In Search of Darkness: Part II
Part II of this devilish documentary series exhumes even more vintage 1980s' horror.
Robert Englund elaborates
Writer-director
David Weiner and the team at CreatorVC Studios successfully launched their 1980s
horror opus In Search of Darkness in
2019. Conceived, produced and distributed in a mere 18 months, the feature was
successfully crowdfunded via campaigns on Kickstarter and Indiegogo, amassing
over $350k dollars. Featuring interviews with filmmakers and horror icons, who
discuss the evolution and lasting influence of 1980s’ horror, the four-and-a-half-hour
monster doc was made with fans in mind. As with every successful horror movie,
here is its inevitable sequel, another leviathan clocking in exactly one minute
shorter than its predecessor. Utilizing hours of additional footage, Part II follows the same year-by-year
exploration, covering additional films that didn’t make the first cut. Between
each ‘year’ there are a variety of supplemental featurettes on topics such as
Giallo horror, unproduced films, and the careers of industry titans such as the
‘Sultan of Splatter’ Tom Savini.
For the
horror aficionado who hasn’t seen it all, this is certainly a rich resource.
Even diehard genre fans will no doubt come away with a list of films to track
down. In this sense, it is perhaps more useful to its targeted audience than
the first iteration, which primarily focused on more well-known titles. Like
dumpster-diving at a Blockbuster, the sequel culls the VHS store shelves,
churning out titles such as C.H.U.D.,
Cellar Dweller and Hollywood Chainsaw
Hookers. There are surprises to be sure, such as a bizarre early entry from
director Peter Jackson. In his film Bad
Taste, Jackson plays a chainsaw-wielding alien exterminator who wears a
belt on his head to keep his leaking brains intact. The underrated campy spoof Saturday the 14th also garners a
mention, featuring Jeffrey Tambor as the vampire Waldemar. More recognisable
entries in the mix include Tim Burton’s Beetlejuice
and Frank Oz’s brilliant Little Shop of
Horrors, which has thankfully seen its original ending restored in a
Director’s Cut Blu-Ray.
Despite
including some lighter fare, the documentary is often hard to watch. The ‘kill
shots’ alone seem to encompass nearly half of the overall running time. Scenes
that are particularly difficult include the fascination with eye-gouging in
Giallo horror, the real animal deaths from the film Cannibal Holocaust, as well as numerous clips from exploitation
films, coined the ‘video nasties’ in the UK. With a combined running time of
nearly nine hours, completing In Search
of Darkness is no small task. It would be best suited to a series format,
with each episode covering one year in the decade. Blending the documentaries
together would also help strike a greater balance in the overall selection of
films. Those searching for darkness will find it here, in a documentary that
certainly puts the retro in retrospective. At times this secondary venture
really scrapes the bottom of the nuclear cinematic waste barrel. One can only
wonder what VHS phantasms will be unearthed in the recently announced Part III.
CHAD KENNERK
Featuring Nancy Allen, Tom Atkins, Doug Bradley, Clancy
Brown, John Carpenter, Nick Castle, Larry Cohen, Jeffrey Combs, Barbara
Crampton, Sean S. Cunningham, Joe Dante, Keith David, Robert Englund, Stuart Gordon,
Tom Holland, Heather S. Langenkamp, Cassandra Peterson, Linnea Quigley, Tom
Savini, Gedde Watanabe, Alex Winter, Brian Yuzna.
Dir David A. Weiner, Pro Night Madson, Kevin Proctor, Daniel
Squarini, David A. Weiner and Madeleine Woods, Screenplay David A. Weiner, Ph
Oktay Ortabasi, Ed Samuel Way, Music Weary Pines.
CreatorVC.
263 mins. USA. 2020. US Rel: 5 February 2021. No Cert.