66 All-Canadian Horror Movies: World of Terror

By Steve Hutchison

This book contains 66 reviews of horror films written and ranked by critic and blogger Steve Hutchison. Each description includes five ratings (stars, story, creativity, acting, quality), a synopsis and a review. All 66 movies were produced exclusively by Canada. How many have you seen?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Steve Hutchison
• Release date: May 7, 2023
• ISBN: 9781778872549

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.

Book preview

WorldOfTerror2019_AllCanadianHorrorMovies_Cover.jpg

Tales of Terror’s

World of Terror 2019

66 All-Canadian Horror Movies

INTRODUCTION

This book contains 66 reviews of horror films written and ranked by critic and blogger Steve Hutchison. Each description includes five ratings (stars, story, creativity, acting, quality), a synopsis and a review. All 66 movies were produced exclusively by Canada. How many have you seen?

#1

Ginger Snaps

2000

A teenager bitten by a werewolf undergoes slow metamorphosis.

Stars

7/8

STORY

6/8

CREATIVITY

6/8

ACTING

7/8

QUALITY

7/8

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 beast should have been shown. The film looks good but can’t afford showing it all. It would rather redeem itself with a strong script and performances that win you over, given character development is your thing.

Werewolves were never this sexy. Katharine Isabelle is a violent and sexualized version of 1985’s Teen Wolf’s coming of age rendition; proof that times have changed. Humor, sensuality and horror find a perfect balance in the hands of Karen Walton and John Fawcett who flesh out a tragic monster evolving from protagonist to antagonist over a few days and who can titillate us as well as scare us.

#2

Cube

1997

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

Stars

7/8

STORY

5/8

CREATIVITY

8/8

ACTING

6/8

QUALITY

7/8

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...

#3

The Peanut Butter Solution

1985

A boy gone bald uses a magic recipe given to him by ghosts to grow back his hair.

Stars

7/8

STORY

5/8

CREATIVITY

8/8

ACTING

6/8

QUALITY

6/8

The Peanut Butter Solution is the ideal gateway to horror movies for children. It is fun, it is dramatic, but, first and foremost, it is creepy as hell. There is no violence. There is no gore. The movie draws on children’s greatest fears, but adults can definitely relate. This is a complicated story with more subplots than the brain can handle, so you’ll pick up new details upon rewatching

Where to start? This one is hard to summarize, but here we go: a mad art teacher kidnaps children, makes them his slaves, and paints with magic brushes made from the ever-growing hair of a boy who’s used a peanut butter recipe on his bald head after he’s been scared by ghosts inside an abandoned house. Yes, it is as complicated as it sounds, and it’s perfect this way!

The score is amazing. It is very immersive. It is overdramatic, sure, but it gives the film gravitas. It makes the simplest scene feel like a nightmare. The kids’ investigation is a gaping plot hole.