New TT line-up for Sept/Oct 1988!!!

Hello, you.

It's been a long, painful couple weeks in preparation for both Fantastic Fest and the new Alamo calendar and Weird Wednesday's Lars and I are ready to stick our heads in a big whirling blender filled with rabid dogs.

But I'm proud to present the new Terror Thursday lineup, all for you and anyone else that wants to go. Unless they're wearing a Radiohead baseball cap and think it's really clever to quote The Family Guy. They can stay home.

Anyway, here it is. Don't be shy. Tell me what you think:

PHANTASM II – THIS SCREENING at ALAMO SOUTH LAMAR!
Sep 4 Midnite, Free, Dir. Don Coscarelli, 1988, 35mm, 97 min, R
Almost a decade after shocking and befuddling audiences with bizarro cerebral nightmare epic PHANTASM, writer/director Coscarelli unleashed this infinitely more amped-up braindamager. The elderly-but-omnipotent Tall Man (Angus Scrimm) has returned to devour entire towns, transforming select victims into dwarven fiends to aid in his latent enslavement of the Earth. Mankind’s only hope lies with a bald ice cream vendor and a blowdried goof from an insane asylum. More gore, more goop and more chainsaw-wielding, automobile-crushing, house-exploding action than we’ll see in another fright film until Hollywood wises the fuck up. And I’m not holding my breath. The very best horror movies prove that the human body is a canvas and violence is the paintbrush, but PHANTASM II’s ambitious carnage wins an extra gold star for excellence in creative homicide. No worries if you’re new to the series: a 30-second recap knocks things into place for the following 96 minutes of full-tilt transdimensional antihuman dementia! (Zack)

THE GATE
Sep 11 Midnite, Free, Dir. Tibor Tikacs, 1987, 35mm, 85 min, PG-13
There are plenty of fun, easy ways to traumatize children. You can tell them their mother’s been in a fatal car accident, or reveal that ketchup is actually dogs blood. Or - like my parents did in the summer after my 6th grade year - you can simply take them to see THE GATE. This demon-encrusted cinematic deathcoaster was somehow marketed to pre-teen audiences despite the fact that it’s undeniably the most mentally abusive PG-13 film to ever hit the screen. Two 12-year-old outcasts find the actual doorway to Hell in their own backyard, inadvertantly releasing an unstoppable tempest of supernatural violation. Drywalled corpses, stop-motion beastopoids and adolescent self-mutilations culminate in a feature that shouldn’t be viewed by any child under the age of 40. Believe me...this screening is going to be the most horrifying thing to happen on September 11th since I don’t know when. (Zack)

FANTASTIC FEST PRESENTS: RAZORBACK
Sep 18 Midnite, Free, Dir. Russell Mulcahy, 1984, 35mm, 95 min, R
Impossibly huge animals are an integral component of cinema. Since 1933’s KING KONG, hyperactive pituitary glands have inflated nearly all of nature’s children, from the enormous sheepcreature of GODMONSTER OF INDIAN FLATS to the towering interstellar chicken of THE X FROM OUTER SPACE. Even the uncharted wilds of Australia have submitted their entries to the Halls of Gargantuanism, here in the form of a baby-eatin’ multi-ton porcine powerhouse that rampages out of the blackened desert to destroy everything in its path. I saw the “Biggest Pig in the World” at the 2006 Iowa State Fair and it had nothin’ on this snubnosed 30-foot wreckage machine. Watch as a vengeful grandpa, two rural new wave oil drillers and an ineffective schlub attempt to take down this grunting, red-eyed, hate-fueled embodiment of utter annihilation. (Zack)

FANTASTIC FEST PRESENTS: TURKEY SHOOT a.k.a. ESCAPE 2000
Sep 25 Midnite, Free, Dir. Brian Trenchard-Smith, 1982, 35mm, 80 min, R
WITH DIRECTOR BRIAN TRENCHARd-SMITH LIVE IN PERSON!
I don’t want to alarm anyone, but the year 2000 is going to be a real rough ride. After we face a worldwide nuclear holocaust, we’ll be herded into militaristic re-education camps and picked off like animals by sadistic upper-crust pleasure hunters. Fortunately we’ll have fellow prisoners like Paul (Steve Railsback), a ready-to-rumble “deviant” who refuses to stand quietly by as mankind’s future hits the chopping block. Australian exploitation wizard Trenchard-Smith (in attendance, no less!) stirs up a cocktail of celluloid dynamite that combines mutants, machismo, misogyny, misanthropy and a dazzling, bullet-ridden array of violence violence VIOLENCE!!! (Zack)

MINDWARP with director Steve Barnett live in person!
Oct 2 Midnite, Free, Dir. Steve Barnett, 1992, 35mm, 91 min, R
Square-jawed ham-master Bruce Campbell and perennial terrorgeezer Angus Scrimm (PHANTASM) co-star in this blazing sci-gore inferno! When a young woman is catapulted from her cozy computerized comforts into the ice-hearted, warlike Outside, she teams with the last unmutated terrestrial man (Campbell) to escape the vile cannibalistic Crawlers. Things go from bad to worse as the creatures mount the ultimate attack, unleashing wave after wave of unrepentant entrailblasting mayhem upon a world content to live via virtual dreams, unaware of their impending destruction! Good thing that whole internet craze of the ‘90s never caught on, as this cautionary future-shocker shows us that society’s dependency on technological distraction would have inevitably led us down the road to total cultural retardation. Whew. Dodged that bullet. (Zack)

ANGUISH with STAR Zelda Rubinstein LIVE IN PERSON!
Oct 9 Midnite, Free, Dir. Bigas Luna, 1987, 35mm, 89 min, R
Easily among the 1980s’ most criminally overlooked horror treasures! A perpetual avalanche of unexpected shocks and shifts, ANGUISH was too damn good to be rightfully appreciated in its day. But now that mankind has reached its evolutionary apex, we can finally fully absorb this brazenly ambitious creation. To tell you anything about the plot of ANGUISH would endanger its plentiful fright-film magic and remove layers of surprise from a brilliantly constructed slash opera, so instead, let’s talk about how eye-gougingly exciting it is that we’ll be joined by the film’s lead Zelda Rubinstein (left)! Mz. Rubinstein’s well-known role in POLTERGEIST has made her an undisputed terror icon, but she herself says that ANGUISH - where she’s the psychotic hypnotist mother of a madman (Oscar nominee Michael Lerner) - is one of her favorite films, and it’s crucial that it be seen in a theater. So be here for what’ll be the most raging cinematic horror experience of your life!! Very special thanks to Eric Vespe. (Zack)

THE BOOGENS
Oct 16 Midnite, Free, Dir. James L. Conway, 1981, 35mm, 95 min, R
In the abandoned mines beneath a humble Colorado town, an ancient evil has awakened. And by “ancient evil,” I mean a couple handfuls of blood-starved, gimpy, clawed, tentacled, leechy turtle fellas. Not-so-ready for combat with these ridiculous creatures is the film’s cast of miners and female ‘80s TV sitcom stars, including Anne-Marie Martin from SLEDGE HAMMER and director Conway’s wife. But back to the beasts; THE BOOGENS is part of that great drive-in monster movie tradition where the viewer can’t help but root for the monsters. I mean, there’s a lot here to identify with...these little humpbusters work hard, love a nice meaty dinner and are totally pissed off about all these stupid rotten humans. It’s enough to make me want to join the family. (Zack Boogen)

SLUMBER PARTY MASSACRE
Oct 23 Midnite, Free, Dir. Amy H. Jones, 1982, 35mm, 77 min, R
Horror fans are often called on to defend our interests and point out that not all fright films are built on a rampaging maniac carving up half-dressed girls. On the other hand...some are. SLUMBER PARTY MASSACRE was marketed as “The Ultimate Driller Killer Thriller” and is truly the very best of the bunch, exhibiting a sincere frenzied flair for high school maulings and blood-soaked nightclothes. With all power tools fully charged, it’s an earth-shatteringly id-gratifying onslaught of nubile sashaying and unapologetic savagery that alternates between graphic mutilations and gratuitous shower scenes. But before you get all Gloria Steinem on my ass, consider that not only is director Amy Jones most likely a female, but the screenplay was written by Rita Mae Brown, an iconic 1960s feminist and gay rights activist who’d go on to create a series of bestselling mystery novels with co-author Sneaky Pie Brown, her goddamned cat. (Zack)

NEAR DARK
Oct 30 Midnite, Free, Dir. Kathryn Bigelow, 1987, 35mm, 94 min, R
99% of vampires are pussies. Prancing little lily-livered mama’s boy drama kids with NIN stickers on their shiny vinyl lunchboxes. But NEAR DARK documents the remaining 1% with a white trash vindictiveness that drop-kicks all the elegance of plasma-sucking straight into the trailer park, as a pack of undead shitkickers cruise the American backroads in a blackened-window Winnebago searching for jugular nectar. Most shocking is that these binging feral sadists are actually an intensely likeable familial unit, led by PUMPKINHEAD’s Lance Henriksen in his all-time greatest performance as Civil War veteran Jess. Also watch for Bill Paxton at his rootin’, tootin’, biker-bitin’ best and that ugly kid from RIVER’S EDGE as junior throatripper Homer. This Halloween, Terror Thursday salutes monumental ‘80s horror masterpiece NEAR DARK for making vampires monsters again! (Zack)


...that's it! Enjoy! Live wild! Eat meat!!

- Z