80 All-Canadian Horror Movies: World of Terror

By Steve Hutchison

This book contains 80 descriptions of horror films reviewed and ranked by critic Steve Hutchison. Each description includes five ratings (stars, story, creativity, acting, quality), a synopsis and a review. All movies were produced exclusively by Canada. How many have you seen?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Steve Hutchison
• Release date: Feb 14, 2023
• ISBN: 9781778870644

Steve Hutchison

Artist, developer and entrepreneur in film, video games and communications Steve Hutchison co-founded Shade.ca Art and Code in 1999, then Terror.ca and its French equivalent Terreur.ca in 2000. With his background as an artist and integrator, Steve worked on such games as Capcom's Street Fighter, PopCap's Bejeweled, Tetris, Bandai/Namco's Pac-Man and Mattel's Skip-Bo & Phase 10 as a localization manager, 2-D artist and usability expert. Having acquired skills in gamification, he invented a unique horror movie review system that is filterable, searchable and sortable by moods, genres, subgenres and antagonists. Horror movie fans love it, and so do horror authors and filmmakers, as it is a great source of inspiration. In March 2013, Steve launched Tales of Terror, with the same goals in mind but with a much finer technology and a complex engine, something that wasn’t possible initially. He has since published countless horror-themed books.

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INTRODUCTION

This book contains 80 descriptions of horror films reviewed and ranked by critic Steve Hutchison. Each description includes five ratings (stars, story, creativity, acting, quality), a synopsis and a review. All movies were produced exclusively by Canada. How many have you seen?

Hello Mary Lou: Prom Night II

1987

The ghost of a prom queen terrorizes the students of a high school.

The first Prom Night was down to earth and wasn’t surreal the way Halloween was. It was a whodunit with a masked killer, but he was obviously human. Prom Night 2, as its name implies, takes place around prom night. This said, like 1976’s Carrie; another great prom night themed horror movie, this sequel contains a strong supernatural aspect crucial to the story.

Mary Lou Maloney is designed as a resilient and magical horror icon in the likes of Freddy Krueger, Pinhead or The Tall Man as a late attempt at generating a sustainable franchise. The new plot is unrelated to the original film’s and it hurts in no way. It is dark, gory, smart, sexy and kinky. It cleverly links the 80’s with the 50’s, two decades that aren’t so different when it comes to cinema.

Different generations of actors come together and all offer convincing performances. Everyone is cast to perfection, too. The writing and directing are not only irreproachable, but much above average for a genre film so much of its time. Prom Night 2 stands out most because it creates trends rather than surfing on the expected cliches and tropes instigated by previous horror successes.

Cube

1997

Amnesic strangers awaken in a three-dimensional booby-trapped maze.

Imagine an existential slasher where the murderers are the booby-trapped cubic rooms of a futuristic and potentially alien three-dimensional labyrinth. This larger than life horror take on Rubik’s cube works miracles with limited but brilliant production design that takes us out of our element and into a world of technology, traps, math, doubt, repetition, confusion and fear.

Much like its architecture, this science-fiction slasher feels like a game; like a puzzle. As such, it encourages its victim to think more than act if they want to survive. The different cubic rooms are trapped in imaginative ways to generate striking gore. The characters are amnesic and start in the cube. There is therefore little to no character exposition aside what pertains to the plot.

Cube is close to flawless. Considering its small budget, much like its heroes, the makers used their brain to come up with a gimmick that create both an illusion and a nameless subgenre that translates to puzzle horror. Only one room was used to shoot the whole maze. The illusion is seamless! This is a mystery, so expect more questions than answers. It’s part of the game...

Cube Zero

2004

A prison operator infiltrates the rigged labyrinth he controls to save a victim.

The little backstory and the few answers Cube 2: Hypercube provided led us to believe humans; possibly government officers, were nothing more than suited scientists of the future doing cervical experiments. Some might have felt Part 2 revealed too much and undershot the enigma. Cube: Zero, presumably a prequel, takes place in the rusty rooms and around the traps of a three-dimensional prototype.

What’s more, evil is given at least four faces. Two of them are compelling protagonists who set a fun tongue-in-cheek tone. They are the better part of the backstory we get; other bits going as far as imaging life outside the cube that should have ended up on the cutting room floor. We are fed too much detail about the fact this this one takes place in the future and in our world.

We care little for the people inside the maze since we already know how their story goes and ends. Zachary Bennett plays Eric, the most interesting and strongest character in the franchise. He is who we worry about. His arc is immense and his perspective on the mystery makes him the perfect protagonist of a smart, well-written sequel. Part 1 was great, Part 2 was good and Part 0 is a blast!

Ginger Snaps

2000

A teenager bitten by a werewolf undergoes slow metamorphosis.

To be terrifying, a werewolf movie needs to have its protagonist be afflicted by the curse and not be mere victim of the beast itself. Apprehending the transformation represents half the fear there is to be had in this subgenre and Ginger Snaps is excellent at it. It offers a teenage but not cute girly spin on the typical formula and goes as far as metaphorizing puberty in the werewolf equation.

The use of 3-D animation isn’t abusive and most of the good stuff relies on practical effects, fortunately. The visual are always frightening and lit just right, though more of the