And the biggest non-spoiled issue of Screfourem is...

quite hair raising

Hayden Panettiere sports one of the oddest cinematic hairdos since Whitney Able in Monsters or well, Courteney Cox in Scream 3. 

We will never forget

It's not that this attractive young actress can't handle a crop. She has a lovely little face that could easily pull off a pixie cut, but what part of common sense was her stylist lacking when he/she decided to keep the front pieces long enough that they required the strange tie-back? It's baffling and frankly, the scariest sight I've seen on the big screen since that dancing dwarf thing rocked out to Tiny Tim in Insidious.

While we're on the subject of hair, allow me to raise a second point of contention: Woodsboro's severe lack of scrunchies. Does NO ONE in this town own a Goody pack of hair ties?

Well, Marley Shelton’s Deputy Judy does, but note how she uses bobby pins to keep most of her ponytail back, yet fashionably keeps large grown-out bang strands in her face the entire film. Sure, they're blond and therefore light enough to generally see through, but doesn't an officer of the law have more important things to worry about than constantly blowing those angles out of her eyes? No wonder her lemon squares taste like rumps (paraphrased from Gale Weathers-Riley's potty mouth).

These are the details that can sometimes prevent me from loving a film. Prime flip side example: The Running Man. There Maria Conchita Alonso is, sweating in spandex and fighting for her life. Her rich dark locks sure look lovely flowing through underground hockey rinks, but what crosses this film into successful four-star territory is that choice her character makes to grab that mane, twist it around and efficient prevent it from becoming a stalker's easy handle.

Apologies for the HairCare PSA. I just sometimes find it necessary to shout out the truth.

Oh and Scream 4? 

I liked it.

I suppose I could go into a deeper analysis on what the Scream franchise has meant to me and my generation of horror fans, but many a blogger has done that over the last few weeks. Scream 4 (or Scre4m, which doesn’t really make sense because Screfourem sounds more like an algebra equation or mild infection than horror film) is not in any ways a perfect film. Some of the dialogue gets clunky. The kills are repetitive, since there’s apparently only so many things you can do with a kitchen knife that doesn't involve stabbing or slicing assy lemon squares. Gale and Dewey's relationship feels sad and leaves me pondering what a now unemployed big city reporter-turned-suburban housewife has been doing for ten years (answer: lots of Botox). 

A meta line about cheating makes me feel uncomfortable. The apparent eternal youth of Sidney Prescott (who looks EXACTLY THE SAME) makes me wonder if either a) Neve Campbell started sharing Vanna White's virgin blood moisturizer or b) Neve Campbell has just always looked 30. And finally, we're introduced to the emptiest hospital since 28 Days Later, where I beg any and all of you to never end up in because through screaming, pulled monitors, power outages and gunshots, no staff member will dare pass by to check on your status.

Then

Now

All that aside, Screfourem was a fun theatrical experience, particularly in the company of a full audience that jumps and shouts in all the right places. I won't delve into any spoilers here, but I do thoroughly recommend the film to anyone that considers themselves a fan of the franchise. It doesn't come near matching the freshness of the original or wit of part 2, but it knows enough to still be a horror movie (unlike the goofy 3) while getting with the times and satirically playing with the modern tropes and cliches of the genre as it stands in the 21st century. 

Is it everything someone who used to have Scream memorized was living for? Not quite. Is it a good time and $13 well spent? Absolutely.

Now about that hair...

They're All Gonna Laugh At You (Until You Kill Them)

There is a great horror film about a chubby teenage girl waiting to be made.

The Spell is not it.

This isn’t too much of a shame. A TV movie made in the shadow of Carrie, The Spell is a brisk and entertaining slice of late ‘70s mediocrity that offers a few giggles matched by surprises. It’s perfectly fine for a quick Instant Watch even if you might forget everything about it one day after viewing. It’s fine. It is fine.

One of my favorite memoirs is Judith Moore’s Fat Girl, a painfully honest documentation of a woman battle-scarred by a lifetime of obesity. It literally hurts to read, and yet I cannot recommend it highly enough.

Oh. But I’m supposed to be talking about The Spell, which doesn’t hurt to watch but also...well...doesn’t quite make good on its potential.

Quick Plot: Teenage Rita is mildly overweight and majorly pissed about it and everything else in life. At school, the big-haired slim-waisted gymnasts tease her mercilessly. I suppose that’s bound to happen to the size 10 teen when every other student is in pristine physical condition. 

During one fateful day in gym class, Rita’s most outspoken tormenter has a deadly (and hilarious) accident, plummeting from the ceiling after she attempts a Ringling Brothers’ circus move on the rope. Anyone who’s seen Carrie--which, let’s face it, is why you’re watching the film to begin with--knows that a touch of telekinesis is surely at play.

See, Rita is, to put it kindly, surly. Aside from her sympathetic mom (Lee Grant), her family is cruel and friends nonexistent. Dad likes to make cutting fat comments and little sis (a tiny Helen Hunt) is a bad-pizza-making brat. Luckily for Rita, *someone* in town has an afterschool club on using psychic energy and little by little, her strength rows to increasingly bizarre murders, the best of which is the slowest spontaneous combustion of all time. Really it’s more a slow roast, which sounds much more delicious than it probably is.

The Spell wears its, ahem, influences on its belled ‘70s sleeve. On one hand, it’s an enjoyable enough slice of moldy cheese that passes 77 minutes as well as anything. On the other, it’s a huge missed opportunity.

The Carrie of Stephen King’s novel is not a Sissy Spacek size 4. She’s plump and pimply, and in that is a multi-dimensional story waiting to be told. The Spell could have done so. 

High Points

Maybe my sick day 50% functioning brain wasn’t at its most nerdy, but I was genuinely surprised by a few of the film’s twists

Low Points

As my review mostly states, it just seems like there was a genuinely interesting story to be told about Rita’s unhappiness. I really would’ve appreciated a film that dared to tell it

Lessons Learned

In the 1970s, it was standard physical fitness to be able to climb a rope

If the Nightmare On Elm Street saga has taught us anything, it’s that being a member of the swim team is a surefire way to a wet wild death. Take heed The Spell, take heed

The best way to show your unhappy psychic teenage daughter that you love her is to send the kid four thousand miles away for the next year of her life

Rent/Bury/Buy

Instant Watch is where The Spell belongs. It’s a breezy under-80-minute film that doesn’t really merit any effort, but is entertaining enough in its ‘70sness. One could do a whole lot better but hey...there’s also always a whole lot worse.

Escalator Kisses

When a non-filmish friend starts talking about a terrifying ‘80s horror involving The World’s Scariest Escalator Scene of All Time, it becomes my duty to seek it out. No cinema civilian is supposed to know something about movies that I don’t!

Hence, 1988's The Kiss.

Quick Plot: A pair of sisters are separated as teenagers in Africa, one of whom goes on to live a normal life with her father while the other gets possessed by the ancient vampiric spirit of the woman charged with watching her. Them’s the breaks!

Flash forward 25 years or so (I don’t know that the math makes great sense) where older sis is a Catholic housewife with a randy husband and sensible teenage daughter named Amy, played by Meredith Salenger (who will always be known as one of my childhood heroines, Natty Gann). As Amy makes her confirmation to a kickass pool party, mom gets a phone call form long lost sister Felice and shortly thereafter, is smashed to death by a truck. Actually, it's more a smashing, then eventual and hilarious loss of leg. Hard to describe, but it's more wonderful than whatever Natty Gann is staring at in the picture below:

A few months later, Amy and her dad are trying to move on when Aunt Felice comes to town in a swirl of chic scarves. She’s something of a sexpot, you see, with one of those exotic accents that tickle men’s funny parts and cause women all around to narrow their eyes with justifiable suspicions. Little by little, Amy discovers that yes indeed, Auntie Cool is some form of horny vampire who can put unusual curses on any mere mortal whose possessions are taken.

This is where The Kiss has its fun and for most nostalgic viewers, leaves the lasting memories. Felice makes some voodoo magic on any of Amy’s pals who seem mildly threatening, including her mallrat best friend (in the aforementioned and understandably memorable escalator scene) and prospective beau, a ponty-tailed, sports jacket over button-up denim wearing mall bakery employee--and yes, there is a LOT of mallage in The Kiss--whose main character quirk is his constant habit of losing his stud. Stud Muffin (because what else can we call him?) gets the pleasure of meeting Felice’s trusted pet, a Fizgig-like Critter thing that likes to bite people’s faces, then back away and scream. It’s adorable.

As is The Kiss, when you think about it. The film is practically watermarked with its 1988 date, from the horrendous fashion choices cursed upon every character to the evil stepmother storyline and possession sprinkles. With a few impressive sequences withstanding, it doesn’t really hold up as a ‘scary’ movie, but I’d be dropping my stud if I didn’t say I I enjoyed it.

High Points

There’s some pretty neat and creative FX at work, with fun, possibly Final Destination inspirational death traps and gooey creature designs during the film’s finale 

Low Points

This was never meant to be Citizen Kane, but there is something off about the basic story pacing of The Kiss. The constant time flash forwards are a tad jarring, and much of the plot development seems to have no real calendar to give us any sort of time context

Lessons Learned

When your nanny introduces herself to your 11 year old daughter with the offer that she is going to teach her how to flirt with doctors, you may want to intervene before she also possesses her body

Oversized sweaters with full body bald eagle prints will drive the male mall crowd WILD

Leopard print, tiger stripes, why choose?

If you’re having difficulty escaping a demonic swimming pool, perhaps you should try moving one foot away to this wacky new contraption call ‘a ladder’

Rent/Bury/Buy

The Kiss is no lost ‘80s gem, but it sure is a good time, particularly for those of and near my generation whose hearts simply soften a few spots when our noses smell hairspray. The DVD is sadly sans extras, so a casual rental should satisfy your curiosity with a few smiles. 

Stufffffffffffffff!

I love 1988’s The Blob. You should too. There’s absolutely no reason to not. If you need more proof, download the latest Girls on Film to hear me and a few special gals make audio love to one of the ‘80s’ greates horror movies.

It's gooey.

Also, there’s talk of Tokyo Gore Police and an extended discussion about shopping for bras in clearance bins.

It's educational.

In other news, there’s a new Rogue Cinema issue online, wherein you can find my reviews of the sleazy (in a good way) The Super, plus the anthology Tales of the Undead and the serial killer meanie The 11th Aggression. Go get some!

Lastly, the real reason you're still reading:

Let’s face it: you came here to be BurlyQ’d. And the best way to do that? Download the GleeKast Meets Podcast Podcast commentary track of course! How else are you going to hear a whole bunch of overly intoxicated podcasters impersonate Cher singing television theme songs of the ‘80s? 

So slip on those glitter butthands leotards and wagon wheel watusi your way to iTunes!

The Greatest Movie Since Gangland

Of all the movie monsters lurking in the vaults of your local horror section, mummies tend to fare the worst. Perhaps any sense of terror was destroyed by The Monster Squad, which reminded us that essentially, those ancient Egyptian beings are really just a mega Price Club pack of toilet paper draped over the 6’ frames of lumbering moaners.

Hence, I didn’t expect to be frightened by 2005’s 7 Mummies. I also didn’t expect to be so giddily entertained.

Quick Plot: A pair of prospectors (maybe) uncover a box of gold (not chocolate) coins, smiling through squinty sunlight only to then get sliced up by a shadow on horseback. Cut to a lone tarantula crawling over the desert as extended opening credits roll. 

Stock footage can go a very, very long way.

Now to our main characters, a van filled with prisoners in transit and their two inept police guards. The cons shoot one and make a hostage out of the other, mostly because she’s a hot female and they maybe have plans to do something with that. “Something” means nothing really, though the grizzled ringleader does beat up one of the lesser cons who attempts to rape her. So I guess they’re good guys, except they’re also supposed to be jerks with intense criminal records. It’s all quite confusing.

Anyway, much like that fine Tales From the Crypt episode of decades past, the crew starts hoofing it through the desert under the hungry eyes of vultures. There they meet Apache, a giggling and talkative Native American played by none other than Danny Trejo. He laughs. A lot. And if you’re human, you will probably laugh too.

A lot.

Eventually, they reach a ghost town populated by extras wearing whatever was in the studio’s costume closet marked “Old West.” Oh, and Billy Drago, who has an unhealthy amount of fun as a preacher-y town sheriff. He also gets about 2 minutes worth of maniacal laughter, probably to ensure in his contract that he would be getting the same treatment as Danny Trejo. Trejo, however, gets the last laugh of the film because for whatever reason (really there’s none), 7 Mummies ends with a flashback to Trejo...laughing.

I realize this review is making little sense, but I can only work with the material given to me. I’m not a magician--hahahahahahahahhhaaaaaaaahaaaaaahahahahahahaaaacoughcough

Sorry. I just felt left out.

Right, so in the Old Westy saloon, the cons get their grind on with a bunch of free, well-groomed, and artificially busty prostitutes. Billy Wirth, looking exactly the same as he did 20 years ago (i.e., exactly like Luke Wilson today) does not grind though. He has to look serious, because that’s how Billy Wirth rolls. Also, he might be hitting on the female corrections officer named Lacey, which is about the least believable name for a highly unbelievable corrections officer ever laughed out loud.

The hookers are vampires, or something. And there’s hidden gold that the grizzled con leader really wants to find, even though it might mean releasing kung fu flying mummies. 

Yes, that was not an impressive typo. This movie has KUNG FU FLYING MUMMIES. And they’re dressed like Jawas.

Also, a guy that shoots himself in the foot while arguing with the sun. And a race between a motorcycle and horse that rages from night to day to a different dimension. Oh, and best of all, a rumored $5 million budget that explains where that tarantula footage came from.

High Points

Any film that ends with an extended “Noooooooooooooooo!” will instantly earn four stars from me (maybe that’s why I didn’t like The Fighter?)

Low Points

I’m not asking for character development in a film that features KUNG FU FLYING MUMMIES, but when you have the chance to play with prisoners as your antiheroes, why not take advantage of that by making them actually tough or interesting? 

Lessons Learned

Breast implants, tattoos, and hoop earrings were popular choices for 1880s saloon prostitutes

Your first and last drink are always free. You should have no reason whatsoever though to think that there’s any relationship between the two

Time traveling in the desert happens sometimes, so there’s really no point in spending any time considering the fact that you’ve just time traveled

Rent/Bury/Buy

7 Mummies is a film I’d compare to Gangland, that kickboxing block of cheese that tried hard, just never at anything that would make it a good movie. At around 80 minutes, it’s an easy bit of fun on Instant Watch that makes for a giggly good time unworthy of even .3% of your brain cells. Queue it up with some liquor or friends and laugh maniacally like the cult movie character actor you know you want to be.

My Cinematic Alphabet

The great and mighty Rupert Pupkin and Citizen Robot hath decreed an order, and who am I but a lowly denizen to not follow?

The rules are simple: Pick your favorite film for every letter of the alphabet. Easy as ABCs, right?

Sigh.

Though I don't have children, I do have two cats, and allow me to say that choosing the representative for some of these letters is pretty much akin to me being Sophie only not in the Holocaust and not winning an Oscar. In other words, it's kind of insane luck that my third favorite film OF ALL TIME happens to begin with the same letter as my second favorite film OF ALL TIME, but sadly, that explains why you won't find Christopher Lee talking about snail sex on this list. I won't even mentions how I had to choose between TWO Paul Verhoeven films once I reached S, a challenge so ridiculous I decided to give up and defer his letter as T.

As a result, some of my most loved movies didn't make the grade, while lesser adored ones did (options for X was so hard that I fully acknowledge cheating). At the really tough spots, I decided to use a rough deserted island style system to decide which film would make the cut when I am inevitably sent to live on one.

Onto the alphabet!

A is for Airplane

B is for Battle Royale

C is for Child's Play

D is for Dawn of the Dead

E is for The Empire Strikes Back

F is for Field of Dreams

G is for Goodfellas

H is for Heathers

I is for Inglourious Basterds

J  is for Jacob's Ladder

K is for Killer Klowns From Outer Space

L is for Labyrinth

M is for The Muppets Take Manhattan

N is for The Naked Gun

O is for Once

P is for Parenthood

Q is for The Quiet Earth

R is for Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves

S is for Stand By Me

T is for Total Recall

U is for UHF

V is for A Very Long Engagement

W is for The Wizard of Oz

X is for eXistenZ (it's not cheating if the X is the first capital letter, right?)

Y is for Young@Heart

Z is for Zombi

1. I really hope I proved that I actually know my ABCs.

2. It is the next time and thusly do I ask, now won't you play with me?