Book Review: Everything You Ever Wanted
to Know About Zombies
(But Were Running Too Fast to Ask)
Zombos Says: Very Good
(but is it really everything?)
Like zombies, books about zombies are unstoppable and indefatigable. Matt Mogk's Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Zombies joins the horde with an informative–although we've read much of this information before–and concise rundown of the zombie-scene in chapters like Zombie Basics, Zombie Science, Zombie Survival, and Popular Culture. The tone is light and the handling movie-centric, with a welcomed focus on George A. Romero's influence on the genre.
Zombie science bores me to tears. I realize serious work is being done here, with practical applications, by imaginative professionals in the sciences, but I can't force myself to get through all that neuro-science and biological what-if and suppositional analysis. But the Popular Culture chapter is one I devoured with relish. Mogk mentions video games, those wacky zombie walks, zombie organizations, movie zombies, and even asks why the undead are so popular. At this point in time, I'd be asking instead why we aren't all dead tired of hearing, reading, and seeing zombies in everything from publishing to commercials, but hey, I don't want to be a killjoy or derail the gravy train; although Mogk does question hopping onto that train ride in regard to The Writer magazine's article Dawn of the Undead, which encouraged amateurs and pros alike to bask in the zombie apocalyptic glory, no experience needed, to make an easy buck or two.
More meet and greet (ironic, isn't it?) with Zombie LARP (live action role playing) sounds like it would be fun and that tag game called Humans vs. Zombies would seem likely to put a little kick into an old pastime. Given the popularity of zombie walks these days, Mogk pinpoints the necessary blame to Thea Munster's instigation in starting the first one for her Toronto neighborhood. Very appropos last name, don't you think? Beyond the cultural nerdy-byproducts, mention of the fast versus slow zombie conundrum and the realization that in some movies, like 28 Days Later, the zombies aren't dead, helps to fortify the book's title and shows Mogk's versatility.
As an introduction to the modern zombie phenomenon, Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Zombies is hearty in its coverage, from Romero's take on zombies being heavily influenced by Richard Matheson's I am Legend (and the movie version, The Last Man on Earth with Vincent Price), to beer-goggle zombies, Mogk's term for characters, like the Frankenstein Monster and mummies, often mistakenly referred to as zombies.
Arguably the strongest chapter is Zombie Survival, which has nothing to do with zombies surviving, but does concern potential ambulatory food-stuffs–that would be you and me–staying alive when the undead hordes arrive. Mogk reveals the single most important item you must have in your survival kit and he nails it; most would-be survivalists toting their M14s would be surprised. I was because it's so obvious, so essential, and yet so overlooked. This chapter will help keep you going during any disaster, not only end-of-days, so read it well.
A courtesy copy was provided for this review by the Zombie Research Society.
Graphic Book Review: At the Mountains of Madness
Zombos Says: Fair (art mutes story too much)
On and around that laboratory table were strewn other things, and it did not take long for us to guess that those things were the carefully though oddly and inexpertly dissected parts of one man and one dog. (H. P. Lovecraft in At the Mountains of Madness)
In a clear mismatch of artist with storyline, At the Mountains of Madness, the graphic novel adaptation illustrated and written by I. N. J. Culbard and published by Sterling Publishing for the U.S., fails to convey H. P. Lovecraft's tone and mood entirely. Culbard's cartoony style is good for a newspaper comic strip, but it supplants the cosmic undertones of finding an ancient alien race by its minimalist panels and inadequate coloration. Culbard's coverage of the novella's highlights is good, but also conveys as much dread and suspenseful buildup as a Boy's Life magazine article, especially when it's most needed during the encounter with a Shoggoth in the subterranean passages beneath the ancient city in Antarctica: the bubbling mass of chaos is drawn in an uninspiring way that holds as much otherworldly creepiness as a Scooby Doo monster. The revelatory and bizarre dissection scene, which should have been on a scale similar to a sublimely messy melange as seen in John Carpenter's The Thing, becomes a perfunctory half-page panel that loses all shock value.
As an introduction to the underpinnings of Lovecraft's pantheon of Elder Things and their biologically-induced mistakes, Culbard manages to cover the first person narrative of Professor Dyer effectively for new readers of Lovecraft. However, the unfolding of Miskatonic University's tragic expedition to find deep-level rock and soil samples from various areas of the antarctic continent is done in a digest-sized format more suited to an adaptation of the slicker 1951 The Thing From Another World, where the implications of finding proof of an alien creature from space is not so philosophically or religiously troubling. The nuances of Lovecraft's total disdain for the spiritual are not adequately reflected here: the cosmic joke has no punchline and there is no unraveling of faith beyond all reason.
More reliance on Lovecraft's prose in key panels, with a sprinking of style like Bernie Wrightson's grim swirls or Neil Adam's electrifying, kinetic angles would have pleased the eye-nerves more. Along with a larger page format to expand the panels into the heinous acts of visual insanity that Lovecraft alludes to, a more experimental color palette to fluctuate the mood would have been a better choice than the standard one used here.
For readers newly exploring Lovecraft's dark universe, Culbard's graphic novel may, hopefully, wet their appetite for delving more deeply into this ancient Cyclopean city and the nature of its past and present inhabitants by reading Lovecraft's work directly.
What I’d Like to See in Horror Movies for 2012
Egyptian Theater Concession Stand, 1935
With all the Best Of lists for 2011, promising lists for 2012, and wishful thinking commentaries floating around as the 2012 movie season kicks into gear, I thought I'd share with you what I'm hoping to see more of this year in horror.
Reviewing movies to provide nominations for B-Sol's Vault of Horror Cyber Horror Awards has put me into a learning and yearning frame of mind, which naturally leads to reflection on those character and story elements in modern horror you just don't see enough of these days. And with movies like Underworld: Awakening regurgitating the usual unimaginative pablum audiences scarf down all too easily with their popcorn, a more refined palatte is left wanting–starving actually–for better artistic and involving fare. Granted upcoming movies like The Woman in Black and Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter have me hopeful for some good classic scares and attentive direction, I'm still worried we might see more of the same old dreck creating the same old box office wreck.
So here's what I'd like to see more of in horror movies for 2012:
Fewer Dumbass Victims — enough already with screaming mimis who have no character depth beyond video game stats and stereotypical behaviors. Are we not men? Are we not women? It's time for characters in horror movies, both young and old, to stand up and be counted as important, living, breathing, beings with souls, and not just expendable appendages and body count possibilities. Make me care, people!
Fewer Romantic Vampires–I admit I'm a fan of Twilight, to a point. I'm all for expanding the landscape into softer areas not always deemed acceptable by hardcore genre fans. But give us back the completely evil, the unstoppable blood draining machines with no souls or compassion, who relish the carnage they bring. Honestly, Abe Lincoln, I'm talking to you!
Scarier Movies–all I'm saying is The Woman in Black better be pitch dark scary. Paranormal Activity brought back the scares, but it is overstaying its welcome. What's needed now is a good supernatural terror, borne of tragedy, winged with malice. Make me dread the dark spaces in the far corners of the room once again for 2012.
Much Less CGI, More REAL Special Effects–let's face it, when CGI figures heavily into it, a script's important pacing and character motivations fly out the window. What's left are hey, I've got this cool image we can do approach that kills suspenseful drama and leads to shakycam pyrotechnics to cover its impracticality. I'd like to see more real special effects instead of animated cartoon monsters and setpieces, or be damn sure to make it more believable, at least.
Stronger Female Characters–you'd think most women in horror movies are easy prey, and always looking for a good time, or are morally loose, and wear impractical clothing on hunting trips, and run straight into danger on cue, and scream a lot when any sound means instant death. How much longer are we going to have to suffer through these slasher-convenient, male-centric wet dreams of slaughter? Grow up, already!
No 3D, Really, Please, NO 3D–after suffering through post-production 3D-itis, I can emphatically state that if you don't know what you're doing, then 3D's a quick gimmick to add to the ticket price to make fast money before the audience catches on to your incompetence. Either know what you're going to do with it or leave it out. This is one movie gimmick that's mostly no fun when used in a horror movie.
Memorable Monsters–when was the last time we had a memorable monster? Yeah, that's right.
I'm sure I could add to this list, but if I could just see a little more of any of these, I'd be thrilled. Here's looking at you, 2012.
Magazines: Playset Magazine 11
Marx Monster Mansion!
Playset Magazine #11, 2003, provides a monstrous issue for monsterkids with its glimpses of the prototype for the Marx Monster Mansion and other cool plastic monster toys every boy (and some girls) howled for back in the 1960s and 70s. "The mansion would have been 23" x 13" x 11" tall, the exact same dimensions of any Marx castle in this configuration."
My favorite playsets to pretend-play with included Fireball XL5 Space City and Hamilton's Invaders (giant bugs, pull the string to make them walk, military victims included). Now, had I the Monster Mansion to hang my action figures and plastic creatures from the gallows, or drop them to their doom from the walls, well, I might never have grown up.
I wish I still had my MPC Haunted Hulk. I took it for a sail every time I took a bath, which was once or twice a month. I would load it up with those MPC pop-top horrors and push the green-slime colored hulk through the bubbles–I mean post nuclear mutating mist–and spray crazy foam at the monsters. I miss crazy foam.
Usually illustrations and photos are in black and white, but the full-color spread on the Monster Mansion is eye-popping. So be prepared to pop them back into place if you haven't seen this issue yet. Those eyeballs can roll around the floor like crazy.
Rocketship X-M Vinyl
From Starlog Records
Here's some vinyl from Starlog Records, straight from Professor Kinema. He's the only person I know who still has hundreds of these funny round things we used to stick needles on to play. Amazing. Remember this science fiction movie? I've included the End Title music to jog your memory.
Bela Lugosi Meets Alfred Hitchcock
Sadly, Bela Lugosi and Alfred Hitchcock really don't meet; but here's some vinyl from Professor Kinema's archive where they lend their vocal talents to two old radio dramas. The first is Lugosi in The Doctor Prescribed Death, and the second has Hitchcock hosting Once Upon a Midnight. The recording of The Doctor Prescribed Death comes from Relic Radio, where you can find many OTR dramas, including horror. (I'll have the Hitchcock radio drama up shortly.)
Bela in The Doctor Prescribed Death
Hitchcock in Once Upon a Midnight
Underworld Awakening (2012)
Should Have Slept More
Zombos Says: Fair
Too Loud, with murkiness obliterating screen detail, with laughable post-production 3D, with lazy art direction, Underworld: Awakening is a disappointing sequel to Underworld: Evolution.
Kate Beckinsale’s Selene is on autopilot as she evades humans and lycans, kills humans and lycans, and evades them some more. In a script rework off of Resident Evil: Apocalypse, Selene is put on ice, experimented on, thawed out, and royally pissed because David (Theo James) is missing in action. Replace clones with one offspring named Eve (India Eisley)–no, really, she’s named Eve– and add nefarious Andigen Corp run by evil, and near comatose, Dr. Jacob Lane (Stephen Rea) hatching a dark plan just as nefarious as Resident Evil‘s Umbrella Corp, then see Selene run, kick high, land gracefully, and run some more. With her seemingly inexhaustible automatic handguns firing away at everything in motion, I began to wonder just how stupid those lycans were as they jumped, howling in rage, into her hail of bullets again and again.
Lost in this iteration of the Underworld series is just that, the gothically moody underworld. Much of the action takes place above ground at Andigen, or on the dark city streets, where lycans chase Selene, car-hopping their way closer and closer to her van, close enough so she can shoot their brains out. Again.
While she’s not pointing those handguns–now they spit out a gazillion bullets per second–she’s pouting, waiting for the story to catch up with her. The open montage–two actually–at the beginning, rushes the backstory to bring us up to speed, then rushes us by the pre-story, where Andigen and Dr. Lane purge the world of vampires and lycans. Or are they?
Directors Mans Marlind and Bjorn Stein must have watched too many video games, trying to emulate their exhiliration by steam-rolling the opener and much of the movie with monster-fighting-monster scenes. Had they actually played those games, then maybe we’d get more drama and suspense in the breathing spaces between all that huffing and puffing. Too many directors and too many writers (more than a handful) add up to a rote actioner that never forgets its CGI. Huge lycan towering over Selene? Its here. Two-fisted gun fire to blow out the bottom of a descending elevator? It’s here. Thin Selina piroueting and gliding in tight leather, looking sleak and sexy as she deals death and destruction in rapid motion to screeching music and loud booms? It’s here.
Selene’s discovery of a vampire coven provides the only visually interesting moment when a call to action brings the immense, wrought iron, candle-dripped candelabra down from the ceiling to retrieve their weapons cached within. This moment of gothic surprise is brief, and not even the coven lair’s dripping stonework sustains enough fashion sense reminiscent of the earlier Underworld movies.
Given the vapid approach taken with Underworld: Awakening, I recommend they slap Twilight and Underworld together with a cat fight between Selene and Bella, otherwise this series is kaput.
Book Review: Fright Night On Channel 9
Zombos Says: Excellent
For me, and many like me, the impact of Fright Night has not lessened over time, but the generation that I am part of, the one that can truly appreciate this era, is rapidly aging. It's not difficult to imagine a point in the not too distant future where Fright Night, and all the programs like it, may be lost to fading memories and a society no longer interested in such antiquities. (James Arena)
I'm not as big a fan as James Arena is, but his passion for Fright Night, a horror-hostless, near midnight showcase of the good, the bad, and the ugly in fantastic cinema, that ran on New York's WOR-TV from 1973 to 1987, is well shared in Fright Night on Channel 9 from McFarland Press.
I don't often read McFarland titles because they're awfully expensive and not all of them are well-written or carefully researched. Being a Brooklyn boy growing up watching Channel 11 and Channel 9's sumptuous telecasts of horror and science fiction movies, both foreign and domestic, I couldn't resist Arena's book. If you're familiar with Fright Night, or just love to read about television in the days before anyone could see just about anything they fancied anytime they chose, this book is a gem of interviews, anecdotal nostalgia, and glimpses into how the biz worked to bring packages of movies to affiliate stations on a regular basis. We're talking pre-video and pre-digital here, when stations ran 16 and 35mm prints, spliced up the film reels frame by frame for commercials, and did a little editing to run in allotted times and–more or less–to remove the occassional booby show, or overly nastiness, not fit for young eyes.
Within the two parts of Fright Night on Channel 9, Arena recalls the ritual of watching Fright Night regularly at the late-night hour as well as capturing that unique feeling of excitement of finally getting to see that movie you had heard was so awesome or so awful you just had to see it. Part One: The Story of Fright Night provides the history of the show, enriched by the interviews and the wheeling and dealing work involved to acquire "product" like Universal's horror pictures, Hemisphere's Block of Shock package of movies, and Samuel M. Sherman's Independent-International Pictures Corp. and his Euro-horror movies for the show's run. Part Two: The Films of Fright Night lists all the movies that were shown with airdates. Arena goes further than simply regurgitating plot synopses by adding his personal observations to the various entries, making this part enjoyable reading as well as informative.
Hanging onto the movies once they were contracted for play wasn't always easy. The highlight of the book for me is Samuel M. Sherman's recounting of a run-in with a bankrupt processing lab holding his 16mm prints of his Exorcism at Midnight and House of Doom. The WOR contract stipulated delivery of a specified number of movies and couldn't be fulfilled while the lab held onto them. Elements of the shyster lawyer, the payola-or-kiss-your-prints-goodbye scenario, and the eventual showdown, to strong arm the prints from the lab, is a wild and wooly story.
I read Fright Night on Channel 9 in one night. Half of my effort was made because I remembered the unique experience of watching the show, and others like it, which has shaped my horror habit of today, but the other half is because James Arena kept me up late with his vivid remembrance of a culturally significant "antiquity" that shouldn't be forgotten, nor the people who made it so.