Horror movies, reviews and more at buried.com
Horror movies, reviews and more at buried.com
Horror movies, reviews and more at buried.com
Horror movies, reviews and more at buried.com
Horror movies, reviews and more at buried.com
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03.28.2024
THE GRAVEDIGGERS'S TEN BEST HORROR FILMS OF 2008!

Just when you thought 2008 was gone for good and you had bid good riddens to it... along comes The Gravedigger to put in his 2 cents about the best in horror for the past year. While all of us may not totally agree with the order of this list, we do agree that 2008 was a pretty good year for horror, and a pretty bad year for everything else. Put the past year to bed and get a load of what The Gravedigger thought was the best in horror of 2008!


10 BEST HORROR MOVIES OF 2008

#1: CLOVERFIELD
It's rare when a movie is able to live up to it's hype and anticipation but CLOVERFIELD does just that.

The movie is told entirely from the perspective of a single video camera, with several different people taping that eventful night when a giant monster attacks New York City.

It begins with a going away party for a guy who is relocating to Japan, then ends with the survivors of the group taking refuge beneath a bridge in Central Park as the Army bombs Manhattan. In between are quite a few harrowing encounters, such as when they travel down the subway tunnels and encounter a batch of small, ferocious monsters (which may be the big creature's offspring or just the equivalent of lice) to when they try to rescue a girl trapped on the 39th floor of a collapsing apartment building.

Other than in GODZILLA: MONSTERS ALL-OUT ATTACK, this is the first time I've seen a movie that shows the devastation done to all the fleeing people as the monster rampages through a city. It's both creepy and effective. The characters are all interesting, so there's a connection there, and plenty of edge-of-your-seat action (or running).

As for the monster itself, it's exactly what the American version of Godzilla should have been, though this creature resembles more the monster from THE HOST than it does Big G. It is suitably ferocious and intimidating. CLOVERFIELD is definitely worth the wait. It's among the best giant monster movies ever made.

#2: DAYS OF DARKNESS
This is an impressive horror movie, particularly in that it does something unique with the overdone zombie genre. A young couple, gone for several days camping up in the mountains, return to civilization to find most people dead and many transformed into zombies. They take refuge at an abandoned military facility where there's already a group of survivors, ranging from a porn queen and her daughter to a used car salesman.

It turns out that a passing comet is responsible for all the mayhem-and the undead. In fact, the comet has carried with it some type of spore, which is responsible for the zombie infection. The zombies are all growing an alien organism within them.

DAYS OF DARKNESS is a cross between NIGHT OF THE COMET, DAY OF THE TRIFFIDS and any Romero LIVING DEAD movie.

#3: TEETH
Dawn (Jess Weixler), a sexually repressed teenager who is unfamiliar with her own body, starts to realize that she's different from other girls. When her and her boy friend Tobey go to a nearby lake to swim he rapes her--and finds out that she has teeth where there shouldn't be any teeth. He falls into the lake and they later find his body. Dawn, meanwhile, makes her first trip to a gynecologist to confirm her suspicions. Of course, the doctor is slimy (he doesn't use latex gloves when examining her) and deservedly gets a few digits nipped off.

The biggest strength of this film is Jess Weixler's performance. She's going to be a great actress to look out for.

On one hand this is a serious coming of age movie but it's also a dark comedy and a horror movie with plenty of bite. If you're a guy you can not help but cringe

#4: SPLINTER
A couple, Seth and Polly (Jill Wagner of BLADE: THE SERIES), decide to go camping but pack it in once their tent erection goes awry. As they are driving to a motel, they decide to stop for a woman who appears to need help. She doesn't-- and her boyfriend, Dennis is quickly at the car window waving a gun. Seth and Polly are taken hostage until they run over some type of animal, which flattens one of the tires. Seth has no idea how to change a flat so Dennis has the honors, though he gets a splinter in his finger from removing the blown out tire. You see, the dog they ran over is contaminated by this spike-like growth and now it's in Dennis.

They go to a nearby gas station but the gas station attendant is nowhere to be found , so Dennis decides to help himself to the cash register, while his girlfriend goes to the restroom. She finds the gas station attendant, only dead-looking and with these spikes protruding all over him. She's the first to die-- and the three others manage to get inside and lock the doors. But how long will they be able to keep the creature(s) out before it gets to them?

Not only is this movie non-stop, with plenty of action and some excellent special effects, it has some interesting character development. Although parts reminded me of THE THING, EVIL DEAD, THE BLOB and NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD, the movie very much has it's own unique monster. Hands down, SPLINTER is one of the best horror movies of 2008. See this movie.

Directed by Toby Wilkins

#5: THE LAST WINTER
Larry Fessenden's latest is about a group up in Alaska who are at odds with each other. Ron Perlman wants to bring in his oil boring equipment but James Legros tells him that the permafrost is melting and it can't support all that weight and they won't be able to bring in the equipment. Perlman gets him fired, but in the meantime, while he's waiting for the plane back, one of the group members freaks out and walks out one night into the ice, naked. They find his body, eyes ripped out by ravens. There's also a videotape, as he had a camera with him, which shows that something else is indeed out there. The two Inuit workers talk about the Wendigo and thus ties this as a sort of sequel to Fessenden's previous WENDIGO.

There's a scene where a plane crashes into their building and people are running around on fire, but it's not the cheap CGIi fire, but real fire, and it has much more of an impact because it's convincing. The same goes for all the scenes with the ravens, particulary in the last scene when they are eating someone's dead body. Real birds, not CGI birds. The wendigo itself is CGI, though, and because it's so ethereal looking it works.

THE LAST WINTER is purposely vague, which increases the sense of unease you get while watching the movie. The ending reminded me of the ending for RESIDENT EVIL, as it amounted to the same thing...the end of the world.

#6: BOTCHED
A thief (Stephen Dorf, THE GATE) is sent by the Russian mob to Moscow to steal a gold cross that once belonged to Ivan the Terrible. He's able to get into the large building and take the item but getting out is a different matter. The elevator stops on an empty floor and they are stuck, along with "hostages". Soon, people start dying and they are stalked by Ivan the Terrible's demented descendants, who have the entire floor rigged up for their diabolical bloody games.

The effects are gory and Dorf is always an entertaining actor to watch.

This dark humored, highly entertaining flick is one of the best horror movies of 2008.

#7: DEATHS OF IAN STONE
Every time Ian Stone dies, whether it be hit by a car or shot, he returns to a different life. However, he starts remembering these previous lives and the more he recalls the more complicated his existence becomes. Also involved is his blonde girlfriend (Christina Cole of HEX)/

Ian learns that there are these vampire-like entities that sort of look like Mystique from XMEN crossed with the liquid Terminator from TERMINATOR 2: JUDGEMENT DAY (which is a little weird, considering this is produced by Stan Winston and Winston did the effects for T2). It's an interesting, surreal movie, along the lines of JACOB'S LADDER.

#8: RULE OF THREE
Novelist Eric Shapiro's directorial debut is an engrossing thriller mystery which reminded me a bit of a David Lynch movie. There are three different stories that intertwine and keep you guessing as to what direction the film will take. The first is about a father, Jon, who is desperate to find out what happened to his daughter, Lo, who has disappeared for two weeks. He keeps on going back to the cheap motel where she was last seen. Then we cut to two weeks previously, with Lo (Rhoda Jordan) and her boyfriend at the hotel. They've decided they want to do a bit of sexual exploration with a threesome and the boyfriend manages to track down an old friend (Tiffany Shepis), who eagerly shows up. Then there's the overweight, nervous business man who had checked out the motel room prior to them--and he's all set to drug and rape a woman co-worker who he is soon expecting. However, the drug dealer (Rodney Eastman) he's bought the "roofies" from wants to stick around and have a go at her as well. All three stories have an unexpected twist and don't turn out how any of the characters want them to.

RULE OF THREE is one of the best independent movies I have seen in the last few years, with great performances by all the actors. I felt like I was a voyeur watching real people rather than characters in a movie-- and that's no easy thing to accomplish.

#9: THE KILLING GENE
The premise of this movie is that in NYC various gang members are being killed in a strange way--they are being tortured. The first victim discovered is a pregnant woman who was electrocuted and when the police go to question her gang member boyfriend they find him hanged, with similar cuts on him. Is he somehow responsible for her death and did he kill himself afterwards?

It turns out that a woman who was tortured and raped by the gang is getting her revenge, by capturing the culprit and someone they love, hooking them up to two chairs, one of which is rigged to deliver a lethal electrical charge to the other, and giving them a choice. She will only stop their torture when they pull the switch that will kill their "loved" one. To her this proves the theory that there is no such thing as "love" or "altruism".

Stellan Skarsgard (EXORCIST prequel) gives another stellar performance, as the jaded detective in charge of the investigation. What happens to his character will move you. This has been the year for Selma Blair, who gives a compelling performance as the killer/victim.

THE KILLING GENE is a smarter version of SAW, a prime example of an intelligent horror movie.

#10: UNTRACEABLE
Diane Lane is an FBI agent who tracks internet crime. She and her partner, Griffin Dowd (Colin Hanks) come across a website that shows someone hooked up to some type of device--and the more viewers who click on and watch the quicker their death happens. One of these involves an anti-blood coagulate, so the guy bleeds to death, another involves many sunlamps and the guy blisters and burns up. The worst, however, is when agent Griffin is captured and put in a vat of water, to which sulphuric acid is added-- and his skin sloughs off.

This movie surprised me because it's along the lines of the SAW movies and I wasn't expecting that. Check it out if you're interested in being grossed out.





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