A smattering of horror films sure to please this Halloween

On video and DVD

With Halloween on Sunday, the weekend crush is on for horror movies, the hottest of which likely will be the DVD release of Zack Snyder’s “Dawn of the Dead,” an excellent, often darkly hilarious remake of George Romero’s 1978 classic horror movie of the same name.

It’s exactly the movie it should have been, taking place at a mall that becomes so awash in blood, it will never see another white sale.

The film respects the original, building on what was there, and it takes elements of the story and makes them its own. It works so well that it stands – or, in this case, slithers, bleeds and crawls – as one of the best horror movies to come out of Hollywood in years.

If you can’t find it or the original at video stores this weekend, obviously there are scores of other horror films worth renting.

Over the past two weeks, more than 40 were revisited for this column. Because of space considerations, not all could be reviewed here. Some classics such as “The Exorcist,” “Night of the Living Dead” and “Dracula” were left off because we already know they’re great. So, what follows is a broad sampling of others – some familiar, some not so familiar.

The horror genre is one that can be enjoyed on two primary levels – for the fear it elicits when it’s done well, or for the wild comedy it offers when it’s B-movie bad. With that in mind, I recommend the following:

. “Hollywood Chainsaw Hookers” – Distilled camp. A horror movie with a Maine connection not associated with Stephen King. Northeast Harbor resident Gunnar “Leatherface” Hansen (“Texas Chainsaw Massacre”) is The Stranger, a cultish pimp who employs a bevy of topless hookers to help him sacrifice the unsuspecting. They use chainsaws – natch – and are backed by an advertising slug that notes they charge an arm and a leg for their services. Ho, ho.

. “28 Days Later” – Released at the height of the SARS epidemic, the movie is a post-apocalyptic zombie nightmare that tapped into a national mood of unease. It focused on the very real horrors lurking in new, unknown viruses. Director Danny Boyle sustains the horror with black comedy, genuine suspense, quick-cut editing and his vicious, unpredictable zombies. A worthy offspring of Romero’s “Dead” series.

. “Frankenfish” – The dark side of “Hee-Haw.” Giant prehistoric fish wreak havoc on hillbillies in a backwater bayou. Voodoo, decapitations and mutilations ensue. At times, the actors, covered in body parts and brain matter, can’t ignore the absurdity of the situations or contain their own amusement; they giggle through the gore. So will you.

. “Halloween” – Director John Carpenter got it right. A slasher film needs more than a butcher knife and a boogeyman to be effective. It needs a main character worth rooting for, a plot that facilitates a suspension of disbelief, a spellbinding score that complements the creeps. In “Halloween,” we get it all, with Jamie Lee Curtis fending off masked madman Michael Meyers. A lucrative series was born.

. “Woodchipper Massacre” – So bad it hurts. So bad it’s good. So much for using only wood in a woodchipper. Three children murder their rotten, mean-spirited aunt, chop her up, freeze her solid, and then put her assorted body parts through a woodchipper. Messy, horribly acted, but puckish fun. Inspired a similar scene in “Fargo.”

. “The Sixth Sense” – Director M. Night Shyamalan built a career out of this movie, and then squandered it with a series of disappointing films that never achieved the greatness he reached here. Still, what a movie. “Sense” is a measured slight of hand whose secret now is well known but whose artistry and suspense remain. Scenes linger; “I see dead people” became a pop phenomenon. So did the movie – deservedly.

. “Mommie Dearest” – Okay, so not a horror movie, per se, but a great party film if seen with the right crowd. It’s scary, terrifying, allegedly true. Faye Dunaway’s performance as Joan Crawford is cut-throat. She wields an ax. She serves raw meat to children. She devastates a garden. She uses bathroom cleanser as a weapon. For good measure, she also provides a corpse – her own, waxen and blue in the film’s climactic scene.

. “Misery” – Joins “Carrie” and “The Shining” in being among the best adaptations of a Stephen King novel. Kathy Bates understands the core of madness, she gets its edge, mines its black humor, goes to extremes. She’s so good, she also got the Academy Award.

. “The Changeling” – Underrated. A fantastic haunted-house movie without the gore or the cheap thrills. George C. Scott brings gravitas; director Peter Medak brings a tense mood. A seance spectacle with a lone antique wheelchair fueled by a spirit determined to murder. A forgotten classic. An enduring favorite.

. “Motel Hell” – A drive-in staple when there were drive-ins. A motel owner with a cannibalistic penchant for turning his guests into smoked meats. Don’t eat the jerky. In the garden is a nasty buried secret. Onscreen is something more unsettling – Wolfman Jack in cameo. Love the pig’s head.

. “Psycho” (1960 version) – Janet Leigh in the shower, with a knife in her back, her torso, the palms of her hands. As in so many Hitchcock movies, an undercurrent of sleaze runs through the movie; it was startling for the times. Anthony Perkins is a timid bird slavishly beholden to his mother, he’s no caricature. His performance is a lark. Hitchcock exploited Leigh and made her a legend. Turns out she did well by that.

. “Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?” – Bette Davis as a former starlet turned raging, delusional drunk; her face is the horror. Joan Crawford is sister Blanche, wheelchair bound and terrified by Jane’s jealousy. Mind games uncoil. Dead birds and dead rats are served for dinner. Audiences are served a feast.

Christopher Smith is the Bangor Daily News film critic. His reviews appear Mondays and Fridays in Style, 5:30 p.m. Thursdays on WLBZ 2 Bangor and WCSH 6 Portland, and are archived at RottenTomatoes.com. He may be reached at BDNFilm1@aol.com.