Memorable, crazy movie

everything you have heard about this movie is true.

A Masterpiece!

It's funny watching the elements come together in this complicated scam. On one hand, the set-up isn't quite as complex as it seems, but there's an easy sense of fun in every exchange.

Back before "Scream", "Saw" torture porn and endless sequels became the norm in horror films, moviegoers were treated to legitimate, creative and well thought out scares and shocks when they wanted to see a scary movie. "Terror In The Aisles" is both a retrospective of that time, and the ultimate love letter to that genre. A documentary type film, hosted by Donald Pleasence (Halloween) and Nancy Allen (Dressed To Kill; Robocop) take us on a ninety minute guided tour of the horror film genre. Along the way, we get all the best parts of so many great horror films from the last half of the twentieth century. Since Pleasence is basically the host of this memory lane trip, "Halloween" is given ample exposure, but make no mistake: If it was a scary film from the 60's on through the mid 80's, it's represented here, in some form.No matter if it's Linda Blair barfing up pea soup from "The Exorcist", Jack Nicholson's iconic freak out in "The Shining" or David Naughton turning into a very scary werewolf from "American Werewolf In London", if you were young in the last half of the 20th century, you probably saw most of these films, you remember what made you jump, scream, have nightmares, and then laugh about it all later with your friends. And it's all here, in all their gory, creepy, grisly glory. Along the way, several themes are discussed: Why do we like scary movies? What really scares us? Are we afraid of evil monsters from space or from Hell, or are the monsters within our own minds and subconscience even scarier? As we go along, we get lots of nifty montages from similar types of horror films: people being killed, bad guys and monsters moving in for the kill, people running for their lives, sometimes escaping, sometimes not. From a film editing standpoint, "Terror In The Aisles" is the ultimate horror remix. We've seen all these clips before many times, but put together in this format, with this type of presentation, they feel fresh and exhilarating once again.Even films that weren't strictly classified as "horror", such as "Marathon Man" and "Nighthawks", still contained harrowing visual shocks and nerve wracking suspense so their inclusion into this potpourri of terror feels quite natural.And at the end of it all, you can appreciate just how carefully and skillfully the American film industry has cultivated the art of horror films through the decades.Great retrospective film! Check it out! (And with the lights out while you watch it, if you dare, hee hee hee...)

Documentaries about horror/ thriller movies are indeed my favorite subjects. I liked the selections this movie gave out. Donald Pleasance(1920-95) and Nancy Allen did a great job explaining the causes and effects of a thriller. Mr. Pleasance from the "Halloween" movies really showed some effects when he sees Jamie Lee Curtis' character attacked Michael Myers. Knowing your in that particular movie, you must expect to root for the hero/heroine. I liked the selection of movies they displayed: Friday The 13th, Alien, The Thing, Ms. 45, Halloween, and many others to mention. This reference movie was very helpful, though I couldn't name every movie that they sampled it was very useful to know what they are. I also like the part where they did some archival footage of Alfred Hitchcock. He IS the master of suspense! Horror and thriller movies wouldn't be the same without him. Despite being a documentary, people should have the understand of horror, and there will be less nightmares when leave the theater, or go to sleep at night. Hey, horror movies don't faze me! Rating 4.5 out of 5 stars!

Horror film fans should be sure to check out this hard to find semi-documentary, Terror in the Aisles. Donald Pleasance and Nancy Allen explore many of the great moments in horror movie history (though most are archived footage of movies released by Universal Pictures, since they are the studio that released this movie). The movie is hosted inside a movie theater with Pleasance and Allen, both horror movie veterans (though Pleasance is more than Allen since he's appeared in nearly every Halloween movie), probing what it is about horror movies that audiences enjoy (perhaps we like the nightmares knowing they're only imaginary as Pleasance sullenly suggests) as well as some of the evolution of classic horror tales (such as Lon Chaney in Wolfman or the Hitchcock horror classics like Psycho and The Birds) into dazzling modern horror creations (like The Exorcist, Halloween, and Jaws). Basically, the movie is just a series of clips of great scenes from great Universal Picture horror films (and many emphasizing special effects in the genre more than anything else).For example, you see werewolf transformation scenes in Wolfman and the famous Rick Baker transformation in American Werewolf in London. You see the head explosion scene from Scanners (one of the best special effects sequences in a horror movie); the famous shower sequence and Norman Bates finale from the classic, Psycho; the nanny hanging sequence from The Omen; shark attacks from Jaws; those many awesome creature scenes from The Thing and Alien; Jack's crazed persona in The Shining; Carol Kane on the telephone in When a Stranger Calls; scenes from the 1970s remake of Invasion of the Body Snatchers; and many other scenes from some of the greatest horror movies ever made (except for The Brood and Alone in the Dark, those were pretty awful films). Although, the latter half of the movie isn't as good as the first, because the mood changes and you get a lot of archive footage from movies that aren't even of the horror genre. Scenes, for example, from the movie 'Vice Squad' (the movie with Wings Hauser as the crazy Texan who is beating up a female hostage in front of the cops); Nighthawks (a great cop thriller with Sylvester Stallone and Rutger Hauer, but certainly no horror movie); Marathon Man (yes, the "is it safe?" part with Lawrence Olivier is certainly creep city, but it is still only a thriller and not a horror movie); Klute; and so forth. So it isn't entirely about horror films (though I suppose that, judging by the title, it doesn't promise to be strictly about horror films). If you like horror and suspense movies or just want to see your favorite scenes from the classic titles, Terror in the Aisles is a good choice.

"Terror In The Aisles" is not a definitive compilation film of clips from terror movies,but it is still good.It contains a lot of interesting clips from movies,many of which are often famous terror movies.The film,however,has two main difficulties.One,the narration by Donald Pleasence and Nancy Allen rings flat. two,as famous as the different scenes from the movies mentioned often are,THEY ARE NOT SCARY out of the context of the original films that they are from.Almost anyone who has seen most of or all of the movies that these film clips are from will have a lot of fun recognizing what scenes are from what movies,especially before the names of those movies are mentioned in the closing credits to this film.Overall,"Terror In The Aisles" is a good movie,but it DOES HAVE ITS LIMITATIONS.I give this movie a rating of 6/10.