Shmegalamonga

Saturday, October 31, 2015

Halloween Part 5: Back In Orange!

We did it, gang!
The fifth orbit around the sun back to this celestial spot in the cosmos.
And we managed not to croak.
If you're seeing this, you're alive!

I don't know about you, but it feels like 5 years.
So here they are.

Happy Halloween!!!! (Hell yeah, ya fuckin boogins!!!!)
Halloween Part 2: All the drugs in me, all the bugs in me!
Halloween Part 3: Hi-jinks Ensue!!
Halloween Part 4: Under the wire, and through a loophole!
Halloween Part 4.5: Delayed gratification!

And, here's this year's compilation...

Y'know....I think this has been my favorite one of these yet.
It just might be the best.
*Gets misty*

ANYWAY!
Song time!

And, as always...

Merry Deathmas!
And a happy new candy! :-D

Next year, Witch's Brew.

Read More......

Friday, October 30, 2015

Obituaries, 2015.

Yeah, I feel like an asshole, we had a lot of famous deaths this year, and I didn't keep up on them as good as I should have.

I did Christopher Lee, and Wes Craven, and put them into "Masters Of Horror 2".

And, I did Leonard Nimoy, and Harve Bennett.

But, I didn't do a shitload of others, including Rowdy Roddy Piper, and that's the one that really bugs me for some reason.
'Bout all I had was this quickie "They Live", review (13th one down).

But, thankfully, Hyla did a much better job on his, and he's given me permission to link.

TGND's HALLOWEEN BLOGATHON - 2015 (3) : The HALL Of The HONORED DEAD

And also...

The QUEST FOR HORRAH - 2015 (1) : "THEY LIVE"

...for Roddy Piper, and...

The QUEST FOR HORRAH - 2015 (2) : "DRACULA HAS RISEN FROM THE GRAVE"

...for Christopher Lee.

So, there, read those.
I second all of that.

Thanks, Hyla. :-)

Tomorrow, Halloween.

Read More......

Livin' In A Time Machine!

I got thinking, if I could open up a micro wormhole, and get a weak modem signal through it so I could only text my past self (at about 13-14) on a crappy Apple computer, what would I send myself?

Setting aside warnings of 9/11, and shit like like that, the topic would eventually roll towards movies.
Cuz I know myself.
Now, remember, I can only text, I can't download things to myself, and the crappy 1988-1989 tech wouldn't be able to handle it anyway.
So no future movies.

So, it's got to be recommending movies of the time that I missed out on, or could have seen a lot sooner.

It would have to be these.
And I would tell myself "come on, you like Garbage Pail Kids, and Madballs. Flicks like these are the next step, you'll love 'em. Same sense of humor. Go for it. Don't be a pussy".

(Course, really, it's just an elaborate excuse to get these films together where they belong)

Evil Dead 2 (1987)

Natch.
See here.

The Toxic Avenger (1984)

Hell yeah.
See here, and here.

Class Of Nuke 'Em High (1986)

See here.

Blood Diner (1987)

See here.

Street Trash (1987)

See here.

Redneck Zombies (1989)

See here.

Return Of The Living Dead (1985)

See here, and here.

Freddy 1-4 (1984-1988)

And then keep up on the series for....ever.

See here, and here.

Romero Dead 1-3 (1968-1985)

And keep up on these forever.

See here.

Yeah, that'd do the trick to get me started.

Here's the song that I got the title from.

"Time Machine"- Black Sabbath.

And, that's that weird little category out of my head.

Up next, one more thing.

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Candy Dish (Fun Sized Compilation)

King Sized Movie Glut.

Honorable Mentions (part 3)

Yep, here's the full sized bar that ruins your supper.

These are ones I wanted to do in "Fun Sized Movie Treats", but I couldn't get them to fit into my pattern of 31 days.

So, I decided to moosh 'em all into one thing, and make it a threequel to the original "honorable mentions", because those were the original leftovers.
To make it a proper continuation, here's the link to those...

...and here we go.

Sssssss (1973)

A scientist with the same ethics as the ones in "The Kindred", turns Dirk Benedict into a snake man.
Because, y'know, science.

Before we got cable, both sets of grandparents had it before us, and I dunno if my dad thought it was a fad that was going to go away, or what, but he really dragged his feet hard in getting it for us.

I think "Fraggle Rock", on HBO made him give in.
Like, if Jim Henson was making original shows for it, it must be a real thing.
I think that was the logic.
I could be wrong.

Anyway, USA played this over one of my grandparent's houses, and I think it was my first actual horror movie.
That's why it stands out.
Safe to say it would be schlock to me now.
But, it was a good one to get me started, no real gore or nothin.

Caligula (1979)

Wonderful.
Just wonderful.
If only all movies were this full-tilt.
Jesus, I get so bored.

You can see the high powered talent involved on the poster there.
It's the classiest porn ever about the greatest villain ever.

Yep, Caligula was a real guy from history, Google it, kids.
You'll become a fan.

"Salo", pathetically wishes it were "Caligula".

"Cannibal Holocaust", cries into its pillow every night that it isn't "Caligula".

And "Annabelle"?
Caligula fists Annabelle, and makes Loraine Warren watch
Fuck you, lame modern horror.
Fuck you!

Heartbreakingly, a movie like this will probably never be made again.
Savor this one.
Its gotta get you through a whole lifetime.

Prom Night (1980)

Jamie Lee Curtis's followup to "Halloween".

Ehhh, it's not so hot.
Pretty formulaic.
And the big twist is sorta "meh".

But, at least after seeing it on video store shelves for ages, I finally saw the damned thing.

Motel Hell (1980)

Another one I saw on shelves, and always chickened out, and got something else.
Yes, that's a repeating story, and yes, I nailed them all this year.
I ground Google's gears to powder, and made goddamned sure of it.

Pretty much the same basic premise as "Texas Chainsaw Massacre".
Cannibal rednecks.
This time, they run a hotel, and sell their meats as packaged products.
The Sawyer family wishes they were the Smiths.

This was supposed to be a goof on flicks like TCM1, but then Tobe Hooper made TCM2, and took dark humor out a whole new door.

Anyhoo, it's got Rory Calhoun, Wolfman Jack, Nancy Parsons (Balbricker from "Porky's"), and John Ratzenberger (Cliff from "Cheers").

As implied above, it's no TCM2, but, it's a fun little flick, and the whole thing ends with a punchline delivered by Calhoun that's fucking priceless.
Worth checking out.

The Burning (1981)

Okay, so "The Final Girls", actually parodies two movies.
"Friday The 13th", of course, and "The Burning".

But, "The Burning", is essentially a store-brand knockoff of "Friday The 13th", anyway.

You've got humping campers vs. a psychopath, and characters drop off one by one.

The titular burning refers to the villain, Cropsy, getting burnt all over his body in a prank gone wrong.
This motivates him into homicidal revenge...on kids that didn't do it.

Well, it's not like real psychopathic assholes don't take their problems out on innocents.
Pretty much every rampage shooter ever.
Assholes.

Cropsy's trademark weapon is hedge clippers.
Eh...
Like I said with "The Kindred", I bet there was a kid out there who drew Cropsy pics, and hyped up Cropsy like he was the new Jason.
You just know there had to have been.
And you know he got picked on.
I hope he didn't end up on a clock tower.
Poor bastid.

Anyway, it's mostly notable for Tom Savini doing the effects right after "Friday The 13th".
So, they not only stole its structure, they stole its effects wizard.
Total clone, top to bottom.

Is it any good?
Ehhhhhhhhhhh.....*wavey hand*
You could miss it, and not have a deficit in your life.

I only researched it to enhance my enjoyment of "The Final Girls".

The Pit (1981)

I just stumbled onto this looking for 80's ones I'd missed out on.
What a pleasant surprise!
What a lost gem!

An evil little boy finds a pit in the woods full of flesh eating Wookies, and lures all his tormentors into said pit to get munched one by one.

His Teddy bear talks him into all this shit.
We're mostly to assume the bear's voice is all in his head, but they toss in a scene where the bear's head turns when another character's back is turned, so I dunno anymore.

I like to pretend this is a lost prequel to "Ted", and this shit went down in between Mark Wahlberg being a really little kid, and the story we did see.

Makes it a whole lot more fucking interesting.
Muuaahahhaa!
}B-)

Zodiac (2007)

These next two were recommended by Billdude in Comments.
Thanks, Billdude.
Your efforts weren't in vain.
Here you go.

Based on the book written by the guy played by Jake Gyllenhaal, and based off real events.

The Zodiac is right up there with Manson and Dahmer for famous killers that scared the shit out of everyone. Wish I'd done this along with those.
But, here it is anyway.

Really good, but really long.
Good performances by everyone.
And "based on a true story", isn't a lie.
So that's always a plus.

Robert Downey just before he became "Iron Man".
And Mark Ruffalo 5 years before becoming Banner/Hulk.

Highly recommended.

Nightcrawler (2014)

And "Nightcrawler", for the fucking WIN!

Best of this batch, IMHO.

Jake Gyllenhaal (him again) plays a directionless guy who sees cameramen swarming around a car accident, and is inspired to become one of these independent cameramen (nicknamed nightcrawlers) who get footage (usually bloody and exploitative) for news outfits.

Gyllenhaal's character is a functioning psychopath, so things escalate.
Hi-jinks and shenanigans ensue.

I found it an indictment on the media more than anything else.

Excellent.
Deserves way more awards than it got.
Shoulda got Oscars.

And, that's the real end.

Up next, compilation time.

Read More......

Fun Sized Movie Treats (Part 31)

Part four of four.

The End!

Here we are!

I plotted this whole list out on the first fucking night!

Its been a long fucking road, but the plan has finally come together.

And, now you can see, part of that plan was, to have one of these for every single day of October.

But, since I used up the first 6 days, I had to do all those two-parters to even it out.

Here we are.

And our flick is....

Horror Express (1974)

From here and here.

(Re: The Projectionist)

Found it buried under several boxes at Shady Dave's.

Kept threatening to subject Hyla and Spencer to a double feature of this, and "Bloody Mama", if they didn't behave.

I didn't actually have "Bloody Mama", but...I knew where to get it.

"Horror Express", would have made an adequate substitute, I suppose.

I can reveal now, the threats were empty.

They probably knew that though.

I wouldn't even subject an Al-Queda operative to that.

Well, I did actually watch "Horror Express", with Hyla and Spencer.

I had forgotten when I wrote that.

I can't remember what they thought of it.

Hyla will have to chime in on that.

I've since re-watched it...and it's actually pretty good!

I totally recommend it!

As you can see on the poster, it's got Christopher Lee, Peter Cushing, and Telly Savalas.

Even though it's an Italian co-production, it feels like a Hammer movie.

All right, let's get down to the plot.

Archaeologists find a frozen caveman, and long story short on this plot point, it turns out to be possessed by a body-swapping entity from outer space that's been on Earth since before the time of the dinosaurs, quite possibly during the primordial ooze ages.

It can body swap, and does so, but also can suck a person's memory dry with its death ray eyes, but you have to make eye contact, and its eyes have to be glowing in the dark, so it doesn't work in a lit room.

Okay, so the frozen caveman is brought on a train by Christopher Lee, he meets and befriends Peter Cushing, caveman thaws out, rouses to life, jumps into another body, sucks brains, mayhem ensues.

The rest plays out like an Agatha Christie mystery, trying to solve who the killer is, even when the killer can change into someone else.

So, it's kind of "Murder On The Orient Express", meets "Who Goes There?".

It's a neat little movie.

Check it out.

Right here!

Next up, a very special episode.

Fun Sized Movie Treats (Part 30)

Part three of the final four!
We're closing in!

The Kindred (1987)

First off, fucking schlock, but I'll get to that.
More important is the backstory.

The VHS was on shelves at the exact same time as "Evil Dead 2", and stores were pushing it just as hard.

My parents finally eased up on the age restrictions on R rated horror, and ED2 and this were my rental firsts in a 2 for 1 night batch.

Both were splatterfests, but I hadn't developed a discriminating palette yet, and convinced myself they were equally entertaining.

I also had it in my damned fool head that Anthony was a worthy next big monster to stand alongside Freddy, Jason, Michael, Brundelfly, etc, etc, and drew him in my notebooks, and referenced him amongst my friends like they were supposed to know what I was talking about.

Hey, you know some young nerd out there is doing exactly this with the fucking Bababdook right now.
Not saying "The Babadook", stinks, but I'm wagering we won't still be talking about it in 30 years.
So, give that poor kid a break, is all I'm saying.

Now, to the flick....

A crazy lady clones her son's cells, and mixes it with an octopus, and makes a deadly Lovecraftian horror, for....no discernible reason,
I see no medical gain from making this thing, it's just horrible, and probably envied the dead as soon as it was born.

Despite this, the protagonists keep respecting her research like it was properly done science, and not unethical madness, and keep blindly respecting her like she was 100% rational.

This is what stupid people who post anti-vax or creationist shit on your Facebook feed think scientists are all like.
Just skinning puppies, jotting its anguished noises down on a clipboard with a dead look on their faces, and growing squid men in jars.

Anyway, crazy lady dies, and the dumb son of crazy lady, and his even dumber college buddies go to her house to clean out stuff, and run into Anthony, and he starts picking people off slasher movie style.

One of the knuckleheads in tow is Amanda Pays from "The Flash".
She's secretly working for a guy that skins cats (seriously!), and wants the formula to make more Anthonys, cuz science.

Anthony is ultimately defeated, much slime is sprayed around, literally drenching the set, and we're all stupider for having seen this.

I think deep down, I knew ED2 was the better film.
There's no way I didn't know.

I've re-watched this, and...wow, pee-yoo.

This is only worth seeing if you're historically curious to see Amanda Pays turn into a fish.

Otherwise, take a wide path around it.

Next up, the DOOM-choo train!!!

Read More......

Pages

Saturday, October 31, 2015

Halloween Part 5: Back In Orange!

Friday, October 30, 2015

Obituaries, 2015.

Livin' In A Time Machine!

Candy Dish (Fun Sized Compilation)

King Sized Movie Glut.

Fun Sized Movie Treats (Part 31)

Fun Sized Movie Treats (Part 30)

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