Today sees the release of David Sandberg’s Lights Out, a deliciously creepy horror film which uses our innate distrust of the dark to great effect. The star of the show is undoubtedly the creepy monster who lurks only in the shadows, and the filmmakers use some genuinely unsettling visual tricks to play havoc with our primal fears.
Lights Out Film Interview – David Sandberg & Lotta Losen
You can read our review of Lights Out here, we called it ‘a film that is likely to terrify anybody who stumbles across it, with several intense, nail-biting set-pieces that make for truly indelible cinema.’
Part of what makes a great horror movie is a tangible fear of the evil we are presented with. Looking back into the days of cinema past we see a succession of terrifying horror movie monsters on the big screen. Even now we are on the cusp of a new cinematic universe which will contain all the classic monsters, inspired by the unusual nature of the shadowy antagonist in Lights Out we’re looking back at some of our favourite unique movie monsters.
Lights Out Film Interview – Teresa Palmer
Let’s begin…
Gremlins
A seasonal offering first up, and given the 50s nostalgia inherent in Joe Dante’s love letter to the horror films of his youth Gremlins taught up a valuable lesson early on: It isn’t Always a Wonderful Life…
Gizmo and Stripe, two sides of this particular horror movie monster, were all over the playgrounds of our youth. There were our gateway to the terrifying horror films of the past (something Tibor Takács would also compound two years later with The Gate), and even today there’s something genuinely unsettling about monsters who spend their evenings hitting the local bar, getting wasted before hightailing it to the local picture house. Sounds a little too familiar to us…
The Shining
A hotel may not be a likely candidate for a memorable movie monster, but the Overlook is no ordinary hotel. Stephen King may not have liked Stanley Kubrick’s version of his tale of madness and isolation but there is no doubt that the 1980 film maintains a stifling grip on the nerves of its audience.
The twins in the hallway, the dead stare of the barman serving Jack Torrance, the horror that lurks in room 237… the list goes on. As with the next film on this list the devil here in unseen. It is the darkness in the hotel, the isolation and the closing off of the world outside. The horror is shown through its vessel, the unfortunate Mr. Torrance, who could be any one of us. The film remains as powerful today as ever.
The Exorcist
The Devil made them do it, and in 1973 William Friedkin created a horror film which will echo through the ages as the most terrifying film of all. The film’s production has been well documented (Mark Kermode’s Fear of God is an unmissable love song to the film) and this writer can well remember seeing one of the first showings of the film, once the BBFC’s banning of the film was lifted, and feeling like he’d been in a fight.
The corrupted innocence of Linda Blair’s poor, possessed Regan MacNeil has been replayed and lifted many times since the film’s release, but none of these imitations come close to matching the horrifying erosion of the soul portrayed here. The devil comes in many forms, so we are told, but none have been so well captured as with Friedkin’s seminal horror film.
Them!
Recently featured in our look at the new Warner Bros Premium Collection Blu-ray set Them! is 1950’s paranoia cinema dialed up to 11. Though the effects may have aged poorly there’s enough menace and geo-political subtext to ensure the film is as relevant today as ever.
This atomic age horror may stretch credulity today. However it is testament to the success of the film that the endless parodies which came afterwards make the thought of nuclear-enhanced giant ants marauding over the landscape of America seem a little silly. It’s still well worth a watch though, especially if you’ve not seen many early horror films.
Annabelle
Giving life to inanimate objects is a staple of the horror genre. James Wan did great things in 2007 with Dead Silence, and in 1978 Richard Attenborough gave us a chilling variation with Magic, starring Anthony Hopkins.
Wan returned to the titular doll following its appearance in The Conjuring films and throws in Satanic cults and demons to thrill and terrify. The blank smile of the doll captures the innocence of children so readily played upon in the horror genre. Frankly it’s a surprise that the entire doll-making industry hasn’t ground to a halt following these films.
Beetlejuice
The black and white stripes of the titular character’s costume combines perfectly with the colourful chaos of Michael Keaton’s performance to create something truly unique in the horror movie pantheon. Tim Burton has given us many great movie monsters in his time, with Frankenweenie playing clear homage to the classics, but this is our favourite of this particular tale from the dark side.
The straight-laced nature of Alec Baldwin and Geena Davis make a perfect foil for the outrageous bio-exorcist. Burton has enormous fun with the afterlife and the malleable nature of the dead. It’s a performance that will always hold up – and may come around to haunt us again if the long-awaited sequel, Beetlejuice goes Hawaiian gets off the ground…
Where the Wild Things Are
This is not horror-related. However, we couldn’t talk about our favourite movie monsters without mentioning Max and his trip to the place where the wild things are. His travels across the barren deserts and fulsome forests with Carol, K. W., Judith and the rest are simply wonderful and have a genuine warmth to them.
Spike Jonze and Dave Eggers conjured up a perfect mix of playful hi-jinx and the dark onset of adolescence. Through some shrewd use of practical effects laced with some CG-wizardry the Wild Things come alive and throw us head-first into the beautiful chaos of the film. Not your average movie monsters, this is a wonderful film to immerse yourself in.
Lights out is available now on Blu-ray, DVD and digital download
