Five-Legged Iguana

¡QUÉ HORROR! 2009
The Preliminaries (1)

It’s getting to that time of year again, when I have 12 months’ worth of film viewing to look back on so I can compile a rundown of the 13 best horror movies from that time frame.
Given that when I put together ¡Qué Horror! 2008, I had yet to have seen certain key titles from that period, and this past year has proven to be a time to play catch-up as best I could, there’s a bit of an overlap between ¡Qué Horror! 2009 and last year’s batch.
So I decided to tweak the parameters of the list somewhat. Instead of a rundown of the 13 Best, Most Recent Horror Movies, I just chose the 13 best horror movies I’d seen for the first time in the past 12 months, regardless of initial public screening date.* (I did, in fact, manage to finally see a key 1995 vampire title earlier this year, but as you’ll note, it didn’t make the list; wasn’t too enamoured of it…)

Also, another deviation from last year’s ¡Qué Horror! will be its frequency: last year, I posted one entry a day for the last 13 days of October, culminating on Halloween.
Now, you’ll have noted that the Iguana isn’t as active as it was in the heyday of its first two years (long, involved story not really pertinent to this post). As such, I can’t really say I’ll be able to replicate last year’s feat, so I’ve decided to start posting as early as October 1, on an irregular basis. I may even post more than one title on any given day. That should give me enough wiggle room to get through all 13 films before October 31 comes around.
That should also give you time to hunt this year’s baker’s dozen down for a Halloween frightfest marathon, should you so wish it.
(The cut-off viewing date for this year’s batch is September 30, and there are only about 7 hours left of that; any horror film I may see for the first time this October will be eligible for ¡Qué Horror! 2010.)

Now, before I leave you to it, I’d be terribly remiss if I didn’t publicly thank my nephew Jeb, who’s responsible for my having had the opportunity to see eleven of this year’s formidable batch.
Many, many, many thanx, Jeb. This would have been a sad-a$$ ¡Qué Horror! without your invaluable help.

Next, in The Preliminaries (2), I’ll have a rundown of ¡Qué Horror! 2008.

* Which is the date listed with each title.