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2008-11-18T18:15:00.000-08:00

I am just testing the resuscitation of my old website's content.

Visitor Q (2001)

2008-11-18T18:10:00.002-08:00

Visitor Q Reviewed from Rapid Eye Movies DVD Region 2 PAL 2001 84 min. Rating 18+

All right kiddies, you got your stuff? All packed and ready to go? Good. Because this week, your good buddy Hackzilla is taking you on a trip to the Far East. All the way to the wonderful country of Japan. If you haven't seen a Japanese genre film yet, then I suggest you start. And what better place than right here with your old friend Hackzilla? The movie is Visitor Q, and I guarantee you've never seen anything like it. "Have you ever done it with your dad?" Uh.... yeah.... uh, well you see, those are the first words that pop up on your screen in English. We then proceed to see a sex scene between a prostitute and her client, the whole time the guy keeps saying it isn't right, as if he's wrestling with some moral dilemma here. Well, he should be, as we later find out the prostitute in question is really his daughter. Still with me? Good. That's only the tip of the proverbial iceberg in this wonderfully sick film. As the movie continues, we are introduced to the rest of this lovely family. There's the son who beats his mom after she forgets to take the commercials out of a video she recorded for him, along with the school kids who shoot fireworks into his house to torment him. Then there's the mom who, after getting beaten by her son shoots up heroin, and well, I don't wanna give it all away, but you get the idea. And you've already met the father and daughter. Well, on dad's way home, a mysterious man at the bus station hits him over the head with a rock. After he comes to, he's hit over the head AGAIN and well, then the two are seen eating dinner in the father's home. Let the party begin! From there, the movie just goes into a downward spiral of perversion and depravity is we watch this family proceed to give new meaning to the word "dysfunctional." There's more heroin, more prostitution, rape, necrophilia.... oh, did I mention the lactating breasts? I didn't huh? Well, there's those too. All the while, the mysterious visitor is in tow, and seems to be setting the family free in some ways, or maybe he's just screwing them up even more. This was my second venture into the films of Japanese director Takashi Miike. My first was Audition which I also highly recommend (and you should pick it up from Oh, the Horror! You cheap bastards!!). Anyways, so far, I'm likin' what I'm seeing from Miike, and look forward to his future projects. So once again you ask,"Hackzilla, is the movie any good?" You bet your ass it is. See, the movie is sick, but all the while, you know it's not just sick to be sick. There's a point to all this. We're never told exactly what it is, but we're free to come to our own conclusions about it. The DVD is an import, and for those of you out there who haven't experienced the joys of having a multi-region player, you're out of luck. The disc looks good though with a 2-channel Dolby Digital audio track. Subtitles are good and easy to read. The extras are a written interview with Miike that is entirely in Dutch (I think), so it may as well not be there. Then there are the trailers for Visitor Q, Audition, and Wild Zero, a filmography and biography. So in conclusion, it's not really a horror film, but it's not You've got Mail either. There're no zombies or gut munching, but there's plenty of depravity here to make even the most hardened filmgoer blush. See this somehow.

Frailty (2002)

2008-11-18T18:10:00.001-08:00

Frailty Reviewed at some Hack theater 2002 99 min. Rating R

OK boys and ghouls, welcome to the first of (hopefully) many reviews of your favorite, or not so favorite flicks by me...Hackzilla. "So Hackzilla," you say. "What fine piece of cinema have you viddied this week?" Actor Bill Paxton makes his directorial debut with a little southern-fried piece of celluloid called Frailty. Frailty is the story of two young boys and their father (played by Paxton) living out in the countryside. Paxton is visited by an angel one night who tells him that the end of the world is near and that God wants him to help in the final battle between good and evil. How, you ask? By slaying demons of course; demons who look just like humans. Now I know what you're thinking: "he must be nuts Hackzilla." Well, our storyteller is right there with us. See, the whole thing is being told as a flashback by Matthew Mcconawhatever whom you'll remember from that fine piece of entertainment that is Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Next Generation. Anywho, he's playing a grown up Fenton who was the older of the two young boys in our story. When Paxton relays this tripe to his two kids, Fenton thinks he's nuts, but his brother is convinced that his dad is one of God's soldiers. Time goes by, nothing happens, and Fenton writes it off as just a spell his dad must've had over a little too much Schlitz or something. Until one day when dad comes home with an axe, a lead pipe, and a pair of gloves. He says these are his demon slaying weapons given to him by God. Well Fenton is nervous, and he gets even more nervous when his pappy brings home a list of names saying they were given to him by the angel. Now we're talking murder here folks. Mayhem ensues, and the killer becomes known as the "God's Hand killer." The whole time, we're with Fenton in the police station as he's telling the story of who the killer is to an FBI agent.Now I know what you wanna hear...is it any good? Well, I'd give it a good, healthy...meh. Not bad, but not all that great either. It's nothing in particular, just one of those flicks that's OK. As I said before, this is Paxton's directorial debut, and it's pretty impressive. He serves up a healthy dose of creepy atmosphere, not relying on too many "fun house" style shocks. Gorehounds will be disappointed though as most of the violence takes place offscreen. The story is pretty original, and the acting is damn good too. It's good to see a modern day horror flick taking itself seriously. But as Flavor Flav said: don't believe the hype. Little quotes by Sam Raimi, and James Cameron stating this is the best horror flick since The Shining are founded in friendship. If you'll remember, Raimi worked with Paxton on A Simple Plan and Cameron worked with him on Aliens. So it seems that this is just them using their big names to get people to go see their buddy's movie. But like I said before, it ain't bad.

The Flesh Trilogy (1967)

2008-11-18T18:03:00.001-08:00

	Title: Touch of Her Flesh/Curse of Her Flesh/Kiss of Her Flesh	Format: DVD
	Region: 1/NTSC	Studio: Something Weird
	Length: 75 min/78 min/69 min	Year: 1967/1968/1968 / DVD 2003

The movie: (reviewed by Hackzilla)

“This little pussy is really a primordial carnivorous beast!” This is only one of many oh-so-quotable lines spoken by Richard Jennings (no, not that news anchor) in Michael Findlay’s The Curse of her Flesh. But I’m getting ahead of myself, for Curse is the second in a series of Findlay films lovingly referred to as “The Flesh Trilogy.” And lucky you, Something Weird Video have put them all on one DVD. Now you too can relive sleaze-era New York over and over again right in your own living room.

But let’s begin at the beginning. The Touch of Her Flesh is the first of the three. We are introduced to Richard Jennings (Findlay) and his wife Claudia (or the way he says it “Clawwwdia”). As Richard is just out the door to go on a business trip, Claudia brings over a man, and things start to heat up in the bedroom. Too bad for Claudia, Richard forgot some papers, and goes back home only to catch his lovely wife in the arms of another man. This makes Richard snap, and next thing you know, he’s got an eye patch, a wheelchair, and a helluva lot of misogyny. Now he’s made it his life’s goal to dispatch women; particularly, women of a more “sexual” nature. We’re talking go-go girls, strippers, hookers…the usual. And there are plenty of creative ways that Jennings goes about this from using a blow dart, to a buzz saw. Jennings doesn’t rest until his vengeance is satisfied. Hell, even a harpoon doesn’t stop the man. His story continues…

IN… The Curse of Her Flesh. This is the second entry in Findlay’s trilogy of trash. Jennings is back (sans wheelchair), and this time, he’s after Steve…that’s the guy that he caught with Claudia back in Touch. Before he kills Steve though, he just wants to fuck up everything in his life. In a particularly weird sequence, we see a girl masturbating with a squash in a film within the film called Squash Crazy. See, that’s how awesome this movie is. Of course there are killings which I’ve skipped over…There’s murder by poisonous cat’s claw, machete, and poisonous g-string to boot. All of this is inter-cut with go-go dancers and strippers doing their thing. There’s even a scene of a girl getting whipped on stage. But in the end Jennings catches up with Steve and a seat gripping fight on the back of a truck ensues. Is this the end of Jennings? Not according to the title card that tells us that Kiss of Her Flesh will be coming soon to this theater.

Curse upped the weirdness ante a notch from Touch, but it’s Kiss of Her Flesh that really ramps it up. In the first scene Jennings is back and he kidnaps a girl off of a wintry beach by knocking her out with a tire iron. Once back at his place, he tortures her with a lobster claw before finally electrocuting her to death by hooking up a battery to her earrings. No, really. There’s more mayhem as Jennings goes after women using various items including a blowtorch. And as usual, there’s plenty of nubile flesh on display. Is this the last we’ll see of Jennings? Well, probably because it’s the end of the series.

Let me just say right off the bat, these are not “good” movies. They are poorly acted and they drag quite a bit despite their short running times. But for a lot of us, that’s the appeal of them. Even more so than that, what makes me love these films so much is how they’re like a time capsule of an era gone by. This is a pure “roughie” from the “grindhouse” era, and I love that. This is what used to push the envelope people. And even in addition to that, I think these films (especially Curse) are actually shot pretty well. Findlay isn’t a master, but there are some great shots during the bar scene in Curse. And last but not least, the movies are just really…well…something weird.

The Video:

For movies this old, the video looks fantastic. The films are all black and white, and they look great. Strong contrasting blacks throughout. Bravo Something Weird Video.

The Audio:

Again, great for a movie this old. Clear and understandable; no real problems.

The Extras:

Well…there aren’t really any “extras” per se, but there are three full length films with great quality on ONE disc for a pretty reasonable price. I mean, do you really need any more extras?

The Verdict:

I loved watching these films. They’re not perfect, but they’re definitely unique and quirky. Check ‘em out if you like the sleaze.

The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (2003)

2008-11-18T18:02:00.001-08:00

	Title: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre	Format: DVD
	Region: 1/NTSC	Studio: New Line
	Length: 98 minutes	Year: 2003 / DVD 2003

The movie: (reviewed by Hackzilla)

Now how does one go about re-making one of the best (if not the best) horror movies of all time? Well, I can’t answer that question. Maybe it doesn’t have an answer. Maybe it’s not supposed to have an answer. Or maybe you should ask the guy who directed the Dawn of the Dead remake. He seemed to be on to something. Anyways, this movie has it all wrong right from the beginning.

The basic story is this: A group of teens circa 1974 are on their way to go see Lynyrd Skynyrd in concert (see, they like Skynyrd because it’s the 70’s and they’re in Texas, get it?). On the way, they pick up a hitchhiker and along with that some really, really bad luck. Now minus the Skynyrd, this isn’t all that different in its basic premise than the original. But you know, maybe that’s the problem. When you think of good remakes, you think of Carpenter’s The Thing or Cronenberg’s The Fly. These movies had their roots, but were completely different animals (no pun intended) than their earlier counterparts. I think when a remake tries to take too many lines, shots or scenes from its predecessor, it makes the viewer feel that the filmmaker’s think they can do better than the original. In this case that’s a HUGE mistake. Does this yahoo really think his version of the famous “hammer scene” is better than the original? What about the meat hook scene? Ugghhh. It just reeks of trying to best the original every chance it gets. Every time it tries though, it falls harder and harder on its face.

Don’t even get me started on all the clichés that are rampant throughout. This definitely follows every Hollywood standard to a T. One thing I can’t stand is when a character who’s been traumatized comes into a room or scenario and says something like: “They’re gonna get you all.” Then character #2 says something like “Who’s gonna get us all?” Then character #1 says again “They’re gonna get you all.” Now that’s not a direct quote, but there’s a similar scene in this (and plenty of other horror movies) and it just frosts my ass. Then there are the rednecks. Seriously, we all know woods and unfamiliar territory are scary, but do you have to line tool sheds with broken doll parts to get your point across? We get it. They’re scary rednecks. You’re really pushin’ the envelope there. See, I missed that in Wrong Turn, Deliverance and some other movie from 1974 called The Texas Chainsaw Massacre.

On a final note, Jessica “7th Heaven” Beale runs around with a wet tank top for the last 30 minutes or so. One would think that that would give this movie at least some appeal. But unfortunately it just comes off as a last grasp at putting something in this movie that wouldn’t make you want to go back to the box office to demand your money back and (producer and uber-hack) Michael Bay’s home address. It’s just so obvious it’s annoying.

The Video:

Do you really care? Clean and crisp. How I wish the dvd of the original would look.

The Audio:

No seriously, do you care? DTS and all that crap.

The Extras:

An interesting documentary about Ed Gein. Other than that it’s all self-indulgent crap like 4 (overkill) commentaries and production notes.

The Verdict:

This is TCM for the WB generation. I think saying it sucked would be an understatement.

The Devil's Backbone (2001)

2008-11-18T18:00:00.001-08:00

	Title: The Devil's Backbone	Format: DVD
	Region: 1/NTSC	Studio: Columbia/Tristar
	Length: 108 minutes	Year: 2001 / DVD 2002

The movie: (reviewed by Sef)

Wow, I clearly remember the day this film was released in theaters. I made sure to be at the first showing of the day and I was not disappointed. I really didn't know what to expect, whether it would be a straight ahead ghost horror story or something with a little more meat on its bones. The film is set in Spain during a civil war at an orphanage run by a one-legged headmistress and doctor sympathetic to left-wing ideals. They take in orphans from the families of the left-wing Republicans and are able to make a living through the selling of rum from the well in the basement in one of the buildings of the orphanage. The main character of the film, Carlos, has been abandoned by his tutor to the orphanage. The usual, new kid has to be accepted and dela with bullies come into play at this point in the story but where it changes is with his encounter with the ghost of yound boy who is adamant to tell him something. I don't really want to go too deep and give away anymore than I already have, but there is some gold involved, an evil caretaker and an un-exploded bomb that lies in the middle of the courtyard as well as the ghost's claims that "Many of you will die."

The Video:

Everything looks a-ok to me. Let me mention that Guillermo Del Toro's idea was that the day shots look like a Sergio Leone film and that the night shots looks like a Mario Bava film. Mission accomplished.

The Audio:

Sounds great, Looks great. You get the picture, no pun intended.

The Extras:

Great making of featurette, but honestly the bees knees here is the commentary track by Guillermo Del Toro and Guillermo Navarro. It was informative, funny at times and went into explaining in detail some of the things that you may have been wondering, like why it was called The Devil's Backbone.

The Verdict:

Guillermo Del Toro's best film to date, don't miss out on this one and make sure you listen to the commentary

Torrente (1998)

2008-11-18T17:58:00.000-08:00

	Title: Torrente : el brazo tonto de la Ley.	Format: DVD
	Region: 0/PAL	Studio: Manga
	Length: 93 minutes	Year: 1998 / DVD 2001

The movie: (reviewed by Sef)

Wow, I can not say enough great things about the comic genius of Santiago Segura(he wrote, directed and starred in this film as well as Day Of The Beast, Muertos De Risa, & also has a cameo in Blade 2). This guy just makes me laugh, I don't know what is about him. Well whatever it is, it made this film #1 in box office take in Spain's history. This is truely a film classic although I do not think it is for everyone 's tastes. A few of my friends found this hilarious while others did not understand what I thought was so funny about it. Also, I think some of the jokes lose something in the translation which can hurt those that do not understand Catellano (Spanish) . The film is about Jose Luis Torrente, a true dirtbag. He is a former cop who has delusions of grandeur and thinks that solving a big case will get him back on the police squad but the problem with him is that he is racist, alcoholic, sexist, lazy, rude, you name it, that's what he is. The film has an incredible supporting cast that makes it a stand out in Spanish cinema. By the way, if you're politically correct, do not watch this film.

-----------SPOILERS AHEAD---------

I'm laughing just thinking about how good this film was. I had heard things here and there about it but I really couldn't believe what a dirtbag this character is. When he walks out of that convenience store after stealing 2 bottles of liquor while a hold-up is going on and the whole time having you believe that might attempt to stop it, that's probably my favorite scene. Or when Tony Leblanc as father has had enough of the guys holding him up in his own house and he begins to insult them. I love that no one is safe in this film, and you should too.

The Video:

The picture was dark and grainy, but honestly, I didn't care too much, i was just happy to finally see it.

The Audio:

OK, audio, nothing spectacular.

The Extras:

Great disc with 72 minutes of extras Contains the TV Spots & Trialer for the film plus trailers for a few other Spanish films. A Making Of, Gallery and plenty of other things to keep you occupied. Pretty awesome is you ask me.

The Verdict:

You must own this film, a CLASSIC in every sense of the word.

I Stand Alone (1998)

2008-11-18T17:57:00.000-08:00

	Title: I STAND ALONE	Format: DVD
	Region: 1/NTSC	Studio: Strand Releasing
	Length: 93 minutes	Year: 1998 / DVD 2001

The movie: (reviewed by Hackzilla)

Jesus, Mary, and Joseph! This movie was nuts! But would you expect any less from a Hackzilla review? Of course not, and that’s why this review for the highly offensive and controversial I Stand Alone (AKA Seul contre tous which is French for….I guess “I Stand Alone”) is a real treat. Anyways, this movie is about as fucked up as it gets...so what’re you waiting for? READ ON---------

The film just bombards you from the get go. You start off by getting up to speed with the life of a certain butcher who has been recently released from prison. Oh yeah, he went to prison in the first place for stabbing a guy in the face, because he thought the guy raped his daughter. Oh yeah, and he’s raising the daughter by himself, because his wife left him. And, oh yeah, one more thing, the daughter is in a mental hospital now due to the trauma of seeing a guy get stabbed in the face. So anyways, we get a peek into this guy’s head, as he is our star/narrator for the film. Let me say, it’s a pretty vile, mean, creepy peek at that. Much like Hackzilla, this guy hates EVERYONE. I mean, the guy’s had a shitty life which we’re tuned into during the recap, but it’s not until we meet his pregnant girlfriend, that we see how miserable his existence really is. They are living with her mom, and he’s waiting on her to give him the money to open up a new butcher shop. She won’t though, and he’s forced to work at a local deli, where he soon gets fired from for not smiling. So how does one deal with such a situation? Well let’s just say, he gets rid of his problems in a not so PC way. When he’s back on his own, he ends up moving to Paris. After getting into a scuffle at a local bar, he finally decides that the right thing to do would just be to start killing people.

Of course, I’m oversimplifying his motives, but much more would be spoiling this spectacular film. If you’re a fan of transgressive cinema (and hey, who isn’t?) you’ll definitely need to pick this one up. You won’t find this one at Hackbuster video, but check the mom and pop’s around your area. Warning though; if you’re not desensitized yet, you may wanna wait to see this one. It’s completely nihilistic and hopeless. But hey, isn’t that how all movies should be?

The Video:

Not too shabby. Strand Releasing gives us a non-anamorphic widescreen transfer. It's pretty free of scratches and blemishes, but the color looks a little...muted or something. Although director Gaspar Noe uses a pretty nausea inducing color palette to begin with, so it may be the result of that as well.

The Audio:

Nothing to write home about in this department. Not bad, but don't expect Raiders of the Lost Ark or something. It's Dolby Digital Stereo. Add French language to that with non-removable English subtitles.

The Extras:

What extras? Oh, right, those trailers for other Strand Releases, none of which is for I Stand Alone. (Yawn)

The Verdict:

Excellent film, but a sub-par DVD. There are some foreign releases of this which are much better, but may not have english subs. Seek it out either way. The film alone is worth the price.

Guinea Pig (1985)

2008-11-18T17:56:00.001-08:00

	Title: Guinea Pig: Flower of Flesh and Blood/ Making of Guinea Pig	Format: DVD
	Region: 0/NTSC	Studio: Unnearthed Films
	Length: 89 minutes	Year: 1985 / 1986 / DVD 2002

The movie: (reviewed by Hackzilla)

Flower of Flesh and Blood is the second entry into the Guinea Pig series. "But wait Hackzilla, we haven't even seen the first one yet!!!!" Not to worry my little piglets, this isn't a series that has an ongoing storyline. What it does have is an ongoing theme: Displaying the sickest shit ever put to film and GP2 sure delivers the goods in the gore department. The film only runs about 40 minutes, and like I said, the series doesn't really have a storyline so don't expect much in that department. It's more of an exercise in endurance. How much can you take? To sum up the plot (or lack thereof), a woman is stalked, kidnapped, and taken to a basement where she is drugged and butchered. The whole time, the guy is wearing a samurai outfit, and spouting out some dialog about how her blood will be like a blooming flower. Yup, that's it. See what I mean? No real plot, BUT don't confuse that with necessarily being a bad thing. Like I said, it's an exercise in endurance. This movie is not for the squeamish. If you're one of those hacks who thinks Soul Survivors was a worthy genre entry, then go back to Blockbuster and let me know how Domestic Disturbance turns out. Now, for the true horror fans, if you think you've seen it all, then seek this out. It's one of those movies that your friends will think you're crazy for owning. The dismemberment is shown in detail along with all the great sounds that accompany it. You know, saws cutting through bones and chisels hammering away at shoulder blades. The most disturbing thing about this movie though is the fact that it looks like a snuff film. The flick starts with a woman being unknowingly video taped in the subway, and even though the gore is EXTREME, there's something about those few opening shots of the woman being followed that really stuck in this reviewer's noggin. It just makes it seem all the more real. And that’s just the start of this DVD….read on

In addition to viewing the infamous Flower of Flesh and Blood Unearthed Films has made this another double feature (like the last 2 DVDs which you should all own by now). This time, it’s the Making of Guinea Pig feature. It’s basically what it sounds like. It documents the making of the first 3 GP films Devil’s Experiment, Flower of Flesh and Blood, and He Never Dies. They show how they did the infamous needle in the eye, all the crazy dismemberings in Flower and just about everything from He Never Dies. While I wish more time would’ve been spent on Devil’s Experiment, it was mostly spent on He Never Dies. But hey, that’s nitpicking. This is a great feature, especially to accompany this episode that is so famous for it’s effects work. It runs about 45 minutes.

The Video:

The video is just as good as the previous releases. The subtitles are easier to read this time around, and the previous problem with subtitles over subtitles (like during the opening scroll) has been dealt with. This was originally shot on video, so it kind of has the same look as a soap opera or porno, but it’s pretty much blemish free, and crystal clear. The blood never looked so red.

The Audio:

It’s in mono, and hey, it’s pseudo snuff. No hack explosions or anything of the sort. It’s nice and clear though, so you’ll be able to hear that bone chisel better than ever.

The Extras:

For anyone who whined that the previous DVDs had no extras, now is the time to shut the fuck up. This disc has some nice extras. Besides the trailers from the Mermaid/He Never Dies DVD, there’s a new Flower trailer that makes it look pretty creepy. Then there are the history pages again which are nice for those who might’ve missed ‘em. Then there’s not 1, but 2 cool interviews with director Hideshi Hino. The first is one conducted by Unearthed Films, the other is an interview he did previously for Dark Side Magazine. Also included is the original Manga Akai Hana, which Flower was based on. Now, since Paramount sees interactive menus as an extra, I figure I”ll mention the menus in this section. These are a HUGE step up from the last two releases. The menus are absolutely gorgeous. AND they’re better than any menu I’ve ever seen on a Paramount DVD. And last, but not least there are some easter eggs on this release. One of them is a videotape version of Flower. This is the movie without the credits, subs or dialogue, and it looks like it was recorded from a 10th generation VHS. It’s the way most of us first saw it, and really shows how realistic this films probably looked to some unsuspecting viewers. The next are two hidden trailers for some movies which look extremely fucked up even compared to the Guinea Pig films. One is for The Red Room and the other is Mu Zan E. Have fun finding them kids. It should also be known that Unearthed released two covers for the DVD. One is the illustrated one pictured above. The other is the "gore cover" which can only be purchased from Unearthed Films theselves or some other specialty retailers. Look for this one to be a collector's item.

The Verdict:

So should you spend the beans for this DVD? Well, you have been warned. You may get sick, your friends may leave you, and you may never be the same again. OR, if you're totally jaded like the fine people at Filmjunk, the answer is a no-brainer: FUCK YEAH!!! Thank you Unearthed Films. To find out more about this, the other GP entries, and the whole history behind the series, head to www.guineapigfilms.com.

Guinea Pig (1988)

2008-11-18T17:54:00.000-08:00

	Title: Guinea Pig: Devil's Experiment/ Android of Notre Dame	Format: DVD
	Region: 0/NTSC	Studio: Unnearthed Films
	Length: 100 minutes	Year: 198X / 1988 / DVD 2002

The movie: (reviewed by Hackzilla)

Alright, alright, everyone just calm down. Hackzilla is back just like he promised with the first of FOUR (count 'em, FOUR) Guinea Pig DVDs from Unearthed Films. This is the first ever time that the GP films have been officially released in North America, and Unearthed Films gives them to us in all their gut-churning glory. STILL haven't seen the GP films???? Get your keister to www.guineapigfilms.com (and of course, read the rest of this review) to see what you're missing.

Devil's Experiment is the first in the Guinea Pig series. You ready for this? This film is, in a word: BRUTAL. The film begins with a message saying that in 1985, the producer received a videotape of 3 men conducting an "experiment" on the thresholds of pain. There are no credits aside from the disclaimer, and a title card that simply reads "Guinea Pig." We start off with some random camera angles from a moving vehicle, cut between shots of a woman in a hanging net. Then we get to the warehouse. A title card flashes with a little icon in the corner that says, "Hit." As we get to a shot of a woman sitting in a chair, we proceed to see three men taking turns punching and slapping this woman in the face. For those of you keeping score, there's a counter in the lower left hand corner of how many hits have actually been taken. The film continues in this manner. After the "hit" segment ends, we go to the "kick" segment. Can you all guess what happens here? That's right! The 3 guys proceed to kick the woman and verbally degrade her. The film continues like this with other torture highlights like "nail" (where they rip off a fingernail), "burn" (where they throw boiling oil on her), and "guts" (where they throw animal guts at her while they laugh). They grand finale though is what graces this disc's cover. The ol' needle through the eye. And let me say too, the effects here are nothing short of phenomenal. This looks VERY real.

Android of Notre Dame is where the series takes a weird ass turn. This one actually has credits this time around. Although the title card says "Guinea Pig 2", this film is actually a later entry. You'll hear some people say it's the 3rd; some say it's the 6th. Hey, if you're DYING to know, head over to the web site. Well, this one has a story. A dwarf scientist has a sister who has a really bad heart condition, and he is trying to find a cure for her. After animals prove to be no help, the scientist gets a call from an unknown person saying that he'll send over a dead body for him to use. He gets the body and proceeds to run some gory experiments on it. After that fails, the unknown person calls back again, this time he's trying to blackmail the ol' dwarf. Why? I honestly don't know. Something about some records or something. Well, the little guy has some tricks up his sleeves, and this is where the movie's gore factor kicks in. Although the film IS gory (as are ALL the GP films), the effects are not up to the caliber of those seen in Devil's Experiment. Plus the story line is nothing spectacular

The Video:

So how is the DVD? Pretty damn good is the phrase I believe I'm looking for. You won't find a better-looking version of this anywhere. I know there was a German boxed set out there at some point, but this is more than good enough. All the GP movies were shot on video, so they have that kind-of "daytime soap opera" look to them. Free of blemishes though, and clear as a bell.

The Audio:

Stereo sound. It's clear. What more do you want?

The Extras:

Interactive menus. That's about as much as you get with this disc. But hey, these films have been sought after by many a horror fan, and the fact that they're on DVD (NTSC, Region 0 no less) is in itself a gift. Besides, the next release is going to have some never before seen trailers and animated menus. The menus for this disc are fine, but not animated, and the chapter selections seem to be in no particular order at first glance. You really don't know where in the films they'll take you. The chapter names though are pretty clever. My two faves are "Legzactly" and "Fucking Ouch!" Classic.

The Verdict:

So in conclusion, pick this thing up. Sure, Android is pretty hokey, but it's worth having in any horror collection. These films finally found their way home, and I for one welcome them with open arms.

Cannibal Ferox (1981)

2008-11-18T17:52:00.000-08:00

	Title: CANNIBAL FEROX	Format: DVD
	Region: 1/NTSC	Studio: Grindhouse / Image
	Length: 93 minutes	Year: 1981 / DVD 2000

The movie: (reviewed by Hackzilla)

Director Umberto Lenzi kicked off the Italian cannibal subgenre in 1973 with the jungle adventure Man From Deep River. It wasn't until 1979 though when Ruggero Deodato's Cannibal Holocaust hit the scene that the cannibal film hit its peak. But Lenzi decided to try again anyways, and a year later released Cannibal Ferox (AKA Make Them Die Slowly). The story is very similar to that of Holocaust, but then again, all the cannibal movies have very similar stories. If you haven't seen a cannibal movie before, they basically involve a group of people going into the jungle to find someone or something, and run into some cannibals. The cannibals are then attacked by the westerners, and retaliate with horrific results. Cannibal Ferox is no different.

This time around, a couple of guys run from New York because they owe money to some drug dealers. Meanwhile, a girl who is getting her PHD is going to the jungle to prove for her thesis that cannibalism doesn't really exist. The schoolgirl and her crew run into the drug dealers in the jungle, find out that they've gotten themselves into some serious shit with the cannibals, chaos ensues, and the gut-munching begins. Now, at this point, I think I should explain some rules of the cannibal subgenre. 1. Some guy usually gets his dick cut off, 2. At least 1 animal really dies, and 3. The violence is pretty graphic. These films are a far cry away from Friday the 13th. They're nihilistic, sadistic, cruel fucking movies. So, that said...lets move on. All the previous rules are followed to a T in this movie. A snake, turtle, and mongoose all die in horrific detail. 2 guys get their schlongs cut off, and in the rest of the violence department, there's entrail eating, brain eating, penis eating, and hanging by hooks through the breasts. So, if you want blood, you've got it.

Now as said before, Lenzi's movie came out right on the heels of Deodato's infamous Cannibal Holocaust, and it really shows. Ferox feels like almost the exact same movie. Not to say that it's that bad, but Deodato's film definitely holds more weight than Lenzi's. The whole movie just feels like it's going for the gross-out factor. In one scene a crocodile is shown being killed and eaten for no apparent reason, and the overall story is pretty flimsy. But, the film does move at a pretty fast pace, and the gore scenes (especially the breast hanging) are done pretty well. The animal violence, while standard in the cannibal subgenre is completely reprehensible. I think it's probably some kind of a nod to the mondo films, which were popularized by Italy at the time. Anyways, its still pretty shitty.

The Video:

Now, the DVD is pretty impressive though. For a movie such as this, it's really been given the treatment. The print has been really cleaned up, and looks spectacular. It's also widescreen and uncensored, so you'll be sure to see all the gory details.

The Audio:

Nothing to write home about in this department. Not bad, but don't expect London After Midnight or something. It's Dolby Digital Stereo.

The Extras:

A slew of trailers and promo posters is also included, along with the standard actor/director biographies/filmographies. There are some liner notes included written by Bill Landis from Sleazoid Express. These are interesting, because he talks about Times Square, and this movie's first showing, and subsequent reputation. Then last but not least is a commentary by director Lenzi, and actor John Morghen. The two were obviously separated when viewing the film, because they have very different opinions based on the film. Normally this would be off-putting, but it works very well here because of the two very contrasting views of the two. Morghen is pretty embarrassed by the flick, and Lenzi really loves it, at one point exclaiming "I am a genius!" It's pretty funny, and well worth listening to.

The Verdict:

So, while it's not the best of the cannibal movies, it's also not the worst (especially for being a Lenzi movie). I think that title goes to the director's other cannibal outing Eaten Alive! It's great as a little slice of trash from the past, and the DVD is pretty amazing. Worth having for it's infamy at the very least.

Aenigma (1987)

2008-11-18T17:51:00.001-08:00

	Title: AENIGMA	Format: DVD
	Region: 1/NTSC	Studio: Image
	Length: 85 minutes	Year: 1987 / DVD 2001

The movie: (reviewed by Hackzilla)

AENIGMA is one of the many redheaded stepchildren of Lucio Fulci’s large library of films. This is not to say there aren’t many gems in his back-catalog, but for all the gems there is at least a handful of misfires.

This film (as many have said before) is Fulci’s answer to CARRIE. Our social misfit this time around is Cathy who is killed in a prank gone too far within the film’s first 10 minutes. When a new girl named Eva arrives at the St. Mary’s College where Cathy was a student, all heck begins to break loose. Despite the fact that Cathy is shown in a hospital room where all her monitors register that she’s dead, AND the doctor busts out those ER paddles to try and revive her (to no avail), AND we are shown a POV shot of her spirit leaving her body, she still somehow manages to half-assedly possess our newcomer Eva. Besides THAT, she also has enough energy (or is it angst?) in her comatose brain to bring statues and reflections to life, and even order around some killer snails. Sound silly? Well, it kind of is. I mean, I guess 100 or so snails crawling all over you is a little gross, but couldn’t one just stand up and shake them off?

Despite its faults, AENIGMA does have a couple of things going for it. The snail scene, while hokey is a little gross. Then there’s the scene in which one victim seems to be unable to escape her boyfriend’s beheaded corpse conjuring up memories of Fulci’s masterpiece THE BEYOND. The look of the film isn’t bad, and Cathy, although comatose and immobile throughout most of the movie does look pretty creepy once in awhile when she opens her eyes. It’s only in the last half hour or so of the movie that it starts to rev up, but then only slightly as the movie pretty much moves at a snail’s pace throughout (pun intended).

The Video:

Image’s DVD is widescreen 1:85:1 and non-anamorphic. The picture looks OK at best. There aren’t a lot of blemishes except for the beginning of the film, but it has a really soft look to it. Not the best around. Also, according to DVD Delirium Vol.2, the US version is shorn of a short flashback sequence that’s available in other DVD versions from the UK and Italy.

The Audio:

The sound is Dolby mono, but really doesn’t sound all that great. Most of the time, the voices sound pretty muffled. Don’t even get me started on the craptactular opening tune “Head Over Heels.” It’s about as bad as they come. As an added bonus, you can hear it again over the end credits. Just don’t listen to it too long, or it’ll be engrained in your skull for the following week.

The Extras:

No extras. Not even a main menu. Just a chapter selection…yay.

The Verdict:

I don’t know, I love Fulci, but this is not one of his better flicks. For completists only.

Beyond The Darkness (1979)

2008-11-18T17:49:00.000-08:00

	Title: Beyond the Darkness	Format: DVD
	Region: 1/NTSC	Studio: Shriek Show
	Length: 93 minutes	Year: 1979 / DVD 2002

The movie: (reviewed by Hackzilla)

Aaaahhhhh.....love stories. You know the ones. Boy meets girl, they fall in love, girl dies, boy digs up her corpse, embalms her, and keeps her all to himself. ...Wait, you AREN'T familiar with this kind of love story? Well my fiends, ol' Hackzilla has got a treat for you. It's a putrid little flick called "Beyond the Darkness" (AKA Buio Omega).

Even death can't keep Frank and his girlfriend (or wife; we are never told) Anna apart. We're introduced to the two lovebirds when Anna is asking Frank, on her deathbed no less, to give her one last good roll in the hay before she kicks the proverbial bucket. Frank doesn't think it's a good idea, but before he can even change his mind, Anna is out of commission. This doesn't stop Frankie though. He proceeds to go to her funeral, where he embalms her, and later makes off with her body in the back of his truck. He finally makes it home after unwillingly picking up a hitchhiker with a bad cockney accent. Luckily for him, the hitcher falls asleep allowing Frank to get down to business in preserving Anna's corpse. Well, right in the middle of all this, the hitcher wakes up, and tries to get away. This is where we see that not only is Frank a nutjob, but a sadistic fucker at that. But now Frankie boy has Anna all to himself. Seems he just forgot that she's a FRIKKIN' CORPSE!!! But since taxidermy is his hobby, he's probably fine with that. All the while, there's the subplot of the somewhat incestuous relationship between Frank and the housekeeper Iris. She's all he really has left, and there is a definite mother-son relationship going on, but at the same time there is a kinky sexual thing underneath it all.

Now how can you NOT love a movie that's got gore, weird incest-like relationships, corpse loving, and cannibalism? This movie rocks. Directed by the late Joe D'amato, it's no surprise this film was so filth-ridden. D'amato went on to direct more gory horror flicks like "Anthropophagus (AKA Grim Reaper)," as well as hardcore skin flicks (including the infamous "Emanuelle in America"). Did I not mention the T&A? It also stars Cinzia Monreale as Anna whom you'll remember as the blind girl Emily from Lucio Fulci's "The Beyond." It seems like it was a pretty easy gig since she plays a friggin' dead girl.

The Video:

The DVD released by Shriek Show is right on. The picture quality is great. Darks and lights seem perfect. They bring it to us in an anamorphic widescreen transfer, so all you lucky bastards with 16x9 TVs rejoice. There is another release by Japan Shock, which I've heard some fans prefer, but really, this is a fine release in terms of video.

The Audio:

The sound is OK; just don't expect it to boom like it does when all you hacks out there are watching your Michael Bay movies. Hey, but it doesn't really need the treatment in that department, and it does great for what it's got. It's Dolby Digital Mono. BUT Italian horror soundtrack gods Goblin kick out the jams on this one. The main theme is very memorable with a keyboard line mimicking a heartbeat. Lovely.

The Extras:

We got some trailers for "Solange", "House on the Edge of the Park" (although the trailer says it's "House of the Park on the Edge"), "Seven Blood Stained Orchids", and of course "Beyond the Darkness." Then there's an interview with Cinzia Monreale, and an Interview/Commentary with Art Director Donatella Donati (this is basically an interview over the gorier parts of the movie). We also get an 8-page booklet with some interesting bits about D'amato and Goblin, AND, last but not least...as an added bonus, you get a double-sided DVD cover. So if you think the one it comes in sucks, you can flip it over and try the other one. If you think that one sucks, well then I guess you're shit outta luck.

The Verdict:

So there you have it folks. Guts, butts, nuts, and sluts, this flick's got 'em all. If you're a fan of twisted cinema (and I'm assuming you are if you're reading this), then get off your ass and pick up this disc. You shan't be disappointed.

Accion Mutante (1993)

2008-11-18T17:46:00.000-08:00

	Title: ACCION MUTANTE	Format: DVD
	Region: 1/NTSC	Studio: Substance
	Length: 91 minutes	Year: 1993 / DVD 2002

The movie: (reviewed by Sef)

If you're a fan of Alex De La Iglesia's work, then you'd know that this is his first film and you'd know that this film must be some sort of masterpiece. So how is it you ask??Awesome...No....Terrible....No...Just Right. Does it rank up there with his other films? At times it does but it is definitely something to see if you're just getting into Spanish cinema. The plot...a group called Accion Mutante (Mutant Action) , which happen to be a pretty fucked bunch of characters go against society's standards, they don't like pretty people etc...and they decide to kidnap a socialite's daughter and hold her for ransom.

-----------SPOILERS AHEAD---------

The first half of the film is actually better then the second half of the film. The first half consists of news clips of their terrorism(which are really funny and remind of the ones from Muertos De Risa, another Alex De La Iglesia film). and the plotting of the kidnapping and the fiasco that ensues during it. Once they make their escape on the space ship and their leader turns on them I think the film had nowhere to go (but hey, that's just me, what the fuck do I know?) The only thing the second half has going for it that Santiago Segura(Torrente, Day Of The Beast) has a small part as one of the hicks on the planet. Don't get me wrong Antonio Resines (Torrente 2) as Ramón and Alex Angulo (Day Of The Beast) as Alex both do a phenomenal job but they can't save the second half once the dragging begins and you can pretty much see what is coming.

The Video:

As for the disc, how was the picture? Well it was a bit dark but what the hell, it was a bootleg and at least I finally got to see this film.

The Audio:

As good as a bootleg can get. In Spanish with English subtitles, which is good because I hate to see a badly dubbed film that is available in its original language.

The Extras:

No extras, Damn them...

The Verdict:

OK film, OK DVD. My suggestion? Watch it if you can find it

Nick Beal 04/02/04

2008-11-18T17:44:00.001-08:00

The Real Beal

Hey, great news! Saul and his wife, Debra are coming for the holidays! No, seriously, they're bringing the twins and they're staying for at least a week. You know, Saul's business has been taking off lately but he says he misses Lenny and me so much that he's coming down for a visit, no matter what.

Right about now, you're scratching your hat holder and asking yourself why the Hell you should care about Saul, Debra and the freakin twins, right? The answer, dear reader, is simple YOU SHOULDN'T. I sure as Hell didn’t give a rat's ass when the older-than-pumis couple sitting in front of me during Kill Bill Volume 1 started talking about them, IN THEIR OUTSIDE VOICES!!! Nor did I give a rat's ass about Propecia's cell phone call from Yochandra, or Uncle Louie's pager going off so many times that it sounded like an Intensive Care Unit or Tad and Candi's seven weasely, whiney, snot-nosed, heavily-scabbed, obnoxious children! Yeah, that's right, they brought seven freakin children to a movie! I mean, for God's sake - couldn't Snow White have babysat? You know, I saw movies with my parents. They were Disney movies! You remember that concept right? Kid movies that you bring your kids to. Now, I know nowadays that's a pioneering concept but that's the way it's supposed to be. If you're dopey enough to have manufactured Hellspawn, there's no reason on Earth why those of us with some brain matter should have to put up with your mistake! I'll make a deal - you keep your angels of doom out of my big people's movies and I'll stay away from Jingle All The Way! How's that for a deal? As far as you parents wanting to see an occasional movie, either get a babysitter or see something else. You barely want to spend time with your own terror tykes. What makes you think we do?

I mean, have you gone to the movies lately? Every circus freak and their three-eyed brother that can slither up to the ticket window gets in. Age doesn't matter, size doesn't matter, nothing matters, as long as they've got cash. I swear on my left hand, I was watching Kill Bill Volume 1, and somewhere around the eighth ending a couple waddles in. They are using so many walking sticks, canes and other implements of destruction that each of them looks like Edward Scissorhands. Both are deaf in one ear and can't hear out of the other. Neither can see more than four inches in front of them - so, I immediately know they drove to the theater. After a half hour they finally make it to my aisle, of course. They choose to shuffle past me, of course, and sit down to my immediate right, of course. The next thing I know, the woman is screaming at her husband, Is this the theater? He's the only one in a four-mile radius who didn't hear what she screamed, so she kicks it up a notch and yells again. This time, glass breaks. It sounds like Betty Boop got a tit caught in a car door, only not as sweet. You getting this? They're watching the same movie I'm watching - two tiny people old enough to have been Christ's Camp Counselors, sitting in front of a screen so tall it needs blinking airplane warning lights, and she doesn't even know if she's in the theater yet. Why did they even bother to go out of the house? It must have taken a day and a half, just to get dressed! All so they can pay six bucks each to watch the last half hour of a movie that they don't even know they are watching. Does any of that make sense?

You wanna know why DVDs are flying off shelves like stool through a mallard? That's because when I'm sitting at home watching Les Veux Sans Visage, the car-wreck lives of Propecia and Candi and Lenny and the rest of those inconsiderate ingrates don't invade my life. That's the way it should be. Because if those assholes would just stay home to take phone calls, play with kids or just grow old and rot away, the rest of us could go to the movies. But seeing as they're so damned ignorant and inconsiderate that their tiny pea-brain can't wrap itself around the basic idea that movie theaters are actually for watching movies in, let them pay the bucks to sit in a dark theater and we'll stay on the couch and catch a flick. Now if only I could get my old Sensurround to work.

D'Entre les Morts,
Nick Beal

Nick Beal 12/10/02

2008-11-18T17:38:00.000-08:00

12/10/02

The Real Beal

Nick Beal

AliasNickBeal@aol.com

WARNING: My name is Nick Beal and opinions are my opinions. Sef and Marcela, the good folks at Oh, The Horror don't necessarily concur with all of my opinions. (Although everyone should.) My email address is AliasNickBeal@aol.com. So, if you disagree with anything I have to say, please feel free to write me or bite me!

Return to the Main Page: Here!

WHERE HAVE I BEEN???

I can’t tell you how many emails I’ve gotten asking where I’ve been. I’m talkin’ assloads! First of all, yes, I do know it’s been over four months since my last column. I know what a calendar is and I can navigate one fairly easily. If I had realized I couldn’t step away for a few months without you bozos getting all bleeding gums goofy on me, I would have had Hackzilla step up and jot down a quick note to you goomers. But I actually forgot that, aside from gorging yourselves on my monthly columns, you wankers have no lives. So, here’s the deal – and pay attention, cause I’m not ever going to account for my whereabouts again: I decided to pull a Kerouac and hit the road. Dealing with the day to day of horror entertainment news filled my head with so much rodent pudding that I had to step away and get back to basics. No rum, no hookers, no DVDs or any of the other modern-age contraptions. Cell phones and pagers? Gone! I only checked my email twice and didn’t feel the least bit guilty about it. I cleared my head by communing with nature – the great outdoors. And, you know what I found? Do you want to know the mighty mystery of life?

The great outdoors blow!

Thank God I wasn’t born a century ago or I’d have pried my freakin’ brains out though my ears with a tomahawk! Technology is my God and I know it now. I will never stray again! Six months with no booze and no hookers came to a boil last week when I spent an uncomfortable night in the woods contemplating what it would be like to have sex with a squirrel. Now, I know that might sound sick to you but there was one squirrel out there that, I swear, had one of the nicest asses I’ve ever seen. Needless to say, when I woke up the next morning, my animal-mating virginity still intact, I knew it was time to get back home. Immediately upon my return, I got liquored up and got some stank on my hang-low. A little lurid lovin’ The good kind – the filthy kind. Once, when asked if sex was dirty, Woody Allen replied, “Only if it’s done right.” This is my new mantra. And now that I’m back home – to the land of hookers, booze, cell phones, pagers, cable, DVDs, Internet porn, my beloved Oh The Horror, Cuban food, Cuban cigars and Cuban women - it’s time to start getting back to getting back. Can I get an “Amen!” brothers and sisters?

So, what has been happening while I was gone?

To start, Sef is redesigning OhTheHorror.com and it’s going to kick twice as much ass as in the past. From now on, my column will be my column. Instead of giving you the same old news you can get everywhere else, I’m going to pick a few subjects for each column and give you my opinions. It’ll be a longer version of The Real Beal – which was the best thing about my old columns because, let’s face facts here, my opinion is the only thing that really matters anyway. If I do get any scoops, I’ll pass them along in my column… and you just know I’ll get scoops.

If there are any contests, Sef will handle them. I tried Movie Quotes and none of you “experts” had the cranial meat needed to figure them out. So, I had to resort to the incipit “Guess The Tagline” contest and then, to make matters worse, pretend not to know you bozos were getting the answers from the Internet Movie DataBase. I swear, I thought I was going to vomit blood during those contests. Good riddance to bad medicine.

So, let me close with a personal gripe. (I have Bambi coming over in a few minutes for the first time since I’ve been back and she’s aching for a staking, if you catch my drift.) While I was away, someone, who shall remain nameless, bought the address OhTheHorror.NET (Not to be mistaken with our little love-fest, OhTheHorror.COM.)(editor's note- ohthehorror.net seems to be down) Not only could this pencil-dick not come up with an original name to call his site but he even had the nuggets to get in touch with Sef and ask him for some help getting onto search engines. How’s that for ‘nads? Now, Sef has already told me that he doesn’t want to give this dildo any publicity. But, I’m my own man and I have something to say about it. Sef was the one who came up with OhTheHorror.COM. He’s the guy who sat and brainstormed one day a few years back, trying to come up with a good name for his fledgling site. The site has always had cool, obscure things to sell and off-the-norm things to report. One look at OhTheHorror.NET and you’ll see the usual, mundane fanboy crap that every other site has. Gosh, he’s even got a Nightmare On Elm Street page, kids. Could you just spew? So I think we need to get the word out that NET is not COM. If you want to see the same baggie of crap you see everywhere else - looking, by the way, like it was written by a twelve year old - please feel free to check out the site where shit rules; OhTheHorror.NET. But if you want your horror served hot and still squirming, keep the mouse on OhTheHorror.COM. We haven’t let you down yet. Why would we start now?

D’Entre les Morts,
Nick Beal

PS: The best way to show that joker at NET that he needs to get an original name and, more importantly, and original thought, is to ignore him. Fanboys are NEVER worth your time and energy. Take it from your Uncle Nick, NET is for Fanboys and you don’t want to be a fanboy… Do ya Sparky?

Nick Beal 08/06/02

2008-11-18T17:25:00.000-08:00

08/06/02

Movie News

Nick Beal

AliasNickBeal@aol.com

WARNING: My name is Nick Beal and opinions are my opinions. Sef and Marcela, the good folks at Oh, The Horror don't necessarily concur with all of my opinions. (Although everyone should.) My email address is AliasNickBeal@aol.com. So, if you disagree with anything I have to say, please feel free to write me or bite me!

To Read Nick Beal's New Column, "The Real Beal" Click Here
NOOSE REPORT
HALLOWEEN COMES IN AUGUST THIS YEAR! (REMORTGAGE THE HOUSE!) Well, DVDeviants, August is shaping up to be one hell of a month for horror and science fiction fans. Be afraid, be very afraid, cause it’s time to break open those piggy banks, auction off the farm, sell Dad’s antique Playboy collection or any other way you can afford to shell out the necessary cash. ‘Cause, boys and girls, this one’s gonna hurt. Here is just a partial list of the goodies coming your way: AUGUST 6th Curse Of The Devil Exorcist II: The Heretic Frankenstein ‘90 Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring Parasite Star Trek 2: The Wrath of Khan: The Director's Edition The Swarm Them Time After Time The Unearthly V: The Final Battle Werewolf Shadow Wolfen AUGUST 13th Brotherhood Of Satan Curse Of The Demon Return Of The Vampire Revenge Of Frankenstein AUGUST 20th The AntiChrist Blade 2 Gremlins: SE Gremlins 2: The New Batch: SE Nightmare City Zoltan: Hound Of Dracula AUGUST 27th The Attic/Crawlspace MGM Double Feature The Believers Deranged/Motel Hell MGM Double Feature Edge Of Sanity Fangs Of The Living Dead The Fog Hysteria (Hammer?) Last House on the Left Masque of the Red Death/Premature Burial MGM Double Feature Needful Things Ninth Gate: SE Oblong Box/Scream and Scream Again MGM Double Feature Return of the Living Dead Vampire's Kiss What’s The Matter With Helen?/Who Slew Auntie Roo? MGM Double Feature Dan Curtis Macabre Collection: Dracula, Turn Of The Screw, Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde, The Picture Of Dorian Gray So there you are. Told you it was going to hurt. You’re scared now, aren’t you? - - - - - - - - - - - - - BUSTA BLOWS! SAMUEL L. JACKSON & NICK BEAL AGREE Well, sort of… You see, Samuel L. Jackson doesn't think much of the trend that is turning rappers into movie stars. ``To take people from the music world and give them the same kind of credibility and weight that you give Morgan Freeman, Laurence Fishburne, Forest Whitaker - that's like an aberration to me,'' Jackson said. ``It's not my job to lend credibility to so-and-so rapper who's just coming into the business.'' ``I know there's some young actor sitting in New York or L.A. who's spent half of his life learning how to act and sacrificing to learn his craft but isn't going to get his opportunity ... because of some actor who's been created,'' he said. Why, Sammy won't even check out a script that gives a rapper a starring role. So, I guess that means no Samuel L. Jackson in Halloween 9… like that would ever happen. - - - - - - - - - - - - - MGM NIXES H1KC Well, it looks like Rob Zombie’s House Of 1,000 Corpses still isn’t getting the respect he feels it deserves. Now, last time, I told you that supersnitch PIPPO told me many moons ago that H1KC couldn’t find a distributor because it sucks mastodon bone. Then came the news that MGM had picked up Zombie’s funhouse frightener. Well, kiddies, the latest news is that MGM has purged H1KC like fetid meatloaf. So, it looks like the only way we are going to be able to judge for ourselves is when Zombie releases the film himself, direct to video, on October 15th. Gee, that’s always a good sign. I’m still banking on PIPPO being right... He usually is. - - - - - - - - - - - - - ZONE IN Back on January 24th, I made some rather disparaging remarks about whether Anthony Michael Hall had the talent to play Johnny Smith in USA’s upcoming (at the time) series, The Dead Zone. I ended by stating that Hall was going to have to prove himself to me. Well, he did. I not only find the show completely watchable but, with only as few missteps so far, it’s become a show I actually look forward to. So, I am pleased to report that, yes Virginia, there will be a second season of The Dead Zone. USA is still negotiating the exact number of episodes for the renewal with Lions Gate, which owns the North American rights to the series. The network is eager to commission 13 new episodes on top of the existing 13. Lions Gate wants to do even more, seeking to secure a deal for as many as 26 new ones. The production company's argument is that 26 fresh hours would help USA avoid the syndrome of declining viewer interest triggered by a long time lapse between original episodes. Because these discussions are still taking place, the parties declined to comment on the renewal. But I have it on good faith that USA is going to make this happen, no matter how much they have to bend. Another reason for USA’s DZS (Dead Zone Stiffy) is that reruns of the show will fit the program strategy of the Sci-Fi Channel, USA's sister network Sci-Fi has already begun repeating each "Dead Zone" episode Friday night at 8:00 PM. - - - - - - - - - - - - - DON’T FORGET FJA To write to Forry and pass on any good wishes for a full recovery, here’s his address: Forrest J Ackerman 2495 Glendower Ave Los Angeles, CA 90027
BURIED TREASURES
Out of the kindness of my heart, I’m going to toss a little extra your way in the form of an Easter egg. Now wipe that sloppy grin off of your face. I don’t mean a real Easter egg or a rich, creamy chocolate one, bursting with caramel goo... I mean a feature, hidden in certain DVD menus, like Joe before he shotguns Tom. All set? You betcha. MANIAC: SPECIAL EDITION Anchor Bay’s maniacal Maniac DVD [DV11653] has a rare treat for your ears that’ll make you flip your wig. From the MAIN menu, go to the EXTRAS menu and then press the RIGHT arrow key on your remote control. This will bring up an “X” over Caroline Munro's face. Press ENTER right now and you will be treated to a rare audio segment in which Maniac's director William Lustig and Exorcist director William Friedkin discuss Maniac’s trails and tribulations. Go ahead, take a stab at it.
WIN ZOMBIE DOOM ON DVD!!!
FREE DVD: The winner of the Premutos DVD is the man with the Argentoesque email name: Jeff McGivney. [Said email name is for me to know and you posers to find out.] Anyway, a whole buttload of you winner-wannabes guessed correctly that “THERE’S MORE THAN ONE WAY TO LOSE YOUR HEART” was the tagline from one of my guilty pleasures, MY BLOODY VALENTINE. But, Jeff-meister brought it on home. Anyway, Sef and Marcela have ponied up a brand spankin’ new DVD of ZOMBIE DOOM, as a prize for one of you pathetic patrons. So, I guess it’s time to get to this column’s tagline. Ready, pondscum? Take a chance: MOVIE TAGLINE: “TODAY, THE POND! TOMORROW, THE WORLD!” Okay, you toads, you know what taglines are. To give a non-horror example; George A. Romero’s Knightriders’ tagline was “Camelot Is Just A State Of Mind.” See, it’s super simple… just like you. Now, the scallywag from Pago Pago that I pay 22 cents a year to be my faithful protégé and toilet scrubber, cuts and pastes all of the correct entrees onto sheets of paper for me, then cuts them up into individual slips of paper so we can do the drawing. That’s why I need FULL NAME, CORRECT ANSWER and EMAIL ADDRESS. And don’t wait around forever, now. We’ll be picking a winner in a few weeks. From now on, even ex-winners can play immediately, as I haven’t shared the source of the tagline with anyone, including Sef or Marcela. Now, crank up your brain and write me at AliasNickBeal@aol.com with the correct fearful fright flick the above Tagline is from… or don’t.
And now it’s time for…
THE REAL BEAL!
These are my thoughts. Read them, print them, bind them, keep them and worship them for the epiphany they are. DELETE THIS! Okay, I feely admit it – I’m a Deleted Scenes whore. You tack a few delete scenes or alternate endings onto a movie – even one I can’t stand – and that DVD is mine! I am eternally optimistic when it comes to deleted scenes from crappy movies. It is always my hope that a few extra feet of celluloid will take a vat of viscid mucous, like Children Of The Living Dead, and somehow magically transform it into a cinematic masterpiece. You know what? It’s never happened. Trust me. DVDs are always proudly boasting of their restored footage, deleted scenes, alternate endings, etc. You know, the enticing claims of versions you’ve never seen. Imagine my shock and delight when I first picked up Universal’s Collectors Edition of The Birds and noticed the words Deleted Scene in the Specials Features list. Now, imagine my shock and disgust when I realized that the deleted “scene” was nothing more than a few stills from a scene that was never shot. Now, Universal knew this was wrong. If I took some of the Universal execs into a screening room and told them I wanted to show them a few “scenes” from a movie they had just spent money on and then proceeded to show them a freakin’ slideshow, I suspect they’d be a tad on the miffed side. So, what made them think I’d be okay with it? But I’m just being bitter – I actually have a point to make. I can’t wait till that glorious day when Halloween: The Curse Of Michael Myers is released on Special Edition DVD. I know what you’re wondering; Beal, for God’s sake, why? Because, dear readers, back in 1995, Fangoria printed an article in which the writer stated that Halloween: The Curse Of Michael Myers was a great screenplay and a terrific movie before it was edited to death. If we all could just see the print that he saw, we would hail it the Citizen Kane of horror… or some crap like that. The next thing you know, this legendary cut of H6 rocketed from a simpleton’s story to something roughly akin to modern mythology. Suddenly, on the convention circuit and online auction sites, H6: The Director’s Cut became horror’s Holy Grail. Maybe some of you have it. I do, along with that legendary screenplay. (What a stinkburger!) Well? Is there one of you that actually thinks that these long-talked-about missing scenes turn H6 from doody to diamonds? I thought not. Sure, it makes the film the slightest bit more coherent but only because H6, as released, couldn’t have been less coherent. Hell, lighting the negative on fire would have had the same effect. And those of us who bought this mess-terpiece are left with little more than a low-end blank tape, on which to tape Charmed, to show for our hard-earned twenty or thirty bucks. When the Special Edition of Halloween: The Curse Of Michael Myers is released finally the world will know what the rest of us have known for years – that all the deleted scenes in the world can’t fix the unfixable. The problems with H6 can be placed solely on a bad script, bad direction and bad acting, with the exception of an ailing Donald Pleasence. And anyone who tells you any different is bullshitting you. And don’t think talk of legendary cuts and deleted gems will fade anytime soon. Hack director Rick Rosenthal is still unable to talk publicly about his cut of Halloween 2 – the one that was supposedly so lacking in suspense that John Carpenter had to shoot new scenes and reshoot others. As you know this is the same guy who helmed Halloween: Resurrection – the one that was, again, so lacking in suspense that reshoots were needed. Well gang, this time I can personally vouch for these needed reshoots. Because I’ve seen and earlier cut of H:R – back when it was called Halloween: The Homecoming and, believe it or not, it was indeed worse than Halloween: Resurrection! No, I’m not yanking your collective chain. Before it was sent back for reshoots, the latest Halloween was so devoid of suspense that it made Dude, Where’s My Car? look like a nail biter. So if, God forbid, Halloween: Resurrection hits DVD as a Director’s Cut, - including, of course, Deleted Scenes - you can count on one thing and one thing only… a snorefest of epic proportions. The saddest news of all is that Halloween: Resurrection pulled in just a bit more than 25 million dollars at the box office and disappeared from the top ten list after only its second week. Doesn’t sound like much, huh? I mean certainly not enough to warrant another sequel, right? Consider this, since I can’t imagine that it cost more than thirty-seven bucks to make, that’s one hell of a profit margin. So, see you all next October, for Halloween 9: The Implosion Of Michael Myers… We should all be so lucky. D’Entre les Morts, Nick Beal

Nick Beal 05/17/02

2008-11-18T17:24:00.000-08:00

05/17/02

Movie News

Nick Beal

AliasNickBeal@aol.com

WARNING: My name is Nick Beal and opinions are my opinions. Sef and Marcela, the good folks at Oh, The Horror don't necessarily concur with all of my opinions. (Although everyone should.) My email address is AliasNickBeal@aol.com. So, if you disagree with anything I have to say, please feel free to write me or bite me!

FORRY NEW ADDRESS UPDATE!!!
Okay, kids, Forrest J Ackerman has been moved again. It's my understanding that this new place will be able to provide the physical therapy he needs to help him try to recover. Once more, I find myself asking you to dig under your seat cushions and grab up enough change to send Forry a Get Well card. Kaiser and The Pavilion will forward any cards they receive but he needs you to send a new one every once in a while. Hey, if I can take time out of my busy routine of Cuban cigars, Barbados and cheap trollops, you guys can do a little extra for FJA. Right? Right! His new address is: Amberwood Convalescent Hospital 6071 York Blvd Los Angeles, CA 90042
NOOSE REPORT
FORREST J ACKERMAN UPDATE – WE GOT THE SCOOP! Well, gang, I spoke to Forry on Wednesday and he sounded, quite frankly, like he got the crap kicked out of him. He recognized my voice but appeared to be extremely frail. He was supposed to get out of the hospital roughly three weeks ago and I’m glad to be the first to report that ol’ FJA is free at last… almost. Can I get a Halleluiah, brothers and sisters??? He will be transferred to an assisted-living rehabilitation facility today or tomorrow. They are just waiting for a male bed to become available. But this just means that he’s good enough to go to a rehab facility – NOT that he’s fully recovered or out of the woods yet. In fact, he needs his fans now more than ever. THIS MEANS YOU! Bottom line: Those of us who grew up reading his words in Famous Monsters Of Filmland, learned that we were not alone – not the freaks that others said we were. We owe this man a debt of gratitude. The very least you can do is to send a Get Well card to help cheer him up. I promise that it will do just that. Even if you’ve already sent a card, send another. Even if you hate my worm-laden guts, do it for him. Get off of your asses, pry your wallets open and spend a few bucks to help put a smile on the face of The Ultimate Horror Fan. Do it now. You’ll be glad you did. Now, things change at the drop of a scalpel, in the hospital biz. So, check back with this sight all weekend in case they change the facility at the last minute. If the following address is still up Monday afternoon [5/20], it’s the right one. Starting Monday afternoon, let’s send out as many greetings as possible for this guy. He certainly deserves it. Send cards, letters, flowers, cleavage-bearing women to: Forrest J. Ackerman c/o The Santa Monica Pavilion 12001 Santa Monica Boulevard Los Angeles, CA 90025 - - - - - - - - - - - - - M:I 3 CRUISES ALONG WITH FINCHER AT THE HELM SE7EN director David Fincher has chosen to accept an interesting mission - taking the reins of Mission: Impossible 3. While this project might not give Oh The Horror fans a much-needed cinematic stiffy, the Mission Impossible flicks tend to do bizarre things to directors. Master thief, Brian DePalma managed to direct M:I 1 without ripping off Hitchcock – not an easy feat for DePalma – and it was a pretty fair flick. I said, “Fair”. M:I 2 seemed the perfect project for action-tsar, John Woo. But Woo just proved that he should have never left the old country. He hasn’t made a good film since he plopped down on this side of the pond. What’s the reverse of Yankee Go Home? So, what will M:I 3 do to the guy who brought us Panic Room, Fight Club and the much-underrated Alien 3? Only time will tell. But, since both Tom Cruise and Fincher are represented by Creative Artists Agency, we’ll all be able to sleep at night knowing that CAA will get a big fat hairy paycheck. What a shock! - - - - - - - - - - - - - IN THE ZONE Actor/Producer/Director Forest Whitaker is about to add Spooky Narrator to his growing resume. UPN has lured Whitaker into its Twilight Zone. He has taken on the host role for the network's anthology series, providing intros and outros to each episode's self-contained vignette, and will also have producing input. Now before you purists start whining, let’s remember that if any of you numb-nuts had given the mid-eighties CBS series half a chance, you would have been treated to some pretty impressive stories like, Wordplay, NightCrawlers, The Shadow Man, Shatterday, Button Button, Gramma (and a slew more) directed and/or written by the likes of Stephen King, Harlan Ellison, Rockne S. O'Bannon, Joe Dante, Wes Craven, William Friedkin and the always entertaining, Alan Smithee. You would have also seen some great performances by non-genre stars like Robert Klein, Danny Kaye and, especially, Ralph Bellamy, in Monsters. So, knowing that you screwed the pooch once before, maybe you TZ geeks will grow a pair of nads and give UPN’s Twilight Zone a shot before deciding if it’s good or just doo-doo doo-doo. - - - - - - - - - - - - - TLOTR: TFOTR: SE [WHAT IS THIS, KLINGON???] An extended cut, Special Edition, of "The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring" will come out on DVD just five weeks before sequel "The Two Towers" premieres in theaters on December 18th. The VHS and DVD versions will include more than 30 minutes of extra footage that likely will generate an R rating, the folks at New Line Cinema told me. A four-disc DVD version also will include more than six hours of supplemental material. The PG-13 version of the three-hour movie will be available Aug. 6. Tempting consumers to buy both editions, the first DVD version, on August 6th, ($29.95) will include a 10-minute behind-the-scenes teaser of "Two Towers" among two hours of supplemental material on a double-disc set. Yeah, because us poor saps have too much freakin’ money to begin with, right? Now, New Line’s going to make us buy both versions. Great! Don’t I get to leave some money to the bitches when I die? Cause make no mistake - I takes care o’ my bitches! In a related matter, a longer, director's cut of Pearl Harbor, is coming out on July 2. It will include never-before-seen footage of the sinking of the USS: WHO GIVES A HEALTHY SHIT??? This movie sucked! It was an insult to those who fought and died at Pearl Harbor. Why in the Blue Hawaii Hell would I want to see 19 minutes more of it? Stop already!!! - - - - - - - - - - - - - FOG – FINALLY! Those of you who don’t own the Laserdisc of John Carpenter’s The Fog, have missed out on a whole bunch of extra goodies. The lucky few of us that do own it, have known for years that The Fog is one of Carpenter’s best discs, both in quality and content. Well, I have some great news for you puny 5-inchers. On August 27th, MGM will release a long-awaited new Special Edition of Carpenter's modern ghost story. The disc includes a new 2.35:1 anamorphic widescreen transfer, an all-new 28-minute documentary on the making of the film, along with most of the goodies found on the laserdisc: an audio commentary with Director John Carpenter and Producer Debra Hill, an outtake reel, trailers and TV spots. And the cover art is among the spookiest I’ve ever seen. MGM continues their fine tradition of giving us high quality at a low cost. The Fog Special Edition will list for $19.95! Hey, did you hear that Paramount? A Special Edition for under twenty bucks. And you lummoxes dare to list the trailer-only DVD of The Dead Zone for 29.99? You guys must have a set of balls the size of Rosie’s ass!
BURIED TREASURES
Out of the kindness of my heart, I’m going to toss a little extra your way in the form of an Easter egg. Now wipe that sloppy grin off of your face. I don’t mean a real Easter egg or a rich, creamy chocolate one, bursting with caramel goo... I mean a feature, hidden in certain DVD menus, that is sure to be more fun than a pencil in the ankle. All set? Groovy! EVIL DEAD [LIMITED EDITION BOOK OF THE DEAD] Anchor Bay’s latex-covered Book Of The Dead [DV11904] has two interesting Easter eggs that are bound to please. Get it? Book… Bound? Eh, good humor is wasted on you dummköpfes. First: Go to EXTRAS", once there, hit the LEFT arrow and highlight the sketch on the left side of the screen to see a short special effects test. Then: Continue to next page of BONUS FEATURES and move left until the skull is highlighted and you will get to see a panel discussion of a 2001 Halloween Night screening of The Evil Dead. Hey, don’t take my word for it… See for yourself.
WIN ZOMBIE HOLOCAUST ON DVD!!!
FREE DVD: The winner of Lamberto Bava’s Delirium on DVD is the one, the only, Philip Thron. [Hey, wasn’t there a Disney flick called Thron?] Anyway, a buttload of you winner-wannabes guessed correctly that “IN SPACE, NO ONE CAN EAT ICE CREAM!” was the tagline from KILLER KLOWNS FROM OUTER SPACE. But, Phil got picked like a five year old’s nose. Sef and Marcela have ponied up a brand spankin’ new DVD of the infamous gut-muncher, Zombie Holocaust [a/k/a: Dr. Butcher MD] as a prize for one of you movers and shakers. So I guess it’s time to get to this column’s tagline. Let’s get ready to rumble: MOVIE TAGLINE: “THEY SAY THERE’S NOTHING NEW UNDER THE SUN. BUT, UNDER THE GROUND…” Okay, dirtbags, you know what taglines are. To give a non-horror example; George A. Romero’s Knightriders’ tagline was “Camelot Is Just A State Of Mind.” See, it’s super simple… just like you. Now, the Botswanan boy I pay $1.00 a month to be my trusty ward and assistant, cuts and pastes all of the correct entrees onto sheets of paper for me, then cuts them up into individual slips of paper so we can do the drawing. That’s why I need FULL NAME, CORRECT ANSWER and EMAIL ADDRESS. And don’t wait around forever, now. We’ll be picking a winner in around two weeks. From now on, even ex-winners can play immediately, as I haven’t shared the source of the tagline with anyone, including Sef or Marcela. Now, crank up your brain and write me at AliasNickBeal@aol.com with the correct frightful fear flick the above Tagline is from… or don’t.
And now it’s time for…
THE REAL BEAL!
These are my thoughts. Read them, print them, bind them, keep them and worship them like the epiphany they are. TCM: 2K3 - DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT OR SHUT THE HELL UP! I was sitting here last night slurping Barbados, devouring a slab of churrasco and feeling pretty freakin’ sorry for myself. Forrest J Ackerman is ailing, The X-Files ends on Sunday and every good horror movie from the 50s, 60s and 70s is being remade. The more I thought, the more I realized that there’s nothing I can do about it… or is there? I mean, I gotta have faith that Forry will do his best to fight his way outta this Health Hell he is in, I know in my heart that The X-Files needs to end, and the assholes remaking Dawn Of The Dead and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre [to name just two of the many] are doing this only for the money… like most good whores will do. As someone who reports on horror entertainment, I hear it all. So do the guys at Gorezone and AICN on the Net, Fangoria, Video Watchdog, Midnight Marquee and myriad printed magazines. For the most part, we are fans, just like you, and we are outraged when we hear that the guy who wrote Scooby-Doo is doing the screenplay for Dawn Of The Dead or that Ryan Witherspoon… uh, I mean Ryan Phillippe is going to play Leatherface in the new Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Oh, I’m not shitting you. My left hand to God, pretty-boy Ryan was cast as Leatherface. By the way, did you know that Ryan has tons of homepages made by teenage girls with nothing better to do with their time? Are they informative? You betcha! Why, just yesterday, I learned that Ryan likes cycling, basketball and reading. Also long walks by the… you get the idea. He’s not an actor – he’s a heartthrob. Dear God, can you imagine a Gunnar Hansen home page that talks about Gunnar’s love of kayaking and communing with the great outdoors? “Gunnar keeps a scrapbook of his favorite leaves from his many nature walks…” That would be enough to make me puke out my own stomach lining. Gunnar is all man, baby. Gunnar can eat the bark off of the mighty oak tree. Gunnar, at age 46, can kick the jolly green snot out of Ryan Phillippe’s entire family, while simultaneously eating Reese Witherspoon’s spleen! Cycling, indeed! I wish that was all of the bad news related to TCM: 2K3. It isn’t. Producer Michael Bay [Yes, he’s remaking I Am Legend too!] has hired Marcus Nispel to helm the TCM update. Who, you ask? Why it’s the same Marcus Nispel who is responsible for – are you ready? – drum roll please – many music videos and commercials. Don’t ya just wanna eat your own vomit? Me too. And lastly, in the lousy TCM: 2K3 news department, Michael Bay has told many publications that this movie will focus more on the horror than the gore. The gore? Did he see the same movie I saw? The most brilliant aspect of the original Texas Chainsaw Massacre is that there is no gore. It is all implied – so much so, in fact, that you can still find people who will tell you that you can see the meat hook actually go through and come out of the female victim, as Leatherface hangs her up to dry. Now that really speaks to the brilliance of Tobe Hooper’s TCM. What to do about it? We - journalists and fans alike - need to send the message that we want these shitheads to stop spending $20 million bucks on remakes and start making original product! Don’t they realize that good horror fans will see anything new? Shit, in 1981, a bunch of my friends and I went to see The Boogens. That’s right - a movie that sounds like the monster crawled out of a nostril. But, we were all there. Actually, we had a great time. And how do we send that much-needed message? Don’t pay to see it and don’t, under any circumstance, report on it. Will it work? I honestly think so. Remember, the opposite of Love isn’t Hate – it’s Apathy. Look, AICN is a great site. And I promise that they won’t go under if they don’t show the latest pictures of Leatherface, when they finally surface. Gorezone won’t fold and neither will Oh The Horror. Fangoria is still, after many years, a very good print magazine and a great source for upcoming movies. I know it’ll be hard for them to pass on covering TCM: 2K3 and Dawn Of The Dead. Video Watchdog is the best DVD review magazine in the world. Let’s hope Tim and Donna Lucas decide to pass on these two DVDs. Trust me, the publishers of today feel the same about these movies as we do and it’s time for them so step up to the plate. Fangoria covered Pus Van Sant’s Psycho way too much. Even they would admit that. Well, they don’t have to make that same mistake again. Here’s their chance to prove it. The fans have a responsibility too. Don’t pay to see these movies. Download them from KaZaA or wait till you get a free Hollywood Video rental coupon or sneak into the theater [Not that I’m suggesting you break any laws, mind you. I’m not.] The Producers will brag about making the money on the foreign market, etc. But if Americans don’t pay to see these movies, it doesn’t matter how much foreign cash comes in – they won’t be made in the future. Look, I know it’s easier said than done. There’s a part of me that can’t wait to see how they’re going to butcher TCM: 2K3, I Am Legend, Dawn Of The Dead and whatever ends up being the next cartoon-turned-live-action movie. But if you want this madness to stop, it’s time to do something about it. If not, you’d better get ready for remakes of Re-Animator, The Sixth Sense, Phantasm, The Exorcist, Videodrome and The Evil Dead (with someone other than Bruce Campbell playing Ash.) Can’t be done, you say? Let me remind you – Ryan Phillippe is Leatherface! D’Entre les Morts, Nick Beal PS: Someone remind me to peel the masking tape “X” off of the living room window at 10:00PM, Sunday night. It won’t do any good after that.

Nick Beal 11/14/01

2008-11-18T17:17:00.000-08:00

11/14/01

Movie News

Nick Beal

AliasNickBeal@aol.com

WARNING: My name is Nick Beal and opinions are my opinions. Sef and Marcela, the good folks at Oh, The Horror don't necessarily concur with all of my opinions. (Although everyone should.) My email address is AliasNickBeal@aol.com. So, if you disagree with anything I have to say, please feel free to write me or bite me!

NOOSE REPORT
BIG TOYS FOR BIG BOYS… YEAH, AND BIG GIRLS TOO! Clive Barker and Todd McFarlane have signed on Universal Pictures’ dotted line to produce a film based on a line of action figures created by Mr. B, himself. Figures of Barker's Tortured Souls were released in limited numbers last year by McFarlane Toys, and sold out faster than spit through a trumpet. The six grisly Tortured Soul characters -- Agonistes, Talisac, Scythe-Meister, Mongroid, Lucidique and Venal Anatomica -- were each sold with a chapter of an original Barker-penned storyline. When combined, the chapters form a novella outlining the origin of the Tortured Souls. Barker is currently writing the Tortured Souls treatment based on that novella, but the ultimate plot remains a bit fuzzy. [And I don’t mean the warm fuzzies!!!] The deal with Universal could be worth two million buckaroos to Clive and Todd if a feature film ever sees the light of day… or, more likely, the dark of night. Why, this sounds so good, it just has to suck! - - - - - - - - - - - - - I DO NOT HAVE SLEEP? Well, that might be the literal translation but when Artisan releases Dario Argento's latest shocker, Non Ho Sonno on DVD December 18th, it’ll be titled the more English-friendly; I Can’t Sleep. The DVD will be widescreen, with a photo gallery, a theatrical trailer and something that is sure to give you una costruzione - an Argento audio commentary. Now, really… would you rather count sheep or bodies? - - - - - - - - - - - - - THE SEQUEL IS OUT THERE! TV God, Chris Carter is in serious talks with 20th Century Fox to develop a second movie based on his long-running hit TV series, The X-Files. As with 1998’s X-Files: Fight The Future, Carter would write and produce with God-in-waiting, Frank Spotnitz. Although not tied to the project yet, original stars David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson have both indicated a desire to return for the new picture. Since Duchovny left the series last year and Anderson is slated to leave at the end of this season, the next movie is being developed as a stand-alone vehicle for agents Mulder and Scully. And that’s a good thing! Most of The X-Files’ best episodes [Home, Terms Of Endearment, both Squeeze and Tooms, Bad Blood - to name just a few] have been the stand alones instead of the ones steeped in the often-too-elaborate "X" mythology. Carter and Spotnitz are expected to begin writing the screenplay within the next few months and the picture could begin shooting by late 2002. It's expected the earliest this puppy could be released is Christmas 2003. Until then keep chanting the mantra; more boxed sets, more boxed sets, more… - - - - - - - - - - - - - BIG FREAKIN’ DEAL! Attention, Attention: You might want to write this one on your next calendar… in invisible ink! On March 5th, 2002, Universal is dropping the price of Jan de Bont’s The Haunting from $24.99 to $14.95. Wow! Hey, guys… drop that sucker another fifteen bucks and it might just be worth picking up. Thanks for nothing! - - - - - - - - - - - - - ED4? GROOVY! It looks like Robert Tapert, Sam Raimi and Bruce Campbell are going to thrill us with again with their first indie project in decades. But, will it be Evil Dead 4? Tapert has been talking but not in specifics. "Well, I've sort of been authorized to make some sort of statement... and Sam, Bruce and I want to make a good, old fashioned independent film. Sam directing and Bruce starring. Whether or not that will be an Evil Dead sequel, I don't know if any of us know that. But this project is something we are definitely moving forward with." To add fuel to the fire, Empire Magazine, from across the pond, printed an article about the making of the original Evil Dead. When asked about the possibility of a fourth movie Raimi replied: "Absolutely, the camera is going to start on the surface of the moon, full of giant craters and as it pulls back, it's Bruce Campbell's dimpled ass, playing a 25 year old man when he's far too old. He's going to have a big, pot bellied gut and he's going to get back The Eye of the Tiger to battle the Evil Dead." Add to that, the fact that Bruce Campbell was down in this neck of the woods recently for a book signing and, via phone, told me that he’s no longer 100% certain that there’s not going to be another Evil Dead. Isn’t that a double negative or some English Class crap like that? Anyway, I’m takin’ that as a big, fat, wet “Yes!” So, kiddies, be warned – it looks like Ash is comin’ back to kick ass and chew gum… and he’s all out of gum! - - - - - - - - - - - - - EPISODE II DEBUT: MAY THE SCRIPT BE WITH US! Twentieth Century Fox has finally set a domestic release date for Star Wars: Episode II: Attack of the Clones of Thursday, May 16th, 2002 – a mere eight days before the Memorial Day weekend. Gee, I don’t know about you, but I personally can’t wait to find out who’s going to talk like one of the Cosby Kids this time! Ah, sweet mysteries of life. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
BURIED TREASURES
Out of the kindness of my heart, I’m going to toss a little extra your way in the form of an Easter egg. Now wipe that sloppy grin off of your face. I don’t mean a real Easter egg or a rich, creamy chocolate one bursting with caramel goo... I mean a feature, hidden in certain DVD menus, that is sure to make you happier than a dog on a warm shin. Ready? Let’s light this candle! Hannibal MGM’s way cool Hannibal DVD [1002321] has a knock out Easter egg for you to salivate over. Go the Breaking The Silence submenu on the special features disc, and on the left side there should be a vertical series of numbers [W950087673]. Use the remote to navigate the cursor to the numbers, and press ENTER. You can now view a special music video entitled Clarice, comprised of various outtakes of Julianne Moore during filming. It really doesn’t take a head full of brains to enjoy this one!
MUCHO IMPORTANTE: READ, OR ELSE!!!
GRAND PRIZE: FREE DVD!!!
QUOTE: “Death has come to your little town, Sheriff. You can either ignore it or you can help me to stop it.” FREE DVD: You know, you goobers make me want to eat my own vomit. You write in bitching and whining like schoolgirls that we don’t give prizes for our QUOTES. So, we decide to give away a sealed copy of Anchor Bay’s The Johnsons DVD, presented widescreen (1.85:1) and containing an audio commentary with Director; Rudolph Van Den Berg and Writers; Roy Frumkes and Rocco Simonelli, a theatrical trailer and talent bios. It retails for $29.98 on Anchor Bay’s website! BUT, and there’s a big but here, I’m not going to slip you candy-asses an easy quote if I’m giving up goodies for the correct answer. So, after all of that, how do you repay my kindness? Well, I get twenty or so wrong answers and only ONE of you boneheads comes up with the right answer and he doesn’t have skull-stuffing enough to follow the rules. I mean, there were only three rules to begin with. What’s the big? So for you light-brained, I’ll give the simple rules again. Here goes, so pay attention. There will be a quiz! You need to send your FULL NAME, your EMAIL ADDRESS and the CORRECT ANSWER. Anyone can play, as I haven’t shared the source of the quote with Sef or Marcela. So, even if you’ve had your name printed in this column for guessing a past quote, the slate has been wiped clean. Just to recap; 1. Guess the quote 2. Win the contest 3. Get the FREE DVD! Last time, I said that I bet those rules were even simple enough for you guys! I guess I was wrong. So, write me at AliasNickBeal@aol.com and tell me which spooktacular fearfest the above Quote is from. Or just sit there like a freakin’ pile of flesh and I’ll keep the DVD. Now, I’m hopping in the black Dodge and driving up Route 666 to my hometown of… what business is it of yours! I’m going to be enjoying a Thanksgiving dinner with the few remaining souls who are willing to admit that they are my kin. I’ll be back in the corner office on November 30th and we’re going to take the names (that’s plural) of all of you cretins that guessed the right movie, put them in Ivan’s stuffed monkey’s hat and pick the winner. I’ll be checking my email daily. So if you actually think you know something about movie quotes and you can use a keyboard without hurting yourself, email me and maybe, just maybe, you’ll be a winner for a change!
And now it’s time for…
GET REEL!
These are my thoughts. Read them, print them, bind them, keep them and worship them like the epiphany they are. WHAT’S UP WITH THE COW? So, I’m talking to Sef the other day and we’re discussing what we always discuss – movies. I like talking to Sef. He’s insightful, he’s knowledgeable, he’s witty… he signs my paycheck. Anyway, Sef and I are trying to debate important issues and the conversation inevitably comes around to that age-old question; Do you put Psycho II in the Alfred Hitchcock section? After literally seconds of intense debate, we decide that Sef should leave Psycho II where it is now… on the floor behind the poster rack. With that world-altering decision out of the way, our chat turns to the stillbirth that is 1998’s “Re-Envisioning” of Psycho. At least I think that’s the term Gus Van Sant used. I can’t remember exactly because I don’t pay attention to any of the verbal diarrhea that spews from his lips. So, I say to Sef, “Hey, man, what the f$% is up with the cow?” “What cow”, Sef replies? And that’s when I realize that Sef doesn’t know about the cow! Sef, who is a stinking genius when it comes to horror flicks, has no earthly idea what in the blue Hell I’m talking about. I further realize that a whole buttload of people don’t know about the cow. Damn, you don’t even know about the cow, do you? Do you??? From that point on, my mission becomes stunningly clear – Warn People About The Cow! I’m not going to waste valuable space telling you what a dripping pusburger Psycho ’98 is. I mean, you can’t really call it Van Sant’s Psycho. He directed the freakin’ movie from Hitchcock’s storyboards. Hell, he had a copy of the DVD on the set so he could check the original against his crapfest. Now, if a director [and I use the term loosely] uses another director’s storyboards and shoots a movie almost shot-for-shot the same as the original, who really directed the movie? Let’s face it; Hitchcock said many times that his directing took place in his head, months before the film began to roll. So, since Gussy used what Hitchcock came up with, I guess ol' Hitch must have directed this one too… well, except for the cow! [I’m getting to the cow.] The original Psycho has tons of famous scenes. Many shots stick in one’s head. Two of the more-famous are Arbogast’s death on the stairs and, of course, the shower scene. Shall we take them one at a time? We shall. What makes Hitch’s shower scene so memorable, students? Actually two things. We all take showers, with the possible exception of Sandra Bernhard, and we all feel vulnerable in the shower. In most cases, there’s nowhere to run if a knife-wielding maniac is stabbing you repeatedly. It is claustrophobic and Hitch was smart enough to keep all of the shots in the shower, tight. He’d never do anything to take the viewer out of that claustrophobic atmosphere. Especially something so stupid as to show storm clouds – thus bringing the moviegoer outside into the wide gray yonder. Well, Gussy did. Check it out! There are shots of storm clouds interspersed with shots of his shower scene. Oh, yes… that’s stupid and sure proof that, where it comes to Van Sant, no talent exists. But he didn’t stop there, kiddies. Nope. Sure as I’m the Dark Lord and I want to take Mira Sorvino as my queen, ol’ GVS did something dopier than storm clouds during the shower scene. [Okay, I’m getting to the freakin’ cow already!] This brings us to Milton Arbogast’s death. Most of us have taken a dive down a flight of stars at least once in our lives. Some of you might have even been sober when it happened. But few of us do it right after being stabbed and even less of us have gone down backwards! Can you imagine how painful that must be? When I saw Martin Balsam headin’ down to the first floor, in the original, I kept hoping he’d catch his balance and run like hell, out of that house. I mean, he seemed like a standup guy and I didn’t even want to think about the head-smack he’d take when he hit the bottom. So, I was rooting for Arbogast like there was no tomorrow. Unfortunately, for him, there wasn’t. [Cow alert!] Now, while watching the great William H. Macy do the same scene, it was tougher to concentrate on his inevitable plight. Why? Well, I guess I was distracted. By what, you ask? Why, the COW, of course!!! What, you missed it? Then I suggest you pick up your drink, grab the Psycho ‘98 DVD you’ve been using as a coaster, slap it in your player, cue up the Arbogast-buys-the-farm scene and look closely. You’ll see it. Right after the knife makes the second slice on Arbogast’s eye, GVS inserts a shot of a cow on a rain-slick road. Way to take ‘em outta the game, Bubba! I’m pretty sure if you did manage to catch the cow shot, you were too busy thinking, “What the f$%?” to give any kind of a rat’s ass about Arbogast, world peace or whether your date was going to give you happy pants after the flick ended. Be warned, once you’ve seen the cow, you’ll never see Arbogast’s death again. No matter how used to it you get. So, now you know about the cow and it is important that you pass on what you know about the cow to folks that might not be as “in the know” as you are. Dear friends, it is imperative that you do everything in your power to preserve all rental copies of Psycho ’98. That’s right… preserve them. Treat them like a ’68 Dodge Charger or a high class hooker. I don’t want anything to happen to those DVDs. They need to last a good long time. You see, the reason we have history books and the reason we leave death camps standing is so that no one will ever forget and commit the same despicable acts again! You catchin’ my drift? D’Entre les Morts, Nick Beal PS: I admire few people, but William H. Macy is a brilliant actor. He da man! So, why aren’t I jumping all over his butt for taking a roll in this celluloid plate of steaming poop? I have to believe that he received some sort of head trauma during the filming of Pleasantville and, therefore, can’t be blamed for this minor filmatic indiscretion. If that’s not the case, don’t tell me.

Nick Beal 10/30/01

2008-11-18T17:15:00.000-08:00

10/30/01

Movie News

Nick Beal

AliasNickBeal@aol.com

WARNING: My name is Nick Beal and opinions are my opinions. Sef and Marcela, the good folks at Oh, The Horror don't necessarily concur with all of my opinions. (Although everyone should.) My email address is AliasNickBeal@aol.com. So, if you disagree with anything I have to say, please feel free to write me or bite me!


NOOSE REPORT
FM RIP? The newsgroup, Reuters is reporting that Famous Monsters of Filmland, [FM to its fans] a 44-year-old magazine credited with inspiring such future Hollywood luminaries as Steven Spielberg, George Lucas, Joe Dante, Rick Baker and Stephen King, may be seeing its last Halloween. The Los Angeles-based magazine, a staple in the horror world for paying homage to classic science fiction and horror film characters, is slated for court-ordered auction this week, the Los Angeles Times reported on Monday. The magazine is in trouble because U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Arthur Greenwald declared that its publisher, Ray Ferry, fraudulently transferred ownership to his housemate, Gene Reynolds. Hey, people, if you think that’s the only thing Ray Ferry ever did that was less-than-forthright, I have this bridge in Brooklyn... This oozing scumbag screwed over our Uncle Forry [Forrest J Ackerman], kicking him off of the magazine that was truly his and then continuing to put out FM without telling anyone FJA was gone. As far as I’m concerned, FM #210 [if memory serves] was when Famous Monsters really died. I haven’t purchased an issue since then and anyone who knew FJA was gone and continued to buy FM was NEVER a fan of the original Famous Monsters. Let’s face facts here, FM was FJA and FJA was FM! Keep repeating that because, in a world of lies, that is an absolute truth. In 1990, FM was brought back to us when FJA, its founding editor, joined forces with Ray Ferry. But the partnership ended a few years later. Last year a Van Nuys jury found Ferry liable for breach of contract, libel and trademark infringement and awarded FJA $500,000 and rights to the pen name "Dr. Acula." Ferry then transferred his assets to Reynolds and filed for bankruptcy protection, the Times reported. The judge found the asset transfers fraudulent because Ferry was trying to keep them away from creditors, while continuing to function as the magazine's editor. Ferry claimed he owed his housemate back pay and was merely donating his time and equipment to Reynolds. Yeah, that’s the ticket. Bridge anyone? Solution: One or two of you guys who FM did so much to help – King, Lucas, Spielberg, Dante, Baker - need to step up and buy FM. It won’t amount to much more than lunch money for you guys. When I called Forry to wish him a Happy Birthday [82, I think] he sounded energized and, with him at the helm, Famous Monsters could be a premiere magazine again. Now, I’m not saying he should run the thing on his own like in the old days. He’ll need a good staff, a little start-up money and the corner office. Forrest J Ackerman still has much to say about the world of fantastic films, especially with so many classics coming out on DVD. And, let’s face it, retro is “in”, bigtime! Come on, guys… Buy FM, kick Ferry’s ass out and put Forry back in. This way, we can all die happy... Well, except for Ray Ferry. Rot in Hell, chum. - - - - - - - - - - - - - I’M DREAMING OF A BLACK CHRISTMAS Will wonders never cease? Bob Clark's classic scarefest, Black Christmas is finally getting a proper U.S. DVD release, on November 6th, thanks to Music Video Distributing! [I know, I haven’t heard of them either!] Up until now, Black Christmas has only been available on DVD from Critical Mass/Video Service Corp. Their 25th Anniversary Edition [VSC1269] was presented 1.33:1 and contained Interactive Menus, Cast Bios and the Original Theatrical Trailer. By far, the highlights of the Critical Mass disc were the two short interviews with horror legend, John Saxon. Totaling just over three minutes, [2:09 & 1:00] the interviews contain Saxon speaking very fondly of his experience acting in Black Christmas. Let’s hope the folks at Music Video Distributing are aware of the interviews and will add those to this much-anticipated release. The MVD disc will have a non-anamorphic widescreen transfer, 2.0 stereo track, the always-welcome theatrical trailer and cast and crew bios. And the cast and crew bios should be mighty lengthy, considering the incredible behind-the-camera folks associated with this movie. John [Tenebre, A Nightmare On Elm Street] Saxon, Margot [Sisters, Superman] Kidder, Keir [2001: A Space Odyssey, The Starlost] Dullea, Olivia [IT, Psycho IV] Hussey and Andrea [Yes, from SCTV!] Martin are among the cast. By the way, I was emailed, just the other day, and asked if the sequel to Black Christmas is A Christmas Story. Uhhhhhh, No! While it’s true that Bob Clark directed both movies, and I personally think they are both great flicks, Black Christmas has about as much to do with A Christmas Story as Henry And June has to do with Henry, Portrait of a Serial Killer. So, have yourself a scary little Christmas and add this exceptional horror film to your library. Don’t make me come over there and kill you in your sleep, ‘cause once I start, I won’t be able to stop myself. I mean it Missy! - - - - - - - - - - - - - WHAT? Oh, this one is priceless! Kismet Entertainment Group and International Media Films have merged to form a new company, Kismet Classics. Good for them… Bad for us. You see, they have designed this company to do remakes of 13 films helmed by Italian horror film director Mario Bava, and 14 other Italian horror, sci-fi and adventure films! The first library deal for Kismet Classics; Baron Blood, Black Sunday, House of Exorcism, Bay Of Blood and the Boris Karloff gem, Black Sabbath. ``Bava was an auteur who didn't really get much credit until after he retired, but who had great style and substance to his films,'' David E. Allen recently stated. ``It was so impressive to see that what he pioneered during the sixties and seventies, you are still seeing done into the nineties.'' Allen went on to say that Kismet Classics will be reminiscent of Dark Castle, the company formed by Joel Silver and Bob Zemeckis, primarily to redo the films of horror maestro William Castle. Oh, well that explains everything. One more hack company to remake cool films from the 50s and 60s and turn them into assembly line junk! Hey, Davie, if you were so impressed by Bava’s “style and substance” why in the blue Hell would you want to redo his movies, handing over the reins to a director who won’t have anywhere near Bava’s “style and substance”? And if “what he pioneered” we are “still seeing done, into the 90s”, then why do we need to see your guys do it? Give me a break! Here’s a suggestion; hire a writer willing to give you an original idea - since you can’t seem to find one on your own – and put out a quality horror movie that we will all love. This way, you’ll make tons of box office dough followed by a DVD that is so good, we all need to buy it. In short, you can start making new classics and leave the old ones alone. There are only a handful of good remakes out there [Carpenter’s The Thing, Cronenberg’s The Fly, Savini’s Night Of The Living Dead…] Trust me, you don’t have the juice or the talent to get on that short list. Especially if you plan on putting out the caliber of rat snot that the recent House On Haunted Hill remake brought to the genre. Do us all a favor – Go away! - - - - - - - - - - - - - THE POWER OF CASH COMPELS YOU! The producers of Morgan Creek’s upcoming mega-million dollar Exorcist prequel have snagged another big name for their cash-soaked pic. They started by signing Bill [T2] Wisher to write the script, then John [Manchurian Candidate, Seconds] Frankenheimer to direct. The latest to be added to the Big Paycheck List is Liam [Darkman] Neeson – who will play Father Merrin, the part that Max Von Sydow made famous in the original shocker. The new Exorcist begins production this Spring in the United States, Africa and the United Kingdom. Now, before you all go thinking that this bad boy is going to have any kind of merit, just because Morgan Creek is throwing the bank at it, let’s remember two words… Washington Redskins. - - - - - - - - - - - - - RETURN OF THE LIVING DVD My new mole at MGM tells me they’ll be releasing Return Of The Living Dead on Region 1 DVD in the second half of 2002! This extremely cool, extremely funny fright flick will be released widescreen with 16X9 enhancement. Now, if they could only go the Killer Klowns From Outer Space route and toss in a coffinload of extras, I’d be willing to kiss them on the lips. Well, some of them. Recently, some InterNUTS out there started claiming that ROTLD was shot 1.33:1 or 1.66:1 – probably due to the fact that the film was shot "open matte", so full-frame transfers reveal more picture information on the top and bottom than a widescreen transfer does. This may be true but I have personally seen the workprint of Return Of The Living Dead more than a few times and I can tell you, plainly, simply, Return Of The Living Dead was shot 1.85:1, period. Hey, what about this for a solution; considering that MGM says they have future plans to put a bunch of their DVD titles out fullscreen on one side and widescreen on the other, why not give everyone a big ol’ pumpkin smile and start with Return Of The Living Dead? And remember our mantra; More Brains!
BURIED TREASURES
Out of the kindness of my heart, I’m going to toss a little extra your way in the form of an Easter egg. Now wipe that sloppy grin off of your face. I don’t mean a real Easter egg or a rich, creamy chocolate one bursting with caramel goo... I mean a feature, hidden in certain DVD menus, that is sure to make you happier than Norman Bates in a cutlery shop. Ready? Steady Go! C.H.U.D. Anchor Bay Entertainment’s ultra-cool release of C.H.U.D. [DV11327] includes a Halloween hotty for you. From the Main Menu, go to the Extras Menu and press UP. This will highlight CHUD’S eyes. Next, press ENTER. This takes you to an extended scene of a girl taking a shower. Mature Audiences Only! You youngsters need to back off… There’s hootage here!
GRAND PRIZE: FREE DVD!!!
QUOTE: “Death has come to your little town, Sheriff. You can either ignore it or you can help me to stop it.” FREE DVD: Okay, geniuses, I’ve been telling you for the past three columns that the quotes were going to get tougher. But, what I didn’t tell you was that, from now on, we’ll be giving away free stuff to one of you weasels who guesses the movie my current quote appears in. On November 13th, we will take the names of all of you cretins that guessed the right movie, put them in Ivan’s stuffed monkey’s hat and pick the winner. That winner will receive, by mail, a sealed copy of Anchor Bay’s The Johnsons DVD. This sucker is presented widescreen (1.85:1) and contains an audio commentary with Director; Rudolph Van Den Berg and Writers; Roy Frumkes and Rocco Simonelli, a theatrical trailer; talent bios… you get the idea. Hey, on Anchor Bay’s website, it retails for $29.98! You need to send us your full name, your email address and the correct answer. Anyone can play, as I haven’t even shared the source of the quote with Sef or Marcela. So, even if you’ve had your name printed in this column for guessing a past quote, the slate has been wiped clean. So, just to recap; 1. Guess the quote 2. Win the contest 3. Get the FREE DVD! I bet that’s even simple enough for you guys! So, write me at AliasNickBeal.com and tell me which spooktacular fearfest this is from. Or just sit there like a freakin’ lump and I’ll keep the DVD. LAST COLUMN’S QUOTE: “You’re crazy to know who I am, aren’t you? Alright… I’ll show you!” James Lutz of CA was the first reader to get back to me with the correct answer: The Invisible Man. Nice going, James! That one was as plain as the nose on your face.
And now it’s time for…
GET REEL!
These are my thoughts. Read them, print them, bind them, keep them and worship them like the epiphany they are. 666 CHANNELS AND NOTHING’S ON! Let’s travel back in time, shall we? Not too far… back to October 15th. I’m sitting in my spacious office, looking out on the little people, contemplating possible ways to solve world hunger and other important crap like that. Suddenly… a knock at the door. The retinal scan verifies that it’s my trusty Ward of 11 years. I think his name is Skippy… or Juan… I know it starts with a capital letter. Anyway, the boy enters and hands me a small, plain, brown paper bag. “Here are your TV book, Mr. B.”, he squeaks in some kind of accent. Needless to say, I slap him loopy for his insolence! [Mr. B, indeed!] As he scampers out of the office, I open the paper bag to reveal the TV Guide for October 27th through November 2nd. [No, not that toilet tissue from the newspaper that you poser’s use. The real TV Guide.] Ahhhhhhh, the Halloween issue. How I look forward to the Halloween issue each and every year. The thought of all five VCRs whirring away for one whole week excites me like no woman can. I have stocked up on blank tapes – ten a week since January – just to make sure I’m ready for Halloween. And, now, the time has finally arrived. I cancel all of my appointments, tell the boy to hold my calls, grab my yellow highlighter and get to work. Hmmmm, Harry Potter on the cover. Okay, I can live with that. The Harry Potter flick is gonna be huge, so it’s a logical choice for the Halloween TV Guide cover. Oh, sure, a near-topless Jamie Lee would have been better but I really need to pick my battles here. Besides, it’s what’s inside that counts. We’ll start with the Halloween articles. I mean, I never read this crap but, hey, if it’s horror-related, I’m there! Let’s see…West Side Story, Bill O’Reilly, Gilda Radner, Jason Alexander, Peter Jennings… Ah, here we go - Jeri Ryan. Well, to be fair, it’s not really horror-related but there’s a cleavage shot and that automatically gets points with me. So, it’s a quick check of Ms. Ryan’s photos and onto… nothing. Nothing! Okay, so there are no Halloween-type articles. No biggie. After all, it’s what’s on the tube that really matters. I begin to peruse. Regular series do really cool things at Halloween. Especially, The Simpsons! Let’s flip right to Sunday at 8:00 and… Baseball? You’ve got to be %^$&ing kidding me! I check the FOX site and find that The Simpsons’ Halloween Special is going to be on… Tuesday, November 6th? Lovely! Why not just save it for Thanksgiving!?!?!? Add to that, in almost all cases, there are no synopses for the syndicated Simpsons so you can’t even tell if anyone is airing the old Simpsons Halloween Specials during the week. Oh, well, nothing I can do about it. Might as well stop whining and get back to checking out what the other series are serving up for Halloween, this year. Let’s see, My Wife And Kids… nothing! Inside Schwartz… nothing!! Bob Patterson… nothing!!! The Education Of Max Bickford… nothing!!! And that’s when I see something no man should ever have to see. The hair on the back of my neck stands and tries to run. My mouth goes dry and I can barely stir up enough saliva to moisten my already-rising scream. My testicles invert, hiding somewhere near my thorax. There, on page 141, smack dab in the middle of Tuesday, is a full-page ad. And – horror of horrors - filling that full-page ad, grinning like the cat that swallowed the… whatever… wearing a witch’s hat and holding a broom, is Christopher Lowell, letting us know that the Discovery Channel is running a Wicked Makeover Marathon, Tuesday from noon till 5:00PM. Now, I’m no doctor but, all at once, at that very moment, I know beyond the shadow of a doubt, that I have turned impotent. And it becomes perfectly clear to me that not even Charisma Carpenter, bare naked and slathered in Cheez-Wiz, could reverse this condition. Okay get over it, Beal, and move on. Shake it off! [Possibly the wrong phrase for a time like this.] Besides it’s time to check out the movies. Hey, there are oodles of movie channels. I’m sure there are plenty of tasty terrors this week. Saturday is off to a great start with Los Siete Vampiros de Oro. Must be some cool Mexican horror flick from the sixties. Man those movies rock! Let me see… Siete = Seven… Oro = Gold… Vampiros… Ah crap! It’s The Legend Of The Seven Golden Vampires – a Chinese/British co-production, now translated into Spanish for the Telemundo crowd! Don’t need that. Cool enough movie and Peter Cushing is in it but I got the DVD. Sunday… nothing. Monday… nothing. Tuesday... Finally I find something; a documentary about the Omen trilogy [I refuse to acknowledge #4!] on AMC. Man, AMC does great documentaries every year. So, that should be freakin’ amazing. Other than that… nothing! Wednesday – Halloween… NOTHING! Nothing on Halloween??? Oh, this just sucks out loud! Okay, that’s it. I can’t take it anymore. I might as well just throw on some DVDs and… and… And that’s when it hits me like an ice pick to the temple; after too many years of being the preferred choice of horror fans on and around Halloween, broadcast TV is a thing of the past. DVD is the new Prince Of Darkness. Think about it. A looooooooong time ago, movie theaters would run two or three-picture horror movie marathons the week of Halloween. I once saw Zombie, I Dismember Mama and Squirm at a Halloween show. Sadly, those marathons became a thing of the past in the mid-seventies. [It’s that freakin’ Star Wars’ fault!!!] And with only a handful of stations, TV showed almost non-stop horror movies the week of Halloween… Even PBS! So, whenever the horror-shock-a-thon ended at the local theater, you could rest assured that, no matter what time it was, some independent TV station in Botswana was showing The Blood Waters Of Doctor Z or Carnival Of Souls in glorious black and white and you could go to sleep terrified, but happy. Then came the eighties and video – both VHS and Beta. That was pretty cool. You could literally make your own movie marathons. Still, most of the intense Italian horror movies were cut to shreds while TV, to its credit, was still running some very cool Halloween fare. Remember when Michael Landon finally got sick of everybody wrongfully stating that he was embarrassed about his horror roots in I Was A Teenage Werewolf? That year, on his hit show Highway To Heaven, he reprised his roll in the episode, I Was A Middle-Age Werewolf. Whether you were a fan of that syrupy-sweet series or not, you had to admit that it was a really cool thing to do. TV had mighty good Halloween specials and even the occasional spooky made-for-TV horror flick, back then. So, video still wasn’t the place to be. The nineties saw the advent of Laserdiscs – they were a videophile’s wet dream. Most movies were loaded with extras and Don May’s Elite Entertainment started giving horror movies the respect they deserved. Oh sure, each disc weighed forty-seven pounds and you constantly had to get out of the hot tub to flip it over and, let’s not forget that extras-laden movies like Night Of The Living Dead, A Nightmare Before Christmas, Jaws and a few others were over one hundred dollars each! Now, I might not be living in a refrigerator box on a side street in Boca Raton but I’m sure as hell not going to choose between owning the Deluxe Edition of The Brain From Planet Arous and making my car payment! Still, while the 37 of us who actually bought laserdisc players were drooling over our Re-Animator Special Editions, AMC was showing great original documentaries, like Monstermania and Bride Of Monstermania and movies like The Curse Of Frankenstein, The Oblong Box, Haunted Palace and Curse Of The Mummy’s Tomb – all letterboxed – something that no money, at the time, could have bought us on laserdisc. So, although it was losing its grip, TV still had a few surprises up its glass sleeve. Now that we are in a new century, we finally have the best of all worlds: DVDs. [Can I here ya say Hallelujah?] There are hundreds of new releases each week for rental or for purchase. Sef and Marcela, at Oh The Horror! rent and sell almost nothing but horror DVDs. If you’re in South Florida, theirs is the place to go. But there are DVD rental stores all over the country – probably within hitchhiking distance of you, right now! Or you can go to any retail outlet and purchase both Dr. Phibes discs for around twenty-five bucks! The entire Halloween series is out on DVD. Most of the Friday The 13th movies, both Re-Animators, the Evil Dead trilogy, enough Argento, Raimi, Corman, Romero, Bava, Whale, Carpenter, Jackson, Hitchcock and Craven movies to make your chinos slippery. More discs than not have incredible extras like outtakes, featurettes, trailers, documentaries, running commentaries and so much more. I defy each and every one of you to listen to any of the Evil Dead commentaries with Bruce Campbell and Sam Raimi without making mookie stinks in your shorts. And AMC? Well, this year almost 100% of the movies they are showing are on DVD. Same with all of cable. Go ahead, check. Don’t take my word for it. Seeing as you’re reading this column, you’re probably DVDeviants already and I’m preaching to the choir. But just in case you’re not one of us, you need to be. Each day we realize that DVD is one hell of a religion. So pull up a comfy chair and join us. It’s either that or stay at home and watch Christopher Lowell. And if that’s your choice, you don’t deserve testicles anyway. D’Entre les Morts, Nick Beal PS: Happy Halloween /\|\^._.^/\|\

Nick Beal 01/24/02

2008-11-18T17:05:00.000-08:00

Movie News

Nick Beal

AliasNickBeal@aol.com

WARNING: My name is Nick Beal and opinions are my opinions. Sef and Marcela, the good folks at Oh, The Horror don't necessarily concur with all of my opinions. (Although everyone should.) My email address is AliasNickBeal@aol.com. So, if you disagree with anything I have to say, please feel free to write me or bite me!

NOOSE REPORT

CAN THE AUDIENCE TAKE “PAINKILLERS”?
Okay this one’s a bit wacky, even by Oh The Horror’s standards! French artist [and major nutbag] Orlan, who is most famous for using her body as art, recently reported that David Cronenberg’s next movie is entitled Painkillers. It centers around… um…. er…. you know, maybe you should just read Orlan’s exact quote:

"David Cronenberg wrote a movie called Painkillers, based on my treatise on "L'Art charnel" and the fight against pain. I will be playing my own role and I also know that Nicolas Cage will be part of the cast. As for when shooting will begin, I will know more about that during this year's Cannes Film Festival, where I will be presenting my work to the public".

Interesting. I mean, it certainly is Cronenberg’s cup of tea to shoot a flick about a woman who has had roughly ten plastic surgeries to achieve art status. Personally, I’d rather see Orlan hanging in a museum but I’d go see a Hello Kitty movie if Cronenberg directed it. So maybe I should just shut my pie hole, sit back and wait… Yeah, like that’s going to happen.
More soon.

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…BUT NOT WITHIN THE PACKAGE
In the crappy news department, Michael Felsher, an Anchor Bay spokesman, has issued the following statement:

"Monday, we were notified of an unexpected situation that is going to prevent us from including Within The Woods (the short film that inspired The Evil Dead) on our DVD. I do not have further details on that. However, this is not an attempt to hold the short back for another release of Evil Dead, down the line, or anything of that nature. Needless to say this is disappointing for us as I am sure it will be for the fans. As a result of this, Within The Woods is being removed from our packaging and website details, and will not be mentioned in any further ads or print material concerning our March 5th Evil Dead promotion. Unfortunately a few advertisements are already running that do mention Within The Woods. However, at this stage, we weren't able to
recall everything. In the end, we did everything we could to make Within The Woods happen. But, as many other studios have experienced, sometimes last-minute roadblocks can intervene when everything seems set in stone. We've never had an occasion where a feature of a DVD had to be dropped at such a late stage in the process, however we are 100% positive that this will not delay the street date, and that the Book Of The Dead will, regardless of this change, be a worthy and exciting release come March 5th".

You know, I’m torn on this one. I mean, the folks at Anchor Bay have been better to the horror fans than any of us could have ever hoped for. They release more great horror DVDs than anyone. So, in essence, they should also be given more slack than anyone else. But, with MGM, Synapse and [to a lesser extent] Elite always nipping at their heels, Anchor Bay needs to go that extra step to make sure this kind of thing doesn’t happen so often. With missing bits from Tenebrae, The Night Stalker and Manhunter [to name just a few] recalls on Opera, insulting releases like Night Of The Living Dead 30th Anniversary Edition and now this Book Of The Dead debacle, Anchor Bay should realize that, even though we love them like one of our children, sometimes children need to get a smack on the ass. “E” for effort, Anchor Bay. Now, go to your room… And don’t make me come up there!

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CASTLE KEEPERS
On March 12th, 2002, the good folks at Columbia are releasing three new-to-DVD thrillers from famed horror director, William Castle. Mr. Sardonicus, Homicidal and Strait-Jacket are set to join The Tingler, House On Haunted Hill [the good one] and 13 Ghosts [ditto] as part of Columbia’s William Castle Collection. All three will boast trailers and featurettes. Mr. Sardonicus is, by far, the spookiest but all are great fun when viewed late at night… might I suggest, in between brothel visits?

Add Anchor Bay’s still-in-print I Saw What You Did And I Know Who You Are and, really, all we’re waiting for now is The Night Walker to complete the DVD list of Castle’s most infamous spooktaculars. Oh, sure, there are still other William Castle flicks besides these [Macabre, Zotz!, etc.] but the above-mentioned are easily the most anticipated from us Castlemaniacs.

So, hey Universal, howzabout either pushing The Night Walker up a bit [seeing as you haven’t even gotten to House Of Dracula, The Raven and The Black Cat in your Classic Monsters Collection] or handing it over to Anchor Bay, like you saw fit to do with I Saw What You Did. They did a balls-out job with that one and I’m sure they’d treat The Night Walker right too. Columbia is treating William Castle fans very nicely. Your turn!

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DON’T YA JUST H8 THIS CRAP?

Hollywood’s latest divorce? Nope it’s not Tom and Drew. It’s the on-again/off-again cinematic affair between perpetual Halloween Producer Moustapha Akkad and clunker-meister director, Rick Rosenthal. Funniest of all, there are so many “official” press releases floating around, it’s now impossible to figure out what in the Blue Hell is going on.

Depending on what you read and where you read it, Halloween: The Homecoming is now retitled - either to Halloween 8 or Halloween: The End Of The Bogeyman. [The End? We should all be so lucky!]

Consider these statements: Director Rick Rosenthal was officially fired as director, by Moustapha Akkad, leaving the film unfinished and unpolished. [Hey, let’s be honest here - even if Rick Rosenthal stayed on, the film would have been left unpolished.]

So, that’s the “official” word… unless you read Moustapha’s press release, which states that “Yes, there were re-shoots - but no, Rick Rosenthal has not been fired.” [Re-shoots on a Rick Rosenthal Halloween movie???]

So, there you have it… Except that Rick Rosenthal now states that he actually quit over a dispute between himself and Moustapha Akkad.

But then there’s the Miramax camp that states that Rosenthal did get the axe and that Steve Miner was brought in to do massive re-shoots.

Until you listen to H8 screenwriter, Larry Brand who states that Rosenthal is on board and just finished an 83-minute first cut, and that it had tested extremely well.

Well, we might not know who’s directing this disaster but at least we know when we’ll get to see it. Miramax has stated that it’s going straight to video this October, period!

But rumor has it that Jamie Lee Curtis had the idea of saving it and re-shooting for a theatrical release. It's now slated for a late summer 2002 theatrical release. Miramax has just officially changed their minds and agree with the later summer 2002 theatrical release.

Except late word says that they might now hold out till 2003 because it's the 25th anniversary of the original film.

Miramax claims they are 100% behind the H8, which is good…

Until Larry Brand tells us that it was very hard to work at Miramax, and that they really have no interest in creating a quality film, which is bad. Brand claims that not only did Miramax edit out Michael's reason for bumping off the people in the house, they also took out a long subplot involving a character at the mental institution, where Laurie Strode is now living, who likes to dress as serial killers. Supposedly that’s how Michael gets into the compound to stalk Laurie. Allegedly, Miramax thought it would be more interesting to have him get in through an open gate. [Yeah, that’s original.]

There is only one thing everyone seems to be able to agree on, when it comes to Halloween 8; With Miramax having lost roughly 10 million in the shooting and re-shooting of H8, they are no longer interested in being a part of the franchise. Moustapha Akkad has stated for press that he wants nothing to do with Halloween sequels after this one is completed. Rick Rosenthal, obviously, will never be back to a Halloween set. So, it looks like those of us who have Halloween monkeys on our backs, who jones for anything with Michael Myers in it, will finally be able to get healthy. It looks like the long road that John Carpenter started building in 1978, has finally hit a dead end.

Unless H8 makes money. Then…

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BUT WAIT, THERE’S MORE!
Late word in: The teaser for Halloween: The Homecoming [Yes, that’s the freakin’ title I was given!] will be attached to this months theatrical horror thriller, The Mothman Prophecies, which comes out on Friday, the 25th. You don’t mind if I’m just a tad skeptical, right?

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LA ZONA MUERTA
Cable's USA Network has picked up The Dead Zone, a series adaptation of the Stephen King novel that had been on UPN's slate as a possible midseason entry.

USA picked up the completed two-hour pilot and ordered 22 episodes of the psychological thriller, which stars Anthony Michael Hall as a man who gains psychic powers after emerging from a coma. Nicole De Boer, Chris Bruno and John Adams co-star.

Production on the Lions Gate/Paramount series is expected to start in March, and it will likely premiere on USA in early summer.

"We are building the show from the pilot, and it will be a somewhat different show for USA than it would have been for UPN," said Jeff Wachtel, USA Network's exec VP of series programming. "We have a slightly older, broader target audience than UPN's younger viewers. So it will affect the creative balance.”

Anthony Michael Hall? Hey, don’t get me wrong, I like the guy… But is he playing another poor slob who gets psychic powers after coming out of a coma or is he playing the same Johnny Smith Christopher Walken played in Cronenberg’s movie? If it’s the latter, I gotta tell ya that I can’t see that happening in this lifetime. I mean Christopher Walken is in a league of his own when it comes to acting and Anthony Michael Hall can’t play Johnny Smith as well as Walken could. Hell, I’d bet Anthony Michael Hall can’t play Anthony Michael Hall as well as Walken could. Sorry, Tony, but you’re gonna have to prove yourself to me on this one. Good Luck.

FREE T-SHIRT: Ah, there’s good news tonight! The winner of our John Waters Pecker T-shirt is none other than Kathy McCord. That’s right, kids, Kathy knew that last column’s quote: “Who’s going to believe a talking head. Get a job in a sideshow.” was from one of the great low-budget horror efforts of the last quarter century; Re-Animator. Not only did Kathy know the right movie, she even managed to follow our simple directions. She sent her name and email address too! Kathy should get a gold star cause Lord knows I get enough correct answers that don’t contain the other major ingredients. We even had a correct answer sent to Sef. Unfortunately, that doesn’t fly because I don’t even tell Sef the correct answer. My personal favorite, though, was the reader who didn’t send his full name, didn’t send his email address but did send an answer… Unfortunately for him, it was the wrong one. Too bad, so sad.

Now, I am pleased as punch to tell you all that we have another great T-shirt, from John Waters’ Pecker to give away, courtesy of Amy Gorton of New Line. So, some of you goons actually get another chance. Remember, the shirt is an Extra Large so take a good, honest, look in the mirror before taking a guess. I’ve managed to come up with a quote that I think will make you send the hookers out for a bite and burn the midnight oil. Here goes:

QUOTE:

“I don’t want you to flee the room, here. I’m going to advance a weird Duchovnian riff. What if what we’re dealing with, here, is in fact… Vampires! Huh?”

Okay, class, remember you need to send your FULL NAME, your EMAIL ADDRESS and the CORRECT ANSWER. And don’t wait around forever, now. We’ll be picking a winner in two weeks. Anyone can play, [excepting Rhonda Phipps till 5/02 and Kathy McCord till 7/02] as I haven’t shared the source of the quote with anyone, including Sef or Marcela. Now, show me what you’re made of. Write me at AliasNickBeal@aol.com and tell me which frightful fear flick the above Quote is from… or don’t and I’ll be the shirtkeeper.

DISC-COVER-IES

We’ve all seen it – you’re perusing your new DVD cover and all of a sudden you read something like “After directing Star Wars, John Cleese began work on…” Suddenly, you realize that the people who design DVD, Laserdisc and video packaging are, a good part of the time, blithering idiots. Need proof? Well, every now and then, I‘m going to serve up the proof you so rightly deserve. Hey, who loves ya, baby? First up on your hit parade:

BURIED TREASURES

Out of the kindness of my heart, I’m going to toss a little extra your way in the form of an Easter egg. Now wipe that sloppy grin off of your face. I don’t mean a real Easter egg or a rich, creamy chocolate one, bursting with caramel goo... I mean a feature, hidden in certain DVD menus, that is sure to be more fun than a herd of flaming cows! All set? You’d better be.

Mars Attacks!
Warner Brothers still-funny-after-all-these-years, star-studded DVD of Mars Attacks [14480] has an Easter egg that really kicks asteroid. From the disc's MAIN MENU, go to SOUNDTRACKS. From there you get your choice of English, French, Spanish and Martian. Highlight MARTIAN and be taken to a menu featuring Martians that attempt to brainwash you. Of course, for most of my loyal readers, that brainwashing would be an effort in futility

Nick Beal 08/19/01

2008-11-18T17:04:00.002-08:00

Sunday, August 19, 2001

NOOSE REPORT:

ED GETS GREEN FOR RED
One of my big bad sources, Bevo, tells me that the rumors are true; Edward Norton has signed on to play former FBI Agent Will Graham, for director Brett Ratner in "Red Dragon" - a loose remake of the 1986 Michael Mann-helmed thriller, Manhunter. That version starred William Petersen ("CSI") as Graham and Brian Cox as the first screen incarnation of Hannibal Lecter. Anthony Hopkins has all but inked the contract to play Lecter for the third time, this November, for a summer 2002 release. Red Dragon was given the green light by Universal after Hannibal grossed more than $350 million worldwide for the studio and partner MGM. [350? We’re talking Oprah money here!] Well, Red Dragon is going to end up costing major bucks, so look for MGM to partner up with Universal yet again. That kind of commitment [spelled m-o-n-e-y] is probably going to be too much for either of the once-powerful studios to tackle alone. As with Manhunter, Red Dragon will be based on Thomas Harris’ novel, Red Dragon, published in 1981. Hey, guys, what about bringing Dennis Farina back as Jack Crawford? He would be a cool inside tie-in to Manhunter. Come on, howzabout a Farina fix!

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DAWN OF THE DEAD REMAKE? WELL, EAT ME!
They say that when the end of the world draws near, we will receive a sign. Well, that sign hit me like a machete to the head the other day when I learned that Beacon Communications is planning on remaking writer/director George Romero's 1979 horror classic "Dawn of the Dead."
But the news goes from bad to worse. It appears that Scooby-Doo scribe James Gunn will be handling the writing chores. Can anyone say, “Ru-Roh… Rombies!!!”
Now, I know what you’re thinking – give the guy a break! It could turn out like Savini’s version of Night Of The Living Dead. WRONG! Romero wrote Night Of The Living Dead (1990) and Savini had a real feel for the material. That movie is an underrated gem. This, on the other hand, is going to be more in the vein of the 30th Anniversary Edition Of Night Of The Living Dead. Remember that piece of badger turd? The new footage? The new music? Gee, fellas, why not crap on the Good Book next time you want to get blasphemous.
Now, of course, this time we won’t be going the Unrated route. Nope. Too much money at stake to go with anything but an R rating. Isn’t that a lovely thought?
So, who’s ultimately to blame for Beacon getting the rights to Dawn Of The Dead? Why the ultra-untalented Richard P. Rubinstein, who owns the rights. Ole Dick has been busy for the past few years having lawyers write “cease and desist” letters to kids who put Dawn Of The Dead photos on their websites. You see Dick hasn’t figured out that fans put up websites to promote their love for, and pay homage to, a film or group of films. He somehow can’t fathom the fact that the more websites there are to pay tribute to the properties he owns, the better it is for him. No, instead he feels that people who love Dawn Of The Dead should write about it but not show it. Nice!
So, unless the updated Dawn Of The Dead goes the way of Basic Instinct 2, get ready to use them old barf bags, kids. Unfortunately, this time, it won’t be because of the gore.

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JABBERWOCKY DVD NO LONGER A FANTASY!
So, you’re a Python fan but you’ve never seen Jabberwocky? Well, you’re not alone. [Of course, I saw it in the theater when it was first released, but I’m special... you’re not.]
Based on Lewis Carroll’s poem, Jabberwocky (duh) this eerie, funny, wacky Terry Gilliam fairy tale is finally coming to DVD, October 23rd, from Columbia TriStar Home Entertainment.
PLOT: After his father dies, Dennis Cooper (Michael Palin) travels to a far away kingdom, to seek his fortune. Unfortunately, for poor Dennis, this particular kingdom is in the grips of a horrible monster called The Jabberwocky. Will Dennis make his fortune? Will Dennis make it till the end of the week?
EXTRAS INCLUDE: the original theatrical trailer, sketch-to-screen comparisons, poster and photo gallery and, best of all, a running commentary by director; Terry Gilliam and star; Michael Palin. While I would have loved to see this great film given the multi-disc treatment it deserves, I’ll save my schoolgirl whining for another time.

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THE CASH IS OUT THERE
Well, it has been almost six months since Fox Home Entertainment released the third season of Fox & Dana’s X-cellent Adventures. With the X-Mas dollar days rapidly approaching, it’s time for The X-Files: The Complete Fourth Season. This will be another 7-disc box filled to the brim with digital masters of all 26 episodes and oodles of extras. The release date is November 13th [Lucky 13 for many of us!]
EXTRAS INCLUDE: an exclusive documentary, deleted scenes, interviews, something like four audio commentaries, and much more.
Hey, I hate to be a thorn in the side of X-Geeks everywhere but us grownups don’t have to save up money from our paper routes to buy these things. So, hey Fox, how about releasing these suckers three times a year instead of twice!

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TOP TEN TERROR TITANS [a/k/a: FANS’ FAVORITE FRIGHT FOES]
The Brit website only-movies.com recently polled their readers, [and we all know how painful that can be] asking who filmdom’s worst, or best bad guys are. Over 17,000 of you voted and here are your top ten choices:
1. Hannibal Lecter (Anthony Hopkins) - Silence Of The Lambs (1991), Hannibal (2001)
2. Darth Vader (David Prowse/James Earl Jones) - Star Wars (1977), Empire (1980), Jedi (1983)
3. Norman Bates (Anthony Perkins) - Psycho (1960)
4. The Sheriff of Nottingham (Alan Rickman) - Robin Hood, Prince Of Thieves (1991)
5. Annie Wilkes (Kathy Bates) - Misery (1990)
6. John Doe (Kevin Spacey) - Se7en (1995)
7. Freddy Krueger (Robert Englund) - A Nightmare On Elm Street (1984)
8. Cyrus The Virus (John Malkovich) - Con Air (1997)
9. Scorpio (Andrew Robinson) - Dirty Harry (1971)
10. Count Dracula (Christopher Lee) - The Horror Of Dracula (1958)
The Sheriff Of Nottingham? Number 4? Oh come on. The guy’s a lightweight! What about Willem Dafoe’s Bobby Peru in Wild At Heart or Nick Nolte’s Inspector Cray in NightWatch or Peter Cushing’s Sir John Rowan in Corruption or Barbara Streisand in… well, just about anything she’s done? Let’s face it, you want bad, you gotta go to Babs every time!

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VEIL ATTEMPT
Let’s hear it for the folks at Something Weird Video! Come September 11th, you’ll be able to rent or own one of the least seen projects in Boris Karloff’s long, illustrious career: The Veil. This ten-episode series pre-dated Thriller by two years and has only been available on video [big bucks] or truncated into three crappy TV anthology movies; Destination Nightmare, The Veil and Jack The Ripper. Finally, for a price that begs to be paid, this 2-disc set will include all ten episodes, starring the likes of Niall MacGinnis (Curse of the Demon), Patrick Macnee ("The Avengers"), Clifford Evans (Kiss of the Vampire), Robert Hardy (Psychomania) and even a young George Hamilton. [Yes, Virginia, at one time there was a young George Hamilton.] You’ll also be amazed at some of the directing talent afoot, highlighted by the likes of George Waggner (The Wolf Man) and Herbert L. Strock (I Was a Teenage Frankenstein). And with a running time of roughly 311 minutes, we can finally tear you away from the “Could The Thing Beat The Incredible Hulk In A Fair Fight” chat rooms. You know, you really need to get a life!

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BURIED TREASURES

Every now and then, out of the kindness of my heart, I’m going to toss a little extra your way in the form of an Easter egg. Now wipe that sloppy grin off of your face. I don’t mean a real Easter egg or a rich, creamy chocolate one bursting with caramel goo... I mean a feature, hidden in certain DVD menus, that is sure to make you squeal with delight. We’ll start off with an easy one for the DVD-challenged among us. Squeal, little piggies. Squeal!

The Texas Chainsaw Massacre
The Pioneer Special Edition of Tobe Hooper’s brilliant “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre” [DVD0123] has a nasty little hidden feature, guaranteed to give you a case of the slippery dirties. Hit the disc’s Main Menu and… and… and… just sit there. That’s right – nothing more to do. Approximately every minute or so, the title will start dripping blood and suddenly Leatherface will charge the screen, wielding his favorite landscaping tool. Spooky stuff! Don’t say I didn’t warn you.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

QUOTE:

“Yeah, they’re dead. They’re all messed up.”

I know, I know… I made this one for simpletons. That’s because I’m one Hell of a guy. Write me at AliasNickBeal@aol.com and tell me which deliciously evil fright flick this is from and I’ll mention your name in the next column… maybe.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
And now it's time for:

GET REEL!

These are my thoughts. Read them, print them, bind them, keep them and worship them like the epiphany they are.

PLANET OF THE APES & ROBIN, FOREVER
Director, Tim Burton is standing firm that there will be no sequel to his Boffo Box Office Blockbuster, Planet Of The Apes.
"The idea of doing a sequel -- I'd rather jump out of the window, I swear to God," Burton told Britain's Independent tabloid on Friday.
"They give you a script and you do a budget based on that, and say 'This movie will cost $300 million to make', and then they treat you like a crazy, overspending, crazy-person. It's like, 'Well, you gave me the script'," Burton blasted.
"I'm fascinated by the studio technique that sort of leaves you bloodied, beaten and left for dead right before you're supposed to go out and make a great movie for them. Then, the only time someone listens to anything you have to say is when you go ballistic and psychotic."

No sequel? No sequel! Well, that’s just great, Timmy! So, now, instead of having you spoon-feed me the explanation of that freakin’ ending, I have to try to figure it out for myself? You’re asking me to think? You bastard!

Thank God, Mr. Burton, that Hollywood still has scruples enough to make a sequel without the participation of the talented people who were originally attached to a mega hit. Thank God the studios only really care about the franchise names! They won’t leave us stranded like you are going to do. No, Mr. Burton, there will be a Planet Of The Apes sequel. Of course, Mark Wahlberg and Tim Roth said they would only do one if you were involved. Same with most of the other cast members. Yeah? Well screw ‘em all! You heard me - You can take all of your Wahlbergs, your Roths, your Bonham-Carters, your Clarke Duncans… even Rick Baker and jam them where the twin suns don’t shine!

So, you think I’m taking a rather cavalier attitude, Timmy? Yeah, well that’s because I just happen to have an ace in the hole. I’ve got two words for you and the I’m-not-doing-the-sequel vile you’re spewing. And those two words are; Joel Schumacher. So, now who’s the putz, Burton? I have Joel Schumacher! He was man enough to take your dark brooding Batman and bring him into the light where he belongs – surrounded by bright colors and wacky funtime music, just like he was in the sixties. My guess is that he’s man enough to do that to the Planet Of The Apes 2 and 3.

And Schumacher can get big-name stars too, Mr. Artsy-Fartsy Tim Burton!
First, it’s out with Wahlberg and in with Val Kilmer. Oh, sure, Schumacher stated, right after the Batman Forever shoot, that he’d never work with Kilmer again… But time heals, baby. Time heals!
So long to Helena Bonham Carter and howdy to Uma Thurman. As long as we can still kinda see the goods through the smock, there isn’t a guy in America who gives a rat’s ass.
Michael Clarke Duncan out – Arnold Schwarzenegger in. Yeah, there will be a bit of a height and accent discrepancy but, hey, if Hollywood Effects Wizards can make Kris Kristofferson talk, they can do anything!
Tim Roth? Bu-bye. Don’t let the hut door smack you on the bum on your way out. I see [fanfare please] Jim Carrey as Thade. That character was too much of a downer anyway. Jim is just the kind of actor needed to show Thade’s zanier side.

So you see, the list of big-time stars that are willing to work with Joel Schumacher is endless and that gives 20th Century Fox plenty of above-the-credits names to crow about. Oh, and the trading cards will be cool too. So there!

So, Timmy, why don’t you take your creative genius, your unique visions, your amazing directing style and go apply them somewhere else. The Planet Of The Apes franchise is in Joel Schumacher’s more-than-capable hands and we’ll be just fine, thank you.

Now, if we can just find away to cram Alicia Silverstone into a chimp suit...

D’Entre les Morts,
Nick Beal

Nick Beal 09/07/01

2008-11-18T17:04:00.001-08:00

Friday, September 07, 2001

JUST DUG UP

Hot Off The Press For You Newsers

I SEE DUMB PEOPLE

This just in… and it’s a doozy! Thirteen-year-old Haley Joel Osment, the child star who was nominated for an Oscar for his role in 1999's The Sixth Sense, believes that A.I.’s failure at the box office may be due to the fact that it‘s too advanced for people to cope with yet. But, he told reporters at the Venice Film Festival, he has no doubts it will be a classic in time.

"I think A.I. will mean a lot more in the future when we see that maybe some of the things perceived in the film maybe actually become real,” stated the diminutive thespian.

Really! Now, I realize I can be as slow as the next guy from time to time, so I just want to make sure I got this absolutely straight… A.I. was too advanced for me to grasp? I’m the problem with this muddled mass of wolf stench? Well, if you listen to HJO, we are all the problem with A.I. It wasn’t a crappy script or Steven Spielberg's lackluster direction or the fact that the film had seventeen-and-a-half endings. Nope, the simple reason A.I. tanked is that you and I are such idiots that the deep meaning and intent of this piece of celluloid snot went right over our collective heads.

So jot this down, film fans, I am predicting that sometime in the distant future, an advanced race of gummi-beings will traverse the frozen globe in their flying cubes. After much searching, they will find a long-dead Blockbuster Video and there, in the bargain bin, a previously viewed DVD of A.I. (hopefully one without too many extras) Upon viewing, they will deem it a cinematic classic and the perfect example of 21st century filmmaking at its very best.

Is my nose growing?

D’Entre les Morts,
Nick Beal

Nick Beal 10/02/01

2008-11-18T17:03:00.001-08:00

Tuesday, October 02, 2001

NOOSE REPORT

A SLAYER FOR YOUR PLAYER
Well it’s about damned time! The gang at Fox Home Entertainment has finally gotten off of their collective duff and set a street date of January 15, 2002 for Buffy The Vampire Slayer: The Complete First Season. This three-disc set includes a full-length Joss Whedon audio commentary on "Welcome to Hellmouth", Joss Whedon interviews on six episodes, an additional interview with Whedon and actor David Boreanaz, (charge up the batteries, girls!) a trailer or two, a photo gallery, the "Welcome to Hellmouth" script and a bunch more! It retails for $39.95, so get ready to drive a stake through those piggy banks, little buddies. You know, add this to The Simpsons, Planet Of The Apes, The X-Files, M*A*S*H, The Alien Legacy… and even a talent agent can see that those wacky kids at Fox have become the Boxed-Set Gods! Now, whom do I have to bend over for to get you guys to release the Millenium Box next?

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MAD ABOUT MAX

And speaking of bigtime January releases… You had better hope that Santa fills your stockings with cash this year or that mom starts hooking again because a mere week before Buffy: Season One hits the street, Mad Max returns to DVD – yeah, like that first piece-of-crap Orion release counted! Well this time, MGM is doing it up right in the form of a Special Edition. The biggest news is that this release is complete with Mel Gibson's original Aussie audio track, not the dubbed version previously heard in the good ole U S of A! But wait, there’s more; there’s the brand-new anamorphic widescreen transfer, new 5.1 audio remix, two documentaries, an audio commentary with Special Effects Coordinator Chris Murray, Cinematographer David Eggby, and Production Designer Jon Dowding, a trailer and a buttload of other goodies. Equally amazing is the fact that Mad Max: The Special Edition will retail for only $19.99! Isn’t that less than what the first release listed for?

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POTA SEQUEL UPDATE:
At the time of this writing, Joel Shulmaker isn’t attached to the 2002 still-unnamed sequel to this year’s 20th Century Fox blockbuster, Planet Of The Apes.

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HALLOWEEN 2 X 4
Well, Halloweenies, Rick Rosenthal has allegedly done it again! Rumor has it that Dimension is so unhappy with Halloween 8: Homecoming it has ordered three weeks of reshoots for January. That means that we won’t see H8:H until sometime around Easter. And at that time of year, Moustapha Akkad better hope we don’t all decide to Passover this probable dud.
Well, to be honest, it’s not really Rosenthal’s fault that he keeps screwing the cinematic pooch. Let’s face it, if producers keep hiring him, they deserve what they get… or don’t get, in this case. And Moustapha Akkad has absolutely no excuse, here! After all, he was the one who hired Rosenthal to direct Halloween 2 and that shoot was a legendary cluster-boff. In fact, H2’s first cut was so bad that John Carpenter came in to shoot or reshoot most of the stuff that made Halloween’s first sequel a memorable one. Well, you can bet your ass Carpenter isn’t going to do the Cavalry thing again, this time. So with rumors flying that Rosenthal is either leaving the production on his own or getting kicked out on his less-than-talented ass, this looks like one of those films that’s destined to become an Alan Smithee production.
As if the boning of H8:H isn’t bad enough, Rosenthal is one of the major reasons that Universal’s new Halloween 2 DVD is no-frills – he decided not the do the audio commentary on what could have been an extremely interesting package. Let’s see… Goodtime’s out-of-print, no-frills Halloween 2 disc in the cut-out bin at Suncoast for $9.99 or Universal’s new no-frills Halloween 2 disc for $24.95. Do we need to take out our abacus, students? I think not!

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SON OF A PITCH

Slab o’ meat, Vin Diesel will earn just slightly more than $11 million to star as the title character in Pitch Black 2: The Chronicles of Riddick. Universal Studios is banking on PB2 to be the highlight of their summer 2003 schedule. The highlight?

The Vin-meister decided to pass on playing the title role in Fox’s Daredevil, an adaptation of the Marvel Comics comic book series about a blind man who becomes a superhero. This news alone should make Marvel fanboys squeal with delight, as Diesel would have probably been way over his head playing a multi-faceted character like Daredevil.

While the original Pitch Black turned a tidy profit for Universal, they sure weren’t paying anyone $11 million, back then. No need to fear, though, if Pitch Black 2 fails at the Box Office, ole VD can always star as the lead in Ego Boy… That’s a comic book, right?

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LOST IN A FOG

MGM has yanked John Carpenter’s ghost story The Fog from its 2001 DVD release schedule. Oh, stop whining! It’s a good thing.

Those of you who weren’t into laserdiscs [I, of course, was] have no idea what a tasty package Image/New Line put together a few years back. The Fog laserdisc included a running commentary with John Carpenter and Debra Hill, Carpenter’s score isolated on a separate audio track, a theatrical trailer, television spots and an outtake reel!

Not to be outdone, [I hope!] MGM Home Entertainment has arranged to release The Fog in 2002, as a full-blown Special Edition with a mess of extras.

My source at MGM didn’t know the fine details, which means that along with remaining nameless, he will remain payoff-less. [Time for a new snitch. Any takers?] Anyway, while MGM will now own the video elements such as trailers, TV spots, outtakes, etc., Image still owns The Fog’s audio commentary track because they paid for it – making their laserdisc package that much juicier.

Carpenter is less-than-enthusiastic about re-recording commentaries so, as I see it, MGM has two choices; either cough up the bucks for Image’s Carpenter/Hill audio track or create a Director-less/Producer-less commentary track with the top-notch cast The Fog boasts. I mean, really! I’ll take Jamie Lee Curtis, Adrienne Barbeau, Janet Leigh, Hal Holbrook, Tom Atkins, Charles Cyphers, Nancy Loomis and Rob Bottin on an audio track over another flat Carpenter commentary any ole time! Let’s face facts, the Vampires audio commentary sucked! Come to think of it, so did Vampires!

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THAT’S A WRAP, TONY

Ah, there’s good news tonight! I don’t have much info on this one but it looks like George Romero’s next film is well into pre-production and fan-fave Tom Savini has been contacted to play a role in it. The flick’s name is The Assassination. The whispers are that the film will star Anthony Quinn, Ed Harris, and, oh God help me, Ricky Martin.

As Mr. Quinn has been dead for some time now, I’m guessing this information might be a tad on the outdated side. I’ll let you know if and when George comes to his senses and gives Ricky the boot.

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BURIED TREASURES

Out of the kindness of my heart, I’m going to toss a little extra your way in the form of an Easter egg. Now wipe that sloppy grin off of your face. I don’t mean a real Easter egg or a rich, creamy chocolate one bursting with caramel goo... I mean a feature, hidden in certain DVD menus, that is sure to make you happier than a maggot in road kill. Ready? Let’s rock!

Suspiria
Anchor Bay Entertainment’s stunning release of Dario Argento's Suspiria [DV11610] includes an amazingly cool hidden feature.
From the Main Menu, go to the Extras Menu and press the remote’s right arrow key. This highlights one of the peacock feathers and that will launch an hysterical outtake showing Horror God, Udo Kier driving the soundman bug-doody as he rakes his fingernails across a Styrofoam cup. Oh, the fun they have.

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QUOTE:

“Listen to them... Children of the night. What music they make.”

Okay, this is the last easy one I’m giving you. So, write me at AliasNickBeal@aol.com and tell me which deliciously evil fright flick this is from and I’ll mention your name in the next column… maybe.

LAST COLUMN’S QUOTE: “Yeah, they’re dead. They’re all messed up.”
Kathy McCord of TN was the first reader to get back to me with the correct answer: Night Of The Living Dead. Way to go! They’re coming to get you, Kathy.

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And now it’s time for:

GET REEL!

These are my thoughts. Read them, print them, bind them, keep them and worship them like the epiphany they are.

WILL THE REAL JOE PLEASE SHUT UP
On September 11th, We The People took one hell of a sucker punch in the gut. Four large planes slammed into Towers 1 and 2 of The World Trade Center, The Pentagon and a patch of American soil in rural Pennsylvania. Thousands of unsuspecting people died that black morning. Thousands of flames were extinguished. And now, thousands of stories may never be told. All because a large group of twisted bastards thought their God would accept this kind of sub-human behavior! Of course, they missed the real mark. They didn’t get it and they never will. By trying to tear us apart, they succeeded in bringing us together. And trust me, fellas, the last thing you want breathing down your necks is a pissed off United America. But I don’t need to tell you that. You’re going to learn soon enough. We promise.

Now, I know what you’re thinking – Hey, Beal, you’re supposed to be writing about horror movies. So what does all of this have to do with horror movies? Nothing. NOTHING! Did you hear that Senator Joseph McCar… err, I mean Senator Joseph Lieberman? This had NOTHING to do with scary horror movies or bloody video games or spooky novels or monster magazines or anything like that. These murdering scums of the Earth didn’t sit and play Evil Dead: Hail To The King to learn how to perform these evil deeds. They played Microsoft Flight Simulator! And chances are pretty damned good that these cowardly sons of whores didn’t sit around watching The Texas Chainsaw Massacre or Halloween or Re-Animator, either. They were too busy learning how to kill innocent men, women and children.

America is the greatest nation on Earth. These assholes are not going to stop us from keepin’ on keepin’ on. We are going to kick us some terrorist ass and then we are going to get back to our lives. Which means, Senator Lieberman, that you are eventually going to get back to your personal crusade against all things horror. Maybe on your way back up the high horse, you’ll think back to September 11, 2001 and realize that nothing you sought to censor or take away altogether would have made a damned bit of difference to the roughly 7,000 people who lost their lives that day. For your future edification, horror movies are among the most moral tales that are told. Almost without exception, the good guys win and the bad guys lose. And horror fans are, for the most part, extremely moral, honest and passionate people. So if things ever get back to normal and you find yourself bored and in search of a quest, why don’t you try going after the real bad guys and leave the horror fans alone. We don’t deserve it!

D’Entre les Morts,
Nick Beal

Nick Beal 10/18/01

2008-11-18T16:58:00.000-08:00

Thursday, October 18, 2001

EJS 3/14/26 – 10/21/00

NOOSE REPORT

PLAY MST FOR ME
My good pals at Rhino are releasing two more Mystery Science Theater 3000 DVDs, November 20th, just in time for the holidays. Even better, they’ve been good enough to release two of my personal favorites; Manos: Hands Of Fate and Mitchell. These are two titles guaranteed to give you happy pants.

Now, never let it be said that Nick Beal looks a gift horse in the mouth but… WHY THE HELL ONLY TWO??? Jeez, guys and gals, you’ve got a shipload of those titles out on VHS. So, why the holdup on DVD? What, us DVDeviants don’t deserve special treatment? Are we or are we not better than Tapeheads? Of course we are! So, all you have to do to please us is to slack off of your VHS titles and start burning them discs. After all, the last thing you want is a bunch of Pissy MSTies on your hands.

Torgo Rules!

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TO BOLDLY BLOW, WHERE NO SONG HAS BLOWN BEFORE!
Where the Hell is Alexander Courage when you need him? Or, for that matter, where the Hell are James Horner, Jerry Goldsmith, Leonard Rosenman… Will anyone who has ever written music for any of the Star Trek series or movies PLEASE start writing! Star Trek needs you, Trekkers need you, Earth needs you, and [dare I say it] The Federation needs you!

Why, you ask?

Disgusted Trekkers are gathering online by the thousands to sign petitions demanding the removal of ''Faith of the Heart,'' the power ballad that serves as the theme music for the latest Star Trek series, Enterprise. Oh, and by the way, yes, that’s the same “Faith Of The Heart” that Rod Stewart crooned during the end credits of the Robin Williams stinkburger, Patch Adams. Only this time, Rod “the Mod” isn’t the one belting out those dulcet tones. This time the dishonor goes to Russell Watson, who sounds just like Stewart - so why even bother?

Look, I am a fan of Enterprise and the Trekkers are right… “Faith Of The Heart” hyper-sucks! It is as wrong a decision as one could ever make. I grok that the producers of Enterprise are trying to distinguish this series from others in the franchise. [Hell, they don’t even use the words Star Trek in the title!] But this is clearly the wrong way to go. Enterprise is a gray metallic adventure series that takes place before transporters were a safe mode of travel and it deserves a powerful, orchestrated, theme song, not the Sci-Fi equivalent of Kiss’ “Beth”.

So, I’m going to help you do the right thing and sign the petition. Just go to: >Lose The Enterprise Theme Song Petition! to help reverse this ridiculous decision and get a proper theme song for this series. By signing, you’ll help our economy too. You see, Trekkers are spending a lot of time on this petition thing. And it’s taking them away from putting the finishing touches on their Playmates action figure collections, stopping them from ordering 4XL Captain Kirk gold uniform shirts, purchasing the new, unabridged Klingon Dictionary (updated to include Klingon square dance terms) and so many other super-important Trek-related items. Without those Trekker bucks, Paramount will lose valuable income from their Star Trek licensing fees and they will have to pay series writers less than the legendary industry-low writing fees they have always paid Star Trek writers. I don’t need to tell you that when the scripts go south, it’s not long before we have a sucky David Gerrold Tribbles episode creep into Enterprise… and, trust me, NOBODY wants that!

Live long and sign the damned petition, already!

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LYNCH MOB
David Lynch, whose new film, Mulholland Dr. hits theaters, wide, tomorrow, has signed on as the Executive Producer of Cabin Fever - a thriller about five isolated friends who contract a deadly flesh-eating virus. [Oh, this should be timely and fun!]

The picture will star Michael Rosenbaum [Smallville], Jordan Ladd [Embrace Of The Vampire] and James DeBello [Scary Movie 2]. The independently financed pic is slated to begin shooting Oct. 29 in High Point, N.C.

Cabin Fever marks the feature writing and directing debut of Eli Roth, a protégé of Lynch's. The two met while Roth was shooting his NYU thesis film Restaurant Dogs, which won a 1995 student Academy Award. Since then, Roth has worked with Lynch on his Web site, http://www.DavidLynch.com/.

Holy gee gosh, a website designer! Quick, let’s sign ‘im to Episode 3!

NOTE TO ELI ROTH: Hey, Skippy, you’re working for one of the few guys in H’wood who actually has talent… Don’t bone it up!

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TIME TUNNEL AFTER TIME TUNNEL
On the latest TV rumor front, The Time Tunnel is supposedly headed back to television -- but whether the remake ends up at ABC or FOX is now the subject of a battle between the two networks. Both ABC and FOX have made big bucks offers for the rights to the project, which is being put together by writer Rand Ravich [Candyman: Farewell To The Flesh] and director Todd Holland [Twin Peaks, Eerie Indiana] via Regency Television and 20th Century Fox Television.

ABC's initial offer is said to be significantly higher than FOX's bid. [Remember, we’re talkin’ M-i-c-k-e-y Money here!] Each network has offered to commit to a pilot with a cash penalty if the project is not taken to series. In addition, industry insiders report that ABC has also made a 13-episode commitment to Time Tunnel, along with a higher cash penalty. FOX is apparently willing to match ABC's bid. ABC executives, however, have already signaled their willingness to improve substantially upon their original offer -- but are now worried, for damned good reason, that Regency/20th are trying to ensure the project lands at FOX, a sibling of 20th Century Fox. In most cases, FOX would have first crack at Time Tunnel, but because the estate of series creator Irwin Allen co-owns the rights to the series, 20th and Regency are required to get fair market value for the project.

The Time Tunnel will be updated from the original 1966 science fiction/adventure series, which revolved around two young scientists working on a secret government project that allows them to travel back and forward in time via a large cone that looks suspiciously like a Bugles corn chip [Now, with half the fat!] Kevin Burns [Fantasy Worlds Of Irwin Allen, Behind The Planet Of The Apes] joins Jon Jashni and Sheila Allen, [Irwin Allen's widow] as Executive Producers.

One question: WHY? Now, look, I was as big an Irwin Allen fan as you’re likely to find. But The Time Tunnel was easily Allen’s worst 60’s Sci-Fi series. It was barely more than a good excuse to use the studio’s huge library of stock footage and props left over from other series. The history lessons it taught were, at best, distorted and thank God for that! Let’s face it, inject enough real history in this thing and it becomes as exciting as a Thorazine drip. So, if I were you, I’d hope The Time Tunnel becomes “history” before it even gets off the ground.

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POTA2 UPDATE:
20th Century Fox has yet to announce Joel Schumacher’s involvement with the still-to-be-named Planet Of The Apes sequel.

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WTC IN “AI”, OK

DreamWorks has no plans to remove the twin towers of the World Trade Center from two brief shots for the DVD release of A.I. Artificial Intelligence. Before the announcement, there had been some speculation that the twin towers might be removed from the film in the wake of the September 11th terrorist attacks, but word from DreamWorks is that the film will remain intact. A spokesperson for DreamWorks stated, "They're seen 2,000 years into the future. Who knows what will be built in the future?"

Listen, after seeing AI, I am fiercely certain that Spielberg has no concept, whatsoever, of what will take place in the future. But leaving the twin towers in DVD versions of AI seems like a good idea to me. Actually, if I might be bold enough to make an artistic suggestion, take the money you would have spent removing the WTC from AI and put it to good use removing a few of the many endings we all had to suffer through. Better yet, hold off on the DVD until you see whether or not the towers are going to be rebuilt and make your decision then. This way, everybody wins!

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BURIED TREASURES:

Out of the kindness of my heart, I’m going to toss a little extra your way in the form of an Easter egg. Now, wipe that sloppy grin off of your face. I don’t mean a real Easter egg or a rich, creamy chocolate one bursting with caramel goo... I mean a feature, hidden in certain DVD menus, that is sure to make you happier than a pig on Mason Verger. Ready? Punch it, Chew-meister!

Killer Klowns From Outer Space

On MGM Home Entertainment’s Midnite Movies fun-tastic release of Killer Klowns From Outer Space [1002350] you can find two egg-citing hidden extras.

This is a stupid-easy one, for those of you who are too lazy to drag your butts off of the couch, let alone have to think or press remote buttons! Simply insert the disc and don’t touch anything. After the Main Menu has been running for 3 to 5 minutes, a new 'Easter Eggs' menu screen will come up, which gives you access to KLOWN AUDITIONS, a funny 3-minute video segment that shows how the Klowns worked on their walks before going in front of the camera and also an ALTERNATE SCENE in which actor John Vernon is duped - replacing his line 'Holy Shit' with 'Holy Smoke' for TV audiences. So, stay away from the man with the popcorn bucket on his lap and enjoy the show!

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QUOTE:

“You’re crazy to know who I am, aren’t you? Alright… I’ll show you!”

Okay, this is really the last easy one I’m giving you. Next time, no more Mr. Nice Guy! So, write me at AliasNickBeal.com and tell me which devilishly clever fear flick this is from and I’ll mention your name in the next column… maybe.

LAST COLUMN’S QUOTE: “Listen to them... Children of the night. What music they make.”
Janet Hilton of NJ was the first reader to get back to me with the correct answer: Dracula. Nice one, Janet! Thanks for sticking your neck out.

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And now it’s time for:

GET REEL!

These are my thoughts. Read them, print them, bind them, keep them and worship them like the epiphany they are.

OF PARAMOUNT IMPORTANCE TO HAMMER FANS: AN OPEN LETTER
What do Hammer Studios classics The Man Who Could Cheat Death, Frankenstein And The Monster From Hell and Captain Kronos; Vampire Hunter have in common? They are all owned by Paramount Home Entertainment. This leaves Hammer fans to wonder if and when these three Hammer Horrors will ever see the light of day on DVD.

Anchor Bay has been balls-out fantastic to Hammer fans, releasing around 30 videos and DVDs of Hammer’s best - most of them loaded with discloads of extras. And Anchor Bay has promised there are even more to come. A few other home entertainment companies have released a spattering of Hammer titles on DVD too, adding to the growing list of titles produced by England’s greatest studio.

But Paramount Home Entertainment has had a stank-butt history bringing these three must-have horrors to the home video market. The Man Who Could Cheat Death has aired occasionally on cable’s Cinemax and Captain Kronos; Vampire Hunter was released on video, fullscreen, using a lackluster print with muted colors. But the worst offence of all was Paramount’s video release of Frankenstein And The Monster From Hell through their Gateway label at [Oh, dear God, give me strength] the SLP speed! Now, that alone would have been bad enough, but Paramount’s fullscreen print was cut to ribbons. That’s right, gang, my copy of FATMFH, taped in the early nineties off of the USA Network, runs longer! How totally embarrassing is that?

“So”, you ask, “What can I do?” Well, seeing as you’re sitting on your hindquarters at the computer, anyway, you can email or write to Paramount and tell them that if they burn it, you will buy! Their address is:
Paramount Home Entertainment
5555 Melrose Ave.
Los Angeles, CA 90038-3197
Telephone: 213-956-5000
Fax: 213-956-1100
E-Mail: 5555@paramount.com
E-Mail: webmaster@paramount.com
Web Site: http://www.paramount.com/

Now listen, geniuses, don’t start your letters Dear Spit-For-Brains, Dear Blithering Idiots, Dear Mental Midgets, Dear Jiminy Cricket-Pest Bastards… While all are excellent examples of the kind of people we’re dealing with, here, chances are your letter will not reach its intended audience if you are all rude and obnoxious about it. What is the old adage? You can get more with honey than with an M-16… or something like that. Write a concise, intelligent letter asking the good folks at Paramount to add these terrific Hammer horror films to their 2002 Halloween DVD list and then promise, triple-cross your heart, hope to die, stick whatever you want wherever you want, to buy all three titles the same day they are released. If you’d like, compliment them on their Sleepy Hollow DVD, with all of the extras or the Star Trek IV Director’s Series DVD. You see, these guys at Paramount need prodding. They hardly ever release DVDs with extras beyond the now-standard theatrical trailer. Enough positive endorsements of the DVDs they’ve released with extras and they might actually get the hint. Tell them you’re really looking forward to the Star Trek TMP Deluxe Edition. You get the idea – STROKE THEM! And maybe, just maybe, Paramount will come across with some tasty DVD packages and finally get off of my poop list.

Oh, one more thing… Hey, Universal, don’t think you’re going to get away lightly on this. Some of us remember that you released Nightmare, Kiss Of The Vampire, Phantom Of The Opera, Paranoiac, Evil Of Frankenstein, Brides Of Dracula, Curse Of The Werewolf and other Hammer creepers on laserdisc [some in widescreen] a few years back. Since then, your only Hammer DVD has been Kiss Of The Vampire and that one adds new meaning to the words “no-frills”. I know you’re busy putting out your excellent Universal Classic Monsters Collection [The Black Cat sometime before I die, please?] but fans deserve to have beautiful transfers of the Hammer classics in your library and I’m going to ride you like a dime-store pony until you serve ’em up! Oooooooooooo, sounds like fun!

D’Entre les Morts,
Nick Beal