What's Your Favorite Scary Movie

Happy Halloween to Y'all! Hope you had a good weekend and enjoyed the Cyclone victory as much as I did:) Today's Halloween so first thing is first:

HAPPY BIRTHDAY NATE!!!

Ok, so I added another title to my wall at a party Saturday night. I am now a Pumpkin Pie eating champion among all the other titles I already hold. We had 1/4 of pie with lots of whipped cream to down as fast as we could using NO hands. I still won but admittedly had crap all over my beard when we were done. Feels good to be a champion.

And no, I did not dress up this year. I usually don't dress up. No good excuse really, I was just lazy this year and didn't come up with anything.

But in the spirit of the holiday, I'd like to share my list of my favorite scary movies or movies about Halloween.

1) The Shining. Does anything else beat Stephen King, Jack Nicholson, and Stanley Kubrick? All three being geniuses at what they do make for one heck of a scary movie. Especially when I watched it at 1 in the morning with my brother when I was in high school. Not sure why that freaked me out so bad but it remains one of my favorite scary movies of all time.

2) Sleepy Hollow. Speaking of great directing and acting - I LOVE Tim Burton films (Charlie and the Chocolate Factory comes out this month) and he always calls upon Danny Elfman to do his music and Johnny Depp to do his acting. All three are very dark characters and have a great result in anything they work on (yes, even Edward Scissorhands was awesome in my mind!)

3) The Ring. I loved this movie, but probably because I watched it at 1am in a darkened basement so when the little girl starts crawling out of the TV.... that ruled! I love movies like that. The Ring 2 wasn't nearly as good but I thought they did a decent job for a sequel.

4) The Blaire Witch Project. This is probably the greatest movie of all time to see in the theatre because constantly throughout the movie people are screaming and getting tense in anticipation of something jumping out but NOTHING DOES! I loved that. I saw it 3 times in the theatre just to watch the other people's reactions. I also wasted $7.50 to see the second one which was easily one of the worst films I've ever seen. Don't bother.

5) 80s Horror Flicks. There are a bunch of them but While Friday the 13th part 1 is a classic (ending is one of the greatest scenes), the rest of them are pretty crappy. Halloween 1 and 2 are pretty good (along with the Halloween H20) but again, after that they sucked. Nightmare on Elm Streets are standard classics and will make you think twice before going to bed. But the only character who freaked me out as a kid watching these movies was Pinhead from the Hellraiser movies. He was one scary SOB. Chucky was just dumb (although some doll will probably kill me in my sleep tonight just for saying that).

Others:
Silence of the Lambs - made me scared of windowless basement rooms and crossdressers who look in the mirror and say "Would you f**k me? I'd f**k me... I'd f**k me hard". I know that's Eddie's favorite scene.

Jack Frost - movie about a serial killing snow man. Was really crappy but made me laugh. I just love the thought of a killing snowman! Note that it has the same title as the Michael Keaton family flick that came out a year later but was a totally different movie.

Tales From The Crypt - a quality show on HBO that I wish they still had. That was 1/2 the reason I wanted to get HBO when I was in high school. I'll let you figure out what the other 1/2 was. Another show with Danny Elfman doing the theme music.

Exorcist - Although I enjoy the Bunny's Version better, still a standard setting classic. I'm still haunted by the random scary face that pops up on the screen when Karras is dreaming about his mother and she comes up from the subway and crosses the street. I heard once that it was this scene that caused Billy Graham to denounce the movie as being "from Satan".

Anyway - hope you have a great Halloween! Send me your costume pictures and I'll post them! As long as they're fully clothed. And if you ladies send pictures that aren't fully clothed, send more of them! haha....

Song of the Day - with all the Danny Elfman references, I pulled out his CD Music for a Darkened Theatre which has a sort of "best of" his earlier movies that he's done. For a full list of his works, go here. Oh yeah, he did the theme to Desperate Housewives which I know is THE PAT's favorite show. So remember that before you go making fun of me.

Video of the Day - I watched Boo! this weekend and it was pretty crappy acting as would be expected but there were a couple of scenes with things jumping out. Rent it if you're really bored!

Webpage of the Day - A list of all sorts of "haunted places" (thanks Cari for the link!). Has a bunch from Cedar Rapids where I grew up (including the Black Angel in Iowa City) and only a couple from Rochester. Guess the only thing scary about Rochester is the idea of living here as a single person who enjoys arts and culture!

Have a great Halloween!!!