Craig Rettig.com

Beaumont: “I thought that beauty alone would satisfy. But the soul is gone. I can’t bear those empty, staring eyes. You must bring her back!”
Legendre: “Aren’t you a trifle afraid, monsieur? How do you suppose those eyes will regard you when the brain is able to understand?”
Beaumont: “Better to see hatred in them than that dreadful emptiness.”

— Charles Beaumont (Robert Frazer) & Legendre (Bela Lugosi)

Since I started with a classic Lugosi film, I thought it appropriate to end with one. White Zombie tells the tale of what can happen when unrequited love meets madness. A young engaged couple, Madeleine and Neil, are traveling, when they meet Charles Beaumont, who falls head over heels for Madeleine. The millionaire convinces them to get married at his Haitian mansion, where he tries every means he knows to make Madeleine love him.

When traditional methods don’t work, he turns to Legendre, a witch doctor, who gives Madeleine the zombie treatment and arranges for Neil to disappear. However, once Beaumont sees Madeleine’s free will gone, he begins to have second thoughts, but Legendre doesn’t like to undo his work, and things start to unravel.

White Zombie isn’t your typical horror flick that relies on violence, costuming, or special effects. Much of White Zombie‘s horror is atmospheric and psychological, relying on the audience to imagine such a scenario really happening (explored again in 1988′s The Serpent And The Rainbow). As with most films of this era, it’s definitely worth watching, and a fine addition to Lugosi’s résumé.

“Men anger the gods with their pride, and in order to punish them, the gods looked on as Pandora opened her box letting chaos loose. And now here in Monster City, mythology will become reality.”

— Mephisto

Demon City Shinjuku is a late-1980s anime where a young man, Kyoya, unwillingly walks the hero’s journey to save the world from ultimate destruction at the hands of his father’s former training partner, Rebi Ra.

Ra and Kyoya’s father were students in an esoteric magical martial art called Nempo, but Ra sought to exceed Kyoya’s father and made a pact with demons to increase his power, ultimately winning in a battle to the death between his former friend. Now, his demon masters want to take Earth as their own, and it’s up to Kyoya to stop them.

As the cover says, this movie is from the director of Vampire Hunter D: Bloodlust and Ninja Scroll, so if you’re familiar with either of those movies, you can pretty much guess the formula for this one. Still, it’s visually stunning, and the action and creep factor make it a good choice for Halloween viewing.

“The Living Dead and the dying living are all the same. Cut from the same cloth. But disposing of dead people is a public service, whereas you’re in all sorts of trouble if you kill someone while they’re still alive.”

— Francesco Dellamorte (Rupert Everett)

Cemetery Man proves that no matter how bad your job is, at least you don’t have to re-bury bodies after they come back to life as flesh-eating zombies. Dellamorte lives in the cemetery with his barely-functional assistant Gnaghi (François Hadji-Lazaro) and has never been able to enjoy a normal life thanks to his unusual vocation.

His world gets shaken up when he finally meets the woman of his dreams (Anna Falchi), and then is forced to kill her. As he tries to get over her death, he keeps meeting her identical twins… and ends up killing them, too.

Cemetery Man is a rather bizarre black comedy/horror film that would definitely fill the need to see something “different” this Halloween season.

Megan: “Tell me. Honestly, what are our chances?”
Cooper: “Morale seems good, considering. But that will only last as long as the ammunition holds out. Although high spirits are just no substitute for eight hundred rounds a minute, but I don’t think that’s what you wanted to hear.”

— Megan (Emma Cleasby) & Cooper (Kevin McKidd)

Dog Soldiers is one of my favorite werewolf movies, second only to The Howling. It follows the story of some British soldiers out on a training exercise that stumble onto a group of werewolves. It turns out there was a little more than just coincidence that led to this encounter, but the backstory takes a second rung to the non-stop action in this flick.

I think what I like most about this movie is that it doesn’t pretend to be anything other than what it is, an action movie with horror elements. Despite the cast being mostly unknown actors, the performances are authentic and convincing. The dialog is witty, although sometimes hard to understand for non-Brits like myself. The wolves themselves are actual physical models and costumes, not CGI. On top of all that, there’s a lot of action for a mere 105 minutes.

So if you’re looking for a good werewolf movie to watch this Halloween, give this one a spin in your DVD player.

“Exactly. I hunted them. And shall I tell you why? I’d been a scholar all my life. I was curator of a large museum. And the war began. I who had never killed anything in my life assigned to duty as a sniper — a sharpshooter — because of my steady hand and keen eyesight. (chuckles) It amuses me now that I found it distasteful at first. And as time went by I adjusted my new activity. For what had been an unpleasant duty became a pleasure then it developed into a passion and then into a lust. A lust for blood! A lust that has grown with the years! And one that I spend my entire life trying to satisfy.”

— Dr. Albert Balleau (Wilton Graff)

Bloodlust, much like The Corpse Vanishes, is another hybrid movie, this time combining the teen slasher genre with Richard Connell’s novella The Most Dangerous Game. Two teen couples out for a joyride on a boat decide to explore an island they’ve never seen before. While looking for stuff for a clambake, they become the unwilling “guests” of Dr. Balleau. It isn’t long before they find out his real passion as well as his sinister intentions toward them.

The movie itself is true ’50s horror camp, with Wilton Graff doing his darnedest to channel Vincent Price through an Orson Welles filter. Also of note is that the “leader” of the teen quartet is none other than Robert Reed, who later became the father on The Brady Bunch. It’s by far not one of the greatest movies of the genre, but it’s fun watching nonetheless.

UPDATE: I just found out you can watch this for free online at Classic Cinema Online.

Caleb: “How old are you, Jesse?”
Jesse: “Let’s put it this way: I fought for the South. We lost.”

—Caleb Colton (Adrian Pasdar) & Jesse Hooker (Lance Henriksen)

Near Dark is one of the more interesting vampire movies to come out of the ’80s. Instead of painting the gothic romance or going the glam metal route, the vampires were a small, ragtag group of ne’er-do-wells roaming the country going from one meal to the next to avoid discovery. Things go awry when Mae meets Caleb, nips him, but doesn’t finish him off. Because he’s one of them now, the vampires have to take Caleb with them. Unfortunately, Caleb’s father and sister don’t stop looking for him, and Caleb won’t kill.

Near Dark also presents the concept that vampirism can be cured through medical procedures, which seems a bit far-fetched, but hey, you’ve already got some suspension of disbelief, so why not?

Packing a cast of ’80s and ’90s stars, Near Dark is definitely worth watching and remains one of my favorite vampire movies.

“Why, yes, in a manner of speaking. I find a coffin much more comfortable than a bed.”

—Dr. Lorenz (Bela Lugosi)

The Corpse Vanishes is a classic flick starring horror legend Bela Lugosi as a demented scientist who kidnaps brides after they die at the altar, using them in his twisted experiments.

This movie is a hybrid of the typical “mad scientist” flick crossed with the legend of Countess Báthory. Rounding out Lugosi’s Dr. Lorenz are his crazy wife (’40s scream queen Elizabeth Russell), a midget, a mutant, the mother of the pair, and a personality-less henchman.

Dr. Lorenz has been getting away with his scheme for a while until overachieving reporter Patricia Hunter (Luana Walters) finds a clue at one of the abductions — one that leads directly to Dr. Lorenz. After an unsettling night spent at the Lorenz house, she becomes completely convinced of Lorenz’s guilt and sets up a plan to catch him in the act.

I consider this one of the better movies of the era, with an ample number of plot twists for a mere 68-minute film. Definitely worth checking out if you haven’t seen it before.