Three Christmas Movies for Friday the 13th

Anne Marie here to spread some holiday scares. Friday the 13th has crept up on us again, bringing joy to thousands of horror fans. If you're a Christmas lover, then these three movies should scratch that holiday horror movie itch. And if you hate the holiday season, then that's all the more reason to watch an evil naked Santa go on a murder spree. 

Black Christmas (1976) - This is considered a slasher classic alongside its more famous calendar-themed cousin, Halloween. Black Christmas follows a group of sorority sisters in what I swear must be Canada as a deranged unseen killer picks them off one by one. The cast alone is worth the watch: Olivia Hussey six years after Romeo & Juliet, Margot Kidder two years before Superman, and Andrea Martin twenty six years before she fondled John Corbett's hair and offered him lamb in My Big Fat Greek Wedding. While the kills themselves are relatively tame by today's ridiculously gory standards, the true chills in the film come from the babbling and screaming phone calls the killer makes to the sorority house every time he claims a new victim.I should point out that Black Christmas was remade in 2006. However, I'm hoping that a Christmas miracle will happen and the remake will be vanish, never to be seen again.

Gremlins (1984) - The Gremlins are proof that giving your kid a pet for Christmas can be a very, very bad idea. This 80's classic strikes a very difficult balance. On the one hand, it is adorable, as when the fluffy mogwai Gizmo drives a toy car around a department store for the last third of the film. On the other hand, it can be downright violent, as when the gremlins murder a neighbor by causing her stairlift to fling her out a window. Overall, the flim tends to err on the side of campy humor: Gremlins get drunk, breakdance, and mostly act like tiny, lizard-like bros at a frat party. This mischief and mayhem make Gremlins the most light-hearted movie on this list. Fun trivia: Gremlins is actually responsible (along with Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom) for the creation of the PG-13 rating. Apparently the MPAA agreed that mogwais were too cute for an R rating but too bloody for a PG one instead.

Rare Exports: A Christmas Story (2010) - "He sees you when you're sleeping. He knows when you're awake. He knows when you've been bad or good. And he doesn't give a ****!" Finnish horror movies have a strange sense of humor. In Rare Exports, an archaeological dig uncovers an old man with a long white beard frozen in stasis. When he awakens, he immediately starts kidnapping children and hauling them away in potato sacks. For this monster is only the helper to Santa Claus. The true Father Christmas is far, far worse. This movie gets serious points for being one of the most bizarre reinterpretations of the Santa Claus mythos. On top of that, it's an engaging, funny, scary movie. I promise you'll never look at mall Santas the same way again.

 What scary ghost stories do you save for the holidays? Post your Friday the 13th suggestions below. Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good fright

Team FYC: The Evil Dead's Make-up

We're looking at our favorite fringe awards contenders just to widen the conversation. Here's JA on the drenched-with-everything Deadites of The Evil Dead reboot.

Happy Friday the 13th, folks! In the spirit of the day, let us make a wish upon a star (a very very far away star, and probably a red one for all the gore... a red dwarf, then!) that we lived in a world where not only the dead could rise again, but that they would do so to walk upon the stage of the Oscar telecast to collect a trophy for Best Make-Up And Hairstyling. (Granted we're ignoring the latter half of the award's title here - dead people are decidedly hair-don't.) As Nathaniel mentions in his Oscar predictions when he lists World War Z and Warm Bodies as most distant nomination possibilities, for some strange reason the Academy just doesn't nominate zombie films... so let us bridge the gap! The bad guys in The Evil Dead universe aren't zombies. They are dead-ish people possessed by demons. Totally different!

In all seriousness (alright, half seriousness) while Fede Alvarez's reboot of Sam Raimi's much-loved slash much-reviled series was greeted by many fans and non-fans alike with something akin to the emotional equivalent of projectile vomit (although I'll admit I personally enjoyed the heck out of it), the one non-negotiable highlight for fan and non-fan alike has got to be the film's old-school dedication to practical make-up and prosthetic magic. The team behind the Evil Dead reboot managed to honor the original designs of deplorable Deadite decay and destruction, while whipping it up into a modern day supernatural frenzy of red and green and black-as-sin fluids drenching every which corner of the screen. (And maybe right out into the theater itself? I felt deliciously dirtied by it, anyway.)

Did The Dallas Buyers Club show Jared Leto saw off his own arm with an electric carving knife? It most assuredly did not, even though it most assuredly would've been the better film for it. Remind me of the part in American Hustle where it rained fifty-thousand thousand gallons of blood from the sky? Oh wait that didn't happen, because suck it American Hustle. Get back to me when Jennifer Lawrence believably swallows somebody's soul and then maybe we'll talk. (Fab hair though, Jen.)

SAG / Globe Part 2...TV Noms

Hey kids. I have been in Iceland for a few days (all will be revealed in time) so I thought I'd pop in quickly for three things. First, to thank Anne, Tim and Glenn for providing you content while I'm away. Second to say "congrats!" to Golden Globe nominee Sally Hawkins who I met just before leaving on my trip (interview forthcoming) and who kinda sorta blew my mind by actually knowing / loving the site. Was it my Happy-Go-Lucky (2008) obsession? Third, and finally, to list the TV nominations for Globe & SAG.

I'll have more to say on the movie nominations (where my heart lies as you know) other than "co-sign! What Glenn said" once I return to the States this weekend. But for now let's talk the TV nominations after the jump since I only have a hot minute between events here in Iceland. 

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To Ozu on His 110th Birthday

Today marks not only the 110th anniversay of Japanese director Ozu Yasujirō's birthday, but also the 50th anniversary of his death. He was born on this day in 1903 and died exactly 60 years later in 1963. For a director whose work is very neatly put together and assembled that feels awfully appropriate. It also makes this a rather opportune moment to bring him up. I hadn't seen any of his works until a few months back, but I've now see Tokyo Story (1953), Equinox Flower (1958) and An Autumn Afternoon (1962), the final film he made. I loved Equinox, but it's Tokyo Story that rightly has the reputation as one of the greatest films ever made. Just last year it topped the director's poll in Sight & Sound's greatest movies poll and ranked third on the critics list. Impressive.

I look forward to investigating more of this master's work (I've thankfully got some time). He never got the stateside recognition that his countryman Akira Kurosawa received (no Oscar nominations for Ozu's films), but maybe he may have if he hadn't died so young. Nevertheless, does the occasion spark anything in you dear readers? I'd love to hear what films I should be on the lookout for in any repertory houses. Or just speak up with your own thoughts on the man. 

Animated Feature Contender: The Wind Rises

Tim Brayton will be looking at the key contenders for Oscar's Animated Feature race. He previously reviewed Ernest & Celestine, Frozen, and Letter to Momo. This week: The Wind Rises.

It’s easy enough to expect great, career-capping things of the final film of any important director even when it was largely an accident of timing that it worked out that. And when the director in question has openly announced his retirement with his film still fresh in theaters, that makes it that much more tempting to view it as some kind of Overt Statement. In the case of Hayao Miyazaki’s The Wind Rises, it’s a bit hard to say what an Overt Statement might actually consist of, but we can get this out of the way and then relax: there’s nothing about this that feels like a grand farewell to an artform. Far from being a summing-up, it’s probably the least characteristic film of the director’s canon, except in one respect: it makes the fascination with flight and objects in motion, a concern in every single movie he’s made (if only in a very small way), the central driving force of its plot.

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