By Melissa Antoinette Garza
Some people think of romantic films as the basic, nice boy meets nice girl; they break-up, and get back together. Jennifer Lopez, Renee Zellweger, and Reese Witherspoon films come to mind. My older sister drags me to those movies all the time. Some are okay but they’re all the same and they just don’t hold the punch that crazy romance movies do.
10) Psycho Part IV – Norman Bates is back and he’s having a baby! Poor Norman is still haunted by the thoughts of his mother. His wife tries her best to convince him that he’s not the same murderer he once was. He’s changed. Still, he slowly descends into madness and nearly kills his wife. In the end, Norman finds happiness.
9) Bride of Chucky – Chucky’s crazy and Jennifer Tilly’s character Tiff is a gorgeous homicidal maniac. Even as a doll, she’s gorgeous. I love her voice and she’s fun. Chucky’s sense of humor is perfect and his momentary lapses of softness towards Tiff are enough to make me root for them every time. I’m still hoping they do a prequel with Brad Dourif as Charles Lee Ray and Tilly of course as Tiff. I’d love to see their relationship when he was alive and well. Dourif happens to be one of my favorite actors. If anyone can get their hands on a copy of Horseplayer, you’ll never doubt his abilities. I know he’s done very popular things including Deadwood.
8) Catch and Release – This is probably the most conventional of all my picks yet still very underrated. It starts when Gray (Jennifer Garner) is having a funeral for her fiance. To escape all the people who continuously touch her, she finds the bathroom and sits in the bathtub. While she does her fiance’s friend Fritz (Timothy Olyphant) has sex with a coworker without knowing Gray’s sitting there. She becomes livid and tells him off. Soon, Gray finds out her fiancé cheated on her and Fritz stayed to help clean up the mess. Soon, Gray falls for Fritz despite her disliking him previously. They hide the relationship from everyone. Olyphant is so sexy. He needs to do more movies!
7) Bloodletting – Serena (Ariauna Albright) finds the man she believes is the serial killer who has killed her best friend. Rather than turn him in, she asks him to show her how to kill. Butch (James L. Edwards) readily admits he is the murderer and decides to show her how. The two go on a killing spree together. This is such an artistic and intelligent film; much more so than Natural Born Killers. NBK tries too hard to be artistic. It’s a great movie but it’s hard to get past the fact that the characters are complete assholes. Whereas in Bloodletting, Butch and Serena are a charming couple who happen to kill. It’s their level of ordinariness that makes the movie stand out so much. Matthew Jason Walsh is such an amazing writer. When I think of those that inspire me in my ventures and attempts at writing, he is most certainly on the list. The casting was terrific and the acting topknotch. If this isn’t in your collection it should be!
6) Phantom of the Opera – Phantom of the Opera is not underrated but it’s still going to be on my list because the ending has pissed me off for years. Lon Chaney is so great. I always root for the Phantom to get the girl…but No…..Christine runs away with Raoul. I hate that ending. It’s like in Pretty and Pink where Ducky was always there for Molly Ringwald’s character Andie, and she ended up running away with Blaine. Screw Blaine. He sucks. I wish that Raoul and Blaine ran away together leaving Christine and Andie alone and sad…and that the Phantom of the Opera got someone like 1980s Samantha Fox or Shakira. I’d like to see Christine when the Phantom is walking down the street with Shakira. I’m sure then she’d come running back….she’s a skank. Not that I’m bitter or anything.
5) Goodfellas – My husband doesn’t believe this is totally a romantic film…but hey I say it is. When Henry Hill (Sexy Ray Liotta) bashes the guy’s skull in with his gun 11 times and tells him “on my mother if you ever fucking touch her again and I’ll kill you” I thought it was sweet. He was defending her. Whenever a guy beats up another guy for treating his girl wrong, it’s great. Like, True Romance when Clarence (Christian Slater) kills Alabama’s (Patricia Arquette) pimp Drexyl (Gary Oldman) it was super romantic. I remember watching that when I was a kid and saying, “awwww..that’s sweet.”
4) Kingdom of the Vampire (1991) – This is another Matthew Jason Walsh film and in my opinion not only his best but one of the greatest movies ever. The more I watch this movie the more I love it. First the main character Jeff (Matthew Jason Walsh) is a lost soul who doesn’t know what to do. He’s a vampire who has a horrible mother that kills anyone including children to feed her habit. He falls for Nina (Shannon Doyle) who shares his feeling. The audience is able to experience one of the sweetest love stories as it unfolded.
3) Class of 1999 – Why isn’t this movie more popular? It’s fantastic! Cody Culp (Bradley Gregg) is a former gangbanger and drug addict who gets out of prison just as the schools are releasing three new teachers – all of which are secretly robots trained to push out discipline. Well it goes too far and the teachers start killing people and making it appear as though the gangs are doing it. Soon, the gangs turn on each other and when Cody’s younger brother is killed he demands to be jumped back in. During this, he falls for the principal’s daughter Christie (Traci Lind). She is almost raped outside the school and Cody jumps on her. There are several very sexy scenes despite the fact that they only kiss once. It’s very subtle and very sweet but sometimes less is more and this is proof of this fact.
2) Massacre at Central High – I was debating on whether to put Heathers here or Massacre at Central High as Heathers most certainly and liberally borrowed from this film. Nonetheless, Massacre is awesome. David (Derrel Maury) comes to a new school and sees that all the jocks and most of his classmates are scum…so he kills them. Any fictional character that kills bullies is A-OK with me. Well, he ends up almost bedding his best friend’s girlfriend but it’s in a very sweet way and he ends up turning her down though he really wants to have her. He becomes protective over her and does his best to ensure her safety even when he’s about to blow up the entire school.
1) Secretary – People complain about this film, left and right. They say that it is derogatory against women. They say that because their stupid. In the film, James Spader’s character Mr. Grey enjoys sadomasochism though he attempts to stop it believing it to be something to be ashamed of. Lee Holloway (Maggie Gyllenhaal) has just been released from a hospital for the criminally insane and instantly takes to Mr. Grey’s ways. She begins as a very mousy woman but finds freedom through his actions towards her. Soon, she’s in full control and demanding from him what he wants to stop. She helps him realize that what he enjoys isn’t wrong but instead a mere game that they play. It’s sexy and actually one of the few movies that understands feminism in the most truest and wonderful forms. On a side note, a few years back I threw a party called SpaderVasion because I have a massive celebrity crush on James Spader…so much so that I knowingly talked to someone impersonating James Spader online and corrected the misinformation they had on him.
