Aside from mentioning that I Saw the Devil was my favorite horror movie this year I’m going to stick to only clown-themed movies since that was my 2011 focal point. I expected to see some genuine attempts to tap into coulrophobia the way that Clownhouse did so seemingly effortlessly. Alas, many of the psychos turned out to be nothing more than textbook slashers who happened to wear face paint and baggy pants.
Nevertheless, let’s take a look at the nominees!
1) Cheezo the Clown (Clownhouse)
2) Horny the Clown (Drive-Thru)
3) unidentified band member from "The Clowns" (Terror on Tour)
4) Buster the Clown (We All Scream For Ice Cream)
5) The Marvelous Mervo (Blood Feast)
6) Shivers the Clown (Fear of Clowns)
7) dystopian future clown (Let's Visit the World of the Future)
8) giant monster clown (Killer Klowns From Outer Space)
9) Flappy the Clown (Vulgar)
10) Punchy the Clown (Final Draft)
11) Gurdy the Clown (100 Tears)
12) Mr. Jiggles (Mr. Jiggles)
13) clown that 50P said looks like Carrot Top (House of Fears)
14) Dissecto the Clown (Torment)
15) Pennywise the Dancing Clown (It)
16) useless clown (The Clown Murders)
And now for the (slightly modified) categories:
Scariest Clown: Cheezo the Clown (Clownhouse)
Best Looking Clown: Punchy the Clown (Final Draft) I didn’t expect to rank the “hobo clown” the classiest of the bunch but how could I deny that handsome bastard?
Most Badass Clown: Gurdy the Clown (100 Tears). Hand Gurdy his trusty meat cleaver and he’ll chop all of the other clowns to pieces faster than you can throw a pie.
Lamest Evil Clown: The clown from The Clown Murders belongs on a cereal box and Mr. Jiggles was appallingly lame but I have to award this one to Tiny Tim’s Marvelous Mervo in Blood Harvest simply because he had zero kills.
Hidden Gem: Let's Visit the World of the Future
Most Memorable Clown Kill: Pennywise luring sweet little George into the storm drain in Stephen King’s It.
Worst Clown Movie (Ever): Mr. Jingles - I simply don’t know how or why this movie was made. Nobody involved seemed to give two clown shits about it so why bother filming in the first place?
Overall Best Evil Clown Movie Out There: The only films I’d actually recommend are Stephen King’s It, Clownhouse, Let’s Visit the World of the Future and 100 Tears. Out of these I crown 100 Tears the king of killer clown movies. I loved it so much that I watched it 5 times, once with commentary!
Conclusion: I sifted through a lot of crap but I’d like to think that the whole experiment taught me a thing or two about life. For one thing I learned that while evil clowns such as the Joker made their mark in the past, the killer clown movie genre did not really exist until 2006-2008 when it suddenly and inexplicably became a “thing”. I also learned that… actually I didn't learn anything at all and probably forgot some important things along the way. Still I regret nothing!
As we’re nearing December I find myself going through evil clown withdrawal, so much so that I rented Shakes the Clown last week. It’s not a horror movie but it is a hoot, mainly because of its amusing take on clown culture. Did you know that the mime is the natural enemy of the clown?
0 comments:
Post a Comment