WHAT'S YOUR TOP THREE FAVORITE HORROR FILMS? WEREWOLVES IN SIBERIA (CHRIS CAVORETTO) SPILLS HIS GUTS!

If you've been around here a while, you know how big a fan I am of Werewolves In Siberia. Masterminded by Chris Cavoretto, WiS are one of the best horror-prog projects out there. He's created modern classics of the genre with THE RISING (2013), BEYOND THE CITY OF THE DEAD (2014), and THE DEAD HOUSE (2015). In addition, earlier this year WiS provided the soundtrack to the excellent slasher comic SLICE. Along with those stellar albums, you can find some fantastic covers and mixtapes over at the WiS Bandcamp page HERE.

So continuing with our series of Top 3 Favorite horror films (scroll down for previous lists from Jeffery X Martin, Albert Muller, and Ghoulish Gary Poulin) I asked this lycanthropic synth fiend for his...

What the hell else can I possible say about John Carpenter's HALLOWEEN??? Especially for this time of year, it's a must watch. Somehow the barebones approach and premise of this 1978 classic is able to stand the test of time, remaining scary against almost four decades of stiff competition. And that music- my kids haven't even seen the movie, but I can walk up behind them and hit play on the music from my phone and they scream. That's how powerful Carpenter's synth game was. HALLOWEEN will always be remembered alongside such indispensable classics like THE BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN, NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD, and PSYCHO. And Michael Myers aka The Shape is as iconic a monster as any that's graced the silver screen before!

THE FOG was one that Jeffery X Martin picked as well and called it "the best American ghost story filmed in the last forty years." I'm not going to argue with that dude and neither are you, punk!

"Legend says that Antonio Bay was built in 1880 with blood money obtained from shipwrecked lepers, which no one believes. On the eve of the town's centennial, many plan to attend the celebrations, including the murdered lepers." (*from IMDB) That's just plain creepy and the film is even more so. Starring Tom Atkins (HALLOWEEN III), Jamie Lee Curtis (HALLOWEEN), Adrienne Barbeau (SWAMP THING), and Janet Leigh (PSYCHO), and directed and scored by John Carpenter THE FOG is a trick or treat bag filled with full sized Snickers bars and for parents looking for something a bit more stout than IT'S THE GREAT PUMPKIN, CHARLIE BROWN, but aren't quite ready to break out THE THING for the young'uns, THE FOG is fairly bloodless and boobless. As creepy as it is, it's totally appropriate for 10-12 year olds. 

Rex Reed called TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE "the most horrifying picture I have ever seen." Anyone would be hard pressed to argue against that statement. The 1974 shocker featuring a band of lost teens dummying upon a lone farm house where a family of crazed cannibals resides has shocked audiences around the world, been a standard bearer for horror films that followed, and threw down the gauntlet as a challenge for future film makers. With it's documentary style intimacy and twisted Americana through the looking glass sensibility, TCM  remains the one to beat 42 years later. On top of all that and a terrifying score, uncomfortably realistic sets, and devastating kills, TCM also gave birth to one of the scariest horror icons to ever terrorize the silver screen, Leatherface (Gunnar Hansen).   

  

WHAT'S YOUR TOP THREE FAVORITE HORROR FILMS? JEFFERY X MARTIN GIVES US HIS IN A GUEST POST!

Do you read Jeffery X Martin? BLACK FRIDAY, STORIES ABOUT YOU, HUNTING WITCHES..? X is an old friend and an amazing writer. We used to perform at the same bar back in Knoxville. I was just a dumb kid and he was an early supporter. So I'm honored to run this, his second guest post for Stranger. Follow the LINK to get your hands on X's books. And now...

JEFFERY X MARTIN’S TOP THREE HORROR MOVIES

When I’m asked to make a list like this – and it’s always an honor to be asked to write anything for someone else – I realize how fluid my Top Ten list is. I watch a lot of horror, which makes sense given my occupation, and new great stuff pops up all the time. My Top Three, however, is pretty solid and doesn’t move about much. Well, not this week, anyway.

3. CARRIE (1976)  -- Not just one of the greatest horror movies, but one of the best films ever made. Carrie evokes so many emotions, watching it should be part of the Voight-Kampff test. Carrie is a stone cold classic. It manages to

excoriate organized religion, high school cliques, and the lack of information women receive about their own bodies. While things don’t end well for anyone in the film, Sissy Spacek is a marvel to watch as a girl who takes her personal power, embraces it, and uses it to set fires with her mind.  A pivotal piece of feminist cinema, and one of Brian De Palma’s finest directorial efforts,

2. JOHN CARPENTER’S THE FOG (1980) – Carpenter’s follow-up to Halloween has often been looked upon as a flawed film (even by Carpenter himself, according to interviews), a soft lob after the non-stop intensity of the goings-on in Haddonfield. I respectfully disagree. Not only is The Fog as scary as Halloween, if not more so, it’s the best American ghost story filmed in the last forty years. It is a campfire nightmare come to life, complete with hidden treasure, the walking dead and ghostly lepers. It never operates outside of its own logic and the special effects, all practical, are surprisingly good. This solid scary movie holds up like suspenders, and is one of the few must-sees of the genre.

1.) SUSPIRIA (1977) – Dario Argento’s masterpiece is like nothing you’ve seen before. The story of an American girl who goes to Germany to continue her ballet training, Suspiria takes its fairy tale elements to the darkest corners of the magical forest. With a brilliant soundtrack, violent set-pieces, and witches that would make MacBeth run screaming from the forest, Suspiria sneaks into your brain and sets up residence. It will not leave. Suspiria is an assault on everything you’ve come to expect from the genre, and it stands alone as horror-art. Every horror movie that has come since owes some kind of debt to Suspiria. Not one of them has ever fully paid up.

KING VULTURE'S SOUND ATTACK; 10.3.15 OCTOBER HAS BEGUN MIX

MY HEROES HAVE ALWAYS BEEN MONSTERS PART 40; THE FOG

One hundred years after their deaths, ghosts in a Californian coastal town have returned in a mysterious fog for revenge.
Simple. Simple, elegant, tight. A great straight forward ghost story from one of the true masters of the horror genre. John Carpenter's The Fog (1980) gets less attention and respect than Halloween or The Thing, but it's a real treasure for those who have seen it. The set pieces are tense and well crafted, the ghosts are truly scary and the cast (Andrienne Barbeau, Jamie Lee Curtis, Janet Liegh, and Tom Atkins) is strong and entertaining.
I first saw The Fog on late night TV and on a tiny set. I sat on the edge of my bed glued to the set with a notebook in my lap treating the movie like a master class (rightly so), trying to figure out how to tell frightening stories. I was in love with the movie and it scared me so bad there was no way I was sleeping until the sun came up.
While Halloween remained my favorite of Carpenter's films (and favorite slasher) The Fog's minimalism and classic ghost story feel, not to mention another great score by Carpenter himself, was a cut above the standard horror fare and stood out at the dawn of a decade that was dominated by the cookie cutter slasher genre. Carpenter would go on to greater acclaim in '81 with Escape From New York and in '82 with The Thing, but The Fog is that overlooked middle child that really deserves every bit of attention as it's older and younger siblings.

Keep watching the sky, nerds!