Halloween 2025: September 3rd

 

Death of a Unicorn (2025)

Long ago, longer now than it seems, "Cabin in the Woods" featured a murderous unicorn. It was a great gag but did make one wonder: Can the unicorn be a movie monster? The modern conception – a majestic white horse with a single golden horn – is most associated with little girls, the queer community, and anything colorful, graceful, and pure-of-heart. This represents a flattening of the weirder creature found in classical mythology. One-horned ungulates first appeared on pottery from the Indus Valley around 2000 BC. In 70 AD, Pliny the Elder included the "monoceros" among the wildlife of India. This was an animal with the body of a horse, the head of a stag, the feet of an elephant, a boar's tail, and a long black horn emerging from its forehead. Descriptions of unicorns as fearsome, uncatchable beasts that healed the sick and purified water with its horn were common by medieval times. Something closer to the modern version emerges then, usually depicted as a white horse or goat with cloven hooves, a long tail, a beard, and a narwhal tusk growing from its skull. Stories and tapestries depicted the unicorn as an untamable, violent beast whose wild heart could only be soothed by a virginal maiden. This narrative – the fearsome unicorn pursued by man in his greed, captured by the fair lady, killed and then miraculously revived – proliferated as a parable for Christ's crucifixion, resurrection, and bond with the Holy Virgin. The latter most story inspired filmmaker Alex Scharfman to write "Death of a Unicorn." It was A24's quirkier horror project earlier this year and, despite some soft reviews, I wanted to catch up with it.

Widower lawyer Elliot Kinter and his teenage daughter, Ridley, drive through a mountainous nature preserve on the way to the estate of Odell Leopold. The CEO of a powerful pharmaceutical company, Odell has secluded himself in his villa – with his wife Belinda and idiot son Shep – as he dies of cancer. Elliot has been summoned to sort out Odell's affairs. On the drive-up, he strikes an animal with his car. It looks a lot like a white horse with a single golden horn. Both Elliot and Ridley get splattered with the creature's blue blood. Only after the animal has to be killed by Leopold's head of security do Elliot and Ridley noticed that their ailments – her acme, his nearsightedness – have been healed. Realizing what they have, Odell injects the blood and regains his health. The Leopolds immediately go about trying to turn this miracle cure into their next million dollar drug. Ridley, who grasped the animal's horn and received a vision, believes it is a mythological unicorn... And that the medieval legends of the creature are far more dangerous than those around her realize. It's not long before the parents of the young unicorn, vicious and determined, come to retrieve the corpse of their off-spring. 

“Death of a Unicorn” is faithful to the medieval morality tales it invokes. It is an updating of what you might call a fairy tale, in the Grimm Brothers' sense. This is a story where the wicked are punished and the virtuous prevail. Setting such a story among pharmaceutical company CEOs led to some complaints that the film is ham-fisted. Maybe but those that seek to profit off the sick and dying, bleeding them dry with criminally high prices, while patting themselves on the back for “helping the world” deserve all the comical scorn they can get. Leopold is a cartoonishly evil capitalist. His son is a moronic spoiled brat, with no actual talents aside from a prodigious hunger for drugs. His wife whitewashes her reputation at the right hand of evil through a charitable foundation. They abuse and ignore Griff, a faithful family servant. The doctors and scientists have moral concerns but always kowtow to their corporate overlords.They all get what's coming to them before “Death of a Unicorn” is over. You can definitely argue that some of Scharfman's gags are a little too broad. Shep's fondness for mind-altering substances results in bigger and crazier jokes that might be a little too goofy. However, for the most part, I enjoyed the cultural satire at work here. If the last decade has taught us nothing else, it's that the avarice and conceited stupidity of the billionaire ruling class is beyond parody. 

Scharfman is not subtle about his influence. He includes repeated shout-outs to “Aliens,” in the teenage daughter's name and multiple sequence of hunters being tracked by their prey. Spielberg was obviously on his mind as well, “Death of a Unicorn” recalling “Jurassic Park” more the longer it goes on. In fact, the movie strikes me as rather Amblin-esque. The opening shot of the film is of Ridley falling asleep on her dad's shoulders, which he moves away from in pursuit of a contract on the floor. Throughout the film, Elliot references how much money he can earn from this deal, in order to provide a future for his daughter. Like Peter Pan in “Hook,” and the workaholic parents in a dozen other family flicks, Elliot is fixated on money and his job. He uses this as a placeholder for the obvious emotional chasm between him and his daughter, as a way to avoid grappling with the grief of his wife's death. Naturally, through the events of the film, Elliot will reconnect with his daughter. I think the script takes it too easy on the dad, who is often far more emotionally clueless than any parent should be and far too complacent in other blatantly evil acts. However, if you can buy into the gulf between father and daughter here, the emotional arc of “Death of a Unicorn” is surprisingly heartfelt and sincere. 

As someone obviously way too invested in folklore, I found myself hoping “Death of a Unicorn” would lean into the weirder medieval conceptions of its titular beast. I'm happy to report that the unicorns here have the whipping tails and billy goat beards, with the welcomed addition of serrated fangs. The script does not stray far from the mythological roots. The cycle of death and  resurrection, and the creatures' irresistible connection to a virgin maiden, are well represented. Perhaps the film can be criticized for merely doing the stuff it's already told us its going to do. Sure. At the same time, a lot of fun is had contrasting the modern idea of unicorns as magical friends to all children and their wilder roots. There's quite a lot of impalings with those single horns, the script repeatedly finding clever new ways to have the creatures gorily execute the film's villains. That includes some disemboweling and head-crushing too. If you can't have fun with that stuff, I guess you and I simply have different ideas of what's entertaining.

It also helps that “Death of a Unicorn” has a stacked cast. This is one of those films that fills its ranks with beloved character actors and stars and allows them to play totally to type. Richard E, Grant is hilariously despicable as Leopold, digging into much of his dialogue with the kind of vigor he excels at. Will Poulter plays Shep as a bumbling golden child and manages to wring repeated laughs out of the selfish behavior and dopey dialogue he's given. Anthony Carrigan is often hilarious as Griff, the most put-upon of put-upon butlers in recent memory. Jenna Ortega plays another alienated teenager struggling to connect emotionally with their parent. It's a role she's quickly getting typecast in but she does go through the beats nicely. Paul Rudd enters the film looking like the Angry Video Game Nerd.and probably gives the silliest performance, with a few too many obvious quirks for the character to register as a real person. Still, Rudd has an affable screen presence that eventually wins you over. 

Larry Fong, Zack Snyder's go-to cinematographer, creates some lovely visuals. The sweeping mountain setting and meticulously designed sets are beautifully photographed. The film gets a surprising amount of mileage out of unicorns running through the mist, blinding lights, and infrared shots. This is tied with some psychedelic colors and dreamscapes. Some of the CGI isn't flawless but I do enjoy the practical monster unicorn effects we get throughout. “Death of a Unicorn's” satire is definitely, probably too on-the-nose and it can't make every emotional beat of its story hit exactly right. However, it's also an enjoyable horror/comedy that makes a creditable threat out of long-since neutered mythological concept. Considering Piney's “monoceros” was certainly describing a rhinoceros, this is a idea I'm surprised nobody had really done before. Maybe I'm simply too much of a folklore nerd and a sloppy monster kid at heart to resist whatever charms this one had. I'm fine with that. [7/10]

The Phantom Creeps (1939)

Between 1914 and 1964, Universal Pictures would make 146 serials. Basically the Netflix shows of their era, designed to get people to come back to the theater every week, these cinematic series have been forgotten by all but the most devoted of classic movie nerds. However, at least one of these serials has had an odder legacy. Unsurprisingly, there was some crossover between Universal's serials and their horror movies. 1939's “The Phantom Creeps” would star Bela Lugosi, giving this one a little bit of a cult following. It also fell into the public domain, surely being broadcast on many creature feature shows in the sixties and seventies. That's probably how the young Mr. Robert Zombie first saw it and why he gave the serial's distinctive robot menace a key role in his “Dragula” music video. The machine went on to become something of a mascot of Zombie's, extending “The Phantom Creeps'” legacy – or at least the legacy of that ugly-ass robot – a lot further than it otherwise would've gone. Some have even gone so far as to consider “Dr. Zorka's Iron Man” a Universal Monster. That means I had to watch it! 

“The Phantom Creeps” exists in two forms: The original serial, totaling four hours and twenty-five minutes, and a 78 minute feature cut, assembled for TV broadcast in 1949. I watched both, naturally. Either version follows the same story: Mad scientist Dr. Zorka has discovered a new element from a meteor. He's fashioned an array of fantastical weapons from it: A belt that grants invisibility, that eight foot tall robot, a gas that induces a death-like state, little robot spiders attracted to radioactive disks, and a laser gun called a Z-Ray. After he inadvertently kills his wife and fakes his own death, Zorka promises to unleash his vengeance on the world. (With the help of Monk, his incompetent and cowardly henchman.) Government man Captain West, hot-shot reporter Jean Drew, and former colleague Dr. Mallory try to stop Zorka's plan. Meanwhile, spies for an enemy nation seek the element for their own purposes.

My exposure to old time movie serials has, admittedly, been limited. However, I've certainly read plenty about the cliches of the format. “The Phantom Creeps” does nothing to dispel these pre-conceived notions. The serial sacrifices pacing, ambiance, and often coherence in favor of constant action. Nearly every episode features a car chase or a shoot-out. There are multiple plane crashes across the twelve parts and a speed boat crash too. The plot essentially sees Zorka's mysterious element trading hands between himself, the heroes, and the spies. “The Phantom Creeps” repeats this pattern over and over again across its twelve installments. Sometimes, the element is swapped between the different parties multiple times within the same episode. Such as in the improbable plot turn of Zorka renting an apartment right above the secret hide-out of the spy ring. Shit like that reminds you that these serials were basically made for kids, an audience that could accept unlikely developments like Zorka discovering a hitchhiker that looks just like him or pulling a number of amazing inventions out of this one magic rock.

Of all the contrivances of the classic serials, none is more notorious than the cliffhangers. Each chapter must end with the heroes having fallen into a seemingly inescapable sort of peril. “The Phantom Creeps” deserves points for creativity. The good guys are left in planes and cars and even a boat that crash and burns. Zorka also derails a train they're riding on, pulls electric wires down onto their heads, throttles Captain Bob with his killer robot, and tricks them into crossing a bridge about to be dynamited. No matter how fatal each of these events may appear, the heroes emerge unharmed at the start of the next chapter. Getting out of the cockadoodie car is one thing. The characters emerging unharmed from the fiery wreckage of a train wreck or simply driving through the explosive hazards is harder to swallow. This pattern is designed to keep viewers coming back next week. To modern eyes, it makes “The Phantom Creeps” seem utterly devoid of tension. No matter how elaborate the danger, no one will actually be hurt.

When you combine that with the repetitive plot, “The Phantom Creeps” quickly becomes a tedious experience. When contrivances like the G-men driving by the spies on the same road occur, leading to yet another car chase, you feel exhausted. Moreover, constantly going right up to something truly crucial happening only to pull back makes the series feel like a perpetual tease. Whenever you feel like that murderous robot is finally going to do something, the story goes back into a holding pattern. Any time the plot threatens to get truly exciting, the story returns back to the mundane settings of Zorka's lair or Dr. Mallory's suburban home. Most of the characters are men in suits and fedoras, often making it difficult to keep track of which group has the MacGuffin at any given time. I often forgot whether I was watching Captain Bob or his sidekick or the gang of foreign agents. The characters that are memorable are rendered less likable by their repeatedly foolish actions. Monk attempts to betray or dessert Zorka multiple times but the mad scientist never disposes or fires his cowardly henchman. Or the spies seem happy to let the Lois Lane-ian heroine go at one point. It's hard to be too invested in what happens when the characters are this dumb and indistinct.

At the same time, I am tempted to forgive “The Phantom Creeps” for its dumber, more tedious trespasses. It should go without saying that Bela hams it up to glorious heights as Dr. Zorka. Honestly, his expression when being exposed to his own gas, threatening Monk with bodily harm, or being shocked when he accidentally derails a whole train brought me more entertainment than anything else across these four hours. I was also repeatedly amused by Monk's ability to absorb multiple gunshot wounds without any consequences. Fast-talking, adventurous lady reporters almost always win me over and Dorothy Arnold plays that role nicely here. Once “The Phantom Creeps” finally stops fucking around in its final part, its constant action is finally given some weight. The perpetually scowling Iron Man takes on a small army and goes up in spectacular fashion. Bela unleashes his wrath via bombs dropped from a bi-plane, resulting in a lot of stock footage from the crash of the Hiddenburg and World War II combat. That chaotic final act is deliriously violent enough almost to make up for the extremely stupid way our villain is undone.

Ultimately, “The Phantom Creeps” has limited charms. Bela is giving it his all. Watching him lurk around a cobweb strewn lab, make himself invisible, or brood over bubbling chemicals isn't without its value. Edward Von Sloan plays the leader of the spy ring. There's some novelty in seeing him as a bad guy, despite the disappointing lack of interaction he has with Lugosi. Honestly, Rob Zombie definitely stole the most memorable element from this serial. That towering robot, with its perpetually scowling face and stiffly moving arms, is amusingly goofy. The serial repeatedly trying to turn such an awkward, comical creature into a creditable threat results in some chuckles. The full length serial quickly becomes a slog to get through. The abbreviated version operates more like a best-of reel than a coherent narrative, though it is slightly more digestible. Will I continue to hold onto the Blu-Ray simply to say my Universal Monsters collection is as comprehensive as possible? Obviously the answer is yes. [5/10]

 

 

Alfred Hitchcock Presents: The Glass Eye
 

Far back within the reaches of human history, a person realized they could make it seem like their voice was coming from a source other than their own throats. This skill was originally used during religious ceremonies. At some point, somebody fashioned a piece of wood into a crude representation of the human form and, using the same talent, made it appear like this facsimile was alive and talking with its own voice. Presumably five minutes after that, somebody else realized this was all kind of weird. And so the proud narrative tradition of creepy ventriloquist dummies emerged. In 1944, John Keir Cross published the short story "The Glass Eye" and its fine and unsettling twist ending surely caught the attention of Alfred Hitchcock and his team. He would host an adaptation of the tale – with Robert Stevens directing – as the premiere episode of the third season of "Alfred Hitchcock Presents."

An unusually subdued William Shatner appears as our narrator, cleaning out the belongings of his late spinster sister, Julia. Upon discovering a glass eye, he relates the tale behind it: On one of the rare occasions where she ventured out into the world, Julia took her bratty nephew to a show. There, the famous ventriloquist Max Collodi and his dummy George performed. Julia immediately became infatuated with Collodi, quitting her job to follow his performances around the country. She wrote to him obsessively, requesting a meeting, and included a photograph of herself when she was younger. After many rejections, Collodi finally agreed to see her, in a darkened room and only for five minutes. This preceded a horrifying discovery. 

Most stories of devious dummies and malevolent marionettes usually go the route of the puppet being imbued with life through supernatural means or representing the fractured psyche of the ventriloquist. "The Glass Eye" goes a slightly different route, its shock ending nevertheless probably being easily guessed by most savvy modern viewers the minute they get a look at "George." (Or notice a specific name in the credits.) Either way, Stevens' direction and John L. Russell's moody cinematography keeps this captivating. The climatic meeting between Julia and the object of her desire plays out in a shadowy room, the sole source of light upon the ventriloquist's table. The reveal plays out like a nightmare come to life, conveying the odd circumstances strictly through tight close-ups and sudden emergencies. If nothing else, the episode does a good job of impressing on the viewer how psychologically devastating Julia finds these uncanny events. 

It leads up to a rather melancholy epilogue, the sadness of which Hitchcock's typically morbid quips in the host segments can't defuse. Creepy as it definitely is, "The Glass Eye" mostly strikes me as a deeply sad story of how self-loathing unavoidably goes hand-in-hand with the need for human contact. Jessica Tandy plays Julia as someone crippled by her fears of being judged by others. She considers herself an old, used-up woman that is unlovable to the world, despite Tandy being all of 47 at the time and hardly a crone. Still, she hopes for a partner to touch. She falls in love with Collodi from afar, seeing the handsome ventriloquist as an ideal figure she can reach out to. Despite her devotion, she still fears rejection by him and sends a younger photo. The bitterly ironic ending is that her celebrity crush isn't even real, that the true puppeteer is somebody else who clearly fears rejection and hides from the world as well, and that her need to hold and treasure undoes her own fantasies. You could apply a lot of these themes to our modern world of NEETs, "stan culture," and parasocial relationships. That proves that good writing is immortal and "The Glass Eye" remains potent to this day. [8/10]

The Addams Family: Morticia's Romance: Part 1

With the start of its second season, I suppose the writers decided it was time to flesh out the Addams Family's backstory a little bit. This necessitated the show's first two-part episode. On the night of Gomez and Morticia's thirteenth anniversary, the kids gather around for their parents to relate the story of how they met. At the age of 22, Gomez was a bachelor with no interest in women and perpetually congested sinuses. Grandmama, sick of her son being alone, conspired with her old schoolmate Hester Frump to arrange a marriage between their children. Ophelia Frump is happy to marry Gomez but he has no attraction to the super-strong, wide-eyed girl... Her twin sister Morticia, on the other hand, immediately captures his attention. The two fall in love quickly and wish to wed but don't know how to break this news to their mothers. Gomez consults Cousin Itt for advice on how to get out of this dilemma, the hairball suggesting a suicide pact. 

"Morticia's Romance" essentially operates as something of an origin story for the kooky, creepy brood. It clarifies that Grandmama is Gomez' mother and Itt is his cousin, while stating again that Fester is Morticia's uncle. It seems Lurch and Thing were already lurking around the house by this point. The episode has great fun re-introducing as many of the family's quirks as possible. It turns out Wednesday is the spitting image of her mother, who was also fond of pigtails, maxi-skirts, and decapitated dolls. The episode shows Gomez meeting Cleopatra – just a sprout at the time – and Kitty Kat, while Morticia stumbles upon Zelda the Vulture. The mention of Gomez' pet octopus or Itt and Fester appearing on-screen are clearly meant to be cheer-worthy moments too. While Morticia seems simply like a shyer version of herself at this age, Gomez is far more neurotic and antisocial. Save for his love of exploding toy trains, he doesn't develop into the passionate, boisterous, French-loving gentleman we know until Morticia lights his flame. Yeah, I can relate to that. Sometimes, it takes meeting your other half to give you the confidence needed to come out of your shell. 

The episode also expands the Addams Family a little bit. In what surely must have been the first big guest star the show went after once it became a success, Margaret Hamilton appears as Gomez' soon-to-be mother-in-law. Of course, the Wicked Witch of the West is Morticia Addams' mom. We also meet Ophelia, the twin sister also played by Carolyn Jones. (Resulting in the required shot of the two standing across from each other in a horizontal shot.) The idea that someone would be too eccentric for Gomez must've presented a challenge. The show resolves this by making Ophelia brightly dressed, enthusiastic about nearly everything, and gifted with a penchant for judo. You'd think his partner regularly beating him up – or shrilly playing a broken violin – would be right up Gomez' alley. I guess Morticia sparked his love of sadomasochism too. If nothing else, Jones clearly delights in a chance to play the opposite of the soft-spoken and reserved Morticia. 

There's some solid gags here too. A conversation between Gomez and Ophelia while she cleans the series of dishes she shattered leads to some amusing visual jokes. The same can be said of Fester's introduction. The extremely bleak joke the episode ends off on is another example of this show being edgier than I'd expected. I guess cracking wise about committing suicide was a lot more common in the sixties than I realized. Another example of this subversive streak is that Gomez gifts Morticia a lacy nightgown as an anniversary present. The two are clearly about to get up to some not-fit-for-prime-time activities when the kids barge in. Despite the separate beds, the fact that Gomez and Morticia Addams fuck can never be ignored. The only element of this episode that seems wrong to me is the reveal that these two have only been together for thirteen years, meeting when both were merely twenty-two. I guess I'm accustomed to the Addams as quasi-immortal beings, untouched by time, as suggested in the nineties film. Am I truly meant to believe that these two are younger in their prime than I am now and not ageless entities that have prospered for eons? Oh, also it's weird that this was the second episode of the second season when it was clearly meant to operate as the premiere. I guess they didn't want to open the sophomore year on a two-parter? [7/10]