Can I Get a Mummy Renaissance?

I keep telling myself that I have to keep up with the classic horror films. Just like my sister tells herself that reading the classics is something she must do. Just like all of us feel that because something is so old, it has to be brilliant and in turn---a masterpiece. But why don't more people address the fact that just because a movie is old, doesn't mean it's necessarily a great film?

Sometimes I think about 70 years into the future and the possibility that kids then will think that "old" movies are all highly regarded as masterpieces. Will we see intellectual types touting Wild Things as a landmark in psycho sexual thrillers? Will kids be bragging about their vintage Blu-ray copy of Freddy Got Fingered or maybe discussing the thematic importance of Battle Los Angeles? I shudder at the thought . I even shudder at the thought of The Social Network one day being referred to as a classic film. Isn't it scary? It's terrifying!

At any rate, my blatant disregard for the Universal horror classics has meant a lot of mean stares getting sent my way. After not loving Dracula or maybe even calling it overrated, I realized that most people have an instant defense mechanism built in for when people attempt to raise eyebrows at classic films. I always ask these people in my head, do you really believe it is a masterpiece? Or do you just think you have to believe that it is? Granted the majority of people while not necessarily equating it to masterpiece level do love it simply for the impact it made on the genre. This I can agree with for obvious vampire obsessed reasons. But then this idea brings me to The Mummy.

When talking about the Monster Squad once, I made light of the fact that Dracula picked a few of the worst possible monsters he could to populate his bad boys club--namely The Mummy who can barely out walk a gimpy pigeon and who can be turned to dust in seconds.

Plus--he's not even very scary...okay well, he's a little scary in his more skeleton-like state but overall, he's not utilized much is he? When I made these claims however, a few people protested the lack of scare by bringing up Boris Karloff in The Mummy. Could it be that at one point, mummies were a scary monster? This I had to see.

As it turns out, Boris Karloff in my opinion is not scary or terribly great as a mummy. To me he is Frankenstein and as far away from looking Egyptian as possible. To top it all off however, the actual mummification of Boris Karloff is over almost as quickly as it began. For those brief moments where his eyes flutter open and his bandages brush over the young and annoying archaelogists hand, we do feel at least some kind of fear. But then what? Then we catch a quick glimpse of a strand of bandage as it goes out the door and 10 years later, Boris Karloff returns rejuvenated into a presentable if not very wrinkly Egyptian man, and the movie morphs into a Dracula infused love story. Once again, the actual mummy aspect is not utilized properly!

This bothers me immensely for some reason because The Mummy is no longer really the mummy. He is now, a tragic love story. I want the thrills. I want the breathtaking power that Frankenstein evokes. Is this maybe why, mummies never really caught on as staples in horror culture? Is this why we don't have a mummy craze like we have a werewolf and vampire craze? I bet it is. Which of course prompts me to revisit my previous claim; mummies are still not very scary to me but I want them to be. I so badly do. I want them to be fearsome. I want to see blood seep through bandages. I want evil curses to be flying out at people left and right. I want mummies to actually threaten some damage! I think it's time for a mummy rebirth. Who's with me?

And in case you haven't figured it out by now, I don't think very highly of The Mummy. I didn't even finish it actually which obviously begs the question of whether or not I reserve the right to say bad things about the film but it is my blog and all so I win. It has a few moments of intrigue but overall an improper use of mummies me thinks. And Boris Karloff is still just playing Frankenstein only with some heavy eye makeup. Sorry dude.

Let Me In: Yeah It's Okaaay

I admit I didn't have much motivation to see Let Me In. This is due to the fact that many who saw the remake to the wonderful and quietly terrifying film Let the Right One In--dubbed it as being far too similar to its predecessor. I suppose I prefer this to the remake being a complete waste of space, but this review from my peers wasn't entirely hopeful either. For a remake to be good in my book it needs to do something new and exciting with its source material. We know the obvious examples of films that do this (The Thing, The Blob, The Ring (yes The Ring!), but when a remake is just as good as original or almost as good---it doesn't really excite me. And why should it? Why would you want to see the same exact movie again except in English?

I will say after watching it however that Let Me In is a good thing that happened. I say this because the story is interesting enough that most people who do see the remake first---may in fact be tempted to visit the original, which they should for many reasons that I'll get to later. In the meantime, Let Me In surprised me in how well it respected its foreign twin and also in how not EXACTLY similar it was, despite what everyone had told me.

The story remains the same: Owen is an awkward skinny young boy who is constantly bullied by some real assholes at school. When Abby, a girl who appears to be Owen's age moves in next door with her "father" some weird things start happening. People are turning up dead, and despite the growing friendship that Owen develops with Abby, he can't help but feel something is UP.

Well obviously Abby is a vampire and her "father" is her helper person. The film and its original original source material the novel, Let the Right One In, do a fine job of commandeering a friendship between Owen and Abby that is both innocent and strange. It is in fact their relationship that remains as the focal point of the film while the whole vampire theme stands as more of a plot point. An important one yes but still if you think about it, it really is just a way to move things from here to there. Let Me In takes this same tactic which is a giant relief considering the teeny bopper fad that vampires have become. Here Abby's "condition" remains scary and the pair's relationship never falls into annoyance. They really do seem too young for this to get into Twilight territory and that is brilliant.

While the film doesn't take any great divergence from the original, it still manages to do some different things. Some may consider these things minor--but I don't know. I think people tend to focus on what they don't like because they don't want to like it. If you're going into a remake thinking that it's going to be exactly like the original, your brain is going to spot the similarities more than the differences. The similarities seem like a big deal because those are big moments--and they are the best moments. Why change the things that are absolutely brilliant and perfect?

Despite all this, the thing about Let Me In is that it doesn't seem to contain that same brutality of the original. A lot of things felt surprisingly held back in this. All the brutality seemed hidden and subdued. Abby's vampirism was also a little too.....vampiric for me. I realize that probably doesn't make sense to anyone that didn't see the original so I apologize. What I mean is that I loved that aspect of the original--that Eli (Abby) didn't really seem like a full fledged vampire. She was one of course, but it always seemed more like some weird disease, than a thing of myth. My favorite part about the original is when Eli's face turns into that scary old man face. In Let Me In however that face turns into VAMPIRE. Like, white eyes, huge jagged fangs and growls and scariness. It just seemed a little too typical to me.

There's also the annoyance of the policeman character in Let Me In. He's pretty useless and at one point shows up and completely botches everything. I'm not sure I was comfortable with Abby being tracked so to speak and her lair being unveiled. But mostly---the policeman is just useless. Just a way to get some suspense and urgency out of the audience--but we don't need it. The real push and driving force between the ultimate conclusion of the film comes from the asshole bullies doesn't it?

Overall, Let Me In is a worthy film to watch. It's not spectacular and it seems a bit muted in contrast to the original, but it still captures that same moving and intriguing tale. The roles of Abby and Owen are different enough and well done and while there could have been a lot of more blood on snow action---I feel pretty okay about things as it is. You should still of course see the original if you have not. I feel like there's a lot of more depth and brutality to it that really pushes it into that awesome territory that we all love so much. It's just.....foreign films seem to be able to do blood better than we can you know? Do you ever feel like that? Well I do! It's like...........they respect the blood or something. They make it into something artful rather than just something to symbolize gore. Probably this isn't true, but for the sake of this beer I'm drinking right now, it is definitely true. And also I'm always right about everything. Except for when I think wearing my flip flops in the rain is a good idea. But hey, I'm just human.

From Dusk Till Dawn: A Titty Twister Sounds Scary

Perhaps you've noticed that I've been somewhat M.I.A these past few days? Perhaps not? Well, I have, because I've been spending the past week moving, starting a new job and dying a slow and painful death without the Internet. It's funny, when you do not have the Internet you're forced to do things like read books and socialize. It's really very mind blowing when I sit down and think about it. In fact, I had a whole slew of things that I could have done without the Internet, like watch DVDs and write news articles ahead of time---but I didn't! I just slept, and read books and pet my cat and stuff. What a life.

Anyways, I'm back now (!) and I came back at a great time because Netflix Instant watch decided to add about 1,000 awesome horror movies to its list. Including but not limited to, today's movie, From Dusk Till Dawn. A film that reeks strongly of Quentin Tarantino and subtly of Robert Rodriguez. Or maybe it's the other way around.......maybe they've dispersed the smells evenly. Regardless, the most important thing is that From Dusk Till Dawn IS about vampires however much you want to believe that its about Middle Earth and Orcs on steroids.

Here, we follow Seth and Richie Gecko who are wanted by the FBI for robbing banks and shit. Along the way they take the Fuller family hostage on route to Mexico. Here, they stop at a bar called the Titty Twister and some crazy shit happens. Like sexy women turning into snake vampire demons and other shit.

This funny thing happened to me whilst watching From Dusk Till Dawn. I got embarrassed! Twice actually. First off, after about an hour into the film I started realizing that I was probably wrong about the whole vampire thing. This wasn't about vampires at all! It was about George Clooney and Quentin Tarantino being mean bank robbers. How embarrassing I thought! Once again, my preconceived notions fooled me and I was destined to hang my head in shame and kick around dirt in an "Aww nuts!" kind of way (Just like that time I thought Working Girl was about prostitutes). But then suddenly there WERE vampires and From Dusk Till Dawn turned into Dead Alive except with vampires and Tom Savini in horrifying sexual situations. Then I got embarrassed for thinking that I was wrong about the vampires, when actually there were vampires. Totally embarrassing I know.

Anyways, it's fine that this happened to me because I realize looking back that the film is divided quite purposely, into two distinct tones. First we have our witty screenwriting and characterization as brought forth by Tarantino's screenplay and second we have our fast paced, silly, gory action-fest as brought forth by Rodriguez. How neat! Of course I would be lying to you if I said I was a fan of this. Personally (as in according to my taste buds), I'm not the biggest fan of movies that veer off into buckets and buckets of vampire gore and exploding vampire head after exploding vampire head. It's entertaining yes, but I can only take so much of it you know? And even though the first hour or so of the film deals very little with the actual horror genre, I found myself favoring it much more over the 2nd half.

One thing is for sure however: Quentin Tarantino's foot fetish thing is taken way over the top in this. In fact, it gets kind of awkward doesn't it? It's like when someone makes a racist joke and then everybody laughs but then the person's like, "No seriously, black people? Fuck them" and then everybody looks around and pretends that they have to go do their laundry. It's definitely like that.

Because......yikes.

Also upsetting---once AGAIN God thinks it's very funny to put Tom Savini in compromising sexual situations. Like having him be a tough as nails biker named "Sex Machine" who has a penis gun.

Sick! I don't know what it is about Tom Savini that completely turns me off but whatever it is, it makes me never want to have sex ever again. P.S. does anyone else think he acts like a total douche bag when he tries to portray a bad ass? Maybe it's because I've heard that he's a super dickhead in real life--but whenever Tom Savini gets these super amped up awesome roles, I can't help but be *annoyed*.

I don't mind From Dusk Till Dawn persay, but I suppose it just wasn't what I had in mind. I do admire how balls to the wall it gets and how it's very anti-happiness and all that good stuff. There isn't some bullshit romantic twist or sweet goodbye or even sadness happening. Shit just goes down, people die and it sucks BUT we don't feel like our hearts are being pulled out of our chests and staked.

I still think that the vampires are a little too Middle Earth to really be classified as vampires though.

In fact, I totally thought they were demons at first (embarrassing thing number 3 that happened to me during this) and not vampires. Oh and Selma Hayek's tantalizing dance that everyone is obsessed about? It's okay. But honestly, that whole whiskey down the foot thing and the drinking the whiskey and spitting it into Quentin Taratino's mouth thing really killed it for me. Kind of gross right?

What I mostly feel though, is regret. Regret because I realize that I'll probably never be in Seth Gecko's cool book, for the following reasons.

Reasons Why I Am Not In 'The Cool Book'

1. I wear slipper socks

2. I just added The Mighty Morphin Power Rangers movie to my queue.

3. Blueberries? Hate them.

4. I prefer milk chocolate over dark.

5. Mexican food? Meh.

See what I mean? I'm definitely never going to be in the cool book and that makes sad.

Look, it's a manjo!

Stake Land: See This

On Saturday night I got a chance to see the much talked about Stake Land and I had a grand old time. Twas a midnight showing and thanks to my crafty job at tricking my body into thinking it was earlier than it was, I stayed up and didn't yawn once. But we're not here to discuss my superb skills at staying up late--we are here to talk about Stake Land, and how you should go see it immediately.

Stake Land is the 2nd directorial feature of Jim Mickle, whom many of you may be familiar with for directing Mulberry Street. The film puts its own spin on the apocalypse by using vampires and injecting some good old fashioned chaos and characterization into our situation. We follow Martin, a young boy who gets swooped up under a rough and tough vampire hunter's wing after his family gets massacred by a vampire. He is known only as Mister, and sees it as his duty to train Martin as his apprentice. The two set off in search of the much talked about "New Eden" and along the way encounter crazy religious cults, new friends and plenty of vampires.

While the plot may sound like your typical, gang trying to survive in fill-in-the-blank apocalypse, Stake Land is surprisingly original and refreshing in just about every single area. Sure it may remind you here and there of Zombieland or even The Road--but Stake Land has enough WOW moments to really ground your thoughts. Once the credits roll and you start to replay the film's events in your head you realize that Stake Land is simply Stake Land and nothing else---and that is important.

The best thing about Stake Land is how unbelievably polished and great it looks despite its smaller budget. Made for under a million, Stake Land boasts some of the greatest looking vampires and dead vampires that I have ever seen. While a few of the live vampires at times look a little orc-ish and CGI happy--the real star is the aftermath of the vampires. You'll see some really, really fantastic FX work here that will blow your mind. Rotting and gutted vamps hanging from trees, burnt to a crisp vamps in grotesque positions. Vamps tied to ladders awaiting the final judgement of the sun. Truly, spectacular.

Stake Land also has one of the more notable opening scenes that will make you both smile and cry at the horror. Hint: a baby is involved. In fact, when all is said and done in the grand scheme of Stake Land, you will definitely find yourself going WOW more than you are saying YIKES. Ya dig?

Sure it has it down points: The uber religious and scary Jedidiah comes off as a bit cartoonish--especially at the end, and feels worlds away from the tone established so far. The film also runs a bit too long in my opinion and I couldn't help but feel that with at least 15 minutes shaved off we would be in fine condition.

Still, as with most apocalyptic horror films these days--it's all about the people. Mickle himself at the screening explained how one of the most repeated nods in the film goes to 9/11. The film itself is meant to show how we as humans are able to come together in times of tragedy and hopelessness. The bonds formed between our main characters seem to remind us that one day IF the world comes to an end--there may still be hope after all.

I totally have a crush on this kid. Call me.

Stake Land gets huge points in my book for being insanely original. You won't find standard jump scares or cheap shots here--instead you'll come across scenes that will simply make you excited that it's happening. You'll ask yourself how it is possible that no one thought of that before. This is what I enjoyed most about Stake Land, it wasn't predictable and it kept us on a continuous level of admiration--which I find to happen less and less to me these days. These days it's all about the dissection, the, "Well, they SHOULD have done this" and "I didn't like the THIS". Here though, I found myself appreciating what was done more than anything.

One scene in particular will have you filled with such confusion and horror that you'll be playing it over in your head for days. It's a remarkably well done scene that will surely be spotlighted a 100 times over. I don't want to spoil it.....oooh but I really want to talk about it!

Alright well I'll just say it, and if you'd rather not know you may skip this paragraph now. The scene in question comes during a moment of rapture. Our characters have stumbled into a government aided lock down area and a jolly good moment of dancing ensues. Suddenly without warning, a helicopter appears overhead and something comes crashing down on the table. We don't know what it is and the camera whips around frantically emphasizing the chaos. Then we hear more deep thuds and crashes and we see glimpses and hear the growls of vampires. It is clear in that moment that the evil "brotherhood" has seen it fit to cause as much destruction and chaos as they can. They are dropping vampires from the helicopter right on top of the town and all of its good intentions, causing mass hysteria. Crazy right? It's the best scene in the entire film.

Alright back to normal! Overall, Stake Land is a surprise. It's not perfect but it's definitely a film that will make you appreciate the fine art of making films without a super mega budget. Its characters will stay with you and more than a few scenes will make your eyes pop out of your head. Stake Land helps keep vampires on the scary list of movie monsters and it does it all without sacrificing a thing. So if and when Stake Land rolls in near you, do yourself a favor and check this one out. I hope you won't regret it, but something tells me you won't.

Daybreakers: Contrary to Popular Belief, Ethan Hawke DOES Still Exist

I feel like it's been ages since my last vampire film. But you know what? It hasn't. Not really, anyways. Maybe I've just been so dependent on disturbing films and Asian films lately that I've completely forgotten about the existence of other horror movies. Or maybe I just can't admit that William Dafoe makes me nervous and slightly giddy at the same time?

I remember when Daybreakers came out and after reading people's thoughts I immediately decided that when it came out on video I would need to see it. For some reason, I completely forgot about that necessity until noticing that it had become available to watch instantly. I also must point out that my memory only gets worse the further we progress into winter. If it's not better by the time Spring rolls around, consider the possibility of me getting a very early case of Alzheimer's or maybe even Dementia.

So Daybreakers. I'm not sure but I think I like you. I kind of really dug that futuristic, Minority Report/ Gattaca thing it had going on. I don't love everything about it but I will say that it's one of those movies that I just find really neat. It's a different idea and one that I am willing to bet we've all thought about at some point when dealing with the vampire genre. What if, the population was ruled by vampires? What would happen if one day the humans died out and there was no blood to sustain the vampires? Crazy shit. That's what would happen.

Apparently, when a vampire goes for too long without human blood they turn into this.

A really ugly, vomitous version of a scaly bat plus, they get all mean and scary. Human sympathizer Edward Dalton however is on a mission to find a blood substitute before all of Earth's population turns into scary bat people.

There's more to the plot of course but that is the general gist. Basically, the big corporations and pharmaceutical companies are all for harvesting humans for the blood and making as much money as they can off it. Sound familiar? Daybreakers is surely a metaphor for any big companies being a dickhead scenario you can think of. Most notably, many believe it to draw similarities to capitalism. Personally, I like to enjoy Daybreakers just for the film it is--is that so wrong? The bottom line is that there's a lot of "neat" going on here and even the CGI can't bring that neatness down.

First off--Ethan Hawke!

I swear just the other day someone asked me where Ethan Hawke was and I had no answer. The man doesn't return my phone calls how am I supposed to know? I had no idea he was in Daybreakers though. Or maybe I had known at some point but mischievously chose to ignore it, who knows. To be quite honest there has never really been anything about Ethan Hawke that has excited me. He's kind of just always there. He's the character we never really like, but we don't hate him either. He remains neutral in our minds forever. Then there's also William Dafoe who plays a vampire cured by sunlight. Ooooh William Dafoe. I don't know what to think about you. I'm guessing I'm supposed to like him because he's all badass and looks glorious holding a crossbow

and blah blah blah ejaculated blood one time---but I don't know. Doesn't he scare anybody else? Am I alone in the world of William Dafoe fear?

And let us not forget about Sam Neil who I continue to confuse with Michael Ironside AND Hugo Weaving. I can recognize them when looking at pictures of course but when I try to sort who's in what movie....that's when things start getting fuzzy. Let's see...Michael Ironside was in Scanners, Sam Neil, Event Horizon and Hugo Weaving was in Babe the Gallant Pig?

That can't be right....hmmm no no it's definitely right. How strange.

Ah well, back to Daybreakers. Like I said, the CGI is rather bothersome but it's not a deal breaker.

In a strange way some of it fits with the overall imagery. The futuristic blues and greens, the cars with neato vampire cameras and extra high security in houses. It's like we expect the blood to look futuristic too. Alright well I admit that's shitty reasoning, but I truly feel this is a rare case where the story line is capable of balancing the CGI out.

I'd consider Daybreakers less of a horror movie and more of an action thriller though. There were some scary moments, notably with the scary bat vampires but other than that, it was a lot of crossbows and gun shots. I enjoyed the desperation put on display here especially that opening moment of the young vampire girl who writes a suicide note and then goes outside to be baked.

It reminds me oh so wonderfully of Martin--and my ranting and raving about how closely connected vampirism and depression is. It would really, really suck to be stuck in puberty wouldn't it?

Aside from this, there's also the desperation surrounding the supply of blood. The mob scenes, the dangers for humans. I simply loved how everything was all vampiric in the "future". Convience stores selling blood,

blood in coffee! News reports about blood supply.

It was all just again so neat.

The film did kind of lose me towards the end however. Things got a little too chaotic and crazy to withstand normal movie watching for me and the second cure seemed a little too convenient to just stumble upon. The ending seemed to leave so many questions unanswered and I began relentlessly wondering if this little plan would work out.

I also found the other human characters to be completely useless--mostly because, they were. I'm not a huge fan of introducing characters one of our main character's is suppose to be really close with--killing them, and then having no one really care. This happened twice in Daybreakers and while granted what's her face probably wasn't best buddies for life with these people--it was still kind of pointless.

For a good example of doing this see Star Wars and Luke's short but sweet and ultimately sad reunion with Biggs.

In any case, Daybreakers was still the perfect kind of film to enjoy on a rainy Monday afternoon. It entertained me and really---isn't that what we crave most? And P.S. how amazing was that test subject scene? I believe I remember people talking about this scene but I had honestly forgotten all about it. It's like two giant balls of unexpectedness coming at YO FACE!

Literally. Maybe that was just the scene I needed to rid myself of my fear of vomit?

The Lost Boys: Death by...Awesome

For those of you looking for possible explanations as to why I did not see The Lost Boys until now, here are your choices.

A. Corey Feldman's face is upsetting to me even when he was "cool".

B. Corey Haim's tragic death caused everyone to talk about this film too much.

C. Kiefer Sutherland is not The Donald

D. There is no reason, I am an asshole.

E. All of the above.

Well clearly the correct answer is C. Kiefer really freaks me out because he just doesn't possess the same charming quality that The Donald does.

I like to blame this on the fact that Kiefer is often type casted into roles that have the words; rapist, scum bucket, creep, and bad guy tacked onto the description. Believe me, if anyone was shocked that he would one day save the world or whatever he did on 24--it was me.

Alright, alright I'm kidding. The real answer is E.

There actually is no good reason for my delay in seeing this. I would have seen it sooner actually had I not noticed it would be going live Instant Watch on the 1st day of the year. I think I was also partially dubious of its charms. Yes, it was a fan favorite among many or all horror fans but was it a hit just because everyone grew up with it? Would it be another case of Andre hates something that everyone else likes?? Fear not, I loved just about everything having to do with The Lost Boys. Even Corey Feldman. And his face.

In fact, few movies have sucked me in as quickly as The Lost Boys did. But then again, few movies offer up this eye candy so early on in the film.

Apparently this was considered cool and hip in the 80s. And why wouldn't it? What isn't cool (straight) about a shirtless, Chris Jericho look-alike playing the saxophone and singing next to flaming trash cans? It's no wonder I was such a loser back then--I was much too invested in listening to Marky Mark and pretending that he was my boyfriend. And before you ask, yes I have been shown the SNL skit with Jon Hamm--3 times now in fact. It is marvelous but a clear case of shirtless saxophone wonder thieving.

I'm pretty sure I was the last horror fan on Earth to see this, but in case my calculations are wrong, here is the plot. Sam and his older brother Mike are forced to move to Santa Carla with their Mom. Santa Carla is the capital of murder because there just happens to be a clan of vampires roaming the carousels at night.

After Mike gets mixed in with the wrong carousel hunting gang, it's up to Sam, his new comic book hoarding friends, Mike, some chick and a small child, to stop them before it's too late.

I think what I enjoyed the most about The Lost Boys is that it is a no frills vampire story. It does not contain a need or desire to give characters a sudden superhuman strength to fight off the vampires. Nobody is given a wooden stake and suddenly an expert at killing things. Nobody is shown as fearless. In fact, it reminded me a lot of Return of the Living Dead in that respect. We are given what is largely a very real depiction of what a vampire infestation might actually look like. People scream, and people cry.

Teenage boys are not blessed with immediate and flawless aim and they use squirt guns filled with garlic and holy water. They care about the well being of their dogs, aren't afraid to sleep with their mother at night and still take bubble baths.

It's all just so refreshing to me.

Not only that, but The Lost Boys is insanely hilarious. It's one of those smile movies. You know, the kind that infect you with a giant smile the entire time you are watching it. Even when bad things are happening, even when Kiefer Sunderland pokes his big nasty vampire face in your face, you're still smiling like a fool.

It also happens to be the 2nd most quotable horror film behind The Monster Squad. Corey Haim is so charming and genuine, you can't help but love him. Even Corey Feldman and his annoying "weird husky voice thing" never gets old. Little moments where the boys bust into a church and fill their canteens with holy water made me laugh out loud.

Corey Haim's frantic shouts to his mother and how he constantly tells her that they need to have a talk will stay burned in my brain. The Lost Boys really is a truly fantastic film.

It's not pretentious, or overly "cool". Or who knows, I was only born a year previous to it so I can't say if adorning one's walls with giant swatch clocks was a cool thing to do. While we're on the subject, did anyone else detect a little gay undertone in Corey Haim's character?

Take another look at his bedroom and explain to me how having that poster on one's closet is not suggestive.

Oh wait George Michael was still cool back then I had forgotten...! Never mind, never mind.

So where does this leave me? Pretty bummed that I have been missing out on this for my entire life. It really is just a delightful film. And it's scary, and fun, and surprisingly gory. It's everything I would have loved when I was younger, and it's everything that I love right now. On Twitter someone asked me if The Lost Boys had "aged well". I didn't have an answer as this was my first time seeing it, but now that I think about it--I believe it hasn't aged at all. The Lost Boys may very well be a timeless horror classic. Yes, a shirtless man playing the saxophone was considered cool back then---but let's be honest with ourselves, it's pretty still fucking cool, and not gay at all. It grabs a hold of us from the moment it begins until the first names beginning sc scrolling in the end credits. The ending scene of mayhem is one awesome explosion after the next--and the final hero's last words are priceless.

Yes, The Lost Boys has made its official entry into movies I want to rub on my face for all eternity. Breathe it in and don't ask silly questions about why the only dogs there are Huskies, or why the only place to go is the Boardwalk. Just let it be.