If you’re old enough, cast your mind aaaaallll the
way back to the 80’s, when cable came in one variety: basic. We made do with a
handful of channels and considered ourselves lucky. My children wonder how I lived
through such depravation—no streaming, no interwebz, no cell phones. Somehow, I
struggled through and made it all the way to adulthood before texting. Oh, the
tragedy of it all.
Anyhoodles, back in the day, local stations didn’t
carry seventeen late night talk shows and were forced to get creative and develop
their own programs. Hence the boom of the late night horror fest, with dozens
of Elvira knockoffs who introduced scary movies to the kiddos and a few adults
who had nothing better to do.
In our market, we had Friday Fright Night, and during
my tween years, watching a trio of schlocky movies became a ritual. So every
Friday, after the local news, I’d be huddled up with my friends, and with the
lights off, we’d watch horrible horror movies that would send delicious shivers
of terror up my spine. But I knew all would be well, because after a
particularly frightening scene, car commercials broke up the tension and gave us
the opportunity to grab handfuls of popcorn and talk about boys.
The movies weren’t very scary, not really. I’ve
rewatched some of them as an adult, and boy, are they stinkers. But these cheesetastic
favorites take on the warm glow of nostalgia, because I watched them with my
childhood pals. So I’m going to give a few that I remember fondly.
Prom
Night—the original from 1980. Before Jamie Lee Curtis
became the yogurt lady whose concern about our intestinal health got a little obsessive,
she was a scream queen. After Halloween,
she put out a few more slasher flicks, including this one. Everything about
this movie—from the tedious, drawn out flashback at the beginning to the incomparable
Leslie Nielsen, in an ironically serious role as high school principal/Jamie
Lee’s dad—bears all the hallmarks of a teen slayfest. Kids getting killed while
having unprotected sex in the back of a van? Of course! Bizarre weapons used on
mean girls wearing prom dresses? Like, duh. But…this movie has the added bonus
of Leslie Nielsen disco dancing.
Yeah, you read that right. Leslie, performs some seriously smooth moves with
Jamie Lee on the lighted dance floor. You’re not going to find that type of entertainment just anywhere.
And speaking of Jamie Lee, we have Terror
Train—1980. On board a party
train, a sadistic killer is picking off teens, one by one, to right a wrong no
else remembers. Isn’t that always the way with these sadistic slashers, always
exacting overly complicated revenge? This plot is almost identical to the above
mentioned Prom Night. But sadly, no
disco dancing. And the teens here are in college, not high school. However,
where else are you going to find David Copperfield—yes, that David Copperfield—in riveting role as a magician? Um…
Moving on, we have Satan’s School for Girls—1974. This was originally a made for TV
movie directed by Aaron Spelling. Bonus feature: it stars Kate Jackson and Cheryl
Ladd. Yes, before they were Charlie’s Angels, they were Satan’s schoolgirls.
This movie is bad. I mean bad, bad. Our heroine’s sister is found dead, so even
though she’s like, thirty-six, she enrolls in Salem Academy for Women to find
out the truth. Our girl should have known something was up when she was issued
a gas lamp because the lights often went kaputz for no apparent reason, and, oh
yeah, no one wants to talk about all the dead girls piling up like chicken
bones at a picnic. On the plus side, we get manly eye candy in the form of a groovy
art teacher who says profound things like, “You have to let your mind hang
loose.” Word, Professor Good Hair.
And finally, no awful horror movie list would be
complete without Halloween III: Season of
the Witch—1982. What makes this movie so bad, you ask? Aren’t the Halloween movies, featuring the
recurring hockey-masked Michael Myers, a classic franchise? Yes, I answer, they
are. But this movie isn’t connected to the Halloween
movies in any way, other than the title. You see, some old dude is making masks
and he advertises them incessantly, accompanied by a highly irritating,
electronic song counting down the days until Halloween. And some dad figures out
the old dude is shady. So he decides, like all good dads would, to head to the parent
company and ask a few questions. ??? Along for the ride, is a woman he wants to
schtup. ??? But after the schtupping and sleuthing, our duo are taken prisoner
by the old dude—Oh Noes!—and have to stop the clock before the chip embedded
into all the evil masks makes the kids’ heads turn to mush. Not sure why the
old dude is going to all this trouble. All he needs to do is wait a few years
for the video game boom, and then their little brains will be mushy in no time.
But I digress. So, the dad gets free and saves most of the kids. Whew! What a
close call. This movie is laughably bad. Therefore, I bought the DVD and watch
it every Halloween.
And so ends my list…for this year. But I’ll be back.
Mwhahahaha. No seriously, if you get the chance to watch any of these movies,
you have way too much time on your hands. But they are worth a chuckle.
So, do you have any awful horror movie memories? I’d
love to hear all about it!
Do you remember Magic? The commercials scared my childhood self so profoundly that even in the 80 when it was on late-night I was too scared to watch it.
ReplyDeleteHey, Julie! Yes, wasn't that the one with the ventriloquist's dummy? Anything with dummies, clowns, or dolls that come to life are automatically scary for some reason. *shudder*
DeleteI haven't seen any of those. But then I thought Gremlins was scary. Who know Jamie Lee Curtis did so many horror movies?
ReplyDeleteAw, Gremlins! And yes, Jamie Lee was making quite a name for herself as the sole survivor in many a teen massacre.
DeleteI have to admit, I am such a chicken that even these might scare me LOL
ReplyDeleteI've gotten more squeamish through the years, Christy. But I recently started watching The Walking Dead. I have to take off my specs and watch it between my fingers. :)
DeleteThe Fog - the original one not the even lamer new one. Adrienne Barbeau and... Jamie Leigh Curtis! But wait... Janet Leigh, too?! Be still my heart! They try to stay alive as a group of leprosy covered ghosts came back to town for what was rightfully theirs. Good stuff.
ReplyDeleteThe Fog! Yes, I remember this one. A Velveeta-coated classic! If I'm not mistaken, Adrienne Barbeau was a scream queen for awhile, too. Good call, B.E.
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