Foreign Fears: Somos Lo Que Hay (We Are What We Are) Mexico (2010)

written by Steven M. Duarte

I was especially excited in viewing this film as I had heard great buzz surrounding this Spanish film. I knew the basic premise surrounded a family who recently lost their father who was the sole provider for the family. The twist here is the family is not your ordinary family. They feast on the living and kill their prey to survive.

While I can’t say I was overly satisfied with the final product I can say it was a well put together film that is worth a view or two. The family has a certain resemblance to a certain family that resides in Texas. They have a dirty house with an obsession with wall clocks. They keep to themselves and keep their social activity to a minimum. There is an internal struggle within the family of who is going to be the new alpha male leading the pack. This plot point never really fleshes out and the film pretty much ends.

I can’t go about writing this piece without pointing out the similarities between this film and the Hamilton’s. They both centered around eccentric families, one being vampires the other cannibals, both center on the families struggling to stay alive, both having strong family members who are strict and act as the muscle of the family. The Hamilton’s has been out for awhile and its extremely hard to not have it in your mind when viewing this film.

What does hold the film back is the many missed opportunities. For one the family references to the “ritual,” the entire film. By the time the film is done we do not get a viewing of this ritual nor do we even know what it consists of.

Secondly, the gore could have been turned up a notch. Now I know gore never makes a film but considering that these people are cannibals we could have done with a little more blood and guts.

While not a great film it still is one worth a viewing to see some decent foreign filmmaking. On a side note see if you get a flashback from a certain Guillermo Del Toro film. I won’t give the scene away but your sure to remember once you see it.



--Steven M. Duarte

Brian Sammons Hi-Def Horror Hoedown!

DEXTER SEASON 5 (2010)– Blu-ray review.

Director: various
Cast: Michael C. Hall, Jennifer Carpenter, David Zayas

DEXTER can now be added to sex and pizza, that is; even when it’s not great, it’s still pretty good. Yep, that’s Season 5 of Showtime’s mega hit serial killer TV show in a nutshell. Now it’s not just a comparison of this last season with the amazing one that came before it. You know; the one that had John Lithgow portraying a truly terrifying monster and ended with the mother of all season cliff hangers? Yeah, if you haven’t seen season 4 of DEXTER then you missed out big time. But we’re here to talk about the season that had the unenviable task of followed it. So grab your knives and your plastic wrap, its DEXTER time again.

Oh. and SPOILERS for the aforementioned epic season 4. If you don’t want some surprises ruined, stop reading now.

So season 5 starts of right where the last one left off; with deeply disturbed and deadly Dexter coming home to find his wife Rita dead and his infant son cover in her blood. That means the first couple of episodes of this season are spent with Dexter picking up the pieces and trying to get his family life in order. And while later Dex will get back to doing what he does best, and honestly what everyone really wants to see, this theme of Dexter the family man plays out through the entire season. And if I had to pick just one reason while this season feels lackluster in comparison to all the others that came before it that would be it. While it’s nice that Dexter is a fully fleshed out character, this season seemed to have lost sight on what made DEXTER so unique, compelling, and addictive, and instead replaced it with some of the typical melodrama that can be found on any other TV show. And just in case you think I’m being unfair when I say that, both the creators and the actors have said as much in various interviews and on multiple talk shows since the end of season 5. They have even promised that the upcoming season 6 will be a return to form. Let’s hope that they’re right. I mean, everyone can make a mistake; the trick is learning from it and not repeating it. Oh well, enough of that, let’s get back to it.

After taking care of Rita and what’s left of his family, Dexter is back on the hunt. But again, comparisons between this season’s main villain and last season’s amazing badie played by John Lithgow are bound to rise up, and that’s when season 5’s evil Tony Robbins impersonator falls flat. This choice of antagonist is not truly awful, but neither is he memorable. Maybe it’s because Dex has to slice through a lot of proxies before getting to the chief creep? Whatever the case may be, this nemesis just sort of felt “meh” to me. He is no Ice Truck Killer, let alone the Trinity Killer.

Another misstep was the addition of a tortured rape victim becoming both a love interest and serial killer partner to Dexter. Not only was that a stretch to believe on multiple levels, but her inclusion seemed to totally go against Dexter and all we had learned about him since the start of the series. Now some have laid much of the blame for this season’s shortcomings at the feet of actress Julia Stiles who played the tortured woman, but I am not among them. While I was not blow away by her performance, I didn’t think she did a bad job, she just did what was written for the character, which was sadly none too great.

As for special features, that’s where this Blu-rays gets a completely failing grade. Sadly, that has always been the case with all the DEXTER seasons. There are a handful of short interviews with the cast and…that’s it. Yep, that’s the whole enchilada. Oh there are a few free episodes for two of Showtime’s other shows, but that’s not “special features”, that’s nothing more than blatant advertising. Sorry Showtime execs, but if I wanted to watch THE BORGIAS I would, how about you someday give us some real special features on these discs? That would be nice. So as far as extras go, these Blu-rays get a big thumbs down. Thank god the show is good enough to still warrant a buy all by its self.

So season 5 wasn’t the highpoint of this critically claimed series, but it had enough good parts to keep me watching. Besides, if you have the other seasons of DEXTER in your home library, can you really let yourself pass on one? No, I didn’t think so.

THE TWILIGHT ZONE: SEASON 5 (1963-1964)– Blu-ray review

Created by Rod Serling
Directors: Various
Cast: Various

Ok, here it is TWILIGHT fans. No, I’m not talking about that tweeny, angsty, abstinence-message-in-disguise crap about the sparkling, emo vampires. I’m talking about the slice of classic entertainment that will forever outright own the word “twilight” in the hearts and minds of all true horrorheads. That’s right, it’s the TWILIGHT ZONE and here is the least season of the original series finally out on Blu-ray from Image Entertainment.

Now I firmly believe that THE TWILIGHT ZONE is like pizza, and that I really shouldn’t have to sell it to you. You know exactly what it is, and you know if you want it. I’m just here to let you know that these Blu-rays are now available for purchase and to remind you just how great of a television show this series, and specifically this season, was. Here you will find “Steel” about a boxer going up against robotic opponents. Hey, doesn’t that sound just like a certain movie coming out soon staring Hugh “Wolverine” Jackman? Yeah well it was done here first. Got a thing about creepy dolls? Well then stay away from episode 126, “Living Doll”. Are you a critical snob? Well then be sure to check out “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge” which won an Academy Award for best short film in 1963. Or how about just one of the greatest TWILIGHT ZONEs of all time (and that’s saying something); Richard Matheson’s amazing “Nightmare at 20,000 Feet” and staring William Shatner. You know; the one with the gremlin on the wing of the plane? Yeah, that was awesome. Those are just some of the classic zones that proved the old adage of saving the best for last. Season 5 proves that the ZONE went away far before it should, and despite the two attempts to resurrect it, the first in the 80s being good to ok and the last in the early 2000s being pretty damn painful to watch, these discs easily show that the original is still the best by far. This is how great sci-fi, horror, and fantasy TV is done.

This five disc Blu-ray set from Image has 36 episodes, 20 with brand new audio commentaries. There are a bunch more extra goodies to be found here as well. There’s an extended conversation with Rod Serling, a radio interview with the director of photography of many of the TZs, and 22 radio dramas on the majority of episodes on this disc starting a wide variety of talent such as Louis Gossett, Jr., Adam Baldwin, Adam West, Luke Perry, Kate Jackson, Ed Begley, Jr., Jason Alexander, Jane Seymour, and more. There are a bunch of video interviews with writers like Richard Matheson and George Clayton Johnson and actors Bill Mumy and June Foray, to name just a few. Every episode comes with an isolated music score, in case you want to jam to the sounds of the ZONE without the pesky dialog. There are “next week’s show” promos, more interviews, scenes from the MIKE WALLACE SHOW, home movies (no, really) and more.

To say that these new discs are jam packed with extras would be accurate. To say that THE TWILIGHT ZONE is mandatory viewing for everyone would be an understatement. Simply put, the TZ is good television. Since I already used one old adage, I’ll dust off another one for this; they don’t make them like this anymore. If you already have the other seasons of TZ on Blu-ray then you owe it to yourself to end the series right and get this new set. If you have yet to start your High-Def collection of TWILIGHT ZONE then the good news is that you can watch them in any order, and since Season 5 has some of the best episodes, it’s a good place to start “zoning” out. So no matter how you come at it, starting off or ending things, this is a must have collection and as such it is very highly recommend.

PRIEST (2011) – Blu-ray review

Director: Scott Charles Stewart
Cast: Paul Bettany, Karl Urban, Cam Gigandet, Maggie Q

This is a movie that I wanted to like, should have liked, and while I sort of, kind of did, the one thing that kept me from relay enjoying it was its stupidity. Now maybe that’s a bit harsh, maybe it’s the “modern way of film making” for all the A.D.D. afflicted audience members that need bright colors and constant stuff happening on the screen, no matter how ridiculous, that I honestly find myself hating more and more as they continually ratchet up the cartoonish, and downright buffoonish “gee whiz wasn’t that cool” factor that you can’t escape in these day. Whew, that was a long sentence. But anyway, I guess when the only kind of action films Hollywood wants to make anymore are about guys in spandex fresh from the comic books, you have to expect the cinematic equivalent of jingling keys in a baby’s face to pass for entertainment. But damn it, when films like this make you pine for the “realism” of say, Arnold Schwarzenegger’s COMMANDO, then you know something has gone terribly wrong. Ok, sorry, just had to vent a little at my overwhelming disappointment at this flick that showed such promise, but ultimately left me unfulfilled. Ok, no more beating around the bush, let’s get to it.

In the world of PRIEST, vampires have existed as a separate race from mankind for a long time. An age’s long war raged between the humans with their technology and the vamps with their superhuman speed and strength. This turned the world into a wasteland and threatened to destroy all of mankind, when the Holy Church brought out their secret weapon: the priests. Think of these god fearing ass-kickers as Jedi, only without the cool lightsabers. These supermen turned the tide in the war and when this movie truly starts, the vampires have all been banished to reservations and humanity now lives in walled cities under the tyrannical thumb of the oppressive church that wants to control all aspects of people lives. That includes the priests who saved the world, and as their reward they get disbanded and are forced to work menial jobs. Yeah this film takes a very dim view of organized religion, so if such things offend you, be warned.

Anyway, one night the vampires return in force and attack an isolated farmstead, killing a husband and wife and abducting their twenty-something daughter. This unexpected turn of events turns out to not be really random when the girl turns out to be the niece of the titular priest in this movie. Naturally this vamp masher wants to go get her back, but he’s forbidden to do so by the church who just wants to stick their collective heads in the sand and pretend that the new vampire threat doesn’t exist. Well the priest isn’t having any of that, so he leaves anyway, forcing the church to send out more priests to hunt him down.

Now this movie does get a lot of things right. First, I loved the setting; a sort of western in the middle of a post-apocalyptic world that looks like it was nuked rather than vampire plagued. That is just cool and this movie pulls off that genre mash up very well. Then there are the vampires themselves. They aren’t just guys in eveningwear with capes, or glittering brooding bad boys, or even the rotting corpses of traditional folklore. No these bloodsuckers aren’t even remotely human. They are eyeless things with huge jaws and claws, hairless, blue flesh, and to complement their alien appearance, they live in hives they make out of slimy bodily secretions, just like the big bad bugs in ALIENS.

Then there is the star of the show. No, not Paul Bettany as the priest, but Karl Urban as a priest turned into the first ever human vampire. How exactly that happens, I won’t spoil, but Karl steals the show every second he’s on screen. He’s imposing, funny, and generally seems to be enjoying himself here, where as everyone else just seems to be going through the motions for a paycheck (yes I’m looking at you, slumming Christopher Plummer) or are just emotionless non-characters, like the aforementioned Paul Bettany who’s about as fun to watch as paint drying. He’s not really bad in this film, just god awful boring.

And that brings me to the stupidity that I mentioned earlier. Early in the film a guy, not a priest, but just a regular old Joe, tosses a single pistol round in the air, draws his knife, throws it at the bullet, and not only hits it, but cuts it in half. Now if reading that has you wondering why I’m making such a big deal over it, then forget I said anything, and you might be the perfect audience for this film. Unfortunately the too cool for school moments don’t just stop there. Priests can fall for fifty stories and not take any damage, they can shot tiny targets flying through the air without even looking at them, and later one priest tosses two rocks into the air and then a second priest uses those falling stones as steps to reach a monster above them. Now there’s being Jedi, and then there’s insulting my intelligence to an unheard of degree and this movie falls into the latter camp time and time again. But the eye-rolling silly bits don’t stop there. In this film, gravity is more of a suggestion then a hard and unbending law of physics as everyone; vampires, priests, and regular old humans alike, continually mock it. I can let such things slid in films like THE MATRIX where anything can happen in a computer fantasy, but when you’re trying to pull off a gritty horror world that in all other ways is supposed to be realistic, then these bits of superhero foolishness do nothing but shatter my already fragile sense of disbelief. Seriously, every time I was getting into this movie it would do some sense of over the top nonsense that made me hate it just a little bit more.

As much as a disappointment this movie was, the Blu-ray from Sony is pretty darn good. First off the movie looks gorgeous. I won’t say that the colors and bright and vibrant, because other than ash gray, cold blue, and wasteland brown, there really isn’t much color to be found here, but the blacks are deep and dark and the image is clear and laser sharp. As for the extras, there is a commentary with the director and actors Paul Bettany and Maggie Q. There are the usual deleted and extended scenes, two featurettes on the world and weapons of PRIEST, and a blu-ray exclusive feature called “Bullets and Crucifixes” which is one of those neat-o picture-in-picture running commentaries.

PRIEST was a pretty fun film and if you’re not as put off by modern movie making sensibilities for what’s considered hip and cool as I am, then you may like it more. As for me, I just couldn’t get past all the stupid bits that assailed me over and over again to fully get into this film, and as such I can only give it a mild recommendation at best.

TROLL HUNTER (2010)– BD review

Director: André Øvredal
Cast: Otto Jespersen, Robert Stoltenberg, Knut Nærum

I really love what the Norwegians have been doing with genre flicks. Be it slashers (COLD PREY), zombies (DEAD SNOW), or now good old fashioned monsters movies with TROLL HUNTER, they actually seem to “get it”. Moviemakers in that cold, snowy land take a Viking’s approach to making flicks, that is they take no prisoners and just go for it. This latest movie is a prime example of this, it takes a somewhat silly premise, that being hunting honest to goodness trolls in the modern day, but treats the subject with care and respect you just wouldn’t find in an American movie. Sure there are funny bits, but the laughs are organic, part of the story, and not forced or worse yet, at the expense of the titular trolls. This is how monster movies should be made. So put on your heavy winter coat, grab a very bright (and very special) flashlight, and let’s go hunt some trolls.

TROLL HUNTER is shot like a certain other big critter flick, CLOVERFIELD, and that is through 1st person, shaky-cam style. In the tradition of other “found footage films”, a news show gets a few digital discs sent to it anonymously, showing some very strange stuff, but with a note stating that the video is 100% authentic. These discs are from three college kids (two men and a woman) doing a news report on a supposed bear poacher. Yeah, I guess it was a slow news week in Norway. Anyway, the intrepid trio tracks down the man, and he is indeed a hunter, but his quarry isn’t bears. With a title like TROLL HUNTER for this movie, can you guess what he really hunts? Yeah no surprise there, but then you must have known that from the get go, so let’s move on.

The three filmmakers follow the hunter into the woods one night, lose him, and then bump into him as he comes running out of the forest yelling “troll!” Sure enough, there is a twenty-foot-or-so tall troll on his trail. Luckily this guy actually hunts these things and he knows daylight kills them, and even though it’s nighttime he has some high power UV lights to turn the trolls into stone. The three college kids get the battle all on film and then somehow convince the hunter to let them follow him around and document his secret war against a whole slew of trolls whenever they get out of line, culminating in a truly epic battle for the climax. You’ve seen the Blu-ray cover right? Yeah, that gives you an idea on how big that battle is.

As for those trolls, while wisely seldom seen, and at first only hinted at like the shark in JAWS, they come in all shapes and sizes. The filmmakers decided to use traditional looking trolls, and not just random big scary things with fangs and claws. While they appear weird, and often downright goofy at times, it is their unique look and variety that makes this movie stand out. You really never know what exactly you’ll see next when these Christian hating (yes, they’re not fans of Jesus and his followers) monsters take the screen. And it is rare instances like this, when movies need to show something truly fantastic and unreal, that I think my dreaded enemy, CGI, should be used. NOT as a cheap copout for gunshot wounds and blood effects that could be done better with practical makeup effect. But that’s a rant for another day…

Back to a more pleasant topic: there are a few goodies on this new Blu-ray from Magnolia’s Magnet division worth discussing. However it must be said that some of the usual extras you’ve come to expect are missing on this disc, but that’s sadly par for the course when it comes to foreign films. Case in point, there’s no director’s commentary track here. As a commentary track junky, it always makes me wonder why they just can’t get a translator to come in for this. Anyway, there is a nice 23 minuet behind the scenes featurette, and a shorter HDNet look at the movie. Then there are the usual suspects like trailers, photo galleries, deleted and extended scenes, and even a blooper reel. Perhaps the best “extra” for many will be the full 5.1 English audio track in addition to the original Norwegian one. So if you avoid foreign films out of hatred for subtitles, well then you’ve got no excuse to let this groovy little movie pass you by.

I really dug this weird little flick. It wasn’t terribly deep but it sure was a whole lot of big monster fun. The acting and direction is both competent and the landscape is truly breathtaking and has that rugged, primeval feel that you could believe had trolls living in it. If you’re a fan of monster flicks then do yourself a favor and check out TROLL HUNTER. I’m betting you’ll dig it too.

I SAW THE DEVIL (2010)– Blu-ray review

Director: Jee-woon Kim
Cast: Byung-hun Lee, Min-sik Choi, Gook-hwan Jeon

I love revenge flicks, they speak to me on a primal “eye for an eye” level that tickles my lizard brain to no end. And boy howdy, it seems like no one does revenge these days like the Koreans do. OLDBOY, LADY VENGEANCE (both directed by Chan-wook Park) and now I SAW THE DEVIL by Jee-woon Kim, whose last film, the aptly named THE GOOD, THE BAD, THE WEIRD, I loved to pieces. Sure there are other good Korean “you did me wrong, now you’re gonna pay” films, but these are three of my favorites. Oops, I guess the cat’s out of the bag early on how I felt about this film, but let’s make it official.

A young woman gets a flat tire on a lonely road and in doing so, becomes the latest victim of a sadistic serial killer. Unfortunately for the mad murderer, that woman just so happened to haven been married to a very driven man who swears that his wife’s killer will know the same pain and fear that she did. To make matters worse, again for the killer, the woman’s father is a retired cop and her husband is some sort of secret agent. So between the two men, it isn’t long until vengeful husband, Soo-hyeon, finds the psychotic Kyung-chul. But here is where things take an unexpected turn. In most revenge flicks you’d expect the husband to kill the madman in a righteous fury. But no, here Soo-hyeon beats the ever living snot out of the killer, then when the bad guy’s unconscious he slips a military grade tracking device down his throat. Why? So he can keep tabs on Kyung-chul and come back to beat him to a pulp time and time again.

In doing that one, simple change, this movie plays with the normal revenge playbook. Director Jee-woon Kim turns the killer into a victim and the grieving husband into a vengeance-obsessed monster just shy of the psycho he wants to punish so vehemently. That new spin on the old genre is what really makes this movie stand out, but there are other praiseworthy elements to this film. For one, the acting is top notch. Byung-hun Lee as the avenging, grief-stricken husband is both sympathetic and monstrous in his single-mined quest. And while Min-sik Choi as the killer isn’t sympathetic in the least, he is thoroughly believable as a brutal man at ease with doing very brutal things. The direction is up to Jee-woon Kim’s usual high standard, with enough of his off-kilter touches to keep people guessing and wondering just what the hell is going to happen next. This includes a terrifying visit to a hospital, a cab ride with random thugs, and a cannibalistic best buddy. Add all that together with a sharp and vibrant visual style with enough violence and blood to keep the gorehounds happy, and you’ve got a serial killer revenge flick like no other, but one sure to please horrorheads of all kinds.

The Blu-ray by Magnet offers a fantast transfer of this film, but sadly very little else. There are a few deleted scenes and a behind the scenes featurette, but that’s it. I guess with the language barrier an audio commentary track with the director would be out of the question, but still a few more extras would have been nice. Oh, I guess I should mention that this Blu-ray has both the original Korean dialog with English subtitles, and a dubbed English audio track. Therefore, even if you’re one of those people who say, “I hate subtitles movies, I don’t go to the movies to read”, you have no excuse not to see this very cool flick. If you’re like me and always saying that you would like to see something new, well then rejoice, your prayers have been answered with I SAW THE DEVIL.

DYLAN DOG: DEAD OF NIGHT (2011)– Blu-ray review

Director: Kevin Munroe
Cast: Brandon Routh, Anita Briem Sam Huntington

This film with the funny name, came and went quickly at the box office pretty much without a sound, almost like the stealthy vampires that are in it. So was this stylish story of all things undead staring the last man to play Superman an unsung sleeper hit, or just some horrible thing trying to pass it’s self off as the next great cult favorite? Well I’ll tell you what, it does seem like a mirror’s reflection of HBO’s fangtastic fan favorite; TRUE BLOOD.

Now I said reflection and not pale shadow of, or even blatant rip off, as both this movie and that TV show are based on old properties. Dylan first saw life in French comic books, while Sookie and the vampires (sounds like a New Wave band from the 80s) began as a series of novels. Now I guess I could do some research to find out who came first, but honestly I don’t care all that much. What is undeniable is that TURE BLOOD only exploded in popularity once the TV show started and this movie came out at least three years into that HBO hit and the similarities are there. Both are sent in the Louisiana (who knows, perhaps both are cribbing from Anne Rice), both have lots of vampires and werewolves in them, trying to get by in the human world, both are (or at least try to be) far more comedic than even remotely horrifying, and last but not least, In DYLAN DOG there’s even a group called “The True Bloods”. Now even if all the other stuff already existed in the comic book world of this character, don’t you think at least that part should have been changed? Unless the producers of this film were just trying to ride the Sookie and Bill fandom wave for as far as they could, but such a thing would be a calculated skeevy thing to do, not to mention a desperate cash grab, so what are the odds of that? Well at least Dylan isn’t a tortured, sexy vampire with a tragic past. Nope, he’s a tortured, sexy human with a tragic past. See, completely different!

Mr. Dog, no relation to Snoop, plays the one human in all the world who acts as a cop for the undead. As a regular Joe he is thought to be unbiased mediator when, for example, vampires somehow wrong werewolves, which I never thought were undead, but whatever… Unfortunately a few years back that tragic event I mentioned happened, which caused Dylan to go postal on a group of bloodsuckers. Since then he has given up the monster policing thing in favor of being a low rent PI, but after a beautiful young woman’s father gets killed by a werewolf, and Dylan’s own partner gets munched on by a zombie, he is dragged back into the world of the monsters.

What follows is a smirky action flick with a wee bit of mystery on top, but one thing that it never is, is scary in any way, shape, or form. Honestly, you could have replaced the vamps, shape shifters, flesh eaters, and all the rest with organized crime, or terrorists, or even aliens and the story would have to be changed only a little. The supernatural aspects of this film are window dressing and nothing more, so if you were looking for an actual horror movie, look elsewhere. That’s not to say that this movie is bad. No, it was a fun romp, a popcorn movie if there ever was one. But just like popcorn, while it tastes good its nether really filling or all that good for you, and you never say to anyone, “hey remember that time we had that amazing popcorn?” No, popcorn is completely forgettable and sadly, so is this movie. An hour after watching it, you’ll already be forgetting it. I know I was, and I’m paid to remember things like this.

Perhaps the biggest (only) surprise in this movie was Brandon Routh. I know he took a lot of grief for his emo portal of Superman, and rightly so, it was pretty damn bad. That said, he is the highpoint of this film, showing off farm more charisma then he did as the Man of Steel, being able to be realistically tough (ok, it gets a bit much when he goes hand to hand with a werewolf) and surprisingly funny. I’m sad this movie wasn’t better and not just a cobbled collection of monster noir bits because I’d like to see Mr. Routh do something more. As for the rest of the pieces that goes into the puzzle of making a good movie, they are ok, but nothing to write home about. The comic sidekick does his duty, the girl in trouble is sadly wooden and just sort of blah, and Taye Diggs does justice to the clichéd modern, ultra suave vampire crime lord. Next to Routh, Peter Stormare as an over the top, scene chewing werewolf is my favorite performance, although professional wrestler Kurt Angle isn’t horrible as a meathead werewolf himself. I guess all those years of acting in the WWE paid off. The direction is competent, if only just, but everything just sort of reeks of coming straight out of the Modern Southern Gothic playbook. As for the special effects, they’re pretty bad and come in two flavors of disappointment; incredibly fake looking CGI, or incredible cheesy looking makeup.

DYLAN DOG isn’t a horrible movie and might be a fun watch…once. But that’s all the praise I can give it. As such, I really can’t recommend it, except maybe as a rental.

VENOM (2005)– Blu-ray review

Director: Jim Gillespie
Cast: Agnes Bruckner, Jonathan Jackson, Meagan Good

Some movies come and go like the proverbial fart in a windstorm. This is one of those films. I sort of remember something about it when it first came out, but that’s about all; ‘something’. This mid 2000s fright flick garnered neither raves nor scorn. You never hear genre fans ever say “hey remember that movie, VENOM?” either to praise or slam it. It was almost as if the film never was. And here’s the kicker; even I, your humble and incredibly well informed reviewer, never saw it, and I’ve seen a lot of horror movies, both good and bad. Well, mostly bad. But this movie? Nope, never caught it…until now.

Despite its title, VENOM has nothing to do with Spider-Man’s arch villain of the same name, although I’d bet that’s what most kids will think of when hearing it. No it’s a good old fashioned voodoo tale. Ok, it’s a hip, modern (to 2005 standards, anyway), and teen friendly voodoo tale, but surprisingly a lot of the voodoo hoodoo they toss around in this film is pretty well researched. See, I’ve always been fascinated by voodoo. I even know that the preferred term for this complex, maligned by Hollywood religion is 'vodou' or 'vodrun’. Don’t know why I’m so attracted to the gris-gris and the Loa, I don’t believe in it and being from the northern United States I’ve never been exposed to it, but something about it always trips my cool trigger. So yay, this flick had that going for it, but did it have anything else?

Surprisingly, yes. In addition to the voodoo theme the story had a few fresh takes on the supernatural slasher genre, which ultimately this movie is. The main “baddie” of the piece is a tow truck driver named Ray and he really isn’t all that bad. Sure he’s a big, dirty, creepy looking cat with a wicked scar on his face, but he’s actually kind of nice towards the leading lady of the movie. Sadly, he doesn’t remain that way for long. You see, one dark and stormy night (ok, that ‘take’ is not at all fresh, I admit) a witchy voodoo woman digs up a suitcase full of magic snakes out of the swamp. A car accident on an old bridge not only kills the magic woman before she could properly take care of the evil serpents, but gets the helpful and misunderstood Ray into her car just as it plunges into the swamp. In the ensuing chaos the snakes come out the suitcase and proceed to bite the living hell out of Ray, killing him.

The next day Ray’s waterlogged corpse leaves the morgue and starts off on a killing spree.

Enter the plucky heroine and her friends who soon cross the path of the rapidly rotting corpse filled to the brim with evil that just wants to kill folks and worship the dark voodoo spirits. So why is the once peaceful Ray now a full-on death machine? Well the now dead voodoo woman used to help people like murderers, rapists, and other charmers like that by having snakes suck the evil out of them when they died, so they could get into heaven, I suppose. How that works, who knows, since snakes usually pump bad stuff into people, like the titular venom, and not suck bad stuff out of them, but that’s magic for you I guess. Anyway, when the now immortal snakes bit poor Ray they pumped him full of all the evil they had sucked out of who knows how many people. That gives you one super evil, and surprisingly smart zombie who can drive cars, throw crowbars, sandblast of girl’s faces (no, really) and figure out puzzles.

While watching this movie it always felt like this was one of the late 90s post SCREAM slashers, even though it came out in 2005. Largely that had to do with the look of the film, and a large part of that was the way-too-good-looking cast of young people that was the hallmark of 90s horror. Then when the end credits began (I must have blanked on the beginning credits or something) I saw why: not only was it produced by Kevin Williamson, the guy who wrote the SCREAM and I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER flicks, but it was directed by Jim Gillespie who directed the first I KNOW WHAT YOU…yadda yadda… movie. So if you’re a fan of that generation of horror movies then you’ll probably dig this one as the Williamson flavor is definitely tangible here. If you hated that era of fright flicks then this probably won’t do much to change your mind. But you know what, it just might. I did like it a lot better than the evil Gorton Fisherman with the hook hand flicks. But hey, that might have just been the voodoo mojo in this movie that appealed to me.

This new Blu-ray was brought out by Echo Bridge. Now normally that mean you can pick it up for a very good price, but it also means that it will be devoid of extras and perhaps not really live up to the video quality you would expect to find on a Blu-ray. Hey, sorry, but them are the facts. That said, this release was a bit of a surprise. The video transfer came off very well and the movie looked crisp, clear with bright colors and deep, dark blacks. It’s probably the best Blu-ray I’ve seen from Echo Bridge yet. Also, there were actually a few extras on the disc. Sure, they really weren’t anything to jump up and down about; a very brief (about eight minutes) making of segment, some storyboard to film comparisons, and a few audition tapes. However that’s a lot more in the way of extras than the typical release from this company, so I hope it’s a trend they continue to follow.

VENOM was a nice little slice of fright film. It had an interesting premise, the young actors did a pretty decent job, and the film looked good and swampy. The makeup effects were sound, and the continually rotting Ray was a nice touch, but CGI effects were, as always, pretty damn weak and did nothing but make me think I was watching a cut scene from an videogame rather that seeing a film. That said, all in all I rather liked this much forgotten movie and if you give it a chance I think you may too.



--Brian M. Sammons

THE EAST IS RED #22 – Mystics in Bali (1981)

by Lisa Morton

Back in 1998, there was a book that came out called "Mondo Macabro" by Pete Tombs that rocked my cinematic world. The book’s subtitle – "Weird and Wonderful Cinema Around the World" – gives you just the tiniest hint of the wonders that are to be found in this amazing tome. Where most other books on cult or exploitation movies were covering the same old tired ground (really, how many essays praising Herschell Gordon Lewis as an auteur do we need?) and revisiting movies we’d not only heard of but actually seen, Mondo Macabro was presenting us with stuff like Indian horror movies by the Ramsay Brothers and a crazy Japanese flick called Exorsister and something deliriously titled Satanico Pandemonium. They had an inspiring section on Tsui Hark, and, back in the days when the internet was little more than a bunch of ugly graphics that still took forever to load on your dial-up connection, they were an amazing resource.
But one movie stood out even among the wonders described in Mondo Macabro. One movie sounded so marvelously strange and received such high praise that I instantly went running to every video store and distributor in town searching for it.
Nobody had "Mystics in Bali".

I hated Pete Tombs. This guy made this 1981 Indonesian cheapie sound like the most kickass thing EVER, and now it was turning out to be more like the mythological Holy Grail (I’m not kidding, either – even its eventual DVD box art referred to it as “The Holy Grail of Asian Cult Cinema”). It was impossible to find. Descriptions of it – the plot was supposed to center on an Indonesian creature called the leyak, which was a disembodied head flying around trailing its own innards – formed strange and glorious pictures in my mind.
Finally, five years after the publication of Mondo Macabro, a wonderful thing happened: Mondo Macabro became a DVD company, and Mystics in Bali was one of their first releases.
Then it went out of print almost immediately.
I’d missed the damned thing again. Occasional copies that turned up online were astronomical in price. I decided this was a movie I was destined to never see.

Then, in 2007, I heard that Mondo Macabro was about to re-release it in a remastered version. This time I didn’t wait: I pre-ordered that bastard. It was a magical day when it finally arrived.
So, was it worth the wait? Did it live up to its street rep as (in the words of one website review) “one of the most psychedelic experiences you'll ever have in front of a television set”?
Wellllll...
Do cheese and Asian food ever go well together?
I’m going to dispense with my usual well-reasoned and carefully analytical approach here and just describe this bitch, because that’s really the only way to do it justice.
The credits alone let you know what you’re in for: As drums pound on the soundtrack, a bunch of Indonesian masks are held up before the camera and shaken, all behind credits that look like a font designed by a nearsighted five-year-old. The story: An American student named Cathy has come to Indonesia to study black magic; she’s already adept at voodoo (she really looks like a voodoo expert), and has heard about the Indonesian leyak. Her boyfriend, an Indonesian who looks strangely like Lionel Richie, takes her to a remote island and arranges for her to meet the ultimate leyak master, who has foot-long nails, a nastyass wig, and who laughs a lot. And laughs. And laughs.

The next night they return to see the master again. This time the shapeshifting master appears as a giant tongue, who drinks the blood they’ve brought (“This is really good blood!”), engraves some designs in Cathy’s leg, and gives her a cloth with magic symbols (“It’s all a lot of mumbo jumbo to me,” exclaims Cathy, the voodoo expert). The next night Cathy returns to the creepy forest to meet the master alone. More laughter announces the master’s arrival (what, was this leyak master a failed standup comedian?). This time the master performs a lot of spastic movements and laughs until Cathy starts laughing, too (Cathy, however, is such a supremely bad actress that you may not be sure if she’s laughing or trying to clear her throat). Cathy’s face begins to distort. She and the leyak master bounce around for a few seconds in completely stupid pig costumes, then turn all the way into pigs.
The next day she tells Lionel – er, I mean, Mahendra – about her porcine adventures, and Mahendra goes to see his uncle to ask about how to fight this evil magic (apparently he doesn’t want to believe that his girlfriend is really a pig). His uncle tells him he has mantras that will fight a leyak master, and he gives Mahendra a magic dagger.

Mahendra goes to see Cathy the next day, but she’s not feeling well (swine flu, perhaps?). That night she goes to see the leyak master again. You don’t think there’s more laughter involved, do you? In the middle of the laughter, Cathy’s head suddenly lifts off her body (courtesy of possibly the worst optical effects ever), dangling guts. The master is in control of Cathy now, and sends her head flying off. Cut to: a woman in a jungle hut in labor. Cathy’s head and guts fly through the jungle (okay, this is pretty cool), attack the woman, and apparently suck the baby right out of her. We go back to the master laughing again.
Cathy’s head returns to her body, and she tells the master she’s learned enough and she’s done. But of course she’s not: On the way home (or is it another night? Who knows), she meets a mysterious woman (the leyak master turned young? Who knows?) and they both transform into snakes. Mahendra is hiding nearby, watching. The next morning he finds her asleep, kisses her awake, and she instantly vomits off green goo and live mice. Remind me not to kiss any Indonesian guys who look like Lionel Richie.
Cut to: A bunch of talking, grunting fireballs having a duel in the middle of the jungle. They laugh, snarl and explode some trees. One of them is dumber than the others, and turns into Cathy. She watches as the remaining two fireballs duke it out. It’s kind of like the WWF with lighter fluid. One of the fireballs finally flames out in a less-than-spectacular display of optical effects. The remaining fireball turns into the leyak master, who tells us she’s finally defeated her enemy. Laughter ensues.

The next day, Cathy starts having neck pains, and off goes her head. A young woman watches. Laughter. Cathy wakes up later and finds her face covered blood. “Must have been a dream,” this brainiac mutters. “Guess I bit my lip!” They don’t get much smarter than Cathy. I hope this isn’t how Indonesians see all Americans.
The girl who saw the flying head tells Mahendra’s uncle, who meets with a council of do-gooders who try to figure out what to do. They reveal that if the leyak master takes one more life, her power will be complete. Uncle wants to handle this quickly…so he goes off to meditate.
The leyak master appears to Cathy the next night as a beautiful and wildly overacting young woman. She tells Cathy she wants “hot fresh blood”. “All right,” Cathy drolly intones, “I’ll get it for you…but not tonight.” I guess the local Hot Fresh Blood store is already closed. The leyak master laughs some more, then sends Cathy’s head off again. Mahendra’s uncle shows up at Cathy’s room, and finds her headless body; he drives some toothpicks into the neck stump (so much for mantras and meditation), and shows the body to Mahendra (“maybe Catherine’s being used by some evil supernatural forces now,” Uncle brilliantly suggests, after driving sizzling toothpicks into a neck stump). Meanwhile, a bunch of villagers confront the flying head and drive it back into the jungle. When it returns to the body, it just can’t get together, and the head flies off. Cathy’s body collapses.

Cathy’s body is buried the next day, and Uncle tells Mahendra they have to stop the head from rejoining the body. Mahendra is obviously heartbroken by Cathy’s death…or not (he nods when uncle tells him to “move on”). The next night, Uncle and Mahendra guard the grave. Cathy’s head and the Leyak master (inexplicably back to a deformed old crone) show up and laugh more. A bunch of really terrible optical effects ensue, scored by something that sounds roughly like cats wailing. The master attacks Uncle with some day-glo green animation, distracting him while Cathy’s head rejoins her body. The master rips out Uncle’s throat, kills another villager who attacks her (who turns out to be Mahendra’s ex – wow, talk about bad breakups), and attacks Mahendra, who performs a spectacular double somersaults backwards into Cathy’s open grave. Suddenly a naked old guy dressed in a sheet shows up, and turns out to be the great master Oka. He fires some pretty white animation at the leyka master, and the big duel’s on. The two big cheeses (yes, I mean that in every sense) battle it out. Leyka turns into a bipedal pig with huge boobs (I swear, I am NOT making any of this up), and is stabbed by Oka – at which point she turns into a sort of masked clown thing. Unfortunately, the leyka master has become so obsessed with laughter by the end of the climactic fight that she’s caught by the rising sun and melted away. Likewise, Cathy’s body collapses in Mahendra’s arms. He and Oka have won.

But have we? Well…Mystics in Bali is astoundingly bad on every level. The direction (by H. Tjut Djalil, complete with jerky pans and zooms and jump cuts), the acting, the dubbing, the cinematography (shots are often not even in focus), the script, the effects, are all so sub-par that they make the worst American children’s show of the 1970s look sophisticated by comparison. There’s not one single thing in this movie that’s genuinely frightening or disturbing.
But…damn, you can’t take your eyes off it. In the history of movies that work like train wrecks, this could well be the Hindenburg. If it’s not at all scary, there’s no denying that it’s a laugh riot (despite being filled with more annoying laughter than any other movie in history). It’s ridiculous and colorful and has just enough local color to be visually interesting and my GOD is it cheesy.
So, there you have it. Is Mystics in Bali good? Oh God no. But is it worth watching? Oh yeah. Just don’t expect outrageous Asian cinema on the order of Zu: Warriors from the Magic Mountain or Jigoku and you’ll probably enjoy it. Hey, want some cheese with that rice?



--Lisa Morton

Movies Worth Googling: Strange Movie Reviews by Jenny Orosel

Shatner Dance

by Jenny Orosel

After last month’s column on “The Birthday”, I really wanted to do a column on some movies I knew I would have fun with. Sure, there are a lot of movies I can go to for fun viewing, but overall, there is certainly a cure for the movie blahs—Shatner time!

When people think William Shatner, most (understandably) think of “Star Trek” and nowadays “Boston Legal” or “S**t My Dad Says”. But from “Twilight Zone”, “Outer Limits” and beyond, Shatner has horror running through his Internet Movie Database veins.

The first one I picked up was “Visiting Hours” (1982) a little slasher flick known for its place on the “Video Nasties” list of banned videotapes from the UK. An outspoken news anchorwoman (Lee Grant) is attacked in her home by a crazy stalker (Michael Ironside), who, after she is admitted to a hospital for her injuries, continues to hunt her down at County General. It’s a great, tense little piece with some intense moments and rather brutal violence. As a movie, I would totally recommend it. As a Shatner movie, it’s a fail. I had high hopes; he had second billing, right below Grant. His character of the news producer was completely forgettable. There might have been a few dozen lines, none of which were very important to the story. Again, I enjoyed watching the movie but, dang, I was really hoping for a lot of Shatner.

I did get some serious Shatner joy with the next movie, “Incubus” (1966). A lovely, unnamed pastoral town has both human and demons living within its borders. A succubus, Kia, is bored with seducing those already predisposed to be damned. For a challenge, she decides to ensnare the most pure, most kind soul she can (Shatner). But, after seducing him, she finds that rather than tempt him to the darkness, she finds herself drawn deeper into his goodness. Enter the titular incubus, hoping that by destroying his sister, that Shatner would be infuriated enough to fall to the dark side.

“Incubus” is one of those crazy stylized movies I enjoy so much. It was directed by Leslie Stevens of “Outer Limits” fame, using a lot of the same crew. They worked hard to make the world unrecognizable as far as time and country. In fact, they went so far as to film all the dialogue in Esperanto, the infamous artificial language that exploded in popularity among science fiction crowds of the sixties. And it wasn’t just the dialogue that created a bizarre alternate universe, but the deft framing of every shot, making each moment look like a painting. Then there’s the whole spontaneous goat rape scene, whose violence stood in stark contrast with the gentle pastoral beauty of the rest of the film. And lest we forget the Shatner factor. Sure, there was a little bit of the overacting he gets taunted for. But really, it works with the surrealism of the rest of the movie, and it was a lot of fun watching him play a character so pure and innocent.

In 2002, Shatner not only acted in “Groom Lake” but also directed it. Kate finds out she is dying of Lupus and only has a few months to live. She and her boyfriend travel to Groom Lake near Area 51 because UFOs had been spotted there, and she desperately seeks proof that life outside Earthly existence exists. Meanwhile, something strange is going on at a military base run by Shatner (who dresses up as an alien to distract folks from the real aliens there). Then there’s strange townsfolk who may or may not be from this planet, a possible rape that might have ended up with an E.T. pregnancy, and you have “Groom Lake.”

“Groom Lake” was a valiant effort, but perhaps not the most successful one. There were some plot misdirections (the alien rape/baby/glowing hands storyline is forgotten almost immediately after being introduced). It was a low budget movie that shows its lack of dollars. Digital video was used instead of regular film and it shows in the picture quality. The special effects would have been state-of-the-art a decade or so before, but looked completely out of place in a twenty first century movie. Still, I can’t say I didn’t have fun watching it. If you’ve ever seen an Ed Wood movie there’s a certain enthusiasm in the filmmaking that is unmistakable. Every actor was completely dedicated to their role, even when the dialogue busted down the realism door. Think “Troll 2” with actors who can actually act. And Shatner, while starting out as perhaps not the most sympathetic character, quickly charms the audience and soon completely pulls off the role of hero.

I capped off the Shatner fest with one of my personal favorites “The Intruder” (aka “I Hate Your Guts!” aka “Shame”, 1962). Rather than being the hero, or completely gratuitous character, Shatner gets to be the villain. He plays Adam Cramer, a stranger who comes to a small southern town during the week their school first gets integrated. He claims to be from an organization dedicated to freeing towns from the horrors of integration, and it doesn’t take long for the willing townspeople to blindly follow his hate-filled lead and even surpass his evil expectations. Is he just an angry man or is there something more sinister motivating his actions?

Roger Corman directed this disturbing flick from a screenplay by “Twilight Zone” writing star Charles Beaumont. While the movie is strong enough to deliver some serious punches and takes the subject matter of small town prejudice strongly, it is probably one of the most understated of Roger Corman’s movies. He doesn’t rely on anything but a strong script and talented actors to make the movie work, and it sure does. Shatner should have been given more roles as the heavy, because he does a damn fine job of balancing charm and seeping evil.

It’s important to have a back log of certain actors that make movie-watching fun. Some folks will see whatever Will Ferrel brings to the screen, while others laugh in glee when Christopher Walken is spotted in a flick. Me, a little some William Shatner now and then to keep life interesting. His movies might not be the best and they might not even be good, but they will definitely be fun for ME. Find your personal Shatner and stockpile a good cache of films to watch whenever you need a little lift.

WHERE TO FIND THE MOVIES:
“Visiting Hours” is out of print on DVD as of this writing, but will be back in print September 13, 2011. It is also available on Netflix Watch-It-Now.

“Incubus” has recently gone out of print, but there are enough copies floating around that you should be able to find it under five dollars.

“Groom Lake” is readily available.

“The Intruder” is not only available on DVD, but also on Archive.org as a streaming video: http://www.archive.org/details/shame_

--Jen Orosel

The Horrible Hokey Pokey: #1- The Back-to-School Edition

By Barb Breese

Greetings and welcome to the first installment of 'The Horrible Hokey Pokey'. This is where I'm going to share a little bit of my world with you, and also, we're just going to have a good time poking fun at the movies that beg to be made fun of , and appreciating the movies we can watch time and time again.

Because I'm new to you, and this is new to me, I wanted to start off with a bit of an introduction. My name is Barb and I'm a horror addict. It's my parents' fault. They exposed me to my drug when I was young, and they encouraged and enabled my addiction for years....and I absolutely love them for it. Because my parents were fans of horror themselves, and didn't trust anyone to babysit me when I was a child, I got to tag along on the weekly outings to the local drive-in for the horror double features that started at sundown. The first horror movies I remember watching from the backseat of my father's Duster were: "The Amityville Horror" , "Carrie", "The Exorcist" and "The Burning". Not too shabby, eh? Oh, I also lived in a haunted house during my younger years, but I'll save that story for another time. Remind me to tell you, okay?

Fast forward from that time to this one and here's where I am: I've been married for the past 14 years to a wonderfully tolerant man. Tolerant, as in...he hasn't killed me yet. I know he's probably thought about it a time or two, though. Hahaha! I also am a mother to two of my very own monsters. A six and a half year old daughter, who has earned my loving nickname of "Demon". She's totally a mini-me...which is terrifying, but really not that surprising. She also came up with the name of this column. She's a clever demon, no? My son is four and a half, and just the sweetest little devil. He's starting pre-school in a couple of weeks, and I think he's going to be a really ladykiller. No, not literally. Well, maybe when he's older. He's got a nickname as well, but I can't share it as it involves part of his real name and I just don't know any of you that well to share. Ha,ha. Aside from writing the column, I'm also a co-host on a horror radio talk show called 'Delamorte's Dungeon of Deadly Delights'. We're a nationally broadcast show and we talk to some of the greatest names known to the horror genre. If you'd like to see what it's all about, you can find us on jackaloperadio.com every Thursday night.

So, that about wraps up my introduction. Like I said, the column is just me trying my hand at something new, while sharing my thoughts and observations as I watch the best and the the worst of the horror genre. I hope you enjoy what I bring. Let's get started, shall we?

As is often the case, I found myself suffering from a bout of insomnia and was searching Netflix for something to watch. I scrolled through all of the suggestions and out of pure desperation, I settled on a gem of a doozy called, "Shattered Lives" (2009). You know it must be good if there's not even an image for it on imdb.com.

The description Netflix offered said something about clowns and crazy kids, so I figured it was right up my alley. I mean, it sounds like a match made in heaven, right? Oh...so...wrong. First off, I cannot suggest that anyone ever watch this movie. I might even be so bold as to call this the worst film I've ever seen. I know some of you might watch it out of curiosity and /or because I've just told you not to. Your choice, I tried to warn you.

Now, the opening sequence was quite graphic, in a way. Not a good way, but it was enough to keep my attention. Some nutjob in a gas mask comes and hacks up a bunch of stoned and/or drunk kids. Original idea, isn't it? Yeaaah, I know. Anyway, jump from the carnage to a scene where a little girl is playing with her creepy little dolls, having a lovely time. Along comes her mother, who eerily resembles Casey Anthony, who yells at the kid to get in the car so they can go to the park....where Mommy pretty much shoos her daughter off to play while she meets up with a guy she's obviously more than friends with. Once playtime is over, the mother and daughter return home, to get ready for dinnertime and dull conversation with Daddy. The little girl obviously loves her father, and knows that things between he and her mother aren't ideal. Every time she asks her father about her mother, all he can tell her is that, "Mommy's sad". I guess it would be in bad taste if he said, "Mommy's a whore", instead. So...anyway, it's more than obvious that the family's dysfunctional, and this is going to affect the child badly.

So, after dinner, the father tucks the kid into bed and reassures her that her mother loves her, and that she's just...sad (sigh). The father walks out, and the kid goes to sleep, only to be awakened by the sound of some loud whistling and clicking of shoes...and a spooky shadow moving along her wall. Then we finally see something...a midget dressed as a creepy clown sitting against the wall and and some grumbling "monster"-like thing trying to claw its way out of the television set. Creepy voiced midget clown-dolls start coming to life, they do some stupid dance and talking to the kid, telling her that they don't like her mother. Who does? Anyway, I guess this is supposed to signify the child's descent into madness. Are we scared yet? By the way, the fast forward button on the remote is my dear friend. It came in handy during the clown dance, which goes on for far too long and really makes no sense. Once the clowns-demon things are done dancing, they get in bed with the girl and they discuss fear and death and come up with a plan to kill Mommy....or something like that.

From creepy clowns, we move to Mommy and Daddy talking in the kitchen about how they need to "fix" their relationship. The guy bought 2 tickets to Hawaii, for goodness sake! But, the miserable woman can't be happy about anything because she comes out and admits that she resents their child and is jealous of the attention the kid gets. See, was I wrong about the Casey Anthony reference? Cue the dancing midget clown demons!! Oh, and they do make an appearance the very next day, when Mommy's boyfriend comes over for a playdate. Yes, there's a cheesy sex scene...gotta throw boobs into the mix somewhere to keep it interesting. Eventually, the annoying, foul-mouthed clowns come out to tell the kid to go play a game with knives, which she does. She goes into the kitchen and grabs the biggest knife out of the block, and exactly after she does....in comes Mommy. The clowns announce that it's time to play, and I get excited. And then... we cut to another family dinnertime conversation (WHAT?!), in which the kid tells her father of her mother's cheating ways. The mom flips out, curses at the kid and sends her to bed. Send in the clowns....again. Somebody needs to die at this point. More talking ensues. Another push of the fast forward button.

To sum things up: Daddy kicks Mommy out of the house. Mommy blames the kid for messing the family up. Kid gets stabby with her mom...finally. Blood gets splattered on the camera. Daddy sees what the kid did to her mother. He asks her what she did and she says she doesn't know. The house gets put up for sale. Is it over? No. Skip ahead to the kid now being a 'disturbed' teenager. On a fateful night, she finds out that her father , the only thing she has in life, has been killed in an auto accident, hit by a carload of drunk and/or stoned kids. Oh no. Whatever will she do now?! Send in the clowns...again, and grab the gas mask!



And that's what it's all about. I can't get my time back and I'm still recovering from the pain of watching this. Damn you, Netflix, damn you.

Until next month, friends.

--Barb Breese

Servante of Darkness: #1- A Review of Classics Mutilated, Edited by Jeff Conner

Classics Mutilated, Edited Jeff Conner

Review written by Anthony Servante

I’m a college professor, but I’m here as a horror fan today. Sort of. You see, today’s column concerns itself with literature…and horror. As many of you may be aware, there is a new trend in town: The classic reworked as Monster Lit. Which brings me our book for today: Classics Mutilated, Edited by Jeff Conner, IDW Publishing. Jeff has compiled 13 original crossover stories by some of today’s seasoned as well as upcoming authors, who have taken on the task of turning a literary classic into a horror classic. Jeff describes this mix of genres as a “mashup”, similar to the phrase used to describe two or three songs mixed together to create one song. Monster Lit injects established works of literature with horror subplots, but keeps the storyline intact. In CM, Jeff seeks to free up the contributors and allow them to reinvent the form. No longer are they tied to the original classic; the authors in the anthology are given rein to create new hybrids, that is, new stories for the literary characters, from Alice to Ahab, without worrying about retelling the original story. So here we have all new stories combining old and new literary conventions. Does it work? Let’s review the stories.
The Fairest of Them All/A Symphony of Revenge by Sean Taylor mixes Alice in Wonderland, Sleeping Beauty, and H.P. Lovecraft. It almost works, but strays too far from the originals to remain cohesive. Our heroine Alice has become a villainess. Is this what happens from spending too much time in that underground nightmare? I remember Mad Magazine turning Wonderland into scary place in which Alice fears for her life. Although the parallels of Wonderland to Lovecraft’s Cthulhu are interesting Alice never quite fits in. It is a crowded mashup, the parts never becoming a whole.
Anne-droid of Green Gables is a really bitchen title. But it bears little resemblance to the original character. I guess if author Lezli Robyn is saying that Anne is stiff and robotic, then it’s a cute observation, but the story of a family and the droid made for a good story on its own, without the literary mashup. But we were promised a blend of genres, two books in one, so to speak. I recognized the Green Gables, but couldn’t place the ‘droid’ to a familiar book or story. Adam Link, perhaps?
Little Women in Black by Rick Hautala and “Alcott” is good Gothic horror, but any resemblance to Meg, Jo, Beth, and Amy March from the original book is lost in this great mood piece by one of my favorite writers today. And I thought that the story was going to be a wink to Men in Black but wasn’t. Still, this was my favorite story overall, but a weak attempt at a mashup.
Death Stopped for Miss Dickenson by Kristine Kathryn takes the poet’s famous poem and literally turns it into a romantic tale. The figurative becomes literal. Cute conceit, but I preferred the poem: Because I could not stop for Death, he kindly stopped for me. Well worked story, but avoids the whole mashup thing since Dickenson was a real person and not a character from a classic book. Still, good standalone story.
Twilight of the Gods by Chris Ryall mashes Norse mythology and the Twilight series of vampires and werewolves. Sorry, but Twilight is not literature and is not worthy of a mashup as the series parodies itself much better than the story here. And I thought it would have something to do with the Chariots of the Gods. Oh, well.
Pokky Man by Mark Laidlaw fuses Pokeman and Werner Herzog, two media sources unemcumbered by literary reference. A very curious mashup. I once wrote about a world where cartoon characters were flesh and blood, rather than ink, as in Roger Rabbit, and subject to human pain and joy. Such are the Pokeman (men?) here. This is possibly the most horrific story of CM. Mad Magazine once did a similar take on Donald Duck and Mickey Mouse, with Donald trapped in the human world and subject to experimentation after being betrayed by Mickey. Always enjoy anthropomorphic horror. But there are no classic books here to discuss.
Vicious by Mark Morris does not excuse itself for not being a mashup. It follows Sid Vicious ex of the Sex Pistols who took Sinatra’s My Way to new heights, or depths, depending on your point of view, on his American tour. He dabbles in voodoo, but alludes to no particular classic that I’m aware of. This story is more in the Night Gallery vein, not the genre of Monster Lit. He does get inside the head of Vicious the way I remember him. This is a story I would have liked in a horror anthology about rock stars.
From Hell’s Heart by Nancy Collins blends Moby Dick’s Ahab with the legend of the Wendigo in a satisfying mashup tale. Collins grabs the classic premise and adds a healthy dose of horror that meets the requirements set by the Monster Lit paradigm but pushes it no further. I didn’t care, because the story held my attention, and it was good to follow Ahab on another adventure.
Frankenbilly by John Shirley meshes Billy the Kid with Interview with the Vampire. Again, as with Twilight, is Interview classic lit? Depends on who you ask, I suppose. As a mashup, however, the story works as a western take of the vampire novel. It’s clever without the confines of classic lit, but I would have liked to have seen a book like Wyatt Earp’s memoirs merged with Rice’s book rather than reach into American history for a companion to Interview. There’s enough literature in the western genre to create a good mashup. Shane of the Dead, anyone?
The Green Menace by Thomas Tessier mashes up Senator Joe McCarthy, the Red Scare mastermind of the Fifties with a plague of frogs, real biblical stuff. Reworked history with an element of horror thrown in avoids the Classic motif and is probably the weakest story in the anthology. It doesn’t even try to demonstrate the premise of the book by adding a classic literary storyline. If frogs scare you, this tale may work for you, but the real “Red Menace” was much more frightening. Go see Woody Allen’s The Front and follow Zero Mostel as Hecky Brown. That’s scary stuff.
Quoth The Rock Star by Rio Youers mixes Edgar Allan Poe’s The Raven with Rock Star Jim Morrison. The lizard king meets the bird. The story doesn’t bother to follow the premise of the Poe poem, but follows the mythos of the Morrison bio as seen in Oliver Stone’s The Doors. I’m surprised this story made it into the anthology at all. Even Doors fans will shake their head with bewilderment. I see Morrison as Picture of Dorian Gray fodder, perhaps. But it’s a tight squeeze for The Doors in Poe’s claustrophobic world.
The Happiest Hell on Earth by John Skipp and Cody Goodfellow ties The Island of Dr. Moreau with the Wonderful World of Disney. This mashup made me giddy when I started reading it. I expected much from the H.G. Wells story mixed with Disneyesque characters, and the story delivered. A true example of how Monster Lit, even its mashup counterpart, can work as literature. When old and new classics coalesce, a new form is born, and Happiest Hell marks a good direction for the mashup form. I wished that the story had been longer and hope that Skipp will reconsider it for a novel in the future.
Dread Island by Joe Lansdale mixes Huckleberry Finn with Cthulhu to create a nice hybrid that the anthology promises to give. Lansdale delivers a horror tale that echoes Twain without mimicking him. Huck and Jim track Tom Sawyer to Dread Island where Lovecraftian creatures lurk and loom. Neither Lovecraft nor Twain, but a perfect mix that gives us a mashup that stands on its own as Horror Lit. This is what Monster Lit is evolving into. If you read the Lansdale tale first (it is last in the anthology), you can easily measure the other tales’ successes and shortcomings as Dread Island transcends the form it seeks to emulate.
I tried to judge the stories as mashups of literature and monsters. As such, some were on target, capturing characters from classics and reworking them into horror tales, but others latched onto sources other than literature for inspiration and mashed up popular trends rather than ‘classic’ works. But if you aren’t anal about the premise, every story is enjoyable for the horror fan. I’m just a little bit picky about what I’ve been promised, you know, as a literature teacher, and all that.

--Anthony Servante

It Came From the Back Issue Bin! #19: San Diego Comic Con 2011 - July 20-25/2011

by Jason Shayer

In late April of this year, I received news that my application for professional status for SDCC 2011 had been approved. I had sent in the supporting documentation with little hope of having them approved. After doing a happy dance around the house, I settled down and planned for the upcoming event. It seemed to take an eternity for July 20th to come around, but it finally did...

WEDNESDAY JULY 20/2012

Flew into San Diego around 6:45pm from Toronto and jumped into a cab and raced to the Convention Center for Preview night. I spent two hours, stunned and with my mouth open, walking around the main hall taking it all in. It was amazing and overwhelming. Even by Sunday, I don’t think I had seen everything.

At the end of preview night, we followed the massive crowds out of the Convention Center and into the Gaslamp Quarter and had a late dinner at Dick’s, which was quite an experience.


THURSDAY JULY 21/2012

Woke up early and excited and scarfed down breakfast at the hotel. After some confusion over the shuttle buses, we ended up taking a cab to the Convention Center. Managed to snag lottery autograph tickets for Jim Butcher and Grant Morrison. Then I rushed down to the Avatar booth and got into the George R.R. Martin line and got a few of his books signed. Then back up to the autograph area and into the Jim Butcher line to get his autograph on a few books. Then over to the Epic Fantasy Writers line to get Patrick Rothfuss’ autograph and then over to the Grant Morrison line. Sigh!

Then got in line at the DC booth to meet up with Scott Snyder and Rafael Albequerque, the creative team behind American Vampire, which won the Eisner for Best New Series! Back up to the autograph area and got an autograph from fantasy writer, Raymond Feist.

Bid farewell to the Con for the day and headed up to Smashburger for dinner.


FRIDAY JULY 22/2012
Back at the con around 8:30am, but was already too late to get in line as it had already been capped for the Captains panel hosted by Kevin Smith with Bill Shatner. Decided to head over to Room 8 and check out the screen of the Locke & Key pilot that Fox had rejected. What a great pilot! Can’t believe that Fox passed on it. Hopefully someone will be smart enough to pick it up at some point.

Went over to Artist’s alley and then the DC booths and got signatures from Ron Lim, Paul Levitz, Jim Lee, and Dave Gibbons.


SATURDAY JULY 23/2012
Met and got autographs from the legendary Alan Davis at the Marvel booth and then raced over to his booth for a lovely sketch of Kitty Pryde and Lockheed.

Roy Thomas had been unavailable for Thursday and Friday, so I had to lug all his Marvel Masterwork around on Saturday. Met him at the TwoMorrows booth and got his autographs. What a gentleman.

Hovered around the Legendary booth until they finally formed the Frank Miller autograph line. Finally got his signature and told him: “Damn you for creating this book [Batman: The Dark Knight Returns #1], it made me grow up in 1986!” To which he replied, “Ah, yes. 1986. That was a good year.”

And ran into Zatana Zatara...

Went over to the IDW booth and picked up the SDCC exclusive version of Locke & Key Volume #4 and got it signed by Joe Hill and Gabriel Rodriguez.

SUNDAY JULY 24/2012
Sunday was the quietest day of the con with a lot of people heading back home already. Took the shuttle bus to the Convention Center. Decided against getting into the crazy line-up for Hall H which was hosting the Supernatural panel. Instead, got into the lottery line at the Marvel Booth for a chance to get a Nathan Fillion autograph. No such luck.

Then went over to the DC booth and got into the line for the Fables group autograph panel (Bill Willingham, Steve Leialoha, Mark Buckingham, and Todd Klein).

To cap off the entire con, got autographs from Robert Kirkman (Walking Dead, Invincible).

Said farewell to the Con and made my way to the airport. Flew to LA and waited four hours for my flight back to Toronto. Seems like I spent the entire trip in line! The landing was delayed by a thunderstorm and aborted landing. When we finally touched the ground, we were further delayed as the ground crew couldn’t operate in the thunderstorm for obvious safety reasons. Finally got home just after 8am and collapsed!

BEST GIVEAWAYS: DC’s Wayne Casino poker chips
BEST AUTOGRAPH EXPERIENCE: Grant Morrison, Frank Miller, Robert Kirkman...
BEST SURPRISE: Meeting 1980s fan favorite artist Art Adams!
BEST BOOTH: DC Comics. Running around on Saturday trying to get autographs, I found out that the Dan Jurgens autograph line had been capped. I approached a DC booth staffer and explained that I only had one item I wanted autographed. He smiled, took the issue, and went over to Jurgens and had him sign the issue!
BEST EYE CANDY: Slave Leias.

Only 47 or so weeks until SDCC 2012!!!

--Jason Shayer
(THE BLACK GLOVE MAGAZINE thanks Jason for his time and effort in reporting his convention visits.)

Graphic Horror: Game Reviews

By Brian M. Sammons

It’s the height of summer, and sadly that traditionally means the dregs of videogames. And as far as new games to disc go, that’s pretty much true. But thank god for this modern, digital age we live in, for there is still some good games to be found, if you know where to look. Here are 2 full games, albeit smallish ones, that are part of Xbox’s wonderful Summer of Arcade special and 2 add-on pacts that give old games new things to do.

BASTION, by Supergiant Games & Warner Brothers Interactive, Rated 10+, PC, Xbox 360.

If you’ve heard anything about this game at all then it’s probably been about its active narration. What is that? Well they got a guy with a rich, deep voice to comment on pretty much everything you do. For example, you start the game in bed, and when you get up, Mr. Narrator says, “The kid pulled himself out of bed.” When you find your first weapon, a big hammer, he chimes in with “He found an old friend.” Now in those instances the narration might have been scripted, but there are times where the omnipresent voice will comment on something you just did. Go crazy and start smashing things and he’ll say, “The kid raged for a while.” Equip two different weapons and he’ll comment on your pairing. Now while all that is nice, where the narration really shines is when it’s telling you the background and story of the game while you play through it. No lengthy cut scenes, no pages and pages of dull text, this is a great, dynamic way for the story to unfold and this alone justifies all the hoo-ha the narration has been getting.

So great idea about the narration, but ah…is the game any good? Or is it just a swell audiobook that you occasional mash buttons for?

You play as “the kid” in a weird world struck by a calamity that all but destroys it. You flee to a floating safe area, called The Bastion, only to find it also in shambles and completely empty of other people. So it is your duty to return to hot spots in the ravaged, monster infested world to collect the items you need to repair the Bastion. Naturally those monsters won’t leave you alone, so you’ll get a nice variety of weapons to use to do them in, including hammers, guns, flamethrowers, machetes, and more. These tools of the trade can be upgraded RPG style and eventually become a bit too powerful, making an already not too difficult game downright simple. While that may be good for kids, more seasoned gamers may find this a bit too easy and therefore boarding on boring.

Luckily there are a few things to help fend off the tedium. You meet up with a few colorful characters, there are challenge rooms for each of the weapons you find, and the world is fun to explore with a neat trick of having the ground come whooshing up to meet you as you run around, although that means you sometimes fall off the edge of the world. There are even some yes or no decisions at the end of the game that may justify repeat play. In essence BASTION is a neat 3rd person beat ‘em up with a charming art style, solid gameplay and light RPG elements. It honestly does nothing really new, other than the one trick of the narration, but it is a neat trick. Combined with the length of game you get for the reasonable price of this downloadable and everyone should spend some time with Bastion.

For doing something new, and doing something old but doing it well, and doing it all for a good price, I give BASTION a 4 out of 5.

DRAGON AGE 2: LEGACY, by BioWare & EA Games, Rated M, PC, Xbox 360.

If you are a faithful reader of Graphic Horrors, then you’ll know that I’m a big fan of BioWare games. That said, their last game, DRAGON AGE 2 was quite the letdown from their previous titles. While it wasn’t horrible or anything, it just failed to meet the usual level of excellence people have come to expect from BioWare. It was with a heavy heart that I have it a mediocre score of 3 out of 5. So now there comes this, the first downloadable expansion for the game. Will we once again be disappointed, or has BioWare listened to all the critics and returned to form?

Thankfully the answer this time is the second one. LEGACY is a fun, old school fantasy dungeon romp. If you are a big old nerd like me, and used to roll funny shaped dice back in the day while slaying orcs and doing the nasty with elven princesses, then it will remind you of an old time module for DUNGEONS & DRAGONS. It is well written, self-contained and concise. It is relatively short, as you can run through it in one to three hours, but it is reasonable priced at just ten bucks. But how exactly does this DLC get things right when the core game of DRAGON AGE 2 got things so wrong?

Well first, it gives you plenty of new, something that was sadly in short supply in DA 2, which reused the same dull locations again and again and then one more time for good measure. LEGACY has new and interesting locations, new monsters to battle with, new puzzles, a new powerful weapon, and a new twist on the tale that’s at the heart of the DRAGON AGE world. As for the story, it seems like some dirty dwarves are desperate to get your blood, whether you want to donate it or not. After a few assassination/abduction attempts, you go looking for answers and your journey will take you from a woodland fort, to a mountainside, to what deep, dark secrets lay underneath that mountain, and beyond. And if all that wasn’t enough, there’s even some Hawke (that’s you) family history to be discovered.

LEGACY is a great addition to DRAGON AGE 2 and if you already own that game then you owe it to yourself to get this, if only to see how the entire game should have been done. Therefore I can give this expansion pack an easy and well-deserved score of 5 out of 5.

FALLOUT: NEW VEGAS: OLD WORLD BLUES, By Bethesda, Rated M, PC, PSP 3, Xbox 360.

The NEW VEGAS chapter of FALLOUT is fast coming to an end with this, the second to last DLC expansion for the post-apocalyptic RPG game. With this sequel, and its previous downloadable content, there has been ups and downs, some parts that were great, and others that were not so hot, so which one was this? Well let’s find out.

This time around a strange radio signal (yes, it’s always a radio signal in these things) leads you to a downed satellite and eventually to the “Big Empty” or more correctly the Big MT, where the “mt” stands for mountain. There you meet several great minds of science, but only that; their minds, as their brains are now locked in floating robotic bodies. And here is where you first sees how this add-on really shines; the writing of the dialog. Each of these identical looking brain-bots are nonetheless some of the most memorable characters in NEW VEGAS, based solely on the writing of the crazy crew, and the talented voice actors portraying them. And knowing their strengths, the makers of this DLC has filled it to the brim with characters like these and they pop up in the most unlikely places, and in the most unusual forms. I mean here you can have a conversation with your kitchen sink, talk politics with your toaster, even flirt with your bedroom light switch, and I honestly recommend chatting with all of them, as they all have interesting things to say, and quite often will leave you laughing.

That’s the good news. The not-really-bad-but-not-too-great news is that other than the great characters, this excursion really doesn’t offer anything new. With the exception of some robo-scorpions, there are no new baddies to blast. While Big Mountain is technically a new location, it pretty much looks like every other place you’ve already encountered in this game. You do get a few new weapons to play around with, my favorite being a gun called the K-9000, which is powered by a dog’s brain. Science! Oh and you can gain another five levels by playing through this expansion, although this time around I noticed no new perks added to the already impressively long list.

Oh, and I almost forgot, there’s a nice bit about a mad scientist stealing your brain and you having to get it back. Yeah, in this game you literally are brainless. So as you can imagine, that was kind of fun.

OLD WORLD BLUES is a good, but not great, addition to FALLOUT: NEW VEGAS. It has memorable character interactions, but not a whole hell of a lot more. Still, if you’re a FALLOUT addict, then this will satisfy your jones nicely. I give these OLD WORLD BLUES a 3 out of 5.



GENRE BREAK

TOY SOLIDERS: COLD WAR, by Signal Studios & Microsoft Game Studios, Rated Teen, Xbox 360.

Do you know what a tower defense game is? Well just in case you don’t, that’s where you build various stationary defenses to safeguard your base from wave after wave of enemies. Bad games like this can be tedious, but good ones are a lot of fun. Thankfully the TOY SOLIDERS series (as it can now officially be called as this is its second title). Also, it adds a new spin to things by letting you take direct control over any of your defenses, and also units you can drive around the map with, shooting at the bad guys, like tanks, attack choppers, and jet fighters. So in most ways it’s like the previous TS game, so what’s different this time?

Well, first and foremost, it’s the setting. This time the action is firmly set in the glorious 1980s and your little toy soldiers must defend the world from a full-blown invasion by the Soviets. This is easily the best thing about this title, its setting and style. This game could not get more 80s if it was wearing leg warmers, a Flock of Seagulls t-shirt, drinking a New Coke and playing with a Rubik’s Cube. And that’s fine with me. As before, your battleground is actually a small diorama set in a kid’s bedroom, and if you take the time to explore these backdrops you’re sure to spy something that gets you grinning. In addition to the backdrop, the game as a whole revels in nostalgia. From the GI JOE inspired title font, to the soundtrack that plays as a tune as close as you can get to the TOP GUN theme without getting sued, to the commando you sometimes play as that looks and sounds like Rambo. Oh, and speaking of the commando, he is just one of the random power-ups you can get as you play to help you overcome overwhelming odds. These range from artillery strikes and bombing runs, to flying gunships and even the ability to drop a nuke or two.

COLD WAR has kept the fast, fun, and addictive gameplay from the first game, gave it a beautiful 80’s paintjob, complete with huge hair and glam metal, and added new elements. If that wasn’t enough, they have also packed it with a robust multiplayer, co-operative play, survival mode, and about a half dozen mini-games and challenges, and more. So as far as bang for your buck, you get quite a lot of bang here.

TOY SOLIDERS: COLD WAR gets 4 lousy red commies in the sights of my machinegun, out of 5.

--Brian M. Sammons