Horror Report

Category: The Vault

  • From the Vault: The Summer of boring horror

    From the Vault: The Summer of boring horror

    We have written about how exciting the summer box office of 2026 is for horror! But back in 2001 in the stone ages of the internet, we were not that excited .. From the annals and the deeply old records, we opened the vault to see what we were saying in May 2001 about ‘cutting edge’ horror that was mostly just dull and boring…

    …for your review.. were were less than enthralled then at what Hollywood was giving us..


    Sit back in the chair, sip a warm Pepsi … and watch a Late Night jam session between Conan O’Brien and Martha Stewart. I am. But off in the distance flashes halloweenmovies.com’s latest Halloween 8 update. Rick Rosenthal saves the day! H20, the fabled 20th anniversary film, wasn’t too final. We needed another sequel, this being a sequel of the H20 film, which was a sequel of 1 and 2, not including 4 and 5 and especially not harboring love for 3…Season of the witch.

    The May 9th flash reads:
    ….May 10, 2001 Star of MTV’s THE REAL WORLD SEATTLE and URBAN LEGENDS: FINAL CUT, Jacinda Barrett, has been cast in HALLOWEEN 8…

    Shocking, especially since their May 10 report was filed May 9. I check my computer date. No, it’s May 9. Thought so.

    Wonderful. The director adds another MTV generation star to the roster. Make some room, Busta Rhymes. Save a chair, Bianca Kajlich, and save the last dance, Sean Patrick Thomas. And if it’s not too much to ask, keep your hands in the aisle, Tyra Banks. You might be next. And you might all be in nine, unless Mike hacks you up this go around.

    Speaking of which, will Carson Daly play Michael Myers? Why not reprise the role of Dr. Loomis with the ever trustworthy Kurt Loder. MTV news. All Snoop, all the time…

    Clamoring Halloween fans asked to make sure Jamie Lee Curtis’ character was treated with at least some respect, maybe more than she got in H20. Sip some Bianco, Ms. Tate. What might come from the latest motions from the office of the director as told to Halloweenmovies.com as told to the American and world public as reported 4th handedly on this website is the ultimate finale of a Jamie Lee Curtis death scene. Laurie Strode, from tight pants to fatal H8 conclusion.

    Rick Rosenthal, evidently signaling and end of the “Strode girl’s” work told the big honchos at halloweenmovies.com about a “strong” role for Curtis during the first half hour of the film. Read between the lines…see the blood. She will die…my sources tell me. Rumors at this point, but then again, so is Freddy Vs. Jason–for 6 years now.

    Not only the absence of sense from H8 appears to be in the works, but also the missing link of Dr. Samuel Loomis’ presence. Made difficult by the death of Mr. Donald Pleasance himself…don’t worry, they gave tribute to him in the wretchedly edited H6, although they spelled his name wrong in the credits and killed his character off without remorse.

    Oh, the state of modern horror. We had been Forsaken long enough, then Along Came a Spider, and Mummified again, driving out Driven, riding with Croc Dundie..again…This time in LA. An original concept. You’re not in Australia anymore, Crocodile…then again, were the Survivors? Did we put a man on the moon?

    Coming soon Spiderman will save us from reality TV, maybe even be more realistic than Rob Burnett’s Survivor which subsisted from a rating bonanza and a bout of hunger in the outback….Was that Colby? Tina? Or their doubles, Mr. Mooves?
    The Rock left the World Wrestling Federation, Stone Cold turned heel, and Vince McMahon lost his status as engineer of a genius operation with his X(extreme)F(football)L(league). But the Rock appeared in a film for ten minutes and became an ‘actor.’

    And without the drug busts of late and the possible strike that never happened, Hollywood would have been quite boring. Nicole Kidman would have been stunned to find her short handed ex husband to be gay, though he denied and sued, but the stalker was most surely fond of the rumor.

    True horror has become more fascinating and sensational than even that which graces big and small screens alike. Tim McVeigh will soon die, Europeans cannot eat meat, NBC is the strongest link with their Weakest Link, and Kentucky Thoroughbreds are dying unexpectedly. Gas costs and arm and leg, plus $1.65 a gallon for regular as a whole…California is darker than even Hollywood thriller sets.

    Did I mention Elvira was coming back to screen? No?
    Guess it can’t get scarier than this.

    Horror Report
    Filed Thursday May 10, 2001 1:14 AM EST

  • From the Vault: JASON X in 2002

    From the Vault: JASON X in 2002

    Jason X was a bad film.. just awful..

    And we are old enough to recall going to theaters to see it in April 2002 when it was released..

    Some movies get better over time and accepted.. Kind of like Halloween 3, we change in our review..

    But all this time later it doesn’t seem like much has changed in the world of JASON X viewpoints..

    We had no mercy in 2002 when we revealed the entire movie after being told from those who screened it earlier in the year what happened..

    At that time, we were constantly fixated on Robert Ebert (*may he rest in peace) and his hatred of horror movies.. He did not disappoint in his review of JASON X..

    We also wrote in 2002:

    Roger Ebert reviews JASON X…”There will be a “Jason XI”–or, given the IQ level of the series, “Jason X, Part 2″…
    “The characters follow the usual rules from Camp Crystal Lake, which require the crew members to split up, go down dark corridors by themselves, and call out each other’s names with the sickening certainty that they will not reply”

    JASON X / 1/2* from THE SUN-TIMES….Although Ebert’s review was the most comical, the rash of negative reviews have not surprised us…Although, the amount of them has…

    Other reviews from horror sites at that time (many are gone now)..

    CREATURE-CORNER: “Is it a good film? F*** no. The musical score sounds like Philip Glass taking a dump on his Casio, the production design and costumes sometimes falter, and there’s more than one joke that goes so bad as to require the audience to audibly groan”

    U-WIRE.COM: ” Never pee in the woods. Pee in the woods and your head gets chopped off. Actually, it’s not just urinating that gets you in trouble, but smoking a joint, having sex, taking a shower, talking, eating, etc. The only people who seem to live are the ones who just run around calling out names. So, if you are alone in the woods at night and hear “ch-ch-ch-ah-ah-ah,” don’t do anything except run around shouting for your friends.

    CINESCAPE: JASON X therefore winds up being a rather strange hybrid – sort of but not entirely horror, sort of but not entirely comedy, definitely (assuming you like this sort of thing in the first place) guilty-pleasure fun….

    It was just that bad then and maybe just as bad now..

  • HORROR REPORT flashback: What we wrote about SILENT NIGHT DEADLY NIGHT in 2001

    HORROR REPORT flashback: What we wrote about SILENT NIGHT DEADLY NIGHT in 2001

    From the deep dark hallways of the Horror Report and the annals of anarchy.. From December 2001.. the HORROR REPORT went seasonal with a review of bad horror.. SILENT NIGHT DEADLY NIGHT..

    Submitted for your Mandela Effected approval.. the screen shot in time:

    We concluded:

    I will admit that if done right this concept could have amounted to something, at least for the first movie. However, it was horrible in all aspects and it died before it ever had a chance to live, and then they continued to beat the dead body 4 more times with a large stick. The Silent Night, Deadly Night series, although incredibly bad does have a certain charm to it. That charm may only be the incredible ease that exists when making fun of it.

    The movie is no better to us today than it was then.