Thursday Movie Picks: School (Halloween Edition): Wandering through the Shelves hosts a weekly movie challenge in which you choose 3-5 movies based on that Thursday’s theme and explain why you chose those movies. Today’s theme is School (Halloween Edition) so here are my choices!
carrie (1976)
I mean… duh. I absolutely adore this book by Stephen King, and I thought the movie was very faithful to it. I remember watching this movie at what was probably too young an age, but it stuck with me and helped start my love of horror movies. Sissy Spacek is fantastic as Carrie White, a bullied young woman with telekinetic powers who is pushed to the breaking point. In my opinion, Margaret White is one of the top ten horror villains of all time.
scream (1996)
Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck, I love this movie. I can remember watching it at home with my little sister when it first came out on …. DVD? I can’t remember the format in 1996. But we still had landlines back then, and yes, the phone rang during this movie, scaring the crap out of us. Wes Craven really did it like no other, and I miss him so much. Great performances, a clever, funny script, and genuine scares/kills. This is on my watchlist every single October.
the craft (1996)
What teenage girl didn’t want to be a witch after watching The Craft? I am still in awe of Fairuza Balk’s performance whenever I watch this movie. Honestly, they just don’t make high school horror films the way they used to anymore. Or maybe I’m not watching the right ones… any recs? 😀 But seriously, I love The Craft, and I love the cult-classic label it’s gotten over the years.
Joel
October 7, 2021Wow I’ve actually seen all three of these, didn’t expect this week since horror is not a genre I really put much effort into watching.
Sissy Spacek and Piper Laurie are tremendous in Carrie. I don’t know if you’ve ever seen any of Piper’s earlier work when she was a young starlet at Universal-she was all dewy sweetness teamed with Rock Hudson or Tony Curtis-so Margaret White was a HUGE step away from that image.
Scream is a fun parody of all the horror tropes without making a mockery of them, the sequels got progressively worst which is par for the course with those types of movies.
I watched The Craft grudgingly feeling from the synopsis that it wasn’t a film made with me as a viewer in mind. I was right, but I knew several teenage girls who adored it.
As I said horror isn’t my jam so after thinking of my second pick which I had seen recently I was stuck so I turned to two were the horror is more psychological than physical.
Child’s Play (1972)-Paul Reis (Beau Bridges) returns to St. Charles, the exclusive Catholic prep school he graduated from a decade before to teach. Almost immediately he finds himself caught in a dark power struggle between his former mentor, the popular English teacher Joseph Dobbs (Robert Preston) and the detested autocratic literature teacher Jerome Malley (James Mason). What starts as a cold war of barbed insults between the instructors gradually escalates into cruel mind games that pulls the students into a rash of malicious hazing and ritualistic violence.
Cutting Class (1989)-Freshly sprung from the nuthouse troubled Brian Woods (Donovan Leitch) returns to school where the other kids give him a wide berth. Enamored of fellow student Paula Carson (Jill Schoelen) he attempts to win her away from bad boy Dwight Ingalls (Brad Pitt-looking impossibly young). Their rivalry takes a back seat though when students begin disappearing at an alarming rate with Brian the prime suspect, but is it him? Exploitation junk worth seeing only for baby Brad in one of his first credited roles.
Toy Soldiers (1991)-Seeking to leverage a judge’s son life for the freedom of his drug kingpin father Colombian terrorist Luis Cali (Andrew Divoff) takes the entire campus of the Regis prep school hostage not knowing the boy has been relocated. Since the school is a haven for rebellious students, often expelled from other schools, the main troublemakers-Billy (Sean Astin), Joey (Wil Wheaton), Snuffy (Keith Coogan), Ricardo (George Perez) and Hank (T.E. Russell) find that they are better equipped to deal with the threat than the mostly ineffectual government agencies sent to rescue them. With resourceful Billy as their leader, the students struggle to defeat the terrorists and save the school!! As preposterous as it sounds but still actiony, a little scary at times and fun in a mindless way.
Sara
October 14, 2021Oh goodness at first when I read Child’s Play I was like… that doesn’t sound like Child’s Play! LOL I’ve never heard of this except for Toy Soldiers which is a great pick tbh!!
Brittani
October 8, 2021I’ve never seen The Craft and I really need to. I’m not sure how I missed it. Love your other two picks!
Sara
October 14, 2021Ahh! Definitely give The Craft a watch! It’s worth it just for Balk!
Sonia
October 9, 2021I feel like I’m the only one who didn’t like Carrie. Both film and book.
Sara
October 14, 2021Aww! I have a few fellow King fan friends who aren’t that big on the book either tbh.