TRAVIS BYRAM'S MOVIE REVIEWS

What was I complaining about in the last post...horror films? Well, in the middle of October, as Halloween is just around the corner...we still haven't gotten a true horror movie. Crimson Peak comes close, but director Guillermo del Toro has described it more as a Gothic romance, a very accurate description, though many times throughout the film I did find myself squirming and jumping from anticipation or jump cuts...both fairly effective. Something a great director (an Eastwood, a Kubrick, a Spielberg) most have is a particular, identifiable style. In that sense, del Toro is on his way. I've seen his Blade II, Hellboy and Pan's Labryinth , all dripping with his signature macabre and creative style. Hellboy is the most accessible and enjoyable out of those three, while PL is the best in terms of story quality. The man's been attached to so many projects it's hard to keep count: he was so close to directing the Hobbit trilogy (that would've been an interesting

Horror's been getting a bad rep nowadays. The only horror movie to top the box office last year (if you don't count Dumb and Dumber To ) was Ouija . With a...um...less than certified score of 7% on Rotten Tomatoes, the film benefited from having weak competition that Halloween weekend, though it incredulously beat out the excellent Nightcrawler the next week, which was far more superior in creeping you out, trust me, I've unfortunately seen both. But those are the cash-cows studios push these days: cheapo horror flicks that (primarily) teenagers flock to see to get a burst of adrenaline and nervousness (take a college midterm, it has a similar effect and it kills fewer brain cells). They have D-list acting and make as much sense as the people who actually assign power to ouija boards do. So that's why, when the super-low-budget Australian horror flick The Babadook was widely lauded at the '14 Sundance Film Festival, you could imagine my surprise. A horror flick ge