Halloween Horror Triple Features, Day 4

One of my FAVORITE horror tropes -- and one of the tropes that genuinely scares me the most -- is the conspiracy plot, the idea that everyone is in on it but you (or the main character, rather). The feeling of not being in control and that everyone else is operating under a different set of rules or different information than you is TERRIFYING. Sometimes these fears are unfounded, but I really love the ones where the fears are justified and the character has to deal with how far the conspiracy goes and who they can and can't trust. Here are three movies that utilize this trope extremely well.

GET OUT (2017) -- The newest addition to this trope, and a confronting look at race in America. Chris goes with his white girlfriend to spend the weekend with her parents, and even before the usual horror stuff starts, the racial awkwardness is already horrifying. From the cop's profiling of Chris to Dean's interrogation to every horrific conversation at the garden party ("Is it true? Is it better?"), this movie is as deliberately cringe-inducing as any David Cronenberg body horror. Like a lot of movies of this subgenre, Get Out gets a lot of mileage out of making you suspicious of something (like a phone being unplugged) and then undercutting it with the knowledge of how ridiculous it sounds to speak that suspicion out loud. Surely it can't be what it looks like -- that's ridiculous! Right? TSA Rod's conversation with the cops is this whole trope in a nutshell. We know what he's saying is (mostly) right, but it sounds so insane you wonder why he thought anyone would believe him. (Strangely not available to rent online. You can buy a digital version on most streaming sites, but it costs about as much as buying a physical copy.)

ROSEMARY'S BABY (1968) -- I love Mia Farrow's Rosemary more and more every time I watch this. It would be easy to read her as a weak, passive character, but in truth she's anything but. She's suspicious of the Castevets almost immediately, but her husband assures her that there's nothing to worry about. Her biggest mistake is trusting him, but who would suspect their spouse of the things Guy is doing? Especially at that time when gender roles were so different than they are now. Rosemary puts up a good fight, though, and it's only through deception and manipulation (Guy is just disgustingly passive aggressive and gaslight-y) that the devil worshippers are able to keep her under control. I still say she should have known something was up, though, when they were able to afford an apartment in that building, which in real life is one of the most famous and exclusive buildings in New York. (Available to rent on Amazon and iTunes.)

SOCIETY (1989) -- A good percentage of this movie is cheesy 1980s "rich people partying" goodness, but there's a lot going on here and it's frighteningly relevant to our current times. (There's a theme song that actually has the lyric "when you get tired of winning." #somuchwinning) This movie is one of the better examples of undercutting the protagonist's point of view, because Billy does have genuine psychological issues and hallucinations. And feeling alienated from his family could just be a result of his having his own life and his own friends. The third act has to be seen to be believed, and it's a vivid (and perhaps on the nose) metaphor for how the rich suck the life out of the poor. (Streaming on Shudder.)

Halloween Horror Triple Features, Day 3

I find huge trucks inherently scary. They're just so enormous and they're on the same roads with the normal-sized cars and driving around them is kind of frightening. I can't imagine actually driving one either. I don't know, it makes total sense to me that "scary trucks/truck drivers" is a little niche in the horror genre. Scary cars is adjacent to this niche, but I'm going to stick with trucks because it's a particular kind of creepy. And most of these movies take advantage of the inherent anxiety I think most of us feel when we're driving on the open road in the middle of unfamiliar territory. It's a bit wild west and it feels like normal rules of society don't necessarily apply. Anyway, here's a trio of scary truck flicks! [Side note: I've seen all three of these for the first time in the last three months.]

DUEL (1971) -- Wow, you can see Spielberg's gifts on full display even this early on in his career. I love that you never see the driver of the truck, and I *LOVE* how things escalate from something so simple -- our hero passes a truck with his car, which is something all of us who drive have done a million times. And after watching this movie, I may never do it again without at least briefly wondering if I just set someone off and they're going to start terrorizing me. I also really dig the exploration of the main character, because he's kind of a coward. Even when he calls his wife at home, you can see that there are real things in his life that he just doesn't feel like dealing with because he doesn't like confrontation. And now he's forced into this situation where he *has* to face this thing, even though it's very likely to make things even worse. That scene in the cafe where he knows the guy is in there but doesn't know which person it is, and he's practicing how to confront him. I relate to that so hard. (Available for rent on Amazon.)

MAXIMUM OVERDRIVE (1986) -- Stephen King's sole directorial credit, and you can kind of see why, but it's not THAT bad. The premise is that Earth is passing through the tail of a comet, and during that time, all the machines on the planet become sentient and start terrorizing the population. Several people hole up at a truck stop and fend off a bunch of semi trucks who just want some fuel, man. This is a sort of cool idea, but I couldn't help wondering what was happening with all the non-truck machines. We get teased with an electric carving knife coming to life and slicing a woman's arm, but then it's all about the trucks. What about, for example, the thousands of planes that must have been in the sky? There is a bit of awkward philosophizing (yes, giving the trucks fuel is EXACTLY like Neville Chamberlain appeasing the Nazis) and a hilariously tacked-on "solution" to the crisis (we're told literally by a closing title card that, oh yeah, it was aliens and some Russian astronauts shot their UFO, the end!). But it's still enjoyable, with a badass AC/DC soundtrack and at least a *few* genuinely tense moments. (Streaming on HBONow and available for rent on iTunes and Amazon.)

ROAD GAMES (1981) -- Stacy Keach plays a truck driver who tries to track down a serial killer with the help of a hitchhiking Jamie Lee Curtis. The film is set in Australia, and if there's anywhere I don't want to be driving for long periods of time more than West Texas, it's Australia. This is a really well put together movie, with a great mystery set-up and you're never fully confident that what the truck driver believes happened actually happened, or if it's just a product of his exhausted mind. The movie has a pretty sick sense of humor as well, and it really captures the strangeness and uneasiness of driving alone at night and how the road can play tricks on you. (Streaming on Shudder.)

Almost Made the List: JOY RIDE -- This is half a great movie and half a not-so-great one, but the first half really is stellar and wonderfully tense. Listen for Ted Levine (Buffalo Bill from Silence of the Lambs) as the uncredited voice of "Rusty Nail."

Halloween Horror Triple Features, Day 2

How lovely to be a woman! LOL just kidding, it's pretty horrifying, am I right, ladies? And nothing better exemplifies the horrorshow of womanhood than the monthly hemorrhaging. Menses are featured in a handful of horror films, and such films could go hand-in-hand with films that deal with the horror of childbirth (Whaddup, The Brood!). So hit the deck, guys -- all three of these films have pretty memorable scenes involving bleeding vaginas. If you're going to do this triple feature, I'd highly recommend prefacing it with the educational short Naturally a Girl (bonus for the Rifftrax version -- why yes, the female reproductive system *does* resemble a 70s rock album cover).

THE LOVE WITCH (2016) -- Man, I love The Love Witch! On the surface, a loving homage to Hammer films and other lush Technicolor frightfests, but underneath a pretty serious exploration of gender roles. It also brazenly confronts our society's unease with feminine sexuality and sexual power. Not to mention feminine hygiene. I think it's also worth looking at this film through the lens of the history of witchcraft in America and the persecution of women believed to be witches, many of whom were simply outcasts who didn't conform to society's expectations of women and what their roles should be. (Streaming on Amazon, for free if you have Prime.)

VALERIE AND HER WEEK OF WONDERS (1970) -- This is usually seen as more dark surrealist fantasy than horror, but it's still pretty danged creepy. Not least for the ideas it so beautifully visualizes, which seem more timely than ever as our culture is finally starting to come to grips with how women are frequently treated as sex objects. The eponymous heroine's "week of wonders" is incited by her first period, illustrated for us in the film's most indelible image -- a drop of blood splashing on the pure white petals of a daisy, an unmistakable metaphor for innocence lost. This film blurs the line between reality and Valerie's subconscious, so any attempts to put things in some kind of order are misspent. Just let go of logic and let the movie wash over you. (Currently streaming on FilmStruck. Also available for rent on iTunes and Amazon.)

CARRIE (1976) -- This movie is about what happens when you have to go through the horrors of entering womanhood (not just the blood part) and have no tools or support system to help you deal with it. I can't believe there are people out there who think Carrie is the "monster" of this movie. Have you SEEN that shower scene?! The horror climax of this movie is NOT Carrie's rampage of revenge (which is much more cathartic than scary -- for me, anyway). Rather, it is the one-two punch of Chris's pig's blood prank (one of the best Hitchcockian "show them the bomb" set-ups by a director not named Hitchcock) and the confrontation with Margaret at the end. Carrie is the one with telekinetic powers, yes, but she is still quite powerless for most of the film and only uses her abilities as a form of self-defense. There's probably a comparison to Frankenstein/The Creature confusion to be made here, but I think it's an even better metaphor for women in general. (Available to rent on iTunes and Amazon; you can own the HD digital version on iTunes for 4.99 - just a dollar more than the rental cost.)

Almost Made the List: GINGER SNAPS, about a girl whose "monthly gift" is turning into a werewolf.

Halloween Horror Triple Features, Day 1

I find myself inspired once again by PureCinema Podcast, which recently did an episode of horror triple features, each revolving around a particular theme. So, naturally, I am compelled to do some of my own.

People were obsessed with fitness in the 1980s. It was everywhere. There was even a product on the toy market called "Get In Shape, Girl." I earnestly pestered my parents to get this for me, but they never did, possibly (and if so, righly) guessing that it would only serve to exacerbate my burgeoning body image issues. Fitness is obviously still a huge industry, but the mid to late 80s is when it exploded, and it even bled over into horror movies, giving us a little cluster of movies that either heavily featured -- or were entirely set in  -- health clubs. Such as...

KILLER WORKOUT (1987) -- Oh wow. This movie (which is alternately titled Aerobicide, as in the poster above) is something else. Not good, by any stretch of the imagination, but fascinating. Around 13 minutes of the movie's 85-minute runtime is nothing but scenes of women doing low-impact aerobics and calisthenics -- no story, no character development, just five - and - six - and - reach - and - stretch! The killer's weapon of choice is a comically oversized safety pin. There is burn-victim nudity, which is one of the most perverse things I've ever seen. You'll probably guess who the killer is pretty early on, but the motive is a nice little mystery. More of a mystery than you have any right to expect from a movie like this, at any rate. 

NINJA III: THE DOMINATION (1984) -- I know what you might be thinking at this point: If this is III, is there a I and II that I should see first? Great news -- though there are two previous "ninja" movies in this pseudo-series, you don't have to see them to understand what's going on here. Enter the Ninja and Revenge of the Ninja are only connected to this movie by name, and barely that. Our Ninja III heroine is a telephone linewoman by day and an aerobics instructor by ... other days. She is possessed by the evil spirit of a dead ninja who uses her body to exact revenge on the people who killed him, and only through combat with another ninja can she be rid of him!  It contains what I'm pretty sure is the only instance in film of someone using V8 juice in foreplay. It's a Cannon film, so that may suggest something to you about its quality, but their Ninja movies are some of their better fare.

DEATH SPA (1989) -- Holy moley, this movie RADIATES 1980s. The clothes, the mullets, the skeeze masquerading as confidence. Death Spa, like its older sister Killer Workout, is set almost entirely in a health club. But Death Spa's setting is a health club of THE FUTURE! Where everything is automated (swipe your card at the bench press and it sets the weights according to your personal needs), which sounds great until you think about how horribly things could go wrong if there's a glitch or a hack. This being a horror movie, you can guess how that goes, and all these shenanigans lead to some cool inventive deaths (the shoulder press death alone is worth the price of admission). (Streaming on Amazon, for free if you have Prime.)

Almost Made the List: DEMONS 2 (Streaming on Shudder.) Apartment building's residents start becoming possessed by demons and patrons of the building's gym try to escape through the parking garage!

Five (Because) NYC Films

About a month before I moved to New York, I did a series of LiveJournal posts about NYC films and the lessons I believed they offered to me as a prospective New Yorker. I'm still pretty proud of those posts and I feel like they hold up.

Breakfast at Tiffany's
Taxi Driver
King Kong (1933)
Sweet Smell of Success
Rosemary's Baby
Manhattan
Big
Sex and the City
The Fisher King
Can't Stop the Music
The Goodbye Girl
The Muppets Take Manhattan
(I also did a post referencing Funny Girl, but it was the day I moved and more a "here I go" squee than a proper post.)

Having lived here nine years has, unsurprisingly, given me a new perspective. So here are my "five because" New York movies.

#5. A Very Murray Christmas (2015)

This may seem like a weird one, but I first saw this on a Christmas Eve when, for financial reasons, I was in the city rather than in Tennessee with family (don't get too sad for me -- it was just a lot cheaper to fly after the holiday, which is what I ended up doing). It perfectly encapsulated the lonely-yet-exciting vibe of being in Manhattan away from family at Christmas -- at least as I was experiencing it -- and there was nothing more emotional to me than the group rendition of "Fairytale of New York." On the other end of the emotional spectrum, of course, is "Santa Wants Some Loving" (LMAO George Clooney creeping out from behind the trees!). This is not actually a movie, I guess, but it's a new holiday favorite of mine and makes me want to spend Christmas Eve at a piano bar in Midtown.

#4. Eyes of Laura Mars (1978)

You can keep your Sex and the City, *this* is my Fabulous and Fashionable New York Movie. Faye Dunaway is a fashion photographer whose work has taken a turn for the macabre, and her photos somehow closely resemble crime photographs that she can't possibly have seen. She experiences episodes where she literally sees through someone else's eyes, instead of what's actually in front of her, and people keep dying around her. Tommy Lee Jones is her love interest, Raul Julia is her ex-husband, and Rene Auberjonois is her fabulously bitchy manager. The movie is a particularly brutal example of "Bury Your Gays," but in 1978 that wasn't as much of a trope yet (though with Someone's Watching Me coming out the same year and Cruising a couple years later, it was well on its way). And coming as it did in the late 1970s, it arrived with its own "love theme" -- by no less than Barbra Streisand! (Check it out, it's so dramatic!) I love this movie as a straight-up thriller, but I also love it as a New York movie. Iconic Manhattan locations, stark studios, creepy warehouses and credibly cramped apartment sets (except for Laura's lavish apartment, of course) make this a much more genuine look at New York than most movies set here now, even if that look is somewhat outdated.

#3. The Secret of My Success (1987)

Hang on, hear me out. Most of my own personal mythology about New York came from the 1980s, and The Secret of My Success was certainly part of that. Sure, it's a complete fantasy (not to mention basically an 80s remake of How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying), but it's also a snapshot of a particular slice of New York -- one that's part of the image of "making it big" out here. I'm not a successful CEO or hedge fund manager, but I do get to work in some of the shiny buildings like the one pictured above. I work at a desk, I have a job that actually makes use of my college degree, and I get a nice car to drive me home every evening. And there is occasionally free food and swag. It's not overwhelming success, and I don't have a ton of time to write (which is what I came here to do), but if you'd told 17-year-old me what I do every day, she would have thought it was amazing. But what does she know? ;-)

#2. The Out-of-Towners (1970)

When I'm having a bad day here, where it feels like the city is against me at every turn, I'm irresistibly reminded of this movie. It's a perfect encapsulation of a phenomenon that any real New Yorker has experienced many times. You start the day with a plan and either one little thing goes wrong or there's some piece of information you were missing, and it sends your entire day down the toilet. Like, you might as well have never left your apartment. Jack Lemmon and Sandy Dennis have one hellacious night, with misfortune piled onto misfortune, and you can trace a whole lot of it back to one or two little things they should have done differently right at the beginning. I don't really like where this movie ends up, with the couple deciding no big city job is worth this big city headache (everyone has a bad day, give it a little more of a chance than that, guys), but I've had days that feel at least a little like what they go through in the movie -- having to be late to work because the subway trains are borked, falling on the sidewalk, having to trample over trash bags because no one left a path, being pooped on by a pigeon, finding out that place you need to go to is closed on the one day you're trying to go, etc. You have not truly lived here if hasn't happened to you.

#1. The Warriors (1979)

The longest subway ride EVER. In fact, I'm fairly sure that *if* you were to take the subway from Van Cortlandt Park to Coney Island, as the characters of this film have to do, it would take longer than the running time of this film (for one thing, you'd have to change trains at least once). And that's even without the police and the other gangs dogging your every step. This movie is so, so good, and I love that -- even though it's set in Future New York, it's still unmistakably New York (side-eyes the fake NY of Escape from New York). I could cry at the diversity -- not just ethnic diversity, but all the different gangs that feel fully realized with their own backstories. It's kind of a perfect metaphor for the city itself; every gang has their own turf, their own rules. And New York isn't one big city, it's a bunch of different neighborhoods all crammed together. (just like the real NY) The movie's plot is simple, but incredibly effective and has the same basic structure of another film by the same director (Walter Hill), Southern Comfort -- our characters have to get from Point A to Point B, but it's super hard because 1) they have a serious disadvantage of some kind, and 2) there's been a major misunderstanding that puts them at odds with people they have to get through/past to get to their destination. I've always wanted to make a day of taking that subway trip. Just probably not in the middle of the night.

Ten (Because) 1990s Cult Films

There are a lot of different ways to define "cult movie," I guess, but I'm going with Pure Cinema's more loose definition that includes movies that either weren't hits at the time of their release or have been forgotten or overshadowed in the years since their release, and have acquired a devoted (though perhaps small) following. So not necessarily "weird" movies. Though some of these certainly fall into that category too.

#10. What Dreams May Come (1998)

This won an Oscar for visual effects, and while it's not the *best* movie in terms of storytelling, it's a really remarkable visual feast. The ideas about the afterlife (greatly simplified from the book on which it is based) are very thought-provoking, especially the notion that it's radically different for everyone. I think everyone who at least has heard of this movie has seen the picture of Robin Williams walking through the painting (see above), but the image that most stuck with me was the vision of hell as an upside down cathedral. The plot here is pretty forgettable, but that's not what you watch this movie for. (Available on Amazon and iTunes)

#9. The Swan Princess (1994)

I'd only vaguely heard of this movie before its love song "Far Longer Than Forever" was nominated for a Golden Globe, but just a few seconds of that song made me want to see the movie immediately. (Seriously, it's gorgeous.) A loose adaptation of the ballet Swan Lake, the movie itself is nothing groundbreaking, and the animation is barely above television-grade for the time, but it has some great voice acting (including Jack Palance as the villain Rothbart), and the love story is actually rather nice -- a kick in the teeth to the "love at first sight" and "who's the fairest" tropes. (Available on Amazon and iTunes)

#8. Beautiful Girls (1996)

This movie is responsible for an obsession I had for quite a while in the 90s with Timothy Hutton. He is at the height of scruffy, sideburned, piano-playing sexiness here. The rest of the cast is a who's who of 90s actors -- Matt Dillon, Lauren Holly, Mira Sorvino, Rosie O'Donnell, Noah Emmerich, Michael Rappaport, a young(ish) David Arquette, and a quite young Natalie Portman. Yeah, it's another movie about men who don't want to grow up (most clearly exemplified by the not-as-creepy-as-it-sounds mutual crush between Hutton and Portman), but the cast has great chemistry and the movie has a lot of charm. Plus a GREAT soundtrack which is basically the Big Chill soundtrack of the 90s. It also has this beautiful profanity-laden rant from O'Donnell about beauty standards, which is worth the price of admission all by itself. (Available on Amazon and iTunes; soundtrack available on iTunes)

#7. Innocent Blood (1992)

There was a pretty huge vampire movie that came out in the 90s, but despite its supernatural cred, I'd hardly call Interview with the Vampire a "cult" movie. Innocent Blood -- John Landis's semi-comic take on vampires -- is another matter altogether. Not quite as brilliant as his werewolf movie the decade before, Innocent Blood nonetheless has a lot going for it. It was a cool idea to cross vampirism with mafia culture and equate being made a vampire with being "made" in the mafia sense. Loads of great actors in this -- Anthony LaPaglia, Robert Loggia, Don Rickles, Chazz Palminteri, Luis Guzman, Angela Bassett, plus some cameos from horror icons Tom Savini, Sam Raimi, Dario Argento and, err, Linnea Quigley (hey, if you're a horror fan, you know why she's a legend). (Available on Amazon and iTunes)

#6. The Quick and the Dead (1995)

Come for the DiCaprio, stay for the subversion of the western genre. This movie stars Sharon Stone, still riding the post-Basic Instinct wave, but here, refreshingly, she isn't (that) sexualized and instead plays an atypical female for a western -- a vigilante who has arrived in town to seek revenge for her father's murder many years before. LOADS of great actors in this -- Gene Hackman, Russell Crowe before he was a big movie star, the aforementioned DiCaprio, Pat Hingle, Keith David, Lance Henriksen, Tobin Bell, Raynor Scheine, Gary Sinise, and Woody Strode, fer cryin' out loud! I love that this movie never takes itself too seriously, and that it kind of knows how ridiculous it frequently is, but everyone in the movie is playing it totally straight. (Available on Amazon and iTunes)

#5. Cronos (1993)

The feature film debut of Guillermo del Toro and a brilliant addition to the vampire lore. An old antique dealer finds a device that makes him younger but has the unfortunate side effect of causing him to crave blood. Like so many of del Toro's horror movies, this has a lot of emotion and the real power in the horror elements is that you care so much about these characters and are genuinely horrified to see bad things happen to them. Don't get me wrong, there's also a good deal of artfully rendered blood and gore, but there's a tragic quality to the horror that pushes it past mere gladiator-style entertainment. There's an especially poignant relationship with the man and his granddaughter that I find really compelling to watch. (Available on Amazon and iTunes)

#4. Tales from the Hood (1995)

I saw this for the first time recently and really loved it. I remember thinking at the time it came out and I was seeing ads for it that it seemed like a dumb horror parody like so many that had come before, but it is definitely not that. Sure, there's a bit of the absurd here, but that's true of most horror in general. No, what this is is some brilliant commentary, specifically from the perspective of black America. There are bits in this that are still pretty danged relevant, starting with the opening tale where a black activist is killed by the police. The pièce de résistance, however, is "KKK Comeuppance," in which a racist southern senator is terrorized by a bunch of creepy dolls that hold the souls of previously tortured slaves. (Available on Amazon and iTunes)

#3. Cookie's Fortune (1999)

It is a CRIME that this isn't available to buy or rent. Even the Wikipedia page is half-ass. This is an Altman film, with his characteristically massive all-star cast. Let me just lay some of these names on you -- Glenn Close, Julianne Moore, Ned Beatty, Courtney B. Vance, Charles S. Dutton, Patricia Neal, Donald Moffat, Lyle Lovett, Chris O'Donnell, Liv Tyler, and musicians Rufus Thomas and Ruby Wilson. It's set (and was filmed) in Holly Springs, Mississippi, and is legit one of my favorite crime films. The story begins with the titular Cookie (Patricia Neal in her last film, save one), who kills herself because she's bored of being a widow. She's found by her niece (Glenn Close), who sets about trying to make Cookie's death look like a murder -- mainly to spare the family the embarrassment of a suicide but also to set herself up in the family mansion. This is wickedly funny, and is one of those rare films about the south that doesn't feel exploitative or mocking. (Tragically not available, even for sale, except used copies; trailer on YouTube.)

#2. Dead Again (1991)

The closest to "shipping" real people I've ever been was with Emma Thompson and Kenneth Branagh. They made several films together and were one of the few real-life couples who actually had insane onscreen chemistry. Nothing tops the spark in Much Ado About Nothing, but Dead Again comes close. This is essentially a crime thriller, but it also has definite noir elements and is a sort of romantic fantasy? Emma Thompson plays a woman with amnesia, and Branagh is a detective who's trying to help her uncover who she is. This movie is a pretty cool example of a "past lives" plot, and through past life regression hypnotherapy, Thompson's and Branagh's characters become embroiled in a decades old love story and murder mystery which we see in black and white flashbacks. Noteworthy supporting players include Derek Jacobi, Robin Williams, Andy Garcia, and Wayne Knight. (Available on Amazon and iTunes)

#1. The Last Days of Disco (1998)

Boy oh boy do I love this movie. If you liked Love and Friendship, here's Kate Beckinsale and Chloe Sevigny directed by Whit Stillman nearly 20 years earlier. Though the story largely revolves around Beckinsale and Sevigny, there is a host of memorable and well-defined characters. Like most of Stillman's films, this is a movie where smart people sit around and talk a lot. There is perhaps no greater film conversation than the characters' discussion of troublesome archetypes in Lady and the Tramp. Maybe not everyone's cup of tea, but I love everything about this movie -- the early 80s fashion, the music, the use of Scrooge McDuck as a come-on, and the final shot of two people unironically shimmying to non-existent disco music on an elevated train. (Available on Amazon and iTunes)

Five (Because) High School Movies

One of my favorite podcasts right now is Pure Cinema, where most weeks the two hosts pick a theme or genre and give their respective "five because" list -- not five favorites, not the five best, just five because. Almost every episode inspires me to make my own "five because" list, but this week I actually did it.

There are a BUNCH of super obvious choices for this that I tried to avoid -- much of the John Hughes oeuvre, all those "take a literature classic and set it in high school" movies (sorry, Clueless), and Carrie. I tried instead for some deep cuts, or at least semi-deep or underappreciated.

So here goes. My "five because" high school movies:

#5: Grease 2 (1982)

Deal with it. While you'll get no argument from me that the music in the original Grease is definitely superior, as a whole, Grease 2 is where it's at for me. I think the story is genuinely better, and oh hey, it's actually FEMINIST. It  probably made up more of the image of what I thought high school would be like than any other teen movie I saw before I was actually in high school. And while the songs aren't that great -- some terrible, others terrible-tastic -- they're still catchy and I enjoy singing along to them. The weakest parts of the movie are when it tries to connect to the original, and I sort of wish this had been its own movie and not part of the Grease-verse at all, but the Pink Ladies and T-Birds dynamics are pretty essential to the plot. Whatever else I could say about the movie, though, Stephanie Zinoni is one of my life heroes. "Yeah, I'm free every day. It's in the constitution." (Streaming on Netflix US)

#4: Splendor in the Grass (1961)

Saddest reading of a Wordsworth poem EVER. One of Natalie Wood's best performances ("I'M NOT SPOILED, MOM!"), one of Warren Beatty's best performances, and among the pantheon of great bittersweet love stories. A lot of it takes place outside of the high school -- this could just as easily be part of a mental illness/institution movie list -- but it's still firmly in the high school milieu. Weirdly, this has a connection in my brain to another high school flick of the 60s, Teenage Mother. No, wait--really! They're both movies where a whole lot of the heartache and drama could have been avoided if people weren't so hung up about sex. This is a movie about the tug between what you want and what's expected of you, and dang if I don't get choked up when Warren Beatty is trying to explain to his dad that he wants to be a rancher and not a businessman. We're told in The Breakfast Club that when we grow up, our hearts die, but I don't think that's true and this movie is a great rebuttal to that. It's not that your heart dies; it's that the pull of responsibility and traditional adult roles are almost always too strong to keep fighting against. (Available to rent on iTunes/Amazon)

#3: All Cheerleaders Die (2013)

And now for something completely different. A lot of high school movies are also horror movies. There's lots of great low-hanging fruit in the High School Hell subgenre -- Carrie, Scream, A Nightmare on Elm Street, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and the movie you might think this is a ripoff of but it isn't, Jennifer's Body. All Cheerleaders Die is actually a fairly original and entertaining movie, and the horror comes as much from what these characters are willing to do to each other (in terms of high school backstabbery and revenge) as from any of the supernatural or gory stuff. It's co-directed and co-written by Lucky McKee, so if you liked May and The Woods and his episodes of Masters of Horror (particularly Sick Girl), this might be right up your alley. (Streaming on Netflix US)

#2: Pretty Maids All in a Row (1971)

An unusual mashup of teen sex comedy and murder mystery -- think American Pie meets Scream -- with Rock Hudson as a horny (and decidedly straight) football coach, Telly Savalas as an intrepid detective, James "Scotty" Doohan as his partner, Roddy McDowall as a beleaguered principal, Angie Dickinson as a sexy substitute teacher, Keenan Wynn as an inept police chief, John David Carson as a cute but awkward teenager with chronic priapism, and more absurdly beautiful women than should statistically be possible in a single high school. This movie is objectifying as all get-out, but it doesn't bother me that much considering the time it was made and the movie's other elements.  I love how audacious this movie is; the juxtaposition of genres alone is something that shouldn't work but absolutely does.

#1: Sing (1989)

High school was tough for me, as it was for nearly everyone, but it was made more tolerable by my taking part in artistic pursuits (in my case, marching band, winterguard, and madrigals). This movie is based on a real thing that is still going on in high schools in New York City -- student-run musical productions called "SING!" that typically pit classes against each other in competition -- and since seeing it in my own high school years, it's low-key one of my favorite musicals. The movie takes place at a school in Brooklyn that's facing closure in a community that's crumbling, but they want to put on one more SING! show because it's an important event not just for the school but for the community at large. There's a sweet opposite-sides-of-the-tracks romance, and several genuinely good songs (okay, "Birthday Suit" is hella cheesy, but "Romance" is lovely and all the SING! numbers are great, especially the heart-stirring "One More Time," which feels like a classic David Foster tune, and "We'll Never Say Goodbye," the greatest school song that never was). A lot of the movie is dour because these people's lives are tough, but that only reinforces the joy of the movie's last act, when the community gets together to cheer on the next generation, even against the admonition of the school board. The movie features Lorraine Bracco *just before* she was in Goodfellas, and even Patti Labelle in a minor role, but most of the rest of the cast is made up of lesser-knowns. It's hard to acquire, unfortunately, but the whole thing is on YouTube.