So, AMC's annual Fear Fest has gotten off to quite a bangin' start with a week-long evening marathon of the classic Friday the 13th films. That's great for me; I'm all for the classics.
Anyhow, if you haven't been tuning in, you ought to. They're running most of the essentials, as well as some stuff that you may not be familiar with. What ever your taste in horror, it's well worth an evening.
Wednesday, October 20, 2010
Friday, September 17, 2010
The End Draws Nigh...
Well, we're creeping up on the end of one of my favorite horror franchises. In October, Saw 3D (aka Saw VII) will be released and, we're promised, the final answers to the entire series will be revealed.
I'm aware that there are plenty of people out there who assume that the Saw series is nothing but torture or gore porn. That's not so, but I'll reserve my full diatribe for the seven-part series that's coming to this blog after Saw 3D is released. No, today, I'm here to offer a sort of eulogy.
I'm aware that there are plenty of people out there who assume that the Saw series is nothing but torture or gore porn. That's not so, but I'll reserve my full diatribe for the seven-part series that's coming to this blog after Saw 3D is released. No, today, I'm here to offer a sort of eulogy.
Sunday, September 12, 2010
Review: Death of a Ghost Hunter (2007)
Going into this film, I wasn't sure what to expect. The title and box/poster image made me think it might be some hokey attempt to translate all of the currently popular ghost hunting shows on television into a horror film.
I was close, but I wasn't quite on the mark.
Wednesday, September 8, 2010
New Zealand Horror Week: Day 4: Review: When Night Falls (2007)
Monday, September 6, 2010
New Zealand Horror Week: Day 2: Review: The Scarecrow (1982)
It's been a good while since I've seen this film, but it has always been a favorite of mine for several reasons:
1. New Zealand.
2. John Carradine being his creepy self.
3. It's a bucolic horror/thriller on a par with the books and films of Tom Tryon's The Other and Harvest Home and Tom Reamy's only novel, Blind Voices.
4. NEW ZEALAND!
Sunday, September 5, 2010
New Zealand Horror Week: Day 1: Review: Black Sheep (2007)
This was one of the last films I ever got to watch with my mum, and so it holds special memories for me. Mostly memories of laughing and going "whaaa?" and "whoa!" and being amazed at the effects; for what they're meant to convey, they're damn good. Of course, they were done by the fine folks over at WETA Workshop.
Friday, September 3, 2010
Next Week
First, a little heads up...thanks to an alert over at Midnite Media, I can tell you that Turner Classic Movies will be running the Dan Curtis classic Burnt Offerings back-to-back with the William Castle chiller House on Haunted Hill starting at 1AM central. Catch'em if you can, or set your recording devices.
Just a note: next week over on Exhaust Pipe Potatoes, my pop culture and general entertainment blog, I'll be focusing on films, music, and television from New Zealand. Not wanting this blog to feel left out, I've decided to do a weeks worth of reviews here on the horror films of New Zealand. Should be pretty interesting, so stay tuned.
Just a note: next week over on Exhaust Pipe Potatoes, my pop culture and general entertainment blog, I'll be focusing on films, music, and television from New Zealand. Not wanting this blog to feel left out, I've decided to do a weeks worth of reviews here on the horror films of New Zealand. Should be pretty interesting, so stay tuned.
Thursday, September 2, 2010
Links, Shout-Outs, and Assorted Gibberish
First off, I finally have a follower! Bad Ronald suddenly popped up in my follow box for both this blog and Exhaust Pipe Potatoes. Probably because of the little shout out I gave to his comments on James Cameron's comments on Piranha 3-D. Awesome, because now, I'm not going around in a constant state of "BAWWW, no one's ever gonna follow my blogs!"
Next up, I must recommend this post from The Vault of Horror addressing the sad dearth of horror icons in the modern incarnation of the genre. Pretty much everything written over there is a bit of a treat, including this.
If you're a horror fan, you might also be a death hag. One isn't necessary for the other, of course, but the two often go hand in hand. If you like reading up on the lives and deaths of the famous and the infamous, might I recommend a quick trip over to Find A Death? Scott Michaels runs the site (as well as the Dearly Departed tours out in California, taking you to the spots where the stars met their final fates.) There's a fine selection of interesting stories on dearly departed actors, musicians, and more. Should your tastes run more to mayhem and death down the street, check out the forum, where a lot of great people gather to gab on celeb deaths as well as the passings of average folks.
Finally, a thought for the day: why don't inbred cannibal families take their act on the road? If they get moving, there's less likelihood that they'll be caught quickly, if at all, and if they have reliable transportation, one lone girl (or guy) can't always rise up in the end and slaughter most of them. At least not without a big rig.
Next up, I must recommend this post from The Vault of Horror addressing the sad dearth of horror icons in the modern incarnation of the genre. Pretty much everything written over there is a bit of a treat, including this.
If you're a horror fan, you might also be a death hag. One isn't necessary for the other, of course, but the two often go hand in hand. If you like reading up on the lives and deaths of the famous and the infamous, might I recommend a quick trip over to Find A Death? Scott Michaels runs the site (as well as the Dearly Departed tours out in California, taking you to the spots where the stars met their final fates.) There's a fine selection of interesting stories on dearly departed actors, musicians, and more. Should your tastes run more to mayhem and death down the street, check out the forum, where a lot of great people gather to gab on celeb deaths as well as the passings of average folks.
Finally, a thought for the day: why don't inbred cannibal families take their act on the road? If they get moving, there's less likelihood that they'll be caught quickly, if at all, and if they have reliable transportation, one lone girl (or guy) can't always rise up in the end and slaughter most of them. At least not without a big rig.
Tuesday, August 31, 2010
Review: The Last Exorcism (2010)
I wanted to believe that a film could come along and single-handedly revitalize the exorcism film genre.
Monday, August 30, 2010
A Life of Horror and Wonder
213 years ago, at twenty minutes past 11 on the night of 30 August, 1797, a baby girl was born to a pair of intellectuals residing in Somers Town, London, England. She was named Mary, after her mother.
In less than two weeks, the mother was dead.
Little Mary grew up surrounded by the intellectual and literary figures who made up her father's social circle. Except for difficulty in getting along with the woman her father married when she was four, Mary grew up fairly happy, close to her half-sister Frances and stepsister Clara (better known as Fanny and Claire).
And then, when Mary was a teenager, she met and fell in love with a radical poet, a young man from the landed gentry. His name was Percy, and when he and Mary fell in love, he was already married. To escape his wife and the scrutiny of society, the young couple ran off to the Continent, taking Claire with them.
Things only went downhill from there.
In less than two weeks, the mother was dead.
Little Mary grew up surrounded by the intellectual and literary figures who made up her father's social circle. Except for difficulty in getting along with the woman her father married when she was four, Mary grew up fairly happy, close to her half-sister Frances and stepsister Clara (better known as Fanny and Claire).
And then, when Mary was a teenager, she met and fell in love with a radical poet, a young man from the landed gentry. His name was Percy, and when he and Mary fell in love, he was already married. To escape his wife and the scrutiny of society, the young couple ran off to the Continent, taking Claire with them.
Things only went downhill from there.
Sunday, August 29, 2010
Hungry Like the Wahrwilf Wuhrwulf Werewolf
(A companion piece to my earlier article on vampires...)
It is no surprise that, when humanity began to romanticize the vampire, the werewolf would also be enthusiastically reimagined and reinvented.
Where once the two sorts of creature were on something of an equal footing, being night-walking terrors that one wouldn't want to tangle with, they are now rather like opposite sides of the same coin flipped in the dark of a moonlit night. The vampire is now most often seen as the slick, sophisticated monster, a gentleman (or woman) out for blood, seducing their victims along the way. The werewolf, on the other hand, is ever the animal, a person transformed, whether through chance, fate, or will, into a ravening beast.
It is no surprise that, when humanity began to romanticize the vampire, the werewolf would also be enthusiastically reimagined and reinvented.
Where once the two sorts of creature were on something of an equal footing, being night-walking terrors that one wouldn't want to tangle with, they are now rather like opposite sides of the same coin flipped in the dark of a moonlit night. The vampire is now most often seen as the slick, sophisticated monster, a gentleman (or woman) out for blood, seducing their victims along the way. The werewolf, on the other hand, is ever the animal, a person transformed, whether through chance, fate, or will, into a ravening beast.
Why Vampires are OHMIGOD SOOO Romantic.
(This post started life as a set of comments on the blog of a friend who just doesn't understand why people so romanticize a bunch of walking corpses. It was really an attempt to explain why they are romanticized when, face it...they're just dead people who drink blood. It was first fully posted in this final form on my entertainment and pop culture blog, Exhaust Pipe Potatoes and it seemed a fitting starter for this blog...)
Vampires have long been romanticized. However, if one reads up on some of the more ancient, classic vampire legends, particularly those from Eastern Europe, it quickly becomes clear that a vampire isn't a beautiful, romantic creature; it's a freaking WALKING CORPSE! As one scholar put it, originally, being bitten by a vampire was about as romantic as being bitten by your dead Uncle Boris.
The concept of the vampire as more than just a walking corpse came about because, as well as being immortal, they were well-nigh invulnerable (fire was bad...and decapitation...but most other stuff was just a scratch. Oh, and staking wasn't originally to kill them...it was to pin them down so you COULD kill them...so you had to drive the stake ALL THE WAY THROUGH.) Invulnerability=you don't rot=you are eternally young/the way you were, which is a very attractive prospect to some.
Vampires have long been romanticized. However, if one reads up on some of the more ancient, classic vampire legends, particularly those from Eastern Europe, it quickly becomes clear that a vampire isn't a beautiful, romantic creature; it's a freaking WALKING CORPSE! As one scholar put it, originally, being bitten by a vampire was about as romantic as being bitten by your dead Uncle Boris.
The concept of the vampire as more than just a walking corpse came about because, as well as being immortal, they were well-nigh invulnerable (fire was bad...and decapitation...but most other stuff was just a scratch. Oh, and staking wasn't originally to kill them...it was to pin them down so you COULD kill them...so you had to drive the stake ALL THE WAY THROUGH.) Invulnerability=you don't rot=you are eternally young/the way you were, which is a very attractive prospect to some.
Saturday, August 28, 2010
Not your typical horror blog...
See the title of the blog entire? It's very true: All the World's a Horror Show. Horror is much more than filmed slashers and monster books...horror is around us in our lives every day through the deeds of murderers and ordinary people who wig out a bit. Even worse, horror is in nature in the form of everything from deadly germs to predatory creatures from the deep. We're talking man (and presumably woman)-eating squid here, people! So, this blog won't just be horror film and book reviews or the similar stuff you'll see on a lot of horror blogs. Oh, you'll see plenty of that, but you'll also see a lot of news on the horrific in everyday existence. This blog is for anyone who's interested in horror, but it's bound to particularly strike a chord with those who enjoy the notion of living in a world where every shadow shelters a demon...
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