- Horror Movie - Horror Homeroom

a trapped group of five people look out of a door fearfully.

Posted on September 8, 2023

Flesh and Blood: Talking Deep Blue Sea (1999)

In today’s episode, it’s part two of our deep dive into shark horror with Renny Harlin’s Deep Blue Sea (1999). Blending science fiction with horror, the film follows a crew of researchers as they try to replicate in sharks the brain cells of people with Alzheimer’s Disease. Predictably, the experiment does not end well. Known for its divisive heroine, campy reinterpretation of animal attack tropes, and some truly epic CGI sharks, Deep Blue Sea is the rare shark horror film that resists demonizing the sharks. But is that a good thing? We’re breaking it all down today with spoilers, so stay tuned!

Mentioned in this episode:

Sign the petition to have release its footage of the original ending to Deep Blue Sea
Our podcast on Crawl (2019)
Gwen’s take on Deep Blue Sea.
Tugan, Nuray Hilal. “Neoconservativism in the Science-Fiction Cinema: The Representation of Neoconservativism in Deep Blue Sea (1999).” International Journal of Eurasia Social Sciences / Uluslararasi Avrasya Sosyal Bilimler Dergisi, vol. 9, no. 31, 2018.

Posted on August 25, 2023

Exorcising The Pope’s Exorcist

Guest Post

The Pope’s Exorcist (Julius Avery, 2023) was released in April to much fanfare and has just recently landed on Netflix. While it performed well enough at the box office, it failed to wow the critics. It certainly didn’t rise to the level of The Exorcist (1973). In fact, the many possession/exorcism movies that have appeared since William Friedkin’s masterpiece have generally fallen short. One of the reasons seems to be the failure to really understand the religion portrayed. Let’s use The Pope’s Exorcist as a test case.

A woman in a cage underwater is menaced by a shark

Posted on August 21, 2023

Blood in the Water: Talking Shark Night (2011) & The Shallows (2016)

Podcast

In today’s episode, we are diving into the depths of cinematic terror with Jaume Collet-Serra’s The Shallows (2016) and David R. Ellis’s Shark Night (2011). In The Shallows, a young woman on a pilgrimage to her late mother’s favorite surf haunt finds herself stranded on a rock as she faces off against a relentless great white shark. In Shark Night, a group of unsuspecting friends gather for a little lakeside R&R, only to find themselves being stalked by an assortment of toothy terrors. While both films ostensibly fall under the subgenre of ‘shark horror,’ their differing approaches have us considering the utility of the ‘shark as monster’ trope. Do these films offer up waters chummed with spine-tingling suspense and jaws-dropping scares? We’re finding out in today’s spoiler filled episode, so stay tuned!

REQUIRED READING

CITED IN EPISODE

BERGER, JOHN. “WHY LOOK AT ANIMALS?.” LITERATURE AND THE ENVIRONMENT; LEMNAGER, S., SHEWRY, T. EDS (1980): 32-42.
CLASEN, MATHIAS. “EVOLUTIONARY STUDY OF HORROR LITERATURE”
FUCHS, MICHAEL. “LOOKING THROUGH THE BEASTS EYES?: THE DIALECTICS OF SEEING THE MONSTER AND BEING SEEN BY THE MONSTER IN SHARK HORROR MOVIES”
KEETLEY, DAWN. BLAKE LIVELY DOESN’T NEED A BIGGER BOAT IN THE SHALLOWS.
LATTANZIO, RYAN. “JOHN CARPENTER HAS NO IDEA WHAT THE TERM ‘ELEVATED HORROR’ MEANS”

RELATED REVIEWS AND ESSAYS OF INTEREST

Posted on August 13, 2023

The Black Demon: Shark Horror Meets Folk Horror

Dawn Keetley

It’s summer, so shark movies abound, notably Meg 2: The Trench (Ben Wheatley, 2023) and The Black Demon (Adrian Grünberg, 2023). Both films feature not just a shark but a megalodon, suggesting the need to up the ante when it comes to shark fare – the ante, in this case, being the shark’s size. Neither film is faring terribly well at the hands of critics, although The Black Demon seems to be marginally more highly-praised. It’s not, in truth, a very good film. It is, however, an interesting one.

One woman takes a selfie while riding on a boat while another woman looks at the scenery

Posted on June 22, 2023

Platformed Dread: Talking Influencer (2023)

Podcast

In today’s episode, it’s a disturbing journey into the misleading world of social media courtesy of Kurtis David Harder’s Influencer (2023). The story follows social media influencer Madison (Emily Tennant), who is in Thailand for what was supposed to be a romantic getaway with her boyfriend, Ryan (Rory J. Saper). But her lonely and mundane reality is shown to be completely at odds with the exciting, friend-filled adventures she portrays online. When a chance meeting with local CW (Cassandra Naud) offers Madison an opportunity to turn her lies into truth, she embarks on a dark journey where image is definitely not everything. Equal parts eviscerating indictment of influencer culture and cautionary tale about the importance of skepticism, Influencer is a film specifically of its time. But is that a good thing? We’re breaking it all down today with spoilers, so stay tuned.

We discussed Kurtis David Harder’s 2019 film Spiral in an earlier podcast.