Editorials
Fifteen Years Later: A Look Back at the State of Horror in 2009
Can you believe it’s already been fifteen years since 2009? I feel older than Jason’s mother’s head. But never mind all that. We’re going to look into the past in celebratory fashion today and take a month-to-month look at what the world of horror looked like back in 2009.
The dreaded month of January kicked things off in usual January fashion with a forgettable title, The Unborn. A David S. Goyer picture that’s not very memorable but managed to be the sixth most successful horror film of 2009 domestically, raking in over $42 million at the box office.
Right behind it on the calendar was Patrick Lussier’s My Bloody Valentine 3D starring “Supernatural” actor Jensen Ackles. This slasher remake took the idea of January horror and embraced it, making a silly and gory slasher that was the world’s first R-rated film to ever use Real3D technology. Anyone looking for legitimate scares was probably pissed (the film has a 44% Rotten “Audience” rating) but genre fans had fun with it to the tune of over $51 million at the box office (on a $14 million budget).
Next up, releasing on January 30 was the sleepy PG-13 horror flick The Uninvited. For the life of me, I’ll never understand the choice to release a movie called The Uninvited two weeks after a movie called The Unborn; to be fair, most of us are unable to remember much about either of them.
The reboot of Friday the 13th was served up to us for Valentine’s Day Weekend 2009. A slasher movie that made a ton of money and had fans begging for a sequel… that never came. The Platinum Dunes reboot may not be universally beloved, but I know a fair share of fans (myself included) who thought the new Jason, Derek Mears, and team made a film that was both fun and brutal. And it was juicy enough to come in as the number three most successful domestic horror film in 2009 to the tune of over $65 million. Friday the 13th ’09 was nowhere near perfect but it was a damn fun time with some underrated Jason Voorhees moments and a sleek plan to tell Jason’s origin story quickly via flashbacks that some superhero franchises could learn from. Oh yeah, and it starred the other “Supernatural” bro, Jared Padalecki. I’m sensing a pattern here.
‘Last House on the Left’
Next up, yet another remake of a classic horror film: The Last House on the Left. Wes Craven wanted to see what his low-budget horror film would look like with a little walking around money and the results were that we, the audience, got to see a dude get his head microwaved. The critics weren’t huge fans but let’s be honest, it could have been a lot worse given the subject matter and lack of nuance in the 2000s. Last House went on to land itself in the top ten horror box office returns of the year.
March would also feature one of the many notches in Kyle Gallner’s horror belt, The Haunting in Connecticut, a movie with maybe too many generic possession genre moments to make a major dent in the status quo but enough to make it memorable. I’d take it over many of The Conjuring franchise spinoffs of today, personally. Though, they’re all very much alike.
April Horror would conjure nothing for audiences but Sam Raimi would bring the loud, scary, and funny back to the genre with Drag Me to Hell on May 29. This film that was somehow still PG-13 even with a cat murder, flying old lady eyeball, and mouth-to-mouth puke action was a blast to experience in the theater. Audiences agreed as the film ranked #7 on the horror box office of the year, cashing out at $42 million thanks to a loveable lead in Alison Lohman, the forever horror victim Justin Long, and some good old-fashioned, Evil Dead II-type fun.
‘Drag Me to Hell’
July would shock horror fans in a completely different way with adoption horror flick Orphan. The ending may have had all of us feeling super uncomfortable and shocked but the movie itself had adoption groups majorly upset at how the film depicted the dangers of adoption. So much so that the studio had to add a pro-adoption message to the film’s DVD. No matter, the performance of Isabelle Fuhrman would carry the film to a $41 million box office run and later spawn a decent prequel in 2022.
Speaking of collecting, The Collector was also released in July 2009 and was a pleasant surprise featuring a shitload of originality and some scares to boot. Yet another horror success that would make $10 million on a $3 million budget and spawn a sequel. We’re still waiting on third installment, which abruptly stopped shooting several years back under strange circumstances.
The fourth Final Destination film graced us with its predestined presence in 2009 as well with The Final Destination; the 3D one with the race car track opening. The film was (stop me if you’ve heard this one before) a financial success, raking in over $186 million (worldwide) on a $40 million budget.
Rob Zombie went Rob Zombie’ing as hard as he’s ever Rob Zombie’d with Halloween II later that month. He’d Rob Zombie so hard that we wouldn’t see Halloween on the big screen again until almost ten years later with Halloween 2018. And nothing controversial ever happened in the franchise again. *Shuts book* Stop trying to open it! NO! NOOOOOOOO!
‘Halloween II’
Another remake in Sorority Row was the first film to follow Rob Zombie’s divisive stab-a-thon with a schlocky Scream-esque slasher flick that had a good enough time and even boasted a few neat kills. Critics weren’t fans of this one but if you were? You’ll be happy to hear that writer Josh Stolberg just announced he’s working on the follow-up!
Sexy Horror September continued a week later with Jennifer’s Body and an all-new, emo kind of Kyle Gallner. Jennifer’s Body didn’t exactly crush it for the critics or the box office but has success in its own right and is considered somewhat of a cult classic thanks to some hilarious writing and leading performances from Megan Fox and Amanda Seyfried. Also, shout out to Adam Brody’s band Low Shoulder. Machine Gun Kelly could never.
Part of the low box office for Jennifer’s Body could have had something to do with what came next as Paranormal Activity would rock the horror world a week later. The genius marketing of the low-budget film would feature clips of audiences on night vision cameras losing their minds. Whether it scared you to death or you found the entire concept ridiculous, you had to see it for yourself. Paranormal Activity would bring in almost $200 million worldwide on a 15 THOUSAND dollar budget. I’m no mathematician but I’m pretty sure that’s good. The horror game changer may just be the most remembered of all the 2009 films and it’s one every studio in the world wanted to replicate.
‘Paranormal Activity’
One film’s game changer is another film’s flop as Dennis Quaid and Ben Foster’s space horror Pandorum had the unfortunate scheduling of lining up against Paranormal Activity on that fateful day and in turn, being mostly forgotten.
Spooky Season 2009 kicked off with the beloved horror-comedy Zombieland in October, complete with Jesse Eisenberg’s meta-rules for surviving a zombie apocalypse, Bill Murray, and Woody Harrelson who just wanted a fuckin’ Twinkie. There’s nothing like a good horror comedy and Zombieland proved that all the way to the bank, making $74 million domestically en route to a second film that brought back the entire cast.
It’s only been twelve seconds since I said the word remake, so let’s fix that. The Stepfather remake would follow a week later and be met by an audience getting a little sick of them. Unlike some of the other spirited remakes that surrounded this era in horror (not that they ever stopped), The Stepfather felt like an uninspired retread of the understated but completely messed up 1987 Terry O’Quinn horror cult classic. It’s largely been forgotten over the years.
“Who am I here?” Oh yeah, it’s October in the 2000, there’s bound to be a Saw movie around here somewhere. Saw VI would be released on the 23rd of October and continue the story of Detective Hoffman while adjusting the rates of some shady insurance adjustors. Saw VI would also fall victim to a little bit of Paranormal Activity mania with the film being bested by the continued rollout of its predecessor. Things were looking a little bleak for the franchise at this point. Probably none of us would have imagined that fifteen years later we’d be talking about the same director (Kevin Greutert) returning for the eleventh movie in the franchise.
‘The House of the Devil’
After all these humongous box office successes, sequels, and remakes it would be three memorable indie flicks that would round out October of 2009; the ultra fucked up Willem Dafoe, Lars von Trier sex/horror flick Antichrist, followed by Ti West’s ’70s haunter The House of the Devil and rounded out with some Australian torture horror in Sean Byrne’s The Loved Ones. All three movies each make their mark in their own special ways. What a way to end October.
But it was November that would bring the movie that scared me more than any other on this list: The Fourth Kind. A lot of you are assuredly rolling your eyes right now but this one messed me up on a cellular level despite it being a complete and total fake. The Fourth Kind decided to meld a traditional horror film with the stylings of The Blair Witch Project in an opening designed to make you believe it was based on a true story. An embarrassing attempt but the film itself had me afraid to sleep near windows at night after seeing those found footage abductions. It still messes with me, to be honest. WHY ARE THEIR MOUTHS STRETCHING SO MUCH?!?!
December was too busy doing Avatar and Alvin and the Chipmunks-type family affairs for any horror movies but even without it, 2009 was quite a year for horror. I’d be remiss if I didn’t at least mention some other memorable films that were released either straight to video, limited or overseas that year including Case 39 (that oven opening!), Exam, Daybreakers, Splice, Dead Snow, The Hills Run Red, The Descent 2, Blood Creek, Cabin Fever 2 and [REC] 2.
What were your horror favorites from 2009? Comment below and let us know!
‘My Bloody Valentine’
It took nearly five decades for it to happen, but the tide has turned for Jaws 2. Not everyone has budged on this divisive sequel, but general opinion is certainly kinder, if not more merciful. Excusing a rehashed plot — critic Gene Siskel said the film had “the same story as the original, the same island, the same stupid mayor, the same police chief, the same script…” — Jaws 2 is rather fun when met on its own simple terms. However, less simple is the novelization; the film and its companion read are like oil and water. While both versions reach the same destination in the end, the novelization’s story makes far more waves before getting on with its man-versus-shark climax.
Jaws 2 is not labeled as much of a troubled production as its predecessor, but there were problems behind the scenes. Firing the director mid-stream surely counts as a big one; John D. Hancock was replaced with French filmmaker Jeannot Szwarc. Also, Jaws co-writer Carl Gottlieb returned to rewrite Howard Sackler’s script for the sequel, which had already been revised by Hancock’s wife, Dororthy Tristan. What the creative couple originally had in store for Jaws 2 was darker, much to the chagrin of Universal. Hence Hancock and Tristan’s departures. Hank Searls’ novelization states it is “based on a screenplay by Howard Sackler and Dorothy Tristan,” whereas in his book The Jaws Log, Gottlieb claims the “earlier Sackler material was the basis” for the tie-in. What’s more interesting is the “inspired by Peter Benchley’s Jaws” line on the novelization’s cover. This aspect is evident when Searls brings up Ellen’s affair with Hooper as well as Mayor Larry Vaughan’s connection to the mob. Both plot points are unique to Benchley’s novel.
The novelization gives a fair idea of what could have been Jaws 2 had Hancock stayed on as director. The book’s story does not come across as dark as fans have been led to believe, but it is more serious in tone — not to mention sinuous — than Szwarc’s film. A great difference early on is how Amity looks and feels a few years after the original shark attack (euphemized by locals as “The Troubles”). In the film, it seems as if everything, from the townsfolk to the economy, is unaffected by the tragedies of ‘75. Searls, on the other hand, paints Amity as a ghost town in progress. Tourism is down and money is hard to come by. The residents are visibly unhappy, with some more than others. Those who couldn’t sell off their properties and vacate during The Troubles are now left to deal with the aftermath.
Image: As Martin Brody, Roy Scheider opens fire on the beach in Jaws 2.
It is said that Roy Scheider only came back to fulfill a three-picture deal with Universal (with Jaws 2 counting as two films) and to avoid having his character recast. Apparently, he was also not too pleased (or pleasant) after Szwarc signed on. Nevertheless, Scheider turned in an outstanding performance as the returning and now quietly anguished Martin Brody. Even in the film’s current form, there are still significant remnants of the chief’s psychological torment and pathos. Brody opening fire on what he thought to be the shark, as shocked beachgoers flee for their lives nearby, is an equally horrifying and sad moment in the film.
In a candid interview coupled with Marvel’s illustrated adaptation of Jaws 2, Szwarc said he had posted the message “subtlety is the picture’s worst enemy” above the editor’s bench. So that particular beach scene and others are, indeed, not at all subtle, but neither are the actions of Brody’s literary counterpart. Such as, his pinning the recent deaths on Jepps, a vacationing cop from Flushing. The trigger-happy drunk’s actual crimes are breaking gun laws and killing noisy seals. Regardless, it’s easier for Brody to blame this annoying out-of-towner than conceive there being another great white in Amity. Those seals, by the way, would normally stay off the shore unless there was something driving them out of the ocean…
Brody’s suspicions about there being another shark surface early on in the film. For too long he is the only one who will even give the theory any serious thought, in fact. The gaslighting of Brody, be it intentional or otherwise, is frustrating, especially when considering the character is suffering from PTSD. It was the ‘70s though, so there was no intelligible name for what Brody was going through. Not yet, at least. Instead, the film delivers a compelling (and, yes, unsubtle) depiction of a person who, essentially, returned from war and watched a fellow soldier die before his very eyes. None of that trauma registers on the Martin Brody first shown in Jaws 2. Which, of course, was the result of studio interference. Even after all that effort to make an entertaining and not depressing sequel, the finished product still has its somber parts.
Image: A page from Marvel’s illustrated adaptation of Jaws 2.
How Brody handles his internal turmoil in the novelization is different, largely because he is always thinking about the shark. Even before there is either an inkling or confirmation of the new one. It doesn’t help that his oldest son, Mike, hasn’t been the same since The Troubles. The boy has inherited his father’s fear of the ocean as well as developed his own. Being kept in the dark about the second shark is also detrimental to Brody’s psyche; the local druggist and photo developer could have alleviated that self-doubt had he told Brody what he found on the dead scuba diver’s undeveloped roll of film. Instead, Nate Starbuck kept this visual proof of the shark to himself. His reasons for doing so are connected to the other pressing subplot in the novelization.
While the film makes a relatively straight line for its ending, Searls takes various and lengthy detours along the way. The greatest would be the development of a casino to help stimulate the local economy and bring back tourists. Brody incriminating Jepps inadvertently lands him smack dab in the middle of the shady casino deal, which is being funded with mafia money. A notorious mob boss from Queens, Moscotti, puts a target on Brody’s head (and his family) so long as the chief refuses to drop the charges against Jepps. In the meantime, the navy gets mixed up in the Amity horror after one of their helicopters crashes in the bay and its pilots go missing. A lesser subplot is the baby seal, named Sammy by Brody’s other son Sean, who the Brodys take in after he was wounded by Jepps. Eventually, and as expected, all roads lead back to the shark.
In either telling of Jaws 2, the shark is a near unstoppable killing machine, although less of a mindless one in the novelization. The film suggests this shark is looking for payback — Searls’ adaptation of Jaws: The Revenge clarifies this with a supernatural explanation — yet in the book, the shark is acting on her maternal instinct. Pregnant with multiple pups, the voracious mother-to-be was, in fact, impregnated by the previous maneater of Amity. Her desire to now find her offspring a safe home includes a body count. And perhaps as a reflection of the times, the author turns the shark and other animals’ scenes into miniature wildlife studies; readers are treated to small bits of infotainment as the story switches to the perspective of not only the killer shark, but also the seals and a navy-trained dolphin. The novelization doesn’t hold back on the scientific details, however weird as it may sound at times. One line sure to grab everyone’s attention: “There, passive and supine, she had received both of his yard-long, salami-shaped claspers into her twin vents.”
Image: Roy Scheider’s character, Martin Brody, measures the bitemark on the orca in Jaws 2.
Up until the third act, the novelization is hard to put down. That’s saying a lot, considering the overall shark action borders on underwhelming. There is, after all, more to the story here than a fish’s killing spree. Ultimately though, Szwarc’s Jaws 2 has the more satisfying finale. Steven Spielberg’s film benefitted from delaying the shark’s appearance, whereas the sequel’s director saw no need for mystery. The original film’s reveal was lightning in a bottle. So toward the end, Jaws 2 transforms into a cinematic theme park ride where imagination isn’t required. The slasher-at-sea scenario is at full throttle as the villain — wearing her facial burn like a killer would wear their mask — picks off teen chum and even a pesky helicopter. And that’s before a wiry, go-for-broke Brody fries up some great white in the sequel’s cathartic conclusion. That sort of over-the-top finisher is better seen than read.
It would be a shame to let this other version of Jaws 2 float out to sea and never be heard from again. On top of capturing the quotidian parts of Amity life and learning what makes Brody tick, Hank Searls drew up persuasive plot threads that make this novelization unlike anything in the film franchise. If the Jaws brand is ever resurrected for the screen, small or big, it wouldn’t hurt to revisit this shark tale for inspiration.
Image: The cover of Hank Searls’ novelization for Jaws 2.
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