WARNING: This Article May Contain Spoilers
This week, our horror tour of the world brings us back to Europe. I’ll be honest, finding Austrian horror films was a lot easier than I expected as it seems a lot of the German-speaking films I found were from there instead of directly from Germany.
Goodnight Mommy
This won’t be the only time I’ll be talking about this film as completely by accident I discovered that it was remade last year. I had one suspicion going into this film and that was that the twin boys were going to kill their mother because they no longer believed her to be their mother. However, the mother’s behaviour towards one of the boys, or lack thereof, made me start to think a little differently and much darker. In the end, I was right on both counts! But that doesn’t make the film any less sinister just because I figured it out without the big reveal at the end…
Attack of the Lederhosen Zombies
I don’t know if it will be familiar to anyone else when they watch this film but the opening piece of incidental music really reminds me of John Carpenter’s The Thing. I always say, if you’re going to take on an idea that has been many times before you have to find a new way to go about it and, honestly, creating zombies with snow formula is pretty new. It is clearly a comedy-horror film, especially as they reference straight away that they’re zombies they are dealing with. Josh even calls for help based off zombie films! When has anyone ever done that in a horror film? Be prepared for blood, gore and pretty cool snowboarding tricks towards the end.
Tartarus
I like to describe films like this as period horrors which you don’t find many of these days. I will say this much, the film is pretty slow going. For the majority it just feels like two guys returning home from the war. Wait, I realise I said that like it was a positive which it really isn’t. However, the good thing about this film is that we don’t actually see the villains of this film….or do we? The interesting thing is that it seems to me that Jakob and Veith become the real monsters in this film – Veith for definite as it seems to be his idea to use women as bait for the monsters.
Funny Games
Funnily enough, I referenced the fact that Goodnight Mommy was remade but it turns out Funny Games was also remade in 2007…looks like that’s another article being born out of this. Weirdly, both remakes star Naomi Watts in a leading role. What’s crazy about this film is that it is its simplicity that makes it so dark. The whole time it’s as if normal conversations are being had throughout and even after their son is shot, the scene is silent other the motor racing on television until the father breaks down! Which made me jump!
Blood Glacier
Also known as The Station, even though the German title Blutgletscher literally translates as Blood Glacier, this film also gave me The Thing vibes from the very beginning. Isolation in a cold area and the first to be attacked is the dog…why always the dog? I actually find the film is very much like The Thing, the glacial isolation and the style of characters involved but at least they’re aware to some extent what they are fighting against as in The Thing they aren’t. Normally, I prefer the idea of the unknown horror but the eagle-cross creature that kills Luca and attacks the unknown girl is actually pretty creepy.
Party Hard, Die Young
This film definitely would not have been out of place when it came to my Death at the Party article. A week long party with a murderer on the loose – what more could a group of Austrian graduates ask for? What I love about this, is the fact that we don’t see what happens to Jessy in the beginning so your brain starts to think one of two things. Either she is the killer, or how gruesome was her death that they weren’t willing to show it, seeing as some of the others are as dark as they are. The worrying thing is, you gradually start to mistrust EVERYONE but once Lexi’s body fell (the cause of the blood seen at the beginning) I was certain I had figured it out. This is your typical slasher/revenge story but my god! Does it have a much darker ending than I was expecting.
