Just about everybody has something to say about Aftermath, the 2nd sickest movie of all time on the list - a list I keep bringing up. This leaves only one movie on the list completely unexplored for me.
Well I got a bootleg tape of Aftermath, probably put together before the DVD came out. It's got the other two shorts that the DVD has on it, though Genesis, which comes from another source, is so grainy it is unwatchable. There are some video extras, like the making of Aftermath, which I'm sure is on the DVD, and a 'debate' between Nacho Cerdà and the director of Nekromantik. I watched it in fast forward, so can't say what they were talking about. I'm pretty sure you can get that on the DVD too. The tape has got the dirty cover (DVD has a reversible cover - clean side shown here) which has the full frontal male nudity courtesy of a male model who is the real star of this picture, playing a corpse.
Now that I look online, I see that my tape's cover is a color copy of the original vhs cover, with the "Waken Prods" logos removed and some new text, like "special edition" photoshopped badly onto the front and side. I'm not complaining, it cost me about 3 bucks at the most.
What impressed me about Aftermath is that it is eleven years old and looks like it could have been made today. It is beautifully shot and top notch. You'd expect a short like this to be cheaply made. It's not. Personally I think that the female prosthetic corpse is a little less realistic that the male prosthetic corpse, though I am not so familiar with what bodies that have gone through rigamortis really look like.
Here is a complaint that perhaps says more about me than it does the movie. Warning: I am about to get vulgar. After the mortician stabs the vagina 20 or so times, you would expect the vagina to be damaged beyond recognition, but when it is next shown, it looks the same as it did initially. Ok, listen, I know that the film makers paid attention to detail and that is why this irks me. During the making-of we are told how blood was digitally filled-in to a drain in one shot to preserve continuity.
Are these the best corpses on film ever? Probably not.
Nacho Cerdà is very likable in the documentary. He says he was inspired to make this film after watching a real life autopsy in person, and this autopsy admittedly disturbed him deeply. He claims that what he saw was more horrific than what he put in his film.
Chas Balun, famous horror magazine editor and artist (plus the 1st American distributor of the Guinea Pig movies!) has called Aftermath 'pornographic'. I disagree on the grounds that their is simply no insertion shown. Also, this is art cinema, there is no dialogue, the camera tells the story.
Some have though that Nacho Cerdà made the alien footage in the Fox special Alien Autopsy: (Fact or Fiction?) and in fact he appears on the tv special as a horror film maker. According to this link, Olaf Ittenbach, brought the world the dead alien that could bleed like a real corpse. You know, a lot of reviewers talk about how they wish they could have "these ninety minutes of my life back" after watching a movie that blew. Well, if there were any 60 minutes I wish I could have back, it would be the hour it took to watch Alien Autopsy. What's more, I swear I watched a follow up special where they admitted it was fake? Does anyone else remember this?
Last week in the TV studio they were shooting a P.S.A. on adoption. They brought a dumpster and a ton of trash into the studio to make it look like an alley. In the shoot a girl drops a newborn, actually a baby doll, into the dumpster. Everyone on was talking about how horrible killing babies (in the 1st 75 hours of life) is, but seriously, in this academic setting, you know that most of these people would think it was fine if the baby was terminated prior to birth. I would get into abortion arguments, like I did in my review for The Unborn, which is not something I'm even going to link back to now, though it's in the archives if you really want to search. It's not my fight. It is a subject I find fascinating.
In fairness, a lot of pro choicers are against partial birth abortion which accounts for the difference between a small fetus and a newborn. The full version of Dumplings includes 2 partial birth abortions. I don't know if this is a new Lion's Gate version of 3 Extremes or not, but the version I rented included the Dumplings short in 3 Extremes and a second disc that features the entire Dumplings movie. The short plays like a 'best of Dumplings' and is worth watching because it has a different ending than the feature, but after you've watched the full version you will see that the 3 Extremes version is totally butchered. Watch the full versions for more characters, more backstory (we find out that the dumpling maker (Bai Ling) was a former abortionist in China), and yes, more gruesome shots.
Serious moral depravity here, I liked Dumplings more than the shorts from Chan-wook Park and Takashi Miike. Everyone is evil, vain, or has a price. I like how in the full version the male is just as bad or worse than his former movie star wife. Leading to his eventual desire for the fountain of youth is the foreshadowing where we witness his fondness for eating fertilized hard boiled eggs, with partially developed chicks inside. What I'm saying is, don't eat those fucking things, you weirdos!
Fruit Chan, from Hong Kong, is the relative unknown among the 3 Extremes directors, but he is not unknown anymore. I must say the visually this film is gorgeous. In fact everything on the 3 Extremes discs looks amazing. The Chan-wook Park short is faster paced and flashier than his Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance. It is much like the final showdown in Oldboy, but I'd say it lacks the impact because it does not have as strong characters as did those two full length films. Takashi Miike's piece is strange and slow, reminding me of the 1964 Japanese horror anthology, Kwaidan. It is beautiful and has a ghost scene that will appeal to casual fans of Japanese horror.
Cub, you laugh now, but won't you be looking for some dumplings ten years down the road?
Oh no! Ten years down the road it will be time. Quick, let's start looking for a dumpling maker now so I can preserve the youth.
Will you say you were sorry for making fun of me when I got squeamish? It was that scene on the bus, when the guy in white pants sat in the pool of blood from the girl's abortion. How sick was that?
Ha ha. You totally got squeamish during that bus scene,the both times we watched it. I loved that part! It was great! Sorry? Cub I must have you see it again!
The version in 3 Extremes was a mess, I'm glad you made me watch the full version on Disc 2, good thinking Cub.
I knew the full length would certainly be worth watching cause there was so much being left out in the shortened version, and I knew it would be some of the juicy details, so yes I am glad we saw it. I loved this movie. Great pick!
The other day Cub and I went to sell cd's. Doing this feels pathetic in a way - like I'm desperate for a fix or something. Let me explain. I've never worked in a used cd store, but I've worked at 2 large music chainstores and even in those I've seen some pathetic sights. People bringing in old scratched up cd's that they totally got from Columbia House (12 cd's for a penny?) in 1990 and they think we are going to take this in as a return and give them $18.99!?! It can be a sad sight as these folks are usually not looking their best. Desperation. Over at the used stores they must have seen it all. People coming in with scratched cd's and dog eared booklets, but no cases or back liner notes? The explanation? A cd binder got lifted from somebody's car. How about people selling still wrapped cd's? Well, that was me, at least half the shit I was selling was unopened, but I was in the clear. For those in the know, and the best record store clerks surely are, you could tell that I got many of these discs as promos as the bar code is punched with a small circle. Often, the punch is the only marking that separates a promo from a cd that belongs in a store's inventory. Therefore, a customer buying a used promo at the store is not being shortchanged in any way and that's good for me as I get full credit for selling back a promo cd just as if it were a disc I purchased from Tower for $18.99. I've scored promos in various was over the years. In L.A., for example, there is an excess of shit and buying a full priced cd can be avoided, even if it means buying a used promo at Amoeba, which is often overflowing with promos of the latest releases, that industry types must have unloaded just as they got their copies.
I got the most promos ever - while working in school radio stations. Tip: avoid the rest of the station staff, there are surely some among them who view taking cd's from the station library as wrong. What the fuck is up that? I'll never understand. Anyway, since I was mostly selling off a bunch of obvious (to store clerks) promos I was saved from the kind of scrutiny one would feel when selling off the embarrassing cd's that they were once into. Still, I could not avoid discomfort completely - it's awkward because the clerk know I want the most for each cd regardless of what it means to me. He wants to give me the least that he can - well if he's loyal to his store he does - and we can assume that he is. Trying to act like you don't care does not work, cause you do care.
Cub went first and sold off a bunch of cd's that I gave to her. This is typical. She often sells clothes that I bought for her - that's the next part of the story - I'm getting ahead of myself. Funny thing is Cub tried to sell this rare import cd by Suede. It had been floating freely in her trunk for a couple of years and was covered with gunk on the playing side. I told her not to bother with this one, but she did anyway. I gave lots of advice. Some stuff just won't sell no matter how much you don't want it. I did not bother with trying to lose my promos for Kill Radio or El Pus. These major label records bombed bigtime. If anyone, anywhere, got promos of these, and many did, they already sold them to the store and the store did not sell the copies that they took in. Trust me. Other shit, from the past year or so that I guarantee you can't sell... Busted (I tried), Hazen Street, Amen, and Eighteen Visions.
Next we went to a vintage store where Cub tried her luck at selling off 3 bags of clothes. She did pretty well, considering how discriminating they are. This is not a Goodwill, they pay you cash for what they take. I've had interviews at this particular chain multiple times. They gave me a test, a sack of clothes, and I was to tell them which items I'd buy and which I would refuse. How did I do? "There are no right or wrong answers", I was told. Yeah right, I did not get the job. It's for the best though. Even if these stores are packed with high fashion items, they still smell like thrift shops. Gross.
I could go on forever about the details of a certain shopping day, but it's time to get on topic and continue our look at Salo, or The 120 Days of Sodom, which I started to review last post. It turns out I was extremely close to the finish when stopping this tape last time. The last chapter of this movie revolves around violence and torture, all shot through a telephoto lens that is meant to represent binoculars that the elite perverts are watching this action through. Though graphic, the violent scenes were less shocking to me than all the other elements in this movie which break all taboos. Sodomy is the norm in this movie, in fact those who practice male/female sex are told they will be punished with the loss of a limb. Perhaps sodomy does not shock today, but shit-eating, that will shock Pretty much everything in this movie has ties to bodily fluids or discharge, whether described or depicted on camera. Calling it porno is absurd. It would be an unusual case for someone to get-off on this film. It's not erotic, it's a very cruel picture.
Salo is number 7 on the top ten sickest movies list that I discussed here. To quote ign.com, "By far the most heady and artsy film on the list, Pier Paolo Pasolini’s Salo, or 120 Days of Sodom is also one of the most disturbing and (dare we say) damaging. There are very few films that, upon viewing, will have us running to the showers to try and scrub ourselves clean. This is one of those films."
Here are collected links (and a few screen shots if you click around) on Salo at opsonicindex.org.
Without getting political, though that is fun, it is easy to point out that the shit that went down at Abu Gharib is very much like this. You can see here - many naked and forced gay sex positions, a man smeared in feces, and the famous naked pyramid that is very similar to the judging of the asses in Salo. That said, Salo is real.
Can Salo make anyone think about the perversions of power? In the meantime I'll know what to say if the ruling homeowners association in my apartment complex gets on my case again. "I know what you guys do behind closed doors, you sick, disgusting fucks!"
So we are watching Pier Paolo Pasolini's Salo, or The 120 Days of Sodom in three installments. We don't have A.D.D. - sure it's a long movie, but that's not the reason why the tape keeps getting stopped. The other night we needed a break before bed. Cub did not want to have dreams about this movie. I was feeling a bit dirty, but then the syndicated Sex and the City came on and one of the taboo subjects they discussed: eating ass. Well that's what the first 2/3 of Salo have pretty much bean about (yeah, literally), so don't call me a pervert, it was on Sex and the City too!
So the 120 Days of Sodom are a-Ok in mainstream America today. Last night though, Cub made me stop the tape the 2nd time when a teenage boy was getting his dick burned by a candle. Will she watch the rest of the movie? I think so. It's kind of like a car crash that you can't stop looking at. This movie will require extensive commentary, so expect more in the future. It is allegedly the most rare DVD in the United States today. I'm watching a bootleg version of the Criterion edition.
On to this morning's amazing discovery from the Demonbaby blog. The Second Annual Stupid Myspace Haircuts Awards! Of course the scenester masses are a prime target, but the forgotten industrial-metal genre takes a beating as well. I worked in a gothic clothing store on Melrose for a few months and I saw some pretty bad shit, but these are the worst of the worst. Incidentally, our most hated type of customer would be the "cyber goth" or anyone doing a raver/goth crossover.
Some on the list are myspace celebrities with friends numbering in the thousands. Jeffree Star is a prime example. I've seen this frighteningly good-looking Mechanical Animals (and note the Matrix type layout one of his friends in the top 8 has - we hate that) type crossdresser wondering about Sunset Strip with a pack of short ugly troll girls in tow. Jeffree, lose the entourage and find somewhere else to wander about, Sunset is gross, but you were probably new to L.A. then.
Also, the last guy mentioned, whose hair is compared to the Magic Coral Garden, I've seen him too. Who could forget a haircut like that, though it was only one color when I used to see it. That always impressed me, it is completely original. I guess it really is fantastical material, not for the real world.
Back to The 1st Annual - many of the winners have since quit myspace - will those in round two follow their lead? Everyone from Boston knows Jasper, I wonder how he took to being on this list. He is after all a self-described "muppet" so we can assume this did not get to him. I like his 2-tone Cruella Devilled hair, myself.
So over in the 2nd Annual we've got supposed lawyers for some of the winners ordering the 'cease and desists' in the blog's comments section. If I were Demonbaby I would not worry about it. It's the free press! Besides, what has Demonbaby got to lose? With all due respect, I don't think it is a money-making operation. Are they going to sue for the money in these kids' Amazon.com account?
Soon: More discussion of Salo...
Non-horror: kids in the UK look like this too? At least they are enthusiastic. This video uses some terminology that is like nails on a chalk board to me.
Watched/watching some Italian horrors. Specters (Spettri) from 1987 and Joe D'Amato's Anthropophagous: The Beast, finally in it's uncut form.
Saw a movie that was truly the pits, the German Legion of the Dead, from Olaf Ittenbach, a man Uwe Boll calls "a German splatter freak". Poor Ittenbach has already had to deal with a 2005 movie called Legion of the Dead coming out and his movie was only released in 2001. Bad karma for working with Uwe Boll (FX on BloodRayne) whose previous movie stole the name Alone in the Dark from a 1982 slasher. Yeah, I know it's the video game name, but don't defend fellow German, Uwe Boll.
Anyway, Ittenbach's movie sucks real bad. It's just like From Dusk Till Dawn, just what the world needed in 2001, more 90's retreads. It's the dialogue, I really hated it, and I'm not the only one - imdb comments.
I got the DVD of the Nick Millard, aka Nick Phillips, 3 movie set. Satan's Black Wedding appears to be the best and most disturbing, though I'm only part way through it. The campy Criminally Insane is better known and though I loved it, the movie comes off as extremely amateur even though the film looks great on DVD. Shot of the cleaver raised up, shots of still cleaver touching red paint covered face, shot of the cleaver raised up, etc... To be be fair they used real Hollywood effects blood, that's just the way fake blood looked in 1975. Yes I watched some of the extras. Can you believe it? I wanted to see how Priscilla Alden looks today. The answer is, she looks healthier than she did in Criminally Insane.
The third movie included was the selling point for me, Crazy Fat Ethel 2. Unfortunately it is unwatchable. I knew it would be shot on tape footage of Priscilla Alden and clips from Criminally Insane. Well immediately after watching Criminally Insane this would be a total bore. Actually, Death Nurse 2, I have this on tape, is also shot on video Pricilla Alden killing footage with Criminally Insane clips added. Also unwatchable.
Useless trivia: Death Nurse is said to be the 1st shot on video movie, ahead of Blood Cult. I learned this on the imdb. Priscilla Alden should really work the convention circuit.
Fields they have eyes
Woods they have ears
- from "Warrior" by Public Image Lmt.
The Hills Have Eyes, the remake, from Alexandre Aja, director of the over hyped Haute tension. This movie was a good time, though I though Hills Have Eyes was already remade as Wrong Turn in 2003. I'll take brainless slaughter like Wrong Turn over ambitious horror that falls flat on it's face. Failure is rarely pretty. That's why I approve of junk like Hills Have Eyes or even House of Wax. These movies aim so low that they can't miss the mark.
I must say the The Hills Have Eyes remake was a lot more violent than the original. Personally I prefer the 1985 Craven sequel, The Hills Have Eyes Part II, to the original, as it shows all the best clips from Part I, and adds some new great action with the return of Michael Berryman reaping havoc. Of course everything I like about the thrown together Part II was everything I hated about Crazy Fat Ethel 2.
Note: I think that Hills Have Eyes Part II is referenced in Aja's remake. Did anyone see the school bus in the crater among the abandoned cars? Could be a coincidence. I hope not.
I got my tapes today that I previously thought were never going to show. Man does media mail take a long time to get across the country - where were my tapes over the past month, being transported on the back of a donkey? The metal head vendor sent the package 25 days after I won. I believe him now. Up until a few days ago I was sure that these were not sent period and I reported him to ebay and wrote some nasty feedback. Then I remembered how slow media mail can be - let's discuss the issues...
My main complaint is that the seller wrote "US Postal Service First Class Mail® Estimated delivery 2-3 days" and then sent it through cheaper media mail. This has happened to me a bunch of times and is straight up dishonest. The seller saves a couple of dollars when they charge for the better service and then send it media mail. As a result the package ships up to 23 times slower than advertised, earning the seller a good chance at being submitted negative feedback. Is it worth it for them? I guess so, if the the buyer has a"all's well that ends well" attitude and gives the seller "A+++" feedback regardless of obscene delays. Maybe these slightly dishonest sellers don't deserve the "F-", but how about a "C---". No one wants to seem like a bastard, but from now on, how about taking a stand. Positive feedback is not a right.
I admit, I've been a puss in the past, not wanting to give another horror fan a bad rating. Well fuck that.
One thing that stops buyers from giving negative feedback is that the sellers often wait until they have received feedback before giving their feedback to the buyer. Sometimes they even explicitly mention this, to suggest, "fuck with me and I'll fuck with you". Well, this is ridiculous, feedback should be given to the buyer based on when they pay. The seller is already protected because they don't ship until getting paid. They should leave the buyer feedback based on when they got paid alone, not based on reciprocity.
Still, suppose you leave a douche seller some deserved bad feedback and then they get you back with some nonsense just for revenge. So what? As a buyer does your feedback matter? The buyer, not so much the seller, chooses who does business with who and that's how it stays. Negative feedback hurts the seller more. No doubt. Don't be intimated. Leave the feedback that should be left.
One more thing, before the horror review. Yup, more ebay. When I want to win on ebay and I really want to win, I bid during the last minute. Sometimes this is just not possible, due to work or school or dates with Cub. Then I decided what my maximum bid is, place it, and hope I get if for as little an amount as possible. Often, very often, when I win, the amount I'm paying is suspiciously close to my maximum. Suppose a box of tapes is going for $25. I'll be away from the computer until the auction is over so I plug in my maximum, say $50. I'll leave the computer winning the auction at around $26. When I get back the computer and find that I've won, I'm likely to be throwing down $49.98 for the tapes. It could be legit, someone could have gone up to $49 and not broke $50, but this happens so often that I figure buyers are getting fucked with by corrupt sellers once again. I asked a friend who is a full time seller. She assured me the sellers DO NOT know what their bidder's maximum bids are. Well thank God for that! So sellers ARE NOT logging in under a different name and bidding up to just below my maximum (after all they would not want to bid so high as to win their own item!) every time. All is well and it's an honest world... or is it?
Listen to what my seller friend told me:
The seller isnt shown what your maximum bid is. For a seller to bid on his/her own auction is called "shill" bidding and it is forbidden on Ebay. I know, 'cause I thought about doing it myself a long time ago, ahhaha! But I didn't ever do it 'cause I would be too chicken I that I would get caught (oh yeah, and its wrong! ;D ).
Anyway, most likely you are just getting bid up at the last minute by some other buyer. BUT it is technically possible for a seller to shill bid you.
The only way you could really tell is probably one of 3 ways:
1) check the bid history on the item. See if there are any "bid retractions". This would show that someone could have put in enough money to see how much YOU were willing to pay, and then canceled their OWN bid. Then they could bid again right UNDER your maximum bid.
2)This would be the pain in the ass way...Go to their feedback page. Click on the items they have sold, and check the bid histories there. Do you see a lot of the SAME bidders bidding (but not winning) in their other auctions? I.e. Is the seller using the same screen name to shill bid on his/her other auctions.
3)This way is probably waaaay too much trouble. Its the same as ..2 really, only check to see if there are Ebay name changes. If a Ebay member changes their name (maybe to avoid people noticing their shill bidding) then there will be a white circle icon next to their Ebay ID.
See, it's possible - and I'm not just paranoid, I know it has happened to me - and probably you!
The Kiss was directed by Pen Densham and it is your typical 80's fair. "Fuck You Felix!" is a line uttered by a supporting character as she bats a puppet cat-monster that has be a real murdering bastard throughout the movie. Yes, it is one of the lamest one-liners that I've ever heard. There's a lot of lame dialogue and plot elements here, but the movie is professionally made, with good FX, and novel deaths. Most fans genre fans will enjoy picking it to pieces, so with that said, watch it. The star, Joanna Pacula, is absolutely gorgeous. Let's see what Cub has to say.
You say the Polish star, Joanna Pacula, is prettier than Nastassja Kinski?! This is major, coming from Cub who loves Kinski so very much. Is it really true, is Pacula sooo beautiful? So is this more proof that Polish girls, like yourself, are number 1?
I know it is tough choice because I have always loved and still do love Kinski, however, I do think that Joanna Pacula is a tad bit prettier (although it is damn close between the two of them). Pacula is gorgeous. She is one of the most beautiful women I have ever seen. So yes, cub, I guess that goes to prove that Polish women are the best! Viva la Polska!!!
What was with the end - total bullshit. -Spoiler- Alien snake creature is in the pool. Girl gets pulled out just before snake creature is about to go down her throat. Snake slithers in the burning water. Girl falls back in pool with as audience groans at stupidity. Pool explodes. Where is girl? Father looks frantically, she has vanished. Oh, there she is... off camera she got out of the pool again and is safe. Yay.
The end was totally crazy and it simply did not flow. One second you see her in the pool and it gets blown up (she should have been thrown in the air), the next second she is being shielded by her friend. How does that happen?
There must be an alternate ending to this that has a final shot showing that the creature has transferred into her... right Cub?
I agree with you that the creature should have been in her at the end, for The Kiss II*. Cub you are also Polish, we will have a beautiful Polish family (Buns says he's Polish too!)
*I feel the need to clarify, The Kiss II does not exist!
On the subject of the riot I wrote about in the last post, people are still sounding off about it across the web. One kid has a plan to raise money for the businesses destroyed by punk rioters. He cares about the public perception of punk and wants to right the wrongs. I'd say that's a lost cause, but I think it's great that someone would want to help out some of the small businesses that took hard hits. Driving out of there I saw one bridal shop that got it bad and I felt that they did not deserve the wrath of the mob, but does this mean that punks will be raising money to restore Jack in the Box and Carl's Jr? That would be bizarre, but how can one say, we raised this money for this business and not that one. I really don't think punks should be donating to Jack in the Box or any meat-serving restaurant, but who cares what I think? I'm not giving my money to anyone.
news: Vegan horror filmmaker Scott Goldberg had a $3000 camera stolen on location during the filming of All I Want for Christmas. He is looking for donations and it looks like he's received quite a few. In semi-related news, a friend of mine had $2500 camera stolen from his car in Parking Lot E at OCC. I guess you could donate to him too.
the review:
Well, it's been a few weeks since I saw Bad Dreams, but I think I can remember the basics. Bad Dreams stars the unique looking, strangely attractive, Jennifer Rubin, who also played a role in A Nightmare On Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors a year before. The experience must have been deja vu for her as both movies take place in hospitals and both involve a burnt killer coming back from the dead to kill. I don't remember Rubin in Nightmare 3, but I'll take other reviewers' words for it, that Bad Dreams is a major rip-off of The Nightmare series in many entertaining ways and everybody ought to see it. There is no DVD yet.
scrambled thoughts:
I'm sorry, so many of the details of the novel deaths already have escaped me, but I do remember there being a great deal of gore.
The chubby short chick from Valley Girl, Elizabeth Daily, plays one of the unlucky hospital residents.
Bad Dreams opens with a well done sixties or seventies flashback - one montage was probably watched by Jim Van Bebber before he made his Manson Family.
Rubin's character was a young member a religious cult where everyone committed suicide by fire. She survived and remained in a coma until the eighties. Harris, the burned leader, is coming back for her and kills off everyone in her therapy group. That's the setup.
There is a lot of horror comedy in here, but most of my laughing was unintentional. The movie looks great, despite the awful fashion of the time period. The script sucks. Still, this one is nonstop entertainment.
I'm not going to win any writing jobs with this review, so sorry, Cub Speaks will be better...
Cub, how come you did not recognize the screaming-into-a-pillow group therapy technique? Are you sure you are qualified to help people in need as a therapist?
The scream into pillow technique did seem effective. See you learn something each day, even while watching disturbing films. I will incorporate the technique with my clients.
Everyone called this the Nightmare on Elm Street rip-off of the century. What do you think?
It was a rip off of Nightmare on Elm street, but not as good. Nothing can beat Freddy (I love Robert!)
When Guns n' Roses' 'Sweet Child O' Mine' played over the end credits, you did a little dance in the bed, should we record your dances on video and put them in Cub Speaks?
You should certainly record those dances for safe keeping cub. I can never do them exactly the same when you ask me to repeat them.
Still waiting for Cub to get back to me for the Bad Dreams review.
This weekend there was a riot at a punk show I attended in San Bernardino. Unfortunately I don't have that many pictures of what went down - I took a few and they are blurry. What's worse is that just about all the pictures I've seen are on the shitty side, including news photos. I've seen a bunch of video bits of the action on you tube and only one is really watchable. Here it is, showing damage done to Jack in the Box, which along with a Carl's Jr, probably got smashed up the most. I did not see this happen as I had followed fleeing punks down another street. The mass exodus from the area was caused by threats of police violence and use of pepper spray to clear the area near the parking lot. As a result many (myself included) were kept away from our cars for about three hours and had to roam the San Bernardino streets. Wandering punks were everywhere, filling up every business that was open in order just to have somewhere to go. Most everyone I talked to was in a worse situation that I was, and was missing friends or had possibly been abandoned by friends who could not find them and had been told to leave the scene.
The reason people were separated stems from people fleeing out of different exists of the Pavilion when the tear gas hit the crowd. The choice to gas the crowd was one of the biggest mistakes in my opinion as it started stampedes and people did get stomped. Fortunately, a friend of mine knew that something was about to go down and we followed him over towards the exit so we were some of the first people out the door. Broken Bones was finishing up 'Decapitated' when the crowd suddenly surged towards the exits.
I had gone outside, near the parking lot stage, to see the fighting that was going down in between the Varukers and Broken Bones sets, but there were far too many people watching these fights for me to see a thing. I know what happened from accounts online from the Final Conflict singer. After two very injured people were evacuated, punk continued to throw beer bottles at the handful of cops present. I must say that I agree with the account that blames the punks, because no one should be hit with flying beer bottles. I do not think the cops should have retaliated with tear gas, not just because of all the kids and innocents who were gassed, but also because with a move like that, like it or not, the violence would surely escalate.
As I was in the back stage area, watching people funnel out the exit doors, I knew that there would be a riot because the show was obviously not going to continue and the three headlining bands had not yet played. The very low helicopter overhead barking orders only excited the angry punks. I might mention that the crowd was very drunk, not just those of age either, their was shitloads of drinking in the parking lot.
Anyway, we were herded in a couple of directions, and ended up being some of the last to leave, but I only saw the beginnings of the destruction in what became the ground zero area. At the end of the night, driving out of there, we drove past the wrecked-up stuff. Jack in the Box and Carl's Jr were totally smashed and as were a handful of other business down that street, though those seemed to suffer mostly from smashed windows and it looked like less people had actually been inside those buildings.
There is a website someone sent me a link to with pictures of one very injured person - warning, graphic, this is not a horror movie. To see the pics on this guys site, click the icon in the bottom left corner of the view and then click 'British Invasion 2K6 Riot Pictures'.
my awful pictures - clickable thumbs
This pic just to show you how big the show was. It's The Varukers playing on this massive stage.
This blurry picture shows a crowd around a pit, which is not the dance floor, but a fight. My friend was holding me up to take this picture. No doubt a lot a people on the edges taking shots at those fighting. I'm sure that it was ugly like that. 
People squeezing out the back doors.
Here are news pics:
from all I've read, the only fire was a dumspter fire
displaced punks
saw stuff like this a lot
More pics and opinions and links to galleries at the British Invasion 2K6 myspace page, where people, even me, all have something to say about the evening.
Last minute find - video footage of the mob beating up neo nazis - well this is a good a look at it as most people got.
More horror posts soon - and Fangoria Los Angeles is soon, anybody going?
I thought for a minute that I'd found a copy of the Ghosthouse sequel, Witchcraft, in one on my unwatched tape stashes, but it turns out to be a different movie of the same name from the same year from Rob Spera, the director of Leprechaun in the Hood. This was somewhat of a disappointment.
I think I got burned on ebay by some shitty metalhead from Long Island and you will hear more about this in the next few weeks. I've actually got a lot to say about ebay and did some research on how sellers can rip you off - expect a breakdown of this shit.
The remainder of the post will be a press release I got by e-mail about Herschell Gordon Lewis.
CLEARWATER, FL (March 1, 2006) - FILM STATE 51 INTERNATIONAL, in association with legendary film director HERSCHELL GORDON LEWIS, today announced two new live-action feature film projects: HERSCHELL GORDON LEWIS'S GRIM FAIRY TALES and BACK IN BLOOD: REVENGE OF THE GORE-CRAZED MANIACS.
"Film State 51 is honored to have the opportunity to work with the 'Godfather of Gore'. Mr. Lewis is a cinematic pioneer and horror legend, whose work is more relevant than ever before," said Andrew Allan, president and producer, Film State 51. "His film legacy continues to grow - in both popularity and notoriety - and the world is on the verge of a major Herschell Gordon Lewis renaissance."
HERSCHELL GORDON LEWIS'S GRIM FAIRY TALES marks a return to directing by Lewis, the innovator of the modern horror film, with an all-new fractured fairy tale of a TV game show where if you give a wrong answer, you may lose your head! Or a limb! "This will be my crowning cinematic achievement! We have a great production team in place, and a story that'll spray the big screens with blood," says Lewis, adding wryly, "Stage blood, of course."
Packed with Lewis's signature scenes of cinematic gore and outrageous humor, GRIM FAIRY TALES will entertain horror and comedy fans alike. Mr. Lewis has written the script and will direct, with Film State 51 partners Andrew Allan and Andy Lalino serving as producers, and award-winning Tom Linkiewicz as editor.
BACK IN BLOOD: REVENGE OF THE GORE-CRAZED MANIACS is an all-new feature film based on characters created by Herschell Gordon Lewis. The deranged maniacs from his most infamous horror masterpieces: Fuad Ramses (BLOOD FEAST), Montag the Magnificent (THE WIZARD OF GORE), Adam Sorg (COLOR ME BLOOD RED), and Rodney & Granny Pringle (THE GRUESOME TWOSOME) join forces in a diabolical plot of world domination. They're back from the grave - together for the first time ever in the same movie! "BACK IN BLOOD will be a dream come true for my fans," adds Lewis. "To see my beloved super-villains teamed up in such an ingenious story pleases me to no end. It'll be a wonderfully horrific addition to the legacy." Film State 51's award-winning filmmakers/producers Andy Lalino and Andrew Allan have authored the screenplay, and will produce and direct, with Tom Linkiewicz serving as editor.
Both projects are expected to commence production in 2006. "There are at least five different HGL projects in the works between Film State 51 and other production companies," says Lalino. "But what sets our projects apart is that they offer our audience the only HGL-related feature films which aren't remakes - the storylines are new and refreshingly original." Film State 51's Tom Linkiewicz adds: "As devotees of the genre ourselves, we know what horror fans around the world have been longing for, and we believe these films give them every reason to get very excited."
Herschell Gordon Lewis is affectionately known as the "Godfather of Gore" for pioneering the modern horror film with his 1963 release BLOOD FEAST. It was the first film in history to depict overtly violent and gory scenes, and was an immediate success. HGL horror classics TWO-THOUSAND MANIACS!, COLOR ME BLOOD RED, and THE WIZARD OF GORE soon followed, furthering Lewis's reputation as a Master of Horror.
Famous horror icons Hannibal Lecter, Michael Myers, Freddy Krueger, and Jason Voorhees all owe their cinema stature to the films of Herschell Gordon Lewis, a visionary who single-handedly set the rules for the modern horror movie.
from Film State 51
About 400 signs showed up for me to put out by the freeway in the middle of the night for my night job. Does this mean less posts? Maybe not, cause I'm getting pretty quick at finding spots for these even in O.C. towns I don't know so well. Homework is pretty light too, though I will be getting into some time consuming video production soon.
A quick review now, before me and Cub dig into Bad Dreams in our next post.
This tape looks pretty lame, Ghosthouse, and it says it is directed by one Humphrey Humbert, but grab it if you can. It's an Umberto Lenzi movie (Cannibal Ferox, Eyeball, City of the Walking Dead) that is as good as it gets for the 80's with violent deaths and... dare I say it, the movie is even scary. For one the music that accompanies the killings is the creepiest since Deep Red, with a little cartoon voice muttering repeated words over and over again. For two, the little girl is creepy, but not as creepy as her clown doll, which is bigger than her. I think they stole this clown from the toy that the little boy fears in Poltergeist, though this one is almost human size. Without giving too much away I think I can explain to you that this clown is the source of all evil in the movie. The father, an undertaker, stole it from the deceased who explicitly expressed that they were to be buried with their clown toy. The cheap bastard evidently gave this as a gift to his daughter. Oh no.
Anyway, flash forward a bunch of years and teenagers are camping at the abandoned house where the parents and daughter met their unnatural deaths. You get the idea.
The clown does not move around on it's own, well maybe a little, but it's gonna freak a lot of you out, I promise. The deaths are violent. With the title La Casa 3, the Italians were probably trying to pass this off as the 3rd movie in the Evil Dead series which is called La Casa over there. There is a Ghosthouse 2 (1988), also Italian, though it is perhaps not very closely related to this movie. It is also known as Witchcraft or Witchery and I think I have seen it around.
There is no U.S. DVD of Ghosthouse. There is a UK DVD.
See Ghosthouse. Make an audio tape of the toy's theme music and play it everywhere you go. Check out the poster, the girl has a little audio tape, Deep Red style.
another movie:
So you say "Fear of clowns is played out", well perhaps yes, but I must also recommend Clownhouse, the most immoral movie ever made. The movie is so-so, but if you know the truth behind it about and its director, Victor Salva (Jeepers Creepers, Jeepers Creepers 2), then you know that it is a serious shocker. It's fucked up and wildly inappropriate, as are scenes in Jeepers Creepers 2, if you know this backstory. I am aware that the whole matter is very serious and I'm not making light of it, but not watching the movie won't change the past. Victor Salva served his time, whether it was enough time is politics, something I don't shy away from in this blog, but this time I will. It's another story for a different day. Look into it and discover one of horror's most disgusting dirty little secrets.
Horror fans, two reviews on the way, including a Nightmare on Elm Street rip-off from 1988 that you can't die without seeing.
Well, the ten best I found on youtube.com actualy. See, I've been looking on youtube and finding that a lot of my favorite bands have videos. Who knew? Not me, I never had cable and if I did would probably just have been watching Poison videos at the time. Now I'm discovering tons of thrash videos. How exciting? Yes, and then dissapointing. This videos did not have the best of budgets and by todays standards many could be replicated with i-movie. What's worse, many of the videos lack creativity. I bring you, not a list of the best videos necisarily, but definately the best songs that had videos which I could find on youtube. Some are awesome, others less so.
Don't tell me Motorhead should have been number one or that I should have put Metallica on the list.
Warning! These videos play instantly, sometimes faster than they load. In order to avoid annoying interuption, I pause the video first and let about half of it download before playing through.
1. Anti-Nowhere League - So What - I had this on a bootleg tape of British punk videos. This file I found on youtube is of pretty decent quality. Warning: you cannot play this video on cable TV!
2. Lawnmower Deth - Kids in America - Ah, the thrash novelty cover. I'd already seen this on a Lawnmower Deth fan site. Good stuff.
3. Motorhead - Killed by Death - A classic that all will love, I had it on a Kerrang! tape before Kerrang! became the teeny-bopper bullshit it is today. Video quality is pretty good and I knew this would be an easy find on youtube.
4. Cro-Mags - Path of Perfection - Never saw this one before, but wow. 1) If you are a hardcore kid you probably love the Cro-Mags. 2) If you are a hardcore kid you will probably hate this video and 4 out of the 5 Cro-Mags albums. The explanation? Hardcore kids are douche bags. Forget the 108 reunion, the is krishnacore! File quality is not too good.
5. Tankard - Space Beer - This shit is rare, never seen a Tankard tape or CD in a store. I want this album bad.
6. Youth of Today - No More - Seen this on a tape with an older Royal Rumble on it. Not gonna say where that mystery tape came from, maybe from someone's psycho ex. Anyway there has been mutch talk in certain circles about this video. Too bad the file quality here is awful and does not do it justice.
7. GBH - Give Me Fire - Never saw this before. I'm going to see GBH play this weekend. Video has potential, but is repetitive.
8. Gang Green - Alcohal - I know there is another Gang Green video out there as well, this is worth a watch for thrash fans and party metal types, if there is such a thing as party metal.
9. M.O.D. - True Colors - Love the song, love 'Gross Misconduct', the album. See Billy Milano give Slash the boot and rip on glam metal. Semi-funny vieo, could be a lot better, but good quality file so maybe worth a watch.
10. Crumbsuckers - Trapped - This is what hardcore should be if you ask me. High energy video because of the crowd shots, not just a band in an empty room. Crowd shots go a long way and probably don't triple the video budget. Some of the other bands/directors should have taken notice.
That's ten - I'll post runners up later, including a thrash video with Leatherface in it and some Boston honorable mentions.
This post has been sitting around in draft form for a few days now. I think I out-nerded a kid at school today and scared him with my knowledge of CED Selectavision Discs. Awesome. I was sick when I started the post and I'm getting worse day by day and running on no sleep.
horror: I skipped the Haunt X convention in Los Angeles. I could not figure out their schedule for shit and it looked like I would only be paying $25 for access to dealers' tables and stars eager to sell me $25 signed glossies.
One of the most shocking moments in TV history: El Duce on Jerry Springer. I saw this when it first aired so I've seen the bits that are not included. Duce came out and told the crowd that he and The Mentors rape underage girls on stage at their shows. Obviously he is so full of shit, but the Springer crowd are falling for every word in this "Rape Rock" expose. This tape shows the most tense moments as a woman confronts El Duce. Later on Gwar comes out and the show becomes very PG as they feed Springer to the Ragnarok monster on video. Don't let that take away from the heavy shit that goes down in this clip. Note: the clip seems to get cutoff, well you can watch a little.
Later Duce asks the lady when exactly she was raped. She cites the date and he says "because I think you look kind of familiar". The crowd is too disgusted to even boo this one.
Says a commentor on You Tube, "That is fucking sick and so are you for watching it !!!!"
record shopping: It's been some holiday weekend, Flag Day, or something. I started it off by going to Disneyland in the rain and getting sick which sucks because I always say that vegans don't get sick. My mom is in town and I showed her Laguna Beach today which is by far the most attractive part of Orange County, at least that I have seen. I dragged her into the little punk rock record shop on the PCH and bought some bargain bin stuff cause I can't afford rare punk records. Can you? I tried to make small talk with the clerk, but it not go to well. He did not know anything about the CDs I was buying so I mistakenly tried tell him a little bit about them and I'm sure he did not give a fuck. Plus I mentioned the words "straight edge band" when I was talking about music so I surely became the subject of shit talk between him and the two fashionable dirty rockers who were shopping. I'm saying that they would or did probably talk shit right after I was out the door and just about any other kid talking about straight edge hardcore would be deserving of shit talk - so who can blame them? My mom talked the clerk up quite a bit, she is the master of small talk.
Back in the 90's we would boycott any record store that sold racist records and this store did have Skrewdriver shirts (and not from the "pre-racist" period for any of you record dorks wondering) and some white power record label t-shirts. I'd really like to ask what the fuck they are thinking carrying and displaying those, but you can't bring that stuff up when your near-60 year old mom is with you. She would probably worried that I would get shot, though I doubt I would be in any immediate danger. It's true though, everyone should put as must distance between themselves as possible between them and the white power movement, as if that is not a given. A lot of people in California have grown up with nazi classmates in their schools, but as a transplant to the area, that stuff is more shocking to me, but I digress. I would really like to know the history of that store. I think I should start by learning the name of it.
It all so fascinating because Laguna Beach is an extremely affluent town.
On to another subject: scene teens - spoken word douche bag video brought to you by The Coalition.
I got a hold of the Sav-On Drugs version of Dario Argento's Cat o' Nine Tails, that is a big drug store chain where they often have bins of two dollar budget DVDs. It's not made by Sav-On, but it sure has some budget-looking packaging, perhaps the crappiest I've seen - from Vina Distributor who also sell a lot of Spanish DVDs which cost a dollar more! I gotta find their version of Death Race 2000! Over at their site I saw all the DVDs that those guys put out and most were familiar since I've looked through the bin at many a Sav-On.
So how does this look? Ok. I've seen the Anchor Bay version and obviously that blows this away. Some of the dark scenes from the killer's p.o.v. at the beginning are hard to see on this Vina version and the DVD in general has a fuzzy look to it, reminding me of some of my oldest VHS tapes. The brutal train killing appears to be completely intact, but (spoiler) at the end when the killer slides down the elevator shaft with his hands on the cable, I guess that was to disturbing and got cut from this print some where along the way. I'm sure more is missing, but it's pretty funny to find Cat o' Nine Tails at the drug store.
Have you seen The Thorn Birds mini-series from 1983? Oh wow, I saw a lot of it this weekend lying sick in bed, but that's not all I watched. Werewolf in a Girls' Dormitory (1962) sounds like a crappy movie, but the title is deceiving. It's actually a bit of a proto-giallo originally called Lycanthropus in Italy. I'm not wild about sanitary horror with no blood or sexuality, and that's what it looks like you are gonna get here with the campy "Ghoul in the School" theme song (probably added for the U.S. version) that starts this movie off, but put that out of mind because you can't take all the Euro-horror out of this movie. There is a lecherous professor who pays students for sex, a black gloved killer, and suicides. The movie is written by Ernesto Gastaldi who later wrote Torso, The Whip and The Body, and Blade of the Ripper. He wrote movies for Mario Bava, Antonio Margheriti, Umberto Lenzi, and Sergio Martino.
You can usually get this movie pretty cheaply. I think it's fallen into the public domain which makes the loud pirating warnings on that start off the Killer Creature disc seem pretty hypocritical since I doubt they pay the filmmakers anything.
No class today, but usually Thursdays are for TV engineering where we sit in a locked soundproof room and tape the show and shade the cameras. It's different from being in the control room, where the director, sound guy, and switcher, are all stressing the fuck out. Engineering is where you just kick back. Our professor pretty much told us that this is where you talk shit on the broadcast journalism and TV1 kids and their projects and hard work. Awesome. I was on the other side last semester and can only imagine what people said about the quality of my jobs on and off camera. I was jealous of those engineers.
I thought the control room was bad. In there you get the outbursts from the stressed out director. Lots of swearing cause they gotta put their name on this thing. Engineers are farther removed from the project and have nothing to do while the cameras are rolling but to watch the monitors. Better make sure that communications mic is off. If it is, speak your piece of mind. The professors told us, that when he worked for the networks, he once went on and on a big star and the God Mic was on. That's a mic that can be heard on the studio floor. Bad microphone!
So without class today I'll have time to give my rabbit a haircut. No more nasty dreads on Bun Bun. I bought a buzzer the scissors are too dull. As people in the know say, "Punk's Not Dread". For Bun Bun to look fashionable he's gotta clean himself up.
Watched a big box tape of The Flesh and Blood Show (1974) from the surely defunct Monterey Home Video from Pete Walker who directed Schizo, The Confessional, House of Whipcord, and Frightmare. The Flesh and Blood Show is an interesting British film about a troop of actors called to rehearse for am improvised play. Rehearsals are in an abandoned theater built on a pier in a lonely seaside down. The director does not quite know who the producer is. How strange.
Actors and actresses couple off for sex and then get killed off one by one as expected. Lots of nudity here. The movie is great and takes a weird flashback twist at the end with Shakespearean dialogue (Othello, the more educated Cub tells me) and a tale of infidelity in the packed theater during it's prime, which coincided with a dangerous WWII bombing blitz.
My only complaint is that the movie did not have enough characters to really surprise us when the murderers identity is revealed. Just don't play 'Guess the Killer' with this one It's far too easy. No DVD of this movie too my knowledge, though Pete Walker's better know films are available in the EuroShock Collection.
After the credits, three previews came on for other Monterey Bay tapes. The Slasher Is the Sex Maniac, He Kills Night After Night After Night, and the butchered version of Joe D'Amato's Antropophagus, known as The Grim Reaper. I have not seen the first of these three titles and it supposed to be killer! Keeping my eyes open for The Slasher Is the Sex Maniac.
Photo sure is frustrating. You guys almost got an angry rant last night filled with threats of violence, but this morning I feel better. This weekend it will be time for me to turn on my video camera, as I'm going to have to use some of the advanced features for some technical stuff. Shit!
I am most comfortable with editing now, the Final Cut class is a piece of cake. As for photo, you won't see me on the side of the stage taking blurry photos of hardcore bands. Band photography sucks and I think only girls do that anyway.
The last tape I watched was an Australia supernatural horror film called Alison's Birthday from 1979. Pretty budget, but they managed to get a whole mini-stonehenge up in this one. I enjoyed it very much and it may warrant a full review.
As always, I've seen a lot of stuff that I have not been able to write about. Stay away from Dark Age, another Australian movie, but it sucked to the max. Directed by Arch Nicholson in 1987, it's the tale of a giant croc. Could not tell what was the real croc and what was the fake, which is impressive, but then I'm no wildlife expert so maybe I'm just a fool and all of you are like "dumb wooden croc!". They do a car chase with the massive crocodile on the back of a flatbed trailer truck, but unfortunately it's covered by a tarp. Seeing the fake crocodile speeding down the highway could have a very memorable image, though people already compare this movie to Free Willy due to the on-land rescue mission of a sea creature. This is a salt water croc, so does it live in the sea sometimes? Anyway, cool how the conservationists, who don't want this bloodthirsty croc killed, are the heroes, and the poachers are the scum who get munched, but this is almost too Earth Day for even a militant vegan like me. You know how these 80's enviro movies can be - I'm all for the cause, but the preaching gets old. Almost funny subplot where Burnham Burnham has personal mystical ties to the croc, man, I hope I'm not being culturally insensitive to the Aborigines. Actually, this did work for me at the end when they bring his remains, in a ritual, to this very same killer croc who does escape to the way back wilderness - oops, I guess that was a spoiler! Burnham Burnham was also in Howling III: The Marsupials.
I swear I get the feeling that the whites in Aussie are the worst after this movie and Zombie Brigade. Self-hating whites in the Australian film industry? Animal liberation in the movies. It's never been done right. Never have I been less moved by animal liberation than in 28 Days Later. I've talked about this before, so enough for now.
I'm feeling a bit of fondness for Dark Age right now, thinking of the late Burnham Burnham and some of the movie's more sentimental moments. What's with me? I totally hated it and those better not be real crocs getting shot in the massacre scene! Yes the worst violence in this movie is against crocs and if the shotgun carnage is real, then it pretty much undermines the purpose of this film much like René Cardona Jr.'s Beaks: The Movie. If it was simulated croc killing, well, impressive FX then.
I'm not wild about action films, but this is not really in action film. There is only one machine gun battle sequence. On the whole it's an adventure story in Africa filled with betrayal, racism, and cruelty - may the most hateful man win.
I grabbed this movie because it was in a clearance bin for $3 and it is a Joe D'Amato film. He is the director of Erotic Nights of the Living Dead and Emmanulle and the Last Canibals as it say on this DVD's cover, as well as Porno Holocaust, Antropophagus, Buio Omega, Black Cobra Woman, and a bunch of the Emmanuelle movies with Laura Gemser. He did not disappoint me with this trashy tale, which one imdb reviewer states "uses its badness to dig a filthy hole in the ground and wallow in it". There is literally some wallowing as one despicable soldier makes a young black civilian sit neck-deep in a concrete barrel of shit. He gestures that on three he will be running his sword across the top of the barrel and the young man is forced to submerge himself. The racist line that follows is equally vile and though it can be matched in offensiveness by many of the lines from the hardass Major who leads this group of mercenaries. I wondered for some moments whether these were anti-heroes and are we supposed to laugh along with their hateful lines, but then the movie throws a twist in there that changes everything and makes the viewer feel like a fool. I did not see the end coming, which is a testament to the point it proves. The last ten minutes of the movie are a joy to watch, but getting there is not consistently fun for the reason that this is a very uneven movie. The budget is very low, though it is shot in the Dominican Republic. There are very few effects, including gore effects, and most of the depravity is exhibited by the characters' actions and words.
The movie's most disgusting visual is the fat prisoner's eating of a cooked rabbit on a spit, where he stuffs nearly the entire carcass in his mouth in a display of greed - of course it is poisoned, he pays the price. I find it distasteful as I have a rabbit and would never let him be eaten, but you guys already know my stance on meat eating, if not, see Farm Sanctuary.
Tough To Kill is recommended for a casual view. IMDB critics have said that the DVD version is poor quality, but I found it to be fine and it is WS.
First, pictures of me showing up on the internet again, now on a website (an older site, but I never saw it before) about how to be unique by looking like someone else - pretty funny writing on this site that takes a bit of a dig at everyone pictured on it. "If you don't resemble one of these ultra chic people on the right, then you, my friend, are not unique. You're neither cool nor special, the way they are collectively cool and special. So what sets you apart from these super stylish hipsters? THE HAIR, my friend, the hair...it's all in the hair. So you think this is a bit too superficial and that you're "cool" just because you have a "good personality?" Well nobody cares what's inside the package if the gift wrapping is ugly; especially if the bow is carelessly knotted together."
The pictures are all from the club where I met Cub. I swear we are the only 2 people who ever met there who got engaged. Every other hookup among the kids was doomed to fail due to the slutty times. I used to know a lot of the kids in these pics, but friendships do not last, oh no.
I'm on this page and the caption for my pic reads "Not exactly the unique striped bangs, but unique all the same" and then there is another pic of me right below it with my friend that I moved to Hollywood with. These pics are getting close to 3 years old and now I think I look a strange in them.
Dolly Dearest came out after the first 3 Child's Play movies. For some reason I always avoided renting this one and it is pretty much brainless and irritating except for the doll effects and supernatural elements. Dolly herself, is pretty fascinating, with an expressive face and good puppet work, though Cub and I think that some on the long shots were done with a little person in a Dolly suit.
The story here, the spirit of the devil child from an ancient civilization has been disturbed by archeologist and has flown from the tomb and into the dolls at an abandoned factory. An American family, the father having bought the doll factory, moves down to Mexico. Actually all the dolls in the factory are possessed, but at first we only have to worry about one, the doll picked by the family's daughter, who also becomes possessed, drawing demons, speaking in the ancient language, and sounding like the Exorcist child. Of course the father thinks all of this is nonsense and refuses to move back to Los Angeles despite the mother's insistence. I really wish that at least one of the four family members, perhaps the nerdy son, who I could not stand, would have lost their lives to Dolly by the movie's completion. The only victims, besides a crushed archeologist in the movie's first scene, are the Mexican help, who I guess are more expendable. Unlike the mildly racist filmmakers, I found these characters more sympathetic than the ignorant and bold Americans who are down there to get rich with their third world Dolly sweatshop.
There are some good creepy moments, but there should have been more. Towards the end the dolls' faces turn ugly, in an Exorcist style, and I'm pretty sure one of them even levitates. See it for the Dolly action, but the movie has little else to offer.
Cub, how come I had to hold you tight, because you were so afraid of this little Dolly? Isn't that embarrassing?
No bear, you have it flipped around. It was me who had to hold you because you were terribly frightened and would jump everytime dolly would scuttle around or utter a sound. But I kept you safe.
How come you liked the nerdy brother? I hated his guts.
I liked the brother in the beginning but I have to admit and say you were right, I got totally annoyed with him by the end of the movie.
I hate pretending that horror characters are real, but don't you think that Chucky, if he ever met her, might have the hots for Dolly Dearest? Or for the whole pack of Dolly Dearests, if he was lucky...
Actually I think Dolly could kick his ass to tell you the truth. Plus , she is a tall girl and would not want some short short man.
A bit of off-topic crap from me. Up next will be a review of the killer doll flick, Dolly Dearest, but first, this:
A trip to the Museum of Tolerance in Los Angles has taught me that words have power and that I have been very irresponsible with my language. Free speech, I'm all for it, but what if someone's incendiary words trigger violent outbursts that result in deaths, hate crimes, and terrorism? We have to take responsibility for our words if they are going to be read by the American masses.
What about this blog? I can still write what I want, right? I can, because my readers are smart. They know, that even though I may call for the death of admissions officers at a certain north eastern American college, that it would be in fact unwise of them to go drag these scumbags out onto the streets and beat them until the blood runs red. You see, we are all very bright. God may will the deaths of these people, but just because what we are doing what is right, does not mean that society is ready for these righteous actions.
My following is not huge, in fact, your numbers are so small, that the odds of their being even a single easily influenced and unstable fellow among you are quite unlikely. Now if I was on cable TV, or had a book on the best sellers list, and I published and posted maps to this school where the administration works hours each day trying to prevent me from becoming a financial success, an all out attack on these offices would surely place some blood on my hands.
Irresponsibility... the museum - and it was awesome - had a lighted bulletin that displayed news stories of dangerous words that are too current to actually be part of the exhibits. On the bulletin: the news that European newspapers are publishing cartoon pictures of the Prophet Muhammad with his turban being a bomb. It is an offensive cartoon and the world would be better of without it ever having being printed because of the violence that is a direct result of the reaction to it.
Of course with that attitude, do we have to police everything that might be controversial because it might provoke a bad reaction? No, the bomb cartoon is different for one big reason. It sucks. It's the dumbest cartoon I've ever heard of. "Let's see, I think Muslims are terrorists. What do they look like? They wear turbans! Who is the king of Arabs? Prophet Muhammad! What is a symbol of terror? A bomb! How can we combine the two? A bomb in the turban! Ha Ha Ha". This is like the first political cartoon a racist sixth grader would draw for the school paper. Even in the Midwest, or somewhere like that, the teacher would say, "now Billy, I know you want to make a point, but we can't publish this..." The drawing screams of hatred, and it's not funny no matter how twisted you are and how much you like to push taboos. The reason? Cause it's not sophisticated enough to be funny. If anyone can think it up, it's not funny. Funny people should make cartoons, people with talent, not just rudimentary drawing skills and a limited imagination.
This cartoon is NOT the cartoon I'm talking about, it's just one I found in an internet search, but it proves just how unoriginal the crap I'm talking about is. At least THIS cartoon manages to poke fun at the "What Would Jesus Drive" anti-suv campaign at the same time, so it's far more sophisticated, but at the heart of it, it's still garbage.
Political cartoonists, why do you draw? To express your opinion which you surely believe is right. I no longer understand the point of preaching to the choir. No one on the other side is going to be won over by hateful and insulting drawings. You are not winning any converts to your cause. Maybe if you could be just a bit clever.
Next subject:
Can't a Muslim man get a break? This time it's the crazy protests over the cartoons. Protesting the cartoon is all well and good, but this is getting out of hand and if I was Arab I'd get sick of saying "I'm not like those crazy guys." Even in the movie Crash the Middle Eastern man comes of like a bastard and that's supposed to be an anti-racist movie. Michael Moore sold out Arabs to try to get people not to vote for Bush by showing how chummy Bush and certain Saudis are in an extended sequence. The message: Arabs are demons and Bush is in league with them. I know the movie was partially intended to stop the war effort, which could save Iraqi lives, but to use American Muslim-phobia to sell them on the deal is plain shitty. I plan to make a political cartoon of my own on this issue.
I'm sorry if I scared anyone with my militant talk at the begging of this entry. You see, I spend all day listening to punk rock records about insurrection and revolution, though I'm not stupid enough to think that any of these bands are going to take up arms or even attend a protest. They are two busy selling t-shirts and CDs so it's just a bunch of bullshit preaching with the bottom line being the money. Those pussies never do time while anarchists listen to their CDs in the car on the way to committing crimes against the government. Well maybe not anymore, punk is not very inspiring these days.
Right now I'm pissed because I keep getting warnings from the Homeowners Association about my mess down in the basement. I swear, if they both me once more, the people will rise up and head will roll. We will then put these heads on sticks for all to throw stones at.
Look at this site - Movie Title Screens Page - where a man Steven Hill captured the title screen from all the movie in his DVD collection. I love title screens, and if I could screen capture one frame from every movie I review, 9 out of 10 times it would be the title screen. These can be as good as box covers for me. Steven Hill's collection is full of horror, so check it out.
Lets go off topic, some legal cases have fascinated me lately. They are not front page news, but you could take notice, if you've got a minute:
In a fake part of the war on terror - the part where we try to scare people so that we can control them... check out this paid federal agent who set some kids up for a big fall - see "Anna" in action in some photos.
Also, check out the band Sodom, ready for war anywhere you want to send them. I think this is a newer promo picture.
Don't forget...
We're fighting a war we can't win
But it's a war we can't afford to lose
Corrupt officials play the game
And America's habit is to blame
is oil the habit we should really worry about? now I will chop out some lyrics...
But there's no way to stop the flow
Watch your children's habit grow
Intimidation is the game.
Cut them down they're all the same
Send them all to hell...
In those plentiful days when Amoeba Records in Hollywood was new in town and their used VHS section was absolutely massive, I had a rule that I lived by stating that I would pay no more than four dollars for a tape. The section was stocked so frequently that I could bring home small bags of videos twice a day and spend less than $20. I had more rules at that time. The movies were supposed to either come from respected horror directors, foreign directors, be Poe or Lovecraft based, or be exceptionally gory to have been banned at one point. Before I let these rules go, I turned down a number of tapes, some of which I regret passing up to this day. Tanya's Island was one of those tapes. It was going for a pricey $14.99, but after I read about it on the imdb when I got home, I started to fiend for it. Of course it was gone the next day at Amoeba.
Well now it's on DVD from the sketchy Substance label, who probably do not pay any royalties to anybody who made the film, but that does make it a cheaper purchase. The quality of the DVD is ok, not good enough to please most dvd-philes, but at least it does not cost the big bucks. Mostly with these low quality DVDs it's the dark night scenes that suffer, which is a bad thing for horror fans, but Tanya's Island is filled with mostly day time action. Full-frontal nudity in broad daylight.
I was pretty disappointed, but I did have very high expectations based on the general premises of a story where a naked women becomes the object of a rivalry between a man and a gorilla. I had heard that the man becomes more ape like and the gorilla becomes more human as the film progresses. Fascinating, I thought, but in the movie the transformations are extremely blatant, fast, and obvious. The man is named Lobo, which really sounds like an ape name to me - Bobo. Shortly after he discovers his ape nemesis, we see him scarf down a banana in a less than refined way. Before you know it, he is aping, no pun intended, the gorilla's every move.
On the other hand, I was not as sympathetic to Blue, the gorilla, as I should have been. Blue is gentle with Tanya, but he kills Lobo's pet pig. I do not think that Lobo loved the pig, I think he was just showing it affection in order to win favor with Tanya, yet the killing was wrong in that it hurt the pig. What's more, their are the ethical issue of killing a real pig in order to make this movie. No, there is not an on-screen killing, but I assume the pig's head was real - not a prosthetic, and it could have been the real head of the pig that acted in earlier scenes. I do not know if this is true or not, but my position is that killing a pig to make a movie is not worth it, nor is killing a pig to make a sandwich worth it. Animal life has value to me and I will continue to explore the use of dead animals and slaughter house byproducts for special effects in horror movies. Perhaps times have changed and these effects are less prevalent today. As I get more familiar with the industry I aim to find out. The issue is complex. Is it any more wrong to use pig's blood on camera than it is to have ham sandwiches at the craft services on the set? There probably has never been a movie made that did not have meat on set. These are issues that I, as a vegan, think about.
Back to my faults with this movie. Believability is not a huge issue with me since this is the horror genre after all, but in Tanya's island there were scenes that left me shaking my head. For one, Lobo builds a huge fortress by himself in seemingly no time. Blue's assault on the fortress, by throwing coconuts over the walls, only lasts a couple of minutes, but after the assault is over, the number of coconuts on the ground is so many that Lobo cannot open a door from within a cage in the fortress' courtyard, due to coconut buildup that is waist deep. There are so many coconuts there, that it would take a Blue with ten arms to throw some many over the wall in such a short time.
Blue then traps Lobo with his own fortress door, that Lobo can no longer move, but he must have been able to move it, when he put it in place as he built this fortress single handedly.
Tanya's behavior is a mystery to me. I see why she kept Blue a secret, as Lobo is an insanely jealous man and wants to shoot Blue with his crossbow from the get go. I see why she is disgusted with Lobo, as he rapes her, hits her, and imprisons her in a cage as bait to kill Blue, but I do not see (Spoiler Alert) why she suddenly turns against Blue except for the reason that it facilitates the twist in the plot where Blue then rapes Tanya.
- Ultimate Spoiler Alert - Then Tanya wakes up. It was all a dream, but what is this gorilla scratch above her breast? Endings like that can just kill a movie. Tanya's Island has what it takes to catch attention, but mistakes like these have left it in obscurity.
Directory Alfred Sole made the excellent Alice, Sweet Alice in 1976. I can find no interviews with him online except for one regarding Veronica Mars, the UPN TV series that he is the production designer for.
Blue looks real and was made by special effects genius Rick Baker. With out Blue looking convincing, this movie would have fell flat on its face about twice as quickly as it did. I had assumed that he would be a white ape (I'd read that he has blue eyes), maybe a mythical creature or an anomaly. I think I also got this idea from the box cover where he is translucent and actually saw him as gray throughout the movie until Cub pointed out that he is brown and sure enough she was right. I have heard than there are black supremacists who believe that the white man is inferior due to his resemblance to the gorilla in the sense that whites have straight hair as do the great apes.
Those seeking the ultimate indecency in a movie of beasts are advised to seek out La Bête (1975), aka, The Beast, from Walerian Borowczyk. It has been available on DVD for some time and within the last year a 3 Disc version was released. The opening scene where two horses have sex will probably be enough for some of you, but that's just the appetizer and just sort of sets the mood. I don't want to give anything away, but there is stuff in that movie that will make your jaw drop. Don't think you've seen it all. You have not.
I'd like to write a movie review this morning before I clean up all my bunny's dirty newspapers and stray turds, something that pisses him off because I guess he feels he put those turds there for a reason. I can only pray that he will drift off when I'm writing, and then if I'm stealth enough I can sweep up with waking him.
Evil Altar is an awful movie where I could not determine who in the cast was a teenager, a kid, a grown-up, a brother, a sister, a boyfriend, a step-mom, or a whatever. There are a bunch of important relationships making up the dynamic, but I just couldn't, or couldn't be bothered, to sort them out. From the start, with a coed baseball game, where I could not figure out weather it was little league or grown-ups playing. Then the father takes what seems to be his little boy hunting, but later after the baseball cap is removed, I see that this character is the female lead. If you think that this movie might be trying to challenge my preconceived assumptions about gender roles, it's not, it's just damn confusing. While trying shoot a woodland creature, the girl blows away a vagrant by mistake -not as funny as it sounds, who we already know to be the hired goon for the towns satanic priest. In fact the man is carrying a young black child in a sack at the time, but the father and daughter don't bother to rescue him, and once the town cop is on the scene, it's too late, for he too is in league with satan. The officer is played by Robert Z'Dar, Cordell in the Maniac Cop series.
If you are intrigued, don't be. It might seem like fun to watch a bad movie that borrows heavily from Nightmare on Elm Street and Phantasm instead of the usually plundered material from Halloween and Friday the 13th, but this is none the less a real bore. I'll share with you the two most amusing scenes. In one, the female target is watching TV and sees the news reporter get her throat slit by Freddy... I mean, the villain. We don't see the blood fly out of the television, but sure enough her shirts is splattered with the stuff. When her father runs to find why she is screaming, he does not believe her, insisting that the blood is "just pizza sauce" from dinner.
In the most amusing scene, a baseball flies in threw our heroines window and floats about, smashing up her room, and bouncing off of her somewhat gingerly as she screams in mortal terror. This scene is good for a laugh, but most of the movie will not entertain. For the most part we get bad dialogue and lots of tough talk from the movies male characters who all despise each other. The adults in this movie have mostly made deals with the devil, in a sense setting up their children to be punished for the sins of their fathers, giving this movie an unspoken Nightmare on Elm Street vibe where the disbelieving parents are responsible for creating Krueger through their past secret actions.
Are you familiar with the false horror stereotype, pushed by false horror fans and horror movie spoofs, that states that a black character is always killed first in horror film? I can't think of a movie where that actually happens (and you know I watch many genre pictures -tell me if you can name a single example), but Evil Altar was almost the one! Of course it turns out that the black child is still alive so once again the stereotype does not completely ring true. The child's father, a lawyer from the city who spends most of the movie trying to find his abducted boy, is by a mile the most sympathetic character, but still, even when he finally has to shoot his own possessed son at point blank range with a shotgun, Evil Altar fails to move the viewer. That scene worked a whole lot better in The Beast Within.
