Random metal thoughts...

My brain is currently experiencing a metalliferous gunk-up.  What does that mean?  It means that I have metal opinions and nowhere to dump them.  I could try to talk to strangers at Wal-Mart about the latest Katatonia album, but usually when this happens, I just remind myself that I have a website (hey, I'm almost 40; that's my excuse for being forgetful) and I proceed to unzip the contents of my cranium onto my keyboard.  It's messy, but necessary.

So that new Katatonia album.  It's called Sky Void of Stars, and I want to like it more than I do.  A couple of records ago, the band seemed poised to embrace prog and all of the demure technicality that came with it.  2020 saw the release of City Burials, a calculated step towards accessibility or at least more compact songwriting.  Sky is unsure of itself.  Maybe I'm reading the wrong tea leaves, but these songs are lodged between flat pop sensibilities and intermittent spurts of scorching guitar solos.  It's kind of weird.  NOTE: This isn't a pop record.  That's not what I mean.  Still, Jonas Renkse's vocals sound as though they were imported from a bland pop...thing.

By the way, if my musings come across as disorganized, that's because they are - you guessed it - disorganized.  That's the beauty of random thoughts.  I don't need to make sense.  As it happens, my opinion of Sky is contradictory.  The best moments find Katatonia at their most sullen and rain-slicked (if you told me that they hailed from Seattle, I would believe you).  Other moments are frustratingly rote and generic.  Musically, the album almost feels restrained.  They should have thrown a few Bloodbath riffs into the mix.  Then again, every piece of music ever recorded could stand to be pepsinated with Bloodbath riffs.

Woah, is that where Pepsi got its name?  Holy shit.  Um, I also wanted to talk about Fates Warning.  Looking at their career trajectories, Fates mirrored the progression (pun intended, damn it) made by Queensryche right up to the mid-90's.  They both began as freewheeling power metal units.  If we're judging early material, I don't have a preference.  However, I'm ready to announce that Parallels is the mature hard rock crossover record that Empire wanted to be.  And I dig Empire!  In fact, I reviewed it, but that was years ago and I hate reading my old stuff.  I'll leave it up to you to exhume that corpse.

PS-Shoutout to Tom, the guy responsible for my recent infatuation with Fates Warning.  Man, we have great taste!

Blood Capsule #140

ZONTAR: THE THING FROM VENUS (1967)

Confiscate my b-movie license.  I don't deserve it.  Somehow, I'm just now learning that Larry Buchanan's Zontar: The Thing From Venus is a remake of Roger Corman's It Conquered the World, which explains why several of the script beats felt familiar.  The storyline follows Keith, a NASA scientist who has managed to tune his "space radio" to the right frequency to attract a mélange of bizarre, inimical noises on the other end.  One of those noises is a voice that belongs to Zontar.  With the benefit of hindsight (not to mention the film's title), we know that Zontar is a thing from Venus, but we are not privy to his/her intentions.  Keith is convinced that his alien crony wants to save us from ourselves.  Don't be so naïve, reader.  Could it be that Zontar wants to...destroy us???

Zounds, this is turning out to be a dramatic review.  I won't spoil the ending, but I will impart shrewd, sagacious words of adulation.  Stuff like, "The hokey dialogue is easy to follow."  Anyway, the hokey dialogue is easy to follow.  I've seen John Agar play the straight man in so many sci-fi cheapies, I could probably recite his lines.  Zontar is comfortable entertainment in the same way that licorice is a comfortable midnight snack.  And the creature design is perfection.  It's flippin' beautiful!  I tip my typing wand to the artist responsible for the below drawing.  Be sure to follow the link to check out his/her other works.  No, this isn't a paid advertisement, but I would probably hire this person to decorate the walls of my bedroom.

Click HERE.

My Pretzel Was Stale

Hey-o!  As it was written in the stars (and on this very website), I attended an NXT show last night with a good friend.  I mean, we're just friends right now.  No pressure.  We'll see where it goes, y'know?  Anyway!  The official title was NXT Vengeance Day 2023.  It premiered on Peacock, and while I can't speak to how everything sounded on TV, the live crowd was super hot for most of the matches.  As a matter of fact, several of the talents were more over than I expected, but I'll get to specific wrestlers in a second.  I'm in the mood for an itemized list...

- Wes Lee defended his NXT North American Title in a seesaw contest against Dijak, a former Donovan.  I'll just say it; I don't get Dijak's gimmick.  It's modern pro-wrestling, so I guess that someone has to be the heavy.  Someone has to kidnap weaklings left and right in the backstage area.  If that dude is Dijak, so be it.  I did love his series of barn burners with Keith Lee "back in the day."

- This is where I'll be the cantankerous old duffer and whine about the pacing of matches in 2023.  It seems that the general consensus is that Lee and Dijak had the best bout on the card, but it was also the first bout on the card.  And I'll be damned if they didn't do every move known to man.  What's worse, they extricated way too many false finishes, which is a trend currently plaguing all promotions.  You feel bad for the poor bastards following the opener.  Seriously, how are they supposed to stand out, unless they light each other on fire and/or bleed out onto the mat?

- This is where I'll mention that I enjoyed myself.  Heh.  For my money, NXT is the bottom feeder of (televised) American wrestling, but there's nothing quite like attending a live show.  That's one of the reasons why I jumped at the opportunity to go in spite of the so-so roster.  I knew it would be a blast.  Plus, HBK made an appearance before the PPV started in earnest.  Bonus!

- We don't call them pay-per-views anymore, do we?  Kind of a bummer.  It's the end of an era.

- Apparently, the Chase U guy is a Charlotte native.  He still struggled to evoke a pop.  Chase U is yet another gimmick that I do not understand.  They are committed.  I'll give them that.

- My pretzel was stale!  Yeah, I don't have anything intellectual to add.  Had fun.  Bought a hat.

April Fools Shine On

Can anyone explain the significance of the pre-credits sequence in 1986's Killer Party?  I'm genuinely curious.  It has absolutely nothing (or "fuck-all," if you prefer) to do with the rest of the film, and if I'm being honest, it's not a very catchy song.  Maybe my ears are conked out and there were actually reams of White Sister groupies stalking the Sunset Strip back in the day.  Permissible slasher, though.  This is just a stopgap post before the weekend carries me off to an NXT show.  That's right; I'll be watching live wrestling with a buddy of mine on Saturday night.  No idea if the event itself will provide blogging material, so we'll have to wait and see...

...quick!  "Fools Shine On" was a single released by which 90's rock band?  Don't Google it!  If you're right, you won't win anything, but you can pretend that you're cool for roughly ten seconds.

Blood Capsule #139

KILLER TONGUE (1996)

Years ago, I read an interview with Melinda Clarke where she tried to distance herself from her horror roots.  I can't cite specifics (I don't have the interview in front of me), but it's common knowledge that she made an effort to work outside of the genre after breaking through with Return of the Living Dead 3.  Unless I'm mistaking her for some other quixotic starlet (and I'm not), she came across as...I don't want to say "uppity."  Yes, I do.  She came across as uppity (to give you perspective, this was during her incumbency on The O.C.).

Melinda, dear.  I just watched Killer Tongue.  How can you lay claim to such an overweening, supercilious cloak of conceit when you have tainted the good word of cheese with this cinematic vasectomy?  Folks, I'm only using big words because I made a New Year's resolution not to toss "c*nt" around so freely.  Too harsh?  When it comes to b-movies, I hold grudges.  I'll be a little nicer to the friend who recommended this film to me, although I should at least challenge him to a gimmick match at Wrestlemania.  If it isn't obvious, I wasn't fond of Killer Tongue.  What it gains in momentum with inventive special effects and witty dialogue, it loses with bleary lapses in logic and questionable decisions made behind the camera.

As it says in Mark 8:36, for what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his soul?  Did I just quote scripture in a review of Killer Tongue?  Get on my level!

Album Cover of the Whatever

If I were a graphic designer (neglecting the fact that I went to community college for graphic design), this is the kind of shit I would cobble up.  Look at it!  It's beautiful!  What is it?  It's the cover of Atomic Witch's debut full-length.  Musically, these guys sound like a mish-mash of Toxik and Warbringer.  I reference those bands in particular for a reason.  Crypt of Sleepless Malice is a spastic amalgamation of "old school" intensity and "new school" precision.  It kicked my ass!

Shocking Dark

I was baptized today.  Yeah, I'll start there.  I mean, why not?  I'm always looking for more ways to make this site random.  Of course, that's not the reason for my immersive lustration (or was it?), but it serves as square one.  The question is, how do I go from baptism to Bruno Mattei?  I could draw parallels from one rite of passage to another.  No horror fan starts with Italian ripoff cinema.  You dally with mainstream icons until you're seasoned enough to dig deeper into the b-movie mantle.  You dig and you dig until eventually, your trusty spade thumps a pine box with the words "Also Known As" chiseled into its lid.

You furrow your brow, but the ritual has just begun.  So what now?  Well, you watch genre films with four or five titles directed by people with four or five pseudonyms.  The eucharistic formality of it all can be disorienting.  And really, this process is most comparable to circumcision, but let's not mix up our rites of passage.  1989's Shocking Dark is also known (overseas anyway) as Terminator 2.  It was helmed by Mattei, credited here as Vincent Dawn.  Unfortunately, viewers are not given the option to spectate as someone else.  Wouldn't that be neat?  "Honey, I didn't rent porn last night; Alan Smithee did!"

Almost in defiance of its alternate title, Dark is a rattletrap photocopy of Aliens.  I mean, why not?  When it comes to xerox xenomorphs, I usually reach for Xtro 2: The Second Encounter, but I don't like to brag about my upper-crust lifestyle.  Hey, I'm common.  I'm street.  I don't mind slumming it with blue-collar muck and ingesting Eurotrash.  I'm being flippant, but actually, the first thirty minutes of this flick are supercharged.  For a little while, I thought I had landed the ultimate exhibition of unintentional humor.  This thing was tailor-made for MST3K (or Best of the Worst, or better yet, any nerd-centric parody series).

Energy is high, one-liners are copious, and we get a reasonable glimpse of the rad creature design.  But again, I'll caution you; these accolades only apply to the first act.  I wanted to spend more time with the outrageous characters.  How entertaining is the tandem of Koster and Caine?  I thought I recognized the former, a military grunt modeled after Jenette Goldstein in Aliens, so I looked it up to corroborate my suspicions.  And I was right!  That's Geretta Geretta (IMDb also lists her as Geretta Giancarlo Field), the mouthy prostitute in Demons.  Man, she rules.  You can see why I was disappointed when she kicked the bucket halfway through Dark.

The film itself seems to know that it lost its hero, as the pace backfires and curls into a fetal position.  You didn't know that a pace could do that, did you?  I knew.  Why, I knew from the second Koster became a cadaver that Shocking Dark was doomed to tail off.  Would I recommend it?  I mean, why not?  It doesn't live up to Severin's Blu-ray artwork, but I've seen worse.  Much, much worse.  Robert Z'Dar says, "Meh."

  

Something About Huckleberry

Every so often, I'll be confronted by a movie that defies explanation.  I'd like to think this happens to every film critic, but not every film critic will blunder upon an anomaly with the buggy heft of 1960's The Ship of Monsters.  This thing is review-proof.  The Mexican import is a corporeal freakshow, and I mean that in the most loving way possible.  At first, this aberration seemed poised to depose Spookies as my default go-to for "creature suit" shenanigans.  Can you imagine?  I was ready.  By that, I mean that I slipped on a condom before hitting play.  Y'know, just in case.  You can never be too safe!

In the end, Ship wasn't the bespangled crown I hoped to hoist aloft in the royal quadrangle that is my bedroom.  Christ, the perverse coronation you must be envisioning; I'm painting the wrong picture.  Forget metaphors.  This wasn't the b-movie to end all b-movies.  Still, it's worth watching.  The plot pits a singing cowboy (yep, this puppy is part-musical) against a camarilla of monsters, each one a virile male from a different planet.  I mention their potency because they were kidnapped by Venusian vixens to propagate an entire race of beings.  Needless to say, the special effects are a riot.

Ship milks all it can from its cracked premise, but there isn't much else to milk.  Why does everything I type sound so filthy???  I'll mold your silence into a segway to talk about another flick I caught yesterday.  If you haven't seen Pennywise: The Story of It, rectify your fanatical failings pronto.  It's an engrossing documentary that recently premiered on Screambox, a streaming subscription-based service akin to Shudder.  Off-topic, but enough nerd-catering streaming services already.  I'm going broke over here!

I'm done mewling.  Pennywise features interviews with every living talent associated with the 1990 miniseries.  There is also invaluable footage of the stars who left us too soon.  It's neat being able to see John Ritter's real-time reaction to the puppetry used in the finale.  The doc acknowledges the elephants in the room (i.e. the novel's orgy scene), which is gratifying to hear as a fan of both the book and the film(s).  Of course, Tim Curry's inclusion is an added bonus.  Seriously, you need to watch Pennywise: The Story of It.  And if that's your main course, The Ship of Monsters can be your huckleberry (feel free to substitute your dessert of choice).

Rassle Inn #37

In the years leading up to his retirement, you would hear fans bemoan The Undertaker's seemingly frail condition.  "He should have retired years ago."  "The Wrestlemania undefeated streak is gone, so why bother?"  "When will Michelle McCool give us one last match?"  Okay, so I fabricated that last comment, but it's a cold matter of fact that the WWE Universe was ready for The Phenom to recede back into the darkness.  Now that we've made our acquaintance with his ostensible successor, I'm wondering on a dubious Tuesday if the fans - and to keep it fair, I'll include myself - aren't experiencing some cosmic form of buyer's remorse.

From the very beginning, I've said (to my television) that the best way to book Bray Wyatt was to mirror The Undertaker's rookie year on the roster.  The creative team had to know that he was the millennial's answer to The Deadman, so why not implement a proven formula?  Within a year, 'Taker was a champion.  Wyatt had not secured gold until 2017, long after he was ushered in as a fresh gimmick innovation.  In my ever-so-humble opinion, he should have won the WWE Championship almost immediately.  Imagine how over he would have been, not that he needed much help currying favor with live audiences.

As wrestling historians are well-aware, 'Taker dropped the belt to Hulk Hogan after an abbreviated run in the main event.  His pullulating popularity forced Vince McMahon to turn him babyface, and although he wouldn't become champion again until 1997, he managed to stay at the top of the card by feuding with foul beasts.  Here again, why couldn't The Eater of Worlds emulate his antecedent?  For the most part, The Fiend was a heel.  Crowds were told to boo characters that they instinctively enjoyed seeing on television.  What kind of sense does that make?

I will admit that I'm projecting my biases onto this editorial.  As he's currently depicted on Smackdown, I don't get Bray Wyatt.  He's fine in the ring, but he loses me with his oblique, meandering promos.  Guess what The Undertaker didn't need for close to a decade?  A microphone!  I will also admit that I'm in the minority.  People dig this guy.  I'm just not sure that he's ready to carry a torch lit with the same kerosene that doused Kane.  How's that for a nerdy sentence?

Blood Capsule #138

SSSSSSS (1973)

"Don't say it; hiss it," the trailer admonishes.  This flick has a certain swagger to it, an inherent showmanship that would have made William Castle blush.  It winks at the viewer without showing its hand and fully embracing the cornball folly of its premise.  That's a good thing.  I know I didn't need to be reminded that I was watching a b-movie.  It would have been easy for the contrivances beneath the storyline to fall apart, but Strother Martin plays it cool as Dr. Stoner (sic), an unhinged herpetologist bent on turning his assistant into a cold-blooded monster (or "snake man," as a carnival barker puts it).  The cast takes the script seriously, which makes it easier to swallow all of the loopy trimmings.

I guess Sssssss isn't that ridiculous.  I've alluded to the pragmatic tone, but the film is more somber than one might expect.  Maybe that's just 1973 leaving its dent in the proceedings.  Visually, we're in "made for TV" territory.  Not surprising, considering director Bernard L. Kowalski forged a career on the small screen.  The special effects are noteworthy.  Makeup artist John Chambers would go on to devise greasepaint tricks for Phantom of the Paradise and Planet of the Apes.  I have no qualms about giving Sssssss a seal of approval.  It's commensurate with the previous year's Stanley, though I wouldn't say it's on a level playing field with 1983's Spasms.  There isn't nearly enough Oliver Reed to go around.

Moonflares & Telluric Ashes

Pictured above is Azgorh, a gentleman known in the metal underground for his black metal projects, namely Drowning the Light.  One-man bands have become somewhat fashionable, but this one piqued my interest for a couple of reasons.  For starters, all of the DTL material adopts a nautical theme.  I've always fancied myself as a pedestrian oceanographer.  The fact that I'm about as knowledgeable on the subject as George Costanza is irrelevant.  I could totally be a marine biologist (shut up), so Azghor's littoral riffs appeal to me.  Secondly, he has got to be one of the most prolific artists recording today.  Since debuting in 2004 with Drowned, he has parceled out seventeen full-length albums and a rich abundance of demos/EP's.

I will concede that I only recently got into Drowning the Light.  For what it's worth, I'm currently obsessed with Haunter of the Deep, which was released earlier this month.  Azghor offers a refreshing take on black metal.  Where prior collections fall into the "raw" category, Deep spouts a polished production job.  Many of his peers lean on the subgenre's stale kernels (i.e. tremolos, blastbeats...you know the rest) to the point that they become rhetorical devices.  This splendid record avoids those pratfalls.  And yet it's unmistakably black metal to the core.

While I'm on the topic of busy one-man projects, I would urge you to check out Esoctrilihum.  Constituted by French multi-instrumentalist Asthaghul, this little venture has accrued nine long players in six years (!).  Dude's building up quite the fanbase, though my tastebuds estimate Esoctrilihum to be a hit/miss proposition.  For example, I dig the expansive accessibility of 2020's Eternity of Shoag.  His latest efforts such as 2022's Saopth's and this year's Funeral rub my ears the wrong way.  I'm still going to keep him on my radar, since he's likely to put out something rad, like, this weekend.  Seriously, how do these guys manage to be so productive???

I'm including the cover of Drowning the Light's On Astral Wings of Wamphyric Shadows because...well, because it's awesome.

Phantom of the Mall: Eric's Revenge

I've been eyeballing Arrow's Blu-ray release of Phantom of the Mall: Eric's Revenge for what seems like an eternity.  I could have bought it at Barnes & Noble, but I refuse to pay upwards of $40 for z-grade entertainment.  Granted, some cult classics are priceless (I'm looking at you, Spookies), but $40?  For a pitiable slasher that was shot in the same shopping mall as Chopping Mall?  Hmm, you may be onto something.  Okay, so this flick is low-key incredible, but I stand by my parsimony.  If I'm a miser, so be it.  I eventually found Eric's Revenge for a more reasonable price.  Who's laughing now?  The fine folks at Arrow, most likely.

This is one of the last VHS staples that I had yet to mark off my docket.  I've always been aware of the title, but I was never curious enough to give it a whirl.  The plot is rudimentary.  You see, evil land developers (!) want to utilize a strip of property to construct a new shopping mall.  Regrettably, Eric's house is in the way, so because it's 1989, the comfy domicile is fucking burned down.  Was Eric killed in the fire?  Will the police catch the mystery arsonist?  Is that Pauly Shore???  Yes, the future MTV video jockey appears in a supporting role as an ice cream vendor.  He's...actually not bad.

The cast is chock-full of familiar faces and character actors that you've definitely seen before, even if you don't know where.  A personal favorite is Gregory Scott Cummins who plays a sweaty heavy on mall security.  Horror freaks will recognize him as Tommy from 1988's Hack-O-Lantern, and I also know him as Mac's dad on It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia.  I like to think they are canon.  How's that for a cinematic universe?  The pace is breezy.  Between bloody death sequences and Coscarelli-esque stunt explosions, you won't get a chance to become bored.

Not that I'm counting, but director Richard Friedman throws in no less than six boobs.  Kudos.  It's clear that this motion picture didn't give me much to pick apart.  I will say that the overarching storyline was a little hard to swallow.  Did authorities simply brush aside circumstantial evidence?  How do these people not know that Eric is alive?  And Melody...this c*nt!  Sorry, but she's a c*nt.  I don't know if I should apologize for using that word or for censoring myself.  I can't win either way.  I blame Melody for ditching her deformed ex-lover as soon as humanly possible.

In summation, Phantom of the Mall: Eric's Revenge is on par with that same year's Phantom of the Opera redux with Robert Englund as the titular bogey.  I suggest renting both.  I realize that recommendation came out of nowhere, but it's relevant.  Of course, if you haven't seen the silent 1925 original, then you have no business being in my establishment to begin with.  The nerve!

   

Blood Capsule #137

SUPERBEAST (1972)

As homework, I watched Rob Zombie's video for "Superbeast."  I don't know what I was hoping to glean from it, but with critical hindsight, I see that I could have watched any music video to prepare for this Blood Capsule (caps optional).  Has Rob Zombie even seen this flick?  His flowery, baroque lyrics don't mention the off-screen violence or the uncomfortable racist undertones.  Maybe I'm reading too much into the story of a female pathologist who stumbles upon a perfectly mad scientist in the middle of a jungle.  The deceptively persuasive doctor has been turning locals into misshapen mutants in a vain bid to ameliorate mankind's inner brutality.  Yeah.

Jesus, Superbeast is boring.  Nothing here inspired me to write a danceable rock song, that I can assure you.  I suppose that Antoinette Bower gives a coherent performance as the damsel in (mild) distress.  The chase scenes are about as compelling as an extra-point field goal.  You know I'm groping for words when I employ football references.  Asking for a friend, but would a Panther fan be allowed to switch loyalties and root for the Jaguars on account of the fact that they were both expansion teams that entered the league in 1995?  Just curious.

MARILYN MANSON - Mechanical Animals

I'll be honest.  I'm not in the right headspace to review this album.  Currently, I'm yawning and listening to blackened death metal.  That could be misconstrued.  I'm not yawning because of the blackened death metal; no, my somnolence is merely a case of shopping mall fatigue.  And the metal is anything but sluggish.  I'm chartering my way through Liber Lvcifer II: Mahapralaya, the latest humdinger from Greek warlocks Thy Darkened Shade.  What does it have to do with Marilyn Manson's Mechanical Animals?  Exactly my point!  Eh, maybe I'll surprise myself and reach a stunning revelation by the end of this review.  Or maybe, just maybe, I'll talk about music and proceed with my day as scheduled.

It has to be said that this is a ballsy record.  The last thing that fans and critics expected Manson to do was embrace glam rock, cut his hair (!), and embrace balladry.  But he did all of that stuff.  More importantly, he did it without "selling out," an enervated concept justifiably mocked by Animals itself.  Here again, the album clicks on multiple levels and here again, I'm leaving the postmortem analysis for the zealots.  Truthfully, the Omega/Alpha dual identity machinations give me a headache.  I'm here for it, but I'm also thankful that the music works as a stand-alone piece.  If you didn't know that we were equidistant to opposite ends of a trilogy, you wouldn't be lost in the fray.

As much as Animals is lauded for being a temperate maturation of Antichrist Superstar, it doesn't veer too far from established practice, at least sonically.  This is still industrial rock.  True, this long player is lighter in tone than its sibylline predecessor, but almost any follow-up would seem blithe and starry-eyed compared to that monster.  I maintain that the sound is familiar, especially on heavier cuts such as "Rock is Dead" and "Posthuman."  It could be said that Manson flirts with self-plagiarism on the former, but it's a fun song.  Pull your trousers out of your pink aperture and give him a pass.  The lyrics are sharp, even if the riffs are derivative.  All simple monkeys with alien babies indeed.

I have yet to express my enduring adoration for this record.  Well, "adoration" is a bit strong, but it's totally swell.  Animals features the band's tightest songwriting yet, and as for the lead singer, he proves that he can actually sing.  I was taken aback by the doleful crooning on "Fundamentally Loathsome."  In my estimation, he never did top the melodic, poignant poesy of "Coma White."  Or "The Speed of Pain," for that matter.  Yes, there are moments that ape Pink Floyd (to name but a single influence), but aside from the choir on "I Don't Like the Drugs (But the Drugs Like Me)," nothing feels out of place.

Favorites?  I fancy the lugubrious "Disassociative," the well-stacked "Great Big White World," and of course, the aforementioned ballads.  Mechanical Animals benefits greatly from its sterile mix and monochromatic production choices.  Is it dated by its use of digital blips and techno loops?  Since I asked, yes, but how hypocritical would I be if I bashed something for being a product of the 90's?  The answer is very.  Hmm, I haven't reached a stunning revelation yet, unless...nope.  Wait!  No, nada.

    

Album Cover of the Whatever

Please enjoy the choppy waters of Ultima Thulee, the debut album by French black metal collective Blut Aus Nord.

Eve's Bayou

My A.D.D.* has gotten worse over time, to the point where it's challenging for me to sit still and watch a 90-minute film in one sitting.  108 minutes?  You must be out of your mind.  And yet, Eve's Bayou dares to plunge that running time into my chest, like a stake to the heart of Dracula.  My ticker remains intact.  That must mean writer/director Kasi Lemmons did something right at the helm of this Southern Gothic voodoo drama.  I remember when it came out.  The year was 1997, so I was ensconced in middle school.  The only things on my mind were girls and the latest Deftones album (EDITOR'S NOTE: Around the Fur is still my favorite batch of Deftones songs).

I knew that Eve's Bayou appealed to me, but I was too stubborn to check it out.  If it wasn't an overt, transparent horror show, then I wasn't interested.  I won't pretend that I've made any drastic changes (let's be honest, all of us are still teenagers), but modern day Dom is certainly more open to bench-testing entertainment that piddles on the circumference of the genre.  That's where our subject resides.  The plot follows a little girl, the titular Eve, who becomes wise to her father's philandering ways.  This epiphany shatters the image of dear ol' Dad as a paragon of virtue and reframes her relationship with her witchy aunt.  Yes, witchy.  Eve relies on sortilege and the black arts to punish the wicked.

I should make a distinction here, as the movie is less Practical Magic and more Angel Heart.  We're dealing with a nasty brand of voodoo, although this isn't exactly a bloodbath either.  Eve's Bayou is elegant.  The cast is teeming with actors who won awards for other pictures.  Why this flick was ignored by the Academy is anyone's best guess.  Samuel L. Jackson turns in a multi-layered performance as an unchaste doctor, while a young Jurnee Smollett is just as captivating as his impressionable daughter.  I dug Vondie Curtis-Hall as the flaxen-haired Julian Grayraven.  Suddenly, I have the urge to name my next pet Julian Grayraven.

Eve's Bayou gets downright Shakespearean at times, which is where it loses its footing.  It's my opinion that the characters become too ostentatious for their own good, too "showy."  Hardly a dealbreaker, and I have a hunch that my problem has more to do with Shakespeare than anything that Lemmons conjures.  I've always hated Shakespeare.  Whatever!  I recommend sampling "Lotion" and "Shut Up and Drive (Far Away)" before buying the record in full.  *I'm officially undiagnosed, but my attention does drift.  Not that you could tell from reading a review.

   

Blood Capsule #136

THE WOLF OF SNOW HOLLOW (2020)

This was a pleasant surprise.  As usual, I'm late to the party, as I get the feeling that the rest of the horror community is already well-acquainted with this lycanthropicture.  It's a quiet, unassuming flick that skates by on its winning personality.  Writer/director Jim Cummings plays John, a cop coming apart at the seams.  His (potentially) promiscuous daughter hates him, his father has a (potentially) deadly heart murmur, and the denizens of his town are (definitely) dying off in gruesome ways.  The fact that a werewolf might be behind the murders doesn't even register as a distinct possibility.  He has enough to worry about, and I failed to mention that his father is the sheriff.

This was Robert Forster's last role before his untimely passing.  He excels as the disconcerted Sheriff Hadley.  Cummings is convincing as our flummoxed, overwrought lead, and he proves to be adept behind the camera as well.  The film has a trenchant sense of humor that sneaks up on you.  I found the near-grinning tone to be refreshing, but don't mistake Snow Hollow for a horror/comedy hybrid.  It sobers up in the right spots.  I will say, the ending is a little too convenient, though I wouldn't want to spoil anything.  Form your own opinion.  This is a no-brainer recommendation.

Rassle Inn #36

There is a lot going on in the world of professional wrestling.  If you're like me, you try to stay abreast of promotions outside of North America.  And if you're like me, you get frustrated when you don't have the time/energy to stay abreast of promotions outside of North America.  Prime example?  Wrestle Kingdom 17.  I'll check it out tomorrow, but suffice to say, there is plenty to discuss.  Naturally, I will avert the topic and instead brood over the headlines.

I can hear you now.  "Wrestling is in the headlines?"  No.  No, it isn't, but for all intents and purposes, it should be.  On Monday night, a committed slice of America stared in morbid fascination as a professional athlete - Buffalo Bills safety Damar Hamlin - cheated death.  It was "unprecedented," they said.  Only it wasn't.  Us rasslin' fans have seen this movie before, and our version had a different ending.  A smattering of pro-wrestlers - too few to label as endemic, yet too many for our comfort - have died between the ropes.  The most recent example that springs to mind would be Perro Aguayo Jr., a luchador who passed away instantly from cardiac arrest.

Aguayo took an innocuous dropkick and slumped over the middle rope.  After paramedics cleared the area, the event continued.  The show must go on.  Or at least that's the axiom that has been universally espoused by professional wrestling.  But should it?  Jerry Lawler had a heart attack during a live broadcast of Monday Night Raw.  Owen Hart died in the ring, as did Mitsuharu Misawa and a host of others.  In every case, the show continued.  A pallor would wash over the crowd, and in the instance of Hart's tragedy, onlookers weren't able to check social media for updates on his condition.

You have to ask yourself, what needs to happen to cancel or postpone a wrestling event or pay-per-view?  I hope we don't find out.  If we learned anything from a football player collapsing after a seemingly benign tackle, it's that - shocker! - we actually care about each other as human beings.  Will pro-wrestling get the message before this happens again?

Panels From Beyond the Grave #36

CREEPSHOW (#2, Oct. 2022)

I would say that Creepshow is my favorite intellectual property of all time.  As a brand, I love everything it has to offer.  In my humble opinion, all types of merchandise should be emblazoned with the film's logo.  I'm talking shirts, buttons, coffee mugs, mousepads, condoms, penny-farthings...if it's an object that can be bought and sold, it should be stamped with The Creep's hypothetical seal of approval.  Creepshow comic books?  Hey, there's an idea!  It only took 42 everloving years, but we finally got the four-color version of the self-contained horror anthology.  NOTE: I'm aware of the original Creepshow comic.  Read my review here.

So how does it stack up?  To be perfectly honest, I'm a bit disenchanted with the final product.  It kills me to say it, but the two stories on display in this, the second issue, don't pass muster.  First of all, why only two stories?  It's a negligible quibble, but the EC titles that supposedly influenced Creepshow were surfeited with sardonic scares.  To cut straight to the chase, the stories themselves feel insipid and skeletal.  I guess I'll start with the lead-off yarn, an ambiguous little chiller (more like liquid coolant) called "The Gorgahmorahh Tree."  This may require a paragraph break.

A prepubescent teenager (I don't know; her age is a mystery) decides to stand up to her abusive parents with the help of a demonic red spruce tree.  Actually, the tree type eludes me.  I just like the word "spruce."  In any event, it's never clear if the girl is possessed by the Satanic sapling or if she is playing the role of firebrand by taking advantage of an extraordinary situation.  It reads as though chunks are missing from the exposition.  The pithy dialogue doesn't help.  On top of all that, the ending arrives before you can get a handle on its forward momentum and The Creep is forced to deliver an anticlimactic epilogue.  It was probably a common juniper, now that I think about it.

"Creator's Rites" doesn't fare much better.  The action is rushed, and visually, we don't grab a solid perspective on the money shot.  What good is copious gore if the camera angle is compromised?  Maybe it's me.  There is a silver lining, however.  The artwork strikes a perfect balance between realistic and cartoonish, which is something that neither the TV series nor the sequels can claim.  Listen, I dig the florid colors.  This is a good-looking comic book.  I hate the fact that I'm shitting on the content, but it is what it is.  How's that for a cop-out cliché?  Oh, and the cover is a random image that doesn't appear in the pages.  Blah.

 

Night of the Sorcerers

The Carolina Panthers piss me off.  Sorry, I'm already poised to detonate down a tangential path to nowhere.  I see sports as escapism, but when your team bends over for a rotting quarterback (speaking of zombies), it's hard to stay in a balmy mood.  What movie am I reviewing again?  Oh, right.  Here we have an Amando de Ossorio vehicle, a fine example of escapism coming to fruition.  Ossorio is one of the more consistent horror auteurs to creep out of the 70's, having helmed Tombs of the Blind Dead and its spectral upshots.  He's certainly more consistent than our offensive line.  Sorry, sorry...it won't happen again.

Watching 1974's Night of the Sorcerers, I couldn't help but think of the late Ruggero Deodato.  The narrative pitch sees a group of documentary filmmakers decamp to a secluded island to study endangered elephants.  They don't run into cannibals, but they do infringe upon ritualistic voodoo tribes who luxuriate in flogging and beheading women.  Ossorio knows how to shoot these ceremonial liturgies, as each death radiates agony in the same way that a prism convex lantern radiates light (???).  Unfortunately, the formula grows tiresome.  I didn't think it was possible to yawn while gawking at naked ladies, but we'll chalk it up as a learning experience.

Sorcerors is a visual feast.  I dug the use of filters (or what I'm assuming were filters) to color the hinterlands at night.  The lens is rubricated for scenes set in a makeshift dark room, while jungle exteriors are bathed in powder blues.  Hey, do you think Victor Salva has the Powder blues?  Ack, I'm terribly sorry...that's three apologies in one post; I may have set a new record.  I digress!  Due to the repetitive nature of the film, the pacing suffers and everything slows to a crawl.  'Tis a pity.  The lovely Maria Kosty and the just-as-lovely Barbara Rey didn't disrobe for the viewer to snatch some shut-eye.  Pun intended?

If you're into necromancy and leopard demons, you might have fun with Night of the Sorcerors.  Then again, you might not.  My vote is ambivalent.  To catch Ossorio in peak condition, I recommend The Loreley's Grasp.  Robert Z'Dar says, "Will we ever nab an actual quarterback?  And what about our secondary?  We should have tanked so that we could at least exploit the draft for what it's worth.  What are we supposed to do with six wins?  Six bloody wins!  My chin could scramble better than Sam Darnold.  The real question is, will Dom ever stop bellyaching vicariously through me?"