Last weekend, the $4.8 million Blumhouse joint Happy Death Day went number one at the US box office with a bullet, crushing the $150 million Blade Runner 2049, and confirming 2017 as the year when horror movies came out of the shadows. The numbers are appropriately monstrous and comparable with the post-Watergate horror vogue that yielded The Exorcist (1973), The Omen (1975) and Halloween (1978).
To date, Get Out has grossed $253.1 million, and Annabelle: Creation $301.4 million. The newest incarnation of Stephen King's It, meanwhile, has proved that scary clowns are this year's superheroes with a $630.5 million haul and counting. (The hotly anticipated Saw reboot, Jigsaw, is expected to scare up similar business later this month.)
It's not just that horror has provided the year's biggest hits: the entire genre is undergoing a renaissance. The brand spanking new Horrorthon programme, which takes place at Dublin's IFI from October 26th to 30th, is littered with both corpses and entirely original compositions. Around these parts we are crazy about The Endless, a new film written, directed by, and starring Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead, the brilliant minds behind the 2014 breakout hit Spring.
Here, the dream team play the escapees of a UFO death cult. When they unwisely return to the isolated compound of their youth, they discover that the commune is even weirder than that description might suggest. Fans of the cerebral, lo-fi sci-fi of Brit Marling and Shane Carruth will enjoy the trip.
Another voyage worth taking can be found in Giordano Giulivi's The Laplace's Demon, the monochrome math-horror you didn't know you were waiting for. With a nod to Guy Maddin, this stylised adventure to an island that could well neighbour Dr Moreau's, plays with the 19th-century determinism of the French scholar Pierre-Simon Laplace. Here comes the science: if a demon knows the precise location and momentum of every atom in the universe, the past and future can be calculated from the laws of classical mechanics. Put simply: people in horror movies do such predictable (and dumb) things. Ever wondered what a slasher film would look like in the medium of chess? Here's your chance to find out.
Instagram horror
Another monstrous mash-up is
Tragedy Girls
, arguably the world’s first Instagram horror.
X-Men
’s
Alexandra Shipp
and
Deadpool
’s
Brianna Hildebrand
play the titular teens. Having kidnapped a serial killer (while hoping for tips), the pair slash through classmates and rivals in this comedy of friendship and clickbait.
There's more genre fun in Top Knot Detective, a feature-length spoof chronicling the rise and fall of a fictional egomaniac. As the director and star of a Monkey-alike samurai show, Takashi Takamoto had it all (except actual talent) and blew it. This spot-on Australian mockumentary is the first feature from Clondalkin native Aaron McCann, who is something of a viral sensation Down Under. You'll soon understand why.
There's more high-jinx in Simeon Halligan's Habit, in which a young, unemployed Mancunian finds himself lured into a massage parlour. Which is really a front for a brothel. Which, in turn, is a front for something far more outlandish. There will be blood.
Across the globe, during the first Indochinese War, the eponymous domestic in Derek Nguyen's The Housemaid is spooked by the ghosts of the Vietnamese who have been worked to death on a French rubber plantation. When our timid heroine falls in love with the colonial landowner, his vengeful dead wife has something to say on the matter. Mostly: shriek! Post- colonialism doesn't get any scarier.
Unsurprisingly, this year's programme includes repertory outings for the late Tobe Hooper (Eaten Alive) and George Romero (The Crazies, The Dark Half). See horrorthon.com for further details. It's time to start creeping your friends out by belting out the Silver Shamrock countdown song.
TARA BRADY
