"Godzilla 2000" (1999)
Phobia: Megalophobia (Fear of large things)
Quote: "The recklessness of science gave birth to you, Godzilla. Why do you appear before us?" - Prof. Shiro Miyasaka (Shiro Sano), asking a presumably rhetorical question.
Synopsis: The King of all monsters is back and bigger than ever when a UFO reveals itself as a massive alien monster with awesome destructive powers.
Fear creeps in at 00:03:26: Godzilla does not fuck around. A hapless operator of a lighthouse finds this out when an approaching ocean liner seems to disappear ... only to reappear in the clenched maw of Gojira. Godzilla is a t-shirt: Arrive. Stomp Tokyo. Leave.
See also: Destroy All Monsters; Damaijin; Beast From 20000 Fathoms
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
2009 SGM Month of Halloween Horror Movie for October 19
Tuesday, October 20, 2009
2009 SGM Month of Halloween Horror Movie for October 18
King of the Hill: “Hilloween” (1997)
Phobia: Samhainophobia (Fear of Halloween)
Quote: “Luann, just when I think you’ve said the stupidest thing ever, you keep talking.” – Hank Hill
Synopsis: Hank vows to teach Bobby "the true meaning of Halloween come hell or high water" after a new church member calls it a night for witches and Satanists and gets it cancelled.
Fear creeps in at (mm:ss): Goddamn that Junie Harper. She decries Halloween as a Satanic holiday, and gets the school to shut down Hank's "Haunted House" on the grounds that it violates the separation of church and state. Luanne and Bobby start to believe Junie when she says that Hank is a Satanist, and Hank has to fight against Junie's attempt to cancel Halloween for the whole town. Risking arrest, Hank dons an old costume and takes to the streets with his battle cry: "Trick or treat! Trick or treat!"
See also: Trick 'R' Treat; Murder Party; ... and there’s probably some other scary movies about Halloween, but I’m drawing a blank right now.
2009 SGM Month of Halloween Horror Movie for October 17
The Mask (1961)
Phobia: Hypnophobia (Fear of being hypnotized)
Quote: "Once I was a scholar. Now, I'm like an animal fleeing from my own nightmares. Sleeping by day, prowling by night. And how about you, Dr. Barnes? Are you certain that, just underneath the surface of your own mind, there does not lurk a storm and fury waiting ... waiting to be released? Are you willing to make the experiment, doctor? You hold a key in your own hand. If you are not afraid, put the mask on now. Put the mask on now. Put the mask on now! PUT THE MASK ON NOW!" - The disembodied voice that commands Dr. Barnes (Paul Stevens) to do its bidding.
Synopsis: Explore the supernatural horror and suspense of The Mask, the first and only Canadian 3-D feature. Evil drives all who ware The Mask to madness... and murder! Put the glasses on when the mask is used in the movie and feel the terror behind The Mask.
A young archaeologist believes he is cursed by a mask that causes him to have weird nightmares and possibly lead to murder. Before committing suicide, he mails the mask to his psychiatrist, Dr. Barnes, is soon plunged into the deadly psychiatrist nightmare world of The Mask. AKA: Eyes From Hell, Eyes of Hell, Fire Face and The Spooky Movie Show.
Fear creeps in at 00:22:14: ... dude puts the mask on. Then the truly frightening, bizarre, psychedelic imagery commences ... in 3-D, no less. Disembodied skulls, zombies walking the earth, clerics sacrificing the family of Dr. Barnes at their altars ... and the Mask oversees it all.
See also: Wizard of Gore (1970); A Clockwork Orange; The Manchurian Candidate (1962)
2009 SGM Month of Halloween Horror Movie for October 16
Twilight Zone: “Nightmare at 20000 Feet” (1963)
Phobia: Aviatophobia (Fear of flying)
Quote: "Portrait of a frightened man: Mr. Robert Wilson. Thirty-seven, husband, father, and salesman on sick leave. Mr. Wilson has just been discharged from a sanitarium, where he spent the last six months recovering from a nervous breakdown, the onset of which took place on an evening not dissimilar to this one - on an airliner very much like the one on which Mr. Wilson is about be flown home. The difference being that, on that evening half a year ago, Mr. Wilson's flight was terminated by the onslaught of his mental breakdown. Tonight, he's travelling all the way to his appointed destination, which, contrary to Mr. Wilson's plan, happens to be in the darkest corner of the Twilight Zone." - Rod Serling
Synopsis: Cited by many aficionados as the all-time best Twilight Zone episode, "Nightmare at 20,000 Feet" benefits immeasurably from a bravura performance by star William Shatner. While travelling through rough weather on a passenger plane, former mental patient Bob Wilson (Shatner) peers out of his window -- and sees a hideous gremlin balanced on the plane's wing. Doubting his own sanity, Bob tries to convince himself that he is merely hallucinating. . .and then the gremlin begins to tear the wing apart. [Courtesy of All Movie.]
Fear creeps in at 00:05:56: This one's a classic. I dare say that William Shatner was never better than he is in this creeper. The moment that he sees what appears to be a man on the airplane wing, then goes into full-on, psychotic, "surely I didn't just see what I thought I saw" mode ... This is by far one of the best episodes of any television show, ever. It's revisited with more harrowing special effects in "Twilight Zone: The Movie," but John Lithgow barely scrapes the surface of Shat's original performance.
See also: Red Eye; Airplane; Con Air; any episode of “Wings”
2009 SGM Month of Halloween Horror Movie for October 15
Silent Hill (2006)
Phobia: Lygophobia (Fear of gloomy places)
Quote: “This may sound really off the wall, but listen to me. You've got to believe me. I haven't gone crazy and I'm not fooling around. At first, I thought I was losing my mind. But now I know I'm not. It's not me. This whole town... it's being invaded by the Otherworld. A world of someone's nightmarish delusions come to life. Little by little, the invasion is spreading. Trying to swallow up everything in darkness. I think I'm finally beginning to understand what that lady was talking about.” – Harry, the protagonist of the Playstation video game “Silent Hill,” rethinking his vacation plans.
Synopsis: Based on the best-selling horror action game, Silent Hill stars Radha Mitchell (Man on Fire) as Rose, a desperate mother who takes her adopted daughter, Sharon, to the town of Silent Hill in an attempt to cure her of her ailment. After a violent car crash, Sharon disappears and Rose begins her desperate search to get her back. She descends into a fog of smoldering ash and into the center of the twisted reality of a town's terrible secret. Pursued by grotesquely deformed creatures and a townspeople stuck in permanent purgatory, Rose begins to uncover the truth behind the apocalyptic disaster that burned the town 30 years back.
Dare to step inside the horrific town of Silent Hill, where darkness preys on every soul and Hell's creations await around every corner. But know that once you enter...there is no turning back.
Fear creeps in at 00:23:11: You could be forgiven for mistaking the first few minutes of this film for "The Mist." After the car accident, Rose tries to track down Sharon, only to have her pursuit end in a wild cacophonous attack of ashen humanoids ... or was it a dream? She wakes up, undisturbed, in an abandoned department store. She then opts for a different strategy: Find her car on the edge of town and try to drive through in search of her daughter. On her way back to where she left her vehicle, she's impeded by one major obstacle: A canyon, appearing in the center of Silent Hill as if cleaved by the vengeance of God. Rose and Sharon are now trapped with the terrors and demons of Silent Hill.
See also: Psycho (1960); Session 9; Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974)
2009 SGM Month of Halloween Horror Movie for October 14
Dead Birds (2004)
Phobia: Phasmophobia (Fear of ghosts)
Quote: "Now it is the time of night/ That the graves, all gaping wide/ Every one lets forth his sprite/ In the church-way paths to glide." - William Shakespeare
Synopsis: When a group of criminals on the run after a bank robbery during the Civil War take refuge in an abandoned house they have no idea what evil they have come upon. Isolated and presumed deserted, the house is anything but safe...
As the night wears on and a thunderstorm grows outside, each member of the group begins to have visions of the atrocities that occurred within the house, haunting it forever. Voices in the well, visions of mangled bodies and clawing under the stairs plague their waking hours. As the fear in the group begins to grow and the supernatural forces in the house start to manifest themselves, the group turn on each other and exact the wrath of the souls trapped within the walls.
Fear creeps in at 00:46:09: DON'T look under the bed of an abandoned house after finding a book written in blood. 
See also: The Changeling (1980); Gravedancers; Sixth Sense
2009 SGM Month of Halloween Horror Movie for October 13
The Mist (2007)
Phobia: Homichlophobia (Fear of fog)
Quote: “As a species we're fundamentally insane. Put more than two of us in a room, we pick sides and start dreaming up reasons to kill one another. Why do you think we invented politics and religion?” – Ollie (Toby Jones), seeing things clearly through the fog.
Synopsis: From legendary frightmaster Stephen King and Academy Award nominated director Frank Darabont (The Shawshank Redemption, The Green Mile) comes one of the most tense and terrifying films since The Shining. After a mysterious mist envelops a small New England town, a group of locals trapped in a supermarket must battle a siege of otherworldly creatures... and the fears that threaten to tear them apart. Starring Thomas Jane (The Punisher) and Oscar winner Marcia Gay Harden (Mystic River) in one of the year's most talked-about performances, The Mist "is not only one of the best movies of 2007, it's one of the best horror movies ever made. Period." (Maryann Johanson, The Flick Filosopher)
Fear creeps in at 00:11:49: The whole town is panicked enough on the morning following the horrendous storm from the night before. The increase in military and police activity isn't helping the customers of the Food House relax any better. The warning siren blares into activity, and a bloodied friend and neighbor runs into the store, seeking refuge - "There's something in the mist!" Behind him, moving almost organically, the mist advances, slamming into the doors of the grocery store. As the day goes on, the people trapped in the store will learn that the mist is the least of their worries.
See also: The Fog (1980); The Wolf Man; Empire Strikes Back (Cloud City, dude)
Wednesday, October 14, 2009
Capt. Lou Albano: dead
I eagerly await Cyndi Lauper's comments, since he played a part in her career taking off when it did. Brings up an interesting question: Who made the better dad to a rebellious young pop songstress - Capt. Lou ("Girls Just Wanna Have Fun") or Danny Aiello ("Papa Don't Preach")?
Anyway ... if you see any zombies stalking the streets with rubber bands on their cheeks, run like hell.
Monday, October 12, 2009
2009 SGM Month of Halloween Horror Movie for October 12
Dagon (2001)
Phobia: Ichthyophobia (Fear of fish)
Quote: “I think that these things were supposed to depict men—at least, a certain sort of men; though the creatures were shewn disporting like fishes in the waters of some marine grotto, or paying homage at some monolithic shrine which appeared to be under the waves as well. Of their faces and forms I dare not speak in detail; for the mere remembrance makes me grow faint. Grotesque beyond the imagination of a Poe or a Bulwer, they were damnably human in general outline despite webbed hands and feet, shockingly wide and flabby lips, glassy, bulging eyes, and other features less pleasant to recall. Curiously enough, they seemed to have been chiselled badly out of proportion with their scenic background; for one of the creatures was shewn in the act of killing a whale represented as but little larger than himself. I remarked, as I say, their grotesqueness and strange size; but in a moment decided that they were merely the imaginary gods of some primitive fishing or seafaring tribe; some tribe whose last descendant had perished eras before the first ancestor of the Piltdown or Neanderthal Man was born.” – A description of Dagon’s followers from H.P. Lovecraft’s “Dagon.”
Synopsis: Based on a short story by HP Lovecraft, the undisputed master of macabre... Paul and his girlfriend Barbara are celebrating the success of their new company on a yacht off the coast of Spain. When a sudden storm smashes their boat on a reef, Barbara and Paul swim to the nearest town for help. The decrepit fishing village of Imboca at first seems to be deserted, but unblinking eyes peer out from boarded-up houses. The strange inhabitants offer little help to the stranded couple. By nightfall, Barbara is missing and Paul finds himself pursued by the entire town... but a town of what?
Fear creeps in at 00:41:43: As if the horrifying townspeople of Imboca - with their greenish, sickly skin, their staring unblinking gazes, or their bizarre way of gulping breaths of air - weren't enough to give one pause, it's when the only "normal" (by comparison) resident, Exequiel, gives the twisted history of Imboca that the true gravity of the fate of the townspeople - more importantly, what they are turning into - is revealed.
See also: Piranha; Humanoids from the Deep; Creature of the Black Lagoon
2009 SGM Month of Halloween Horror Movie for October 11
Man Made Monster (1941)
Phobia: Electrophobia (Fear of electricity)
Quote: "You call my work destructive? ... I believe that electricity is life. That man can be motivated and controlled by electrical impulse, supplied by the radioactivities of the electron. That eventually, a race of superior men could be developed, men whose only wants are electricity." - Paul Rigas (Lionel Atwill), your typical mad doctor spouting off a mouthful of crazy shit.
Synopsis: Originally slated as a Boris Karloff-Bela Lugosi vehicle, Man Made Monster emerged on screen as a tour de force for Lon Chaney Jr. (in his first horror-film starring role) and Lionel Atwill. Chaney plays Dynamo Dan the Electric Man, a sideshow performer whose talent for absorbing mass quantities of electricity enables him to emerge virtually unscathed when a bus crashes into a pylon. Dan recuperates in the home of Dr. Rigas (Lionel Atwill), a demented scientist ("Mad? Of course I'm mad!") who hopes to create a race of electric-powered supermen. Using Dan as his unwitting guinea pig, Rigas zaps the poor man's energy even as he injects more and more electricity into his system. Suspecting something is amiss when rabbits and goldfish die suddenly at his touch, Dan nonetheless continues to submit to Rigas' treatment. When the doctor's colleague Lawrence (Samuel S. Hinds) figures out what's going on, he confronts Rigas with a "You're mad! I'm going to notify the police!"-whereupon Rigas picks up his cue by ordering the now-zombiefied Dan to kill Lawrence and confess to the murder. The unfortunate fellow is convicted and sentenced to the electric chair, much to the delight of Rigas, who can now put his theories to the ultimate test. Surviving the death-house jolt, Dan absorbs the entire electrical current and becomes a walking, glowing human power plant, killing the warden and the guards and escaping into the countryside. Slowly dying, Dan finally regains a shred of his humanity by rescuing heroine June Lawrence (Anne Nagel) from the clutches of Regas, then puts a permanent end to the mad doctor's evil designs before spectacularly expiring himself. A prime example of Universal's B-picture unit at its peak, Man Made Monster is among the finest of the studio's second-echelon horror product. The film was re-released in the late 1940s under the timely cognomen The Atomic Monster. [Courtesy of All Movie]
Fear creeps in at 00:14:54: Dynamo Dan McCormick is prepped for his participation in Dr. Rigas' experiment, wondering more about his missing rabbit friend than Rigas' background meanderings. At 00:15:20, Rigas shackles Dan to the experiment table, and he snaps an electrode to Dan's arm. And as Dr. Rigas' experiment crackles to menacing life, and as thousands of watts of electric energy fill the air, Dynamo Dan - a man who makes his living on the carnival circuit, manipulating electricity as it courses through is very molecular structure - begins to feel terror, as Rigas floods his body with more electric energy than ten human beings can withstand.
See also: Shocker; Prison (1988)
2009 SGM Month of Halloween Horror Movie for October 10
"Suicide Club" (2003)
Phobia: Thanatophobia (Fear of dying)
Quote: “Death: the one appointment we all must keep, and for which no time is set.” – Charlie Chan
Synopsis: A wave of unexplainable suicides sweeps across Tokyo after 54 smiling high school girls join hands and throw themselves from a subway platform into an oncoming train. Detective Kuroda and the rest of the police force are baffled as the bloodbath triggers a wave of suicides across the city. When a cryptic phone call tips off police to a strange website that appears to be tracking the suicides before they happen, the question becomes, are they really suicides at all? This outrageously bizarre, wicked social critique in the form of a creepy and enigmatic detective mystery examines the despair of the disaffected Japanese youth and the influence of pop culture on their lives. From international film festival favorite to cult sensation, Suicide Club is a study of contemporary morality that is gruesome, darkly comic and vividly original.
Fear creeps in at 00:03:51: "One ... two ... and three!" And fifty-four Japanese schoolgirls join hands and leap into the path of a full-speed subway train. This scene sets the palpable tone of dread that permeates "Suicide Club," a film about contemporary views of society, culture, and the specter & stigma of death by suicide ... with decidedly strong horror film overtones.
See also: Wristcutters: A Love Story; Leaving Las Vegas; It’s a Wonderful Life
Sunday, October 11, 2009
Saturday, October 10, 2009
2009 SGM Month of Halloween Horror Movie for October 9
Infection (2004)
Phobia: Nosocomephobia (Fear of hospitals)
Quote: “Doctors will have more to answer for in the next world than even we generals.” – Napoleon
Synopsis: A patient in a hospital dies due to malpractice. In a panic, the doctors responsible stage a cover-up. Shortly thereafter, another patient is left at the hospital doors dying of bizarre symptoms. When the patient dies, the doctors involved in the cover-up begin acting strangely...then one by one develop the same mysterious and deadly symptoms.
Fear creeps in at 00:19:10: Central Hospital is in danger of being shut down. Funding has fallen through, and it's not economically feasible to keep the hospital running. The patients are cared for using the bare minimum of resources, in equipment and staff. What staff are left, late one quiet, unassuming night, encounter a situation with a patient previously thought comatose. His life signs are failing, and they struggle to keep him alive. The stresses are plenty, as the staff attempt to put their private and professional hells behind them to provide the most effective care ... all while a senile woman stands by, idly laughing and enjoying the scene that plays out in front of her. As the struggle continues, an errant treatment call from a physician rings out; the attending nurse, confused, complies as per her training. Things suddenly looks promising, but then quickly something goes wrong. The patient dies, and the gravity of the mistake made by the medical team sets in. And in the following decision - "Dr. Uozumi ... Are you asking us to falsify the report?" - steps are put into place that will open up the vengeance of hells unknown to be visited upon the denizens of the medical facility.
See also: Visiting Hours; Halloween II; Disorderlies
2009 SGM Month of Halloween Horror Movie for October 8
30 Days of Night (2007)
Phobia: Nyctophobia (Fear of nightfall)
Quote: “Barrow, Alaska. November 17, 2001. The Northernmost community of North America. It lies 10 miles south of Point Barrow, from which it takes its name. It is a town used to two things: temperatures averaging below freezing and darkness. The climate of Barrow is arctic. Temperatures range from cold as shit to fucking freezing. The sun doesn’t set between May 10th and August 2nd, and doesn’t rise between November 18th and December 17th. This is the last day the sun will shine for 30 days.” – Opening lines of the graphic novel, “30 Days of Night.”
Synopsis: In a small Alaskan town, thirty days of night is a natural phenomenon. Very few outsiders visit, until a band of bloodthirsty, deathly pale vampires mark their arrival by savagely attacking sled dogs. But soon they find there are much more satisfying thirst-quenchers about: human beings. One by one, the townspeople succumb to a living nightmare, but a small group survives - at least for now. The vampires use the dark to their advantage, and surviving this cold hell is a game of cat and mouse - and screams.
Fear creeps in at 00:02:51, then again at 00:13:51: The title card at 2:51 reads, "The Last Day of Sun;" the tension begins to creep in as you know what to expect. In the interim minutes that go by, scenes herald an unease of things to come ... murdered hounds, destroyed cellular phones, reports of rampant vandalism and crimes that appear disconnected, but threaded in some mysterious way. Then, at 13:51 - exactly eleven minutes later - the first nocturnal scene plays out, and the horror begins.
See also: Near Dark; Last Man on Earth; The Town that Dreaded Sundown
Friday, October 09, 2009
As we tra-la-la-la-la further down the spiral ...
"Marge (Simpson) and her pile of bright blue hair are set to grace the cover of the November issue of Playboy. It will hit the newsstands October 16." [more]
C'mon, you know you've always wondered if the carpet matched the drapes.
Note in the article that there will only be "implied nudity." Wouldn't all cartoon nudity be "implied nudity?"
Thursday, October 08, 2009
2009 SGM Month of Halloween Horror Movie for October 7
"Children Shouldn’t Play with Dead Things" (1972)
Phobia: Necrophobia (Fear of corpses)
Quote: “You’re invited for Orville’s Coming Out Party! It’ll be a scream ... YOURS!” – Promotional copy for “Children Shouldn’t Play with Dead Things.”
Synopsis: The Set-Up:
Five young kinky actors and their artistic director come to a desolate and nearly forgotten burial island, complete with a morbid history of Murder, Rape, Curses and Demons. Alan, the brilliant but bizarre Director of the company, has brought them to this foreboding place to dabble in witchcraft; specifically to dig up a fresh corpse and use it in a ritual ceremony which is supposed to raise the dead from their graves.
The Pay-Off:
It seems as though Alan has really gathered his "children" here, only to play a practical joke on them and then to party the rest of the night away. However, the joke's on Alan. His bizarre ritual ceremony really does raise the dead from their graves...only they're in no mood to party.
Fear creeps in at 00:25:50: The zombie mayhem doesn't pop off for our intrepid victims until about the 01:10:00 mark, but those are the "undead;" nope, it's much earlier in the film when Alan and his company of actors dig up Orville. But not only do they dig him up, but guided by Alan, they proceed to make a mockery of his peaceful eternal rest. You ask me, they were askin' for trouble! Of course, the character of Alan and his interactions with the dead Orville make you wonder if this isn't necrophobia, but necrophilia, as dude is all over Orville.
See also: Aftermath (1994); Autopsy (1974); Weekend at Bernie’s
Tuesday, October 06, 2009
2009 SGM Month of Halloween Horror Movie for October 6
"House of Frankenstein" (1944)
Phobia: Bogyphobia (Fear of boogeymen)
Quote: "The undying monster ... the triumphant climax of Frankenstein's genius. And the wolf man. They may know where the records are, friend Daniel. We will set them free, and they will help us." Dr. Neimann (Boris Karloff), grossly overestimating the capacity for gratitude in Frankenstein's monster (Glenn Strange) and the Wolf Man (Lon Chaney Jr.).
Synopsis: Deranged scientist, Gustav Niemann, escapes from prison and overtakes the director of a traveling chamber of horrors. Pulling the stake out of a skeleton, he revives the infamous Count Dracula and commands him to kill the man responsible for his imprisonment. He then finds the frozen Frankenstein Monster and the Wolfman buried under the ruins of the infamous Frankenstein laboratory. When he brings them back to life, the Monster is uncontrollable and drags him to a watery grave.
Fear creeps in at 00:37:06: Dr. Neimann, mad scientist & genetic tamperer, and his hunchbacked assistant Daniel stumble upon an underground ice cavern. The search for Dr. Frankenstein's records have yielded little results, until this fortuitous accident. Deep within the cavern, Neimann and Daniel find the frozen bodies of the Wolf Man and the monster of Frankenstein. Like any good mad doctor, instead of fleeing the scene, Dr. Neimann surmises that he can make use of the two monsters, and he sets to the task of thawing them back to life.
Interesting side note: This film has a remarkable body count, even though much of the death occurs off-screen or is mentioned in passing. The final total – 10 – is also notable, in that it ties this film’s body count with that of the original "Friday the 13th."
House of Frankenstein body count:
Bruno Lampini: Strangled by Daniel
Carl Hussman: Drained of blood, by Dracula
Dracula: Vaporized by sunlight
Ulmann: Killed, brain implanted into the monster of Frankenstein
Fredrich Strauss: Died during the brain transplant procedures
Brohn: Slaughtered by the wolf man
Ilonka: Killed by the wolf man
Larry Talbot: Shot through with a silver bullet, by Ilonka
Daniel: Defenstrated from the top floor of Neimann's laboratory, by the monster
Dr. Neimann: Dragged into the marsh & drowned by the monster
See also: House of Dracula; Abbott & Costello Meet Frankenstein; The Monster Squad (1987)
2009 SGM Month of Halloween Horror Movie for October 5
Taste the Blood of Dracula (1970)
Phobia: Hematophobia (Fear of blood)
Quote: “Having tried everything that your narrow imaginations can suggest, you’re bored to death with it all. Right? … And now, you want someone with infinitely greater experience than yourselves to suggest alternatives. Just how far are you willing to go? ... For instance, would you be willing to sell your souls to the devil?” – Lord Courtley (Ralph Bates), setting up his plans for the weekend.
Synopsis: It's the boys' night out, time for bawdy fun. Yet revelry alone can't satisfy these community leaders out on a lark. There's still an adventure they can be duped into trying, one that will transform a certain Count from moldering dust into blood-lusting flesh.
Taste the Blood of Dracula, the fourth film in Hammer Studios' cycle of hemogobbling Victorian -Era horror, is a showcase of why Hammer became the name in Gothic terror. The solid cast and rich production design raise goosebumps to real-life fear and otherworldly dread. And Christopher Lee dons his red-lined cape again to become Evil Incarnate. He's Count Dracula, a being neither dead nor alive... but his movies are livelier than ever.
Fear creeps in at 00:37:37: Lord Courtley has coerced the group of Hargood, Paxton, and Secker to purchase some occult items, and they are meeting in the abandoned Courtley chapel to conduct a Black Mass ritual. Courtley pours putrefied blood into glasses held by the trio; he then turns to the altar and slices into his hand. He drips his own blood into the glasses, and the putrefied blood begins to feast on the fresh blood, turning into a rising tide of crimson. Courtley, once finished, commands the group, “Now ... drink!”
See also: Cabin Fever; The Shining; I Drink Your Blood
Monday, October 05, 2009
2009 SGM Month of Halloween Horror Movie for October 4
"Tales From the Hood" (1995)
Phobia: Melanophobia (Fear of the color black)
Quote: “This ain’t no funeral home. It ain’t the Terror Dome neither. Welcome to Hell, motherfuckers!” – Mr. Simms (Clarence Williams III)
Synopsis: One of the best horror films of the decade. Welcome to the hood of horrors--a place where it's hard to tell nightmares from reality. A place where you will discover … TALES FROM THE HOOD.
Stack, Ball and Bulldog arrive at a local funeral parlor to retrieve a lost drug stash held by the mortician Mr. Simms. But Mr. Simms has other plans for the boys. He leads them on a tour of his establishment, introducing them to his corpses. Even the dead has tales to tell, and Mr. Simms is willing to tell them all. And you'd better listen--because when you're in his 'hood, even everyday life can lead to extraordinary terror.
Fear creeps in at 01:08:10: Duke Metger, former Klansman, is now running for public office, much to the dismay of local black & Jewish community members. In fact, Metger has taken residence in an old plantation, where the souls of slaves are said to haunt the hallways. These spirits take the form of dolls, crafted by a voodoo priestess whose life is immortalized in a mural in the plantation’s main office. In his confrontation with one of the dolls, Metger has gained the upper hand. The doll, realizing his folly, brings in some help, from the inside.
See also: Bones (2001); Murder Was the Case; Snoop Dogg’s Hood of Horror
Sunday, October 04, 2009
Yep
I have to say...
Ever had one of those job interviews that just absolutely went flawlessly? As in you feel like you already work there and have worked there for 3 or 4 years? I had one of those here recently. Hopefully its the Good Lord's will that I get to move on out of this here situation and into a much better one. Yessir.
2009 SGM Month of Halloween Horror Movie for October 3
"Carnival Of Souls" (1962)
Phobia: Athazogoraphobia (Fear of being ignored)
Quote: “This is the shocking story of a girl who crawled from the river to race through a nightmare, walking a tightrope between heaven and hell. From the unreal, she crashes through to reality.” - From the trailer for “Carnival of Souls.”
Synopsis: A car full of guys challenges a car full of girls to an innocent drag race that takes a horrifying turn when the girls' car plunges off a bridge and disappears into the deep river below. The river is dragged without success, but one of the girls, Mary Henry, emerges from its murky depths. Eager to leave town, Mary accepts a job in Utah as a church organist. But she can't escape the ghostly apparitions that follow her at night or the eerie organ music that haunts her every move. Whatever is happening to her, the answers reside in an old, deserted pavilion where an otherworldly carnival is taking place in her honor. It is here that Mary will learn what nightmare awaits within.
Fear creeps in at 00:34:30: As Mary has been trying to renew her life since the car accident that killed her friends, she moved to a new town and acquired a job as a church organist. All is going well, but as she begins to put the details of that horrible day behind her, she finds herself facing signs that something might not be right. Despite the man who stalks her, be he real or an apparition, she stumbles upon a plane of existence outside of that which she knows. While shopping for clothes, she becomes acutely aware of a sudden, icy silence. As she tries to seek help, her pleas are ignored; the people around her overlook her, ignore her, as if she doesn’t exist. It’s as if she isn’t even alive.
See also: Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956); Ghost (Swayze represent!); Office Space
Saturday, October 03, 2009
2009 SGM Month of Halloween Horror Movie for October 2
"Them!" (1954)
Phobia: Myrmecophobia (Fear of ants)
Quote: “They don't want the classic horror films anymore. Today it's all giant bugs.” – Bela Lugosi (Martin Landau) of “Ed Wood,” criticizing the climate of change in horror movies.
Synopsis: Man has split the atom and ushered in a new era. But how could he know he would also create Them?
Them! is a landmark movie about giant radiation-mutated ants that gets better with age and boasts remarkable, Academy Award®-nominated special effects. Starring James Whitmore, James Arness and Edmund Gwenn, Them! begins in New Mexico with a child wandering in shock, a ransacked general store - and a battered corpse full of enough formic acid to kill 20 men. It ends with an epic struggle in the 700 miles of storm drains under Los Angeles, where the insect hordes are beaten. But they're not conquered, because they spawned a generation of films about radioactive creatures. Some approximate the terror but few have equaled the artistry of Them!
Fear creeps in at 00:28:05: While searching the surrounding desert area for signs of the destructive force that has enslaved the populace in fear, Dr. Pat Medford ... the girl ... wanders off by herself, little knowing that behind her, a gigantic ant pursues her.
See also: Empire of the Ants; Antz; Phase IV
Thursday, October 01, 2009
First my Saturn gets destroyed, and now they ALL get destroyed!
"Saturn's future has been in doubt since GM said earlier this year it planned to phase out the brand by 2011. GM was shrinking to four brands as part of a deep restructuring. Just five days after GM filed for bankruptcy, Penske emerged as a possible buyer for Saturn. Wednesday, Penske backed out, unable to find another company to supply vehicles after GM stops making Saturns in two years." [more]
2009 SGM Month of Halloween Horror Movie for October 1
"Grizzly" (1976)
Phobia: Agrizoophobia (Fear of wild animals)
Quote: "There’s something I’m not doing ... I’m not cut out for this. What am I doing? Giving lectures around the campfire, showing slides, taking long rides in the woods and just looking at animals ... There’s a killer bear out there and I’m just sitting here crushing ice cubes in my mouth." – Kelly (Christopher George) talks up the glamorous life of a park ranger to Allison (Joan McCall), on his quest to sample her local shrubbery.
Synopsis: When an eighteen-foot, two-thousand-pound grizzly bear starts mauling campers and hikers at a state park, a park ranger springs into action. But the job is too big to tackle alone, so he enlists the aid of a naturalist and a helicopter pilot to take this freak of nature down. Meanwhile, the giant grizzly, not content with picnic baskets, continues to kill indiscriminately, leaving pools of blood and piles of body parts in his wake. Can the ranger and his cronies end the grizzly's reign of terror without restoring to excessively extreme measures? Absolutely not!
This post-Jaws, nature-runs-rampant thriller promises grisly grizzly bear mayhem and delivers! Helmed by director William Girdler, Grizzly was a box office hit and the top-grossing independent film of 1976.
Fear creeps in at 00:55:24: Up to this point, you only get glimpses of the animal attacker, but plenty of lingering shots of the deceased; mauled, mutilated bodies that used to be campers. Here, at almost an hour in, eighteen feet and one ton of straight ghetto grizzly bear shows up in all his furry fury. Not only that, but he pushes over a watch station that has been set up to keep an eye out for said grizzly. How a tanker truck of grizzly managed to sneak up on this watch tower is beyond me, but he sure enough does it. Perhaps he’s a ninja grizzly?
See also: Black Sheep (2007); Bats; any of these fantastic “Maneater Series” films coming out recently, like Blood Monkey, Grizzly Rage, or Maneater
SGM Month of Halloween 2009: Worst Fears
Yep, Halloween is back, baby! It’s time again for our annual, oft-maligned tribute to the month that spawns images of creatures and ghouls; of blasphemy and terror; and of course, fear.
This year, it’s a new direction we try, in our quest to keep things fresh on the S to the G-isM. As I sat down to compile this year’s list of horror film candidates, the films that I would be subjecting myself to during the Month of Halloween marathon that I so gladly embrace & document as I go, I started thinking about the basic concepts of fear. Fear, arguably, has its most basic origins in the dark; the shadows and the unknown that they could be hiding. In fact, horror writers point to the strength of the early days of horror cinema, the way that the black and white film would bleed into the dark, shadowy confines of the theater, making patrons feel as if monsters could be lurking right beside them.
Fears, left unchecked, become phobias. Little childhood traumas – a snake racing over one’s foot, or a spider creeping ever closer to the face of a sleeping, defenseless child, or a cascade of bats flying into the face of a hiker unlucky enough to disturb their sleeping grounds – later manifest into full-blown panic attacks when even the simplest of comments are made about the subject of the fear in the presence of the scared. My grandmother, who dealt with a phobia of snakes, would balk and shy away from any discussion of tall grass in the back yard, for the grass could house snakes that had to be somewhat related to one that tormented her at one significant episode in her life.
Ah, phobias. Beautiful in their variety and multitude. Jonathan Crane, the fictional character of Batman comics, established his affinity for invoking fear in the populace, under the guise of the Scarecrow. He knew the score. Control a person’s fear, you control the person. Usually, the treatment for phobias is accomplished by a systematic desensitization of the phobic response to the stimulus. Show an ailurophobic person, say, a picture of a cat, and get them to rate their anxiety response. Follow this up with a story of a cat, and get the client to rate their anxiety response. Eventually, you put the person in the same room with a cat at, say, ten yards away, then five yards, then ten feet; at each step, the person has total control to stop the exposure exercise, as the anxiety rises to a level too intense to manage. Ultimately, though, the goal is to get the client as close to the cat – the fear stimulus – with as little anxiety as possible.
But we don’t care about treatment right now, do we? Halloween is, nor has it ever been, about preventing fear, but rather promoting it, exposing it ... hell, reveling in it. With each movie that made the list this year, I reviewed an online resource, the Phobia List, and categorized each film under a phobia that could be triggered, exacerbated by scenes from the movie. Along the way, I also throw in a few recommendations for further watching, just some ideas to further expand on the exposure to the phobia in question. As in times past, there are some true film gems, some stank ass clunkers, and classics beyond reproach. No matter the pedigree of the film, however, they all share one thing in common: Something in each one is almost guaranteed to scare the shit out of someone.
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