Why Rob Zombie’s Movie ’31’ Matters [Spoiler Free]

I am very easily entertained. Let's just get that right out. I don't spend a lot of time looking for artist statements or even plot holes in movies. I look to relax and be told a story for 90 odd minutes. I found Rob Zombies new movie to be a perfect movie for horror fans.

I was fortunate to grow up in the day of Freddy, Michael, Jason, Chucky, Pinhead and even lesser movie monsters like Horace Pinker or Pumpkin Head. I often wondered, why there aren't more great horror villains. We've had few like Victor Crowley and The Creeper, but the last big ones were really Biilly & Jigsaw from "Saw" and The Ghostface Killer from Scream, both with their last installments about six years ago. Efforts to relaunch some of the classic characters were big failures too. Now, leave it Rob Zombie to give us "Doom-Head". Let's also not forget that "Doom-Head" is actually a "hired killer" and if he wanted, Zombie could make sequels forever featuring "Doom-Head" or other killers hired by the puppet masters who put on the game of "31".

Let's also look at how Zombie made this film. He filmed it all in 20 days. It was done with a really low budget and with crowd funding. Basically Rob Zombie's fans made this movie for themselves. Zombie could just play this movie on a screen behind him when he does his live show and it would be awesome.

Zombie uses a recognizable, but cool stable of actors. E.G. Daily was "Dottie" in "Pee-Wee's Big Adventure". Laurence Hilton Jacobs was on "Welcome Back Kotter", Malcom McDowell has been in roughly one billion movies and t.v. shows, and best of all is Richard Brake. Brake, who is also currently on this season of Ray Donavan is so incredibly intense, he's hard to take your eyes off of when he's onscreen. Almost everyone who sees this film thinks the same thing "this guy should've been the Joker" (Trivia-Brake was the guy who killed Bruce Wayne's parents in Barman Begins). This guy is really crazy scary.

So we have good performances, a breakout star, a straight ahead story, all put together for us horror fans in a manner that could mean a steady supply of horror films. Sure, Zombie will probably not follow this story up, but it's a lesson; we don't need the big budgets of stuff like "The Conjuring" to be entertained. We can support these "basic" films. Let's also not forget the film has a cool soundtrack of rock songs and background music by Zombie and John 5 to up the tension.

What happens to this movie after the one night only Fathom Events showing is a bit of a mystery. I guess it's going to play on some smaller screens then eventually hit d.v.d.  All of that is a bit of a shame. I wish some theater chain would recognize the value of a good slasher movie with Halloween season coming up. It's no matter, I saw it on the big screen and I'll be buying the d.v.d., even though I really don't buy d.v.d.s anymore.

Rob Zombies movies have never been marketed very well, then he dropped the cinematic deuce known as "Lords Of Salem" and that gives everyone in a Hollywood a chance to say "see we told you he's no good" and continue treating him like an outsider. It's my hope that Zombie will pick up a deal like Adam Sandler, and make direct to Netflix movies for a small but passionate crowd.