I watched Halloween III, my assigned film, tonight. I love this movie, although 40 years on 1982 technology seems so antique. Tom Atkin's character has to make phone calls on landlines and pay phones--the plot would have been shortened significantly if he had an iPhone. Also, killing children by sending a signal over broadcast TV to activate a chip from Stonehenge inside Halloween masks? Nobody watches legacy TV anymore. Conal Cochran would have to play King Herod via a cursed mask challenge on TikTok.

I watched The Exorcist, my assigned film, tonight, for the who-knows-how-many-times. I can always enjoy so much about it, but this time I was struck by the detail in which it portrays everyday things: the noise of the trains, the challenge of exterminating vermin in a house, the joy of talking about going to the movies. It's very possible I will revisit this film and its sequels next month, but I appreciate the prompt to do so today.

I think this has been discussed previous years, but I can’t remember the answer. Are there any other Hitchcock’s that could be considered horror besides Psycho and the Birds? I was thinking Frenzy, Rope or Dial M For Murder. IMDB only lists the first two.
I’m on a kick right now and just wondering if I should save some for the challenge.

This was what we decided on for the 2020 checklist entry. I think there one more that was debatable.
EDIT: It was Dial M for Murder.

Thanks! Now I remember that silhouette.

That long tracking shot in Frenzy still gives me the creeps.

I watched my movie, Species II today, for the first and the last time. I wouldn't want to knock a movie if someone else likes it but I feel sorry for Travis and anyone else that has to watch it. Maybe we can do this again next year and I'll get lucky and get a better movie to watch, but I still enjoyed participating in the September portion of the challenge. I hope that everyone else that still has their movie to watch will enjoy themselves!

i have that species box set . i was gonna watch it for the October Challenge

You see, that is why they make movies. It may be that everybody loves Species II but me. It wouldn't surprise me.

Species II was one of the "bullets" in the roulette aspect of the watch. Although I'm with you that I'll likely never watch it again, I did have a little bit of fun going along for the ride of its stupidity

I own a copy of it (IIRC it's in a set of all of them)... but couldn't tell you anything about it as it's been too long since I watched it... possibly because I've blocked the memory...

I watched my assigned Sept film, 28 Days Later.

I had forgotten a lot of this. Great pandemic set-up with Cililan Murphy waking up in the hospital to find London deserted. He connects with a woman and a father and daughter and they drive towards what they think will be a soldiered haven. I liked that the zombie attacks weren't constant. There was some leisure and relationship-building. Once at the compound, it turns out some nasty survivor mindset is in place and it's not safe after all. I remember the zombie effects were super impressive when this first came out and it holds up pretty well.

All theme/subset dates have been assigned as of a few minutes ago. Belated thanks to both tarfrimmer and Undeadcow for the help.
Let me know if there's anything that needs rearranging, but please do so as soon as possible because I need all dates assigned to continue forward with the theme/subset table and subset threads, and both are coming along nicely.

https://forum.dvdtalk.com/dvd-talk/6...l#post14132559

I feel guilty about it, but as with several years past, I don't have as much time as I used to, and will probably ignore subsets, checklists, etc. due to not wanting to spend time hunting down 30+ movies and not having the money to do so as well. I do appreciate the organizers for the challenge, but kind of just wanting to lay back and watch what I want this October. My girlfriend and I broke up earlier this year and this will be my first challenge in 3 years where I'm "free" to watch as a I like. Looking forward to this year's challenge immensely.

Looks good to me! Very helpful in organizing my spreadsheet. I'm getting there! I am ordering a few DVDs/BR. Found a DVD of Le Main Due Diable (1943) on ebay. Supposedly it has English subtitles and is region 0, so hopefully it will work. Ordering a few other for interesting category fillers.

Halloween is in the air!

I'm finalizing my list. I've got most of the checklist covered except the directors category still seems pretty light in terms of more watchable offerings. The deceased list is slim this year in the director category (a good thing). Will more directors be added? There are still 4 ??? slots.

Some suggestions:
Jordan Peele (used before, I know)
Fulci (or another giallo director)
Tod Browning
Reginald Le Borg https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0494110/...ov_dr#director
Phil Karlson (https://www.imdb.com/filmosearch/?ex...&genres=Horror)

Watched my September movie today. It wasn't that scary (actually, it wasn't scary at all) or else I've become jaded since doing the challenge! But it wasn't a bad movie. Tawny Kitaen was not bad in it as a possessed evil entity from an Ouija board. A few dead bodies from the evil entity, but a pretty much a tame horror movie. It's not a bad movie for the Ouija category on the check list. Also a good movie to use when you need a "soft" horror movie to break up all the slasher/giallo movies being watched next month. I rather enjoyed it and will probably watch it again in a few years.

Yes! I had to take a brief hiatus but currently working on it now. I'm trying to get a good mix of the newer and the older, and hopefully a few we haven't covered in years. And unless there's any request for more additions I should have it completed fairly soon.

Also, I was gonna ask for some more director, composer, and makeup effects artists that we haven't yet covered.

Hey Chad, just letting you know that the slashers 2 link is for a Japanese porn site.

Thanks for the head's up. Links 2 and 3 have been updated with a Letterboxd list with just under 900 entries and a much smaller Mubi list. That's surprisingly not the first time a Japanese porn site has taken over one of our links, and it probably won't be the last.

Also added a 1980s only list for link 4:
https://letterboxd.com/jhillman/list...lm-an-attempt/

And a 1990s only list for link 5:
https://www.listchallenges.com/the-c...f-90s-slashers

Watched The Fog, my assigned film, this evening. It's one of my favorite of John Carpenter's movies even though it's a bit messy. (NIa DaCosta pointed out some of the movie's oddities when she guested on an episode of the Blank Check podcast.) Adrienne Barbeau is fantastic as Stevie; it's probably my favorite of her performances... or second - I love her in Carnivale.

I watched The Thing tonight. It was just the plain old Blu-ray disc but it still looks great. I haven't watched it in quite a while (probably right around when the 2011 version was being released) but I still love it.

Thanks for such a great pick IBJoel !!

Loved Carnivale. Still pissed at HBO for cancelling it after two seasons and leaving so much unresolved. With so many TV shows getting rebooted and Nick Stahl back to acting after his drug/alcohol issues I'm still holding out hope for a third season.

Ugh she was such a killjoy on that episode. I liked her other episode too, so it was a huge disappointment

I watched my random pick last night, Witchboard 2: The Devil's Doorway (1993) which IBJoel let me switch to from the first Witchboard.

Gotta say, I liked this better than the first Witchboard (1986) which had the same writer and director, Kevin Tenney, (not to be confused with Witchtrap [1989] which also had the same writer/director but is better than both of the Witchboards).

Anyway...I went into it dreading it, but it was much better than I had anticipated. Ami Dolenz is the cutest thing in the world and has a lot of spunk and charm. Laraine Newman shows up out of nowhere as a sincere, out of touch hippie who is stuck in 1969 and does a good job with a nothing part. While the rest of the unknowns actually make this dumb, slightly dull, non-scary story work. There is an appearance by the skanky blonde from Road House who shows up as an angry brunette but no boobies as you might expect. Actually, there is pretty much no gore and zero nudity in this film which is surprising for a movie of this caliber. But at the same time, the practical effects are very well done with some terrific car stunts and good camera work. I was thinking while watching it that this type of low budget movie would get made now but it would use wall to wall cheap CG and wouldn't look half as good.

Look for a Phantasm rip-off shot of a flying saw blade that was funny but also decently done.

I likely saw this on VHS near 30 years ago but had no memory of it. Enjoyable time waster and a perfect one to get you in the mood for next month.

My rating: *** out of *****

ps. This is likely a generous rating due to going in with poor expectations and itching for some horror which I have been holding out on for months now waiting on October and the Challenge. If you choose to check it out, go in with low expectations and know that other than one jump scare, there is little horrific in it. Almost more a supernatural thriller than horror.

Thanks to IBJoel for putting this on. Makes me even more anxious for October to start. I may have to check out Witchboard III: The Possession (1995) now...even though it appears that it is even worse than the first two from what I have read. (same writer for the screenplay but different director)