A Rundown of the 13 (+1) Best Horror Movies I've Seen in the Past Year

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388 ARLETTA AVENUE

(September 2011)

Produced by Vincenzo Natali, and brought to us by writer/director Randall Cole, 388 Arletta Avenue sees a young couple (played by Nick Stahl and Mia Kirshner) become the unwitting targets of person(s) unknown, who threaten and harass via pop music, Shaun Cassidy, children’s songs and fake cats.

That may sound ridiculous, but trust me, it’s not.

The fragmented nature of the narrative--as told through any number of cameras covertly surveilling the unfolding action--heightens the unsettling tension of the scenario, as we bear witness to the ease with which a person’s normal everyday life can be turned upside-down by malevolent and unknown forces.

Two more points of random interest: an initially unrecognizable Devon Sawa appears here as a possible suspect; and the end credits roll just goes to prove how creeptastic "The Cat Came Back" really is...

(388 Arletta Avenue OS’ courtesy of collider.com & impawards.com.)

¡Qué horror! 2013

The Preliminaries

We’ve officially crept into October, so it’s that time of year once more to tally up all the candidates and make the final cut for the ¡Qué horror! 2013 list.

Before we get into that though, I should run down a list of 7 more candidates that I felt merited some ¡Qué horror! love, but alas, I again wasn’t able to find the time to write about them individually.

Apologies.

Noroi (Curse) (August 2005), dir: Kôji Shiraishi

Sinister (March 2012), dir: Scott Derrickson

In Their Skin (April 2012), dir: Jeremy Power Regimbal

The Possession (August 2012), dir: Ole Bornedal

Come Out and Play (September 2012), dir: Makinov

Among Friends (September 2012), dir: Danielle Harris

World War Z (June 2013), dir: Marc Forster

Thus, there were officially 27 candidates this year (or more accurately, the period between October 1, 2012 and September 30, 2013).

The final list contains 14 titles (there’s one tie), and after the rundown proper, we’ll wrap up with a list of the other excellent non-horror titles I saw in that same period.

So, without further ado…

¡Qué horror! 2013

Candidate #20

+1

(March 2013)

“So. I have many surprises in store for us tonight. Enjoy the festivities.”

Director Dennis Iliadis storms back into ¡Qué horror! territory with +1, where David (Rhys Wakefield) and his friends find themselves at the strangest party ever.

Bill Gullo pens the screenplay here, from a story by Iliadis, and it isn’t really spoiling much to say that the film takes an intriguing angle on the idea of the doppelgänger (you’ll gather as much from both the trailer and the blurb--courtesy of Evan Dickson of bloody-disgusting.com--on the one sheet).

Layered and disturbing like a particularly excellent Twilight Zone tale, +1 is another solid title from Iliadis.

“May your good health be twofold.”

(+1 OS courtesy of impawards.com.)

¡Qué horror! 2013

Candidate #19

RESOLUTION

(April 2012)

Michael (Peter Cilella) and Chris (Vinny Curran) are the best of friends. The thing is, Chris is a junkie caught in a downward spiral who’s been given up on by virtually everyone he knows, so Michael makes a last ditch effort to save him by forcibly making him go cold turkey in an isolated, ramshackle shack.

Things do not go according to plan.

Co-directors Justin Benson (who also wrote the screenplay) and Aaron Scott Moorhead (who also shot the film) bring us this excellent piece of ambiguous, oblique horror.

If you’re the type that needs to have the whys and wherefores of your cinematic horror underlined neatly by running time’s end, then this may not be the film for you.

If however, you appreciate tone and character, Resolution* is definitely something to watch out for.

* Brilliant title, that, given what the film is ultimately about…

(Resolution OS’ courtesy of impawards.com and twitchfilm.com.)

¡Qué horror! 2013

Candidate #18

BYZANTIUM

(September 2012)

“My story can never be told. I write it over and over, wherever we find shelter. I write of what I cannot speak… The truth.”

So, my Neil Jordan Top Three (The Company of Wolves, The Crying Game, and The Butcher Boy) is now officially Four.

Welcome, Byzantium.

Based on Moira Buffini’s play A Vampire Story (Buffini ably adapts her own work for the screen), Byzantium follows the apparently sixteen-year-old Eleanor Webb (Saoirse Ronan) and her “legal guardian,” Clara (Gemma Arterton), both long-lived immortals who subsist on human blood, and who are both on the run from some looming threat whose exact nature Clara refuses to divulge to Eleanor.

Jordan scores here with an excellent cast (which includes Caleb Landry Jones, Sam Riley, and Jonny Lee Miller), some elegant Gothicism, and some brief, yet powerful phantasmagorical moments.

There’s also some noteworthy cinematography by Sean Bobbitt, as well as a score by Javier Navarrete (who also scored Guillermo del Toro’s El Espinazo del Diablo and El Laberinto del Fauno, the latter of which garnered him a whole slew of award noms, including the Oscar).

(Byzantium OS courtesy of impawards.com.)