The Soto List: Some of My Favorite Horror Movies

It's that time of the year, when Halloween is so close, you can smell that weird plastic used in kids Halloween's costumes wafting in the air. It's around this time that people are like "Pffft, horror movies! I always LOVE horror movies! SEE?" and they make a list featuring "I Know What You Did Last Summer" and the remake of "The Amityville Horror". Then November 1st, they go back to their movies starring Phillip Seymour Hoffman called "Jake Farts Roses" or something.*

Anyway.

I'm clumping in with this a feature Kai Parker over at The List does once in awhile. He has people write about three movies that don't get a lot of love and thinks people should check out. He wouldn't let me write a lot about them so I wrote a thing out for him and fleshed it out here. I'm sure this is something he didn't want me to do but I told him I don't play by ANYBODY'S rules, man! I'm a rebel, Dottie! A loner! But to check out the awful PG-13 version that the studio insist I cut, check out Kai's post HERE.

Since I focus on bad movies, which sometimes fall into the realm of horror, I thought I'd do a list of some of my favorite horror movies. There's going to be a lot of movies that probably won't make other people's lists but I guess that's what I'm known for, amirite? So here, in no particular order, is my list of SOME of my favorite horror movies.
(Just know, I put in a few main-stays but left off typical ones like "The Exoricst" and "Nightmare on Elm Street". Just wanted to mention that before I get any "Hey what about-" emails.)

20. Bad Ronald-This is first cause it's probably more of a thriller than horror. But nonetheless, it's creepy as fuck. I plan on doing a full review of this at some point, but for now, I'll just give you a general plot outline. Ronald is a weird shy kid who gets made fun of at a party. On the way home, he accidently kills a little girl. He runs home and tells his overprotective mother, who instead of turning his little boy over to the police, hides him in the walls of their house until "things blow over". But when Mom dies and the house goes up for sale with Ronald still in the wall its when SHIT gets REAL, yo!

19. Drag Me To Hell-I recently watched this movie and I fell in love with it. The ending I sorta predicted but I still liked it. The story is pretty easy too: A hot chick pisses off a Gypsy who curses her with a demon that plans on, well...read the title. It's pretty fucked up. And I like it!

18. Sleepaway Camp-Ok, this movie is "campy" (HA!) as hell but the last 2 minutes you will never, ever, ever, ever EV! ER! fucking forget. I haven't seen the movie in about two years and still that last image flashes in my head-



OH FUCK ME!

17. Bloodsucking Freaks-This movie isn't THAT scary, but it left me with an uneasy feeling long after I watched it. It's one of the movies I need to add images to the review, but I've put it off for a damn good reason. The story is some dude named Master Sardu runs some place where he tortures and kills women in weird ways. He also ships women to other countries. It's kinda fucked.

Speaking of fucked...

16/15/14. Inside/High Tension/Martyrs-French make some fucked up movies. I grouped these three together cause when I think of one, I think of the other two. Plus they all have the same level of creepyness. To quickly run them down:
Inside is about a pregnant lady at home after her husband was killed in a car crash on Christmas Eve. She's due any day, but some crazy lady breaks in, wanting to take the unborn baby out of her.
High Tension is about a chick staying at a friend's house when a murderer shows up and kills the friend's family, so now the chick must follow the murderer to save her friend, who's still alive. Kind of an iffy twist at the end.
Martyrs...ugh. Fuck that movie.

13/12. Poltergeist/Paranormal Activity-Something about ghosts and other worldly beings doing shit and being all invisible while doing it freaks me the fuck out. I think stuff like that is way scarier than murderers and whatnot cause I can see them. When something moves on it's own and there's nothing there, fuck me I'm running out the door.

11. Paranormal Activity 2-Was way fucking creepier than the first one, that's why it gets it's own listing. I don't care if I'm alone on that.

10. The Changling-Another ghost movie, but this is more related to a scene. So George C. Scott moved into this big ass house by himself when some weird stuff starts happening. He does some digging and figured out some shit went down a long time ago. So he brings in a psychic/medium to hold a seance to contact the ghost in the house. This seance is the creepiest thing ever. The psychic is communicating with the ghost by writing a piece of paper and words start forming. And they're also tape recording this and when it's played back...hang on.

Holy shit, it's on Youtube. I DARE YOU to watch this:


9. The Blair Witch Project-True story, I saw this opening weekend back in 1999. When I got back home, it was dark. My mom wanted me to take the garbage out. Now, I didn't live in the woods or anything, but it was a small city that didn't really believe in street lights. Especially in alleys. So needless to say, that was the fast I ever threw out the garbage. I don't think I even went to the can. I think I just launched it from the back porch and ran back into the room and cried.

8. Popcorn-Drifting away from shit that scared me to some good b-grade horror, I love this movie. A bunch of kids put on a film festival showing 50's and 60's style horror movies, with a William Castle-theme to them. But a psycho killer is going around, killing the kids. It's awesome fun. Check it out!

7. Cat's Eye-This is a horror anthology of sorts. There's three stories and the same cat is present in all three stories. One story features James Woods trying to quit smoking so he signs up for this program that'll guarantee he'll never smoke ever again. Another story focuses on some dude stuck on the ledge of a building. I don't remember that one too well. The last story...oh man, the last story. The cat must fight this evil thing that lives in Drew Barrymoore's wall. It's pretty freaky.

6. Parents-I BARELY remember this movie, but when I seen it as a kid I knew it was creepy as fuck. Randy Quaid and another chick are the Parents. The entire movie is from the point of view of their kid. The kid begins to suspects something is up with his parents, especially after they get into the "meat making" business. This movie is truly terrifying cause out of everything that they can make scary, what's more scarier than making your parents an oject of horror. Yeah, woods, TV's, and old houses you can avoid. But you can't avoid your parents. And anyone who ever tried to breeze through their old hometown knows this.

5. Manos: The Hands of Fate-Now bear with me for a second. The movie itself is horrible. From the acting to the directing to the filming to the lighting to the dubbing. But if you think about the story...it's kinda fucked up. Now, pretend you never seen this movie, either by it self or the MST3K version and read this:
A family, including a very young girl, is on vacation. They arrive at some lodge that mysteriously appeared and they're greated by a creepy servant named Torgo. It turns out this lodge is the home of a cult that worships a god named Manos and the leader, The Master, takes on many wives. The Master, and Manos, sets their eyes on the wife and daughter of the family, leaving the husband to take the place of Torgo after he betrays Manos and The Master.
Now, doesn't that sound messed up? Vacations that go wrong do make horrible movies cause when you die, you're in a strange place. No one wants to die in a strange place. Well, I wouldn't mind dying on the moon, but whatever.

4. Cathy's Curse-This movie is FUCKING TERRIBLE...that I love it. Everything about it is so retarded. It's a ghost possession story but done just wrong. From the housekeeper who pretends to clean up broken glass to the fake mustaches, it's just awesome. It's on Netflix, check it out.

3. Slugs-Oh my god, I love this movie. It's about killer slugs but here's the thing: the slugs...aren't giant. They're normal sized slugs! But they eat people! It's crazy! There's so much here. The hero's name is Mike Brady. Half the cast is dubbed for some reason. There's a guy who looks like Leslie Nielsen who yells out "YOU DON'T HAVE THE AUTHORIZATION TO DECLARE HAPPY BIRTHDAY!". It's GREAT!

2. Hatchet-I need to see this again. I only seen it once, two years ago. But I remember loving it. I want to see the sequel so badly. It's a throwback to 80's old school horror. The story is very simple: a bunch of kids on spring break goes to New Orleans. They take a swamp tour and in the swamp lives the ghost of Victor Crowley, a weird looking killer. Boom, dead kids. It's a lot of fun.

1. The Mist-You have to give it up to movies that focus more on the craziness of the people than the monsters. Although, the monsters do make this a horrifying film. I love this movie. And the end is so super effective. It literally made me GASP!, which is something I don't do often to movie.

So there ya go. Some of my favorite horror movies. I've talked about these movies on here but this is for a new audience that never reads my shit so hi new readers! I know you're not gonna stick around so I could say things that aren't true and you wouldn't know any better. My half-brother is Brad Pitt. I met Hunter S. Thompson in Las Vegas in 1999. I was the guy that came up with the Kindle. This website and blog gets 1 million views a day.

Ok, back to your normal lives.
-Jason
*If you think I was talking about you, don't worry I wasn't. I wasn't talking about anyone in particular. Well, except for you.