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Graphic Horror: Dollman
Graphic Horror: Dollman 1991
I’ve had this movie on my list for a long time as well as its sequel slash crossover Dollman vs Demonic Toys because I’ve seen it on various comic book movie lists throughout the years. But after watching the film, I did a little bit of light research and found out that while there was a Golden Age comic book character named Doll Man, this movie wasn’t based on that character. And there was a comic book miniseries based on this character, but it was a tie-in that came out after or alongside this movie. But there was so much bizarreness that I just had to write something about it. Besides, this was the winner of my Patreon poll and if you’d like to donate just $1 a month, you can help decide what I review on this site as well.
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Graphic Horror: Cemetery Man
Cemetery Man 1994
I had heard about this movie a while back when I watched the Brandon Routh Dylan Dog movie, found out that they were basically based on the same character, and then promptly forgot all about it until looking it up again. There’s actually a weird and interesting connection between the comics and this movie. There was initially a novel called Dellamorte Dellamore which is also the Italian title of this movie. The author then went on to create the Dylan Dog comics which follow a similar style as the original novel and the main character of the novel shows up as basically the Italian analogue to Dylan Dog. When the comic was originally drawn, the artist drew inspiration from Rupert Everett and drew the main character to look like him. This movie then starred Rupert Everett as the main character who wore an outfit that resembled Dylan Dog.
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Graphic Horror: Hardware
Hardware 1990
This is another somewhat interesting story when it comes to comic book movies. When this film was released in 1990, the comic book publishers of 2000 AD which was the home of Judge Dredd noticed the striking similarities to a short story they published years earlier called Shok. It was a very short 7 page story but the similarities are striking. Both the movie and the comic feature a guy bringing home a robotic head that reassembles itself to terrorize a woman who is holed up in a highly secured apartment. There’s even a moment in both stories where the woman uses a freezer to disguise herself against the robot’s heat vision. As for the film itself, it’s very much schlock, ultra-violent horror which oddly enough reminds me of another comic book movie Virus that would come out 9 years later. Those two stories both have killer robots that reassemble themselves, have a slow start, are trapped in a relatively small space, and ultimately have a low body count. And while there are some major issues with this film, it’s actually much better than the latter movie.
Graphic Horror: Bad Kids of Crestview Academy
Bad Kids of Crestview Academy 2017
This was one of the last movies that I tried to watch before I went on my hiatus and I even tried a couple times. And while it’s not a great movie, it wasn’t exactly the quality of the film that kept me from finishing it, it was just other things going on at the time. I’ve seen the previous movie and while it had a few good moments, I wasn’t a fan of that one either so I didn’t have very high hopes. This is a horror/comedy/mystery/etc that really feels like a retread of the first movie with only a few slight differences here and there. It’s another group of kids in a weekend detention that get massacred over the course of the movie with a little extra mystery going on in the background. Some of the comedy hit me a bit better this time around, but I just felt like this was another mediocre go around that didn’t learn anything from the first movie and as it hints at a third movie, I just hope that it goes in a different direction if it gets made.
Graphic Horror: Abattoir
Abattoir 2016
There’s still plenty of times when I have to make the distinction on what exactly I consider to be a “comic book movie”. This is a horror movie that’s not specifically based on a comic book. From what I little information I can gather, the concept for the film likely came first, but before production was able to begin, the director took the concept and turned it into a comic book that took place before the events of the movie. A few years later, the film was able to be completed, but in most places, the comic book is referred to as a prequel to the film instead of vice versa. But considering that the comic book was published first I’m going to give this the benefit of the doubt and include it in my list. As for the actual movie itself, it’s a decent mystery that builds into a haunted house style movie with a bit of a twist at the end. The mystery has a good build up and the visual style is excellent, but the characters left me a little bit wanting.
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Graphic Horror: Alena
Alena 2016
I find it interesting the films that I tend to come across from time to time. I enjoy watching films from other countries as they tend to be quite different from most of the mainstream superhero movies and it gives myself and this site a chance to branch out. What I find most interesting is that this would be the second Swedish film that I’ve covered here, and while both films are in different genres, both this and We Are the Best feature a cast filled with young women who have unusual haircuts and are on the fringe of their school’s society. But Alena isn’t forming a punk band with her two friends, instead she’s trying to make any friends at all in a new boarding school while also dealing with some ghosts of her past. This film also deals with bullying in a way that I haven’t really seen in quite this way before, but it deals with other elements in a way that I have many times over. And as this film deals with things that aren’t exactly how they may appear at first, I will be discussing those elements in my review so here’s your spoiler warning.
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Filmwhys #84 Nausicaa and 30 Days of Night
Episode 84 of the Why Haven’t You Seen This Film Podcast where my guest is Non Wels from the Joy Sandwich Podcast who asks me why I hadn’t seen Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind, the first feature length film from the mind of Hiyao Miyazaki that basically became the start of Studio Ghibli. And in return, I ask him why he hadn’t seen 30 Days of Night, the vampire movie set in the Northernmost town in Alaska where vampires savage the town for an entire month.
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Graphic Horror: Bad Kids Go To Hell
Bad Kids Go To Hell 2012
In yet another instance where I happen across a movie that I wasn’t aware of, this was brought to my attention due to a pseudo-sequel which came out earlier this year called Bad Kids of Crestview Academy which I will be watching at some point in the near future. But this was an odd concept of a horror comedy version of the Breakfast Club. It even has Judd Nelson in a small role as the principal or headmaster, whatever his title is. The movie was co-written by the original comic book author Matt Spradlin. Even though they added in an extra member to this horror Breakfast Club, it didn’t help to add much interest, and while it did get a few big laughs out of me, overall it wasn’t that interesting of a film. Either as a horror, mystery, or comedy.
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Graphic Horror: Priest
Priest 2011
Happy Halloween everyone! Just when I thought I had finished my list of horror movies based on comics, I look through my stack of DVDs that I bought for this site and haven’t gotten around to yet and see this bluray that I bought on clearance for $2 a while back. About the only things I knew about it beforehand was that it was some type of vampire movie, and it was pretty terrible. I can very easily see why people don’t like this film. It’s very muddled and copies a lot of inspirations from other, much better films. It also seems to try and push its own religion even though it simultaneously condemns some of its practices. It’s an odd mix of a post-apocalyptic western with Zack Snyder-esque martial arts sequences, and while it is very far from being a good movie, I certainly wasn’t hate-watching it either.
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Top 10 Graphic Horror Films
Top 10 Graphic Horror Films
Once completing my mini-goals watching movies for this site, I often like to end with a nice list featuring some of the best in that category. Now that we’re at the end of October, almost to Halloween I’ve completed watching every horror movie that I can find based on a comic book. If you haven’t been following along, graphic horror is my term for these movies based on horror comics. Graphic violence, graphic novel, it works for me. And for this list, I’m excluding thrillers and sticking with movies that have a notable horror aspect to them. They can be action horror, horror comedy, or straight up horror just so long as there’s plenty of horror in it. Enough chit chat, let’s get on with the list!
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Flights, Tights, and Movie Nights 