Editorials
5 Horror Movies to Help You Ring in the New Year!
There’s not a lot of horror movies set around New Year’s Eve; Christmas hogs the spotlight in terms of holiday horror. It’s almost a shame, too, since there’s a lot more freedom in the holiday since it’s not bound by specific iconography like Santa Claus, elves, snowmen, or other Christmas traditions. Even still, there are enough great titles to fill out a fun night in, ringing in the New Year in the best way – watching horror movies. The most obvious selection is 1980’s slasher New Year’s Evil, but I’m assuming you’ve already seen it and skipping it in favor of less obvious and more interesting (i.e. wackier) selections. After all, it’s New Year’s Eve and you’re probably imbibing. To help you ring in the New Year, here are five horror movies worth checking out.
Cronos
Ok. So, it’s not exactly as though the plot hinges on the holiday, but New Year’s Eve does factor into the narrative and a major scene set at a New Year’s ball. Guillermo del Toro’s feature film debut takes a unique approach to the vampire mythos in a way that only del Toro can. Antique dealer Jesús Gris (Frederico Luppi) finds a 450-year-old mechanized scarab hidden within a statue in his shop. It stings him, injecting him with a mysterious substance, and he soon finds himself growing young again. Albeit with a thirst for blood. Gris’ new-found hunger for blood creates a path of destruction, and really rears its ugly head at a New Year’s ball that he attends with his wife, when he finds a man bleeding from an injury and loses control.
Terror Train
It turns out 1980 brought two New Year’s set slashers, and Terror Train is the more entertaining of the two. It’s also the year that Jamie Lee Curtis starred in two slashers involving pranks gone wrong, as Terror Train follows a masked killer targeting six college students responsible for a botched prank as they party away at a costume party on a moving train for New Year’s. The other is Prom Night. Again, it’s the more entertaining of the two. It also helps that the killer wears the costume of his previous victim, making for a fun twist on a typical masked killer, and that the train setting is unique. Plus, Jamie Lee Curtis.
The Signal
Set over New Year’s Eve into New Year’s Day, a mysterious signal that invades radio, TV, and cell phone transmission turns anyone who hears it into rage-fueled killers. What makes The Signal so much fun and special is that it’s one cohesive story with central characters, but it’s told in three parts by three difference directors. This gives it varying tones, from serious to black comedy, and an anthology feel despite not actually being an anthology. A.J. Bowen plays Lewis, the infected husband to lead character Mya (Anessa Ramsey), who spends most of the film chasing her down as she attempts to escape him with her lover Ben (Justin Welborn). The second segment, directed by Jacob Gentry, takes the film into horror comedy as Lewis crashes a nearby New Year’s party being hosted by the infected. It’s a bloody riot. But the film works great as a whole.
The Night of the Virgin
Warning, this film exists to be polarizing. It’s a gross-out horror comedy, emphasis on gross, that follows awkward, lonely Nico (Javier Bódalo) who attends a New Year’s Eve party with the sole goal of losing his virginity. There he becomes attracted to Medea (Miriam Martín), and he follows her home in the hopes of getting laid but is regaled with stories of a Nepalese goddess Naoshi instead. Medea’s boyfriend arrives, and Nico is trapped in her apartment with the realization that perhaps Naoshi isn’t just a myth. It’s grimy, weird, gross, and gory, and will likely test your boundaries of taste. So perhaps this one is best viewed with friends while buzzed, just maybe don’t eat beforehand. It is New Year’s, after all.
End of Days
Maybe you just want to party like it’s 1999. What better way to do that than with Arnold Schwarzenegger? Schwarzenegger stars as Jericho Cane, a former cop turned alcoholic elite security officer with a crisis of faith forced to save the world when Satan comes to New York to claim his bride and have her bear his Antichrist child on New Year’s Eve. And ring in the end of the world, of course. Action horror meets apocalypse meets church conspiracy equals more fun than this movie has gotten credit for. Gabriel Byrne co-stars as Satan, and Robin Tunney as his unwitting chosen bride Christine, but who doesn’t want to see a grizzled Schwarzenegger battle cultists and monstrous iterations of Satan? It doesn’t get much more holiday appropriate than this one.
Editorials
‘The Vampire Lestat’ Concert Event Launches New Season With The Ultimate Expression Of Fandom
There are thousands of passionate fans decked out in gothic chic and champing at the bit like feral creatures. They’re screaming for Lestat, a legendary vampire-turned-rock star, as if the entire crowd has been glamored into submission.
The entire experience is magic, but not because some supernatural thrall has been activated. What’s going on is even more special. It’s the power of the effusive fandom that’s been authentically assembled by AMC’s sublime Immortal Universe, namely Anne Rice’s Interview with the Vampire, now, The Vampire Lestat.
The Vampire Lestat is far from the first Anne Rice adaptation, and it’s not as if there’s been a lack of erotic vampire material for audiences to sink their teeth into. On June 2nd, during a one-night-only spectacle, New York City’s prestigious Beacon Theatre shook from Sam Reid’s bravado performance and an audience full of adoring fans who had already memorized Lestat’s songs.
It’s clear that The Vampire Lestat just hits differently than its predecessors. It’s become more than just a TV series at this point, and this opulent display of ego, swagger, and pure sex is the perfect way to premiere the new season and give back to the fans who helped make Interview with the Vampire/The Vampire Lestat such a breakout success. It’s exactly the sort of hyperbolized hedonism that would make Lestat cackle.
For all intents and purposes, AMC has successfully created the illusion that this concert/premiere is just one of the many destinations on Lestat and his band’s 54-stop tour that is simultaneously playing out on this season of television. It’s such a sophisticated and thorough level of interactive fan engagement that the audience doesn’t just understand, but also manages to accentuate through its involvement.
It’s a level of seamless synergy that’s not unlike the give-and-take relationship of vampire and victim.
Before the concert started, “LeStans” were sitting in the Beacon and flipping through a fake Rolling Stone issue with Lestat emblazoned on the cover, complete with interviews with the undead frontman inside. Other fans were admiring the vinyl pressing of Lestat’s EP as they walked past a section of undead band merch. Fandom and fantasy blur together, and it all becomes this elaborate, immersive experience. Fan celebration, erotic gothic fantasy, and a lavish rock concert transform into one beautiful thing.
To this point, AMC Global Media’s Chief Content Officer and President of AMC Studios, Dan McDermott, introduced the event by reiterating to fans, “You are the heartbeat of the series.” That’s abundantly clear on nights like this as that heartbeat collectively pulses to this performance. In terms of how AMC engages with The Vampire Lestat’s fans, it’s as bold a reinvention as the season itself.
This intuitive gamble speaks to AMC’s creativity in this department and a fandom that is eager to seize such opportunities. It’s the same innovation that led to zombie walks for The Walking Dead and real-life Los Pollos Hermanos restaurant pop-ups from Breaking Bad. It’s a great way to pump up the audience for The Vampire Lestat and then maintain that enthusiasm for the whole season.
For most series, a rock ‘n’ roll concert just doesn’t make any sense as a promotional tool. The Vampire Lestat finds itself in a very unique position where it can deliver an excellent concert at an iconic theater, but also use it to showcase The Vampire Lestat’s music by Daniel Hart (who was shredding on stage alongside Reid and the rest of their band) and, more than anything, Sam Reid’s endless charisma.
The way in which Reid feeds off of the crowd’s energy, modulating his performance and giving different sections of the Beacon life, is a perfect distillation of the series’ thoughtful relationship with its audience and how it’s become such a breakout success for AMC. AMC Studios President Dan McDermott emphasized that the fans are the reason that the show is still here and why an event like this is even possible. It’s rare to see a series in which every single cog in the machine is so perfectly attuned to its fans. Reid’s fans already cheer whenever they see him, so why not translate that to a concert setting?
It’s clear in this season of television that Reid was born to be a rock star, but it’s surreal to see him effortlessly command the stage — and the audience — at every step of the concert. He recites Shakespeare monologues and bitches out Armand between songs, all while the audience screams in support. For the duration of this concert, Reid is Lestat, and he’s given thousands of fans a memory that’s as immortal as any vampire.
Now bring on the encore and get this show on the road!
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