Latest scary flicks

October hits and all the horror films start growing request lists. People tend to get frustrated when they've thought of a title or two they'd like to pick up at the library only to find upon arrival that it's been checked out by someone else. With Halloween already on sale at stores and on television, it's not surprising that everyone's thinking it's time for something scary to watch.

In an effort to assist you in getting spooked, here's a list of the horror/thriller DVDs that have come out in 2009 and are owned by the UFL.

Local highlights
Filmed locally by locals.

Garbage Man - Filmed locally as well as in Chicago around 15 years ago, this movie tells the story of a serial killer in Champaign who does what the voices tell him to do.
The Transient: The Movie - A short, 25 minute horror comedy about a homeless man and his social worker trying to stop Vampire Lincoln from "sucking the blood of four-score and seven virgins." Included on the disc is the also local, 30 minute University of Illinois vs. a Mummy (also available separately).

Remakes
Looking back, it seemed like there were a lot of remakes, but maybe that's because there were so many gravelly voice0ver, scream-filled advertisements.

Friday the 13th - The one with the killer in the hockey mask.
The Last House on the Left - The one with the parents who capture the group that attacked their daughter.
My Bloody Valentine - The one with the kids and the killer in mining gear.

Hauntings
There were some possessions, angry ghosts, and other supernatural business, too.

The Haunting in Connecticut - A haunted house and a possessed boy...and a scene that looks like vomiting in zero gravity. Win, win, win.
The Haunting of Molly Hartley - Having mom locked up in the mental ward should fix things, right?
Mirrors - A mirror-filled department store built on ground formerly occupied by a mental hospital in which a mass killing occurred is a good candidate for a haunting.
The Unborn - A young lady learns she had a twin who died in childbirth, and this may be the small boy who is now haunting her.
The Uninvited - Anna's been having haunted dreams since her mother died in the boathouse/home hospital and her mom's former nurse is now her stepmother.

Plagues
There were viruses that turned people into cannibal-zombie-like creatures.

Quarantine - A film crew tagging along with a fire department on a call gets quarantined while responding to a call to an apartment building, trapping them with the infected.
[Rec] - The original film from Spain that inspired the aforementioned Quarantine.
Splinter - A young couple and an escaped convict are trapped in a gas station, trying to avoid catching the zombification parasite.

Evil that people do
Some movies are scarier because the plot seems plausible.

Alien Raiders - A militant group storms a grocery store, killing some people there and holding the rest hostage, claiming that they're stopping an alien attack.
Baghead - Four writers in a cabin try to write the scariest movie imaginable, while their imagined scenes become reality.
Let the Right One In - Okay, vampires aren't plausible, but it's the human characters, especially the Stephen Kingesque bullies, that drive the tension in this film. Oh, and our copies all have the good, theatrical subtitles.
Night Train - Three strangers on a train find a body and some diamonds, ditch the body and split the spoils, and then suspect one another of reneging on the deal.
Obsessed - A successful, monogamously married guy meets an attractive temp at work who will stop at nothing to get him.
Repo! The Genetic Opera -In the future, organ failure is common, and if recipients fail to pay their dues to Geneco, the repo man comes.
Sick Girl - An orphaned rural girl takes hostage the bullies who pick on her younger brother and subjects them to physical and psychological torture.

Coming soon
We may not get some movies soon enough before Halloween to borrow them.

Drag me to hell (Oct. 13)
Orphan (Oct. 27)