real asylum. Thanks to emails from an anonymous source known only as "Death Awaits", Alex and his friends slowly begin to strip away the lies about the film, and soon find themselves inside the same asylum facing some of the same problems.

By presenting this multi-layered look in to found footage horror, Grave Encounters 2 runs in to a few problems.  The first thing that really bugged me was the set up, which seemed to drag on for far too long.  One of the main reasons that The Vicious Brothers' original film worked for me was that it seemed to seamlessly transition from its brief set up to the haunted asylum showdown that really got under my skin.  The sequel seems too focused on building its characters and too interested in providing inside jokes about the production, and it left me wishing for a simpler premise that would get down to the scares.  The number of characters involved in the sequel goes up as well and some of them seem like filler characters that serve only as victims for the delayed asylum trip. The first film wasn't a picture of character development, but the sequel seemed to add characters on a whim and drop them even more quickly.

The other problem with Grave Encounters 2's structure is that the tension seems to be broken far too often.  To an extent, all found footage films rely on whiny characters wheezing about their predicament, but Grave Encounters 2 seems to completely break from the action at hand far too often.  The first film seemed to shake off the supernatural and cross-dimensional twists in the name of tried and true shocks, but this sequel spends too much time wading through explanations and trying to make sense of everything that's going on.  Thankfully, the film's not very good at explaining away its mysteries.

Which brings us to an area where Grave Encounters 2 succeeds.  The unraveling reality that we found the characters in during the first film only seems deeper and darker here, with the mid-film return of a character from Grave Encounters only adding to the intrigue.  One of my favorite parts of the first film was watching the characters realize how weird the environment they were trapped in could be, and the sequel only takes us further down that bizarre path, and sequences like a near escape in the middle of the film really do a great job of showing the shifting reality in the film. These sequences help lead to some of the film's better scares, though they don't come with the same build up as the first film.

When I really break down Grave Encounters 2, I can't help feeling the whole picture is a mixed bag.  I liked the first film despite some obvious flaws, mostly because the filmmakers took a complex idea and made it pretty simple and effective.  Grave Encounters 2 seems to be pushing too hard in too many directions at times, and I struggled to sift through everything as I watched it.  There are a lot of high points in the scare department and some perplexing moments of shock and awe, but too much of the film is spent trying to achieve too many goals.  There's a little bit of everything in the horror spectrum here - everything from Scream to "torture porn" to Donnie Darko to the old fashioned haunted house is represented - but I don't think Grave Encounters 2 does any of these things extremely well.  I still think it's worth a watch if you were a fan of the first film, but I'd warn you to be prepared for some perplexing changes in the film and some unwelcome confusion.  Grave Encounters 2 just doesn't come together as well as the first film did, but I still want to watch it again to try and figure out how all the creepy twists in this universe come together.

If you're interested in seeing the film for yourself, it becomes available through online rental and VOD sources today.  Head over to the Tribeca Films website if you want to learn more, or just check out the trailer below.

Midnight Movie of the Week #141 - Hellbound: Hellraiser II

Hellraiser - in it's pure and original concentration - is one of my favorite horror movies to talk about, particularly because of the way in which it shakes my perception of horror.  Every time someone asks me about horror movies I'm all high and might and say things like "Oh man, it's not about the gore, it's about..." and then I talk about "good vs. evil" or "demons in the mind's eye" or something that makes horror seem like a noble and altruistic venture.  And then I watch something like Hellraiser - something that I find perverse and disgusting - and I'm calmed and fascinated.  And I even find it kind of beautiful.  Hellraiser is basically Schrodinger's Cat for horror fans - you can believe you're not fascinated by it when you're not looking at it, but when you pull back the lid and look at it you have to face whatever you see.

The calm fascination that I find in Hellraiser comes, I think, from the distance between myself and the film. Sure, I'm seeing people ripped apart and am face to face with grotesque demons who have fantastic special effects around them, but I'm still safe at home with a TV screen and several other items separating me from the hell that I can see. The things I see are even some times effecting me physically, but I can at the same time realize that this physical response is controlled by my mental response to Hellraiser as an external stimuli.  I'm making this sound really technical, but I really do think that Hellraiser has some kind of philosophical relevance to my life as a horror fan. I can't be the guy who "only likes highbrow horror" if I like Hellraiser.  I also can't say that gore can not equal high art if I like Hellraiser.

Which brings us to Hellbound: Hellraiser II. If Hellraiser is a splattery philosophical debate inside my head, Hellbound: Hellraiser II is the nightmare I have when I go to sleep.  It's less coherent and there are times when the flaws in logic that derail so many nightmares shine through the cracks, but at the same time it hits home plenty of times and even opens our mind to possibilities of horror that we didn't think of before.  It expands upon the events of the first film - even recounting most of them in a myriad of flashback scenes - in plenty of ways, and leaves the viewer at least intrigued by the possibilities it presents.

The plot of the film picks up after the events of Hellraiser, with our survivor Kristy (Ashley Laurence) in a mental hospital and a bloody mattress that holds the key to reanimation that occurred in the house from the first film.  Julia, the evil stepmother (and let's just take a moment to consider the use of the evil stepmother here and how it makes Hellraiser and Hellraiser II kind of like an animated Disney classic) from the first film is soon reborn and then re-skinned thanks to spilled blood, and then the two end up running around the world of the Cenobites.  There's more to it than that, but not a whole lot more.

Let's get back to that world of the Cenobites. Remember that time in the first movie when Pinhead was all "We have such sights to show you!"? He was not kidding.  The most amazing thing about Hellraiser II, to me, is the grand scale "Hell" that our characters end up roaming.  The visuals are very stilted these days - what would now be CGI is accomplished here by matte paintings and illusions of perception - but the labyrinth style (which again makes me think of children's fairy tales) world that entraps our characters has always widened my eyes and made me think about the possibilities that are out there.

 The biggest problem with Hellraiser II is that it keeps making you think about Hellraiser, which was a much tighter and engrossing film. The sequel is far more abstract than the film that came before it, and it simply can not match the feeling that Hellraiser gave us. The first film felt real, even though we knew it wasn't, while this film offers things like Cenobite-ed psychiatric doctors that fly around like a monkey from The Wizard of Oz that are just too dreamlike to be taken seriously.

Hellraiser II does offer up a nightmare world, but it's the difference between that nightmare world and the incredibly realistic - save a few cheesy effects - world that the first film created that holds it back from being truly special.  Still, Hellbound: Hellraiser II is a top notch sequel and a worthy addition to the story Clive Barker created.  The grand scale vision of Barker's Hell that we see in this film is unmatched in other Hellraiser films (then again, most Hellraiser films after this one offer little of anything worthwhile), and some great visuals and cenobite carnage should send fans of the first film home happy.

Midnight Movie of the Week #136 - Hello Mary Lou: Prom Night II

Prom Night II doesn't sound like much of an idea.  Even the most fervent supporters of the slasher film will probably admit that 1980's Prom Night - which is most known for Jamie Lee Curtis' unfortunate dancing and a series of "Wait a minute, what the heck happened to get the guy from Naked Gun into this movie?" moments - is not an entirely successful film.  That Canadian slasher film was one of the first and most obvious ripoffs of the Halloween formula, but it missed most of the things that made that film and several other slashers great - particularly when it came to the film's sluggish pace.

And yet, when you find Hello Mary Lou: Prom Night II, you'll find a horror sequel that's surprisingly talked about and has grown something of a cult following.  Primarily, I think, because Hello Mary Lou is kind of ridiculously crazy.  It's not your average slasher film - and Prom Night, in fact, is the definition of "average slasher film" - it's a body possessing mish-mash of themes from Carrie, The Exorcist, A Nightmare on Elm Street and plenty of other horror movies I'm probably missing.  This movie is basically the horror version of the Mongolian Buffet restaurant that's a mile from my apartment: it looks like one thing while it actually has all different types of things, things that are often put together in a pattern that lacks any type of common sense.  While these things are often disappointing on their own, but when you put them all together you get a decadent mixture that leaves you stuffed to the brim and content.

The film, like many slashers, starts in the past.  It's 1957 and Mary Lou Maloney is the slut belle of the ball at the good old fashioned high school prom.  Unfortunately for her, she cheats on her date, causes a big stir, and ends up set on fire while she's crowned Prom Queen.  The fire kills Mary Lou, but I guess there's a bright side to her predicament. She doesn't wake up pregnant the morning after prom gets to become a rageful spirit of destruction.

We flash forward to 1987 - the year of the film's release - and meet Vicki Carpenter, a mild mannered girl with extra Christian parents and a sweet side.  Vicki's biggest problems, aside from being a mixture of Carrie White and Nancy Thompson, come from normal high school problems like parental control and that one witchy girl who gets her kicks by picking on the girl who's not at all intimidating.  At least not until she inherits the spirit of Mary Lou through a conveniently preserved prom dress.

Unlike its drab predecessor, Hello Mary Lou: Prom Night II (or, HMLPN2 if I get tired of typing that), enjoys breaking the mold that slasher films were stuck in early in the 1980s.  Part of me wonders why the film even bothered to inherit the Prom Night name at all (Probable answer = money.), because this film is such a different animal than Jamie Lee's Dance Party.  Director Bruce Pittman packs the film with wacky visuals and bizarre scenes - like an evil rocking horse or a naked and possessed Vicki stalking a friend in the girls locker room - that remind of abstract '80s horrors like Prince of Darkness or The Pit.

Like that Mongolian Buffet - I'm sticking with that analogy because it makes so much sense in my brain - the pieces of HMLPN2 aren't always good fits with the rest of the meal.  A first time viewer will probably mutter something like "Wait, what?" a few times, but that just adds to the charm as the film crashes through the its plot with a carefree disregard for normalcy.  There's a little bit of Evil Dead in the film's spirit, because anything can happen at any time in this film's universe.

As the story wraps up, it allows the great Michael Ironside to take over alongside Lisa Schrage, who plays the imposing Mary Lou with vigor.  Their performances, mixed with the younger folks (Wendy Lyon has impressive range as Vicki), keep the unpredictable film interesting as it moves with such a brisk pace.  This takes our attention off the little details, leaving us to remember the film in a positive light.

Hello Mary Lou: Prom Night II isn't a titan of horror, even by '80s standards.  But it gets plenty of bonus points for effort, because it spares nothing in an attempt to do something fun with a brand name and a silly plot.  It's hard to call a movie that calls itself a sequel and seems to borrow ideas from so many others an original piece of horror - maybe it's more of a Mad Libs horror movie? - but I still would bet that most people who seek out this movie are in for a few surprises.

The Mike's Top 50 Horror Movies Countdown: #30 - Evil Dead II

Previously on the Countdown: Number 50 - Happy Birthday to Me  Number 49 - Prince of Darkness  Number 48 - House on Haunted Hill  Number 47 - The Monster Squad  Number 46 - Hellraiser  Number 45 - The Fog  Number 44 - Creature From the Black Lagoon  Number 43 - Zombie  Number 42 - Tales from the Crypt  Number 41 - Bubba Ho-Tep  Number 40 - Phantom of the Paradise  Number 39 - Dog Soldiers Number 38 - Pontypool  Number 37 - Dark Water  Number 36 - Army of Darkness Number 35 - The Legend of Hell House  Number 34 - Poltergeist  Number 33 - The Abominable Dr. Phibes  Number 32 - The Phantom of the Opera  Number 31 - The House of the Devil

Evil Dead II

(1987, Dir. by Sam Raimi.)

Why It's Here:

Though it's obviously a sequel - some would argue that it's a remake - Evil Dead II holds a unique place in horror history. Sam Raimi, Robert Tapert and Bruce Campbell followed up their beloved first film with a most excellent blend of horror and comedy that is still a crowd pleaser today. It might not top the splatter that we saw in The Evil Dead (SPOILER ALERT: Few films do.) but the addition of more blatant comic aspects - and the evolution of Campbell's iconic Ash character - have put this on the short-list of the greatest horror sequels out there.

The Moment That Changes Everything:

Ash goes through a lot through the Evil Dead series, but he might be at his low point during the darkly comic scene in which he joins most of the generally-inanimate objects in that cursed cabin in a bit of hysterical laughter.  I think my favorite side character in the scene is the lamp that dances with Ash for a few moments, but that's not the point I'm looking for. The point is that Evil Dead II keeps finding new ways to surprise, and this is one of my favorites.

It Makes a Great Double Feature With:

One of the most interesting things about the Evil Dead films, at least to me, is that there really wasn't much like them released in the 1980s.  This was the decade of the slasher, the sequel, and the teen horror film - and I'm pretty stumped to find something of its era that matches ED2. If there's anything I've seen that matches the crazy intensity of this film, it might be the recent horror hit and future cult classic The Cabin in the Woods, which not only refers to the Evil Dead 'verse but honors it wonderfully.

What It Means To Me:

It was once just an entertaining diversion, but Evil Dead II has kind of become a case study in horror to me over the years. There's so much in this film series that is without equal anywhere else in horror, and I always seem to find something new and unique about all three films. Evil Dead II has lost a little luster over the years - might be because I've seen it dozens of times and know the gags too well - but it's still a fascinating piece of horror that I can admire any day.

Piranha 3DD

(2012, Dir. by John Gulager.)

Man, I really don't want to go write about Piranha 3DD.  This is the kind of movie that does not ask the viewer to access any part of their brain that involves intelligence, and I'd like to think that anything I write about the movie will be more thoughtful than the movie itself. Like, that sentence I just wrote.  I over-wrote that sentence.  I could have said, Piranha 3DD is a dumb movie. And that's all I needed to say.

Then again, the movie - which is a sequel to the less-than-two year old horror remake (that featured the all too lovely and amazing and beautiful Elisabeth Shue - HEY ELISABETH SHUE, I LOVE YOU!) - doesn't aim to be anything but dumb.  The plot revolves around an "adult" water park, (run by the always brash David Koechner of Anchorman), the returning chompy-faced-fishes, and (naturally) a bunch of college kids who can bare their breasts (although, truthfully, all the actual characters keep their stuff under wraps throughout the film) and party and eventually become chum.  They are led by two very good looking young actresses with horror under their belts, the Friday the 13th remake's Danielle Panabaker and Tucker & Dale vs. Evil's Katrina Bowden - but neither actress is given anything to do other than be a standard horror victim.  Bowden's performance stands out a little bit, but primarily because of the predictable, yet entertaining, discomfort that her character is forced to endure.

The folks behind Piranha 3DD are director John Gulager - son of cult hero Clu Gulager, who appears briefly here - and screenwriters Patrick Melton and Marcus Dunstan, the same trio who won some filmmaking reality show and got to make the Feast trilogy, three films that I truly love for their increasing ridiculousness and utter disregard for traditional expectations and/or sanity.  But, like a lot of sequels that are given to promising folks, it's hard to see their stamp on this film.  Don't get me wrong - there's plenty of gore and violence and a few decent shockers - but the whole thing is a bit standard for the guys who made a trilogy with the most ridiculous ending this side of The Matrix.

If there's a positive note about Piranha 3DD - as mean as I'm sounding, I really think there is a positive side to this film - it's the crude and hilarious humor that fills the script.  Things particularly pick up in the final act of the film, when cameos by a bunch of famous folks take over parts of the film.  The humorous additions include three returning characters from the first film - played by Paul Scheer, Ving Rhames, and Christopher Lloyd - who reprise their roles with tongues firmly in cheek.  Lloyd gets to spout sciencey nonsense while dealing with his character's YouTube fame - there's a couple of hilarious lines of dialogue involved there - while Rhames and Scheer deal with the former's injuries from the first film in goofy ways.  An exchange late in the film is punctuated by a comment from Rhames that had me laughing loudly and deeply, and I would have loved to see more from them in the film.

The most entertaining thing about the film, however, is the cameo by television icon and walking punchline David Hasselhoff. (SPOILER ALERT: Germans love David Hasselhoff.)  The Hoff plays himself, lampooning his infamous Baywatch role - and throwing in a rare reference to his work in Anaconda 3, which made me laugh out loud too. We've seen Hoff being Hoff a lot over the last decade or more - heck, he did this same shtick in Spongebob's movie, which is a weird parallel to make - but I'm not above laughing at his foul mouth and self-deprecating sense of humor again.  Hoff is easily the film's biggest star, and I can't tell a lie: I'd love it if they found away to focus another Piranha flick on The Hoff.

And there's the real rub of it all. Piranha 3DD is stupid, dumb, inappropriate, inept, and even - dare I say - pointless. And despite all that, I'm here admitting that I have a place in my heart for a movie like it. I'm not gonna say guilty pleasure, because I believe in guilty pleasures like I believe in the dramatic appeal of Pauly Shore, but I'm just saying that I'm not above enjoying something this ridiculous. I had fun watching Piranha 3DD, even though I know it's pretty worthless and a bit of a let down from the folks behind Feast. (Y'all should really just go rent the first Feast film instead.)  There's nothing wrong with this film that wasn't already wrong with Piranha 3D, so I guess if you liked that film enough you'll like this film enough.  Like one famously bad horror film once said - It's exactly what you think it is.

The Wicker Tree

(2010, Dir. by Robin Hardy.)

39 years later - heck, it's been six years since the remake came out! - Robin Hardy's sequel to The Wicker Man is finally seeing the light of day.  Distributors have spent the better part of the last decade (at least) promoting the original film with one critic's quote that called it "The Citizen Kane of horror movies", and for good reason.  But as I look at The Wicker Tree, it's really hard to see that film - which was truly a one of a kind horror/musical/parable - in the background.

Hardy tries very hard to recapture the same balance that he did in The Wicker Man, but Edward Woodward and Britt Ekland are not walking through that door any time soon.  A digitally enhanced Christopher Lee shows up for a 20-second long cameo, but that's about the only thing that connects the film to its predecessor.

The plot is pretty similar to the '73 film, though everything's blown up a little bit to modern standards.  This time we have two young born again American evangelists, a wholesome God-Pop singer and her "cowboy" boyfriend, heading to the Scottish countryside to spread God's word.  It's pretty obvious from day one that the two youngsters are targets of the society, who are now "ruled" by a nuclear power plant owner who compares himself to Mr. Burns from The Simpsons.  (I'm not even joking. Can you imagine a reference to a TV show in the '73 film? Pop culture has infected EVERYTHING.)

Newcomer Brittania Nicol - to date this is all she's done on film - takes the lead as the Christian songstress, and, along with Henry Garrett as Steve the Cowboy (they'll repeat the word cowboy about 7,348 times to make this point clear to you), presents an "aw shucks, look how naive we are" front that is painful for the viewer to endure.  The characters are one note and ridiculous, even when the film haphazardly tries to draw on their past and present "sins", while the people of New Summerisle - from Graham McTavish as the Patriarch to the aptly named Honeysuckle Weeks as the oft-nude poison fruit of temptation - are laughably over the top.  Even the extras overact grandly, and I often found myself laughing at the people on screen simply because they looked so ridiculous as they tried to sell this story.

I don't know if I'd call the original Wicker Man subtle, but its certainly not as blunt as this awkward sequel.  There's little to no suspense - even if I hadn't seen the original film and/or the remake I'd know that these "pure" characters are, for lack of a better word, screwed - and the satirical approach to religions of all types is handled without any semblance of a delicate touch.  Scenes like the one that reveals our pop star's impure past career inspire more unintentional laughs, and the use of a church hymn in two different roles during the second and third acts had me rolling my eyes.  Music was a key part of the original film, but that too drops off here - the use of music within the film is as annoying as anything else The Wicker Tree throws at us.

I can't believe I'm typing this, but the most unfortunate thing about The Wicker Tree is that its mistakes aren't even memorably bad.  Neil LaBute's over-the-top remake of The Wicker Man has at least made an impact and brought attention to the original thanks to an awful script that Nicolas Cage turned into a pop culture phenomenon.  I'm in a minority, but I've championed that film for its unintentional comedy value before, despite the fact that I know it misses the point the original made.  The Wicker Tree misses the point just as badly, but there's no way I would even recommend someone pick up this film if they enjoy such ineptitude. 

By the time The Wicker Tree rolled into its truly ridiculous (and still very over-the-top) final scenes, I was physically upset that I wasted my time on this movie.  It's not the worst thing I've seen, but it's got next to no redeeming qualities - I can't think of an example of one right now - and it's clear that Hardy doesn't have the same vision that he did when he made The Wicker Man.  By bringing the story to modern times and playing off of modern born again stereotypes, The Wicker Tree becomes grating and unwelcome quickly. 

If you're a fan of the original, avoid this one at all costs.  If you're not acquainted with that film, don't start here either.  And if you're a fan of Cage's Wicker Man and its hilariously clumsy ways - you're not going to find them here either.  This might be the rare film that truly has no audience...and that's probably a good thing.