Drive-in Trailers: Road Tripping

It's been ages since we've had a drive-in trailer entry, so here goes. Next week (Halloween),
I'll be road-tripping with a couple of friends to a convention in Galveston. In honor of said trip,
let's explore the horrific events that might occur, if we take a detour, pick up a hitch-hiker, or decide to make a pit stop...

Note: The Manos one is a fan-made trailer...but it's so perfect...I had to include it.

Drive-in Trailers: Weird Science

Plastic tubes and pots and pans, bits and pieces and magic from the hand...yadda yadda yadda. Let's be honest, nobody understands the misunderstood genius. That's why they end up wreaking havoc on villagers and/or countrysides with their creations. Well, they also tend to be evil. There's that too. Whether it's a gold bikini or a disembodied head, though...I think we can all agree mad scientists are pretty creepy. Yes, Woody Allen isn't a horror director, but you really can't forget the mad scientist in that one...

Horror Flick of the Week: Nightbreed (1990)

As Halloween approaches, I'm reminded of a film I watched all the time as a kid. Despite some massive butchering and very confusing cuts as a result, I always had plenty of fun watching all of the weird underground mutant people acting crazy as shit (as they tend to in any Clive Barker story.)

Imagine Hellraiser if the protagonist WANTED to become a Cenobyte, and if there wasn't a puzzle box but instead a weird cult dynamic. That's pretty much Nightbreed in the form that I've seen. Now on the 28th (6 days from now as I'm posting this little feature) Scream Factory is releasing a special Blu-ray/DVD with the cut we're all familiar with AND a director's cut. Apparently that one is incredible, and I personally can not wait to see it. But you've got to admire a movie that somehow manages to be entertaining, even if it loses a massive amount of relevant plot points after a massacre in the cutting room.

Grim and Surreal Shorts

I find that the most surreal and experimental films tend to carry some sense of dread, whether the storyline makes sense or not. Good horror can often go hand-in-hand with experimental cinema. It makes sense, when you think about it. You can't really scare the same audience with the same trick twice. The following are a few classic shorts in the surreal genre I think every film buff (and especially horror fan) needs to watch at least once...if not dozens of times.

Horror Flick of the Week: Love Bites (1993)

When I was about 4, I had a small blue trunk. I would prop the trunk up in my room and climb inside it, pretending I was a vampire. I’d spend several minutes inside preparing myself to rise from the dead in a proper fashion, but I could never do it just right. Being about a foot taller than the trunk didn’t help. I don’t remember when I stopped doing this, but I’m sure I kept playing the vampire trunk game well until climbing inside the ‘coffin’ made breathing difficult.

But what does this trip down memory lane have to do with this movie? Hardly anything at all, but I was doing just this on the day I first saw Love Bites on the Sci-fi channel. No…not Syfy. This was when it happened to be a legitimate station worth watching. I curse the day someone decided it should be commonplace to take vampires out of their coffins, because I don’t think anything is so satisfying as seeing a vampire ‘rise properly’ (from the coffin, you pervert.)

Adam Ant is not the world’s greatest actor, but he makes up for any lack of talent onscreen with charm and an awesome singing voice. He doesn’t sing in this movie though, so the charm is a double serving. The result is a pretty fun horror rom-com.

Before we proceed, I'd like to say this movie is easy to find. It's not. I spent an embarrassing amount of money on a vhs copy about 6 years ago, and I still don't tell people how much I paid for it. If you see a copy for less than 20 bucks, buy it immediately. I may or may not have found a streaming version available on photobucket, too, if you're really interested in watching this.

Basically the story is about a vampire who over-sleeps, finds out his place has been not only renovated severely but that it's rented out to a young woman with basic karate defense skills, and decides he wants to be human again to experience all the futuristic wonders of the early 90s. This is where it actually gets pretty unique, because in this world, vampires can become human again if they reset their digestive systems by eating real food and getting themselves on a regular night-time sleeping schedule.

For me, Love Bites is a Halloween tradition. I just have to watch it every October, or I haven't done it right. Hopefully it can become your tradition too, if you manage to find it.

Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween, guys! Today, I thought I’d just feature a few awesome fan-made music videos from youtube, just to get everybody in the mood for tonight’s festivities. Whether you’re going to a haunted house, taking your kids trick or treating, actively trick or treating, or even just sitting home and watching a movie.

Spooky Board Games: Ask Zandar

Can it be? At long last, another board games entry? Originally marketed in 1992, this game was the kind that you'd gradually lose every piece to...except the crystal ball. That's right, the crystal ball. Sort of like how you may not have every piece for Pretty Pretty Princess, but you'd damn sure keep that black ring.

So if you're wondering why this little piece of nostalgia is classified as spooky, look at it from the perspective of a six-year-old little girl who clung to each and every prediction this pre-programmed talking doll in a plastic bubble made. I was going to get a phone call? 2 weeks later, I got one. HOW DID HE KNOW?!!!

1-4 players, not one of the larger interactive games, this one makes an excellent companion for a slumber party. Afterwards, maybe a bedtime story from the Necronomicon.

"Bad luck and extreme misfortune will infest your pathetic soul for all eternity. Next question."

Picture the 8-ball, but you draw cards to ask it, then make bets on whether Zandar will answer in the positive or negative. Your goal is to collect all of your colored gems, and you only get them by getting Zandar's answer right. You get it wrong, you lose a gem. Don't worry if he starts talking in Latin backwards, though. That just means he's happy.

Since it was made in the 90s, you're not going to see much appreciation in value for a run-down copy of the game. If it popped back on the shelves, it would probably be in the 15-20 dollar range. Still, it's fun, and it can get kids talking. That's kind of the whole point, really, just to stimulate chit-chat. Perfect for the Halloween season.

Horror Flick of the Week: Angel of the Night (1998)

I'd like to start this off with a very special 'thank you' to gohastings.com, for always having the most random movies at ridiculously cheap prices. This is not an advertisement, I'm not telling you to buy anything there, because it really is all random. They have a bunch of previously-viewed dvd's come in and out of sale, and they cost anywhere from less than a buck to about ten, which isn't a bad deal if you know what you're buying, and it still pretty awesome even if you don't know. Compiling a list of cheapies, I did not know, nor did I do any research on this movie, because I'm a thrill-seeker. Anyway, onto the review.

This started off as a student picture, apparently, but the short film did so well that the director was able to expand it into a feature-length film. It cost about $700,000 in all. Cast and crew could not all be paid upfront, but the picture managed to pull through. It's kind of an inspiration, in a way, thinking of all the younger people involved making this into an actual movie, when a majority of them seemed to have major schedule conflicts, and an awful lot of this was filmed after midnight. Maybe a few other independent filmmakers need to take a page from this book, and use vampires more often?

Rebecca is a young woman who's gone back to her family home, after having inherited it. She brings along with her an ancient tome with really big writing on the front, and a 3d-picture. That's how you can tell it's ancient and fancy, by the way.

She's brought along some friends with her, and decides to tell them the story in her book of a young priest named Richard who was forced to do battle with a 'vampire' to protect his family and town. Unfortunately, he kills the thing, but gets nipped in the process. I use the word 'vampire' loosely, because the monster actually resembles more of a werewolf-monkey, but I digress. Here are some pretty pictures to illustrate the story.

He is then transformed into 'RICO MORTIZ, CREATURE OF THE NIGHT!' I think that's how vampires work, right? You grow long hair and change ethnicity? Yeah, I'm pretty sure that's the thing. 

Back to the present, Rebecca reveals that Richard was actually her great grandfather, thus effectively killing everyone's buzz. She proceeds to mention there are family secrets in the cellar, and everyone decides to do the smart thing. They go check out the cellar. There they find the world's fanciest lawn ornament, the very stake Richard used to slay the vampire.

Rebecca tells yet another story, and I'll admit I was starting to get scared this would be one long narrative summary. But then there's a throwdown with guns, stakes, crosses, and fangs...which I'm always a sucker for. That brings me to one major point, the fangs are just fantastic in this movie. So often, I find I can't get into a vampire movie unless the teeth look real and sharp. As you can see in Rico's shot above, they're beautiful.

In less than twenty minutes, this second story is rattled off, yet somehow makes me fall in love with a character who dies in an even shorter time. Also, hippie Billy Idol vampire. Hippie and Billy Idol...two terms I never thought I'd use in the same sentence. Well-played, mister director. Well-played.

Anyway, though I'd like to repeat I HATE when movies are filled with narrative bits (you know, like someone was written in to explain chunks of the movie, because they either ran out of money, or couldn't write a script with a coherent line of events), buuuuut...this one kind of wins me over. Probably because the fights really are awesome. This is even stranger, because I also don't usually like fight scenes either.

Rebecca does manage to finish talking, finally, and then (wouldn't you know it) it turns out Rico's coffin is in that very cellar. A freak accident occurs, and Rebecca gets a small cut...the blood drips into the coffin, boom. Instant return of Rico. Kind of. Eventually. It's a little bit more complicated, with some accidental incantations, and lots of chit-chat. Another story, too. In the process of the story, Rico is vampire Richard, I guess? I suspect it's because Richard is hella more attractive. Even with fangs.

...Kind of.

You get the drift, though.

There's nothing really original here. Absolutely nothing. You can probably guess how it's going to go, once the bad guy returns, and all hell breaks loose. Even so, it's a fun ride. The pacing is pretty good, and there are certainly less draggy moments than you'd expect from a small picture. Long story short, it's fun, and it knows it's fun. Maybe I wouldn't pay for a Criterion edition (should there ever somehow be one), but I'd definitely recommend at least watching this once, if you feel like you've already seen every other vampire movie on the planet, or need to wash the bad taste of Twilight out of your mouth. Then again, you should have known better, and only have yourself to blame for that one.

Spooky Board Games: One Day at Horrorland

So, you know those games you used to see on tv as a kid, and thought to yourself: wow, that looks fun! The kind that have all the spinning bits, the cool colors, and the fun traps? The games you play when you first unwrap them, or go to a friend's house, and then realize each time you play that there's one more piece missing? This is one of those games. I don't remember too terribly much about this one, except for a few details:

- Incredibly simple instructions
- Incredibly annoying set-up and clean-up
- Really cool-looking
- And I actually spent more time making up stories using it as a 'playground' for other dolls, than as an actual board game.

There is something incredibly trippy about the black and shades of dark green, though, which somehow manages to make me think...even as an adult...that this guy is going to pop up at any moment to take me to the real 'horrorland'...

My whole point here is that it's not a game for kids who can't pick up after themselves, and you're going to want to make sure you have extra baggies at the end of the night to pack it up, but the game looks great, and I even saw it at Walmart for about 20 bucks, so there's no danger of it popping up at an incredibly high price on Amazon any time soon. I think it's pretty much worth that amount, before the pieces go missing. Afterwards, the game parts themselves make pretty nifty shelf decorations.

Spooky Board Games: 1313 Dead End Drive

For the many of you who've had the chance to play Clue, this game is pretty much the exact opposite. Your goal isn't to accuse or catch the murderer, but to be the murderer. Picture 'Mouse Trap' meets 'Clue' meets 'Monopoly' and you'll begin to get an idea of what I'm talking about. You get to bluff and hide your identity, move other people's pieces, kill fellow players, and all for the sake of money. In your average financial game like Monopoly, the bankrupt player generally sends most of their stuff back to the bank, or gradually sells it off until they have absolutely nothing left. In 1313 Dead End Drive, the dead person's cash just goes to the next heir in line.



This was my favorite game as a kid. As dark as it is, it's also incredibly funny. Did I mention it's really colorful, and the pictures are funny too?