Posts Tagged ‘Anthony Perkins’
Thursday, June 1st, 2023
June 3, 1983
The summer of ’83 saw the release of many blockbuster sequels. There was the big space one, a comic book one, one or more James Bonds, also a PORKY’S, a PINK PANTHER, and a SMOKEY AND THE BANDIT. I suppose you could say there were two horror sequels, both continuing beloved classics from Universal Pictures. One of those involved a shark. The other was riskier. These people had the audacity to make a sequel to a hallowed decades-old classic, the mother of modern horror.
I reviewed PSYCHO II back in 2009, and I think that piece is a good summary of what the movie’s like. Even back then I got that it’s not just better than you’d think or surprisingly good, it’s a genuine classic among horror sequels. I didn’t see the movie until quite a few years after it came out, but having grown up in the ‘80s it used to be impossible to think of anything made in that period as worthy of a classic black and white film from 1960, directed by the iconic Alfred Hitchcock. You have your recency bias, but you also think of contemporary stuff as inherently lesser than the classics. In some of my really old reviews you can see me shit talking what I saw as the cheesy ‘80s, not understanding the reverence people younger than me were starting to have for that era. Now I get it, though. I just needed more distance. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Anthony Perkins, Dean Cundey, Dennis Franz, Hugh Gillin, Jerry Goldsmith, late sequel, Meg Tilly, Richard Franklin, Robert Loggia, slashers, Tom Holland, Vera Miles
Posted in Reviews, Horror | 23 Comments »
Friday, October 21st, 2016
In the late ’80s there was a mini-slasher-subgenre about killers who continue their careers post-execution, including PRISON (1987), THE HORROR SHOW (1989), SHOCKER (1989) and THE FIRST POWER (1990). Before all of those that were not directed by Renny Harlin was DESTROYER starring ex-NFL star Lyle Alzado as insufficiently electric-chaired killer Ivan Moser. He’s pretty much the worst guy to ever meet: a giant muscleman convicted of “the rape and murder of 23 men, women and children” who thinks killing is hilarious and likes to cackle about it.
They put a whole bunch of electricity into that bastard, but a riot causes the power to go out and he gets up out of the chair. Or at least something like that happened if we can believe the opening sequence that turns out to be the nightmare of stuntwoman/Final Girl Susan Malone (Deborah Foreman, VALLEY GIRL, APRIL FOOL’S DAY, WAXWORK), who’s spooked by her screenwriter boyfriend David Harris (Clayton Rohner, JUST ONE OF THE GUYS, APRIL FOOL’S DAY, THE HUMAN CENTIPEDE III)’s research into the Moser case. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Anthony Perkins, Clayton Rohner, Deborah Foreman, electric chair, Jim Turner, Lyle Alzado, Pat Mahoney, slashers
Posted in Horror, Reviews | 15 Comments »
Monday, November 2nd, 2009
There are alot of awful things about PSYCHO IV. It forces Anthony Perkins to play Norman Bates almost delighting in his evil, announcing that he’s going to kill again. It was an early example of the snake-eating-its-tail, dog-licking-its-balls, bird-drawing-a-picture-of-its-egg modern Hollywood attitude that what people want to see is a detailed re-enactment of the backstory that happened before the other movie they already liked. It re-uses way too much dialogue from the original, like “Mother! Oh God Mother, blood! Blood!” and “We all go a little mad sometimes.” It has laughable transitions from flashback to wraparound, like when it dissolves from young Norman laying face first on the floor to old Norman in the same position while telling the story over the phone to a talk radio host (CCH Pounder). And for Christ’s sake it has a part where he cuts his finger in the kitchen and the blood is shown swirling down the sink drain. I mean for fuck’s sake director Mick Garris, Moriarty says you’re a nice guy but come on man. That shit cannot be defended. Norman Bates got off by reason of insanity, you will not. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Anthony Perkins, made-for-TV-sequels, Mick Garris, slashers
Posted in Horror, Reviews | 30 Comments »
Monday, November 2nd, 2009
I hope everybody had a good Halloween. Thanks for sticking around for the horror movie leftovers. Among other things I watched the entire PSYCHO series to prepare for the holiday. Well, the Anthony Perkins ones – I didn’t get to the remake or the TV show with Bud Cort. Those will have to wait.
In my opinion part 3’s not quite as good as the previous one, but it has plenty of good touches. It’s directed by Anthony Perkins himself (his first time, and the only other thing he directed was the comedy LUCKY STIFF). It starts out with an homage to VERTIGO in a whole Technicolor-looking sequence involving nuns in a bell tower. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Anthony Perkins, Jeff Fahey, slashers
Posted in Horror, Reviews | 6 Comments »
Friday, October 30th, 2009
PSYCHO II is the best sequel ever made to a Hitchcock movie, better than THE BIRDS II: LAND’S END, NORTH BY NORTHWEST: RETURN TO RUSHMORE or even VERTIGOS. That’s faint praise though, since I actually haven’t seen the first one and the other two don’t exist as far as I know. What I’m trying to say is, no matter how prejudiced you might be against somebody sequelizing a classic like PSYCHO, this is actually a really enjoyable sequel, a clever and suspenseful tribute to Hitchcock and to the character of Norman Bates as portrayed by Anthony Perkins.
It’s 22 years after the events of PSYCHO. Norman Bates has been in an institution, having been found not guilty by reason of insanity, but is now considered fully rehabilitated. Against the petitioning of Lila Loomis (formerly Crane, and still played by Vera Miles) Norman is released. His doctor (Robert Loggia) seems to truly care about and believe in his mental stability, but regrets that cutbacks prevent society from having more social workers to look after him. For Norman’s sake and for ours. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Anthony Perkins, Dennis Franz, Meg Tilly, Richard Franklin, Robert Loggia, slashers, Tom Holland
Posted in Horror, Reviews | 44 Comments »
Friday, October 30th, 2009
You guys ever seen this one called PSYCHO? It’s Alfred Hitchcock’s take on PEEPING TOM. Good shit. Check it out.
The weird thing about watching PSYCHO is that after you’ve already seen it (which in my opinion you have) the biggest trick is already given away. I’m not talking about the ending, the solution to the mystery. I’m talking about the fact that about half of the movie is all mis-direction… Marion Crane is unhappy, so she takes off with $40,000 of her boss’s money. Is the cop onto her? Will her boss know where she went? Will she decide to give it back? In a normal Hitchcock movie it might be about the money, but we know it’s not about the money. The money is not even the mcmuffin, it’s the red herring. We know not to really get invested in this because there is a little matter of something that happens in a motel shower that makes the money irrelevant. We know that and we still watch it again and again.
But with this hindsight we can also notice other things going on: the talk of Marion having to turn her mother’s picture around when her boyfriend is there, her co-worker (played by Hitchcock’s daughter) talking about her mother calling to check up on her… everyone has a mother lingering in their life from afar, overseeing things. But not quite like Norman does. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Anthony Perkins, Ed Gein, Hitchcock
Posted in Horror, Reviews | 54 Comments »
