Sunday, October 03, 2010

Dread



(2009) ***

Another After Dark Horrorfest film. Adapted from a short story by Clive Barker, Dread deals with the slow disintegration of a man's sanity. Quaid saw his parents brutally murdered by an axe wielding brute. He never dealt with his issues, just kept them stuffed deep inside. Now away at college he begins to have nightmares about the killer. Nightmares turn into delusion and hallucinations. Friends begin to notice changes in Quaid's behavior. He descent spirals out of control and those unfortunate enough to get caught in his web suffer the consequences.


I am partial to these decent into madness type films. When done well, everything about them is pure entertainment. Watching the actor go from normal to completely insane. The disbelieving companions getting sucked into the game. The tension coursing through me as I yell to the unaware victim, “Turn around you idiot!” Dread is in the zone for me, just not a bulls eye. At times the film got a little confusing with too much going on.


I seriously cringed several times while watching this. Once involved an incident with green maggot coated meat (barf) and another when a girl tries to scrub her birthmark off with steel wool. Seriously fucked up! Overall I dug this film but I'm partial to Clive Barker's twisted tales. I would imagine that it's not to everyone's liking.

4 comments:

DKC said...

Maggots. Gak.

Nice review, though!

Whirlygirl said...

Rubbing off a birthmark with steel wool. Gross!

Octopunk said...

Jeez, I also just watched a flick featuring a prominent birthmark on the right side of someone's face. What the deuce?

50PageMcGee said...

we should all be keeping a tally of how many times we find ourselves talking to the screen during a thon.

i think i found myself saying, "shoot him again. shoot him again. shoot him again." at least 3-4 times last year.

Salem's Lot 1979 and Salem's Lot 2024

Happy Halloween everybody! Julie's working late and the boy doesn't have school tomorrow so he's heading to one of those crazy f...