Trick or Treat

It's Halloween time, so I thought you might like a suggestion or two about something scary to watch, as if the current times weren't scary enough.  Oh, well, what's a few more scares, right?

The other day I watched The Blackcoat's Daughter on Netflix and found it well worth my time. Now streaming on Netflix, this 2015 slow-burn horror film is beautifully shot and acted, only occasionally outright scary, and leaves it up to the viewer to piece together exactly what happened when it's over. 

I often find movies like that somewhat frustrating, but this tale of two girls stranded alone at their boarding school during a semester break because both girls' sets of parents were delayed in picking them up is so well crafted and has such gorgeous cinematography and lighting that I just ate it up. Besides, it's not too hard to figure out what happened.  And, at only a little over 90 minutes, the movie doesn't overstay its welcome.

If you'd like something a little more rollercoaster-ride scary, without all the arty ambiguity, try out the 2006 version of The Hills Have Eyes, now showing on HBO. Mutated townspeople hiding out in the desert in the American Southwest terrorize a family when their RV breaks down in that same desert (creepily, the RV is actually sabotaged by those who want to make an offering to the mutants).  It's a pretty brutal movie, but also exhilarating and exciting when the family members refuse to just get picked off one by one and start to fight back.  It's a fast, fun, and scary 90 minutes or so.  HBO is also offering the sequel, The Hills Have Eyes 2, and that's okay, too, but not as tense and involving as the first. The sequel features an army unit sent into the desert to take on the mutant threat.

Anyway, there are tons of other horror films out there now to stream at the moment, so I'm sure you'll find something else appropriate to the season, if these suggestions don't wow you. But whatever you end up watching, I hope the scares of a good Halloween movie will nicely distract you for a while from all the real-life scares we're inundated with every day. Happy Halloween!