HORROR TEN SPOT: Top 10 Be4 They Were Stars

Last Updated on August 3, 2021

Well here we are, the first Top 10 of 2008. I’ve decided to go the inspirational route this time and take a look at where some of our biggest stars came from genre-wise. As you’ll see, no one no matter how big a star manages to avoid having a few skeletons in the closet.

So as you work on your resolutions for 2008 – whether it’s completing that new screenplay, getting a role in a movie that’s not financed by your best friend with free passes to the AMC that he snagged while working projection there, or just getting your gf/bf to finally love giving head – remember that all big achievements started out as crazy dreams and lofty goals.

So get out there and do that thing that you’ve been wanting to do. It’s a new year a’comin’. What better reason do you need? For the holidays make sure to be safe ’cause I know ya’ll won’t be good 😉 And Spit Bullets on your plans and resolutions. We wanna know!

1. Brad Pitt, CUTTING CLASS

What?! Tyler Durden was in an 80’s slasher? Yep. CUTTING CLASS presents the perfect example of what this list is all about. The movie is a throw away slasher, but is entertainingly bad so you don’t have to suffer through it. And Pitt is the male lead so you get plenty of his surprisingly high pitched voice (his balls hadn’t dropped yet I guess). On top of that his performance is full of scenery chewing and all the manic over-gesturing that led him to take on semi-psycho roles until he got it under control. A true pleasure from start to finish for BTWS fans!

2. Leonardo DiCaprio, CRITTERS 3

TITANIC heartthrob DiCaprio is best remembered as causing a splash with the double barrel of THIS BOY’S LIFE and WHAT’S EATING GILBERT GRAPE. It is well deserved praise, but that doesn’t mean he couldn’t pay some dues in the most execrable of the CRITTERS movies (which let’s be honest, takes some effort). If Leo had just done a little bit poorer job in the flick then he mighta had a chance at Numero Uno on this list. Sadly, he manages to showcase he’s got talent, even in one of the most excruciating genre watches of all time.

3. Phillip Seymour Hoffman, MY BOYFRIEND’S BACK

This flick is more of a comedy than a horror movie, but it does revolve around a zombie. Better than that it has Phillip Hoffman, no Seymour yet, as a psychotic bully who mostly acts semi-retarded and checks out by whacking himself with an axe. Just. Plain. Awesome. Another bonus is that the film is a helluva good time. One of my all time favorite relatively obscure flicks.

4. Kevin Bacon, FRIDAY THE 13TH

The only downside to Kevin Bacon’s momentary status as non-corpse in the original FRIDAY THE 13TH is that you’re getting no help in your 6 Degrees of Kevin Bacon game from this movie. That’s not to say he makes a big impression with his performance, in fact given his skill on celluloid now it’s a pretty amusing look into how far his skill has come along. Still, his death is my favorite in the film, and guarantees I will never lay down in a camp bed without looking under it first!

5. Jennifer Aniston, LEPRECHAUN

The best part of this movie by far is seeing Aniston with her pre-Friends nose. It was a running joke on that show, but there’s no question that she would not have the career she has today without getting that honker realigned. I leave the relative merits of that truth to ya’ll to discuss. She’s actually not too bad in the flick, although her performance makes it clear why she wasn’t getting better offers at the time.

6. George Clooney, RETURN TO HORROR HIGH

Don’t let those crafty marketers fool you. George is NOT the star of this movie. He barely stays alive long enough to qualify as a glorified cameo, but anytime a legit megastar shows up in a cheesy 80’s slasher and gets killed, it’s worth checking out. It’s also worth noting that watching this film will cause the viewer to ask serious questions about why exactly SCREAM was considered so original.

8. & 7. Matthew McConaughey/Renee Zellweger, TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE: THE NEXT GENERATION

Twofer baby! In one corner we’ve got The Mac as psychotic remote-controlled leg bearing Wilmer. His challenger is mistress squinty-eye as a tenacious victim. Finding two performers who have become box office gold in such an affront to genre filmmaking is always a delicious treat. It’s not quite as cool a find since both McConaughey and Zellweger handle themselves well, thus depriving us of the enjoyment of a truly bad performance, but at the same time they effectively create the only reason to suffer through this piece of shite (especially Matt).

9. Jessica Alba, IDLE HANDS

Alba’s deliciously dim character in this movie manages to establish two key truths – 1) Alba will not get nude, even in a movie that absolutely demands it, until she ceases to be so f*cking hot that people stop putting up with her prissy denials; 2) Girls really want an aggressive kinky guy who takes what he wants in the bedroom (at least that’s what I chose to take from it). This was many people’s first exposure to Jessica’s outstanding brand of gorgeousity, so when you take this and DARK ANGEL into account, the world really owes us genre fans a debt for discovering their favorite hard body.

10. Angela Bassett, CRITTERS 4

Before she took a beating as the iconic Tina Turner, Bassett threw down with those furry little tumbleweeds of toothy genre mayhem the Critters. What’s most notable about this is how little impression her performance leaves. Neither terrible nor showcasing the fire we’d see in her later career, this role kind of floats along like the space station it’s set on.