31 Days of Horror #2

#4. Asylum (1972) Horror anthology movies are almost always fun because of the variety. If you don't like one of the segments, just wait a few minutes and there'll be a new one. This is one of the more well-regarded of the British anthology flicks, taking place in an insane asylum where a new doctor's job interview includes his having to guess which of the four patients was the former doctor he'll be replacing. Of course, each patient has a story, which involve a meat freezer, a magic suit, an imaginary friend, and a man who believes he can bring dolls to life with his mind. None of this is scary, most of it is very silly, and there's a twist ending that made me roll my eyes. But it's saved from mediocrity by its sincerity. It is a handsome, well-acted movie, and it believes that it's terrifying ,which goes a long way. B-

#5. Headless (2015) Is it gross to watch a guy cut off someone's head, pull out and eat their eyeballs, and then molest the severed head? Yes, very. Is it still gross after he does it approximately 10,000 times? Yeah, but we're all asleep by then. This is a spin-off of a pretty good movie called 'Found,' directed by that movie's makeup artist. If there's one good thing here, it's how gruesome, squishy, and splashy the effects are, though, again, the results are wearying. The biggest problem is the lack of real plot, though there is a girl who is apparently the protagonist, but who isn't fleshed out enough for us to really care about. No, mostly the movie just wants to show scene after scene of the serial killer rubbish and your tolerance level for gore won't be tested as much as your tolerance level for pointlessness. D

#6. The Sacrament (2014) I am no fan of found footage horror. It makes me queasy, the filmmakers almost never have a good enough reason for the movie to be found footage rather than just a normal movie, and they usually don't know how to use the format to the advantage of greater thrills. This entry in the craze from director Ti West (House of the Devil, The Innkeepers) is one of the better ones. It poses as documentary footage capturing a day in the lives of the follwers of a small cult, living in a village cut off from the world. But things get super-crazy, and West does a good job of capturing the stress and increasing hopelessness of the documentarians' plight (though it still made me a little sick). The Creepiest part? Gene Jones as the cult's calm and charming leader, a down-to-earth, grandfatherly guy who is as sinister as he thinks he is holy. *shiver* B