Dark Water (2016)

 

24 Days of LosMas- Christmas Twister (2012)

I will be posting Christmas-themed horror films over the next 24 days of LosMas; for the seventeenth night, I am posting Christmas Twister.

Christmas Twister (2012)

As the city of Ft Worth, Texas, prepares for Christmas vacation, a university scientist sees weather patterns that look unusual for the season. Unfortunately, given his reputation for overcautious reporting, the local news ignores his warnings as a powerful storm system develops, resulting in massive twisters and threatening the city and his family. Christmas Twister is a 2012 disaster movie directed by Peter Sullivan and starring Casper Van Dien. While not a horror movie in the traditional sense, Christmas Twister is a 1970's style disaster film that follows a similar format to classic films such as Earthquake, The Towering Inferno, and The Swarm. Like many made-for-TV movies, this film focuses on a small cast that does a decent job of playing their roles. Ultimately, this film seems out of place with more traditional slashers and apocalyptic-style disaster movies.  

Nature Fights Back 1970s Edition- 93 Days to Halloween

Frogs (1972)

Killer Fogs and other critters

Night of the Lepus (1972)

Not the Bunnies

Killer Bees (1974)

BZZZZZZZ

Phase IV (1974)

Intelligent Ants

Grizzly (1976)

He was a hairy bear, he was a scary bear

The Food of the Gods (1976)

Giant rodents and insects attack

A*P*E (1976)

Korean Kong Ripoff

Squirm (1976)

Earthworms gone wild

King Kong (1976)

A tale about a girl and her giant ape

Day of the Animals (1977)

Hole in the ozone drives animals crazy

Empire of the Ants (1977)

Joan Collins vs Giant Ants

The  Pack (1977)

Joe Don Baker takes on some bad dogs

Ants (1977)

Suzanne Somers and some killer ants

Barracuda (1978)

Angry fish and locals losing their cool

The Swarm (1978)

Killer Bees are all the rage

Long Weekend (1978)

Always respect Mother Nature

The Bees (1978)

Bees are no match for John Saxon

Prophecy (1979)

Mutations and bare naked bears

Nightwing (1979)

It's like Jaws, but with Bats 

The Beach House (2019)

The Beach House (2019)

Dir- Jeff Brown

It is not uncommon for a horror movie to occur in a location that would otherwise be seen as a vacation destination. In director Jeff Brown's The Beach House, a seemingly perfect vacation home becomes the setting for terror as four people encounter a mysterious series of events that seem to be coming from the sea. 

Emily (Liana Liberato) and Randall (Noah Le Gros) are a young college couple hoping to reignite their relationship by staying at his estranged father's remote beach house. Their seemingly perfect weekend is interrupted by another couple who are already using the house. They decide to make the best of the situation and enjoy food, wine, and recreational drugs. Yet a strange illness begins to affect each of them as they encounter some bizarre events that test their trust in each other as well as reality.     

The Beach House arrives on Shudder during a global pandemic with its plot that is all too relatable to many viewers who have had to socially isolate. The film blends several horror genres mixing a little Cronenberg with some Lovecraftian imagery. Liana Liberato is well cast as a scientifically minded young woman who has her whole world shaken. She witnesses her boyfriend and house guests, each falling ill to an unknown but seemingly natural threat. The shift in horror styles is carried out quite well and allows the movie to set its own path, giving viewers a terrifying journey as they are left little time to figure out what is going on. 

The Beach House makes effective use of isolation and the threat of an unknown illness to make it a surprisingly scary movie that makes use of bizarre visuals and some gory imagery that helps it stand well against more significant big budget horror films. 

Three and a Half Stars out of Five