Ok, yeah I go on tangents and quickly become a laughingstock... ha ha.
But you mention 3 movies in your post...
Killer Klowns from Outer Space - IS a campy movie with some dark moments, but silly and hard to know what the goal is...well we KNOW what the 'goal' was really... plus the ending... did they die as result of the pies!?
Critters - Eh.. wasn't a fan. Been so long it must not have left much of an impression on me.
Return of the Living Dead - okay, that WAS a bit campy, but still keeping with the "that's just wrong" types of scenes. But NOTHING can touch the original!
And Krampus reminds me a little more of the original black and white Night of the Living Dead. Almost right down to screaming at the TV, "Don't shot him!" at the very end.
Krampus - while, yeah, sort of in the 'style' of 'some' 80's movies... only because the use of practical effects... has a hard time falling in any real category other than 'Christmas', 'Dark' and 'moral lessons learned' sort of.... thing. There is something about Krampus that, even if you hate the movie, there will be something you'll be able to take with you from it personally. Whether you like cool hunting guns with led lights on the barrels (that would be great in a Doom movie), or Christmas, or the kids, or the lewd behavior of some of the cast, the Aunt has really grown on me. And the other cast members in interviews even admit she had the best lines in the movie. And there's something about the connection with the actors' reactions to everything around them. About their connection to their crappy family members, the set, and the Christmas "things" that attack them... there's an odd sense of change from the UNKNOWN 'getting' them, to wondering what's going to happen, while believing and NOT believing WHAT they're seeing AS they see it. Even when the captures take place... (some times OFF screen)... it's like the surreal is GONE fairly quickly, turning into a fight for we want our kids/relatives back. While, yeah, some things just don't make 'sense', but I don't think they're SUPPOSED to make full sense. And the director WANTS us to use our imaginations half the time (in the old style horror movie prior to slasher movies of the 70's and 80's). And like Santa/St Nicklaus I think Krampus has some magic/mana himself for the Christmas season. What that MAGIC is... is outside the realm of the audience and truly yet another unknown, and even HOW that Magic works or is achieved. Yeah, I'm getting a bit deep here, but once you see the movie... you'll sort of understand WHY I'm going in that direction. If it's on Red Box at least rent it. If you really like it, then buy it. Krampus isn't for everybody, but I thought it was a downright good movie. The movie hits me on a personal level with the whole set up (what most people seem to hate), they are almost seeing MY Christmas past on the big screen... we didn't CURSE like they do in the movie, we weren't split politically, but we were split a bit... in the style of class, how can I say... some of us completely changed their clean Missouri dialect to a deep garbled Southern tongue all for the sake of being a 'pal' to the father in law, until he passed... yeah, he's also our hunter in the family too. Sound familiar? A few relatives acted hoity toity to everybody being more 'affluent' supposedly. And while my WONDERFUL cousins (who I love dearly) are both girls, luckily have girl names, were VERY tomboyish in their teen years. One of them has grown out of it I'll admit. But yeah, this movie hits home for me. My dad, uncle, and grandfather acted all nice to each other while not really getting along. My dad really didn't like 'going over there' every Christmas (back then), which caused the 8 or 10 year old to regurgitate most negative comments made by his dad right in front of his in-laws for all to hear! Creating PLENTY of awkward and tense moments, (Yeah, that was me...) :P Miss those Christmases!
3rd generation American from a long line of Gottscheers... it was Drandul, dude!
reply
share