Editorials
James Remar Tells Us His Favorite Satanic Horror Movies!
While the great James Remar has been around since the 1980’s, starring in classics such as The Warriors and Tales From the Darkside: The Movie, younger readers will remember him as the father of Dexter Morgan on Showtime’s “Dexter”.
Next up is a pivotal role in Osgood Perkins’ supremely awesome satanic thriller, The Blackcoat’s Daughter (read my review), now on DirecTV with a theatrical and On Demand release set for March 31st.
Kiernan Shipka (“Mad Men,” Carriers) stars with Emma Roberts (“Scream Queens”, “American Horror Story”) as two terrified girls who must battle a mysterious evil force when they get left behind at their boarding school over winter break.
We caught up with Remar who was cool enough to tell us some of his favorite satanic/possession horror movies.
Here’s what we got:
THE EXORCIST
Not only is it shot in such a haunting, stark fashion, with the narrow staircases and wet cobblestone streets in Washington D.C.…the performances are just so spot on. It’s a phenomenal movie and it scares the crap out of everybody. Everything about that film was a massive, massive hit. The screenplay was immaculate, the source material was fantastic, the execution by the director, all of the production staff, and the actors was really a thing of perfection. And it really reintroduced the American audience to Satanism and exorcism.
THE OMEN
THE OMEN is scary and creepy. The reason being, once again there’s a little kid involved. When Gregory Peck trims his hair and sees the three 6s, it’s a terrifying moment. I actually read the script for it when I was a young actor. Lee Remick as the mom…she had these beautiful clear blue eyes that seemed so pure and so innocent. For that contrast of the darkness of evil that overcomes this family, it was really, really terrifying.
THE SHINING
Stanley Kubrick at his best. Positively haunting. Once again there’s a child in touch with echoes from the past that are demonic in nature. The Shining is an immaculate film, not a wasted frame in it, and it’s just utterly terrifying. Everyone in it is amazing…from the little boy, right up to Jack Nicholson, and obviously Shelley Duvall. What an incredible movie.
KWAIDAN
A personal favorite that is not known very well in this country, is a collection of Japanese demonic, possession, demon-oriented films. Literally translated as “scary story.” Travelers that are lost in the forest meet this demon who is a beautiful woman but if you look her in the eye she will steal your breath.
TALES FROM THE DARKSIDE
KWAIDAN was the inspiration for a movie yours truly did called TALES FROM THE DARKSIDE. The segment was called “Lover’s Vow.” My character has a similar experience, he sees a demon and the demon says “never tell anyone you saw me or I’ll spare you.“ It’s very heartbreaking.
A24 and DirecTV will release THE BLACKCOAT’S DAUGHTER in theaters and On Demand on March 31, 2017.
As I’ve said many times before, if it weren’t for It Follows, my favorite horror film of 2015 would have been Osgood Perkins’ The Blackcoat’s Daughter.
“A deeply atmospheric and terrifying new horror film, ‘The Blackcoat’s Daughter’ centers on Kat (Kiernan Shipka) and Rose (Lucy Boynton), two girls who are left alone at their prep school Bramford over winter break when their parents mysteriously fail to pick them up. While the girls experience increasingly strange and creepy occurrences at the isolated school, we cross cut to another story—that of Joan (Emma Roberts), a troubled young woman on the road, who, for unknown reasons, is determined to get to Bramford as fast as she can. As Joan gets closer to the school, Kat becomes plagued by progressively intense and horrifying visions, with Rose doing her best to help her new friend as she slips further and further into the grasp of an unseen evil force. The movie suspensefully builds to the moment when the two stories will finally intersect, setting the stage for a shocking and unforgettable climax.”
Principal photography took place in Ottawa on the film written and directed by Osgood Perkins, son of legendary Psycho actor Anthony Perkins.
Judging from the unprecedented box office success of Kane Parsons’ Backrooms adaptation, you’ve likely already seen the liminal horror hit that managed to make audiences afraid of empty hallways and bad wallpaper. And now that so many of us have already entered the yellow labyrinth (some of us more than once), the time has come to discuss the spoiler-filled details that make the movie so fascinating in the first place.
And if there’s one element here that makes the Backrooms movie stand out from any previous lore/mythology, it has to be the genius addition of the Still Life entities. Warped recreations of real people that somehow wandered into the Complex, these misremembered creatures are responsible for some of the most disturbing imagery of 2026 – as well as laugh-out-loud memes created by one of the film’s very own concept artists.
However, true to Parsons’ word that the movie would rely heavily on practical effects, each of these distorted monsters was brought to life by real actors under heavy layers of makeup and prosthetics (with the occasional splash of CGI enhancements). While Anora and If I Had Legs I’d Kick You actress Ivy Wolk wasn’t among these performers, despite what Letterboxd might have you believe, the creature cast did benefit from veteran players with plenty of genre experience.
For starters, Alien: Romulus alumni Robert Bobroczkyi (who previously brought that film’s horrific Offspring to life during its most memorable sequence) plays the flick’s main antagonist, the Still Life version of Captain Clark. And though there was some obvious CGI involved in making the character’s peg-leg and nightmarish face more believable, Bobroczkyi’s monstrous performance and his natural 7’7″ frame helped to make that final chase sequence a clear highlight among this year’s genre offerings.
The film’s Texas-Chain-Saw-inspired “dinner” scene also features a freaky collection of less-aggressive Still Life creatures in the form of the Bearded Man, the Red-Headed Woman and, strangest of them all, the cheekily named “Archibald Leland Sutter Still Life” (who earned this title among fans and crewmembers as a reference to his apparent affinity for lamps).
While this was the first major horror outing for both Patrick Baynham (The Bearded Man) and Dana Mahmood (Archibald), Rhiannon Roberts has worked as a stunt performer in everything from Yellowjackets to HBO’s The Last of Us adaptation – which is probably why The Red-Headed Woman is the most active out of Clark’s impromptu “family.” That being said, the Archibald Leland Sutter Still Life is my personal favorite of the bunch simply because his anachronistic outfit suggests that the Backrooms phenomenon might be a lot older than the Async Foundation. I also love how hard he tries to be helpful with that little light of his!
That might be it for the Still Life entities, but I think horror fans will also be pleased to hear that the film’s Found Footage prologue stars none other than Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City star Avan Jogia as Naren Warne – and American Mary herself Katharine Isabelle also shows up in a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it cameo at Mary’s house party towards the middle of the story (though I have a feeling that she originally had a bigger part that was likely cut for time).
At the end of the day, Parsons’ Backrooms may have been an auteur-driven project motivated by the young director’s unique take on the classic creepypasta, but film has always been a collective artform, so it’s fun to see just how many talented performers it takes to bring this kind of supernatural nightmare to life in a way that connects with so many people.
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