Deep Cuts Horror Hit List #24 “30 Days of Night”

Welcome everyone. It is Wednesday, October eighth, and this is the latest installment of Deep Cuts Amy and TJ's Halloween horror hit list. And today on Wednesday, we are up to number twenty four. And I love a recent headline. This is an older movie from two thousand and seven, so almost twenty years ago, but this was a recent headline, just from a couple days ago from the website movie Web to describe our next movie, the most underrated vampire movie of the century, sings its teeth into a new

This is the best, one of the best concepts for a vampire movement ever seen, maybe the best.

Yes, because it's actually fun. This is a vampire movie that feels apocalyptic, that feels almost like a zombie movie except for its vampires. And we're used to seeing vampires be a little bit more romantic, and the genre of vampires has always been I feel like, oftentimes coupled with some sort of romance, some sort of fascination with humans, and bringing humans into the vampire world. This is very different.

Oh, it's Dracula was sexy exactly. Jackiela could buy you a drink and you'd be raided or you know, you have to attack me, sir, bite me, baby, take me. Uh it is what we're all e been used to. And even yes, you go back to I think a lot of people remember interview with a vampire. Those are I mean Tom Prus and a pretty sexy vampires. This ain't that at all. Uh.

Yes, this movie runs a little bit longer than we're used to, but honestly, it goes by so quickly because it's so good. We just rewatched this. I don't even know how many times I've seen this movie, but I am a huge fan. We both are. It's an hour fifty three minutes rateed R and the genre is horror, mystery thriller. We have a synopsis for you as well. It reads. In the far Northern Hemisphere, the small town of Barrow, Alaska, experiences a solid month of darkness every year.

Concept there being if you caught this, if any horror movie you represent, vampire horror movie. If you're scared, scared, scared the whole movie, the one time you relax and get relief as.

Win during the daily dail light.

Soon as you see a daytime see you go, we're cool for a minute. There is no daylight for thirty days. This movie the concept that vampires can roam free and there's no hiding from them day or night for thirty days. It's a cool entrapment type of a movie. Kind of it sounds crazy compared to you know, I love Diehard, but this idea that you're in there with your enemy and nobody can go anywhere is what this movie feels like.

Oh it's so And it did really really well at the box office, seventy five point five million. It had a budget of thirty million. It did really well, but the critics did not give it the love that we believe it deserves. However, I have noticed again this was two thousand and seven, so almost twenty years now. Recent reviews have been much more positive because sometimes critics will go back and re review it, and certainly audience members

Okay, and people you might not know his name, you here, you see his face, You're going to go, oh yeah, oh yeah, you'll probably start being able to name some things you've seen him in. You haven't seen him like this, Oh.

It's so good. And then Ben Foster is really good in this as well. But the director David Slade. Anyway, it was a stellar cast. I thought it an. We thought it was an incredible concept and I thought it was well executed. Did you do you have anything negative to say about the movie?

Yes, I probably will, but later. But the thing I didn't piece this again until we start watching these movies like this, and every day we were talking about the cast, and I think a lot of horror movies are not not necessarily known for great acting, or at least historically.

Well, you know, I also think this. It seems as if there's been a recent shift in years where I think a lot of as you mentioned, well esteemed actors might have been afraid bad pun there to do a horror movie because they felt like maybe it would lower their their artistic how they're considered. You know, it's not Shakespeare, right, So it might have felt like a genre that is beneath you know, well regarded actors, but we're seeing that completely changed.

Tell me, obviously this year was a big deal with weapons and centers, right, and so no, it's been No, it's fun to say, I didn't necessarily put it together till every movie we're reviewing, Oh she has an oscar, Oh he has a golden globe. Oh he was in this show. Oh they're great actors.

All right. So all that said, thirty Days of Night only got a Rotten Tomato score of fifty percent, and their audience score wasn't much better at fifty six percent. We wholeheartedly disagree and urge you not because I think sometimes you do see that and you say I'll pass. It's probably not good. This is one you should not pass on. This made our list for a reason.

You would have passed on this, I think, I mean, given your I mean your rules. Usually if there's a low critic score but a high audience score, you like, hell yeah, I'm all in. But usually when you see both of them, you see a low audience score, you're kind of lukewarm.

I would have looked at this with significant skepticism. Absolutely but I so listen to the critic con consensus. While Thirty Days of Night offers a few thrills, it ultimately succumbs to erratic execution. All right, So that again would

Oh yeah, the whole time. What was that language they were speaking, some language that even added to the.

Terrors and the noises they would make, like, oh my gosh, I can't even do it. All right, So here's some of that. There was another bad one about his skin is Count Shocula. I saw that one that was mean and unnecessary.

And not accurate in the least bit. Agreed Count Schocula wouldn't last thirty seconds.

In this movie was one of my favorite cereals as a kid growing up. No, but here are some of the better good ones that critics gave. Here is one of those rare movies that penetrates the membrane separating all those disposable gotcha scarefests from genuinely engrossing supernatural thrillers. And then another one, an entertaining horror and action film that, by presenting vampires as truly monstrous and ruthless creatures, manages to create an incredibly suspenseful experience.

We don't do that enough, and there's some that do it. But I mean, yes, vampires are sexy right up until they kill you, but they're wearing all black. They usually have a nice tailored outfit, right, This is not that vampires are monsters. Start to finish in this movie, and there's not a single one of them you would ever want to be close to.

Oh my god, No, and the teeth, the makeup, it was so good. They did look monstrous from start to finish, wanted to read a couple of audience recent audience reviews that I really liked and thought summed up part of why we put this on our list. I love this movie, says KK. Thirty Days of Night is dark, suspenseful, and some gross moments, but excellent acting. Even knowing what the big bad was to be from the get go didn't

You can't reason, You cannot reason with them under any circumstance.

Yes, and then Logan writes an all time great vampire movie. Ignore the critics who are just mad that nobody bangs a vamp in this one. I started laughing because it is true. I think there's that expectation of the sexiness.

There is nothing at all. They are creatures in the night who are here to kill all of you. That is the movie, and there is not. Some of the fight scenes the dramatic. They're shot in such a way like battlefields, just in a small town. This is an incredible movie. This is a look. We recommend all of them, but this is what I will scream against critics about.

It stays with you and like you said, like the scenery, the imagery, This Alaskan town frozen with snow everywhere, cut off from civilization, so to speak, with the roads and the weather and the darkness. It's so good. So I was trying to come up with a way to write why it made our list, and I found a website that summed it up better than I could say it. So I want to read it because this is exactly

To add to that, they were we saw victims like disappear in a flash, yes, like they were coming out of nowhere and their attack like you couldn't see anything going on, and that added to I think the fear. I think that might have been some of the early kills to where now you're wondering in every scene, this person's gonna who knows how they're gonna go out?

Yeah, they just get like whipped underneath a building or whipped underneath the truck, and you're like, where did they just go? Oh my god, what's happening to them?

So, yeah, this was a there were I'm trying to I don't want to give this scene away, but there are scenes that no no violence takes place that there is no thing about the scene on the road when they're like, what is that chasing us? Oh? Yes, and there would nobody die. Nobody got hurt in that scene, even but you're scared as all get out because there's just it's cold, it's dark, there's a mystery, and this thing is I'm going seventy miles an hour. For some reason,

Yeah, like super whom human strength coming up at you? All right? So who is this for? Obviously anyone who loves a vampire movie, anyone who loves like an end of day's apocalyptic style movie, because that's what it felt like with the town on fire and everything, like the fights that were going on, it felt apocalyptic. Lots of jump scares, and there is a lot of gore, I would say, and I wanted to add this. I think this movie is for anyone who's rooting for love in

I'm with you there, and I will admit the first time or what, but I got tears in my eyes at the end of this movie, and I bet you all will too, because they do such a good job of building their relationship even though they're no longer in one You your heart is in it with him.

And wasn't it Melissa George.

Yah, your heart is in it with them, and he is as heroic as you will ever see. Josh Hartnett in this movie. And I'm telling you the end is holy hell, I'm telling you it broke me down.

Yeah, and she's a badass in this movie too. I love it. They're both strong. It's not like one's weak and one's helping together. They were both. They were they were a team. That's I'm getting choked, Okay.

So I will say that you talk about who the movie is for, it's for anybody who who who likes being on the edge of your seat for an entire movie like this grabs you very early on, and even the moments where there's not violence and you don't see a vampire, you're standing by waiting for one to come, or what's the next word is gonna come out of his mouth? That that's just constant tension, and they build a mystery for so long the town doesn't know what's going like what is happening to us? It is a

All right, coming up, we're gonna tell you who it's not for What's a Parrot with where you can watch it? And to tease for our next movie on the list.

All right, we continue now number what is it on the list? Twenty four? Twenty four? Now on the list thirty Days of Night. Yes, it is a vampire movie like you have never seen before. It starts Josh Hartnett. Can we give this dude some love? He took a break from acting for a little while, but he has come back in a few things that I have loved seeing him in. I know Trapp didn't get a whole lot of great reviews, but he carried that as a as a what an OCD serial killer?

Yes, I mean the first half of the movie was amazing and compelling. They just kind of lost their way, I think with the writing and the second half. But it was nothing. It had nothing to do with his performance. He was amazing.

But he's had several things he's come back, and I will add I mean, I just this was before he took the so it was twenty two years of movie.

This was two thousand and seven.

He took the break after what I can't remember when he took his break, but man, in the last few years, and this just shows The dude's a solid, solid actor and has been for a long time, so it was it was cool to go back and watch something and to remember I guess the younger cat. Now we see him as an.

Older guy movies, but he's likeable.

He is. Man. I like this guy.

I really do too. All Right, So who is this movie not for? Well? I would say if you're alone, you should not watch it. I think it will creep you out. I don't know. You may disagree, TJ. But and if you obviously, if you don't like blow and gods, you know, vampires are eating people. Okay, so this is gory. So if that's not your jam, this isn't your movie. But man, even if you could just look away during those parts and still get the rest of it, I still I think most people who like or love horror

Yeah. And even if you look away, you got to deal with the sound effcts, because you're gonna hear some slashing and some chomping and some ove all kinds of stuff. No, if you don't like if you're immediately turned off by blood and guts and killing, and it's essentially monsters eating people. It's not like shots and stabs. This is like some pretty mantra. They use their teeth and their sharp claws to deal with their victims. So if you don't think you can stomach that, then heads.

Up, or like anyone laughing with blood all over their face, like there is there are some sister pretty haunting images that stay with you.

To your point about I guess we're different on this regard. If this is one like like you said, I if you want to watch it by yourself, because I'm not worried about the vampire jumping through the window like you said. Sometimes on like the don't watch that alone because the next time you hear a creak in your house, you're gonna freak out. This is one where the vampires don't necessarily scare me.

I see. I feel like at night when I'm sleeping or whatever, like when I'm trying to go to bed and I'm alone and I've just watched that movie that's not I'm like, damn it, what did I watch that movie alone? This might be one of them for me.

How many nights are you sleeping alone these days?

Okay, I'm just rememberring, I'm remembering back to those days of traveling alone in a hotel room and then being so regretful of a movie I watched. I just I have memories of that back in the day when I used to sleep alone sometimes. All right, what to pair this with? Atmosphere? Food, drinks? All right, so obviously red wine and if you're watching a vampire movie, it's fun to have a glass of red wine. You disagree, You know.

Red wine and horror don't go together matter.

I know they don't normally, but I'm saying, when you're watching a vampire movie, it's kind of fun. Yeah.

The thing about drinking blood, yeah, you know, most normal people would want to do.

And I don't know why I felt like this, but I just feel like this. Have you ever mixed raisinets with popcorn?

No?

It's so good. No, it's amazing. It's like a salty sweet.

I don't actually I never heard of that.

I think, Oh my gosh, people do it all the time. Raisinets, so the chocolate covered reason with popcorn. I know people who put the box of raisinets and put it in the popcorn and mix them together so you you get a handful of salty sweet.

This is why I don't hang with your friends.

For some reason, I feel like this movie would be really, really really good to do that with. Why because you get salty sweet. There's no you get hitty sweet with the salty ever.

Why would I do? Okay, that's a different episode, stark, Okay.

All right. I also, obviously, this is one where I believe you have to watch at night because it's dark. You know, we've talked about this. We try. We like horror movies twenty four to seven, but this one would be a hard one to watch during the day because it's dark and then you've got the light. So I just this mood, the ambiance, and even just the fact that all the scenes are.

Can't do it. Yes, you cannot watch this with sunlight coming into the room.

And I think this one is a fun one to watch with a group.

Oh yeah, because you react to so many things and there'll be some people going ooh, look at this. Other than a hiding in the face, that's a very fun communal thing. This is one that will cause different people to react in different ways, and to have them all in one room is fun.

Yeah. This is a this is a Halloween party kind of a film. I think is really fun to watch, all right, And the cool thing is you can watch this. Everybody can watch it for free. That was part of why I think there was a resurgence of recommendations and reviews because it's free on two b it was as of October first, so people got excited that they could

I thought there was in our library. This is not.

Oh wait, I do own this one. I do own this one. Actually there. I do have a few horror movies that I put into my Apple Music Library, Apple Movie Library, and this is among them. But I do think that we are Paramount Plus subscribers because so many horror movies come through that and Shutter, so we never want to miss Shutter.

We need to tell people about Shutters.

They don't know what Shutter and Paramount Plus are like epic four horror movies. So yes, you can watch it. Everyone can watch it, and we're excited and hope you do. All right, our next episode I was really excited about this tease. Our our next movie on the hit list. It would be number twenty three, so it's also underrated. It also has some very big names attached to the movie, and among them a name you don't often see in a horror movie, Betty White.

And it's my favorite role. I haven't ever seen her it.

How's that for a tease? All right, and with that, thank you everyone for listening. We hope you're enjoying our horror hit list. I may Bee Roebuck alongside TJ. Holmes. We'll talk to you soon.

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