Marty Michaels

The first movie monster I can remember being scared of is Pinhead from Hellraiser. I never saw Hellraiser back i the day, but just the image of Pinhead on the poster put the shits right up me. I was born in ’85, so I missed all of these films on their first run, but most of them have become classics. There was less subtlety going on when it came to taglineage in the eighties than in the seventies, but there were still some belters so let’s take a look at the top ten eighties horror movie taglines. Onward!

10. Jaws: The Revenge (1987): “This time it’s personal.”

For sheer ridiculosity, the infamous Jaws 4 tagline kickstarts our list. “This time it’s personal?” Isn’t this a film about a friggin’ fish? How can a bloody fish hold a grudge? Of course, the sensible conclusion is that the tagline refers to the Brody family, not the shark, but that’s no fun. That said, in the film, the shark follows Ellen Brody’s plane from Amity to the Bahamas, so maybe the tag does refer to the shark after all.

9. The Prey (1984): “It’s not human, and it’s got an axe!”

Bullshit. As anyone who’s sat through this craptastic movie can tell you, the killer IS human and only uses an axe once, but when the tagline is this awesome, does it really matter? Of course not – as long as it got bums in seats, who the hell cares?

8. Night of the Demons (1988): “Angela is having a party. Jason and Freddy are too afraid to come, but you’ll have a hell of a time.”

Proof positive that horror movies were doing the self referential thing long before Scream, the tagline for Night of the Demons always makes me smile. The film itself is a pretty standard tits n’ gore affair which was remade not long ago with Shannon Elizabeth and Edward “what happened to my career?” Furlong but it – quite predictably – flopped.

7. The Evil Dead (1981): “The ultimate experience in gruelling terror!”

A tagline every bit as over the top and gloriously excessive as the film it was advertising, the first Evil Dead movie doesn’t exactly live up to the hype, but it’s still a great, if a little slow to start, movie. I almost typed “the film that made a star out of Bruce Campbell” but I think, “the film that made a cult icon out of Bruce Campbell” is more appropriate, The Evil Dead remains a fantasticaly creative debut from Sam Spider-Man Raimi.

6. Polergeist (1982): “They’re here.”

Right, first things first, I don’t like the movie Poltergeist. It starts off promisingly enough, but it all gets a bit sweet and cutesy with midget mediums and that whole sequence with the ghosts coming down the stairs.  Plus, the amount of product placement makes it seem like one long advert for Star Wars.  Tobe Hooper hasn’t made a good movie since his first and comparing that to this, I can’t bring myself to believe he had much say in the direction of Poltergeist. It feels much more like a Speilberg movie than something from the director of Texas Chain Saw. That said, the tagline’s a classic, working on much the same level as Halloween‘s.

5. Nightmare on Elm Street (1984): “If Nancy doesn’t wake up screaming, she won’t wake up at all.”

At our movie nights, my mates and I are currently working our way though the Nightmare on Elm Street series. We’re at number five at the moment and so far my favorites have been one and three. Two has a wierd subtext (if you’ve seen it you’ll know what I mean) and four is, well it’s ok, I suppose. Anyway, the tagline for the original tells you everything you need to know about the film you’re going to see and sums up the movie’s atmosphere of uneasiness perfectly.

4. Hellraiser (1987): “He’ll tear your soul apart.”

Speaking of movie nights, our host James “glory hole” Boyd (sorry mate) is a huge fan of the Hellraiser franchise and it’s easy to see why. The Cenobites, especially Pinhead, are some of the coolest and most scary horror characters ever. The best thing about the Hellraiser tagline though is the implication that Pinhead is a new kind of monster – previous guys would tear your body apart, but this guy’ll tear your fuckin’ soul apart.

3. The Thing (1982): “Man is the warmest place to hide.”

It’s not a warning, it’s not a threat, it’s a statement of fact which hints at the suggestion that, should the Thing decide to hide in you, there’s not going to be a very great deal you can do about it. John Carpenter’s best film (for my money) and one of the few remakes to surpass the original, there’s talk of a prequel coming out in the near future. Dunno how true that is, but if a prequel does come out, there’s no way it’ll have a tagline half as good as this.

2. Re-Animator (1985): “Herbert West has a good head on his shoulders… and another one on his desk.”

The best taglines reflect the film they’re advertising and this is one of the very best – as darkly comedic as the film itself. This tagline reminds me of the It’s Alive tagline in that it’s more like a sick joke than a peice of horror movie advertising. The 1990 sequel Bride of Re-Animator had a great tagline too: “Date. Mate. Re-Animate.” Brilliance.

1. The Fly (1986): “Be afraid. Be very afraid.”

Is it just me, or does the poster for The Fly remind you of the poster of Alien? In any case, “be afraid – be very afraid” is quite possibly the best tagline in any genre and in any decade. It’s so deceptivley simple and yet carries with it such a sense of impending dread that runs paralell to the feeling of inevitable doom that hangs over the film. Jeff Goldblum (another “is it just me:” does Goldblum remind anyone else of Adam West or am I alone here?) plays the titular character, but it is Geena Davis who delivers the line that was used on the poster. One of the most famous lines in movie history, I’ve heard the line from people who’ve never ever heard of, much less seen, The Fly. Classic stuff.

The nineties weren’t a great decade for horror so I don’t think we’ll be seeing a third part to this series, but I think the sheer volume of awesome the seventies and the eighties delivered more than makes up for it. No need for an honorable mentions list this time, but if you can think of any great eighties taglines I’ve missed, let me know. End transmission.

Tags: horror, monsters, movies, taglines, top ten