For a movie about Demons and Hell, this flick strikes me as awfully Lovecraftian. Which is a stitch as according to the IMDb it rips off an M R James tale called The Treasure of Abbot Thomas.

Going to have to look into that.

Anyways, the story is basically about an unscrupulous librarian unlocking an ancient curse while looking for loot. It’s stylish, it’s incoherent, it’s basically what people think of when they think Italian Horror. It’s pretty good.

Though the James story is undoubtable better.

Because of who wrote it.

Anyway, my streak continues. Six reviews written. About a month and a half, give or take. Not to shabby. 6/31.

Another one down! And an even better one than what’s come before. Who’d have thunk?

A small digression, if you don’t mind. WordPress now allows writers to have its AI to generate excerpt commentary. I don’t use it as a rule, but I keep trying it to see what happens. Tonight’s effort came out surprisingly good. I didn’t use it, but I put it here as a curiosity.

Thus the AI on my upcoming review on this particular film:

The 1963 film, featuring legendary actors like Vincent Price, Peter Lorre, and Boris Karloff, explores the story of a desperate, disreputable undertaker who finds shady ways to carry out his business. Despite flaws such as poor comedy direction and noticeable stunt double placement, the film is praised for its witty scripting and entertaining performers, particularly Karloff.

That’s not half bad, really. Kind of a shock.

Anyways, another review in the buffer. And as I finished Man Mad Monster, my count is 5/31. I’m doing decent writing work here.

Hope it helps over all.

This wasn’t the intended feature of the day, but I ran out of time. I needed a quickie and at an hour this fit the bill. Besides, I’ve been meaning to see it. I watched it once as a kid and always wanted to watch it again. Kept confusing it with The Indestructible Man.

In a nutshell, this is EVERY FIFITIES SCI FI MOVIE (even though it came out in the forties). A mad scientist gets a hold of a carny who has an immunity to electricity and turns him into a monster. The usual brouhaha ensues. It is marginally better than most due to the acting and the tightness of the plot. Lon Chaney Jr. does his thing here, but he could have been playing any one of a dozen monsters. It’s unusual in that the female lead tries to save the monster instead of being threatened by him.

I liked it, but I have no taste.

My problem is that on finishing it I got the urge to go ON AND ON about it. As I’m supposed to be doing shorts, this might be a problem. I’m going to try to write a long form out of it tomorrow (it’s only an hour, how hard can it be?). However this has to be considered a stumble in my goals. How bad of one… remains to be seen.

3/31 done. Let’s hope the number grows tomorrow.

As with yesterday’s offering, a bunch of people trapped in a building chased by demons. I adore this flick something fierce. I also have a long review in the archives that I’m now thinking of scrapping for something NEWER.

Might be interesting.

3/31. I have one more in a sort of series, then I really need to find something not demonic related to watch.

God, I love this picture.

People are given tickets to see a nameless movie in a brand new theater by a guy who looks like he’s depriving an Opera house of a phantom. This proves to be a mistake, as it’s some sort of plot to unleash Hell on Earth.

I am so not impartial with this one. It’s one of those “Can watch anytime” flicks.

So we are now 2/31 in terms of reviews for the Sister Site. So far so good.

I had a crazy thought.

This Month of Horror is an annual thing for me. I don’t always make a whole month, but I try. And with each day I write a review.

Last year, on whim, I started rating the films using the system I use for the Sister Site, Welltun Cares Reviews. It felt pretty good, so I thought I’d do it again this year.

This isn’t crazy.

About four days ago I started making up a list of movies to watch. Why keep that to the last minute? Am I right or am I right? Might keep me from missing days if I had it all planned out ahead of time. Pretty brilliant, I thought.

And as I made the list, I realized I was doing all movies.

Welltun Cares Reviews was all movies. More or less.

Why–and I know this is a bizarre thought–but why not post the reviews on my review site?

Madness, I know.

The initial idea was post them as I finished, like I did here. Then the thunderclap came. Am I nuts? Every other review pops up on Fridays. I’ve been doing this for most the year. Why, therefore, should I post a review every day instead of scheduling them all as a massive buffer?

So that’s the plan. I review one movie a day for 31 days. That should give me thirty one weeks, plus four more weeks from Golden Oldie reviews I’d already set up in case I failed. A hell of a buffer.

Long enough so that I should be able to crank out my preferred longer reviews without fear.

So what does that mean for this site?

I still intend to talk about the films, but in a really, really abbreviated form. I see no point in spoiling my efforts on one site by posting on another.

So. Today’s feature was As Above, So Below, a 2014 flick. Another of my goals, I should add, is to put out more reviews of more current flicks. My opinion of modern Horror has been low, which has kept me from it. And as this film has proven, that’s a mistake.

It’s a good flick. Well written, very little fat. Found footage style, so if you have a beef with that subgenre you might have one here. I don’t care for it myself, but to be honest I’ve had a string of good luck with them so far and this continues the streak.

Last review spoiler: 3.5 points.