Scary Movies: Behind the scenes Stories, Reviews, Biographies, Anecdotes, History and Lists

M. Wayne Cunningham is a past executive director of the Saskatchewan
Arts Board and the former director of Academic and Career Programs at
East Kootenay Community College.

A.S. Mott’s excellent compendium of everything a reader might want to
know about fright-filled flicks is an essential purchase for anyone
interested in the genre and the sub-genres the author creates (e.g., the
misfits, hackers and slashers, black humourists, and the evil dead).

While individual readers might quibble with Mott’s assessment of
where to place a particular film on a scale of fright factors, everyone
will agree he has done a masterful job of including references to
everything from An American Werewolf in Paris to The Wolf Man. As well
as mentioning and often commenting on hundreds of films such as Invasion
of the Body Snatchers, Scream, and The Fly, and assessing some of them
(like the Canadian production Ginger Snaps) as “Good” and others
(like Silver Bullet) as “Not-So-Good,” Mott provides lengthy
critiques of horror classics like Psycho and A Nightmare on Elm Street.
Masters of the genre, including directors Alfred Hitchcock, Wes Craven,
and Canada’s own David Cronenberg, receive their fair share of
Mott’s scary-movie spotlight as well.

Compiled by an erudite reviewer who obviously enjoys the genre, Scary
Movies is what nightmares are all about.