“The worst horror movie I ever saw was fucking great,” Stephen King said to Eli Roth during their conversation on Eli Roth’s History of Horror.

I wish I could say the same thing. I quit on so many movies (quit on just about every TV show). My time is valuable to me and watching terrible shit irks me something awful…but maybe I’m just looking the wrong way. There must be nuggets of enjoyment out there.

In an effort to find positives, I’m forcing myself to watch entire movies that I go into assuming extreme suckage.

This is not a rating of the summed up quality, but a rating between 1 (I might barf if I watch the whole thing) and 5 (I could hardly look away from the screen) of how watchable the movies are.

George A. Romero Presents: Deadtime Stories Vol. 1 (2010)

An anthology of three terrifying horror stories presented by horror mastermind George A. Romero. Young lovers are attacked by a mysterious creature, a lonely man opens a mysterious box, and a woman searches for her missing husband in the jungles of South America.

The plan is working already. Looking for the good in bad movies. Deadtime Stories Vol. 1 is an anthology movie (I really enjoy these because I’m impatient) told in three parts. The first was a very, very thin story about a jungle expedition. The acting is terrible. The script is terrible. It’s supposed to be in the Amazon jungle or somewhere else South American but the jungle people are white, painted chalk white (think painting like the Aboriginals in Crocodile Dundee, that kind of white face paint, but on white people or at least very pale people). Then there’s the longing love scenes…Jesus what utter absurdity! It’s bad, BUT the gruesome parts were wild and hilarious. There’s also this scene where this dude’s mouth is falling apart and I think they carved a watermelon to stand in. There’s heads on stakes, also watermelons at points. Lowest of low budget.

The second bit was significantly better. It was a mermaid story and the idea coincided with the budget, which, again, lowest of low. The acting was better. The script was better. The story had a couple layers and left turn ending (saw it coming, but it was what I hoped would happen). Pretty good, not great, but pretty good. Really worked within limitations.

The last bit was the best of the bunch. Tom Savini directed it and was the only one involving stylization in shooting. The acting was good. The story was good, a tried and true vampire-old timey doctor-home visit. The ending could’ve gone a few ways and it wrapped all but one way into the fold of the options, so interesting. Double tap endings are my jammy jam. Again, pretty good. Made the most of budget filming, my guess.

4/5 stars – Watchable? Sure.

#movie #horror #Review #GeorgeRomero