Drive-In Trailers: Slash and Trash

With the Halloween-crazy trend this month, I decided it might be time to tackle slasher movie trailers. What better way to pay tribute to the movie that started it all than to look at some of the many, many, many campy movies it inspired?

Podcast, Episode 16 – Love and Horror

Valentines can be a trying time of year for some of us, and a wonderful time for others. Whether you’re celebrating a candle-lit dinner with your zombie lover, or stalking the aisles at the movie theatre for that perfect bride, why don’t you join Maddy, Corey, and David for a late night podcast? This week we discuss Nightlife, Bride of Reanimator, Die You Zombie Bastards, and My Demon Lover.

https://html5-player.libsyn.com/embed/episode/id/6349913/height/90/theme/custom/autoplay/no/autonext/no/thumbnail/no/preload/no/no_addthis/no/direction/forward/tdest_id/675868/render-playlist/no/custom-color/000000/

Featured Kickstarter: The House on Forest Drive

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/397619968/the-house-on-forest-drive/widget/video.html

“Stand By Me” meets “Evil Dead 2” in the 1980’s throwback feature “The House On Forest Drive” a raw blend that mixes coming of age nostalgia with over the top violence and gore, a real B-rate Bloodbath of enjoyment, with plenty demon bashing BMX action, what’s not to love.

– Mitch Morse

The 80s is back in a big way, thanks to Stranger Things. I’d like to welcome our campy overlords of horror back to their proper place, but in order to do that…well, some awesome new creators are going to need help to get there. This one in particular sounds like just the sort of thing to get started with. Let’s make horror films fun again, the protagonists likable, and the gore entertaining. That’s exactly what I thought of when I discovered this kickstarter project, and that’s what I hope you, the readers think, as well.

Sound like the sort of project you’d like to get behind? Then please check it out and do what you can to see it become a delightfully destructive reality.

Horror Flick of the Week: The Shrine (2010)

 
I feel like horror is one of the few genres that tends to truly suffer if you reveal the ending of a story. That, and obviously mysteries or thrillers. The Shrine is a movie you should watch first, without any sort of spoilers, if you really want to see the story in its entirety and get the most out of it. Because…well, I can’t say much. What I will say is this: when you are traveling, if the people in a village don’t want you to be there…go away. Don’t explore. Don’t stick around. Don’t argue. Just leave.

That, in essence, is one of the establishing factors in The Shrine that really helps set the mood. It’s not merely a mystery, but a supernatural thriller. The best kind. Also, of course, best enjoyed in the dark at night…possibly alone, unless you absolutely need someone to cling to. On another watch, I realized this one still held strong, and that made it even better for the kind of story it is. Nice, creepy, and a sort of moral story (which all good horror should be, if you follow the premise any good, dark Grimm faerie tale.)

Please, do yourself a favor, and watch this movie. It’s on Netflix…it’s waiting for you. Also…maybe avoid the forest for awhile. Just in case.

 

Horror Flick of the Week: Nightbreed (1990)

 

As Halloween approaches, I’m reminded of a film I watched all the time as a kid. Despite some massive butchering and very confusing cuts as a result, I always had plenty of fun watching all of the weird underground mutant people acting crazy as shit (as they tend to in any Clive Barker story.)

Imagine Hellraiser if the protagonist WANTED to become a Cenobyte, and if there wasn’t a puzzle box but instead a weird cult dynamic. That’s pretty much Nightbreed in the form that I’ve seen. Now on the 28th (6 days from now as I’m posting this little feature) Scream Factory is releasing a special Blu-ray/DVD with the cut we’re all familiar with AND a director’s cut. Apparently that one is incredible, and I personally can not wait to see it. But you’ve got to admire a movie that somehow manages to be entertaining, even if it loses a massive amount of relevant plot points after a massacre in the cutting room.

 

Horror Flick of the Week: White Zombie (1932)

 

A year after the success of Dracula, Bela Lugosi found himself onscreen in another (though much more independent) feature which featured his piercing gaze at it’s best. Oh sure. White Zombie is not an excellent example of acting, most of it is your typical 30s low-budget ham. But…there’s a certain charm in this film.

One thing I particularly like is that the heroine shares my name, but a more relevant aspect I’d like to mention is her acting in particular once she becomes zombified. The lead actress, Madge Bellamy, was a relatively popular silent film actress. So her over-the-top gesticulating and posing is really a relic of the previous decade, and it’s very clear in this movie how drastic the transition between talkie acting and silent acting was becoming. Now I’m not criticizing the style at all, I actually love it…in a silent movie. Somehow when she’s this angelic zombie, though, it really works. I suppose it helps that she doesn’t say anything else until the very end of the picture. She’s rather like the ghost of the 20s, stepping through into the 30s to give a final good-bye to the old style in exchange for the new.

If you are a fan of zombie pictures, this is an essential…because it’s one of (if not) the first zombie movies. Not your Fulci-style corpses, but the old-fashioned voodoo kind. People seemingly dead, put into mental slavery through means of a devilish concoction and…if the lobby card up there isn’t a slight hint…the gaze (and I guess hands) of their zombie master.

The combination of some silent film style acting, the music, and the constant close-ups when Lugosi uses his powers…reminds me of ballet. It’s really quite beautiful.

Lugosi is great in this, in the way only he could have been, dastardly and disturbing. There’s no doubt the man had massive screen presence. Some of the pacing is slow, which is to be expected, but I think anyone who really loves the horror genre really needs to devote some time to White Zombie, if not from an entertainment perspective alone, then at least for the historical aspects.

 

Drive-in Trailers: Creepy Crawlers (Part 1)

“Don’t you ever laugh as the hearse goes by,
For you may be the next one to die.
They wrap you up in a big white sheet
From your head down to your feet.
They put you in a big black box
And cover you up with dirt and rocks.
All goes well for about a week,
Until your coffin begins to leak.
The worms crawl in, the worms crawl out,
The worms play pinochle on your scalp,
They eat your eyes, they eat your nose,
They eat the jelly between your toes.
A big green worm with rolling eyes
Crawls in your stomach and out your sides.
Your stomach turns a slimy green,
And pus pours out like whipping cream.
You’ll spread it on a slice of bread,
And this is what you eat when you are dead.”

That song…for me as an impressionable child…freaked me out. It wasn’t the actual part about rotting, or leaking coffins, or dying….it was the worms. The bugs. I don’t have an innate fear of insects and their ilk, but I can’t help but get a little bit of a shiver when I think about being swarmed by/filled with creepy crawlies. So, in honor of their post as really freaking horrible little monsters…the trailers presented today are all about bugs and arachnids. ENJOY….

 

I really had no idea there were SO MANY of these movies, it’s a very expansive genre. So I decided to stop here for now, or risk getting into the triple digits territory. There will be another one some time in the future though, so keep an eye out…and some bug spray handy.

For a Gory Cause: The Mortuary Collection

Back again gang with a new kickstarter that just has me UNBELIEVABLY excited. 13 days to go and still a little over 10k left. This is a cute throwback to the camp of the 80s, and looks like it could be another excellent anthology. You all know how much I love those anthologies.

I’ll just quote the page for you: “An eccentric mortician spins four twisted tales of madness and the macabre in a sleepy New England town where nothing is as it seems.”

If this at all interests you, please check this link out!

Grim and Surreal Shorts

I find that the most surreal and experimental films tend to carry some sense of dread, whether the storyline makes sense or not. Good horror can often go hand-in-hand with experimental cinema. It makes sense, when you think about it. You can’t really scare the same audience with the same trick twice. The following are a few classic shorts in the surreal genre I think every film buff (and especially horror fan) needs to watch at least once…if not dozens of times.

Horror Flick of the Week: Frailty (2001)

When I hear people tell me that Matthew Mcconaughey has only recently started doing more noteworthy roles, not only do I want to slap them silly…but I have the extreme desire to list out great films he’s been in that have reached the 10+ year mark. I don’t usually go that far, because for some reason people start to zone out if you give them movie nerd lingo. But I really want to.

This one is a favorite of mine, and each week I’ve considered talking about it…then looked back and thought maybe I just couldn’t do it justice. I mean, not only does it have Mr. Mcconaughey, but it’s directed by Bill Paxton. Obviously if you’ve watched that trailer up there, you’ll note he’s in it too. It’s got Powers Boothe too, who I believe is an incredibly strong character actor in his own right. So from the get-go you’ll note it’s got a pretty strong cast.

Before I start, I want to tell you right now not to even think about looking up the ending if you haven’t seen this movie. You’ll deprive yourself of an awesome experience if you do…so I’m warning you, do not look up the ending. If you do, the god’s hand killer just might have to deal with you.

It begins with a detective who’s pretty much focused on finding this serial killer called…you guessed it…the god’s hand killer. Then out of the rain, a strange man shows up in the middle of the night. He not only knows who the killer is, but admits to being the killer’s brother. Thus the story really gets under way, as he explains his experience as a child growing up with his brother.

Oh Bill, how do you do menacing and charming so well?

They were pretty normal kids in a small town with a good father who truly cared about them. But everything is pretty much destroyed when dad comes home one day to tell them he received a message from an angel that the apocalypse is coming, and he has to kill people who are “really demons.” It really sounds just like an episode out of The Andy Griffith Show, if you think about it. Only instead of Don Knotts, the love-able supporting character is an axe and pair of old gloves. Also a pipe.

The younger brother, Adam, is all for it. But the older one, Fenton…something bugs him about this.

Obligatory Father-Son bonding moment.

I really can’t reveal any more without ruining it for you…but really. It’s just fantastic.