Here's an example of the interesting contrast we usually see when witches are portrayed in movies: you either see the decrepit naked hag with long dirty hair rolling around in baby fat in a decidedly non-delicious life-style ((The Witch, Lords of Salem) versus the nubile, sometimes naked, beauties rolling in seductive charms and comfortable bed linens (Baba Yaga, Burn Witch Burn, The Devil's Own).
I'll leave it up to you as to which portrayal is your favorite.
Paul Naschy strikes again as werewolf Count Waldemar Daninsky in Night of the Howling Beast. This one was a Video Nasty in the United Kingdom and I don't believe it was ever released there. I have yet to "get into" Paul Naschy's oeuvre, but I know some Naschy fans who would bite my head off for such a lapse.
This looks interesting.
NEW YORK – FilmRise announced today that it has acquired U.S. distribution rights for the documentary, Holy Hell, which premiered at the 2016 Sundance Film Festival.
The film is an inside look at a secretive, spiritual cult formed in 1980s West Hollywood.
Director Will Allen joined the group just after graduating from film school and as he became more deeply involved, he began filming his experiences as the group’s unofficial videographer.
The distributor will release the film theatrically on May 20, 2016.
It wasn’t until after Allen left the cult that he understood the film he’d been making for over twenty years. Working with producers Alexandra Johnes and ex-cult member Tracey Harnish, Allen decided to use his footage to take others on his journey.
Holy Hell is executive produced by Michael C. Donaldson, Cheryl Sanders, Julian Goldstein and Academy Award®-winner Jared Leto, who describes the film as “relentless, haunting and unforgettable.”
“Following its headline-making run at Sundance, we are elated to be bringing this gripping film to audiences come spring,” said Danny Fisher, CEO of FilmRise. “Ultimately this is a remarkable film about the human condition, and I am confident that audiences will be engrossed by this captivating story, told by those who lived it.”
“I am so happy that FilmRise will be releasing Holy Hell in theaters for communities to experience together,” said filmmaker Will Allen. “This story is very personal but also universal, because it could have happened to anyone. And seeing how broadly it resonated at Sundance makes me excited to share it with the rest of the world.”
The deal was negotiated between Fisher, FilmRise’s VP of Acquisitions Max Einhorn representing the distributor with Donaldson Califf’s Dean Cheley and Michael Donaldson representing the filmmakers along with Andrew Herwitz, President of The Film Sales Company. Herwitz noted that there is also substantial television interest in the film around the world.
State asylums always make for interesting television. With ghosts or without. There's something, depressing, poignant, and potentially scary watching two people spend the night in gloomy and crumbling institutional rooms and hallways. In this premiere episode of Paranormal Lockdown, hosts Katrina Weidman (Paranormal State) and Nick Groff (Ghost Adventures), spend 72 hours in the asylum, walking the halls by day, sleeping in them at night.
Having weaned myself away from Ghost Hunters--too many, "did you see that? did you hear that?" moments of subjective experiences and nothing to show for it, I wasn't expecting much. But this premiere episode is paced well, has good camerawork, and minimizes the de rigueur backstory provided by an employee (or in this case a former employee) that stifles so many ghost hunting shows with he saw, she saw moments WE never get to see.
So you usually wind up watching people talk about what supernatural experiences they saw at the start of the show, then watch other people talk about their subjective emotions and feelings for the remainder of the show. Toss in a lot of interpreted voice recordings and you have an hour's worth of not-much-happening.
The hosts for our Trans-Allegheny Lunatic Asylum tour, however, manage a bit more than that for us. Not only does their onscreen relationship work well, we're treated to a backstory that's frightening all by itself, a brutal double murder. And we get a few good geobox moments. The geobox, or ghost box, is essentially a radio the dead can speak through. It's bigger than a breadbox, so Nick and Katrina carry around a more portable sound recorder with them through the various rooms and hallways. A daytime response to an EVP session is promising when they first enter the asylum. Another is repeated twice, which, given the circumstances it's heard in, is noteworthy.
With 13 buildings to choose from, they focus on the Women's Auxiliary Building, the lobotomy recovery room, and the morgue. Adam Berry and Amy Bruni (Ghost Hunters) pay a brief visit.
By the third day, having slept little (would you sleep at all in such surroundings?), things perk up. Maybe it's the exhaustion making our hosts more susceptible to suggestion or maybe the asylum's former patients, who never left, are getting tired of all those annoying EVPs, but the 4th floor provided the more watchable moments. There's one thing caught on camera that was so creepy as hell even the cameraman was unnerved.
I admit I got goosebumps. Now that's what I like to see.
"Premiering tomorrow at 10/9c, Destination America’s six-part series PARANORMAL LOCKDOWN, hosted by Nick Groff (formerly of Ghost Adventures) and co-hosted by Katrina Weidman (formerly of Paranormal State), follows the two as they confine themselves in America’s most terrifying places for an unprecedented 72 hours straight. Living at haunted locations, Groff and Weidman believe that the longer they stay, the more the spirits will communicate with them and the more information they can gather about the unknown. Stretching the limits of paranormal investigation, PARANORMAL LOCKDOWN premieres on Friday, March 4 at 10/9c exclusively on Destination America."
El Vampiro Negro (Blacula) is a bit too slow moving (by today's standards), but this vampire story uses the Dark Shadows romancing the curse theme very well. By the 1970s, Mexican lobby cards used a, usually rough, cut and paste approach to laying out the card. Here's a more striking version. (See the pressbook for Scream Blacula Scream.)
A pretty as a painting Mexican lobby card for La Venganza Del Doctor Mabuse (Dr. M schlägt zu, The Vengeance of Doctor Mabuse, 1972). A fascinating criminal mastermind that borrows much from pulp villains. This cinema entry for the evil doctor is directed by Jess Franco. (Note that 'Jak' Taylor should be 'Jack' Taylor.) Jerry Lacy (Dark Shadows) starred as the nefarious criminal in a 2013 independent entry directed by Ansel Faraj.
A wonderful whimsical style makes this Mexican lobby card an inviting promotion for The Ghost Jesters.
Mexican lobby cards in the 1980s were usually printed on thin, glossy paper. On the plus side, less acidity, so they hold up better; on the minus side, not as appealing as the older, larger, and print-on-thick-card-stock lobbies are. On a side note, I met Robert Lansing while working at B. Dalton Software Etc. on 5th Avenue in New York City. He was looking for a financial software package, I forget which one. We special ordered it. I recall he was a laconic as his screen persona.
Here's one horror movie on my to-see list, but the problem is that the original R-rated version was chopped for VHS and television. A DVD release by VCI in 2001 contains the theatrical version, but not the director's cut. This version has a different ending than the one the director intended. (Ruby (1977) entry on Wikipedia).
Here's the Mexican lobby card for El Planeta De Las Tormentas (Planeta Bur), a Russian science fiction movie.
Almost looks like Freddy Krueger at the top left, doesn't it?
Here's what I'm waiting for on The Walking Dead: someone wearing a luchador mask kicking zombie butt. Come on, people! In a world filled with zombies, how can you NOT have a person in a luchador mask kicking zombie butt?
