I haven’t blogged about movies since spring! Not entirely surprising. Summer is a busy time for my business, and although I’ve been reading and watching all kinds of interesting things, I haven’t had the mental energy to sit down and share. But it’s Fall, folks. Autumn if you’re fancy. The leaves here in central Maine are aflame, the mornings greet us with frosted fields, and the days are cool and delicious. I’ve made three apple crisps, and hiked five big mountains, so I guess you could say things are going pretty great. Pretty darn great. I do love this time of year, melancholy and all.

I’ve been watching spooky movies since mid September or so. I started out revisiting my favorites: Night of the Living Dead, Return to Oz, Nightmare on Elm Street, and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (og of course), but I wanted to branch out and find some new favorites. The horror genre is robust and varies wildly in content, quality, and themes. I’m no snob and will watch just about anything, so needless to say I have sat through some…interesting films lately. But here are a few gems worth sharing.

*General trigger warning, all these films are violent, gory, not for children and might not be for you. Proceed with caution.*

Ms. 45 is a 1981 American exploitation thriller film directed by Abel Ferrara and starring Zoë Tamerlis. This was my first encounter with Tamerlis, who carries the film in the lead role of Thana, a mute seamstress working in the garment district of 1970s New York. I am a bit obsessed with her now (RIP you wild star) and am excited to seek out some of her other stuff. This thriller would fall into the rape revenge/grindhouse sub-genre. Thana is a mute, and doesn’t speak throughout the entire movie, which ads a strange depth to her performance. She is raped twice in one day and this trauma leads her to create a new persona and go on a spree, killing men all over the city. This is a serious, dark, gritty movie that builds in intensity. The men in this film all behave monstrously (even just randos on the street), and by the time Thana starts gunning dudes down you can’t help but cheer her on. I found this story engaging start to finish, and loved the look of the New York of my childhood.

May is a 2003 horror movie directed by Edward Lucky McGee, staring Angela Bettis, Jeremy Sisto and a young and dark haired Anna Faris ( I always love seeing her). It has a cult following, and I can see why. Angela Bettis is brilliant as May Canandy, a sheltered young woman who had a difficult childhood due in part to her lazy eye and cruel mother. Now here’s a fun fact: I had a lazy eye as a kid (lucky for me some vision therapy paid off and my eye never weakened enough to drift as May’s does, but needless to say I locked into this tale right away. Deeply relevant.) May is now grown up and working in a Veterinary office and sewing her own clothing and talking to her doll (a gift from her mother, who told her if you can’t find a friend you should just make one) and trying to fix that dang eye of hers. And then she gets a pair of contact lenses that correct her drifting lazy eye, and her long dormant love life suddenly fires into high gear. But the thing about May is she is a stone cold freak. And once she tries to connect deeply with people that becomes a bit of a road block. Her chemistry with her crush Adam (Jeremy Sisto, looking fine) is palpable, and really draws you in with it’s intensity. She also has chemistry with the kinky nympho lesbian Polly (Anna Feris) who works with May and pursues her sexually with delicious persistence. The movie is funny at times, quirky and strange, very sexy, but also sometimes unbearable to watch. May is an open wound, and is so deeply vulnerable that it really made me squirm. She is obsessed with Adam’s hands and is seemingly incapable of hiding this weird fixation. I wont ruin the film of course but odd side-note, May is a seamstress and she is interested in parts (Adam’s hands, Polly’s neck etc.) so you can get an idea of where things go, and I watched this back-to-back with Frankenhooker (a 1990 so bad it’s good horror comedy), which tells the story of a young man from New Jersey collecting parts from sex workers to rebuild his dead girlfriend. There are some threads here. Connections everywhere. This movie is fun, deeply weird, and oddly moving. May is a very unusual leading character, and her dark triumph is a thing of beauty.

The Babadook is a 2014 Australian psychological horror movie written and directed by Jennifer Kent and stars Essie Davis. This excellent fairy tale of a film is truly frightening, with a wonderful performance by Essie Davis as the mom Amelia. Amelia is widowed, low income, and exhausted, and her young son Sam seems to be very troubled. One night when putting Sam to bed Amelia finds a strange book on his shelf and reads the story of the Babadook to Sam. And from there on out things go sideways. Sam is convinced that the Babadook is real and in their house. And it soon becomes very apparent that it is. Amelia tries to destroy the book and get their lives back on track, but things begin to deteriorate as they become panicked and sleep deprived, and frankly terrorized. And then you might say madness creeps in. Is it the Babadook that is to be feared in this house, or Amelia herself? A new classic and a must see for fans of old school horror.

Crimson Peak is a 2015 gothic romance film directed by Guillermo del Toro, starring Mia Wasikowska, Tom Hiddleston, and Jessica Chastain. Like most Guillermo del Toro movies the look of this thing is absolutely sublime. Visually stunning sets, costumes, special effects, color palette, all of it. I love the big emotions, dark secrets, and burning bodices of a good gothic romance and this film delivers on all counts. Mia Wasikowska plays Edith, a woman who lost her mother at a young age and is drawn into the world of ghosts. She wants to be a writer, and she adores her rich and doting father. Then some strangers roll in to town, Thomas and Lucille Sharpe, brother and sister, with titles, from England, but penniless. And guess what? Edith and Thomas fall in love. But things aren’t as they seem, and a darkness lurks. This film is full of jump scares and a ton of gore, but the story is actually very rich and engaging so it keeps you in it. The beauty of the scenes (especially those in the cursed Allerdale Hall) are mesmerizing. Good classic gothic fun, a real guilty pleasure for me, I just loved it.

I hope you’re getting out there and enjoying some fall, and enjoying some movies! Will be talking books again soon.