Hello, pals.Lars recently moved his Weird Wednesday weekly blog to this format, and he says it was a good idea. Since we both so enjoy embracing modern technology, I decided I'd do the same. So welcome to the new Terror Thursday weekly newsletter, where socially stunted cro-mags like ourselves will digitally convene to discuss the finer points of unwanted cinematic garbage!
This will all be starting the week after this, as I'll be out of town on the TROLL 2: NILBOG INVASION Alamo Roadshow event, and will be missing this Thursday's screening of CREEPERS (thanks for filling in, Lars!)
In the meantime, I'd like to present our brand stabbin' new Terror Thursday line-up for July and August, filled with bona fide humdingers. Please feel free to "comment" and tell me what you think!
Witness!:
HOWLING 2: WEREWOLF BITCH
July 3 Midnite, Free, Dir. Philippe Mora, 1985, 35mm, 91 min, R
This magnificently crippled sequel maintains none of the storyline, characters or logic from the preceding film. The plot and dialogue are so jumbled that it feels like segments have been removed at random. Despite the fact that it’s an American production, the whole affair seems badly translated and poorly dubbed. BUT...no other movie features one tenth the relentless onslaught of new wave lycanthropic mayhem you’ll find here! The titular antagonist is Stirba, an immortal she-wolf played by equally ageless ass-kicking plastic actress Sybil Danning, who has decided to gather an international pack together to assume domination of puny ol’ humankind. Enter monster hunter Steven Crosscoe, played by the legendary Christopher Lee; in devo glasses, no less. He’s aided by Transylvania’s anti-wolf force, which mainly consists of old men with torches and a very high-strung dwarf whose eyeballs later explode. As if that’s not enough, watch for magic beams, papier-mache heads and Mickey from PEEWEE’S BIG ADVENTURE having 3-way werewolf sex. (Zack)
THE DEADLY SPAWN
July 10 Midnite, Free, Dir. Douglas McKeown, 1983, 35mm, 81 min, R
Remember the days when a mouse was a small mammal instead of a computer component? Long for the days when effects artists used latex to create monsters and Karo syrup for blood instead of pixels and green screens? Then we’ve got a movie for you! Join us as we bask in the crimson glow of one of the most grandma-gnawingly, girlfriend-decapitatingly, ALIEN rip-offingly awesome movies to come out of the ‘80s…THE DEADLY SPAWN!! Born not of this world, an alien’s deadly spawn makes Earth its personal buffet and terrorizes a house full of unsuspecting kids, the youngest using his knowledge of horror films and Famous Monsters magazine to ward off these intergalactic eating machines. As close to perfect as a monster movie made for less than the price of a new Hyundai can be. You may want to steal an extra set of eyes so you can watch this twice! (Written by Justin, who has an actual gigantic DEADLY SPAWN tattoo!)
THE UNSEEN
July 17 Midnite, Free, Dir. Danny Steinmann, 1981, 35mm, 89 min, R
Horror films truly succeed when they can unlock the darkest places in our psyche. THE EXORCIST and the original version of THE HAUNTING are timeless because they prey on fears shared by untold numbers of people. But THE UNSEEN is the only film that dares tap into the universal root of all mankind’s deepest terrors: A Fat Retarded Guy in a Diaper. ANIMAL HOUSE’s Stephen Furst courageously portrays Junior, an animalistic cellar-dwelling schlub who loves his teddy bear only slightly more than the flesh of tortured women. But he’s not the only beast on display in this filth-caked morality-free incest bomb from the director of SAVAGE STREETS! Barbara Bach stars, having familiarized herself with hideous human monstrosities via her real-life marriage to Ringo Starr that very same year. (Zack)
PUMPKINHEAD
July 24 Midnite, Free, Dir. Stan Winston, 1988, 35mm, 86 min, R
This movie details exactly why I don’t piss off single dads that hang out with witches. Monumentally undervalued character actor Lance Henriksen plays Ed Harley, a hard luck ruralite whose adorable son Billy is fatally mangled by carousing teen tourists. If this story was shot in 1977, that type of offense would call for some serious shotgun vengeance. But in the late-’80s-tainted hands of special effects wizard/first time director Stan Winston, retribution takes the form of a ten-foot tall demonoid conjured by hillbilly sorcery and thirsty for young blood. And this isn’t your everyday towering hellcritter; Winston’s gargantuan white trash boogeyman cuts through the bayou fog with all the nigh-Lovecraftian rage of a dozen tentacled beasts drunk on Stroh’s. (Zack)
PRISON
July 31 Midnite, Free, Dir. Renny Harlin, 1988, 35mm, 102 min, R
Long before he lowered the national IQ with CGI sharks, Renny Harlin was a director of movies. And though he’d increasingly avoid quality through the remainder of his career, the power of his lone masterpiece PRISON is undeniable. Viggo Mortensen (!) stars as freshfaced convict Burke, one of hundreds of inmates to be relocated to a maximum security prison haunted by a vengeful, omnipotent force that will stop at nothing short of total annihilation. To dismiss the entity as a “ghost” would be like referring to Eric Clapton as “white”... this paranormal maniac is pure spectral evil unleashed, using every method possible to rend all life from the face of the earth. Witness countless creative fatalities as cops and cons alike are broiled, decapitated, lacerated, mutilated, fileted, electrocuted and sliced to ribbons by autonomous razorwire! Not recommended to anyone who respects police or human beings. (Zack)
SLITHIS
Aug 7 Midnite, Free, Dir. Stephen Traxler, 1978, 35mm, 86 min, PG
Los Angeles is a shitty place. In fact, Southern California’s golden hub carries such a legacy of toxicity that it was only a matter of time before Nature fired back. Enter the Slithis, a shambling radioactive behemoth that prowls the choked waterfronts of Venice and works its way up the food chain from lapdogs to bipedal meat. Thank christ that local high school journalism teacher Wayne Connors is hot on the monster’s heels, aided by an assortment of equally useless schmucks including a racist scuba diver, a woman named Jeff and a clearly inebriated biologist that lives in a geodesic dome. But of all of Connors’ dud cohorts, the blazing inferno comes in the swap meet-caliber performance/mental breakdown from spastic bit-parter Hy Pyke as the furious police chief, who I can only compare to a rabid Danny DeVito snorting ground-up infant spinal cord from a shotgun barrel. (Zack)
LASERBLAST
Aug 14 Midnite, Free, Dir. Michael Rae, 1978, 35mm, 85 min, PG
It’s often said that absolute power corrupts absolutely, but an absolutely powerful alien laser cannon will - in addition - transform you into a drooling, green-skinned, unbearable subhumanoid butthole. Case in point: young Billy Duncan, a bullied teen who stumbles upon said intergalactic megaweapon and almost immediately unleashes a rampage of vaporizations and bedlam in his humble desert community. With each laserblast, Billy further mutates into a gloating killing machine, bent on taking out his years of bitter struggle on anyone in his path. This is exactly the type of movie that you saw on Channel 9 when you were in second grade and later disregarded as a Snickers-fueled nightmare. With much impotent hand-wringing from girlfriend Cheryl Rainbeaux Smith and a local professor (Roddy McDowall in obvious need of a car payment), but most excitingly the Terror Thursday return of lord nerd supreme Eddie Deezen from SURF 2 as “Froggy”! (Zack)
DEAD & BURIED
Aug 21 Midnite, Free, Dir. Gary Sherman, 1981, 35mm, 92 min, R
The sheriff of a sleepy New England town makes all kinds of exaggerated upset faces when the local populace begins engaging in mass homicide. It seems that every other citizen in Potter’s Bluff is in on the dirty doin’s, including Robert “Freddy” Englund, all-American dreamgirl Lisa Blount and a charmingly feeble 90-year-old undertaker who couldn’t be more pleased by the sudden increase in his revenue. Though the film unfolds with Ray Bradbury-esque fairytale weirdness, there’s more than a few bucketfuls of shocking gore, including a downright brain-curdling meeting between a hypodermic needle and an eyeball. Director Sherman is the genius behind the mighty RAW MEAT and the equally grimy VICE SQUAD, but teamed with veteran effects maniac Stan Winston and screenwriter Dan O’Bannon of ALIEN and RETURN OF THE LIVING DEAD fame, he becomes a rampaging geyser of heart-crushing terror. Seriously. (Zack)
10 TO MIDNIGHT
Aug 28 Midnite, Free, Dir. J. Lee Thompson, 1983, 35mm, 99 min, R
Everyone already knows that only two perfect things have ever happened in this goddamned world: Charles Bronson and horror movies. The idea of both of them colliding will send any sane person into dangerously violent entertainment seizures, but we’re so excited about this film that we’re willing to risk your life. Though Bronson’s masculine image immediately lands any of his films in the Action category, 10 TO MIDNIGHT is undeniably an ‘80s slasher masterpiece. A maladjusted young man falls into the habit of stripping to his birthday suit and stalking his female classmates. This soon leads to gruesome murder, and we’re treated to many shots of a naked maniac tearing people into shredded gristle. The only man who can stop him is...well, I’ll let you guess, but here’s a hint: He’s about ten million times meaner than a bag of Satans and he’ll shoot you 14 times for sneezing. (Zack)
...That's it! See you guys as soon as I come back from the great salt lake. I'll bring you back a...uh...dirt!
Stay blood,
Zack
