It's day 302 of the year and projects, therefore, it's Day 28 of the 31 Days of Hallowe'en challenges. I'm starting, with my own 31 Days of Hallowe'en, which I talked about back at the beginning of August. Today's theme is Has a Horror Host In It Or Hosting It. I picked Elvira Mistress of the Dark.
After loosing her job, Elvira is told an aunt she never knew, has died and she needs to go for the reading of the will. Seeing that Elvira is needing money to book a show in Vegas, she sets off to the small town of Fallwell. When she gets there, it's obvious that the towns people don't want her staying, and do everything they can to get her to leave. Meanwhile, her uncle is being a bit of a shady character, as he wants what Elvira inherited.
This is one of my all time favourite movies. Who hasn't felt like such an outsider at some point in their life? And everyone has that one dream, that one goal that could use a big inheritance in order to help kick start it.
She has to deal with the prejudice of the over stuffy, church ladies, as well as a jealous rival for the attention of the one single man in town. Everyone takes one look at her and expects she's a witch; and to Elvira's own shock, she finds out her family are.
At some point, I will do a much much more in depth article.
And the 31 Days of Horror Challenge being hosted by Nightmare on Film Street. Their mini theme today is Family Friendly/Gateway Horror. I picked Hocus Pocus 2.
It's been 30 years since the Sanderson Sisters had returned from the dead, caused trouble and were once again killed by a group of kids. The man who now runs the occult store tricks a group of teenagers into lighting the black flame candle. This once again, brings them back from the dead. Now, the teenagers have only twelve hours to defeat them.
Okay, first off, this is the first time I have gotten to see this film, and I was actually settled in thinking it was going to be a drudge because every review I've seen in the last two years was bad. Not one single person seems to like this movie. Even a friend of mine hated it. I actually really liked it. I thought the story worked fairly well. But, at the same time, I'm not the biggest fan of the original. Where as the original is a vampire film; yes it is as they suck the souls out of people, can't go onto blessed grounds and the sunlight kills them. This is a witchcraft movie. As we learn that the main teenager is herself a witch.
I would have removed that first song "The Witches are Back", as it does nothing to add to the story, as well as changed the ending. If you took the rest of this movie but gave it the ending of the original, it would have been a near perfect Hallowe'en film. I felt the ending of the three Sanderson Sisters just giving up to dust was uneventful and sort of pointless. I understand that it was driving at the idea that you have to sacrifice when you want something important and to be careful what you wish for, but it just seemed too soft of an ending. Here's three bloodthirsty power hungry undead creatures who before would have stopped at nothing to stay alive, just shrugging and giving in. That makes no sense at all.
Still, I just do not understand all the bad reviews and hate towards this movie? Dumb ending yes, but it's not that terrible.
Don't forget to check out my daily Letterboxd lists, as I am doing a few movie challenges this month. One of which is the #100HorrorMoviesIn92Days
Come back tomorrow to see what's on the slab.
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