Monday, April 29, 2013

The Lords of Salem (2013)

I've been looking forward to seeing this ever since I saw the trailer. I'm not a HUGE fan of Zombie's work, but for the most part (except for his Halloween II remake which was simply atrocious), his movies have been entertaining and generally alright.

The Lords of Salem stars Sherri Moon Zombie as a local radio DJ. She receives a record from "The Lords" and upon playing the album, she and all the women of Salem start acting weird. She starts having hallucinations and weird dreams, while her landlord and landlord's sisters start to become a little too interested in her.

It's easy to see the old 70s trippy/horror inspiration, most notably Rosemarie's Baby and maybe The Sentinel (along with a little Eyes Wide Shut and many others). While casting his wife is getting pretty old, Sherri Moon Zombie's acting was a little better and required more from her than usual. The three sisters were definitely a highlight, including Dee Wallace from The Howling and Magenta from The Rocky Horror Picture Show, as well as Zombie regulars like Sid Haig and Ken Foree.

There's a lot of really awesome and creepy images and I personally loved the montonous droning music from The Lords' LP. It has a very art-house/religious/psychedelic feel to it without becoming pretentious(although some parts come really close). The main complaint from most people is that the movie plays more like an elaborate music video rather than a film, and I have to agree. There are some over-the-top moments but overall it's definitely worth a watch.

1 comment:

  1. you should check out "Berberian Sound Studio"
    Maybe not completely related, but similar themes of a work of art casting magic spells over it's witnesses and descent into madness, only this one involving the production of the dubbed soundtrack for an Italian Gialo flick. I will RUN to my isohunt and look for this one. +1 thanks for the recommend!

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