Scary Movie Mania

Australia’s 2016 ‘Stranger With My Face’ International Film Fest Now Accepting Submissions

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 03 Dec 2015 04:57:00 +0000

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Australia’s 2016 ‘Stranger With My Face’ International Film Fest Now Accepting Submissions

Tasmania based female-centric film fest launches call for submissions.

Lurking within the darkest corners of Tasmania, a gaggle of movie-minded cineastes are currently plotting and planning for the 2016 Stranger With My Face International Film Festival, an edgy horror fest that focuses primarily on films made by emerging female artists. SWMF derives its name from the novel by young adult author Lois Duncan and is the brainchild of Australian filmmakers Briony Kidd and Rebecca Thomson.

And though the SWMF team skipped this year, they’re back with a bloody vengeance and grim purpose; today, they just announced their first call for submissions. The call is open, with both feature length and short films made after January 1, 2015 eligible for consideration. The festival takes a broad approach to horror, with dark fantasy, Gothic melodrama, horror comedy, dystopian sci-fi, animation, documentary and experimental hybrids all qualifying for the selective festival lineup.

“There’s a great awareness right now that women are underrepresented in the film industry and audiences are hungry for female-driven stories,” says Festival Director Kidd. “Combine that with the innovation characteristic of the indie horror scene currently, and we’re seeing an explosion of female genre talent that makes Stranger With My Face more relevant than ever.”

A new addition to the festival team this year is longtime genre film programmer and writer Kier-La Janisse, author of the film memoir, HOUSE OF PSYCHOTIC WOMEN. Janisse is serving a residency with Stranger With My Face until July 2016. “Stranger With My Face is a brilliantly-curated festival and I wanted to be a part of the enormous potential I saw here,” says Janisse. “With so many gutsy female-centric genre films in recent years, this is a very exciting place to be.”

For submission guidelines and more festival info visit the official SWMF site.

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Top 10 Twisted Tales From Author Chuck Palahniuk

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Wed, 02 Dec 2015 22:57:00 +0000

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Top 10 Twisted Tales From Author Chuck Palahniuk

SHOCK looks at the ten most perverse books in the Chuck Palahniuk pantheon.

Celebrating the success of author Chuck Palahniuk’s FIGHT CLUB 2 graphic novel, out now from Darkhorse,earlier this year, SHOCK felt inspired to take a look at the weirder work of one of this generation’s most prolific and controversial writers. Palahniuk is a writing machine, with 17 novels already under his belt since 1996. He’s famously known for his “transgressive fiction” (his self declared style) and literary works that push societal buttons, but in a very intelligent and humorous way…

So strap yourself in as we eagerly serve up our Top Ten Twisted Tales from the brilliant madman, Chuck Palahniuk:

10. PYGMY

In the tradition of Anthony Burgess' A CLOCKWORK ORANGE, PYGMY utilizes its own dialect in presenting the narrative, just like the Droogs did in Burgess' book. It's a tale of terrorism masterminded by a teenage exchange student sleeper agent nicknamed Pygmy for his pint size. Insane Palahniuk at his best.

9. SURVIVOR

This is a good old fashion, feel good tale, one that revolves around a survivor of a fanatical cult named Tender Branson and his steady rise to fame. Branson is forged by the corporate world to become our next messiah.a new age Jesus Christ. Shockingly funny stuff!

8. BEAUTIFUL YOU

One of Palahniuk's most recent entries is a gushing sensation; what could be more terrifying than a sexual apocalypse that could potentially render men a thing of the past? Imagine a world where dudes aren't getting any and women have replaced men with countless innovative sexual devices that turn them into zombie sex addicts; pure Palahniuk fun.

7. FIGHT CLUB

Project Mayhem, soap, Jack's raging bile duct…it doesn't get any more twisted or nihilistic than this. Chuck's tale of Tyler Durden and the unnamed narrator totally catapulted his career into an entirely new universe with maverick filmmaker David Fincher adapting it into a cult classic film. What are the rules of Fight Club, again?

6. SNUFF

This insane adventure sees aging porn queen Cameron Perrell trying to go out with a literal bang by attempting to the break the world record for the most copulations ever captured on film. Told from the point-of-view of several of the participants, including Cameron’s possible bastard child; a sinful Palahniuk classic.

5. RANT

The unconventional dystopian biography of Buster Rant Casey, a possible “patient zero”, is truly the stuff of nightmares. RANT’s tale unfolds and is explained by the characters who knew him both in the past and the future, creating a unique perspective and exemplifying creative storytelling.

4. LULLABY

Chuck's first true dabbling into the horror genre. Lullaby is a creepy narrative of a journalist named Carl Streator who sets out on a mission to destroy all written copies of a haunting lullaby that will kill the reader upon reading the deadly passage. A unique combination of horror and comedy that only Chuck can orchestrate.

3. DAMNED

Could easily be dubbed THE BREAKFAST CLUB in Hell. DAMNED is the demonically charged tale of suicide victim Madison Spencer and her band of afterlife buddies who are forever damned to Hell. Makes Dante’s INFERNO and PARADISE LOST seem like the Sunday funnies.

2. DOOMED

The highly anticipated sequel to DAMNED and the second part of a potential trilogy. DOOMED continues the insane adventures of Madison Spencer and her mission to command Satan's-and this time round, God’s-attention. Watch out for the scene charting Madison's experience in a crusty, road side, public bathroom with a horrendously grimy glory hole. Proceed with caution.

1. HAUNTED

This Palahniuk classic easily clinches our top spot . The novel deals with a Mary Shelley/Lord Byron inspired writers retreat weekend and is told through the 19 participating writers and their 23 short stories within stories that are horrifically funny. HAUNTED is a nasty gem, true-to-form Palahniuk and you'll never look at bowling balls, anatomically correct dolls and pool drains the same way. Once you’ve read HAUNTED, you can never unread it so be warned.

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New KRAMPUS Movie Featurette Hears Slay Bells Ringing

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Wed, 02 Dec 2015 19:42:00 +0000

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New KRAMPUS Movie Featurette Hears Slay Bells Ringing

The family that stays together gets slayed together in a new Krampus movie featurette

Universal Pictures and Legendary Pictures have just released a new featurette for Michael Dougherty’s Krampus movie featuring new footage from the horror comedy, which you can check out below!

The Krampus movie follows young Max (Emjay Anthony) who, after his dysfunctional familyclashes over the holidays, becomes disillusioned and turns his back on Christmas. Little does he know, this lack of festive spirit has unleashed the wrath of Krampus: a demonic force of ancient evil intent on punishing non-believers. All hell breaks loose as beloved holiday icons take on a monstrous life of their own, laying siege to the fractured family’s home and forcing them to fight for each other if they hope to survive.

Horror fans are likely already familiar with Doughterty’s flair for Holiday terror, as he made his feature film directing debut with the Halloween anthology Trick ‘r Treat. His Krampus movie boasts a cast that includes Adam Scott, Toni Collette, David Koechner, Allison Tolman, Conchata Ferrell, Stefania Lavie Owen and Krista Stadler.

For the film, Krampus and his mischievous underlings have been created by the combined efforts of Weta Workshop and Weta Digital, both renowned for their epic work on The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit trilogies and King Kong, among many others.

Written and directed by Dougherty, the Krampus movie is co-written by Zach Shields and Todd Casey and produced by Legendary’s Thomas Tull and Jon Jashni, Alex Garcia and Dougherty. The film will be released by Universal Pictures on December 4.

Krampus

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Blu-ray Review: FEAR THE WALKING DEAD Season One

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Wed, 02 Dec 2015 16:45:00 +0000

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Blu-ray Review: FEAR THE WALKING DEAD Season One

SHOCK reviews the first season of AMC’s FEAR THE WALKING DEAD on Blu-ray.

FEAR THE WALKING DEAD was a nice surprise.

When AMC announced that they would be birthing a flesh-ripping sibling to their flagship series THE WALKING DEAD it sorta seemed like overkill. Wasn’t one epic long-form, undead apocalypse narrative enough? How much further could they go? What new humans vs. zombies arc could they possibly etch? Indeed, the idea of FEAR seemed like a case of singing the same song, albeit one performed as a cash-grabbing cover version.

Of course, if you caught the show in its initial run this past summer, you know that such cynicism was unwarranted. In fact, FEAR THE WALKING DEAD is an incredibly sophisticated, innovative show, one that takes co-creator Robert Kirkman’s Romero-informed formula of putting people first and ghoul gore second and then steers it into new, nerve-shredding, territory.

The series dials back the clock to the early stages of the “walker” outbreak, events that take place during the point in which TWD’s hero Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoln) was locked into his coma. Instead of trotting out its horrors in the sweaty city streets and back woods of Atlanta, FEAR follows a pack of survivors living in the sun-scorched urban decay of LA, an ideal backdrop to illustrate the collapse of society. Our point of entry into the story is high school guidance counselor Madison (GONE GIRL’s Kim Dickens), a tough single mom now shacked up in a blended family with her boyfriend Travis (Cliff Curtis), daughter Alicia (Alycia Debnam-Carey) and troubled, junkie son Nick (Nick Dillane, a ringer for a young Johnny Depp). When Nick is almost killed by a ghouli-ified junkie in a squatter’s shoot-up dive, he escapes and is immediately hit by a car. Rushed to hospital, the teen tries in vain to convince his mother and others that something is wrong, though the obviously battered matriarch chalks his ravings up to his now unmanageable addictions.

Meanwhile, slowly, surely, the world starts to break down and eventually both Madison and Travis become believers. Travis breaks away to rescue his own son and ex-wife and , after a series of truly harrowing encounters with both the living dead and frenzied inner-city rioters, the clan is reunited in a military safe zone. Of course, as the “protected” residents soon discover, there is no safe zone in this new world, one that propels without rule and mirrored by murder.

First of all FEAR has a radically different look. It’s beautifully shot by Michael McDonough, every day-lit scene looking like a hazy, sun-soaked LA noir. And where THE WALKING DEAD functions as a quasi-western, FEAR THE WALKING DEAD is very much an urgent thriller. The cadence of the dialogue is snappy, the punishing electronic soundtrack by Paul Haslinger, creates an atmosphere of consistent paranoia and stress. And having a female stand as the central hero, especially one played by such an appealing and complex performer as Dickens, is a real coup and adds a kind of vulnerable gravitas to the story.

In many respects, FEAR ‘s first season is superior to TWD’s first two seasons in that it isn’t chained to a direct source material and has the freedom to find its own legs and be its own beast, which it most certainly is. The audience never knows quite where the narrative is leading, resulting in many surprises, shocks and bizarre twists. It’s a confident first round and moves with purpose, deftly balancing the horror of a world breaking down, with carefully ladled out doses of the expected graphic gore and KNB-fuelled zombie shock effects.

Watching the entire season on Blu-ray in a binge, as this critic did, one feels like they’ve seen a fully realized, 8-hour long feature film, one that has both closure to leave the viewer satisfied and yet has enough open ends to keep us on edge for the impending second round.

Anchor Bay’s 2 disc release looks and sounds magnificent but is virtually bereft of substantial extras of any kind, save for a double shot of EPK “making-of” talking head reels. But with all the endless press, blogging and assorted spoiler-doling found all over the internet anyway, it’s rather nice to have a simple, elegant package that leaves the art as is.

Highly recommended.

The post Blu-ray Review: FEAR THE WALKING DEAD Season One appeared first on Shock Till You Drop.

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TV Recap: SCREAM QUEENS Episode 11: ‘Black Friday’

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Wed, 02 Dec 2015 13:39:00 +0000

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TV Recap: SCREAM QUEENS Episode 11: ‘Black Friday’

SHOCK recaps the 11th round of TV’s SCREAM QUEENS.

It’s Chanel’s second favorite holiday: Black Friday. She likes buying cheap trinkets as gifts for her friends, and bribing stock boys to let her into stores a half hour before they open so that the deal hunters lined up outside become enraged when she buys all the doorbusters. The dean isn’t happy that the Chanels are leaving Kappa house to go shopping. But while they do that, Wes, Grace, and Pete go down to the police station to report Gigi’s head turning up on their table, but the detective can’t be bothered. The entire police force, including the chief of police, has been fired due to gross incompetence.

At the mall, the Chanels are oblivious to the fact that they are literally the last people there. The lights go out and they discover all the doors are locked from the outside. The Red Devil is there, stalking them. The girls run and see a loading gate left just a little bit open. The girls slide through it, all but Chanel. She decides as Kappa president, it is her job to stand up to the Devil. So she does, taunting him. The Devil doesn’t care for this and shoots her in the shoulder with a crossbow. Chanel doesn’t stop her taunts, even as she tries desperately to crawl away, and the Devil reloads for another shot. Denise comes running in, announcing that she is the new chief of police and yammers on about nothing while the Devil shoots one of her officers dead and makes his escape.

This incompetence idea is, well, utterly incompetent. In what scenario, on what planet, is an entire police force fired? The police unions are way too strong for that to happen. And in what galaxy is Denise more competent than anyone else on that force? The whole thing is so beyond stupid it makes my teeth hurt. In a season full of stupidity, this one really bothered me.

Anyway, the girls all regroup at the Kappa House, and Chanel thinks it is clear that the dean is the Red Devil and decides they need to kill her. Zayday is a strong holdout, but Grace is on Chanel’s side. She gives another one of her ridiculous sisterhood speeches and the two girls decide they need to poison the dean.

Grace and Chanel visit the dean at her home and the girls concoct a story, asking the dean to teach them how to be more effective feminists. It is nonsense, but the dean bites and starts talking about her internship at Ms. magazine and other assorted nonsense. They toast over mason jars of homemade apple cider (the dean’s favorite drink) that they dosed with a whole bottle of puffer fish poison. Despite it being enough to kill three men, the poison cider doesn’t slow down the dean.

Chad calls a meeting of the Dicky Dollars, but he is the only one still alive. Pete is there because this meeting is the reading of Boone’s will, and he left everything to Pete. Chad thinks they were secret lovers, and Pete admits the truth: Boone was his source in the Greek system. Pete had tried to pledge the Dollars the year before, with the same nonsense of brotherhood that Grace has about her own sorority, but he was roundly refused. Chad invites Pete to join now, because “any secret friend of Boone’s is a friend of mine.” Pete declines, which according to the rules means that he and Chad must duel to the death. Pete leaves, which Chad tells him is a forfeit of his life. “You will get murdered to death!” he yells after him.

Grace goes to Pete and rants about how her first attempt at killing the dean failed. She promises she is killing to stop more killing, but he doesn’t want her to do it – he doesn’t believe she is a killer. He has to “tell her something:” Chad’s invite to join the Dollars. But he doesn’t need that; all he needs is his work and Grace. He says he loves her and wants to have sex with her, but she isn’t in the right headspace. He agrees she is worth the wait. Apparently Grace is a virgin.

Chanel holds another Kappa meeting, freaking out that the dean didn’t die and looking for a Plan B. Grace decides she no longer thinks it is a good idea to kill the dean, which angers Chanel and she decides to kick Grace out of Kappa. Grace expects Zayday to come with her, but she doesn’t. Now she thinks that killing the dean is a good idea.

Grace storms out and goes home, where she finds Wes… with Pete. They are going over the info they were able to find on Gigi. It turns out that Gigi’s real name was Jess Meyer. Her sister, Amy, was the girl who took the bathtub babies, but a few months later, she killed herself. Gigi took over care of the kids, but had a nervous breakdown and they all went to the institution. She raised the kids to be killers in order to get revenge. Pete leaves, and Grace asks her dad for sex advice. It turns into a damned after school special. Pete goes back to his dorm and is packing when he gets a call. He tells the unidentified caller that he is leaving campus and he feels guilty and doesn’t want to be part of this. He warns the person never to call again.

Meanwhile, the Chanels and Zayday take the dean to the cryo-sauna (basically a sauna that freezes you). The dean goes first and steps into the chamber, which is cranked down to -220 degrees. The girls watch the door to make sure staff doesn’t come in, and they leave the dean in the chamber for nearly a half-hour. When they open it back up, they are shocked to find the dean – frozen and covered in icicles – alive and feeling great.

Chanel is beside herself. She has failed twice to kill the dean. After letting the minions give their asinine theories as to how the dean survived, Chanel has a new plan. She gives her minions their Christmas presents, smartphones that light up on the edge. When she calls they will get a red notification light. This means they are to meet Chanel and the dean at the pool, where they will drown the dean. Unfortunately, when Chanel sends out her notification, her minions are arguing with a retail clerk and totally miss the call. Chanel is alone when the dean comes to the pool, and she has to stumble through a terrible excuse about holding a lecture at the pool about feminism and bondage (to explain away the chains she brought) then go for a swim. The dean doesn’t buy this stupidity and leaves.

Grace goes back to Pete’s room and finds him anxious and out of breath. She doesn’t say anything because she is ready to have sex with him now. Pete pulls away uncomfortably, and Grace insists this is what she wants. “I don’t want your first time to be with a murderer,” he admits feebly.

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The Best Zombie Movie Ever Made? THE LIVING DEAD AT THE MANCHESTER MORGUE

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Wed, 02 Dec 2015 01:48:00 +0000

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The Best Zombie Movie Ever Made? THE LIVING DEAD AT THE MANCHESTER MORGUE

SHOCK resurrects Jorge Grau’s terrifying zombie thriller THE LIVING DEAD AT THE MANCHESTER MORGUE.

This in an essay about the living dead so, for the sake of space, let’s start our story in Pittsburgh, 1968, with that too-tall, goggle-eyed grandfather of American horror, George A. Romero…

Taking his cues from Matheson’s seminal 1954 vampire plague novella I AM LEGEND (‘I ripped him off!’ the writer/director unashamedly told me once), commercial /industrial filmmaker Romero’s first feature was a nightmarish, grainy, black and white tale of undead apocalypse; a gruesome story of the fresh dead inexplicably reviving and groping their grey-eyed way to cannibalize the living. That picture, NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD, would slowly shamble its way into horror history, becoming a critical and cult favorite, a staple at midnight screenings and a massive international hit, especially in Europe where it was heralded as a Grand Guignol arthouse masterpiece.

Enter filmmaker Jorge Grau, a young, experimental Spanish director who, along with an equally visionary, French New Wave inspired pack of bratty celluloid slingers (the likes which include THE BLOOD SPATTERED BRIDE helmer Vincente Aranda) was, at the time, being championed as the avant-garde future of the Spanish film industry. In the wake of Grau’s violent, sexual and historically accurate telling of the Elizabeth Bathory legend, 1973’s THE BLOODY COUNTESS, producer Edmondo Amati approached the filmmaker to direct a movie that would blatantly ride the box office coattails of the Romero picture, but add the more immediate dimension of dripping, full blooded color, replacing the gritty, cheap, shadowy expressionism of NIGHT with a more garish, pulpy and stomach churning pallet. Grau, swayed by a larger paycheck and the chance to film in England eagerly obliged, taking the rather straight forward genre screenplay and giving it a re-write, grafting on his own, unique personality quirks, obsessions and style, borrowing from Romero’s creation but forging something completely fresh and deliciously offbeat…

Known on these shores under at least a dozen lurid (and occasionally ludicrous) titles, including DON’T OPEN THE WINDOW, BRUNCH WITH THE DEAD and LET SLEEPING CORPSES LIE, Grau’s resulting 1974 Spanish/Italian zombie shocker “Non Si Deve Profanare Il Sonno Dei Morti”, is a movie that I’ve always preferred to call by its UK moniker, THE LIVING DEAD AT THE MANCHESTER MORGUE. Because I just love the way it reads.

London antique dealer George (a bearded, badass looking Ray Lovelock from, among many other things Armando Crispino’s AUTOPSY) is on a cross-country motorcycle trip into rural England when, after a bike crushing accident, he regretfully hooks up with the beautiful, fragile Edna (Christina Galbo from WHAT HAVE YOU DONE TO SOLANGE?) who is also traveling into the sticks to visit her mentally ill sister. On route, the pair come across a strange machine; a whirring, pulsing metallic engine sitting squarely in the centre of a farmers field. Said machineis an agricultural device that sends out waves of low frequency radiation designed to provoke insects to go mad and cannibalize each other. Science!

Lanky haired, neo-hippie George balks at such underhanded environmental buggery, a position which only increases in intensity when he and Edna discover said supposedly harmless radiation is in fact stimulating the recently dead to get up and kill, with the people they kill then getting up to kill. As the local police (led by American stage actor Arthur Kennedy, in a cruel and cranky performance) attempt to pin the rash of violent zombie induced murders on the troubled couple, the evil crop-protecting, dead- provoking device keeps chugging and spinning and the corpses keep-a-coming, resulting in the inevitable tragic, violent, titular (emphasis on the tit!) morgue set climax.

When THE LIVING DEAD AT THE MANCHESTER MORGUE was released it almost immediately came under fire from critics for its then outrageous levels of graphic splatter, a truly shocking cavalcade of carnage designed by none other than Italian FX wizard Giannetto De Rossi. De Rossi is the latex and karo syrup slinging genius who would later find acclaim drilling brains, poking out eyes and regurgitating guts under the watchful eye of the late, great Fulci and though his art here was not yet quite state of, it’s still pretty damned fantastic: flesh is ripped from bodies, innards are torn out of heaving bellies, eyeballs are eaten and perhaps most notoriously, an unfortunate lass has her blouse ripped open and her left breast crudely removed by the clawing hands of a hungry ghoul.

And speaking of ghouls, the homicidal stiffs on display here are really terrifying; a mangy, slow and stiff lot of relentless red-eyed refuse (incidentally, the crimson contact lenses appear to be exactly the same as the ones utilized for the ‘infected’ in Danny Boyle’s 28 Days Later and its sequel 28 Weeks Later). And these zombies aren’t a bunch of amateur local yokels bumbling around in greasepaint but are in fact real actors, characters ripped right out of the worst (or best, as the case with us horror fans may be) nightmare; I can honestly say that Spanish actor Fernando Hilbeck’s, gravestone tossing, recently resurrected, drowned hobo Gutherie, with his sopping wet clothes, blotchy stare and stubbly lock jaw is one of the most frightening screen bogeymen I’ve ever seen and the damage he inflicts on his victims is just as shuddery.

But beyond the moldy monsters and the ample waste of human life on display, the real impact in Grau’s remarkable motion picture lies in the level of intelligence, of finely crafted human drama, of mounting dread and almost Hitchcockian suspense (and black humor) that so effortlessly guides the grue. We come to genuinely care for George and Edna, to believe in their blossoming love, their genuine connection that builds under the direst of circumstances. And when things take a turn for the worse in the final reel, there’s a palpable sense of loss that pushes the horror into an emotional level unseen in the post Night, non-Romero zombie efforts. The score, by Giuliano Sorgini (SS HELL CAMP) is another major source of the picture’s skin tightening power, a soundscape that deftly veers between string soaked British lounge pop (especially effective in the dazzlingly edited opening credits montage) and heaving, gasping, synth burbling experimentalism.

THE LIVING DEAD AT THE MANCHESTER MORGUE is an accessible, thought provoking and paralyzing Eurohorror classic whose ample flaws, frequent lapses in logic (does ANY of the action actually take place IN Manchester?) and many plot inconsistencies (how does Hilbeck manage to revive his fellow cadavers by wiping blood on their eyelids, exactly? Who cares! It’s creepy!) take a backseat to the movie’s many macabre and gruesomely elegant delights.

This isn’t the quasi- realist American horror of Romero and it isn’t the chunky in your face zombie opera shock of Fulci. This is the zombie film as dark, lyrical, melancholy fairy tale, a film that exists in a class of its own.

And it very well might be the best zombie movie ever made.

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Starz to Run Marathon of ASH VS. EVIL DEAD This Month

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 01 Dec 2015 22:51:00 +0000

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Starz to Run Marathon of ASH VS. EVIL DEAD This Month

Juggernaut series ASH VS. EVIL DEAD to get December marathon treatment on Starz.

With the critic and fan approved Rami/Campbell/Tapert-sculpted series ASH VS. EVIL DEAD still chainsawing its way across the airwaves(or the digital equivalent of such), the network that birthed it has scheduled a mini-marathon of every episode, leading up to the season finale on Saturday, January 2nd at 9pm.

Here’s the schedule:

Monday, December 28th at 9:00 PM PT/ ET – “ASH vs EVIL DEAD” episodes 101-103

Tuesday, December 29th at 9:00 PM PT/ET – “ASH vs EVIL DEAD” episodes 104-106

Wednesday, December 30th at 9:00 PM PT / ET – “ASH vs EVIL DEAD” episodes 107-109

Saturday, January 2nd at 9:00 PM PT /ET – “ASH vs EVIL DEAD” episode 110 – Season Finale

To learn more about STARZ and ASH VS. EVIL DEAD go to the official site.

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Blu-ray Review: 80’s Anthology Horror Classic NIGHTMARES

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 01 Dec 2015 19:39:00 +0000

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Blu-ray Review: 80’s Anthology Horror Classic NIGHTMARES

SHOCK reviews classic 80’s anthology horror film NIGHTMARES on Blu-ray.

In many respects, director Joseph Sargent’s 1983 anthology horror film NIGHTMARES is the epitome of the 1980’s. Specifically, the early 1980’s. What I mean by this is that the first few years of every decade belong primarily to the previous one and cinematically, this is ever evident. In the case of NIGHTMARES, we have in fact 4 small films that exemplify the kind of craft and macabre quality of the best of the 1970’s telefilms (specifically the work of Dan Curtis) with a dash of slicker, pseudo-MTV, rock video style. Both aesthetics work together to create this unpretentious piece of vintage terror that many of this critic’s generation did indeed see on TV…

And famously, in fact, NIGHTMARES started its life as a TV movie, specifically as 4 episodes of the 1981/82 anthology series DARKROOM; when the network deemed those particular tales too extreme for prime-time, the producers pulled them and glued them together without any particular rhyme, reason or connecting thread as a feature film. Because of this, the only thing giving the stories any sort of cohesion is the style of director Sargent,a perfectly decent, no-bullshit filmmaker who had previously directed tons of TV before helming the crackerjack thriller THE TAKING OF PELHAM ONE TWO THREE and then, a mere four years after this, literally jumped the shark with the legendary JAWS: THE REVENGE. But his work here is solid, stylish and tough throughout and really, the shot on glorious 35mm flick plays better today than ever.

The first story, “Terror in Topanga” stars THE SENTINEL’s Cristina Raines as a stressed out housewife who ducks out one night to get her nicotine fix, the same night that a murderer is reported to be on the loose. As she cruises around looking for a place to buy a carton of smokes, she becomes increasingly paranoid that the killer is stalking her. Some decent suspense and an appealing performance by the beautiful Raines (as well as an appearance by BLADE RUNNER star William Sanderson) make this episode work.

The second tale has achieved near mythical status in the small circle of fans who swear by NIGHTMARES; it’s called “The Bishop of Battle” and stars a young Emilio Estevez (years before THE BREAKFAST CLUB) as J.J, a punk-rock and video game addicted teen who hustles kids in arcades to get enough quarters to beat the holy grail of games, The Bishop of Battle. Breaking into the local game joint one night, J.J aims to beat The Bishop…with unexpected results. No doubt Adam Sandler saw this film prior to making his recent comedy PIXELS but “The Bishop of Battle” aint to gag-fest. It’s cool and scrappy, with a great turn by Estevez, decent pre-digital optical effects and great use of music, especially by punk band FEAR. A mini-masterpiece with a great script by Christopher Crowe (who wrote all but the final segment of NIGHTMARES).

A typically haunted-looking Lance Henriksen stars as a priest having a crisis of faith in “The Benediction”. The troubled padre hits the road to find himself and instead runs up againts a ghostly truck that aims to flatten him. A moody blend of THE CAR and DUEL, this is an artfully made suspenser with a strong central turn by a pre-ALIENS Henriksen. Great climax too.

The final tale (tail?) is NIGHT OF THE RAT and it’s often cited as the worst of the quartet, usually due to the spotty blue screen effects of the titular giant vermin itself. But it’s actually a decent segment, with believable performances by INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS and ALIEN vet Veronica Cartwright and THE THING’s Richard Masur trying to save their daughter from the wrath of a screaming, pissed-off rodent.

From the eerie opening credits sequence (a creepy cracked-desert visual that mimics the poster design) to the final frame, NIGHTMARES is an immaculate bit of no-frills horror entertainment. Sporting a dynamite score by Craig Safan, a composer known primarily for his work on the small screen, but who also contributed wonderful soundtracks for A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET 4, REMO WILLIAMS and the end-credits piece used in Michael Mann’s THIEF, the film is far superior to that same-years gigantic budgeted anthology TWILIGHT ZONE: THE MOVIE, with stories that often feel like deluxe versions of Serling’s original series, even moreso than the legitimate 1980’s TZ revamp.

Scream Factory’s Blu-ray is an equally in-and-out, get-the-job-done affair, looking crisp and sometimes lush, considering the age of the material and offering a few bonuses, including a trailer and a meandering but informative commentary with producer Andrew Mirisch and Raines. You can also watch the film in either 1:78:1 widescreen or full frame, if the need to get the real deal, old-school TV vibe should strike you.

Totally recommended, NIGHTMARES is quality escapism; like a firm handshake, covered in blood.

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Twisted Crispin Glover Shocker AIMY IN A CAGE Gets Release Date, Poster and Trailer

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 01 Dec 2015 16:48:00 +0000

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Twisted Crispin Glover Shocker AIMY IN A CAGE Gets Release Date, Poster and Trailer

Head-trip horror flick AIMY IN A CAGE gets trailer and official poster.

In what has been referred to as a hybrid of Kubrick and Tim Burton (especially evident in the Danny Elfman-ish score), writer/director Hooroo Jackson’s mental-case horror meltdown AIMY IN A CAGE has just been announced as locking a release date of January 8th, 2016. The film will roll out on DVD and digital platforms from Osiris Entertainment.

AIMY IN A CAGE stars filmmaker, actor (BACK TO THE FUTURE, WILLARD, THE WIZARD OF GORE) and professional weirdo Crispin Glover and NURSE 3D and THE EDITOR vixen Paz de la Huerta in a tale of a teen who is taken to a demented behaviour clinic in some sort of distant future/alternate reality while a grim plague decimates the wold outside.

Filled with crazed, circus-steeped imagery and echoing twisted flicks like JACOB TWO-TWO MEETS THE HOODED FANG, WILLY WONKA AND THE CHOCOLATE FACTORY and A CLOCKWORK ORANGE, AIMY IN A CAGE is just the ticket for those more daring horror fans looking to have their heads shaken hard.

Check out the wild photo gallery below and then groove on the eyeball-crossing trailer below that:

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‘Ozploitation’ Flick SCARE CAMPAIGN Wins Awards, Reveals New Poster

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 01 Dec 2015 07:39:00 +0000

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‘Ozploitation’ Flick SCARE CAMPAIGN Wins Awards, Reveals New Poster

New ‘Ozploitation’ shocker SCARE CAMPAIGN sweeps Monster Fest awards; reveals new poster.

Hotly anticipated ‘Ozploitation’ flick SCARE CAMPAIGN from writers and directors Colin & Cameron Cairnes (100 BLOODY ACRES) and producer Julie Ryan (RED DOG) just picked up four awards at Aussie horror festival Monster Fest and, while basking in the afterglow have revealed their official poster.

SCARE CAMPAIGN, which charts the increasingly extreme attempts of a horror-themed TV “prank” show to stay one step ahead of its nihilistic online rivals and stars Olivia DeJonge (The Visit) and Meegan Warner (Turn), picked up awards for ‘BEST FILM’, ‘BEST SOUND IN A FEATURE’, ‘BEST FEATURE SCREENPLAY’ and ‘BEST DIRECTION’.

SCARE CAMPAIGN stars Meegan Warner (TURN, THE VEIL), Olivia DeJonge (HIDING, THE VISIT), Cassandra McGrath (WOLF CREEK) and John Brumpton (THE LOVED ONES).

Here’s the official synopsis:

Popular TV prank show, Scare Campaign, has been entertaining audiences for the last five years with its mix of old school scares and hidden camera fun. But as we enter a new age of online TV, the producers find themselves up against a hard-edged web series which makes their show look decidedly quaint. It’s time to up the ante, but will the team go too far this time, and are they about to prank the wrong guy?

And here’s the official poster:

Be sure to follow these wild men and women via their official Facebook page.

And check out the batshit crazy teaser below…

https://youtu.be/7jVrh_t05DA

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Exclusive Interview: Actor Robin Ward on the ‘Lost’ Frankenstein Flick ‘DR. FRANKENSTEIN ON CAMPUS’!

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 01 Dec 2015 04:36:00 +0000

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Exclusive Interview: Actor Robin Ward on the ‘Lost’ Frankenstein Flick ‘DR. FRANKENSTEIN ON CAMPUS’!

SHOCK tracks down actor Robin Ward to reflect on the ultra-obscure 1970 psychedelic horror film, DR. FRANKENSTEIN ON CAMPUS.

With the unfortunate VICTOR FRANKENSTEIN setting new highs for low box office openings (shame, really as the movie is really rather good) we decided to assume the role of the good Dr. Frankenstein. ourselves, sifting not into the soft dirt for corpses, but rather digging deep into horror’s maniacal past to find a film that time has seemingly forgot…

Indeed, a mere week or so before VICTOR FRANKENSTEIN saw release, SHOCK decided to stick our tongue deep into cheek and roll out a list of 5 Frankenstein films that failed to make the grade or effectively trade on the visions birthed during that fateful ‘haunted summer’ by Mary Shelley and her famous kinky friends. Sitting at number 3 on that list was the ‘lost’ Canadian psychedelic horror romp DR. FRANKENSTEIN ON CAMPUS, a totally daft 1970 melodrama about mad science, substances, sex and silliness that was in fact the first film funded by the Canadian government!

Free healthcare AND z-grade horror movies financed by tax dollars. Aint Canada grand?

Originally titled FLICK (we know this because the word FLICK remains on the bottom corner of the screen for the entire opening of the picture), DR. FRANKENSTEIN ON CAMPUS stars future Canadian TV weatherman Robin Ward as a young Baron Frankenstein, blacklisted from his native Austria and hiding out as a student at the University of Toronto. There, he conducts brain experiments on cats and dogs and has weird psychedelic sex with his comely girlfriend before launching a reign of terror on his classmates and the faculty. Oddly, the similarities between this and RE-ANIMATOR are interesting (and almost certainly accidental).

Briefly released theatrically in the US under its “FRANKENSTEIN” handle on a double bill with the skeezy NIGHT OF THE WITCHES, director Gilbert W. Taylor’s mad movie appeared occasionally on Canadian television but otherwise is about as obscure a horror film as you’re likely to (not) find. And while it’s not a great Frankenstein film, it is just so insane, so bizarre and so…so…Canadian, that watching it truly is a singular experience.

Ward is well known in Canada for his stint as a weatherman on National network CTV but he has had a long and interesting career in Canadian film and television including prominent roles in a slew of interesting genre projects like the noted Sci-Fi series THE STARLOST creepy “twinsanity” thriller MARK OF CAIN and SAW II; he even once channeled Rod Serling, serving as the narrator of the third season of the 1980’s revamp of THE TWILIGHT ZONE.

After penning that piece, the spirit moved me enough to make an effort to locate Ward and, with a little bit of effort, I did. The actor is currently in rehearsals for a new play but spared us some moments to chat about his stint making cinema’s strangest Frankie “flick”: DR. FRANKENSTEIN ON CAMPUS.

SHOCK: It’s rather amusing to think that DR. FRANKENTSEIN ON CAMPUS was funded by the Government, especially since it deals with mind control….

WARD: Yes the film was the first to get CFDC (Canadian Film Development Corporation) backing, which I think was ultimately a mistake because it set a doubtful tone. Because DR. FRANKENSTEIN ON CAMPUS was of course a ‘B’ horror film and would not normally have received the scrutiny or the reviews or respect that a pioneer CFDC project would and should have inspired. Consequently it was castigated by all and sundry…

SHOCK: How did you end up in the film?

WARD: I can’t remember how I got the role, whether I auditioned or just met the director. I was quite inexperienced as an actor, but I guess my work at the time suggested something that wasn’t quite real, hence my suitability for the role, perhaps?

SHOCK: The film opens with you fencing in Austria. Where were these sequences shot?

WARD: The Austrian scenes were all shot in and around Toronto, with the Scarborough bluffs substituting for the Alps!

SHOCK: It’s a demented film, truly. Was it always supposed to be sold as a horror movie?

WARD: God knows what the film was supposed to be! None of us really knew. I guess it was a horror film. It was certainly horrible.

SHOCK: Why did they change the title?

WARD: At some point it went from FLICK to DR. FRANK…I think they thought FLICK was too ironic and artsy. It got a limited release in the theaters, but went on to become a cult favorite on university campuses where it’s previously undetected satirical aspects were much appreciated.

SHOCK: The film is an extra curio in that noted Canadian rock band Lighthouse is the house band in the movie! Did you get to hang out with them?

WARD: We did see members of Lighthouse occasionally, especially Paul and Skip, who sometimes appeared during the shoot.

SHOCK: Any funny stories to tell from the shoot?

WARD: Well, I was supposed to wear an electroencephalogram on my head which they jerry-built from masking tape and which reduced the cast to tears of helpless laughter when they saw it perched on my head like an inverted jock strap. I remember we did take after take on a scene that had me wearing it because we kept breaking up.

SHOCK: What do you think of the movie now?

WARD: I haven’t seen the movie for decades. Years of therapy had almost erased it from my memory till you reminded me of its existence. As I said the film did have a kind of cult following and I sometimes am recognized for my part in creating one of the silliest films ever made. An honor I am not worthy of. It was a lot of fun to make; I think I laughed a lot during the film…especially during some of the actual takes when I wasn’t supposed to. Now it’s back to the shrink, I guess…

Here’s hoping that someone, somewhere puts some effort into making DR. FRANKENSTEIN ON CAMPUS available to strange cinema enthusiasts everywhere. It most certainly is a film that needs to be seen. And, once seen, I promise you…it cannot be unseen!

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Toronto! Acclaimed Hitchcock Documentary to Open at TIFF Bell Lightbox

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Mon, 30 Nov 2015 19:36:00 +0000

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Toronto! Acclaimed Hitchcock Documentary to Open at TIFF Bell Lightbox

Celebrated documentary about monumental meeting HITCHCOCK/TRUFFAUT to open in Toronto.

The legendary, week long series of interviews conducted by French New Wave founder Francois Truffaut and iconic Master of Suspense Alfred Hitchcock in 1962 is the subject of Kent (VAL LEWTON: THE MAN IN THE SHADOWS) Jones’ acclaimed new documentary HITCHCOCK/TRUFFAUT. Now, after its festival run at both Cannes and TIFF, the film is set to open on December 4th at the beautiful TIFF Bell Lightbox film center in Toronto.

Screen Daily has called the film, which features heavy-hitting filmmaking talent like Martin Scorsese, David Fincher, Peter Bogdanovich, Paul Schrader and many others, “a little slice of film buff-heaven,” while Esquire noted it “will thrill you and change the way you watch movies.”

Using the original recordings from the Hitchcock sessions, HITCHCOCK/TRUFFAUT is a cinematic depiction of that most cinematic of conversations, the likes of which were published as a book that helped shape film history and elevated Hitchcock’s reputation from craftsman to auteur.

For more on showtimes and ticket sales visit the the official TIFF site.

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The ‘Legend’ of THE LAST MAN ON EARTH

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Mon, 30 Nov 2015 16:48:00 +0000

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The ‘Legend’ of THE LAST MAN ON EARTH

SHOCK dissects the first and best adaptation of Richard Matheson’s I AM LEGEND, THE LAST MAN ON EARTH.

Dr. Robert Morgan is not a well man. A mysterious airborne, plague-bearing dust storm has smothered the world, killing every man, woman and child and reviving them as sluggish, dull witted and eternally ravenous vampires. And yet, somehow, someway, Morgan has remained immune, completely unscathed…well, physically, anyway. He lives his life like a machine, by day rising early, clearing the streets of comatose, emaciated ghouls and throwing their barely living bodies into an eternally burning tar pit, tracking the sleeping stronger ones to their lairs and driving his specially made stakes through their hearts.

But by night, when the sun sinks below the horizon, the fanged echoes of mankind come-a-crawling out of their hiding spots, stumbling towards Morgan’s garlic and mirror fortified bungalow, clawing at his windows, screaming for his flesh and his blood. Such nerve shredding conditions might drive a weaker man to madness but, though he skirts insanity often, Morgan instead opts to play his jazz records loud, pour scotch, crawl into bed, squish a pillow against his head and wait, always wait, for the break of day when he’ll get up and start the horrible cycle all over again. Unbeknownst to Morgan however, he’s being watched by something other than the monsters, something that views him as an even bigger threat than the red-eyed viral vampires themselves.

This is the story charted in directors Sidney Salkow and Ubaldo Ragona’s 1964 Vincent Price vehicle THE LAST MAN ON EARTH, the first (and to date, best) stab at adapting influential dark fantasy author Richard Matheson’s still blistering existential 1954 vampire novella I AM LEGEND to screen. Written, then disowned, by the notoriously cranky author, the low budget Robert Lippert (THE EARTH DIES SCREAMING) Italian/US co-production had often been dismissed as a failed attempt to capture the psyche-destroying , bloodsucker-staking exploits of Matheson’s eternally put upon virus survivor, Robert Neville. Thankfully, that perception has changed through the years. Because although it inexplicably changes its hero’s name from Neville to Morgan, and tweaks the ending somewhat, it otherwise seldom strays from the novella’s narrative and perfectly captures it’s bleaker than bleak tone, downbeat mood and broken heart.

The history of I AM LEGEND and its checkered journey to screen is rather fascinating. Matheson’s gripping, intelligent and horrifying novella became a hit in sci-fi /dark fantasy/pulp fiction circles upon release, eventually landing squarely on the radar of fledgling UK studio Hammer Films. The lads at Hammer commissioned Matheson to self-adapt a screenplay, which he did, reportedly brilliantly and faithfully from a straightforward text that almost read like a script to begin with. But, when the British censor skimmed that script, they were disgusted, promising that the downbeat, violent and depressing film would never, ever get passed. Hammer, still in their relative infancy, were terrified of the all- powerful board and released Matheson from his contract, his screenplay left untouched and un-filmed.

The property floated around for years before American born, British based B-movie producer Robert Lippert got his mitts on it, finally inking an Italian co-production deal, oddly altering the script, hiring a fresh from Roger Corman-ville Vincent Price to play the lead and shooting the whole affair on a shoestring in Rome. When Matheson heard of the changes and rewrites to his script, and the casting of the larger than life Price as his reluctant working class hero Robert Neville, he balked and demanded his name be removed from the credits, instead sticking his often used pseudonym Logan Swanson on the final print. The movie was dumped into drive-ins, dismissed by critics and almost completely forgotten.

But what makes THE LAST MAN ON EARTH the superior cinematic vision of Matheson’s somber, frightening text is the profound way it handles Morgan/Neville’s search for grim purpose. His is a life pushed to the brink and beyond and yet, as his heroic, defiant nature dictates, he fights back; through his terrifying nights, his blood-drenched days and his bittersweet dawns, Morgan refuses to succumb to his hopeless situation, refuses to even abandon his ramshackle bungalow. He becomes a kind of lone wolf, a vigilante, and then a kind of prophet, finally a martyr but always he’s a caretaker, one whose life’s work is to dispose of the sub-human monsters that have insidiously infested what was once a bright and beautiful world and have so cruelly cannibalized any fond memories he may have once had anything resembling a happy life. And though they come to scrape at his windows like clockwork and though the rotting females pout and slink in a vulgar attempt to arouse him, he accepts the vampires, he adapts. To quote Matheson from an interview I conducted with him many years ago, it’s the ultimate “portrait of an everyday Joe confronted with the arcane and emerging somewhat triumphant.”

Even more resonant is the fact that THE LAST MAN ON EARTH retains the absolutely pivotal character of Ben Cortman (though Anthony Zerbe’s mentally unbalanced mutant albino cult leader Mathias in the second and strangest version of the story, THE OMEGA MAN, is certainly a loose variation on him). If you’ve read the novel, you’ll recall that Ben Cortman was a friend, neighbor and colleague to Robert Neville who, post plague, became his chief vampiric adversary. Along with his tireless pack of drooling undead, Cortman is really Neville’s perverted connection to his former humanity, a distorted nightmare logic vision of the man he once was. Over the span of time that the action in Matheson’s story unfolds in, the presence of Ben Cortman is both horrific and hopeful, distilling our hero’s misery and re-focusing it as anger, as a need, a divine mission to kill Cortman, a desire that almost single-handedly saves him from suicide. Cortman is in essence Neville’s ‘El Dorado’ his quest, his reason for waking, yet the kind of quest in which the searcher secretly pines to never complete, lest he be left with nothing to chase. LAST MAN keeps this disturbing dichotomy and mutually corrosive relationship wholly intact. In flashback, the film shows Ben Cortman (here played by Giacomo Rossi-Stuart from Mario Bava’s KILL BABY, KILL) and Morgan socializing at their children’s birthday parties, then trying to develop a cure for the plague, before finally emerging as otherworldly enemies, as a constantly reversing of the hunter/prey dynamic.

It’s a crucial narrative element that’s deftly handled and is both appropriately unsettling and almost overwhelmingly tragic.

Just as beautifully rendered are the final days in the lives of Morgan’s wife and daughter. As the rapidly disintegrating government insists on incineration of the deceased plague victims remains, Morgan, in a temporary fit of unbearable grief and searing madness, goes after the federal body burners in a vain attempt to rescue his little girl’s corpse from the fire. When he returns home, morally beaten and empty handed to find his wife dead, he takes her corpse to a nearby field for a proper burial. Later that night, while Morgan reclines in a chair and waits for the inevitable, a la ‘The Monkey’s Paw’, his spouses’ now gurgled voice chants ‘Robert, Robert…”, her unseen dirty and bloodless hands twisting the door handle, as she grins and moves in to give her still living husband the kiss of death.

And what of poor Vincent Price, the chief reason Richard Matheson turned up his nose at the film to begin with? How does this hammy, wonderfully theatrical icon of horror fare as the haunted, tortured last living man on the planet? In the context of the film, fucking great, I’d say. Price’s hangdog, wounded face and melancholy internal monologue voice-overs are amazing and, if not quite the blue collar Neville of the book, his Robert Morgan is never anything but believable and sympathetic.

Ultimately however, the three (four if you count Romero’s 1968 self-proclaimed LEGEND rip off NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD) filmed versions of Matheson’s soul-destroying masterwork fail to translate his unpretentious majesty verbatim, but really why would you want them too? Movies are dreams. They should be visions of their inspirations, not duplicates. I love THE OMEGA MAN for its bombast, its 70’s action movie bravado, affecting Charlton Heston performance, its then topical sexual/racial politics and of course, that brilliant Ron Grainer score. I really like the 2007 Will Smith version for its haunting urban decay tableaux, its wrenching isolation and magnification of the heart sinking Neville/dog incident and relentlessly sad tone (though the film falls apart in the final reel). But thus far, THE LAST MAN ON EARTH is the only one that has managed to exist as an aggressively depressing and lyrical nightmare, taking all that was profound and painful in the source text and re-presenting it as a low-budget but evocative and funereal slice of semi-cerebral pulp.

Flawed but unforgettable, THE LAST MAN ON EARTH deserves multiple viewings and a secure place in the annals of classic horror cinema. The recent inclusion of the film in Scream Factory’s second Blu-ray Vincent Price Collection means you can see this once though lost to the public domain gem in glorious high-def and the commentary on that release by horror historian (and SHOCK scribe) David Del Valle is marvelous.

If you haven’t seen it…see it. Soon. And to the late, great Richard Matheson, wherever you are….thanks man.

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Sculptor Bryan Moore To Give Bram Stoker the Bronze Treatment

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Mon, 30 Nov 2015 04:40:00 +0000

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Sculptor Bryan Moore To Give Bram Stoker the Bronze Treatment

Noted artist to tackle new Bram Stoker bust project.

Celebrated master sculptor Bryan Moore made a splash a few years back with his stunning bronze bust of iconic dark fantasy scribe H.P. Lovecraft and later, of Gothic godfather Edgar Allan Poe. Now Moore is about to mold another master of horror, that of DRACULA author Bram Stoker.

Says Moore:

“The character of Count Dracula embodies what we’d all like to be: sexy, immortal, wise from centuries of lost l’amour, status hard won and enduring to the last. The undead Count represents everything timeless and deathless that never goes out of style throughout the romantic ages.”

With this latest bust, Moore will continue the trend of casting the statue in the city of his subject’s birth, in this case Dublin, Ireland.

“Fans across the globe helped me to place busts of Lovecraft in Providence, Rhode Island and Poe to Boston, Massachusetts. It seemed only fitting that Bram Stoker should return to the Emerald Isle and will be donated to the Dublin Writers Museum in Parnell Square.”

“Placing a bust of Stoker here puts emphasis not only on his personality but also on his nationality” said Robert Nicholson, Curator of the Dublin Writers Museum. “Being born and bred a Dubliner was just as important to Stoker’s genius as it was to that of his contemporary and acquaintance, Oscar Wilde, and to many other writers born here on the cultural fault line.”

Joining Moore in his literary quest of honoring Stoker is no less than Bram’s great grand-nephew Dacre Stoker, who manages the Estate of Bram Stoker as well as co-author of both the sequel to DRACULA entitled DRACULA: THE UNDEAD.

“The Bram Stoker Estate is very pleased to endorse the Bram Stoker Bronze Bust Project. The Stoker family would ultimately like to see a statue of Bram displayed in a prominent location in Dublin. A bronze bust is certainly a fitting tribute and this effort by Bryan Moore is to be commended and is worthy of our family’s support.”

Also on board is noted DRACULA scholar, author and filmmaker David J. Skal, whose book HOLLYWOOD GOTHIC: THE TANGLED WEB OF DRACULA FROM NOVEL TO SCREEN paved the way for his much anticipated biography, SOMETHING IN THE BLOOD: THE UNTOLD STORY OF BRAM STOKER, to be published by Liveright next year.

As with the Lovecraft and Poe projects, Moore will be launching a Kickstarter campaign to crowdfund the costs of the bust as well as personally making a financial donation to Children’s Books Ireland, a local organization that promotes children’s literacy.

“It’s an incredible amount of work for many months to plan and launch these bust projects with the project team, but also incredibly rewarding” says Moore. “So many fellow fans from across the world rally to the cause and help me turn this vision into a reality, which is to celebrate these legendary authors of works that mean so much to the public consciousness and to pop culture. It’s about time that the authors of these classics of horror literature were seen as legitimate scribes of something really special that never becomes dated. Horror will outlast us all.”

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Graphic Novel Review: KRAMPUS

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Sat, 28 Nov 2015 04:45:00 +0000

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Graphic Novel Review: KRAMPUS

SHOCK looks at the graphic novel companion to Michael Dougherty’s upcoming chiller KRAMPUS.

With Thanksgiving over and Christmas on its way like an unstoppable monsoon of ugly sweaters and eggnog, movie-goers are being treated to a selection of seasonal films to set them in the mood for the coming of ol’ St. Nick. Among the feel-good comedies and feel-good dramas is a new arrival on the market, KRAMPUS. A holiday tale of horror, KRAMPUS promises to show the dark side of our merry revilement, or lack there-of, as a family trapped in their house learn after a snow storm soon gets a visit from the grimmest version of Santa Clause, one with hooves and a bag full of tricks. Thanks to the films production company Legendary Films recent interest in the comic business, Christmas is coming a bit early this year with the recent release of the KRAMPUS graphic novel.

The comic presents three new stories set on the same night as the movie. While our film family is battling KRAMPUS in their house, the town outside is also battling the creature in its own way. The first story focuses on a mall Santa who has pretty much given up on everything but the bottle, but once the storm brings the first sign of KRAMPUS’s evil elves, he takes up arms and joins the fight. But will his change of heart be enough to save him from the creature’s evil present bag? The second tale is about a cop who had never gotten over the death of her sister and her vigilance has kept away from her family for years. After picking up a robber who was Grinching presents from families in the neighborhood, they soon find themselves face-to-face with a town full of monsters and a secret that the two share. The final yarn spins its own version on A Christmas Carol as a penny pinching billionaire takes a trip down the path of his greed.

KRAMPUS is not only helmed by KRAMPUS director Michael Dougherty of TRICK ‘R’ TREAT fame, but many of the writers and artists that he used for the TRICK ‘R’ TREAT comic make a returning appearance. It’s fun to see the artists who have worked on his previous stuff come back for a second round and those who were fans of the TRICK ‘R’ TREAT comic that came out a couple months ago can expect a lot of the same quality. The only drawback is since this comic is out before the movie, it sets the standard for what to expect in the film where with TRICK ‘R’ TREAT, it’s the other way, so it’s easier to find flaws in the KRAMPUS comic instead of thinking of it as an extension of the movie universe (and cutting it some slack). An example would obviously be the stories in this collection came off as a mixed bag. The first two were fun and original, if not unexpectedly dark, but the third simply came off as another re-telling of the same Dickens story that has been told a hundred times. Perhaps in the context of the movie, it all makes sense, but without the source material it comes off as a bit trite and unnecessary. Maybe if the two were released at the same time, the comic work would seem more complete.

The art was very similar to the stories where the first two shorts seemed to have the luck of the draw while the final piece came off as a bizarre ode to late nineties, graffiti style, ‘attitude’ art with cut corners and unfinished background pieces. Its predecessors had a very solid look, especially with the drunk Santa tale presenting fantastically dark line work by Christian Dibari. The last one seemed barely inked, but the facial expressions were spot on and the action scenes turned everyday situations into acrobatic feats.

Either way, this is a fun work for those who hunger for a little twisted morality with their Christmas stockings and, with less than a week until the movie hits theaters, it’s a great way to prepare for the blood-filled holidays!

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Exclusive Photos From Buffalo Indie Flick DICK JOHNSON & TOMMY GUN VS. THE CANNIBAL COP

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Fri, 27 Nov 2015 22:33:00 +0000

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Exclusive Photos From Buffalo Indie Flick DICK JOHNSON & TOMMY GUN VS. THE CANNIBAL COP

SHOCK chows down on exclusive pics from indie horror/comedy DICK JOHNSON & TOMMY GUN Vs. THE CANNIBAL COP.

Buffalo based filmmaker and funnyman John Renna’s new microbudget comedy/action/horror flick DICK JOHNSON & TOMMY GUN VS. THE CANNIBAL COP is currently chomping through festivals and public screenings as we speak and SHOCK has a few exclusive pics to share.

The film stars Renna (who wrote and directed) and fellow Buffalo, NY indie film personality Sam Qualiana as a pair of bumbling cops (the movie also stars Indie film legend Debbie Rochon, pictured above) who are assigned to bring down a rogue cop who is kidnapping and eating young women across Western New York. It’s like an old Monogram picture, with goofy gags bashing up against somber – and in this case gory and explicit – scenes of shock and it’s tons of fun. And, believe it or not…it’s based on a true story!

Feast on the fotos and trailer below and be sure to visit the CANNIBAL COP official Facebook page.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u5OpzGVJjX4

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Remember When Siskel & Ebert Reviewed JAWS: THE REVENGE?

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Fri, 27 Nov 2015 19:48:00 +0000

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Remember When Siskel & Ebert Reviewed JAWS: THE REVENGE?

SHOCK grabs another classic clip of critics Siskel & Ebert reviewing horror films.

As part of our ongoing series digging up vintage clips of lamented critics Siskel & Ebert making sport of horror and dark fantasy films on their long-running, now defunct TV series AT THE MOVIES.

Both critics were often very fair and astute with their assessments of contemporary cinema and certainly, their impact on the art of film criticism (such as it is) cannot be properly measured.

But when they hated something, they used it as fodder for a kind of Statler and Waldorf-esque roasting routine. And while often amusing, horror fans rightfully recoiled at seeing entertainments they adored so casually dismissed.

Now that said, sometimes, just sometimes…their genre jeering was the money.

Witness their attack on Joseph (NIGHTMARES) Sargent’s universally lambasted sequel JAWS: THE REVENGE, the fourth – and to date, last – installment of the man (or woman) vs. shark series that started with director Steven Spielberg’s first masterpiece, 1975’s immaculate JAWS.

1978’s JAWS 2 was a well-produced, well-acted but often tedious and shallow attempt to duplicate the energy of the original. The Richard Matheson co-scripted JAWS 3D was ludicrous but at least it tried to do something different.

JAWS: THE REVENGE, however, is an anomaly; a film that carries over characters from the series, which are based in reality, only to trash the soul of the series by tacking on a quasi-supernatural angle wherein the long-shark-suffering Brody family seem to have been targeted by a dynasty of sharks, with one of the fuckers even following the matriarch of the family from Amity to the Bahamas to finish off the bloodline!

Throw in Michael Caine collecting a paycheck and Mario Van Peebles with a distracting accent plus shark FX that are massive steps down from the already troubled 1975 incarnation of Bruce and you have one of the most ridiculed films of the 1980’s.

In retrospect, JAWS: THE REVENGE isn’t that bad in the sense that it’s well-acted, fast-paced and at least has some class, taking itself seriously and positioning an older female as the hero. Rare for 1987 and just as rare today.

But…it aint a good movie. By any stretch.

And so, when I caught this clip of S&E digging in, I wasn’t mad. At all. God knows the movie had it coming!

Check it out. Be prepared to laugh….

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Ridley Scott Announces Plans to Make More ALIEN Prequel/Sequels

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Fri, 27 Nov 2015 16:36:00 +0000

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Ridley Scott Announces Plans to Make More ALIEN Prequel/Sequels

Visionary director Ridley Scott reveals plans for two more PROMETHEUS/ALIEN: COVENANT sequels.

We already now know that the follow-up to Ridley Scott’s ALIEN sidebar/prequel PROMETHEUS has changed titles more times than a a Xenomorph changes its underpants and we know that the film will now be called ALIEN: COVENANT.

What we didn’t know – but now do – is that Scott is planning THREE sequels, for a grand total of FOUR PROMETHEUS/ALIEN films that will eventually tie into his 1979 original masterpiece.

Speaking from a press conference in Sydney, Australia (where ALIEN: COVENANT will be filmed), Scott had this to say, The Hollywood Reporter reports:

“Its a very complex story. Its an evolution of what I first did with PROMETHEUS 1…(that film) was borne out of my frustration that on ALIEN 1 in 1979 – I only did one as I don’t normally do sequels. I was amazed that in the 3 that followed that no-one asked the question ‘why the Alien, who made it and why?’ Very basic questions. So I came up with the notion of PROMETHEUS 1, which starts to indicate who might have made it and where it came from.”

He added: “So I’m now going to the next one, which is the next evolution directly connected with the first one, which was this Shaw, when [s]he replaced Michael Fassbender in two pieces and we’ll kind of pick it up there and it will evolve. When that’s finished there will be another one and then another one which will gradually drive into the back entrance of the film in 1979… So in other words, why was this space jockey there and why did he have an Alien inside him? And those questions will be answered.”

Well, this writer worships Scott and absolutely loved the somewhat flawed and absolutely visionary PROMETHEUS.. And we all worship ALIEN so…I say bring em on! The more ALIEN-centric films the better!

What say you?

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Review: Polish Mind-Bender THE HOURGLASS SANATORIUM on Blu-ray

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Fri, 27 Nov 2015 04:39:00 +0000

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Review: Polish Mind-Bender THE HOURGLASS SANATORIUM on Blu-ray

SHOCK looks at the Blu-ray release of 1973 Polish surrealist film THE HOURGLASS SANATORIUM.

Cannes Special Jury Award Winner THE HOURGLASS SANATORIUM is a journey within a jaunt perpendicular to a peregrination and overlapped with a transmigration; Wojciech Has’ sumptuous adaptation of the works of Polish writer Bruno Schulz results in a strongly visualized odyssey through the life and thoughts of a man, a undulating promenade of dreams and nightmares.

Beginning with motion, following a black bird flapping in the sky as we pull in through an open moving window, Józef (Jan Nowicki) travels on decrepit train to visit his ailing father Jacob (Tadeusz Kondrat) in a sanatorium. A foreboding train keeper with a candle lantern around his neck and white eyes alerts Józef of his impending stop. Upon arrival he merely walks out the train door, makes his way through a snowy graveyard, and ascends to the massive doors of the crumbling establishment. After attempting to find food in a deteriorating dining hall coated with spider webs, he is led by a nurse to his father in a bizarre room, seemingly under no care at all, with a single bed and a single lamp to illuminate him. Dr. Gotard (Gustaw Holoubek) explains the conditions of the sanatorium and his father to Józef: they’ve managed to slow time down and play with it, ‘recreating’ it, but there is still much left to chance.

Józef looks out a broken sanatorium window, only to see his own self arriving earlier in the day to the same door he first entered. And so begins multiple trips through time, space, and the ether of consciousness through his own life, encountering his youth, parents, relationships with women, and other events both inside and outside himself through extreme vagaries taking him from one reality through another, a truly experiential tale, an Alice in Wonderland of adulthood, sans white hare.

Jerzy Maksymiuk’s flute-centric score haunts the frames as Józef finds his mother in one room, the encounters a group of Jews praying as if they were in synchronized dance. Climbing a ladder he finds a redheaded nearly nude woman who hurriedly brings him into the room. He finds pages of a book, then the book itself, explaining its importance to the woman. He finds more pages under the page, and crawling underneath finds another man underneath, and a soldier in white at the foot of the bed, asking if he is Jacob, his father. He crawls toward the soldier and is then in a city square with buildings with domed tops and men in colorful bird masks about.

He finds the young boy he saw from earlier in the day at the sanatorium who shows him a stamp book he carries filled with stamps from around the world. He finds the train keeper with the lantern on a house and is led to a patch of elephants in the smoky woods. He finds a rotting butterfly, which he holds up to the sun.

Peeking through a fence, he sees a woman in all black who appears to be in mourning. He is told she is ‘inhabited by ghosts, phantoms, larvae, and chrysalises” by the woman’s daughter who covers the hold he’s peering through with her hand. He leaves this scene and finds another broken construction, climbing down a rope ladder into a room filled with mechanized mannequins. One falls over and its mechanical guts erupt from her its face.

The film plays like a dream, or nightmare, though Józef never breaks stride, adapting to every new adventure as a condition of being alive. He doesn’t flinch or pause, just moves through each new world as part of the entirety of life. The fluidity of Witold Sobocinski’s cinematography (also responsible for Andrzej Zulawski’s THE THIRD PART OF THE NIGHT) infuses Has’ adaption of Bruno Schulz’s prose, whose texts Sanatorium Under the Sign of the Hourglass and Spring form the basis of this jaunt.

Schulz’ works are visual and based on sensation over narrative. From this following passage you can see why Has would go for a cinema of sensation over attempts at linear storytelling:

“Fall is a great touring show, poetically deceptive, an enormous purple-skinned onion disclosing ever new panoramas under each of its skins. No center can be reached. Behind each wing that is moved and stored away, new and radiant scenes open up, true and alive for a moment, until you realize that they are made of cardboard. All perspectives are painted, and only the smell is authentic, the smell of wilting scenery or theatrical dressing rooms, a pile up of discarded costumes among which you wade endlessly as if through yellow fallen leaves.”

By the time Józef is rejoined with his father, time has indeed elapsed, folded back on itself, and metamorphosed again, with Józef taking on a new identity, rising forth from an open grave into a field of candles, ready to begin an even newer chapter in the prolongation of his existence.

Boldly visual, exceedingly sensual, and formed from the clay of subconsciousness, THE HOURGLASS SANATORIUM is a film that plays particularly well in the dark and strange cavern of a motion picture cinema, filled with strangers both onscreen and off, though presented with eloquence on Blu-ray, its visuals and sounds are smokily intact.

Now available on Blu-ray from Mr. Bongo .

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Event Report: BLACK CHRISTMAS Reunion at the Hamilton Film Expo

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 26 Nov 2015 19:39:00 +0000

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Event Report: BLACK CHRISTMAS Reunion at the Hamilton Film Expo

To time with Anchor Bay’s new Blu-ray release, SHOCK reports on the BLACK CHRISTMAS reunion in Hamilton, Canada.

We all know what an Expo or fan Convention is about. A wild, fun adventure filled with Vendors, Celebs, Cosplay, pop culture and more! In our first year doing the Hamilton Film Expo, and going forward, we wanted to earn our name. “Hamilton” is not just the city the event is staged in, it’s where I live and work. “Film Expo” is not just a way to drop all of pop culture on people. “Movie Stuff” is our tagline and that is what we wanted to deliver. Year 1, we accomplished that with our All-Canadian celebrity guests, & movie-themed vendors.

Backing up one day, the night before the Expo, Anchor Bay Canada gave us permission to screen BLACK CHRISTMAS for a free midnight screening to raise awareness and items for the Eva Rothwell Centre. All week, the 10th Annual Hamilton Film Festival had been running a promo for the ‘Season’s Greivings Editon’ of BLACK CHRISTMAS on Blu-ray. Basically, we were getting pumped…

Backing up to August 2015, I had a Facebook conversation with actor Art Hindle. I had never met him but we had mutual “friends.” I reached out and asked him if a) he would be interested in doing an introduction at the 10th Annual Hamilton Film Festival for a showcase of Michelle Latimer’s work (art had worked with her on the syndicated TV show PARADISE FALLS), and b) would he be interested in being a part of our first Film Expo. He did his research, got back to me and his response to me was “I want to help you grow this.”

Not only is that a massive compliment to the years of work we have put in, but a real example of a good person who is interested in giving back to the film & TV community. “Just doing my part” is how he worded it. This lead almost immediately to two more guests. BLACK CHRISTMAS co-stars Lynne Griffin and Doug McGrath. In the matter of a few days I had a mini BLACK CHRISTMAS reunion!

During the panel discussion (moderated by Aaron Allen of Hamilton’s Fright Night Theatre Film Festival, pictured above), Doug discussed the importance of his early work in Canadian cinema, but not in an egotistical way. It was in a way that a teacher is proud of seeing a student become successful. BLACK CHRISTMAS, PORKY’S and GOIN’ DOWN THE ROAD all paved the way for films that hadn’t been made yet. Doug was very optimistic that Canadian cinema has, and will continue to have, it’s own identity but more importantly that it has this vast legacy of movies to point to.

Lynn Griffin (who also starred in Canadian slasher classic CURTAINS) is a warm soul with a genuine smile and a passion for the arts. It’s obvious when you first meet her. She recalled Bob (Clark) asking her to imagine that she was hearing some scary things on the phone. Then when she saw the movie, had no idea it would be so disturbing! She talked about “the bag” and went on to explain that she was a swimmer and could hold her breath for a long time. “Probably why I got the part.” She said.

A lesson for filmmakers in the horror genre, came from Art Hindle. He never missed a chance to bring a laugh into the conversation, and said as much about horror filmmaking. “Bring humour into your films.” The “fellatio” scene comes (ahem) to mind across the panel. Later on, a question was asked to the panel, “what prop would you most like to have from the movie?” Art Hindle, without missing a beat said “Olivia Hussey.”

An nice addition to the panel, or audience I should say, was when a question regarding the audio of that scary scream from Olivia at the banister, was asked. The panel wasn’t 100% sure…but an audience member was certain. Bruce Craig worked on the film 40 years ago doing sound special effects work out of a studio (Mirrophonic) at King and Spadina streets in Toronto. The scream was also a mix of their receptionist’s screams! He talked fondly about mixing the film while Bob Clark bounced his new bride on his knee. Bruce also remembered being scared at the premiere, even after seeing it so many times while editing. Bruce is also optimistic about the future. “We felt we were leading edge at that time, but with the equipment and personnel now smaller productions can have longer reaches around the world.”

What was an incredible, intimate, meeting of these wonderful Black Christmas alumni, also turned out to be a great discussion about the Canadian film industry. That is something that we can truly be proud of.

Nathan Fleet is an award winning filmmaker / composer and is the director of the 10th annual Hamilton Film Festival and the organizer of the 1st annual Hamilton Film Expo.

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‘Chris Alexander’s SHOCK TREATMENT’: In Praise of LEGEND OF THE WEREWOLF

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 26 Nov 2015 16:54:00 +0000

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‘Chris Alexander’s SHOCK TREATMENT’: In Praise of LEGEND OF THE WEREWOLF

In this ongoing SHOCK column, editor Chris Alexander muses on classic and contemporary films and music worthy of a deeper discussion.

One of the rarest of lycanthrope-centric films is the unfortunately late, Oscar-winning British cinematographer (David Lynch’s THE ELEPHANT MAN) and noted horror filmmaker (DRACULA HAS RISEN FROM THE GRAVE, TALES FROM THE CRYPT) Freddie Francis’ little discussed1975 Hammer-esque wolfman shocker LEGEND OF THE WEREWOLF. And really, I have to ask why it’s so obscure, because the movie is rather fantastic.

As the films’ star Peter Cushing (whose work here is first rate as always) so helpfully explains in LEGEND OF THE WEREWOLF’s weird opening sequence, it has been said that the beasts of the forest shall watch over and protect human children on Christmas Eve, because, well, their forefathers and mothers did it for Jesus, so if they didn’t do it too they’d be jerks. This bit of made up myth provides credibility for the ensuing tale of poor little Etoile, a baby who, after his immigrant parents are chomped on by a pack of starving wolves, is inexplicably adopted by the now sated pack. He grows up like a sort of lupine Tarzan, a wild untamed thing who is eventually ‘rescued’ by a sleazy carny (the amazing, wild eyed actor Hugh Griffith from, among many, many other fine films, Ben Hur) and top billed in his skid row circus as the feral ‘Wolf Boy’. Eventually Etoile grows into a strapping young lad (played by veteran actor David Rintoul who recently appeared in Polanski’s excellent thriller THE GHOST WRITER) who makes the rather startling discovery that, when under pressure of full moon, he grows fangs, sprouts fur, pops his shirt and end up looking a lot like Oliver Reed did in Terrance Fisher’s 1961 Hammer horror classic CURSE OF THE WEREWOLF.

In fact Jimmy Evans’s Roy Ashton-esque make up schemes for Etoile’s furry face and transformations and the idea of a Christmas curse aren’t the only things that recall that admittedly superior film. See, Etoile ends up ditching his promising career as a rabid roustabout and flees to late 19th century Paris (the Fisher film was based on Guy Endore’s novel “The Werewolf Of Paris” and both pics were penned by Anthony Hinds, under his pseudonym John Elder) where he gets a gig working at a zoo run by OLIVER! heavy Ron Moody and falls in love with a beautiful whore, a woman who – like Reed’s squeeze in CURSE- seems to temper his inner lycanthrope. Of course all goes sour when a jealous Etoile turns wolfy and rips the throats out of the local bordello’s patrons (complete with red optical effects, the kind that Francis was fond of playing with) and it falls on the narrow shoulders of Peter Cushing, here playing an intrepid police pathologist, to line Etoile’s homicidal cloud with a sweet silver lining.

LEGEND OF THE WEREWOLF was produced by Tyburn Films, a tiny, short-lived UK studio founded by Francis’s son Kevin and one that sought to capitalize on Hammer’s massive, decade spanning, international success. Problem was, by 1974 Hammer Horror was already passé and, after one more picture (1975’s fine John Hurt/Ian McCulloch vehicle THE GHOUL) took a permanent dive.

In Canada (where I was born, raised and still live) a little budget video distro outfit called Interglobal Home Video (which I raved about HERE) ended up distributing LEGEND in the 1980’s. I bought that VHS cassette for $10 at a local Kmart and I’m certainly glad I did. Because I’ve never, ever seen the film legitimately available in any other format on these shores. Needless to say, I treasure my copy…

Though hampered by its low budget, and aforementioned plot familiarity, and though its not necessarily Francis’s best work (though it’s about a gazillion times better than his worst film, 1970’s awesomely insane caveman vs. Joan Crawford opus TROG) -LEGEND is a well paced, blackly humorous, creepy and oh-so-very British slice of rough-around-the -edges, modestly budgeted Gothic horror. And Hammer vet Harry Robinson’s brash, often romantic score amplifies the production value considerably.

You should find it. That beaten up tape of mine has seen the insides of no less than 7 VCR’s and it still goes strong, it still pulls it’s LP recorded weight with blood dripping, hairy backed finesse and flesh shredding, electro-magnetic grace. A muddy rip of that VHS is on YouTube and it’s a perfectly acceptable (though faded and fuzzy) version to at least get the sense of the film. Here’s hoping someone cleans this wonderful little flick up and dresses it up for Blu-ray someday…

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Top Ten Horror Directors Making Non-Horror Television

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 26 Nov 2015 14:00:00 +0000

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Top Ten Horror Directors Making Non-Horror Television

SHOCK goes wild and reveals ten horror legends and their ventures into mainstream television.

It’s a sad fact that theatrical feature films are today suffering through a sort of creative dormancy, causing Hollywood’s top talents to migrate over to television’s artist-friendly climate. The horror genre has been especially affected by this trend, with beloved directors seeking work in TV not only for a paying gig, but also to stretch out with subject matter not usually brought their way. Many of these directors have actually been tacking television for years, as the examples below illustrate. Now, this list isn’t to showcase horror folks doing yet more scary stuff on the small screen, such as stints on TWILIGHT ZONE or HANNIBAL or THE WALKING DEAD, but are a look at familiar filmmakers using (or having used) the dominance of television programs for the chance to do something a little unexpected…

CASEBUSTERS (Wes Craven)

No filmmaker felt more ghettoized by the horror genre than the late Wes Craven, and he famously leveraged his SCREAM clout for the opportunity to direct Meryl Streep in the cloying biopic MUSIC FROM THE HEART. But in 1986, well before his Streep gambit, Craven was thinking of the kids—his film DEADLY FRIEND was something he hoped would connect with younger audiences, and it was instead hijacked by the studio and loaded up with ridiculous gore sequences. That same year, Craven would finally get to make a genuine kiddie flick, as he went into league with the House of Mouse to direct an installment of their stalwart WONDERFUL WORLD OF DISNEY program. Craven’s effort, feeling very much like an aborted series pilot, is called CASEBUSTERS, and it concerns a brother (Noah Hathaway of TROLL) and sister, the latter of which is obsessed with detective novels. The duo are helping out their kindly, podgy grandpa (character actor Pat Hingle), who happens to be a private investigator-slash-neighborhood watchman. Teaming up with local delinquent “Ski”, Grandpa and the youngsters take on a geeky Rick Moranis clone and a harridan in mom jeans who are out running a lame counterfeiting scheme. From hilariously awkward and misplaced narration by Hingle, to three (!) ineptly-staged car chases, to dumbed-down and preposterous plotting (the little sister blackmails a guy into chasing down the baddies by threatening him with a fine for dumping garbage?), CASEBUSTERS is juvenile, moronic fluff. Sorry, Wes.

GAME OF THRONES (Neil Marshall)

Fiendishly popular GAME OF THRONES has no shortage of epic set pieces and enormous battles, something Neil Marshall had previous experience in mounting through his swashbuckling 2010 film CENTURION. Marshall got the nod to direct two of GAMES’ heaviest episodes, and it’s difficult to discuss the particulars without spoiling any of the series’ intricate political machinations. Suffice it to say that when Marshall’s name flashes up on the credits of a particular episode, in-tune viewers know that they are primed for scope and scale—it was Marshall who marshalled the massive brawl between the sentries of the Night’s Watch and the feral tribe known as the Wildlings, and the results can be witnessed in the clip below:

NEW YORK UNDERCOVER (Mick Garris)

Having set or broken ratings records with his Stephen King miniseries, it makes sense that Mick Garris would be recruited over the years to hop aboard a number of successful programs. Garris has thus demonstrated his ability to work with the darker corners of teen-driven dramas like PRETTY LITTLE LIARS and RAVENSWOOD, and macabre grownup fare like THE WITCHES OF EAST END and HAPPY TOWN, but it was his helming an episode of Dick Wolf’s mid-nineties cop actioner NEW YORK UNDERCOVER that comes out of left field. UNDERCOVER was part of the then-upstart Fox network’s attempt to coax a younger demographic, and featured regular performances from hip-hop and R n’ B stars of the day. Garris’s episode has cool-guy detectives Williams and Torres backing a local reverend against an evil cigarette conglomerate’s attempts to discredit him, and boasts an appearance by controversial social critic Al Sharpton.

CSI: MIAMI (Rob Zombie)

For Rob Zombie’s many critics who would dearly love to see him direct a script that he didn’t write himself, look no further—in 2010, Zombie was behind the camera for an episode of CSI: MIAMI, conjuring that Bruckheimer beige glow around star David Caruso. There are traces of Zombie’s visual flair during an opening party sequence, and members of the Zombie zoo show up in the form of William Forsyth, Malcolm McDowell, and Sheri Moon Zombie (and there’s also a cameo by ZZ top’s Billy Gibbons!), but the episode hews closely to the standard CSI procedural outlay. The far more amusing result of Zombie’s network television dalliance is his interview anecdote regarding the notoriously crotchety Caruso, starting at 3:55:

DREAM ON (John Landis)

John Landis will the first person to tell you that he’s hardly a horror icon, having only ever made two features in the genre. He most definitely has a dozen blockbuster comedies to his name, so it was hardly an out of character move for Landis to concoct his own sitcom, bringing in FRIENDS’ Marta Kaufman and David Crane to assist in developing it. Alongside TALES FROM THE CRYPT, DREAM ON was a key component of HBO’s early wave of original programming, and Landis would direct many of the episodes himself. The show starred Brian Benben (with whom Landis would reunite in the awful MASTERS OF HORROR episode ‘Deer Woman’) as Martin Tupper, an NYC book editor fumbling through post-divorce dating life. The show’s gimmick is that Tupper spent so much time in front of the television as a child that footage from ancient programs would be spliced in to comment on the action, as Tupper’s brain presumably would do. While DREAM ON’s risqué humor, spicy language, and frequent instances of nudity broke ground for the TV sitcom format, the plots were repetitive and the clips themselves quickly become annoying. Still, Landis can take heart in knowing that his show was in on the ground floor of the towering program slate for which HBO has since become renowned. Here’s a trailer for the show, in German:

HAWAII FIVE-0 (Joe Dante)

Joe Dante has made the odd venture into television throughout his career with a number of forgotten series, such as the excellent kid-oriented spookshow EERIE, INDIANA. And like Rob Zombie, Dante dipped his toe into the CSI world by directing an Amityville-themed 2009 episode of CSI: NY. It’s no big stunner to see that Dante can handle horror on large or small screens, but the surprise is how he became a staple of the HAWAII FIVE-0 revival, directing a total of nine episodes of what has proven to be a solid and consistently entertaining cop series. Of course, the assignment of shooting this year’s atmospheric Halloween-themed HAWAII episode went to Dante, and here’s a nasty, maggoty clip of that particular work:

SCALES OF JUSTICE (David Cronenberg)

As most die-hard fans are aware, David Cronenberg veered into television by directing an episode of FRIDAY THE 13TH: THE SERIES, a show that conveniently shot in Cronenberg’s hometown of Toronto. Less prominent on Cronenberg’s T.V. resume is his direction of two episodes of SCALES OF JUSTICE, a crime re-enactment program hosted by esteemed Canadian defence attorney Edward Greenspan. SCALES was adapted from a long-running radio program of the same name, and the screen version was, to be honest, a stiff and amateurish Northern answer to slicker U.S. fare like UNSOLVED MYSTERIES. Surviving episodes are almost impossible to find—though a brief, unremarkable clip from one of Cronenberg’s efforts can be viewed here:

THE WINNERS (George A. Romero)

Laurel Entertainment was the name of the Pittsburgh production company founded by George A. Romero and partner Richard Rubenstein. In addition to Laurel’s involvement with feature films, the company also produced a series of sports documentaries during the mid-seventies under the title THE WINNERS. Romero himself would cut several episodes of THE WINNERS together; besides a celebration of legendary Pittsburgh Pirates slugger Willie Stargell, there was also a 1974 ode to the gridiron accomplishments of one O.J. Simpson. In retrospect, this short doc is arguably the most horrific project of Romero’s career, but at the time Simpson was a spotless paragon of athletic prowess and adored for his affable, approachable public demeanor. The documentary itself amounts to standard sports-profile fawning, and fairly drips with hilarious seventies’ funky-flute music and graphics, but brush aside the now-odious subject matter and it stands as an excellent example of Romero’s tremendous editing skill, especially in the short pre-credits locker room sequence.

THE EQUALIZER (Tobe Hooper)

In between shooting his features TCM2 and SPONTANEOUS COMBUSTION in the late eighties, Tobe Hooper also got sidetracked by several TV projects. There were the shows that one might expect, from Spielberg’s Garris-guided AMAZING STORIES to the pilot of FREDDY’S NIGHTMARES, and a real curveball among them—an episode of righteous action-drama THE EQUALIZER, a sort of upscale A-TEAM in which a retired British spy (played primly by THE WICKER MAN’s Edward Woodward) is contacted via personal ad by New York’s downtrodden, and then Woodward goes to work in their defense. Hooper’s episode has a family battling a slumlord, and features an uncharacteristically restrained performance by a young Michael (HENRY: PORTRAIT OF A SERIAL KILLER) Rooker, which balances a hilarious, over-the-top Michael (BARTON FINK) Lerner as the heartless slumlord. As with most EQUALIZER episodes, the two-dimensional melodrama is laid on thicker than mayonnaise, and Hooper can’t manage to impart enough of his personality to rescue a single minute of this soppy network slop.

RAKE (Sam Raimi)

Sam Raimi is no stranger to filling up T.V. schedules with Renaissance Pictures’ output in the capacity of producer, and he very recently directed the opening salvo of the Starz channel’s ASH VS. EVIL DEAD series. Less acknowledged is his participation in 2014’s Greg Kinnear vehicle RAKE. Any inch of film or byte of DV directed by Raimi is prized by film nerds for its visual inventiveness, but beyond the splatstick of the EVIL DEAD trilogy or the grandiose spectacle of his SPIDER-MAN and OZ films, Raimi is also an unheralded master of slow-burn drama (Sure, THE GIFT may be spotty, but A SIMPLE PLAN is an American crime classic). RAKE sits squarely in the comedic side of Raimi’s repertoire, and gives him another puffed-up protagonist to torture through karmic misfortunes; this one deftly played by Raimi’s GIFT star Kinnear. Kinnear’s character Keegan Dean isn’t quite in Ash’s delusory league, but roguish attorney Dean is a pretty flawed hero nonetheless. Raimi directed RAKE’s pilot, guest starring the great Peter (FARGO) Stormare as a serial killer, and returned for episode four. Entitled ‘Cannibal’, the episode has AMERICAN HORROR STORY’s Denis O’Hare playing a debonair flesheater that Kean is hired defend in court—before horror fans get too excited, know that this cannibal is handled mostly for laughs, and that the consumption turns out to be consensual. Overall, the short-lived RAKE was a witty, acerbic show gone too soon. (And yes, Raimi devotees, “The Classic” makes a split-second cameo at the end of ‘Cannibal’.)

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New THE CONJURING 2 Set Photos Show the Warrens in 1970s London

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 26 Nov 2015 04:36:00 +0000

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New THE CONJURING 2 Set Photos Show the Warrens in 1970s London

James Wan has shared new The Conjuring 2 set photos with Vera Farmiga and Patrick Wilson

Director James Wan has shared some new The Conjuring 2 set photos via social media. Check them out below for a look at returning stars Patrick Wilson and Vera Farmiga, set to reprise their The Conjuring roles as real-life paranormal investigators Ed and Lorraine Warren. You’ll also get a first look at the retro London location and Simon McBurney (Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation) in period costume, so check out the pics from The Conjuring 2: The Endfield Poltergeist below!

In between shots, posing w the coolest cats-Simon McBurney, @patrickwilson73 @VeraFarmiga #Marylebone #theconjuring2 pic.twitter.com/DY5RuBv1O5

— James Wan (@creepypuppet) November 22, 2015

Taking gorgeous #MaryleboneStation back in time to seventies London. Beautiful Victorian architecture #TheConjuring2 pic.twitter.com/LqyrvYTRA6

— James Wan (@creepypuppet) November 22, 2015

Recreating snowy Christmas in the 70’s on the streets of London. Outside a pub, naturally! #Conjuring2 pic.twitter.com/fcoJfauYvs

— James Wan (@creepypuppet) November 18, 2015

I bring my crane into every pub I visit. #warringtonhotel #london #conjuring2

A photo posted by James Wan (@creepypuppet) on Nov 18, 2015 at 9:55am PST

Unlike the recent spinoff film, Annabelle (which explored the back story of the first film’s terrifying doll), The Conjuring 2 will continue the based on truth adventures of the Warrens, whose cases have also inspired the likes of The Haunting in Connecticut and most notably, The Amityville Horror. The sequel is also set to feature Frances O’Connor, playing the part of a desperate mother whose daughter is experiencing a haunting.

The Conjuring 2: The Endfield Poltergeist features a screenplay by Chad and Carey Hayes who penned the first film along with House of Wax and The Reaping. James Wan (Saw, Insidious, Furious 7) will return to direct for a June 10, 2016 release.

What do you think of these latest The Conjuring 2 set photos? Are you looking forward to another terrifying big screen experience? Let us know in the comments below!

The post New THE CONJURING 2 Set Photos Show the Warrens in 1970s London appeared first on Shock Till You Drop.

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New CONJURING 2 Set Photos Show the Warrens in 1970s London

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New CONJURING 2 Set Photos Show the Warrens in 1970s London

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EvilQueenB’s Horrific Guide To Black Christmas Shopping

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EvilQueenB’s Horrific Guide To Black Christmas Shopping

EvilQueenB just made you Black Friday shopping experience all the more easy with a list of suggestions on where to find the perfect gift for the horror fan in your life. She’s truly a lifesaver!! — Anything Horror Scott _____ It’s that time of year again, when we as horror fans, must suffer with the … Continue reading →

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