AUTUMN IS AMONG US (I saw a total of two orange leaves) AND SO IS CINEMA!!
By Chloe Hampton
Fall is among us!! As an autumnal lover, fall being my favorite season, I was overjoyed to put together a list of films to enjoy alongside that crispy cool pumpkin spice air. I have this thing where I have a seasonal calendar in my head, and certain movies I can only watch at a certain time alongside it. None of these movies are in any way shape or form niche, but they are super awesome watches to celebrate the season. I avoided some huge titles like Scream, Rocky Horror, Coraline, Donnie Darko, and my absolute favorite Dead Poets Society, just because I feel like they’re sort of a given. As well as these are just movies so I avoided shows like Over the Garden Wall, Freaks and Geeks, Midnight Mass, and the absolute peak that is Gravity Falls summerween episode, although I recommend them all the same. I hope this list inspires you to watch at least one of these movies this upcoming month. If not, are you even a film major? (Probably not).
THE LIST
Les Yeux Son Visage (1960) dir. Georges Franju
Fun fact, Billy Idol’s song “Eyes Without a Face” was inspired by this film. Fire song, and dare I say even more fire movie. The first time I watched this was during a slow period at work, best 2AM shift ever. Les Yeux Son Visage, or Eyes Without a Face in English is a French horror film about the horrors of beauty, identity, and obsession. The director Georges Franju actually had gone on past this film to help establish the Cinémathèque Française, one of the world’s most important film archives to this day. I feel like in his films (and most notably this one), you can see his love for cinematic history bleed into his directorial style. He had said before he believes horror didn't have to just be shocking and violent, but could be “poetic” and that is just what this film does.
Les Yeux Son Visage (1960)
Twilight (2008) dir. Catherine Hardwicke
If you know me well at all you saw this coming. The first time I watched Twilight was when I was about five and I can say with full confidence I’ve watched it at least a hundred times since. When someone tells me they don’t like Twilight I think they just mean they haven’t gone in watching it with the right mindset. Is it a good romance story, no, and you shouldn’t have assumed it would be. If you watch Twilight as an art house comedy, which is what it truly is, then you’ll be blown away with genius. People don’t believe me when I say it now, but when this is being screened at film classes in ten to twenty years, who’s going to be laughing then? Me.
Lars and the Real Girl (2007) dir. Craig Cillespie
When I think fall, I don’t just think of horror, halloween, or the supernatural, I also think about how fall makes me feel. It’s my favorite season, but it's also a season that’s kinda quiet, still, sometimes lonely. Lars and the Real Girl features a lonesome man who forms a romantic relationship with a life size doll. Which I know, that sounds like ‘what a freak’ but the film changes the depiction you’d expect. There is no punchline, there are funny moments but it’s never laughing at him. It’s treated with warmth and sincerity, and the way everyone in the film treats Lars after this discovery is strangely heartwarming to me. Although it's about a guy dating a doll, the film is incredibly humane.
Lars and the Real Girl (2007)
Killer Klowns from Outer Space (1988) dir. Stephen Chiodo
A huge shift from what else is on the list thus far, Killer Klowns from Outer Space is a cult classic that fully embraces how absurd its premise is. Alien clowns arrive in a neon spaceship shaped like a circus tent and terrorize a small town with deadly balloon animals and cotton candy cocoons. I’m not joking. I haven’t seen this movie since I was like six or seven and my family had a ton of random dvd’s. However, the last few years I’ve thought about it a lot. The film is a little goofy, gross, but still so much fun and everything a halloween movie ought to be.
Possibly in Michigan (1983) dir. Cecelia Condit
I made my parents watch this multiple times when I was in middle school and each time afterwards they asked me where they had done wrong. A short musical that feels like a nightmare, Possibly in Michigan is a film I can tell you so little about. Cannibalism, feminism I think?, stalking, there’s a lot going on.
An American Werewolf in London (1981) dir. John Landis
Everytime I come home from school, I force my gran to watch a hundred movies I have saved on letterboxd. Just this last summer, An American Werewolf in London came up on our list. Somewhat horror, somewhat comedy, this film is sort of genre defying the werewolf transformation sort of thing. It’s not outlandish or crazy, but it’s a fun watch and interesting to see an earlier depiction of werewolves. Plus nice to see Americans have always made jokes about British people.
Night of the Living Dead (1968) dir. George A. Romero
I love, love, LOVE zombies, my favorite TV show ever is The Walking Dead, one of my favorite movies of all time is 28 Days Later. I first saw this film in my Southern Gothic film class, which I naturally took because I am both southern and a lover of all things gothic. The class ended up being terribly boring, but while watching this I saw clear threads between this movie and every zombie story I love, it all exists because of this film. It's claustrophobic, dark and grim, and still deeply impactful. Night of the Living Dead was one of the first horror films to feature a black male lead (Duane Jones) in a role that wasn’t written specifically as a black character. Romero cast him simply because he was the best actor for the part, which was groundbreaking at the time. His presence, and the film’s ending for 1968 is insane and truly remarkable.
They Cloned Tyrone (2023) dir. Juel Taylor
Equally sci-fi, conspiracy thriller, and satirical horror, They Cloned Tyrone unfolds like a fever dream. Set in a neighborhood that is trapped in a perpetual night, the film follows an unlikely trio, as they unravel a secret government experiment straight out of a Blaxploitation nightmare. I was beyond shocked Netflix would ever put out something like this, but then they made fifty seasons of Love is Blind and ten more wack movies so I came back to reality. This film feels like an episode of Boondocks in the best way possible, not to mention I love a good grainy film.
They Cloned Tyrone (2023)
Bones and All (2022) dir. Luca Guadanino
Never before have I looked at a film and said “that's literally me” so quickly. Metaphorically of course, I’m a pescatarian. Bones and All to me is a transitional movie from the summer to the fall. It follows two young cannibals, dealing with their shared hunger as well as their longing for love, acceptance, and belonging. The cinematography and script is beautiful (expecting nothing else from the goat Luca Guadagnino), and blends horror, romance and coming of age, with sometime entirely unlike what I’ve ever seen before. It’s a pretty polarizing film, you either love or hate, but I think its worth seeing nonetheless.
Memories of Murder (2003) dir. Bong Joon-ho
Fall of 2022 I watched what is now one of my favorite seasons of television, True Detective season one. Unfortunately the rest of the show kinda sucks, but at least the first one was gas. However, like all reasonable people, after coming to the realization it wasn;t going to be very good, I looked for stuff like season one to watch on Reddit. The first thing I saw listed was Memories of Murder. I loved the director's other work, Okja, Parasite, Snowpiecer, and now Mickey 17, so I gave it a shot. It’s based around two mismatched detectives fumbling through a case that seems to get harder to resolve every inch closer they get. The film is slow burn, but there is something evil hiding in the mundaneness of it all. Like True Detective, it’s not about a resolution, but the obsession, doubt, and slow descent into uncertainty of everything. You’re not just haunted by what occurs but what doesn’t.
HONORABLE MENTIONS NOT LISTED:
American Mary, The Night of the Hunter, X, There Will be Blood, and Five Nights at Freddy’s.