Streaming Kino: The Little Shop of Horrors (1960) - Roger Corman, Jonathan Haze

Issue seven of "Streaming Kino": Corman's classic comedy featuring a man-eating plant.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Little_Shop_of_Horrors#/media/File:LittleShop.jpg

Roger Corman was very good at making quick money with a nice movie - in case of "The Little Shop of Horrors", he reused some sets of his previous production, A Bucket of Blood, and filmed it in only a couple of days. The result is hard proof that time and budget doesn't necessarily equal quality - creativity, charm, and willingness, on the other hand, does.

Written by Charles B. Griffith, "The Little Shop of Horrors" is a very witty and funny film indeed. Upon release, it didn't have too much of an impact, but over the years grew a cult following - and spawned a stage production, another movie, and even a little animated TV series.

This man-eating plant certainly has left its mark on pop culture. "The Little Shop of Horrors" features Jack Nicholson in an early role. 

video source:

https://archive.org/details/TheLittleShopOfHorrors1960

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Review: Insidious (2010)

When a young family moves into a new house, weird things start to happen. While the husband has a hard time believing his own eyes, his wife soon attributes the irritations to the change in accommodation. But as it turns out, it's all about the boy...

"Insidious" is a nice watch. A default-touching story of this young family, scary going-ons in a house, some dudes show up for comic relief, we get the wise old lady, etc. pp. We've seen it all before, many times, and director James Wan throws in a little bit of nu-style fancy editing here and there, it's like one big mash up of horror movie styles from the 1970s to the present day. In fact we get nice elements throughout, there are no obvious flaws, even a couple of easter-eggs for horror geeks. No new ground has been broken so far, but it adds up to a nicely paced, thrilling experience.

The profoundness of this movie is very debatable - for some, it may seem like a good idea to resort to stuff like astral traveling as a vehicle for the psychology of the story, others may find it just stupid. In that sense, "Insidious" is a bit on the "Poltergeist" side of things, that links a TV to a Native American burial ground...? In other words, it feels a bit shallow here and there.

But that's ok. All is forgiven when [SPOILER] pops up. It sits so well among all the other depictions of infernal servants, and it's so well integrated into the movie, that it becomes the driving force - and it just works. Now everything makes sense. Yeah, we are scared!

All in all, the movie lacks the depth of Friedkin's "The Exorcist", or Russell's "Altered States", which both go to great lengths explaining the cultural roots of the scares to come. But it's still a wild roller coaster ride, and a great variation of the creepy visual themes found in the folklore of many countries. "Insidious" is mostly solid, sometimes excellent - well done!

Verdict: Nice. Fiery! 7.5/10

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1591095/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Insidious_(film)

Trailer video:

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=62rpZcMYa0A

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