Soon it will be the most wonderful time of the year: Halloween. And how better to celebrate the best holiday of all than by indulging in a marathon of the most sickly twisted films ever to inspire guffaws. Horror and comedy go hand in hand. When confronted with our darkest fears sometimes the only proper response is laughter. As the old adage goes: now and then you have to laugh to keep from crying. The marriage of horror and comedy has never been an easy one. When stirring together two such potent ingredients the mixture must be just right; too much comedy will spoil the horror and vice versa. It's a rare feat for a director to get the perfect cocktail of chills and giggles. I present to you a list of ten films that united the outrageous excesses of horror and comedy to produce an unholy offspring of macabre farce. (Spoilers)
9. From Dusk Till Dawn
Two pulp masters, Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriquez, joined forces to bring this bizarre amalgam of comedy, noir and vampirism to the silver screen. Unfolding as a Getaway-style run from the law picture in its first hour, From Dusk Till Dawn suddenly morphs into a Night of the Living Dead-style horror-farce about a group of survivors barricading themselves inside a bar as they try to fend-off an onslaught of feral vampires. Tarantino's script and Rodriguez's direction pile on one outlandish detail after another from an undead Mariachi band using human bodies as guitars, to holy water filled Super Soakers exploding Nosferatu in clouds of viscera, to a codpiece revolver in the shape of a penis. The bait and switch of turning a crime thriller into an extreme horror comedy may turn off some viewers but if you're on the same wavelength as the mischievous filmmakers then From Dusk Till Dawn is a tongue-in-cheek blast.