AMERICAN NIGHTMARE – Adam Simon
This is a documentary that takes some of the significant American horror films of the 60's and 70's and goes into the background of history and culture that surrounded and shaped their makers and delves into what led to their arising at the precise moment they did. Or at least that's what it aims to do; the inclusion of Canadian horror-master David Cronenberg dilutes the yank-centricity and the choice of films covered while interesting is also eccentric.
The films mainly covered here are:
Texas Chainsaw Massacre (Tobe Hooper)
Night of the Living Dead & Dawn of the Dead (George Romero, Tom Savini)
Shivers (David Cronenberg)
Halloween (John Carpenter)
Last House on the Left (Wes Craven).
The good news is that Simon is pretty passionate about his subject and gets some cracking interviews from his subjects. Tom Savini in particular talks a great deal about his stint in Vietnam and shows us pictures he took there and how it influenced his ground-breaking FX work. Tobe Hooper talks about the ideas and concepts that went into the making of his oppressively gripping Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Romero talks engagingly about the influence of the existing social clime for Night (racial bigotry, lack of trust in the establishment, paranoia about communism) and Dawn (rampant consumerism and other stuff). Cronenberg is given short but gripping screen time as he talks about the sexual and moral ambivalence of the period that gave birth to Shivers, a nasty indie horror about a parasite that takes over people and makes them sexually rampant. It's a pity that more of his work including Videodrome and The Brood which are at least equally important as social horror films don't get any look see here.
Wes Craven in a smooth and pleasingly articulate vein talks about the period of social unrest and public anger in the face of Vietnam that supposedly gave birth to Last House on the Left. Mixed with images of the callousness of American GI's in 'Nam and a haunting background score, the visuals of Last House suggest a far more powerful film than the campy and barely involving hodge-podge I personally found it to be. And while I find John Carpenter a pleasant and well-spoken man apart from having some interesting works under his belt, I really fail to see how his impressions of the social and cultural climate around him could have any relevance towards what I consider an (IMO) over-hyped banal slasher like Halloween.
Apart from the makers, the documentary also covers the reactions of John Landis (American Werewolf in London) and a couple of critics towards these films...while they occasionally say something interesting, the bulk of these inserts are either bland or annoying.
On the whole, American Nightmare is filled with several interesting vignettes of a specific period of American horror movie culture and a worthy watch for the horror fan.
For those of you who read through this review, a little extra - a pic of young Savini in Vietnam:
This is a documentary that takes some of the significant American horror films of the 60's and 70's and goes into the background of history and culture that surrounded and shaped their makers and delves into what led to their arising at the precise moment they did. Or at least that's what it aims to do; the inclusion of Canadian horror-master David Cronenberg dilutes the yank-centricity and the choice of films covered while interesting is also eccentric.
The films mainly covered here are:
Texas Chainsaw Massacre (Tobe Hooper)
Night of the Living Dead & Dawn of the Dead (George Romero, Tom Savini)
Shivers (David Cronenberg)
Halloween (John Carpenter)
Last House on the Left (Wes Craven).
The good news is that Simon is pretty passionate about his subject and gets some cracking interviews from his subjects. Tom Savini in particular talks a great deal about his stint in Vietnam and shows us pictures he took there and how it influenced his ground-breaking FX work. Tobe Hooper talks about the ideas and concepts that went into the making of his oppressively gripping Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Romero talks engagingly about the influence of the existing social clime for Night (racial bigotry, lack of trust in the establishment, paranoia about communism) and Dawn (rampant consumerism and other stuff). Cronenberg is given short but gripping screen time as he talks about the sexual and moral ambivalence of the period that gave birth to Shivers, a nasty indie horror about a parasite that takes over people and makes them sexually rampant. It's a pity that more of his work including Videodrome and The Brood which are at least equally important as social horror films don't get any look see here.
Wes Craven in a smooth and pleasingly articulate vein talks about the period of social unrest and public anger in the face of Vietnam that supposedly gave birth to Last House on the Left. Mixed with images of the callousness of American GI's in 'Nam and a haunting background score, the visuals of Last House suggest a far more powerful film than the campy and barely involving hodge-podge I personally found it to be. And while I find John Carpenter a pleasant and well-spoken man apart from having some interesting works under his belt, I really fail to see how his impressions of the social and cultural climate around him could have any relevance towards what I consider an (IMO) over-hyped banal slasher like Halloween.
Apart from the makers, the documentary also covers the reactions of John Landis (American Werewolf in London) and a couple of critics towards these films...while they occasionally say something interesting, the bulk of these inserts are either bland or annoying.
On the whole, American Nightmare is filled with several interesting vignettes of a specific period of American horror movie culture and a worthy watch for the horror fan.
For those of you who read through this review, a little extra - a pic of young Savini in Vietnam:
