Here we are, at the end of all things SHOCKtober 2023! My, how time flies when you're having horror movies. It's been a terrific time for me, giving a few films a second chance, revisiting some old faves, and watching many more that were entirely new to me--a couple of which have become new faves. But what to choose for the last movie of the month? After much consideration and poring over the list of your favorites until my eyes fell out (it's 951 movies, after all), I said you know what, let me put on some Uggs™, take a sip of my pumpkin spice coffee (my supply is dwindling, by the way), an ..read more

The movie I'm writing about here today is not the movie I'd originally intended to write about her today. I had the other movie all picked out, the DVD in my hand. But as I was about to open the case, it was like something came over me. I entered a weird fugue state, or maybe I was momentarily possessed, I don't know. Whatever happened to me physically or metaphysically compelled me to watch Girls Nite Out (1982), a slasher movie that I absolutely hated the first (and only!) time I saw it, way back in 2005, during the very first SHOCKtober here at Final Girl. At the time, I found it to be n ..read more

If you've been hanging around these parts for more than...oh, let's say three minutes, then you know I've always got a hankerin' for some made-for-TV horror. It's great that it seems like no matter how many I've seen, there's another ol' new-to-me flick waiting in the wings, such as today's one vote wonder, A Cold Night's Death (1973). I tells ya, I hope I never run out of made-for-TV horror! A Cold Night's Death originally aired on Tuesday, January 30, 1973 as ABC's Tuesday Movie of the Week. Movie of the Week ran from 1969 to 1975, each year comprising "seasons" that featured low budget ..read more

Reader, I suggest you strap yourself in with like five seatbelts because I am about to tell you the very exciting saga of how I chose today's chosen. So there I was, perusing the list of your favorite horror movies when my eyes fell upon something called Tales That Witness Madness, which earned a single vote in 2020. "That sounds like some Lovecraft something or other, I will pass," I thought. Then my eyes literally screeched to a halt (and I do mean literally--there was the noise and the blue smoke and everything) when I saw that it was directed by Freddie Francis. You mean Freddie Francis ..read more

Having emerged from The New York Ripper earlier this month with my faculties intact, I decided to play with fire and watch another movie from my "do not watch this, it will ruin you" list. That's right, I took Marbles Harsgrove's "Don't live your life by fear. Don't do that" advice to heart and planted myself in front of the one vote wonder that is... Yes, I have now seen Joe D'Amato's infamous spaghetti splatter flick Beyond the Darkness (1979), aka Buio Omega despite my worries that it would have me puking up my innards like that lady in Fulci's City of the Living Dead ..read more

Reader, I will not lie! Time and the such caught up with me yesterday, and as such I did not watch a horror movie last night. For shame, I know. "But," thought I, "I will just watch something suitable in the morning." Then the morning came and with it, news of a mass shooting that happened in a nearby town. Let's face it, it's a daily occurrence in this country, isn't it? This one was close enough that my city is a ghost town today. We're not on shelter-in-place or anything like that, but the airport, schools, and most stores are closed as at the time of writing this, there's an active shoot ..read more

While you are certainly welcome to partake in it any time you please, I tells ya: If there was ever a movie made for afternoon couch watchin', it's Theatre of Blood (1973). Perhaps the five people who voted for it in 2020 already knew that. Vincent Price is Edward Lionheart, a Shakespearean actor who, with the help of his daughter Edwina (Diana Rigg), takes Shakespearean-flavored revenge on the critics who derided his abilities and gave him countless bad reviews. Price remarked that out of his lengthy filmography, this was his favorite. It's easy to see why: As each murder is modeled a ..read more

As someone who is vehemently opposed to humor in all forms, I tend to avoid horror-comedies. Sure, a little of one in the other is fine, but I like to keep the funny and the scary separate like a cinematic McDLT. That's my excuse, anyway, for being an animals run amok aficionado who had never seen Piranha (1978) before last night. I can think of no other reason why I wouldn't have chomped this one down ages ago. Everything else point to it being made just for me. A 70s animal attack movie from Joe Dante, with a cast one only dares to dream of:  Bradford Dillman, who famously fought t ..read more

When I saw that Silent Scream (1979) earned three votes and landed at number 274 on the 2020 list of your favorite horror movies, I was pumped! It didn't quite land for me when I originally reviewed it, as I found it a case of "the parts are all there, but they are not assembled into a completely satisfying whole." I was therefore eager to revisit it and see if time might weave some magic. Well, spoilers, I still feel that Silent Scream isn't quite satisfying overall, but time has indeed woven a wee bit o' magic, because I find that I'm more than satisfied with the parts. Though it ..read more

Ooo-wee, SHOCKtober really has me wilding out! Look at me, after...disregarding? ignoring? avoiding?... it for 25 years *cough hack die* I watched I Still Know What You Did Last Summer (1998) because one reader out there calls it a favorite. I don't use the word 'hero' lightly, but I think we can all agree that because of this brave step I took, it certainly applies to moi. 1997 was the year of ascension of one Sarah Michelle Gellar. Though she already had a lengthy filmography and an even longer television resumé under her belt--not to mention a Daytime Emmy award--it was the trifecta of ..read more