I reviewed the movie on its opening weekend in October here at borg. The movie is a true triumph for fans of director John Carpenter. Of the ten (yep, ten) prior sequels to the 1978 original that set off an entire genre of movies, Halloween Killsis the most faithful to the original story. On the screen it was great fun seeing Jamie Lee Curtis reprise her starring role as 1970s survivor Laurie Strode, along with actors like Charles Cyphers back as the sheriff, Nancy Stevens as the doctor’s assistant, and Kyle Richards as the grown-up little girl. In Halloween Kills: The Official Movie Novelization, author Tim Waggoner digs into this great story, amplifying the characterization, and making everything that flashed quickly past the movie audience have deeper implications. He digs into the timeline of events in 1978 as the modern-day return is revealed moment by moment on that single day in 2018 that is spread over this final trilogy of movies. You’ll be hard pressed to read a better horror tale or movie novelization this year.
Forty years after the release of the sci-fi classic Escape from New York, we finally have a thorough, modern account of the making of the movie. In celebration of the 40th anniversary of John Carpenter’s one-of-a-kind story of Kurt Russell’s future criminal Snake Plissken and his attempt to rescue the President from a downed plane over a locked-down New York City, Escape from New York: The Official Story of the Film pulls from the studio archives a trove of behind the scenes photographs to showcase the creation of the movie. First previewed here at borg back in June, this must-have hardcover book for John Carpenter fans is at last available now here at Amazon.
Director David Gordon Green’s 2018 movie Halloween was great fun (reviewed here), a welcome callback to the low-budget filmmaking style of the 1970s, a sequel/reboot of the original horror film that set off a new era of scream queens and slasher horror films. But it was only the first act in a three-act opus that continues in Halloween Killsand will wrap next year in Halloween Ends. With this month’s premiere of Halloween Killson streaming platform Peacock Premium, fans will realize Gordon knows the franchise, the genre, and all that retro nostalgia that has audiences clamoring for shows like Stranger Things and Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. Complete with obscure characters from the corners of Haddonfield, Illinois, returning 40 years later, Halloween Kills is not just good horror but great–complete with all the non-apologetic, operatic gore and scares that have been the backbone of the modern monster movie mega-franchises first resurrected by John Carpenter and Debra Hill back in 1978. Since then we’ve seen the likes of Michael, Jason, and Freddy stepping in for Dr. Frankenstein’s monster, The Mummy, and the Phantom of the Opera.
Your annual list of scary, ghostly, spooky, creepy, slashery, and generally monstrous films is back. The goal? Not to miss your favorite Halloween movies in October, and maybe find some new favorites. Below we’ve provided hundreds of movies scheduled to air–hundreds to choose from with a mix of classics and modern fare. Syfy′s “31 Days of Halloween” is back (only the first 10 days of the month have been released so far), along with Freeform′s “31 Nights of Halloween.”AMC has its “Fear Fest” again, and as with last year you can get caught up on The Walking Dead airing throughout the month. Disney+ has the new Lego Star Wars Terrifying Tales streaming beginning October 1. Horror streaming service Shudder is… always… horror, although it has a “61 Days of Halloween” event for the season, which seems to reflect the worst of the back of the old video store horror wall. Luckily TCM is also back with your favorite classics, and if you’ve subscribed to the free Peacock streaming service, you’re really in luck–check out our rundown of their big Halloween movies and shows here. You’ll find this year all the usual suspects: Stephen King, Wes Craven, John Carpenter, Michael Myers, Blumshouse, Jason Voorhees, and Freddy Kruger.
All month long on streaming services and premium channels like Netflix and Starz you can watch horror movies including Shaun of the Dead, Jaws, Rear Window, The Lost Boys, The Boy, Cloverfield, Coraline, Van Helsing, John Carpenter’s The Thing, They Live, and Ghosts of Mars, Young Frankenstein, Resident Evil, House at the End of the Street, Zombieland, The Little Girl Who Lives Down the Lane, Sleepy Hollow, Hollow Man, The Craft, and many more, plus series like The Twilight Zone, Ash vs. Evil Dead, Requiem, Bates Motel, and The Frankenstein Chronicles. 1979’s When a Stranger Calls is on Amazon Prime. Everything you see in AMC’s listings are offered via their on-demand services, so you should be able to watch those whenever you’d like. If all else fails, you can find your favorite ghost story or other horror classic on Vudu and Amazon Prime, where you can buy or rent our recommendations like The Fog (both versions, with the original on Amazon Prime), Crimson Peak, Attack the Block, The Birds, Let Me In, The Others, Winchester, The Watcher in the Woods, The Woman in Black, The Woman in White, Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter, The Ring, and the great family classic, Charles Schulz’s It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown. Need even more recommendations? Check our borg lists of past recommendations here–Halloween doesn’t arrive each year until we’ve watched The Watcher in the Woods and Silver Bullet.
So take notes and put your watch list into your DVR now so you don’t miss anything, especially useful for many of the marathons, which still frequently air in reverse order (?!). We’ve bolded some of our recommendations. All times listed are Central Time:
Friday, October 1, 2021
6:00 a.m. – King Kong (1933), TCM
8:00 a.m. – Tremors 3: Back to Perfection, AMC
8:00 a.m. – The Most Dangerous Game (1932), TCM
9:15 a.m. – The Vampire Bat (1933), TCM
10:00 a.m. – The Crooked Man, Syfy
10:30 a.m. – Pet Sematary, AMC
10:30 a.m. – The Testament of Dr. Mabuse, TCM
12:00 p.m. – Shut In, Syfy
12:30 p.m. – The Crazies, AMC
12:45 a.m. – White Zombie (1932), TCM
2:00 p.m. – Leprechaun 4 in Space, Syfy
2:00 p.m. – Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1932), TCM
3:00 p.m. – Friday the 13th, AMC
3:45 a.m. – Mystery of the Wax Museum (1933), TCM
4:00 p.m. – The Addams Family (1991), Freeform
4:00 p.m. – Leprechaun 2, Syfy
5:00 p.m. – John Carpenter’sHalloween (1978), AMC
5:15 p.m. – Doctor X (1932), TCM
6:00 p.m. – Addams Family Values, Freeform
6:45 p.m. – Freaks (1932), TCM
7:00 p.m. – Halloween 2 (1981), AMC
8:00 p.m. – Tyler Perry’s Boo 2: A Madea Halloween, Syfy
8:00 p.m. – Hocus Pocus, Freeform
10:00 p.m. – Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers, AMC
10:02 p.m. – Leprechaun in the Hood, Syfy
It’s been a little more than a year since we said it. Now the distributors of Halloween Killsare doing exactly as we’d hoped. The latest installment in John Carpenter’s original slasher movie series has been ready for viewing since early 2020. Halloween Kills was wisely kept from theaters a year, so the studio released a teaser then and another earlier this year to keep us interested. The excuse for not just streaming the movie to viewers was always that the filmmakers didn’t want audiences to have a “compromised theatrical experience.” We suggested streaming it for Halloween last year here at borg, because it just makes financial sense. And guess what? They must have changed their minds. This Halloween we get a 1980s style celebration with another Halloween movie entry streaming at home for anyone and everyone who wants to see it. Now it will be released the same day as in theaters via Peacock’s Premium streaming platform. That’s not the free version we bragged about a few weeks ago here, but the version you can subscribe to for as little as $4.99 per month. So instead of dropping $20-40 in a crowded theater at the height of the second year of the pandemic, you can just stay home with the fam and watch it for less than five bucks. That’s going to be great for the streaming service, as it’s sure to be the top bet this Halloween weekend. Then you can hang around for some of the best classic TV series available on any current platform. Plus, we now have a full preview of a new Carpenter music track from the film. Check it out below!
Forty years after the release of the sci-fi classic Escape from New York, fans will at last get a look at the making of the movie. In celebration of the 40th anniversary of John Carpenter’s one-of-a-kind story of Kurt Russell’s future criminal Snake Plissken and his attempt to rescue the President from a downed plane over a locked-down New York City, Escape from New York: The Official Story of the Film pulls from the studio archives a trove of behind the scenes photographs to showcase the creation of the movie. You can pre-order the book now here at Amazon, and check out a preview of the book below.
Stanley Kubrick’s The Lord of the Rings starring The Beatles. Peter Jackson’s A Nightmare on Elm Street. George Miller’s Justice League. Robert Rodriguez’s Barbarella. Shane Black’s The Monster Squad. Two John Carpenter movies you’ve never seen. If you’re wondering what the best movie was in any given year, you have plenty of options. You can look for the movie that had the biggest take at the box office. You can look to critic reviews. You can scroll through the Internet Movie Database. You can review awards lists or Alternate Oscars. Or you can just watch the movies and choose for yourself. Underexposed! The 50 Greatest Movies Never Made, a new book arriving this month from Abrams, could have been called False Starts–it’s a book about movies that almost made it to the big screen.
Peppered with movie poster mock-ups from art group PosterSpy, filmmaker and film enthusiast Joshua Hull tracked down interesting histories of some of the best and most quirky movies that almost got made, but were either abandoned, had legal rights issues, lack of funding, lack of interest, or simply were not made to save audiences from a bad idea. They aren’t from obscure creators, either. The list includes projects from Alfred Hitchcock to Stanley Kubrick and Steven Spielberg–and some are ideas that sound like they could have been pretty great. What were they thinking? Find out in this book.
Just this past Fall, Titan Comics took fans of the Blade Runner movie franchise into their past and future with the comic book series Blade Runner 2019(review here at borg). Both the sequel to Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner and prequel to Blade Runner 2049, the series introduced a new Blade Runner, a female engineered cyborg named Ash. Beginning next week readers will find Ash ten years later in the pages of Blade Runner 2029. With the ghosts of the Tyrell corporation always in the shadows, Ashina has a new mission, a personal one, and she decides to seek a lost target from her past.
Check out our sneak preview of artwork from Issue #1 of Blade Runner 2029, courtesy of Titan Comics:
Although it wasn’t renewed for a second season, streaming service DC Universe’s Swamp Thing was the 2019 adaptation of a comic book series that stood apart in a year where every other series seemed to be based on a comic book. On the small screen, from The Umbrella Academy, The Boys, and Watchmen, to the last seasons of Netflix’s The Punisher and Jessica Jones, plus new seasons of Arrow, The Flash, Supergirl, Legends of Tomorrow, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D, Gotham, and Legion, and new Batwoman and Doom Patrol series, 2019 meant a lot of comic book adaptations that either looked the same or they fought hard to try to be grittier and different. And that’s great–that means there’s something for everyone. But none compared to Swamp Thing. For our money, if you’re looking for fun, creepy timed for Halloween and not cartoony, soap opera-ish, or comic booky, and a series that earned its way to be one of the top 10 comic book adaptations of all, give Swamp Thing a try. Moving from DC Universe to the CW network where anyone can watch it, the first episode of Swamp Thing begins again tonight at 7 p.m. Central.
Your annual list of scary, ghostly, spooky, creepy, slashery, and generally monstrous films is back. The goal? Not to miss your favorite Halloween movies in October, and maybe find some new favorites. You’ll be able to find many staples of the holiday season. Need even more recommendations? Check our borg lists of past recommendations here–Halloween doesn’t arrive each year until we’ve watched The Watcher in the Woods and Silver Bullet. Below we’ve provided hundreds of movies scheduled to air–hundreds to choose from with a mix of classics and modern fare. Syfy′s “31 Days of Halloween” is back, along with Freeform′s “31 Nights of Halloween.”AMC has its “Fear Fest” again, and as with last year you can get caught up on The Walking Dead airing throughout the entire month (you’ll have to check the AMC website for the last few days of the month, as the network doesn’t release its listings this far in advance). Best of all, TCM hosts a day of monster movies on October 12 and 23, plus movies all month featuring Peter Cushing. You’ll find this year all the usual suspects: Stephen King, Wes Craven, John Carpenter, Michael Myers, Jason Voorhees, and Freddy Kruger. Disney channel will be releasing its listings for Monstober later in the month so you may want to check the Disney website for updates.
All month long on streaming services and premium channels like Netflix and Starz you can watch horror movies including The Sixth Sense, The Lost Boys, The Boy, Cloverfield, Coraline, Children of the Corn, Cult of Chucky, Van Helsing, John Carpenter’s The Thing, They Live, and Ghosts of Mars, Young Frankenstein, Aliens vs Predator: Requiem, Underworld: Blood Wars, Resident Evil: The Final Chapter, Zombieland, Life, Scream, Amityville: The Awakening, Sleepy Hollow, Hollow Man, The Craft, and many more, plus series like The Twilight Zone, Ash vs. Evil Dead, Requiem, Bates Motel, and The Frankenstein Chronicles. Everything you see in AMC’s listings are offered via their on-demand services, so watch those whenever you’d like. If all else fails, you can find your favorite ghost story or other horror classic on Vudu and Amazon Prime, where you can buy or rent recommendations like The Fog (both versions), The Birds, The Shining, Orphan, Let Me In, The Others, The Woman in Black, Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter, The Ring, Grimm, and It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown (all these are highly recommended, and you can catch many of these airing this month, too).
So take notes and put your watch list into your DVR now so you don’t miss anything, especially useful for many of the marathons, which often play in reverse order (?!). We’ve bolded some of our recommendations. All times listed are Central Time:
