Monday, September 21, 2009
Sunday, September 20, 2009
Patrick Swayze Was Originally to Cameo in Zombieland...
While it seems a bit fishy and somewhat cynical right after his death to release this "news", Shock Till You Drop is reporting that the late '80s icon Patrick Swayze was originally supposed to have a prominent cameo in Zombieland, set to debut in theaters next month.In an interview at STYD, co-writer Rhett Reese states:
"That was many years ago, before he got sick. It was [going to be] a Patrick Swayze zombie. They got attacked by him zombified and we had these wonderful moments where they found a potter's wheel and there's Columbus on the wheel and these other hands come up behind him and it's Patrick Swayze the zombie. Ultimately, they fight and Patrick bull rushes Tallahassee who grabs him and lifts him into the air, a la Jennifer Grey, and smashes him into a pillar."
Apparently, this all was slated back when Zombieland was planned to be a TV series pilot some years ago. Swayze had to decline the offer due to his condition, and along the way the project morphed into a feature film.Meanwhile, the idea of the celeb cameo zombie survived, with the filmmakers reportedly going after a number of actors such as Sylvester Stallone, Mark Hammill, Joe Pesci, Kevin Bacon, The Rock, Matthew McConaughey and Jean-Claude Van Damme. In the end, they managed to nab Bill Murray for the role, and already there are reports that his appearance is the comedic highlight of the film.
While I do concede that a Swayze zombie would've been cool, I'd just like to give a great big "BOOOO, HISSSSS!!!" to the Zombieland marketing team for choosing to capitalize on the actor's passing as a way to promote their film. Thanks.
* * * * * * * * * *
I'd like to thank the one and only Wes "Fierce" Cavins, a Vault Dweller from way back, who was kind enough to pimp the VoH blog banner. Thanks Wes, you rock sir.
I Sell the Dead: Fiendish, Funny, Fantastic
If you happen to have a theater near you that's hip enough to be showing the indie horror comedy I Sell the Dead, go and see it right away. It's already been out in limited release for over a month, so you might have to wait for DVD. In any event, this is a film that seems to have slipped under the radar somewhat, and that's unfortunate, because it's a real hoot.Dominic Monaghan of Lord of the Rings and Lost fame stars as Arthur Blake, a young graverobber in 18th century Europe who's been apprehended and faces beheading. On the eve of his execution, he tells the whole sordid tale of his illegal exploits to Father Duffy, played by genre stalwart Ron Perlman, who gives the best performance in the picture.
Turns out that during their graverobbing tenure, Arthur and his ghoulish mentor Willie Grimes (played by Larry Fessenden, who incidentally, will be helming the upcoming American remake of The Orphanage) stumbled upon a whole underground trade in the undead. Seeing as how this is far more profitable than the plain old selling of exhumed bodies to shady doctors, the boys delve into a macabre world of zombie-hunting, finding along the way that the competition is even more dangerous than the revenants they're digging up.
Angus Scrimm, a.k.a. Phantasm's Tall Man (how old is this guy??) turns up in a small but memorable role as Dr. Vernon Quint, the robbers' original, overbearing employer, who meets a grisly end when his disgruntled lackies send the unwitting doctor a staked vampire as a specimen. Doc removes the stake and... well, you can figure out the rest.The film is creatively shot by one Richard Lopez, with an almost Evil Dead 2 feel to the proceedings at times. Basically, it's a lot of fun to watch, with tons of inventive composites and compositions to be found. Sam Raimi would certainly be proud. Add an absolutely delightful score by Jeff Grace, who learned his craft assisting Howard Shore on the LOTR films, and you have some damn fine entertainment.
You've basically got it all here. There's genuine scares and genuine laughs. The makeup work on the monsters is quite impressive and frightening, and there's even some bits of zombie gore to enjoy. The script is smart and clever, and filled with intentional anachronisms that only serve to make the film more unique than it already is.IFC picked up the American distribution on this baby, a production of Glass Eye Pix, a minor horror house probably best known for 2001's lackluster Wendigo. That aside, they've struck gold with this one, and it's a pity it hasn't gotten a wider distribution. It is a rather quirky film that's not likely to appeal to the more casual horror movie viewing audience, I suppose. But worth a look for those seeking out unusual, clever horror that breaks away from the boring status quo.
A Quarter-Century of Krueger: The Long-Lost Marvel NOES Comic Magazine...
First off, let me just wish a Happy Rosh Hashanah to all my Vault Kvellers out there. Having said that, I will now turn my attention to a rather obscure yet glorious corner of the Nightmare on Elm Street universe this week in QCK. I'm talking about the notoriously short-lived Marvel Comics NOES magazine.Don't remember it? Shame on you. It came out in 1989, back when I was at the height of my newsstand comics collecting, being as yet too young and unsophisticated to have discovered the wonder of comic book stores. Did you know that it was the best-selling magazine-sized comic book that Marvel ever put out? Quite a feat when you think that this is the company that published things like Savage Sword of Conan!
And yet, as tremendously successful as it was, Marvel's A Nightmare on Elm Street magazine lasted all of two issues. That's right, two issues. It was a sad state of affairs, especially when you consider that it was a fine bit of reading. It was intending to take on an anthology format, unfettered by the movie continuity, yet still featuring Freddy Krueger on a regular basis.But all we got was the initial two-part story, "Dreamstalker"--written by the late Steve Gerber, best known as the co-creator of Howard the Duck and mastermind of many other offbeat '70s Marvel titles; and drawn by Rich Buckler, acclaimed '70s Fantastic Four artist and co-creator of Deathlok.
I happen to own both of those issues, and I remember being blown away by them. At the time, much of the comic adaptations inspired by film properties were rather lackluster, but this NOES mag was some quality work. And being in large format, it was free of the crippling Comics Code, which made it that much better.
Unfortunately, it was also this that brought about its premature downfall. In his Marvel.com blog, Marvel Executive Editor Tom Brevoort (then a mere intern) recalls that then-Marvel president Terry Stewart got cold feet when he began receiving letters from "concerned parents" regarding this new magazine that supposedly glorified a child-murderer. And so, despite the clearly labeled warning indicating this mag was intended for mature readers, Stewart pulled the plug.The story goes that an additional three issues were already in the planning stages. This included a rumored storyline written by Sam Keith (creator of The Maxx) and drawn by Peter David, best known for his revolutionary work on The Incredible Hulk during the same period. A sendup of Field of Dreams, Krueger style (one can only imagine what that might mean), alas, it never saw the light of day.
Marvel's NOES title was the first-ever comic based on the juggernaut horror film series. As we all know, it would be far from the last. But it's a shame that corporate timidity would bring it crashing down so quickly. I don't believe this would be something that would happen today, what with the much greater proliferation of "mature readers" comic books. But then again, when you think about what Savage Sword was getting away with back then, it really makes you wonder what Stewart was thinking...
Saturday, September 19, 2009
EXCLUSIVE: B-Sol/BJ-C "DVD Commentary" for FIDO!
I've long planned on doing this, and finally got the technological logistics figured out (thanks in part to Brad McHargue of I Love Horror) as well as a nice chunk of time set aside. And so here it is, the grand experiment. A special "DVD commentary" that I myself recorded, along with my sister in blogging, the yin to my yang, the peas to my carrots, the Abercrombie to my Fitch, Ms. BJ-C of Day of the Woman. The subject, one of our mutual faves, the superb 2006 zombie comedy Fido, starring Billy Connolly.The idea here is, you can listen here, or go to the Vaultcast page to listen or download our little 90-minute zombie love-in. Synch it up with the movie by starting the commentary at the same moment as clicking "Play" on the Fido DVD menu, and you should be fine. Or if you prefer, you can listen to our wit and wisdom sans flick, on its own merit. Due to some Skype complications, there are a handful of brief gaps in the commentary, so please bear with us.
We hope you enjoy it. This was a lot of fun to do, and I plan to do more of them in the near future...
Friday, September 18, 2009
Thursday, September 17, 2009
The First TV Spot for SAW VI Hits...
Amazing. After dying at the end of the third damn movie, that pesky Jigsaw is still at it. Saw VI is inevitably plodding our way this Halloween, and now, the very first TV commercial for the film has hit the web. I don't know. I really loved the first one. Then it immediately lost me with the very first sequel. Now it's just ridiculous--can anyone tell the difference between the last two movies? They're all starting to blend together for me. I always make a point to see them in the movies out of sheer habit, but I think I'll finally be waiting for DVD on this one.
Anyway, check out the spot below, courtesy of Bloody-Disgusting:
Anyway, check out the spot below, courtesy of Bloody-Disgusting:
Retro Review: The House by the Cemetery
"Anne? Mommy says you're not dead... Is that true?"
Let me make this perfectly clear. I LOVE Lucio Fulci. Not everyone does. This is an argument that can never be won one way or another. Some love him, some hate him. Over the years, he's become one of my all-time favorite horror directors. It's been said that his films resemble nothing so much as "fever dreams" or nightmares, and I find this to be very true. Especially in a film like this, which may very well be my favorite of his.
Only Zombi 2 equals The House by the Cemetery among Fulci's body of work, in my opinion, and it is my personal favorite amongst his revered "Lovecraftian" trilogy. It may be because it's the most conventional, linear and plot-oriented of the three, I don't know. I just get a major kick out of seeing Fulci take on the tried-and-true haunted house subgenre, and adding his gore-soaked fingerprint to it. As I've written before, this is his take-off on The Shining.
First off, the thing that grabs me is what may be the finest of all the scores for Fulci's films, and that's saying quite a bit. This one comes not from Fabio Frizzi, Fulci's usual collaborator, but rather Walter Rizzati.
The lovely Catriona MacColl returns yet again in this final installment of the trilogy, playing Lucy Boyle, wife of Dr. Norman Boyle, and mother of young Bob (odd name for a little boy, no?) Just as in the other two films (City of the Living Dead and The Beyond), MacColl is something of an anchor for the film, with her excellent performance conveying so much of the horror.
And what a monster we have in Dr. Freudstein (great name!!), the bizarre, ghoulish undead denizen of the Boyle's creepy-as-hell basement. A deranged scientist who has somehow managed to prolong his life indefinitely by consuming the blood of the living, he is a truly dread-inspiring creation. We experience all the terror and slowly building panic of the Boyle family, and little Bob in particular, as we learn the truth of what evil resides in this new home they are trying to settle into.
Despite this being supposedly the most linear of the trilogy, it certainly has its fair share of surreal Fulci-ness. There's the prolonged scene in the kitchen with the vampire bat. The freaky housekeeper mopping up blood, and not even being questioned by her employer as to how the blood got there. And that ending, which makes about as much sense as any of the other endings to Fulci's films. But I think what most people misunderstand about Fulci is that these are not signs of poor filmmaking--rather, this was Fulci's exact intention, to throw you off your guard and create this not-quite-right version of reality.
As with any Fulci flick, the gore is here on full display. Few brought the grue like Senior Fulci, and this movie is no exception: necks spouting blood, maggot-filled wounds, throats ripped out, and the usual eye trauma is all here for you weirdos to enjoy. And for some reason, I care more about the victims this time around than in most of Fulci's other movies, which makes it all the more difficult to sit through.
I'm always a sucker for a horror flick that puts children in peril--this will always elicit a visceral terror response from me. And in this respect, The House by the Cemetery pushes all the right buttons. Although reviled by some Fulci fans, little Giovanni Frezza in the role of Bob is the perfect cherubic target for the demonic horrors of Freudstein, and he does well portraying a child for whom the irrational fears of nearly every child are actually real.
I will say this with regards to Bob, and this goes for the entire movie--at least the American print. Unfortunately, to my knowledge, there is no American version in Italian with English subtitles, which would've been my preference. And so, the only version I've seen is the one dubbed in English. More specifically, dubbed very badly into English. So bad, that it does occasionally take something away from the film, particularly in the case of the grown woman they chose to record Frezza's lines. I really wish this wasn't the way I experienced the film, but even through the bad dubbing, the movie's excellence shines through. I urge you to be patient with this one major flaw.
One of the most underrated of the films of Lucio Fulci, The House by the Cemetery is well worth discovering for any fan of haunted house films, gore flicks, or Italian horror.
* Thanks once again to the lovely Marilyn Merlot for this week's Retro Review suggestion!
Let me make this perfectly clear. I LOVE Lucio Fulci. Not everyone does. This is an argument that can never be won one way or another. Some love him, some hate him. Over the years, he's become one of my all-time favorite horror directors. It's been said that his films resemble nothing so much as "fever dreams" or nightmares, and I find this to be very true. Especially in a film like this, which may very well be my favorite of his.Only Zombi 2 equals The House by the Cemetery among Fulci's body of work, in my opinion, and it is my personal favorite amongst his revered "Lovecraftian" trilogy. It may be because it's the most conventional, linear and plot-oriented of the three, I don't know. I just get a major kick out of seeing Fulci take on the tried-and-true haunted house subgenre, and adding his gore-soaked fingerprint to it. As I've written before, this is his take-off on The Shining.
First off, the thing that grabs me is what may be the finest of all the scores for Fulci's films, and that's saying quite a bit. This one comes not from Fabio Frizzi, Fulci's usual collaborator, but rather Walter Rizzati.The lovely Catriona MacColl returns yet again in this final installment of the trilogy, playing Lucy Boyle, wife of Dr. Norman Boyle, and mother of young Bob (odd name for a little boy, no?) Just as in the other two films (City of the Living Dead and The Beyond), MacColl is something of an anchor for the film, with her excellent performance conveying so much of the horror.
And what a monster we have in Dr. Freudstein (great name!!), the bizarre, ghoulish undead denizen of the Boyle's creepy-as-hell basement. A deranged scientist who has somehow managed to prolong his life indefinitely by consuming the blood of the living, he is a truly dread-inspiring creation. We experience all the terror and slowly building panic of the Boyle family, and little Bob in particular, as we learn the truth of what evil resides in this new home they are trying to settle into.
Despite this being supposedly the most linear of the trilogy, it certainly has its fair share of surreal Fulci-ness. There's the prolonged scene in the kitchen with the vampire bat. The freaky housekeeper mopping up blood, and not even being questioned by her employer as to how the blood got there. And that ending, which makes about as much sense as any of the other endings to Fulci's films. But I think what most people misunderstand about Fulci is that these are not signs of poor filmmaking--rather, this was Fulci's exact intention, to throw you off your guard and create this not-quite-right version of reality.
As with any Fulci flick, the gore is here on full display. Few brought the grue like Senior Fulci, and this movie is no exception: necks spouting blood, maggot-filled wounds, throats ripped out, and the usual eye trauma is all here for you weirdos to enjoy. And for some reason, I care more about the victims this time around than in most of Fulci's other movies, which makes it all the more difficult to sit through.I'm always a sucker for a horror flick that puts children in peril--this will always elicit a visceral terror response from me. And in this respect, The House by the Cemetery pushes all the right buttons. Although reviled by some Fulci fans, little Giovanni Frezza in the role of Bob is the perfect cherubic target for the demonic horrors of Freudstein, and he does well portraying a child for whom the irrational fears of nearly every child are actually real.
I will say this with regards to Bob, and this goes for the entire movie--at least the American print. Unfortunately, to my knowledge, there is no American version in Italian with English subtitles, which would've been my preference. And so, the only version I've seen is the one dubbed in English. More specifically, dubbed very badly into English. So bad, that it does occasionally take something away from the film, particularly in the case of the grown woman they chose to record Frezza's lines. I really wish this wasn't the way I experienced the film, but even through the bad dubbing, the movie's excellence shines through. I urge you to be patient with this one major flaw.One of the most underrated of the films of Lucio Fulci, The House by the Cemetery is well worth discovering for any fan of haunted house films, gore flicks, or Italian horror.
* Thanks once again to the lovely Marilyn Merlot for this week's Retro Review suggestion!
Hump-Day Harangue: Petty Greed Sinks the Werewolf TV Series Box Set...
Damn. This was something I was really looking forward to. For those who remember when the FOX network first launched in the late 1980s, the show Werewolf is something of a cult classic. Horror fans in particular ate it up with relish--I can remember one of my parents' friends who taped every single episode. Well, right now, that guy is doing a lot better than 99% of the rest of the show's fans. Because as of a couple days ago, the much-anticipated box set DVD release of the TV show was officially canceled.It only ran for a single season of 28 episodes. But in that time, it picked up a loyal fan following that still remembers it. Werewolf told the story of Eric Cord (John J. York), a reluctant wolfman on the hunt for the leader of his tribe, so he can kill him and lift the curse. Along the way, he also struggles to avoid hurting others and escape the clutches of those who seek to destroy him. It sort of followed the successful formula of The Fugitive and The Incredible Hulk.
Anyway, after the show went off the air in 1988, it completely vanished from sight, becoming the sort of Holy Grail sought out at convention dealer tables and such. And now, the box set, which had been planned, after a series of delays, for release on October 9, has officially been deep-sixed. And all thanks to a couple of greedy has-been holdouts.You see, Werewolf fell under the category of TV shows which used a lot of songs by a lot of different artists, and so when a show like this comes to home video, all the clearances for the rights to each and every song have to be secured. The Shout Factory, which had secured the rights to the show from Sony (why wouldn't Fox own them?) tried in vain, but in the end there were two anonymous parties that refused to allow their songs to be used. In other words, the price Shout Factory was offering wasn't high enough.
The company could not simply replace the tracks, as is usually done in situations like this, because the individual music tracks were never preserved. To remove them would have meant removing all the audio in those sections, including dialogue, sound effects, etc. And so a couple of money-grubbing "artists", no doubt washed up '80s hack bands looking for one last payoff, have successfully prevented Werewolf fans the world over from reliving their beloved show.This is something that has been more than 20 years in the making. Even if you limit it strictly to the DVD era, that's still roughly a dozen years that fans of this show, myself included, have been waiting for it to finally be released. I even included the pilot on my list of favorite horror TV movies of all time, that shows you how much I dug it. Nevertheless, like the other admirers of FOX's early foray into lycanthropy, I will have to make do with crummy bootlegs.
Folks, I'm nearly overcome with rage here. Uh oh, is that a full moon? I think I feel a change coming on...
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
EXCLUSIVE Dawn of the Dead DVD Commentary: VoH & ILH Join Forces!
Are you overcome with the overwhelming need to listen to two geeky blowhards debate the merits of a 1970s cult classic? Then this is your lucky day. You see, Brad McHargue of fellow LoTT-D blog I Love Horror is not a fan of George Romero's original Dawn of the Dead, but he knows that I love it with a passion. So being the contentious, antagonistic troublemaker he is, Mr. McHargue came up with the brilliant idea of teaming up with yours truly to debate the relative merits and issues of this giant of genre cinema.Brad posted the resulting two-hour diatribe over at his site yesterday, and I'm jumping on the ol' bandwagon to cross-post it now. I encourage you to download it and listen as you watch the film itself for maximum effect. Of course, you're more than welcome to just listen in on our nerdy musings on their own merits.
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