... it’s no exaggeration to say that LIFEFORCE tosses everything in but the kitchen in an attempt to entertain you. Actually, scratch that, it tosses everything including the kitchen sink. By the time the movie is complete, you may have to watch it again just to verify that you actually saw what you just saw. The movie is a mess of enormous proportions which I absolutely loved.* (previously) [more inside]
posted by Trurl
on Feb 6, 2012 -
59 comments
Horror movie blog
Arbogast on Film is counting down the days of October with studies of
31 cinematic screams. Considered thus far: shrieks from
The Tingler,
The Pit and the Pendulum,
Two on a Guillotine,
Macchie Solari,
The Black Cat,
Monster House,
The Silence of the Lambs,
She Demons,
The Thing,
L'Amante del Vampiro,
The Nesting, and
Witchcraft.
[more inside]
posted by Iridic
on Oct 12, 2011 -
17 comments
From the start of Bill Lancaster writing the original script to the final edited cut of the film, The Thing underwent some serious changes. A lot of footage ended up littering the cutting room floor. The Collector's Edition DVD gives us a look at some of the Outtakes and Deleted Scenes, but it falls shy of showing us what really was cut. -
Deleted Scenes from
The Thing and other assorted goodies at
Outpost 31.
There is also a prequel of some kind.
posted by Artw
on Sep 20, 2011 -
38 comments
Jason Zinoman, author of the newly-published
Shock Value, a study of horror films from the late 1960s/early 1970s, presents a four-part essay in which he diagnoses the ills of the modern horror film and presents a few solutions. (
1 2 3 4)
[more inside]
posted by kittens for breakfast
on Jul 8, 2011 -
39 comments
Daughter of Horror (original title: Dementia) was a 1955 avant garde film featuring a
noir style, a surrealist sensibility, and virtually no dialogue. A later version of the film even included an over-the-top voice over by none other than Tonight Show sidekick
Ed McMahon, but like Blade Runner the flick is better off without the narration.
Daughter of Horror is probably most famous for being the film playing in the theater overrun by
The Blob. And with a few more surrealistic elements and peculiar dialogue added, this could have been done by David Lynch in a later decade. The film, recently featured on Turner Classic Movies, is
available for free on archive.org.
posted by Celsius1414
on May 1, 2011 -
7 comments
The HP Lovecraft Literary Podcast talks to director Stuart Gordon about Herbert West - Reanimator (
part 1,
part 2). A prolific director, Gordon is responsible for some of the
better adaptations of Lovecraft's work (and
From Beyond). Currently he is directing Reanimator star Jeffrey Combs as
Edgar Allan Poe in the one-man shoe Nevermore, which just finished a hugely successful run in LA and is now heading for Poe's hometown of
Baltimore.
posted by Artw
on Dec 25, 2009 -
23 comments
What's 51 years old and made of silicone with red food dye?
The Blob, best known for it's work in
The Blob, an independent film released in 1958, with Steve McQueen's second movie role (following
Never Love a Stranger, which was released earlier that same year). The movie has been considered
the definitive '50s film about a town that won't listen to the kids until it's too late (as noted in a review for the
Criterion laserdisc release), with a
super-catchy theme song (
extended single version and b-side
Saturday Night in Tiajuana) that was
Burt Bacharach's third US hit song. (See more:
theatrical trailer,
full film on Veoh,
full film as YouTube playlist) Times change, and so do monsters, and things got a bit wacky in the 1970s, with
Beware! The Blob (aka
Son of Blob;
wiki,
trailer,
full film). The sequel played more to the slapstick comedy than the sci-fi/horror spectrum of things. Thirty years after the original,
The Blob was remade in 1988 (
wiki,
trailer,
full film), and is supposedly
being re-created by Rob Zombie, though his statement about reviving The Blob without "the big red blobby thing" has people asking,
then why remake The Blob? (
previous blobby goodness)
[more inside]
posted by filthy light thief
on Nov 3, 2009 -
53 comments
It was the 80's. We were younger then, and anything seemed possible. So it all seemed part of Destiny when my very first screenplay was bought and produced; fame and fortune was surely just around the corner. HA! Fat chance.- The making of
Forever Evil.
posted by Artw
on Oct 4, 2008 -
6 comments
"A group of teenagers, en route to attend a rock concert, lose their way when their car runs out of fuel in the dead of night. They find themselves in an unfamiliar rural backwater where they are confronted by flesh-eating zombies and a psychotic cannibalistic killer dressed in a sheet. It could be the plot to a thousand Hollywood horror films but while these teenagers may dress, talk and smoke dope like young Americans they are in fact young Pakistanis, and the film -
Zibahkhana or Hell's Ground -
is the first modern horror film to be filmed in Pakistan."
posted by brundlefly
on Aug 15, 2007 -
12 comments
Your teenage son loves terrible horror movies, like
C.H.U.D.
How do you mend his ways? Well, you start with
Paranoiac, and move on to
Ravenous 1,
2,
3,
4,
5,
6,
7,
8,
9,
10,
11,
12.
While he's still quaking, show him Takashi Miike's brutal
Ôdishon ( even YouTube won't air those scenes.) Lighten the coming dark with
Shaun of the Dead.
posted by Mblue
on Aug 11, 2007 -
46 comments
Top 50 Horror Movies This is one blogger's opinion of the Top 50 horror movies. There are some expected (Night of the Living Dead, The Exorcist) and some unexpected (Return of the Living Dead 3, Interview with the Vampire) choices for the top horror movies.
posted by Four-Eyed Girl
on Jul 1, 2007 -
101 comments
"It wasn't scary, it was just gratuitous, as if they thought, 'I know, let's have a rape,' and that made me quite angry." The question will be asked often in the coming weeks, as "Vacancy" and "Hostel 2" approach: Do modern horror films ("
gorno," or gore pornography) go too far,
particularly when it comes to women?
Who said violent misogyny was entertaining? Is this just a retread of the
exploitation wave of the
1970s/80s? (Most links NSFW, sensitive souls, people who detest violence)
posted by jbickers
on Apr 11, 2007 -
199 comments
There was a time when his scowling, oversized visage, his battered black fedora, and his long black coat, were as familiar to horror fans as such characters as Frankenstein and Dracula. This character, who appeared in three films, was called
"The Brute Man" or "The Creeper."
Only that terrifying face wasn't a mask or a creation of makeup. It was an actual face, a product of a condition called
agromegaly. And The Creeper never planned to be an actor at all, he was simply decorated war veteran-turned-
Tampa reporter who had shown up one day to cover a film. The movie's director noticed him and recommended he move to Hollywood and pursue a career as a character actor.
He was
Rondo Hatton.
posted by Astro Zombie
on Mar 5, 2006 -
18 comments
"He was someone who acted out our psyches ... He somehow got into the shadows inside our bodies; he was able to nail down some of our secret fears and put them on-screen... the history of Lon Chaney is the history of unrequited loves. He brings that part of you out into the open, because you fear that you are not loved, you fear that you never will be loved, you fear there is some part of you that's grotesque, that the world will turn away from."
A Valentine for Lon Chaney, the
Man of a
Thousand Faces.
(BugMeNot for the first link; more inside)
posted by matteo
on Feb 18, 2006 -
14 comments
The house in Amityville with the fan-shaped windows making an inhuman face is the
Godzilla of haunted house movies. The town and current owner of the house where the DeFeo family was murdered try to
downplay (registration required) its signficance. The trademark windows in the original have been replaced to disguise its identity, and lawsuits force studios to use a house-double. Although latest remake claims the status of "true story," the case has been widely dismissed as a
hoax and the 2005 film has even rased the ire of
George Lutz for how he is portrayed as the haunted father-figure. Other people involved in the case including convicted murder DeFeo are
unhappy with the new attention. Still, the story has its
true believers and
psychics who argue the debunkers have their own agenda. Then again,
Texas Chainsaw Massacre was also claimed by the same production company to be "inspired by a true story."
posted by KirkJobSluder
on Apr 15, 2005 -
12 comments
The Horror Channel A 24-hour, all-horror, uncensored, digital cable channel plans to be launched for Halloween 2004, with programming to include classic and contemporary movies, specials, documentaries and original series’ each season. CEO and founder Nicholas A. Psaltos (former Director of Acquisitions and Program Administration at Bravo Television Networks) hopes the new genre network will capitalize on the success of other genre channels like Comedy Central and The Sci-Fi Channel. Psaltos has even put together a creative advisory board of genre legends and newcomers including John Carpenter, Roger Corman, Wes Craven, Guillermo del Toro, Tobe Hooper, Stuart Gordon, Lucky McKee, Eli Roth, George Romero and Rob Zombie. Starting a TV network is risky business and The Horror Channel is petitioning horror fans to help with programming by providing a survey on their consumer website. (Via
Rue Morgue)
posted by Jeffy
on Oct 2, 2003 -
17 comments
As the
remake of
Ringu opens in
Japan, a rash of remakes of Asian horror movies seems to be winding its way through Hollywood. Not only has Hideo Nakata's latest movie,
Honogurai mizu no soko kara (Dark Water), been optioned, the inevitable remake of
Ringu 2 will occur, and the Hong Kong
The Sixth Sense-esque
The Eye has also been picked up for the Hollywood process.
While it's nothing new to
remake classic
Japanese movies, this latest wave brings a lot of new questions. Is it near-impossible for the US to create horror movies that aren't
increasingly self-
referential? How long is it before we get remakes of
Audition,
Battle Royale, and
Suicide Club? And will we eventually end up with a horror movie in the style of
Fa talai jone, a Thailand Western influenced by
Hollywood Westerns which were influenced by
Japanese Samurai movies?
posted by Katemonkey
on Nov 5, 2002 -
26 comments
100 scariest movie moments Retrocrush is listing their top 100 scariest movie moments, and so far, the quality is pretty high -- well-chosen scenes, and interesting writeups. And one exploding head. You've been warned. Happy Halloween!
posted by GaelFC
on Oct 31, 2002 -
80 comments
Don't watch this. Dreamworks is starting up the hype machine for their remake of the Japanese horror film
Ringu (aka The Ring), and it looks like they're taking the A.I. route with it. The movie centers on a mysterious videotape that causes those who watch it to die seven days later.
Websites are popping up all over the place that seem to connect to the 'mystery'. The first link up top goes to a flash teaser of the actual video from the film, but if you're brave, you can
watch the whole thing at iFilm. I'm curious if this will indeed turn out to be an online game like
the Evan Chan mystery from A.I., or just some better-than-average Web marketing for what looks to be a damn creepy movie.
posted by toddshot
on Jul 31, 2002 -
29 comments
Low or no budget horror films. They're awful, and oh so enticing (prolly 'cause they can be awful, amusing, and sometimes really good).
How do you do
special effects on no budget? Boggles the mind. As Halloween as it gets, the independant film makers and horror officiandos have their own
portal. Crawl down these
haunted corridors at your own risk.
posted by Wulfgar!
on Oct 31, 2001 -
7 comments
