Showing posts with label horror. Show all posts
Showing posts with label horror. Show all posts

Friday, October 19, 2018

Where Wolf? Watch: Wolfen (1981)


Watched:  10/19/2018
Format:  Amazon Streaming
Viewing:  First
Decade:  1980's


Well, I finally managed to watch Wolfen (1981) instead of The Howling.

Sunday, October 14, 2018

PODCAST! HALLOWEEN WATCH! "Isolation" (2005) w/ SimonUK and Ryan


Watched:  09/15/2018
Format:  BluRay
Viewing:  First
Decade:  2000's

A lonesome Irish farm.  A lot of rain.  A cow ready to drop a calf.  Ruth Negga for some reason.  SimonUK and Ryan watch a movie that isn't afraid to borrow, but manages to find a path unique to itself.





Music:

Bride of Frankenstein Theme - Franz Waxman
Milk Cow Blues - Bob Wills
Walking the Cow - Daniel Johnston
Swan Lake - Act 2: No. 10 Scene - Tchaikovsky

Playlists:

Featured:  Signal Watch Halloween 2018




Get your audio episodes at:

Halloween Watch: Vampire Circus (1972)


Watched:  10/12/2018
Format:  Amazon Prime Streaming in my hotel room
Viewing:  First
Decade:  1970's

Sunday, September 30, 2018

PODCAST! SIgnal Watch Halloween Horror Watch: Horror Express and Death Line (both 1972)



Watched:  09/08/2018
Format:  BluRay
Viewing:  First
Decade: 1970's

In the spoooookiest of all Halloween themes - SimonUK and Ryan settle on "Christopher Lee + trains + 1972".  Two wildly different takes on the horror genre from the same year, each with a lot to offer, but offering up chills - one featuring a drunk Donald Pleasance as a policeman, and one Telly Savalas as a vodka-swilling Cossack.  But, honestly, both well worth a viewing this Halloween season.




Music:
Bride of Frankenstein Theme by Franz Waxman
Crazy Train, Ozzy Osbourne
Bound for Hell, Love and Rockets
Swan Lake - Act 2: No. 10 Scene - Tchaikovsky

Playlists:

Featured:  Signal Watch Halloween 2018



More Playlists:

Wednesday, September 19, 2018

PODCAST! A SIGNAL WATCH HALLOWEEN! "Psychomania" (1973) w/ SimonUK and Ryan


Watched:  07/21/2018
Format:  BluRay
Viewing:  First
Decade:  1970s

Watch ALL of Psychomania!

A Signal Watch Halloween BEGINS!

 SimonUK brings Ryan a spooooky film of his youth. The Easy Rider scene reaches the British suburbs as a crew of hooligans cause mischief, dabble in the occult and plan for world domination by generally making a nuisance of themselves. Frogs, the undead, shallow graves, lousy hippie music, motorbikes and locked rooms converge in a film that dares to ask: are you really going to watch all of this?




Music:
Bride of Frankenstein Theme by Franz Waxman
Psychomania Theme by John Cameron
Riding Free from Psychomania
Swan Lake - Act 2: No. 10 Scene - Tchaikovsky


Get your audio episodes at:

Monday, September 17, 2018

ANNOUNCEMENT! PODCAST SERIES! A Signal Watch Halloween 2018!

Coming Soon (like, this week) - The Signal Watch will begin a series of PodCasts for the Halloween Season!

Here's our 90 second promo!

     

I'm assuming some of these movies will be unfamiliar to viewers - they were to me.  But we hope you can find them and watch along with us!

In the can:

  • Psychomania!
  • Late Phases and Dog Soldiers
  • Horror Express and Death Line
  • Isolation
  • Ghostbusters (1984)


and more to come!

Music by Franz Waxman from The Bride of Frankenstein

Sunday, July 22, 2018

Horror? Watch: Psychomania (1971)


Watched:  07/21/2018
Format:  BluRay
Viewing:  First
Decade:  so, so 1970's

Watched for a podcast we're saving for the Halloween season

Monday, June 11, 2018

Horror Watch: The Fog (1980)


Watched:  06/09/2018
Format:  Amazon Streaming
Viewing:  First
Decade:  1980's


Lately I've been having an ongoing conversation with Stuart about the tendency of critics to use the phrases "it's not really a horror film" or "but it's good" in discussing the horror genre when they want to get folks to at least consider viewing something made as a horror movie.  This thinking and talk offends the horror purists, but as someone who tends to think of the endless line of cheapo slasher flicks that lined the walls of video stores during his formative years - I kinda get it.  I understand the coded message: this is horror, but it's not going to just make you queasy and wonder why this is supposed to be a good way to spend 90 - 120 minutes of your life.

I'm of the firm belief that horror is a pretty good indicator that nobody goes to the movies for the same reasons (I usually get very little from horror, but I will have to be carried into a Katherine Heigl RomCom on one of those Silence of the Lambs dolleys).  Still, this does make me think a bit about how I talk about horror films - what I like and don't.

During the course of the chat, Stuart was stunned to learn somehow I'd never seen The Fog (1980), and I had no real reason I hadn't seen it and one convincing Adrienne Barbeau to suggest I absolutely *should* see The Fog.  It's not like I don't dig John Carpenter's other films I've watched - so I broke it up over a couple of nights as I was winding down in Bozeman.

Sunday, February 5, 2017

Hammer Watch: The Wicker Man (1973)



For about two decades I'd intended to see this movie, and somehow just never got around to it.  I'd guess this is partly because I had no idea why I was supposed to see this movie.  People would just say "you've never seen The Wicker Man?" and I'd say I hadn't, and they'd laugh knowingly and tell me to add it to my queue.

I should pause here and point out - apparently I never ask what a movie is about when being given a recommendation.  You'd think I'd care more.

Friday evening, I swung by Vulcan Video on my way home and, after some deliberation, selected this movie out of the sea of titles.  Saturday night Jamie and I stayed in, and while I'd planned to watch The Wicker Man (1973) after she went to bed, we wound up dropping it in the player and watching it together.

Suffice it to say, I now know what The Wicker Man is about, and I get why it has a reputation as a bit of must-see cult cinema in The States, and - I guess - a bit more of a reputation in the UK.  It also was not what I'd call Jamie's cup of tea, and I suppose she'll be picking the next three or four movies we watch together.

The timing is a bit odd.  I'm currently wrapping up a multi-hour/ multi-part series from the You Must Remember This Podcast, something called "Charles Manson's Hollywood".  I'll talk more about that series and the podcast in a future post, but I've spent the past week or so thinking a lot about the hippie and counter-culture scene of the 60's that bled into the 1970's of late, and the bending of free-love into very traditional gender roles, exploration of the psyche via psychedelics and non-Judeo-Christian religion, communal utopianism - and how most of that collapsed in on itself, sometimes ending in violence...  Well, you can see how I might have drawn some parallels here.

Sunday, December 4, 2016

Lust for a Vampire (1971)



Editor's Note (12/5/2016):  Sometimes we sort of half-watch a movie while we're on our computer, and sometimes we aren't paying correct attention.  This has, from time to time, meant that we've totally misunderstood plot-points, found movies unengaging, etc...  

I was a bit embarrassed to learn from someone via twitter that, despite the fact I thought Christopher Lee was in this movie, he is not.  Which is weird.  I like Christopher Lee.  I know who he is.  And I thought it extremely odd he was so lightly used in this film (see below).  Which puts me in a bit of a position.  What did I watch?  

The actor in question is Mike Raven, who bears a passing resemblance to Mr. Lee, especially in facial hair.  I'm now genuinely feeling like I did not give the movie a fair chance and may need to give it a whirl again to reconsider.  When I am wrong, I am wrong, and I try to be open to that idea, especially when I'm so rudely dismissive to a film, book, what-have-you.


Thanks to Judy Jarvis for the correction.



So, I hated this movie.

I was grabbing a few movies at Vulcan and was looking for Vampire Circus (which they literally only had on VHS, so...) or another Ingrid Pitt movie in their Hammer section and saw they had this sequel, and figured "ah, what the hell.  Why not?"  And, why not?, indeed.

I'd argue Lust for a Vampire (1971) is boring, overly long, devoid of even psychological drama, has dull leads, and is a poor successor to it's predecessor, The Vampire Lovers.   That movie was based on a novel with a few centuries under its belt, and, yeah, this was a fresh story about the same vampire coming back to life and being put in a girls' school.  But they replaced Ingrid Pitt as the lead character, which I was willing to accept, and forgot to not just write scene after boring scene where nothing happens.

So, Lust for a Vampire (1971), has some goofy love story where an author falls for Carmilla and so maneuvers his way into teaching at her girls' school where... I dunno.  It doesn't matter.  Even the sex scenes are awkward and boring, and the vampire scenes don't really exist.  Just turning over bodies to see puncture wounds.  AND, unbelievably, it features Christopher Lee and he's basically in a supporting role anyone could have filled in.  Maybe he was just hanging around?


Saturday, November 26, 2016

MST3K Watch: The Corpse Vanishes (1942)


I forgot to write this one up when we watched it a while back.  It happens.

For a long time I thought the first MST3K episode I'd ever seen was Bride of the Monster, the Bela Lugosi-starring picture by Ed Wood with Lugosi playing a mad scientist living in a spooky old house with a slow-witted assistant and pursued by an eager girl reporter out to prove her mettle.  But I actually remembered one of the jokes from the first time I saw MST3K, and as I've subsequently watched Bride of the Monster more than once, I've realized:  nope, that joke wasn't used with that film.

So, I have very particular memories of the day I first saw MST3K which helped me track down the correct episode.

Tuesday, November 15, 2016

Hammer Watch: The Vampire Lovers (1970)


Ah.  Okay.  So.

I had a free rental for some reason at Vulcan Video, so I wanted to continue down the path of watching some additional Hammer Horror.  I was vaguely aware of the movie The Vampire Lovers (1970), maybe from a suggestion from one of you fine people.  I don't know.  What I did know was that the Hammer aficionados have a warm spot in their hearts for Ingrid Pitt, and this one was heavily featuring Ms. Pitt, so who was I to not watch this movie?

Well, goodness.

Sunday, October 30, 2016

Halloween Watch: The Uninvited (1944)



It's been years since I've seen it, but once upon a time, I loved the 1940 movie Rebecca.  And, yes, should my ship come in, I am absolutely naming my expansive estate "Manderley".  I expect to be very unhappy there and hire extremely creepy staff.

The Uninvited (1944) is not Rebecca, but it feels very much of the same mindset and era, like someone took the basic work and pitched it up in some places, toned it down in others and added some layers of complexity while removing some of the scale.  Also - ghosts.

That doesn't mean I didn't like The Uninvited, but it's hard not to see some parallels between stories of lovely seaside houses and the mysteries they hold about their former mistresses.  A good PG-sort of fright fest, The Uninvited has genuinely creepy moments and does a pretty good deal on a World War II era budget and with the limited casting options.

Saturday, October 29, 2016

Halloween Watch: Drag Me to Hell (2009)


Despite endorsements from multiple trusted sources, somehow I'd never gotten around to watching Sam Raimi's post-Evil Dead horror film, Drag Me to Hell (2009).  Which is too bad.  I wish I'd gotten to it sooner.

If you're a fan of Raimi's other horror work, this is more or less in line (and possibly in continuity) with the world of Ash and the deadites.  I was surprised how much it shared both aesthetically and in spirit with the Evil Dead franchise - mixing the horrific with the grotesque with slapstick.

I don't want to oversell the movie - it's not a life-changing experience, but it was perfect for a bit of Halloween spookiness and mayhem and everything it was trying to do worked for me.  And, coincidentally or otherwise, the movie feels a bit like an old school Universal horror film in some ways, which is all right as the movie was at least released through the studio.

Thursday, October 27, 2016

Halloween Watch: The Bride of Frankenstein (1935)


Watching a Frankenstein/ Bride of Frankenstein (1935) double-bill has become my personal Halloween tradition.  I'd already watched Frankenstein this year, and so needed to work in Bride of, which has been tough with the Cubs actually making it into the World Series.  I mean, usually by early October, I'm kinda done with baseball and my football watching is contained to Saturdays.

But, what would Halloween even be (for me) without The Bride of Frankenstein?  I don't even want to know.

The movie remains horrific, beautiful, eerie, hilarious.  Everything I'd want in a single movie, and everything I like about the holiday.

Here's to Mr. Whale and company, and everything that makes this one of my favorite films.

Wednesday, October 26, 2016

Signal Watch Reads: We Have Always Lived in the Castle (Shirley Jackson, 1962 - audiobook)



After reading The Haunting of Hill House, one or two of you (I know Max was one) suggested I check out more of Shirley Jackson's work.  We Have Always Lived in the Castle (1962) was the lead recommendation, and as I'd really liked the other novel, when October rolled in, I selected it as my Halloween read.

That may or may not have been the best selection specifically for Halloween as it's not necessarily the stuff of the monsters and pumpkins and ghosts I usually associate with the holiday, but everyone does it differently.  Rather, the closest comparison I could draw would be along the lines of Hush Hush Sweet Charlotte or Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?.   But even those are a far cry from this book.

Still, depending on how one were to read it - this book is horror.  Not the creeping uncanny spirits of a ghost tale, or even the realization that the normal is face-to-face with the supernatural.  It's the reader wrestling with an untrustworthy narrator and a creeping descent into something not necessarily sinister but tragic and mad.