Horror Streaming Screambox vs Shudder etc

Since they were both on Shudder, I did a double-feature of the original 1981 The Queen of Black Magic and this remake from the team responsible for the previous Indonesian remake of Satan's Slaves. I had an absolutely blast with the original 1981 film - it's chock full of amazing practical gore, an actually decent story about good vs. evil, cheating husbands, and revenge, and characters I cared about and is just a colourful, fun, horror romp! The 2019 remake however is not very enjoyable and bares absolutely no resemblance to the original film other than they have the same title and both have a character named Murni exacting revenge via black magic. Other than that, they are completely different films... the remake is quite the polar opposite as it's colour palette is cold, desaturated, and ugly, the characters have little depth, and the very slow reveal of the backstory that's supposed to connect the events in the film is left un-threaded for the majority of the film. It devolves into cruel torture porn in the third act, but because I didn't care about the characters I was bored by the horror set-pieces that occur. Also, I was infuriated by the fact that despite people being tortured or hurt only a room (or even hallway) over in this small orphanage location, or gone missing, no one could hear them or bothered to go searching for them. And also, over the end credits, they showed images from the gory deaths from the original film without connecting any of it to the remake whatsoever - so if you watched this movie without any knowledge it was a remake you'd be like "what the fuck are these images from? I didn't see these in the movie? Also, these look better than anything I just saw? What is this....?". So skip the pretty terrible remake and watch the original because it rules.

 

Trailer for "Shook"

 

This was not good at all. I had little expectations going into it and still felt like I wasted my time. "A Nightmare Wakes" barley constitutes for a horror film and feels like a bad take on a tv soap opera. The horror elements are minimal, silly and forced. It's also a very cheap looking movies too. I know it was low budget, but trying to pull off a 19th century period piece when you only have two nickles to rub together, your only setting yourself up for failure. The acting here is exceptionally bad, especially the actor who portrays Lord Byron. Everyone goes over the top too much breaking the illusion of the time and place the film is suppose to take place in. Pile on the awful cinematography and this thing is barely watchable. And when I say awful, I mean this film is aesthetically repugnant. Too many scenes are poorly light, making it uneasy on the eyes, and the color filters during the dream sequences are unattractive as well.

It was not good, don't bother.

 

After your glowing comments on the original queen I decided to give it a watch this evening and I got to say I was disappointed it just felt very amateurish to me maybe that's part of its charm, it's good to venture into pastures new and it wasn't a complete loss, there were some things to like and one gore gag which I won't spoil here had me smiling for a while. I will give the remake a go at some point.

 

I'd say it's far from amateurish and is actually quite well made, especially if you've seen Indonesian cinema - it's a low-budget Indonesian horror film from 1981 made for the Indonesian market, so it's not a film that's going to look "Hollywood" by any standards. Even Hollywood's own invasion there in the '70s with the Corman W.I.P. films, etc., look roughly the same, if not worse and more shoddy.

 

^ I didn't think the remake was that bad. It had some fairly effective stuff throughout, especially regarding the bus. I don't disagree that there are too many characters to keep track of and they're all underdeveloped. It's easily the worst of SHUDDER's three Joko Anwar movies (he only wrote this one).

If you're open to it, I still say check out Impetigore. That one kept me on the edge of my seat, and certainly doesn't have the same problem with its characters. I liked it so much I even ordered the blu-ray.

 

I'm certainly no expert on this era but it felt amateurish to me. Each to their own so to speak.

 

So I randomly entered a Dread Central contest for Horror Noire on Blu and won. That was nice cause I really liked the doc, but with a continuing Shudder subscription I was in no rush to buy it since as a Shudder Original it'll be on there for a long time. Unfortunately there are no bonus features, which is really disappointing because my main negative with the doc was how short it was. Show me some deleted scenes!

 

^ I won a DVD of Party Hard, Die Young from DreadCentral... after I had already bought it! They never notified me that I won, it just arrived in the mail about a week after the street date. If I'd known it was coming, I could have saved $10.

The movie's a keeper though, so I'm glad to own it. I ended up mailing the second copy to a friend who loves slasher movies.

 

Walmart will have the dvd for 9.96 this Tuesday will get it if it is on the shelf my store has been terrible stocking new releases on Tuesday. Random acts of violence bluray will be 12.96 not sure if stores will have bluray.

 

I checked Brickseek and it's showing they will have it in store for $12.96. I also checked for Wrong Turn the following week, which is showing at $14.96.

 

Trailer for "Lucky"

 

Trailer for "Slaxx"

 

Now this is some interesting news.

 

I am pretty pumped for this. I’ve been a Shudder guy for years and they keep getting better and better. It is well worth my $60 a year.