Buio Omega (A.K.A Beyond The Darkness) (1979)

Buio Omega is a film by one of Italy's infamous directors, Joe D'Amato. D'Amato wasn't particularly infamous for killing off animals like Rugero Deodato or Umberto Lenzi was but more for making sleazy movies filled with cheap looking gore and ridiculous sex scenes. 

A young rich orphan loses his fiancée to voodoo doll mischief on the part of his housekeeper who is jealous of his attentions. He digs his girlfriend up, cleans her out, stuffs her, and puts her in bed at the mansion. Following this, he tries out and disposes of a series of young maidens, trying to find the right replacement for her, and the disapproving housekeeper helps him with the disposals.

Buio Omega has a terrible beginning. As a viewer you have to fight your way through the first 20 minutes and make sure you don't pass out due to boringness. Scenes are build up insanely slow and are stretched out for absolutely no reason. Luckily after about 20 minutes hell starts to break loose. The gore is pretty awesome and the soundtrack that comes with it is actually quite good. 

D'Amato is obviously inspired by cannibal and killer Ed Gein. Digging up graves, keeping the corpse of someone you love in your house like it's still alive, cannibalism etc. These are all things 50's maniac Gein did as well. Not to mention the housekeeper Iris who treats Frank (Our main character) like a little baby much like Gein's mother did to an already grown up Ed Gein. 

Obviously the film is not entirely filled with blood and guts. There are some scenes where there ain't no killing and the director tries to develop the story. These are the moment you'll actually notice how shitty this movie is. Dialog is scarce and there is absolutely no character development (I still don't get why the main character started killing people). 

On the other hand. Character development and dialog obviously aren't really the first things you think of in a movie made by a guy who also made movies like ''Porno Holocaust'' and ''Erotic Nights of the Living Dead''. 

The fact is that Buio Omega succeeds at the points you want it to succeed. It has lots of gore, nudity and a great soundtrack. Any ''mainstream'' movie critic will destroy this movie 'cause in reality it's a crappy movie. Fans of 70's 80's gory shit will definitely like it though and those are the guys these movies are made for.

The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974)

This is the one you've been dying for. The Texas Chain Saw Massacre quickly became my favorite horror movie and one of my favorite films ever. I've seen it about 8 times now and it still is as macabre, sick, twisted and brilliant as the first time I watched it. 

En route to visit their grandfather's grave (which has apparently been ritualistically desecrated), five teenagers drive past a slaughterhouse, pick up (and quickly drop) a sinister hitch-hiker, eat some delicious home-cured meat at a roadside gas station, before ending up at the old family home... where they're plunged into a never-ending nightmare as they meet a family of cannibals who more than make up in power tools what they lack in social skills...

Tobe Hooper is a very wel known name in the horror genre and it is all because of this film. It's a shame Hooper has gone down hill fast the last couple of years. Don't get me wrong I liked his more recent films like The Toolbox Murders and Mortuary but only due to the entertainment level. It isn't nearly as brilliant as The Texas Chain Saw Massacre or even as good as his Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 and Eaten Alive which were both of his earlier days as well.

This film constantly has a sick vibe around it. The low budget works so well in this movie. It definitely adds to the realism. Every second of this film is sick and twisted. After you watch it a few times you'll also notice Hooper's eye for detail. Just look around in the rooms where the story takes place. This doesn't come close to a clean film set like you'd see in modern movies. This is exactly what the house of a mentally deranged farm family  should look like. Rooms filled with bones, chickens in small cages and disgusting human parts. 

Obviously The Texas Chain Saw Massacre is based on the 50's serial killer Ed Gein. Hooper finds an amazing mix between fiction and reality. The lampschades made of a human face, chairs made of human bones etc. are all based on Ed Gein. Leatherface however is a fictional character, apart from  the human skin masks he wears which Gein wore too. Anywhay, Leatherface is portrayed brilliantly by Gunnar Hansen. He doesn't have a single line in the whole movie and that makes it even more special how Gunnar Hansen manages to create a body language that looks like a real insane, mentally deranged person instead of some tall bodybuilder who has no body expression.

Please.. Forget about Nightmare on Elm Street, Halloween or Friday the 13th. The Texas Chainsaw Massacre is as close to terror as you can come without actually hurting yourself. Get ready for a sick and macabre ride that will absolutely disgust you. 

Fun Facts (Source:IMDB)

During the dinner scene towards the end of the film, when Leatherface cuts Sally's finger, he actually does cut her finger because they couldn't get the fake blood to come out of the tube behind the blade.  

Director Tobe Hooper claims to have got the idea for the film while standing in the hardware section of a crowded store. While thinking of a way to get out through the crowd, he spotted the chainsaws. 

A family was actually living in the house that served as the Sawyer family house in the later half of the movie. They rented out their house to the film crew and continued to stay there during the entire shoot. During filming, the crew discovered that one of the residents had been cultivating a marijuana field; fearful that production would be shut down if they were found near the plants, the filmmakers called the Sheriff, who never arrived to investigate. 

Scream 4 (2011)

 I haven't been posting movie reviews on here for a while with the simple reason that I haven't seen any for a while. The reason is because I'm currently rewatching every season of Lost. I decided to watch Scream 4 last night to get back in horror films a bit.

Sidney Prescott, now the author of a self-help book, returns home to Woodsboro on the last stop of her book tour. There she reconnects with Sheriff Dewey and Gale, who are now married, as well as her cousin Jill and her Aunt Kate. Unfortunately, Sidney's appearance also brings about the return of Ghostface, putting Sidney, Gale, and Dewey, along with Jill, her friends, and the whole town of Woodsboro in danger.

The first +- 45 minutes of Scream 4 annoyed the hell out of me. Ghostface has as much as a cameo and sticks mostly to ''creepy'' phone calls. It must also be said that even the phone calls are less ''creepy'' as in the original. The many references to other horror films feel forced and are far from original. Next to all this BS the old cast has returned and are supplemented with some annoying teens. 

David Arquette is probably the best character and actor in this movie. Neve Campbell and Courteney Cox are decent. Then there also is Marley Shelton's part as the clumsy deputy Hicks which to me wasn't funny and felt like a complete failure. The role of Anthony Anderson as deputy Perkins was probably the most entertaining although it must be said that the character was cliche as hell. 

After about an hour Ghostface starts turning up. It sure as hell isn't best killer out their and more often than not looks rather clumsy but at least he brings some action in this movie. His kills by the way are arguably more brutal than in the original film. 

My review looks slightly negative but it's not like a hate this movie. I'll be the first to admit it's far from original but overal it is an entertaining movie. Definitely not as great as Craven's 1996 original but still a cool movie with some very decent kills and a couple of hot girls to add some flavour. 

Fun Fact (Source:IMDB)

This time, the footage from Stab includes the credit "A Robert Rodriguez Film." Rodriguez really did direct the footage, and also made Grindhouse co-starring Scream's Rose McGowan and Scream 4's Marley Shelton.