The Dead Next Door: A Field Guide to Regional Horror Films

Trailer of the Week: The Boogeyman (1980)

2012-01-23T06:00:00.002-05:00

After he worked with Andy Warhol and Fassbinder, but before he started churning out direct-to-video horror movies about serial killers, Ulli Lommel gave us this fun little possession flick about a demonic mirror (check out that blatantly stolen shot from Amityville Horror!) starring and partly financed by his then-wife/Dupont heiress Suzanna Love, and filmed on one of her family's farms in Maryland.

Trailer of the Week: Death Curse of Tartu (1966)

2012-01-09T06:00:00.005-05:00

Early horror flick from William Grefe, featuring Florida film legend Doug Hobart as Tartu.

Another Touch of Satan

2012-01-05T06:00:00.003-05:00

Satan Place (1990)
Miami, Florida

What's this -- another completely forgotten/lost low-budget horror anthology? Yup.

There's almost no info available about this one, save for the Joe Bob Briggs review, and a few copies of the comic adaptation (the image above is from the comic book, courtesy of the Atomic Avenue listing). According to Briggs, the stories in the film all take a female-revenge-fantasy slant, and there's plenty of blood and devil women in black lingerie.

Director Alfred Ramirez is evidently the same comic book artist who has worked for Marvel and other companies in the past. He and co-director Scott Aschbrenner set up a production company called Power Four at some point, but I've not been able to dig up much else on this film.

If you've seen it or have a copy, drop us a line and let us know more about this obscure film. In the meantime, here's the Jeannie C. Riley song of the same title:

Trailer of the Week: Mako: Jaws of Death (1976)

2012-01-02T12:48:00.003-05:00

Another classic from Florida legend William Grefe, this one reuniting Impulse stars Jenifer Bishop and Harold Sakata, along with one of our favorite actors, Richard Jaeckel.

Trailer of the Week: Santa Claus Conquers the Martians (1964)

2011-12-26T13:18:00.001-05:00

Kiddie matinee fun from New York State. Merry Christmas!

Regional Horror Hit Parade: Track 5

2011-12-24T06:00:00.001-05:00

A holiday tune from Milton DeLugg, courtesy of Santa Claus Conquers the Martians.

Regional Horror Hit Parade Track 4

2011-12-20T13:30:00.002-05:00

Among Burt Bacharach's many accomplishments, perhaps this is his most culturally significant? The Five Blobs vocalize over the opening credits for The Blob.

Trailer of the Week: The Crazies (1973)

2011-12-19T13:14:00.002-05:00

George Romero's return to form after two non-horror features.

Regional Horror Hit Parade: Track 3

2011-12-16T13:23:00.001-05:00

No 1970s bigfoot film was complete without a dance sequence. From Bill Rebane's The Capture of Bigfoot (1979), here are The Friends singing "Sensuous Tiger."

Composers Mitch and Keith Irish still operate a marketing firm in Wisconsin.

Trailer of the Week: Liquid Sky (1982)

2011-12-12T06:00:00.001-05:00

Oddball, experimental sci-fi from New York, featuring Alice, Sweet Alice star Paula Sheppard in her final film role before retiring from acting.

Goin' South: An Interview with Southern Shockers Director Dave Coleman

2011-12-09T06:00:00.008-05:00

When I first discovered the previously unknown shot-on-video horror flick Southern Shockers, it looked like I would never be able to track down the cast and crew. Then a helpful West Point, Miss., citizen pointed me to director Dave Coleman who, it turns out, is a mutual friend of stuntman/director Gary Kent. Dave graciously took time out for an interview with The Dead Next Door, and I've posted a condensed version below.

Although he's out of the film biz now, Coleman had a long run as a screenwriter and story analyst for several studios, worked for Dino De Laurentiis, made movies in Spain with exploitation whiz Juan Piquer Simon (a.k.a. J.P. Simon), and co-founded the Bijou Café website, which eventually morphed into BijouFlix Releasing.

Now based in Austin, Coleman is also writing books including a tome we're especially excited about, The Bigfoot Filmography: Fictional and Documentary Appearances in Film and Television.

You can learn more about Coleman's career here and here.

For now, though, we're going to head back in time. It's the early 1980s. Coleman, a West Point, Miss., native, is a student at USC in the film program, and he's about to make what may turn out to be the most obscure horror film never released...

DAVE COLEMAN: First off, I wanted to thank you for letting us all know that the film was out and renamed Spirit of the Zombie. It was news to all of us that were involved. It's been a real thrill to find out, and I just wanted to tell you thanks up front.

No problem, Dave. I'll have to say, since I started this blog I've received a lot of tips about a lot of obscure films, but this is by far the most obscure project I've come across.

I'm flattered [laughs]! It's been through no uncertain effort, or I should say no uncertain non-effort on my part, to keep it in any way shape or form in front of anyone's eyes. I've always looked at is as a student film project, since I made it when I was in film school. I don't think the results are anything that are particularly representative of my best abilities.

But it's kind of weird. I'd almost really forgotten it, it's been that long. It kind of shocked me. That was a part of my life that was so long ago now. It's been a quarter of a century, I think. It's hard to believe it's been that long. That's when you really start feeling old.

Let's back up a bit. It's 1983 or 1984; how did you wind up in Mississippi making this movie in the first place?

I'm from West Point. I spent most of my childhood there. We moved there when I was young from another part of the state. I was actually going to USC in Los Angeles for film school at that time. Over the summer, right after, a local UHF ABC affiliate opened up, and David Hopper was the general manager there. He was a young guy, not much older than me. I came through on a trip or something, and he'd heard of me and asked if I could meet him. He offered me an internship there for the summer. As we went along we started discussing movies, and he wanted to make an independent project. I was dying to anything at that age to give me a chance to practice beyond just shooting in Super 8.

When you started planning the production, did you bring in friends from USC, or did you use locals?

It was a combination of both. When we started it out it was very low budget. I think the final cost on it was about $30,000 total over all the production time. We started out with the initial idea of making it a much more polished movie.

I'd gone out to L.A. and called on some film school friends and said, "This thing is falling together really quickly. We're going to try and shoot in two and a half weeks. It's going to be a rush job, but we can get some production experience." No one was making any real money, but it was a chance to work on a project together.

Then the script fell out. They guy wouldn't sign off on the contract. So we were left in the lurch, and we'd already spent the money. We had all the locations lined up, we had everybody there and it just seemed pointless to pull the plug on it given that no one was going to expect much from the results anyway. We decided to basically improvise and create scenario scripts. We made it a trilogy because it relieved the pressure of having a continuous shooting schedule. We could break it apart and shoot at each location as they became available.

How long did it take to shoot the film?

I think the total from start to finish was about three weeks, as I remember it. That's a little misleading because we spent the first seven days trying to put out every fire from losing the script to trying to do something far too ambitious for the means we had at our disposal. Our productivity increased radically as we went along, and got along as a core crew. Three weeks off and on. There were lots of production breaks to regroup and move forward with our ever-dwindling resources. I kind of felt like we had parachuted behind enemy lines, and it was just a matter of time before we were all taken hostage [laughs].

I do remember, toward the end, pulling off one of the very last shots. We were down to about three of us, and we pulled the shot off right before a rooster started crowing at dawn, and we all collapsed in hysterical laughter because we'd endured and we all felt like -- and I still feel this way -- we were combat veterans to survive the experience. It was really, in a sense, boot camp without any kind of drill sergeant around to help out.

What's your favorite segment?

Oddly, it's the moonshine one, the one you cited in your review. It was only by then that I felt like, as a director trying to learn how to handle something so over my head, that I had a sense of how I could do it. The learning curve is so steep on something that tremendously complicated. We had a lot of locations and extras, and it was a kind of an over-the-top production in that sense. I was always a little bit overwhelmed by it, even when I was younger and had a lot more stamina. It was like a freight train.

By that last segment, with our crew kind of battle tested, we all felt like we knew how to pull off shots with one or two takes that were acceptable. I felt really good about that.

It definitely shines, even dubbed in Spanish.

I can't wait to see it. For some reason we ended up having to cut on very low-grade, offline three-quarter-inch equipment. I think the money just fell through. I did want to mention Tucker Johnston, because I owe him a debt of gratitude. He was working at a medical facility near USC, and he had 24 hour access. He was doing their media library of industrial tapes, and he got us off-hour access for no money. We were going in and cutting all night. Ken Sanders, who cut a lot of it, also should get a lot of credit for that too, because that was during the school year, which his pretty rigorous anyway. We spent a lot of all-nighters editing and trying to get to class the next day. Everybody assumes you're out partying, but you're really in this dingy medical facility's three-quarter-inch hellhole, cutting away all night. I do remember that tested my nerves more than anything I'd experienced at that point.

What were some of the more challenging shots to pull of?

It's a great question, and the real pithy answer is every single one of them, without exception. There's not an easy shot in that picture that I can recall. I swear. I know what you mean. The city of West Point was really gracious. They obviously blocked off Main Street for us, gave us access to a lot of basic production value, and I have always felt really grateful and sad that I never had a chance to take the film into any kind of American release for that reason. I know people there would love to see it, however flawed it is.

Okay, so you finish shooting the film, you go back to California to cut it. Then what happened?

It stretched on and on because we couldn't afford to cut it. We were having to go over and use the facility, because there was no more money, and it just went on and on. It was month after month, and we could only go in every few nights to get access. Toward the end, like November or so, I took what footage we had to a guy named Robert G. Hussong. He used to release these movies like Frankenstein's Great Aunt Tillie overseas, and he had his office in this little place right above Pink's Hot Dogs, which is like this classic Hollywood joint. Hussong's place was right behind it, which was perfect, in this seedy, rundown building.

By December, I was so burnt out from school and the actual stress of the production, that I couldn't carry it forward or complete it. There were no funds, and I had reached a point where I couldn't complete it with dubbing. We had no access to the original actors, and a lot of the tracks, for whatever reason, were difficult to use and sync in those days. There were so many technical challenges at that point, in order to get the project to Hussong for delivery, David Hopper took it back and actually had a scratch track added with him and his friends to finish it out. We delivered it, limping, to Hussong in time for the American Film Market. I swear to you, I don't remember anything much after that.

Thanks, Dave! Of course, that's not the end of the story. Watch this space for an upcoming interview with producer David Hopper, who provided the behind-the-scenes photos above.

Trailer of the Week: Stanley (1972)

2011-12-05T13:04:00.002-05:00

Cult star Chris Robinson co-stars with a snake in William Grefe's Florida classic, Stanley.

All Manos, All the Time

2011-12-01T14:00:00.005-05:00

Just when I thought there couldn't possibly be any more Manos-related developments, another bombshell. First there was the puppet musical, then the 2-disc special edition from Shout! Factory, then rumors of a sequel. And now -- some half-mad film archivist has stumbled across the original Manos: The Hands of Fate workprint, and is in the process of restoring the film to strike a new theatrical print and potentially produce a Manos Blu-Ray.

A fellow using the handle "Ben Solo" (actually, Ben Solovey) over on the Something Awful forums picked up a pile of film at auction that had originally belonged to Manos distributor Emerson Film Enterprises. Among the reels was the original Manos workprint (bearing the title Fingers of Fate). You can read the whole story (along with a lot of technical details) here.

Solovey now plans to restore the film, and has set up a website so we can all follow his progress.

The site includes some stunning frame scans that show just how much image (and color) has been lost in the dupey copies-of-copies of Manos that most of us are familiar with. I've pasted a few below.

You can year an interview with Solovey over at Film School Rejects. Let's all hope he can stay on schedule and deliver on the high-def DVD -- and that some forward-thinking distributor (Criterion, are you reading this?) can pitch in and give a restored Manos the type of release it deserves.

Trailer of the Week: Last House on the Left (1972)

2011-11-28T06:00:00.004-05:00

To avoid fainting...

Trailer of the Week: Spookies (1986)

2011-11-21T06:00:00.002-05:00

The schizophrenic Spookies, which has some neat effects but suffered from too many directors and post-production meddling.

Trailer of the Week: The Wacky World of Dr. Morgus (1962)

2011-11-14T06:00:00.002-05:00

Here's a New Orleans chestnut starring local horror host Dr. Morgus!

The.Wacky World.of.Dr.Morgus Trailer by soulpatrol

Trailer of the Week: The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974)

2011-11-07T06:00:00.002-05:00

The one and only...

The Very First Regional Horror?

2011-11-05T06:00:00.001-04:00

Hop on the way-back machine and travel with us to the America of 1910, when Edison Studios launched its production of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. Filmed at Edison's facilities in New York, this may very well be the very first "regional" horror film (although, since the film industry was based on the East Coast at the time, that may be a stretch).

You can watch the film below in its 12-minute entirety:

Trailer of the Week: Wild Women of Wongo (1958)

2011-10-31T08:05:00.001-04:00

Early made-in-Florida cheapie with lots of leopard-print writhing -- kind of like a nudie-cutie without all that pesky nudity.

Trailer of the Week: Shock Waves (1977)

2011-10-24T06:00:00.003-04:00

Best Nazi zombie movie ever. Once, they were almost human...

Halloween VHS Cover Bonanaza

2011-10-21T06:00:00.000-04:00

A small gallery of VHS cover art for a variety of regional horror films, courtesy of Fred Adelman over at Critical Condition. Enjoy!

Trailer of the Week: The Offspring (From a Whisper to a Scream, 1987)

2011-10-17T16:22:00.002-04:00

Jeff Burr scores with a wacky, gory anthology. One of Vincent Price's last genre films.

Trailer of the Week: Kiss of the Tarantula (1976)

2011-10-10T06:00:00.002-04:00

Creepy crawlies from Columbus, Ga.

Regional Horror Hit Parade: Track 2

2011-10-09T06:00:00.002-04:00

Track 2 of our "greatest hits" package of regional horror music is a classic -- the Del-Aires performing "Zombie Stomp" in Del Tenney's Horror of Party Beach. The beaches of Connecticut were never as swingin' as they are here.

Trailer of the Week: Blood of the Zombie (The Dead One, 1961)

2011-10-03T06:00:00.001-04:00

A Louisiana obscurity from Barry Mahon, available from Independent-International Pictures (in its entirety) on YouTube.

September Odds and Ends: What We're Reading

2011-09-30T07:59:00.001-04:00

While you were busy reading this blog, you probably missed some important developments on some of our favorite Web sites. Here's a quick wrap up:

* Over at Video Junkie, William S. Wilson gives us the scoop on a forgotten, unfinished horror film called Bloody Pulp from New York filmmakers Thomas Doran, Frank Farel, Brendan Faulkner and Paul Levine.

The anthology film was originally promoted in a February 1982 Fangoria article that also spotlighted The Deadly Spawn and Pranks (a California film later retitled The Dorm that Dripped Blood). The production was shut down, and the film was never heard of again -- until the redoubtable Mr. Wilson tracked down Doran and Farel and got the skinny on its troubled production, as well as another unfinished New York omnibus film, Tales That Will Tear Your Heart Out. Fright fans may remember that Wes Craven also contributed an episode to that lost epic, and some of the footage later turned up in the American cut of Doctor Butcher, M.D. by way of Roy Frumkes (who later produced Street Trash).

You can read all about it here.

Wilson also provided a nice write-up on our favorite white trash Satanist flick from Michigan, The Demon Lover (1977).

* The folks over at the Monster Movie Blogspot provided a nice synopsis and some sound clips from Two Thousand Maniacs!, and Stanley.

* In other musical news, Nightmare USA author Stephen Thrower, Nightmare Movies scribe Kim Newman, and Friday the 13th composer Harry Manfredini were at Queen Elizabeth Hall in London earlier in the month for a panel discussion on the art of horror film soundtracks. You can read about it here and here.

* Bruce Holecheck at Cinema Arcana posted some nice shots of the VHS art for Donald Farmer's Demon Queen (1986) as part of his VHS Archives series, including examples of how the same artwork was re-used for multiple films and its origins as the cover art for Fred Mustard Stewart's book Star Child.

* DVD Drive-In has posted write ups on Final Exam, Haunted, and Manos: The Hands of Fate (Special Edition), which includes extras from our friend Daniel Griffith.

* Also on the DVD release front, Basket Case is out on Blu-Ray from Image, as is Troma's Mother's Day; Mardis Gras Massacre was due from Code Red; and Something Weird's H.G. Lewis documentary is available on both Blu-ray and regular DVD.

* Finally, we've gotten word that McFarland, after a big facility move, is ready to get back to work on the upcoming Dead Next Door book (I'll keep you posted), I've completed interviews with Southern Shockers director Dave Coleman and producer David Hopper (coming soon to this blog), and I'm already ramping up some good material for the coming Halloween season.

Trailer of the Week: Alice, Sweet Alice (1976)

2011-09-26T12:41:00.003-04:00

This trailer for Alfred Sole's excellent, New Jersey-lensed Alice, Sweet Alice (under its alternate title, Holy Terror) certainly does play up the Brooke Shields angle...

Regional Horror Hit Parade: Track 1

2011-09-25T09:19:00.001-04:00

Among the many unexpected charms to be found in regional horror films, the most surprising may be the wide variety of sublime and ridiculous musical interludes. To kick off our tribute to the fine art of the regional horror soundtrack, I give you Pete Yellen's title track for Buddy Cooper's North Carolina slasher film The Mutilator (1985), which originally bore the title "Fall Break". Performed by Yellen's group The Breakers, the song was composed by Michael Minard along with Artie Resnick, a tunesmith who had earlier co-written the Drifter's hit "Under the Boardwalk." It was released a 45 rpm single.

Trailer of the Week: I Drink Your Blood (1970)

2011-09-19T14:11:00.003-04:00

One of the most notorious double features ever: the bizarro I Drink Your Blood paired with the retitled black and white zombie flick I Eat Your Skin (a.k.a. Zombie, which was originally shot in Florida by Del Tenney).

Trailer of the Week: Curse of the Screaming Dead (1982)

2011-09-14T14:05:00.004-04:00

Tony Malanowski's sort-of remake of Night of Horror (1978), under its Troma release title, Curse of the Cannibal Confederates.

Trailer of the Week: Barracuda (1978)

2011-09-05T13:59:00.001-04:00

For some reason, I can only find foreign-language trailers for this film, brought to you by some of the same folks to gave us God's Bloody Acre.

Tobe Hooper Meets Frankenstein

2011-08-31T10:00:00.007-04:00

The archives here at The Dead Next Door are, to put it mildly, a bit disorganized, which is why I'm just now posting about another semi-lost regional horror nearly three years after I found out about -- and it was directed by one of the giants of the genre, to boot.

Back in 2008, Classic Horror Film Board member Paul Haight posted links to some interesting photos from the LIFE Magazine archive. According to the information on the site, the photos were from an amateur production of a Frankenstein film made in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, by a crew of teenagers in 1959.

As it turns out, the teen director was none other than Tobe Hooper (that's him in the picture above, pouring chocolate syrup on one of the monster's victims), who would go on to later acclaim for his Austin-lensed Texas Chain Saw Massacre. Hooper himself joined the conversation briefly (you can see his comments here), sharing that The Heir of Frankenstein was his first 16mm production -- unfortunately, he didn't say whether it was a full-length feature or a short.

I've posted a few of the photos below, but you can see the whole archive at the LIFE site. (All photos are, of course, properly of LIFE.)

Trailer of the Week: Three on a Meathook (1972)

2011-08-29T06:00:00.002-04:00

More nastiness from Kentucky's William Girdler.

Trailer of the Week: The Mutilator (1985)

2011-08-25T09:30:00.002-04:00

This being back-to-school week for a lot of folks, I thought I'd celebrate with a look forward to Fall Break -- the original title of this North Carolina favorite from attorney/director Buddy Cooper.

Trailer of the Week: Asylum of Satan (1972)

2011-08-15T11:39:00.001-04:00

See Kentucky horror host Charles Kissinger (a.k.a. The Fearmonger) in a stunning dual role!

Kiss the Boys and Make Them Die

2011-08-09T11:00:00.007-04:00

Kiss of the Tarantula (1975) was a minor genre effort from Georgia produced by Daniel Cady, a Hollywood character who was involved in the adult film industry, and who later married actress Maria Lease (a regular in Bob Cresse and Al Adamson films). This article from the local Columbus, Ga., newspaper (written to promote a special local screening) provides some interesting background, including the fact that the house in the movie was also featured in The Green Berets.

From the Columbus Ledger-Enquirer (Columbus, Ga.) June 2, 2002

Kiss of the Tarantula
It's Homegrown! It's Just Plain Bad! And It's Back!

Sandra Okamot, Staff Writer

Just before Christmas in 1974, Stephen King was in Maine, putting the finishing touches on his first novel, "Carrie," and Curt Drady was filming "Kiss of the Tarantula" here in Columbus.

Both King's book and Drady's movie featured an ostracized teen-aged girl who turned on her enemies --- Carrie with her telekinetic powers and Susan with her spiders. Both "Carrie" and "Kiss of the Tarantula" were released in 1975. The movie version of "Carrie" came out a year later.

From there, the similarities end. King has published at least one book a year, while "Kiss of the Tarantula" was Drady's first and last movie. He died in 1997.

Drady had just wanted to make movies, and to make them using only Columbus actors.

For "Kiss of the Tarantula," he had a budget of only about $60,000 and a shooting schedule that started Dec. 9, 1974, and ended 10 days later.

Hollywood connections persuaded him to hire Columbus outsiders for most of the big roles, including unproven Suzanne Ling to play Susan and former child actor Eric Mason to play Uncle Walter.

The Film Society of the Columbus Museum will present the movie outdoors on Saturday.

A spider named Jennifer

Darlene Drady Henderson, now 50, was living in Atlanta when her father made "Kiss of the Tarantula."

She helped him behind the scenes, though she says if you look very closely you can see the shadow of her head in one of the cars in the drive-in scene.

She made her biggest contribution after the movie was made.

"I was the tarantula girl," she said. Henderson would take the tarantulas to various radio and television stations around the country to promote the movie.

"I was deathly scared of them," she said. "I had to get used to them."

She became fond of one spider named Jennifer, who died on a flight to Indianapolis.

"Jennifer was tame and I got her to slow-walking," Henderson said. "I felt pretty sure about her, but I took three more. I put them in a box and wrote 'Do Not Handle' all over it. They smashed my box and killed Jennifer. Jennifer died and the other three lived. I had to get used to them and I had to act like I was not scared of them."

Henderson says "Kiss of the Tarantula" is admittedly not a very good movie. "But the thing is, my Dad grew up always wanting to make a movie."

When he began the project, Drady got in touch with some Hollywood folks who encouraged him to make the movie and then told him to hire the professional actors, which conflicted with his vision for the movie.

"These people did him really dirty," Henderson said. "Before he died, he tried to get a DVD made of the movie." She doesn't know the status of that.

"He lost everything," she said. "We almost lost the house. His every saving . . . it got to be very bad."

Yet she said he still had movie scripts he was working on just before he died, and he was trying to raise money to make another movie in Columbus.

"Daddy put all his heart in it," she said.

A homegrown preacher

One local actor, John Suhr, auditioned around Thanksgiving of 1974 but was not called back until filming had started.

"I got a call from Curt, who said he needed me to play a preacher at the grave site," Suhr said. "When I got there, they wanted me to read the 23rd Psalm. Suddenly, I had a speaking part. But there was not much acting."

In a later scene, Suhr plays the same preacher, but 10 years older. First, he's got his natural hair color, then his hair is powered to make him look older.

Suhr, 65, who works in advertising in Columbus, is now the keeper of the "Kiss of the Tarantula" minutiae. He has photographs, copies of the video boxes from foreign countries, prints of the movie.

He and Drady shared a love of movies.

"Curt really had a dream," Suhr said of his friend. "If he was 20 years younger, it may have happened. I think the thing people would be most surprised about is that there was video distribution in so many countries."

Suhr said Drady had three more film ideas the last time he spoke to him.

A hidden house

Drady hired director Chris Munger, whose one other credit is "Black Starlet," a "blaxploitation" flick about a girl who wants to be a star but ends up doing pornography, for "Kiss of the Tarantula."

His cinematographer, Henning Schellerup, had a more extensive career, mostly involved in "B" movies like "Maniac Cop," "Breaker! Breaker!," "Death Race 2000," "A Nightmare on Elm Street," "Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers," "Silent Night, Deadly Night" and "Cease Fire."

"We got to be really good friends with the cinematographer, Henning Schellerup," said Nonie Eakle, a Columbus veterinarian who had a small part in the movie. Schellerup died last year.

Eakle's childhood home, called "Hilton," was hidden within a copse of trees just off Wynnton Road and was a setting for John Wayne's "The Green Berets."

Much of "Kiss of the Tarantula" was filmed at Hilton, and Eakle's late mother, Nora, and her brother, Grandin, also appeared in the movie.

"I probably won't be recognized, but I'm in the Volkswagen scene," said Eakle, now 48. "I'm one of the hoodlums in the back seat."

As for her brother, you can see his feet in one scene. Her mother had a much larger role, playing a mourner in the funeral scene.

The Eakles kept a souvenir from the filming --- one of the tarantulas, Morticia.

"She lived about five years," Eakle said. "The funny thing was, my mother was mortally afraid of spiders."

Eakle said when Morticia died, they put her in formaldehyde and kept her in a bottle in the foyer.

"Then somebody dropped her and we eventually had to throw her away," Eakle said.

Eakle said her childhood home was "pretty much the whole movie." It has since burned down. Other locations included an old church, its cemetery on Double Churches Road, and the current site of Bill Heard Chevrolet, which was under construction in 1974.

A proper drive-in

"Kiss of the Tarantula" is now being shown to a whole new generation of moviegoers, and Tom Lenard thinks that's wonderful.

Lenard, who worked behind the scenes on the movie, now works for Auburn University making films for the state of Alabama and various federal government agencies.

Though he knows "Kiss of the Tarantula" is not the best movie ever made, he had fun making it.

"I can barely do a 30-second commercial" for the budget of "Kiss of the Tarantula," he said.

It was Lenard, now 54, who picked Hilton as a setting. "I knew Nonie," he said. "I was fascinated that 'The Green Berets' was shot there. I got approval from Nora."

During a nighttime drive-in scene filmed at the Bill Heard construction site, Lenard told Schellerup the setting was too pristine.

"I told them, 'You have to stop. I have a background in running theaters. After the movie is over, this is the way it looks.' "

And he scattered trash around the site and left some of the speakers hanging from the poles.

"That was more appropriate," Lenard said.

A boyfriend

Mark Smith was 17 when he played the spider-handling Susan's boyfriend in "Kiss of the Tarantula." Today, he laughs at the memory.

"A long time ago in a hotel now out of existence, I played Joe Penny in one of the worst movies ever made," he said. "Joe Penny had about 45 seconds of lines in the movie."

Smith's longest scene was shot outside a now-defunct strip club called Boar's Head Lounge --- he had to wait for the bikers streaming in and out of the club.

Now 45 and a nurse, Smith says he was an actor for many years before he "got tired of being broke."

"Couldn't we just forget this one like the Battle of Columbus or Albert Fuller shooting Albert Patterson?" he asked.

A beginning

Ron Prather, a 1970 Columbus College graduate, can be seen in the first 10 minutes of the movie.

"I was one of the kids in the Volkswagen," he said. Those kids get killed, of course.

He did his scenes and went back to Atlanta, where he was living, and didn't see the movie until last week. Even then, he only watched the first 10 minutes and turned off the VCR.

Prather, 53, laughs when he says the other movie he can be seen in, "Return to Macon County," is on par with "Kiss of the Tarantula." At least "Return to Macon County" starred Nick Nolte and Don Johnson, who went on to other things.

After spending 20 years in the advertising field in Atlanta, Prather went back to acting about seven years ago.

He's done several commercials for Just for Feet, Citgo, Valvoline and the Georgia Lottery. Prather also had roles in "Pandora's Box" with Michael Jai White and Joey Lawrence and in "World Traveler" with Julianne Moore and Billy Crudup.

Prather saw Suzanne Ling at the Actor's Express in Atlanta where he was doing a show. He said afterward she came up to him and introduced herself, saying they did a movie in Columbus a long time ago.

"I didn't recognize her," he said. "We had all changed."

Trailer of the Week: The Evil Dead (1981)

2011-08-08T06:00:00.001-04:00

Now being presented as a musical at a theater near you!

Trailer of the Week: Abby (1974)

2011-08-01T06:00:00.002-04:00

William Girdler and AIP's blaxploitation take on The Exorcist was the victim of a lawsuit by Warner Brothers, which led to it being pulled from theaters.

Trailer of the Week: The Abomination (1986)

2011-07-25T06:00:00.003-04:00

Bret McCormick's Super 8 splatter fest was shot back-to-back with Ozone! Attack of the Redneck Mutants. It was finally released on DVD by Muther Video last year.

Trailer of the Week: Mutilations (1986)

2011-07-18T06:00:00.002-04:00

Here's a homemade trailer for a super-obscure Oklahoma monster movie.

Trailer of the Week: The Nesting (1981)

2011-07-11T06:00:00.001-04:00

Freaky haunted house hijinks courtesy of porn director Armand Weston, with appearances by John Carradine and Gloria Grahame. Now on Blu-ray from Blue Underground.

Behold the Gorgon (Video Art)!

2011-07-07T11:00:00.002-04:00

Dark Sky Films recently posted a bunch of photos on their Facebook page of original Gorgon Video artwork that the folks at MPI discovered in their basement. The photos include the original art from Don't Look in the Basement, Deathdream, Night of the Bloody Apes, Devil Doll and one identified pic (the one with the theater marquee). Enjoy!

Trailer of the Week: Redneck Zombies (1987)

2011-07-04T06:00:00.002-04:00

Troma presents another snarky, nuclear sludge-themed comedy, the southern-friend Redneck Zombies. We were disappointed to learn that it was filmed north of the Mason-Dixon Line, but it was one of the only horror films shot in Vice President Joe Biden's home state of Delaware. I wonder if director Pericles Lewnes ever saw Southern Shockers?

Trailer of the Week: The Deadly Spawn (1983)

2011-06-27T06:00:00.001-04:00

Toothy terror from New Jersey!

Trailer of the Week: The Black Cat (1966)

2011-06-20T18:20:00.000-04:00

Crazed Texas terror from the pen of Edgar Allan Poe ... sort of.

More Regional Horror Flicks Coming to DVD

2011-06-14T18:00:00.004-04:00

New DVD announcements have been piling up, but I've been too busy to parse through all of them. Here's a quick rundown:

First, Code Red continues to blow our minds with God's Bloody Acre and Tomcats due out in July, along with The Witchmaker, a runaway production filmed in Louisiana by L.Q. Jones.

The company will also release a bonanza of low-budget oddities under its "Maria's B Movie Mayhem" banner, with former WWE eye candy and Playboy model Maria Kanellis hosting. Regional titles in the series slated for September will include Mardi Gras Massacre from Louisiana and the Arizona film Haunted, along with double bills of Scream/Barn of the Naked Dead and Love Me Deadly/Curious Case of the Campus Corpse.

Future titles in the series will include the killer bigfoot flick Night of the Demon, Vampire at Midnight, and a double bill of Teenage Hitchhikers/Teenage Tramp.

Scorpion Releasing (which you may recall is run by Code Red honcho Bill Olsen's brother Walter), meanwhile, has announced its own line of low-budget horror films hosted by a former half-naked WWE/TNA starlet, "Katarina's Nightmare Theater." Katarina Leigh Waters will introduce films like the North Carolina slasher flick Final Exam, along with The Incubus, Humongous, House on Sorority Row, The Carpenter, the promisingly titled American Nightmare (sadly, it's really Canadian), and the ludicrous killer baby film The Devil Within Her.

Something Weird will release its first Blu-Ray offerings via Image Entertainment: Basket Case, the H.G. Lewis "Blood Trilogy" (Blood Feast, Two Thousand Maniacs, Color Me Blood Red), and Frank Henenlotter's recent H.G. Lewis documentary Godfather of Gore. Basket Case will be sourced from the original (previously lost) 16mm negative, so it will look even better than when it was first released to theaters as a 35mm blow up.

Over at VCI, the 12-film Scream Theater package was finally released after being held up by "rights issues." Not sure what those problems were, since the one title that is definitely no longer public domain, the New Jersey film Alice, Sweet Alice, is still on the set. S.F. Brownrigg's Don't Open the Door is also included.

Finally, Synapse Films has announced DVD/Blu-Ray combo packs of Frank Henenlotter's Frankenhooker (New York), Maniac Cop (not technically a regional, but filmed partly in New York), and the James Glickenhaus film The Exterminator.

Trailer of the Week: Raiders of the Living Dead (1986)

2011-06-13T06:00:00.002-04:00

An unholy amalgam of the work of New Hampshire's Brett Piper and New Jersey's Samuel M. Sherman. And yes, that is Flick from A Christmas Story turning his grandpa's laser disc player into a death ray. "They're back from the dead and they don't eat potato salad."

Where the Heck are the Aliens?

2011-06-07T18:00:00.005-04:00

Alien Zone (1978)
Stillwater, Oklahoma

Released the same year as John Carpenter's Halloween, Alien Zone (a.k.a. House of the Dead) is one of just a handful of American omnibus films from the 1970s that has become a staple of public domain DVD collections. The title is a non-sequitur; there are no aliens. Instead, it's a straightforward, EC Comics-style presentation with a ghoulish mortician relaying four stories to a philandering conventioneer who has wandered into his funeral home during a rain storm. Unfortunately, the film never matches the effectiveness of the opening segment (about some Halloween-masked, candy corn-fanged kids terrorizing a grumpy school teacher).

Alien Zone is also one of the few genre items of that era (or any era, for that matter) directed by a woman. Oddly, none of the articles I've found about the movie mention director Sharron Miller. Miller was an Oklahoma State University grad who went on to a successful career in television, making it doubly strange that even the local press failed to profile her.

From the Tri City Herald, June 27, 1978:

Sooner the better says movie mogul

By David Egner, Associated Press Writer

Oklahoma City -- Hollywood, look out. Moviemaking has come to Oklahoma.

"We can do anything here we can do in California," said Oklahoma movie producer Arthur Leonard. "I'm trying to start an excitement here... I want to bring the film and TV industry to Oklahoma."

Leonard, who has completed work on one movie and hopes to produce at least five more in Oklahoma, said the state offered moviemakers low production costs and a variety of settings for films.

"Five Faces," a fantasy thriller about five corpses that come to life, cost $600,000 to film in the Oklahoma cites of Stillwater, Ponca City and Yale last November and December, Leonard said.

Making the same film in California would have cost at least $1.2 million, the producer said.

"People here let you use their facilities for less," Leonard said.

An example, he said, was a hospital that charged only $50 per day to be used as the scene of filming for "Five Faces."

Leonard's film company, Myriad Cinema International, is based in the heartland of Oklahoma wheat country, the city of Enid.

Enid, with a population of about 45,000, became the movie capital of Oklahoma because it is the home of Leroy and Marvin Boehs, two oilmen who've agreed to supply $500,000 in financing for each of six Myriad films, Leonard said.

There are also smaller investors in the company.

"If you make a fairly good film, you can't have a dry hole," Leonard said, turning to oil industry terminology to describe what he considers the bright financial outlook for Warner Brothers and Columbia Studios, but always on B-grade films, he said.

Leonard moved to Oklahoma seven years ago for a land promotion, and has since been engaged in writing and public relations work.

"I like this state because here I could be No. 1" among movie producers, Leonard said, since no other feature film companies are headquartered in Oklahoma.

In Oklahoma, "You're not governed by studio bosses, you're doing your own thing. The only thing that's lacking here is a studio," the producer said, but he has plans to change that.

Myriad expects to turn a Stillwater armory into a studio in September.

"Five Faces," starring John Erickson, is scheduled to be released this summer.

From BoxOffice, November 27, 1978:

Over 200 Attend Bow of 'Alien Zone,' Enjoy Bizarre Evening in Stillwater

STILLWATER, OKLA. -- About 200 curious people withstood pouring rain outside the Aggie Theatre here Tuesday night (14) for a chance ot attend the world premiere of a locally produced horror film, "Alien Zone," writes Mark Weatherford for the Daily Oklahoman. His story is quoted, in part, below.

Rain Curtails Fun

Ceremonies outside were shortened by the rain, forcing the film's executives and honored guests -- who arrived in a funeral hears and limousine -- to make a quick run inside.

Once inside, however, spirits were restored as patrons shook hands with the filmmakers who expressed happiness with the turnout despite the rain.

"We planned it this way so it would match the first scene of the movie," laughed executive producer Arthur Leonard of Oklahoma City.

"This really tells me something about Oklahoma's spirit," said Australian-born Richard Cassidy of Jupiter Films, distributor of the movie.

Funeral March Featured

To herald the beginning of the movie, a scaled-down funeral procession complete with trumpets, drum, pallbearers and casket, marched down the aisle of the packed theater.

The film is a five-vignette anthology of a horror story linked together by the tales of a strange mortician told to his unexpected guest on a rainy night.

Originally shot under the title "Five Faces of Terror," the movie was filmed in Stillwater last November and December, with additional scenes shot in Ponca City and Yale.

The film originated when Leonard, a retired Hollywood filmmaker, and William Jackson, an OSU broadcasting and film instructor, decided to capitalize upon the availability of non-unionized OSU broadcasting students as well as the enthusiasm such a project would generate.

After gaining the financial support of Enid businessmen Leroy and Marvin Boehs, Leonard began work as executive producer for the $685,000 film, produced under the name of Myriad Cinema, Inc., Oklahoma City.

Trailer of the Week: Blood Sisters (1987)

2011-06-06T06:00:00.001-04:00

Probably my favorite of Roberta Findlay's late 1980s horror offerings -- Blood Sisters. There is no escape!

Trailer of the Week: Axe (1977)

2011-05-30T06:00:00.002-04:00

Frederick R. Friedel's minimalist classic (also known as Lisa, Lisa) was shot in North Carolina and distributed by Harry Novak at Box Office International.

Trailer of the Week: Basket Case (1982)

2011-05-23T06:00:00.004-04:00

Another classic from New York: Frank Henenlotter's Basket Case.

Please Don't Return to Boggy Creek

2011-05-20T06:00:00.002-04:00

Arkansas filmmaker Charles B. Pierce took out this full-page ad in Boxoffice magazine to deny any connection to the unsanctioned, G-rated sequel Return to Boggy Creek (1977), brought to you by Texas producer/director Tom Moore.

Pierce would later produce his own official sequel, Boggy Creek II, in 1985. Moore also directed Mark of the Witch, and had a hand in Horror High.

Trailer of the Week: Street Trash (1987)

2011-05-16T06:00:00.001-04:00

More gore from the Big Apple, courtesy of steadicam legend James Muro.

Trailer of the Week: Slime City (1988)

2011-05-09T09:31:00.006-04:00

Greg Lamberson's icky, sticky underground fave from New York -- along with a bonus trailer for the recent sequel, Slime City Massacre (2010)!

Trailer of the Week: The Brain that Wouldn't Die (1962)

2011-05-02T06:00:00.005-04:00

Producer Rex Carlton struck surrealist schlock gold with this New York-based quickie about a loopy scientist trying to graft his wife's severed head onto the body of an exotic dancer. Carlton made better films earlier in his career (C-Man, Guilty Bystander) and worse ones later (Nightmare in Wax, Blood of Dracula's Castle), but none of them ever reached this level of near perfect lunacy.

Trailer of the Week: Color Me Blood Red (1965)

2011-04-25T06:00:00.005-04:00

The final installment in H.G. Lewis and David Friedman's Blood Trilogy. Keep reminding yourself, it's just a movie...

BoxOffice Covers: The 1970s, Part 2

2011-04-20T06:00:00.001-04:00

We wrap up our look at 1970s BoxOffice magazine covers with two of my favorites -- Horror High and Creature From Black Lake -- as well as non-horror offerings from Alaska's Chuck Keen (Timber Tramps), North Carolina's Earl Owensby (Seabo), Arkansas legend Charles B. Pierce (The Norseman), and Florida fave William Grefe (The Godmothers, complete with a staged shot of Grefe and producer Socrates Ballis with the cast in gangster drag).

BoxOffice Covers: The 1970s, Part 1

2011-04-19T06:00:00.010-04:00

A selection of BoxOffice magazine covers featuring regional horror releases. Tomorrow, I'll post a few more goodies, in addition to covers featuring some more esoteric, non-horror releases from regional directors/producers.

Trailer of the Week: Two Thousand Maniacs! (1964)

2011-04-18T06:00:00.002-04:00

Yee-haw! H.G. Lewis follows up Blood Feast with what he sometimes refers to as "Brigadoon with blood."

Messing with Texas: A Pictorial Tribute to S.F. Brownrigg

2011-04-12T09:30:00.006-04:00

If regional horror has an unheralded genius, then that man is probably S.F. Brownrigg, the Texas director who gave us Don't Look in the Basement (1973), Don't Open the Door (1975), Scum of the Earth (1974), and Keep My Grave Open (1976). High on style (but sometimes low on action), Brownrigg's films ooze atmosphere, and are heavy on overly theatrical acting, seedy locations, low lighting, and sweaty close-ups of shady characters staring bug-eyed at the camera. With the promised release of Scum of the Earth on DVD soon (How soon? Someone needs to harass Brownrigg expert Dave Szulkin about this!), his entire horror output will soon be available for home consumption.

Take the release dates above with a grain of salt. All four films were shot between 1972 and 1974 (again, according to Texas horror historian Dave Szulkin); both Door and Grave languished for several years before they were originally released.

So, with the usual thanks to Fred Adelman at Critical Condition and the folks at Wrong Side of the Art, behold the legacy of "Brownie" Brownrigg! (You can also see a nice gallery of Don't Look in the Basement art at the Temple of Schlock.)

Trailer of the Week: Boggy Creek II (1985)

2011-04-11T06:00:00.004-04:00

Charles B. Pierce's official follow-up to The Legend of Boggy Creek, featuring the director and his son in key roles.

BOGGY CREEK 2, TRAILER by chefandew

Would you like a bicycle?

2011-04-06T07:00:00.001-04:00

Michael de Gaetano's Georgia film UFO: Target Earth boasted some early computer-generated special effects, but I'm more impressed with the decidedly low-tech giveaway the local radio station came up with -- a 10-speed bicycle.

Trailer of the Week: The Town That Dreaded Sundown (1977)

2011-04-04T06:00:00.005-04:00

Another based-on-true-events flick from Charles B. Pierce. Someone release this on legit DVD!

Manos -- The Hands of Fate, er, Felt

2011-03-29T21:53:00.000-04:00

In a world where Santa Claus Conquers the Martians has been mounted as a play by middle school students, should we be surprised that the folks at Seattle's Odd Duck Studio have turned one of our favorite regional films into a puppet show? Those of you in the Pacific Northwest have the opportunity to see Harold P. Warren's hypnotically dreary El Paso film Manos: The Hands of Fate re-imagined as Manos: The Hands of Felt from April 1-16 at 10:30 pm.

The show is presented by Puppet This, a Seattle-based puppet production company, and Eclectic Theater Company.

You can check out the event's Facebook page here. You can find even more info at the Puppet This site. You can also read our previous Manos musings here.

Trailer of the Week: The Legend of Boggy Creek (1972)

2011-03-28T06:00:00.007-04:00

Sasquatch terror from Arkansas legend Charles B. Pierce -- based on a true story! Sort of.

Spring Cinema Wasteland is Coming!

2011-03-23T18:00:00.004-04:00

Just a reminder that the spring Cinema Wasteland Movie and Memorabilia Expo is coming up on April 1-3 at the luxurious Holiday Inn in Strongsville, Ohio.

In addition to being a great place to pick up a zombie teddy bear or a bootleg copy of Unholy Rollers, the Wasteland always has a great guest list -- and there's usually a heap of regional horror-related celebrities in attendance.

Of particular interest to Dead Next Door readers this year: David Hess, the leering lead baddie in Wes Craven's Last House on the Left (Connecticut); Evil Dead (Michigan) stars Ellen Sandweiss and Theresa Tilly (Betsy Baker, unfortunately, had to cancel); Evil Dead effects artist Tom Sullivan; frequent George Romero collaborator Michael Gornick, who worked as a cinematographer and/or sound technician on Martin, The Crazies and Dawn of the Dead; actress Lynn Lowry, who appeared in I Drink Your Blood (New York), Sugar Cookies, and The Crazies; porn pioneer Radley Metzger; and Night of the Living Dead actors Judith Ridley and Russ Streiner.

The headliners this year also include director Ruggero Deodato, actor Michael Berryman, Tom Atkins, John Carl Buechler, and William Forsythe.

It's still just $20 at the door Friday and Saturday, and $15 on Sunday. Kids ten and under are free.

Trailer of the Week: Fear No Evil (1981)

2011-03-21T06:00:00.005-04:00

Early work from New York director Frank LaLoggia.

R.I.P. David F. Friedman (1923 - 2011)

2011-03-14T21:51:00.001-04:00

On Valentine's Day, we lost one of the legends of the exploitation flick biz, producer and director David F. Friedman. Although best known for his multi-flick partnership with gore pioneer H.G. Lewis (which resulted in the Florida-lensed "Blood Trilogy," Blood Feast, Two Thousand Maniacs and Color Me Blood Red, as well as a handful of nudie-cuties), Friedman was a walking textbook of exploitation history. He'd worked the carny circuit and learned the art of pitching films from Ohio native Kroger Babb, helping that entrepreneur peddle his birth-of-a-baby classic Mom and Dad. After his split with Lewis, he headed to California where he made a series of elaborate adults-only films and horror flicks, co-owned the Pussycat chain of adult movie theaters, and eventually served as as president of the adult film industry's trade association. A staunch libertarian, Friedman enthusiastically defended the rights of filmmakers to peddle smut to the eager public, and often bragged that he'd voted for Richard Nixon six times (although, given Nixon's position on the porn industry, it's unclear how our former president felt about the endorsement).

While his compatriots in the sleaze-biz were often just as shady as their films, Friedman was a jolly, avuncular presence with a quick with a big cigar. He'll be missed. In his honor, a brief one-sheet retrospective of just some of the man's contributions to 20th Century culture:

Trailer of the Week: Let's Scare Jessica to Death (1971)

2011-03-14T09:30:00.001-04:00

One of my faves: John D. Hancock's creepy Let's Scare Jessica to Death.

Sufferin' Shocotash: A Mess From Ole Miss

2011-03-11T12:40:00.002-05:00

Southern Shockers (1985)
West Point, Mississippi

Last month we wrote about our discovery of a previously-unheard-of, shot-on-video film from Mississippi called Southern Shockers that had turned up on video in Spain under the title Spirit of the Zombie. I found this discovery to be doubly exciting since not only was this an otherwise unknown film, but it was shot in West Point, Miss., a town where I spent six or seven summers in a row during my wayward adolescence. I was in West Point the first time I tasted alcohol, the first time I drove a boat, the first time I was almost arrested, the first time I ever walked into a public restroom in the aftermath of a knife fight, and the first time I ever saw a drunk man wildly fire a small-caliber pistol into a stocked pond during a fishing trip. Watching a cheap horror movie made during the same period I was actually visiting this town would be like time travel for me.

Well, thanks to the efforts of our new friend Jose, we have since been able to view said mystery film, and are happy to report that a) it does exist; and b) it's not nearly as bad as we thought it would be, which in the world of SOV horror movies is something of an accomplishment.

Since the film was apparently never released in the U.S. in any form, and even my contact in Spain was never able to bring himself to watch the entire film, that means that, other than the director and editor, I may very well be the only person on the planet to have watched Southern Shockers from beginning to end. Since we may never find out exactly who made the film or why it was never released on video, and because the one existing print is entirely dubbed in Spanish, I've decided to do you all a favor and provide as accurate a description of the film as possible.

And so, without further ado, the low-down on Southern Shockers -- with screen caps!

The film opens in some kind of filthy min-mart/diner combo where a weird-looking guy with thick glasses (sort of a poor man's Toby Radloff) meets two men in suits (a younger guy with a discrete mullet, and an older man) for lunch. The three of them promptly leave the diner and head to a nearby church, where we are first introduced to Preacher Hopewell (Eric Shusterman).

"Heavenly Father, please forgive our murky lighting..."

When Hopewell sees the men enter the church, he tosses his prepared sermon and launches into what I'm sure is an impassioned speech about ... something (remember, it's dubbed in Spanish) while his mousy organist nods in agreement.

Cut to our first story ("RX"), in which the fellow with the mullet (Tom Hatcher) arrives in West Point, Miss., to set up shop as the new town doctor.

Bitchin' cars and cheap gas -- that's why we miss the '80s

He's a bit disappointed to find that his new home is a dilapidated wreck, but happy to welcome a dark-haired beauty into the house while some locals stare bug-eyed at him through the windows of Marcia's Diner.

Mississippi version of a fixer-upper

Later that night, the young lady returns and has some lusty, back-lit sex with the doctor. The next day he awakens to find that he has mysteriously aged, and he becomes increasingly disoriented while walking down the street -- people keep touching him, apparently draining his life force. Or something. It's hard to tell. He eventually flees town in his car, but is hauled back by a policeman. After escaping the squad car, he's chased by a mob of townspeople until he reaches the scene of an accident. He's forced to touch an apparently dead man who is bleeding in the street, which causes said corpse to open its eyes. Cue unexpectedly fluid crane shot.

I don't know where all these people are going,
but I wish one of them would help us
find more information about this movie

Because the dialogue is unintelligible, the first story comes off the worst, because it's impossible to tell what's going on. Not so for the second story ("Moonshine"), in which the older gentleman from the diner (Robert Harrell) is shown making some white lightning at his run-down shotgun shack.

Another Saturday afternoon at Haley Barbour's house...

Soon, a gaggle of gnarly hillbillies arrive, looking to purchase some of his home brew.

"Buenos dias!"

Later that night, the moonshiner accidentally spills some of his latest batch on his hand, and is horrified to see that it nearly melts his skin! He briefly considers alerting his most recent customers, but instead dumps the booze and dismantles his still. Meanwhile, his impressively bearded customers begin melting and mutating in front of their horrified friends and families (and this was still two years before Street Trash!).

I see someone's been reading Tom Savini's Grande Illusions

They then predictably turn up at the cabin as puffy-faced zombies, out for revenge.

"Was that moonshine manufactured in an FDA-certified production facility?"

After being cornered in his cabin by the angry zombies, the moonshiner finally decides to do the only admirable thing, and swallows the rest of his tainted hooch.

"Moonshine" works much better than the first story, and has a nice (if cheap) EC Comics feel, which is what I think the director was going for. In any case, it's the highlight of the film.

Next up, our bespectacled third protagonist (Mike Gordon) gets the Preacher Hopewell treatment in "King of the Road." Gordon is first seen flying down a rural highway in clear violation of local traffic laws. He stops by a bar, where some good-looking girls and their boyfriend taunt him, then ask for a ride.

Trying to impress his carload of bimbos, our nerdy hero first drives really, really fast, then harasses a slower, elderly driver who crashes into a ditch. He then dumps his shocked passengers on the side of the road.

Our hero?

Enter a rampaging spirit of vengeance in the form of a long-haired demon (played by David Hopper, effects artist Chris Witherspoon, and Andrew Stewart) driving an old hearse with a skull strapped to the hood. The screamin' demon chases Gordon until HE crashes into a ditch.

If you're in the business of harvesting souls, always keep a bungee cord on hand

From that point forward, it's a foot race between the pudgy Gordon and his lithe, leather-clad, scythe-wielding tormentor. The two of them awkwardly gallop from a nearby Indian burial site (this is an actual historical site near West Point) and then through a junkyard, where Gordon finally meets his unpleasant end.

I foresee a future in producing music videos for local bands

Back at the church, the nervous men leave as the church organist congratulates the preacher on his sermon. As the preacher turns to leave, we get the expected ironic coda in which we discover that Preacher Hopewell was, indeed, born with a tail.

So, what do we make of Southern Shockers? While it's cautionary comic book stories are a tad predictable, the film itself boasts some decent special effects, okay lighting (always a problem with these Betacam and Super VHS movies), some interesting camera work, a decently executed car chase, and some banjo music to enliven what is otherwise a typically droning synthesizer score (to be fair, the score may have actually been dubbed in by the Spanish distributor).

In fact, while it's no classic, it's certainly on par with other contemporary SOV films from the same period, which makes it even MORE of a mystery why no one has ever heard of or seen this thing before.

We really would like to track down some of the filmmakers and find out more, so here's a more complete credits list. If you know any of these people, we'd love to hear from them.

Southern Shockers (1985)

Director: David Coleman
Producers: Mike Gordon, David Hopper
Editor: Ken Sanders
Make-up and special effects: Chris Witherspoon
Music: Ron Evans and Mike Hampton

Cast
Eric Shusterman
Mike Gordon
Robert Harrell
Tom Hatcher
Tammy King
John Sorrels
Thomas Shinn
Ken Sanders
Ronald Demerit
Don Smith
Jerry Sanders
Lyndon Love
Anna Wilson
April Fleming
Greg Jeffries
Andrew Stewart
Vicki Stevens
Greg Stroud

Gore and Gumbo

2011-03-08T09:33:00.025-05:00

In honor of this week's Mardi Gras festivities, a visual tribute to the strange world of Louisiana horror films courtesy of the Fred Adelman Archives, Shock Cinema, Wrong Side of the Art, and the Temple of Schlock.

Trailer of the Week: Mardi Gras Massacre (1978)

2011-03-07T06:00:00.003-05:00

Sleaze from the Big Easy, courtesy of local legend Jack Weis, who also brought us Quadroon (1972) and Crypt of Dark Secrets (1976).

March Odds and Ends

2011-03-05T06:00:00.001-05:00

It's time to clear the inbox of all those various bits of flotsam that are spilling over onto my already-cluttered desk.

First up, magazine news:

* The upcoming issue of SCREEM magazine will feature my review of Joe Spinell's final film, The Undertaker, along with my interview with American Grindhouse director Elijah Drenner.

* The latest FilmFax (#126) includes a lengthy piece (part 2 of 2!) on the making of Frankenstein Meets the Space Monster.

* Horror Hound's November issue (released during the Cincinnati convention) included a retrospective on Joe Spinell's Maniac, as well as an article on Oklahoma-based video pioneers VCI.

Speaking of Horror Hound, that mag's upcoming Horror Hound Weekend convention in Indianapolis (March 25-27) will feature a star-studded horror host tribute to New York movie host Zacherley (who appeared in such regional oddities as Brain Damage and Geek Maggot Bingo), featuring appearances by Joe Bob Briggs, Rhonda Shear, Count Gore De Vol, Akron's Son of Ghoul, Sammy Terry, my Kansas friend Gunther Dedmond, and Columbus, Ohio's own Fritz the Nite Owl (more on him below).

Attendees can meet the cast of The Boondock Saints, along with Corey Feldman, Tom Atkins, Barbara Steele, Ken Foree, Greydon Clark and Don Post.

* Fangoria, meanwhile, celebrated its 300th issue with a look at the 300 best horror films of all time (as selected by staffers), which included a ton of notable regional horror flicks, highlighting the importance of backwoods filmmaking to the genre during the late 20th Century: Alice, Sweet Alice, Basket Case, The Blob, Blood Feast, Brain Damage, The Brain that Wouldn't Die, Carnival of Souls, Death Dream, The Evil Dead, Friday the 13th, I Drink Your Blood, I Spit on Your Grave, Last House on the Left, Let's Scare Jessica to Death, Maniac, Night of the Living Dead, Street Trash, and The Texas Chain Saw Massacre. Not to mention the almost-but-not-quite regional flicks like Martin, Sisters and Squirm that made the list, along with newer indies like The Blair Witch Project.

DVD NEWS:

* First up, one of Al Adamson's only bona fide regional flicks, the bizarro Carnival Magic (1982), made in conjunction with Teenage Strangler producer Elvin Feltner down in North Cackalacky. Once thought lost, it is now available on DVD (and Blu-Ray!) from the fine folks at Cultra/Virgial Films and packed with extras.

Code Red canceled their release of God's Bloody Acre because of technical issues (but not before a number of copies made it onto the market and eventually to eBay), then announced it would be released later on a double feature with another Wayne Crawford flick, Tomcats, and then announced again that it would be released on its own sometime this month. Which is pretty much the most action that film has seen in decades.

Code Red IS releasing Harry Thomason's not-quite-as-interesting-as-you-remember-it Encounters with the Unknown on a double feature with When Time Began later in March, and has announced they'll be releasing Mardi Gras Massacre (Louisiana), Michael de Gaetano's Haunted (Arizona), and the berserk bigfoot classic Night of the Demon.

Virgil Films, meanwhile, is supposed to finally deliver on the nutty made-in-Georgia hick flick Poor Pretty Eddie on April 26. The Nesting is due out from Blue Underground on 6/28.

Shout! Factory also released the allegedly made-in-Hawaii Demon of the Paradise which, it turns out, was actually made in the Philippines, which makes slightly more sense.

THE RONDO AWARDS ARE BACK!

Don't forget to cast your ballot for this year's Rondo Awards. We weren't nominated for anything this year, but some mighty fine folks we know were, including Daniel Griffin, The Drunken Severed Head, and The Good, The Bad and Godzilla.

CARNIVAL OF SOULS ON THE BIG SCREEN

Horror fans who grew up in Central Ohio were weened on to the scary stuff by the one and only Fritz the Nite Owl, the smooth voiced movie host who ruled the roost here from the early 70s until he was unceremoniously dumped in 1991. Fritz has been off and on TV and local radio for more than 50 years (!) now, and of late he's been hosting live film events at the Grandview Theater once a month. The March film is the Kansas-lensed public domain classic Carnival of Souls. See it on March 19 at Midnight.

Night of the ... What's That Again?

2011-03-04T18:00:00.006-05:00

I love it when people send me stuff, particularly when they send me interesting new research material, and especially when the source is another regional horror film enthusiast.

I recently received an e-mail from Julia Hedstroem, a PhD student in sociology of communication and media at the University of Fribourg in Switzerland, who is writing her dissertation on American newspaper reception of Night of the Living Dead.

Julia is currently poring through a mound of NOTLD-related news clippings, and graciously shared some interesting items, which we've posted below. Note the evolution of the title in these articles from Night of the Flesh Eaters to Night of the Anubis and, finally, to the more familiar title.

So thank you, Julia, and good luck! We need more zombie-obsessed PhDs.

Trailer of the Week: Terror at Tenkiller (1986)

2011-02-28T06:00:00.005-05:00

More cheap slasher antics from Oklahoma in Ken Meyer's Terror at Tenkiller.

Trailer of the Week: The Last Slumber Party (1988)

2011-02-21T06:00:00.004-05:00

Continuing with our trailer tribute to the VCI/United Home Video family, another slasher film from Oklahoma. They JUST wanted to have a slumber party...

Trailer of the Week: Revenge (1986)

2011-02-14T06:00:00.001-05:00

If you couldn't get enough of Blood Cult, VCI/United unleashed a sequel the following year.

Trailer of the Week: The Ripper (1986)

2011-02-07T06:00:00.002-05:00

More shot-on-video fun (?) from United Home Video. As I recall, Tom Savini once publicly apologized for this film.

R.I.P. Charles E. Sellier, Jr.

2011-02-04T19:00:00.003-05:00

I recently learned that Idaho-based producer/director Charles E. Sellier, Jr., died unexpectedly on Monday. He was 67.

Sellier is best known for writing the original novel The Life and Times of Grizzly Adams in 1972, which he later adapted as a film and a TV series starring Dan Haggerty.

But for horror fans, he's even better known for his long association with the Utah-based Sunn Classic company, producing oddball films and documentaries (mostly for television) like The Mysterious Monsters (1976), In Search of Noah's Ark (1976), The Bermuda Triangle (1979), The Legend of Sleepy Hollow (1980) and The Fall of the House of Usher (1982).

He also directed the notorious Silent Night, Deadly Night (1984), and served as a producer on The Boogens (1981). In more recent years, he had focused on Christian-themed films and TV programs, and he maintained a Web site at www.grizzlyadams.com.

Reclaiming of the Shrew: Killer Shrews Return!

2011-02-02T14:30:00.006-05:00

The news is spreading across the Internet (or at least sites like Dread Central and FearNet) like wildfire: A direct sequel to the Texas oddity The Killer Shrews is in the works, featuring original star James Best.

In The Return of the Killer Shrews, Best will reprise his role as Captain Thorne Sherman, still haunted by the horrors he witnessed in the original film (which, if you haven't seen it, involved the creation of giant, poisonous shrews). He's unwittingly drawn back to the shrew island when he agrees to carry the cast and crew of a reality TV show to the location, along with his first mate Rook (fellow Dukes of Hazzard alum Rick Hurst).

Another former Hazzard County resident, John Schneider, will appear as an animal expert, and according to the poster the cast will also include country singer Mel Tillis. Steve Latshaw (Jack-O, Vampire Trailer Park) has signed on to direct.

Needless to say, I'm stunned by this announcement. I was so excited when I saw the news that I started a thread over at the Classic Horror Film Board, where director Latshaw quickly turned up offering to answer questions.

The film already has a Facebook page, and Latshaw says an official Web site should be up by the end of the week.

I'm a huge fan of the original, which was filmed in the Dallas area and released on a double bill with The Giant Gila Monster. Both films were originally produced and distributed by Gordon McClendon, a Dallas broadcasting legend who had hoped to launch his own movie studio under the McClendon Radio Pictures banner.

McClendon shot both of his horror films back to back in early 1959, and premiered in Dallas that June. He followed those two films with My Dog Buddy, a kiddie flick written and directed by Shrews director Ray Kellogg.

McClendon (who appears in the film as Dr. Rathford Baines) built a studio complex near Denton, Texas, to support his filmmaking enterprise, but he abandoned production after making just three films in 1959. McClendon did, however, obtain a contract with United Artists to produce promotional campaigns for the studio's films, and the McClendon family later owned nearly 100 movie theaters. In addition to owning radio stations all over the country, he also ran unsuccessfully for the senate and for governor in Texas, wrote several books, was a shareholder in Columbia Pictures, and has been accused in the past of having a role in the Kennedy assassination.

Filming on the sequel is expected to begin in Los Angeles early this year. For those of you wondering if there really ARE such things as killer shrews, the answer is "Yes!" -- sort of. Short-tailed shrews, it turns out, are among the only poisonous mammals on the planet. The shrews use the venom to immobilize their prey (typically worms, snails, mice and small birds). The literature is silent on the extended trailer's assertion that "shrews like these have been known to attack a pack of wolves and devour them without a trace."

Trailer of the Week: Blood Cult (1985)

2011-01-31T06:00:00.007-05:00

Shot on video grue from the VCI/United Home Video team.

Mystery Film: Southern Shockers (1985)

2011-01-28T13:00:00.005-05:00

Reader and Classic Horror Film Board member todmichel recently alerted us to a post over at the Cinehound Forum that includes a VHS box cover and screen caps from a previously unheard of omnibus flick called Southern Shockers that was filmed in West Point, Miss., in 1985.

The box in the Cinehound post appears to be from either Spain or Latin America, and presents the film as El Espiritu del Zombie (The Spirit of the Zombie), although the credits are all in English.

For you youngsters in the audience, VHS technology and the color red had an often stormy relationship...

Here's the info:

Director: David Coleman
Producer: David Hopper
Special Effects: Chris Witherspoon
Catering: Marcia Gibson
Cast: Mike Gordon, Robert Harrell, Tom Hatcher, Eric Shusterman (as Preacher Hopewell)

Oddly enough, I spent every summer during the late 1980s in West Point, Miss., and I still have family there. But I never heard of this movie, which appears to be a very cheap, shot-on-video effort. Anyone know anything about this one? If you have information, post it here in the comments section or send me an e-mail!

Trailer of the Week: The Undertaker (1988)

2011-01-25T08:30:00.003-05:00

I actually just finished watching this oddball, erratically edited slasher film that was recently released by Code Red (it previously floated around on video as Death Merchant in some quarters). Joe Spinell stars as a murderous undertaker with unhealthy designs on his recently departed female customers. There's lots of sweat, lots of aerobics, and lots of stock footage from The Corpse Vanishes (and The Terror, and Africa Screams, and Scared to Death, and ... Bedtime for Bonzo).

There's not really a trailer available, but I did find this promo reel (there's an introduction by a guy named Beck who provides some background). It's long, a little disgusting in places, and interestingly enough includes some sequences that are missing from the Code Red DVD.

Spinell died just a few months after completing the film.

Trailer of the Week: Scarecrows (1988)

2011-01-18T09:00:00.007-05:00

For the life of me, I can't find an English-language trailer for this Florida film, which was shot in 1985 by director William Wesley. So here it is in German AND Spanish instead!

Ozzie and Harriet in the House of Death

2011-01-15T06:00:00.001-05:00

House of Death (Death Screams, 1982)
Shelby, North Carolina

When we first learned about the passing of former child star David Nelson, we weren't too surprised to note that most obituaries failed to mention that he had directed the obscure slasher film House of Death/Death Screams. Nelson is best known for portraying himself on the family sitcom "The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet" along with his parents and younger brother Ricky Nelson. But in the 1980s he directed several films (and TV show episodes), including two made in the South: The Florida film Last Plane Out (1983) starring Jan-Michael Vincent, and House of Death, which was filmed at Earl Owensby's EO Studios compound in Shelby, N.C.

House of Death is set against the backdrop of a carnival, with a shadowy killer offing teenagers. Like that other EO slasher film Final Exam (1981), House of Death suffers from a long, boring stretch in the middle and a lackluster killer with seemingly no motivation. What it does have, however, is former Playmate Susan Kiger and former North Carolina pageant queen Monica Boston. William T. Hicks, who plays the obligatory fat sheriff, was also in Owensby's Tales of the Third Dimension, A Day of Judgment, Challenge, and Living Legend: The King of Rock and Roll. (Thanks to Fred Adelman for the VHS images).

On the Track of the Moonbeast: An Interview with Charles Sinclair

2011-01-14T06:00:00.015-05:00

Folks, there are horrible guy-in-a-rubber-suit films from the 1970s, and then there's Track of the Moonbeast (1972). Like its contemporaries Octaman, The Milpitas Monster, and Slithis, the New Mexico-lensed Track rehashes monster movie tropes from the 1950s against a backdrop of the eco-conscious but fashion-challenged 1970s. Only, unlike its contemporaries, Track of the Moonbeast sports an excellent musical interlude and a really long scene about making soup.

Also unlike its monster-flick competition, the film boasts a pair of screenwriters with an unusual pedigree: Co-writers Charles Sinclair and Bill Finger had earlier worked on The Green Slime, a bunch of episodes of 77 Sunset Strip, and a Batman twofer featuring Walter Slezak as The Clock King.

The late Finger, in fact, was the uncredited co-creator of the Batman character, and had been writing comic scripts since the 1940s. Sinclair joined the radio/TV biz in the 1940s, primarily working as a trade magazine editor and PR man while dabbling in screenwriting on the side.

I caught up with Sinclair (now in his 80s) last year, and I've since conducted two lengthy interviews with him about his film work. Below, I've excerpted the part of the interview pertaining to Track of the Moonbeast.

For the record, the film was completed in September 1972, but there doesn't appear to be any indication it had a theatrical release. It first aired on television around 1978, but is generally listed with a 1976 release date.

I'd be remiss if I didn't thank author Marc Tyler Nobleman, who put me in contact with Sinclair. Nobleman is currently writing a Bill Finger biography, and you can learn more about this unheralded comic writer over at his blog, Nobelmania.

How did you get involved in writing the film Track of the Moonbeast?

CHARLES SINCLAIR: I will start by saying that Track of the Moonbeast was the equivalent of a literary one-night stand, honest to God. It came, it went, and I kind of forgot about it. Mercifully, perhaps! The original tip off on this thing came from a lady I knew in the film industry named Joyce Graff.

She tipped me off that there was a company that was looking around for a property because they had been in contact with something like the New Mexico Film Development Board or something to that effect. The state government of New Mexico had decided that it would be nice to have them come down and make movies there to spread the economy around and all that. They were offering location assistance, and everything you could offer a film company.

When this quickie tip came in the early 1970s, Bill Finger was kind of winding down, the poor guy. He was fading away. He had had heart trouble. Bill was ten years older than I was. He was kind of living from hand to mouth a bit. At this point Bill had been working for the government, of all things, in some sort of government film job. The U.S. Army Signal Corps had a studio out in Long Island, the Kaufman Studios, where they made training films and other stuff. It's a famous little studio. They filmed Marx Brothers movies there.

So I got this tip. I thought to myself, what do I know about New Mexico? Not very much. I had never been there. I did a very quick study at the New York Public Library on 42nd Street on the state of New Mexico, and took some notes about the tourist attractions, something of its history, and so on.

Then I got together with Bill, and explained what this was and that we needed a quick, basic idea that we could expand on to make a low-budget film of some nature. All of this is taking place in a matter of a few days. So Bill and I sat around a pot of coffee and knocked ideas back and forth.

The producers were Frank and Ralph Desiderio, and the director was a man named Richard Ashe.

Yeah, yeah. I think we met with the Desiderio people, and who also had a third person there that was to be their cinematographer. So we met in just very routine restaurant somewhere in the east 50s, sat around a table drinking coffee or beer or whatever and discussed this thing.

We pitched our idea, and they liked it. They felt there was enough to produce it, and to get the New Mexico people involved because it was utilizing a New Mexico Indian legend, science fiction stuff, these basic ideas.

We bounced the idea off them and we talked money. And they pleaded that they were a very low-budget operation. I've been trying the last couple of days to remember how much we were paid for this thing. It was a split between Bill and myself, either $12,000 or $20,000 for the finished screenplay. It covered everything, all rights. There was a finder's fee for Joyce Graff, who had pointed us in the direction of this thing.

It was very much the last major thing that I ever did with Bill Finger. The money that he got from it was enough to keep him alive in the last few months and pay off some debts here and there.

Bill's forte was coming up with quick plots, because he had a hell of a memory. He remembered every movie he ever watched, and he would borrow a little here and a little there.

He also wrote nice, tight dialogue. He was a joy to work with on things like that. In comic books you can't be verbose. You're not going to come up with the Gettysburg Address when someone asks about the weather. It had to be simple and readable and snappy and terse. He was a great collaborator.

But we did this movie, we got the money, we paid off Joyce Graff, forgot the whole thing. Bill's fortunes did not get much better. In 1974, clunk, he died. So that was the end of that.

I almost literally forgot about the movie. I have a son on the West Coast who is involved as a writer out there. He phoned me one night, and said "Guess what? Track of the Moonbeast is coming up on an obscure TV channel." It was on the Sci-Fi Channel or Comedy Central or something of that sort. I said, "Great, I've never seen it." I looked in on it that night, and thought, "Oh my god, did I have a hand in this thing?"

It was kind of chopped up and mixed in with these people making corny jokes.

Then you saw the Mystery Science Theater version.

I was vaguely astonished to see that one of the characters in the movie was a fairly presentable, good looking girl who was kind of running around in what looked like these short, baby doll nighties. She's running around with hearts stitched all over her. I thought, "Did we write a girl into this thing?" I guess we did.

By the way, the original working title -- Bill and I always had great working titles that never got used -- was The Lunar Analog. I thought that was very sexy. My brother was a nuclear physicist, and he thought that was pretty good.

How long did it take to write the script?

One weekend. We just talked about the story line, then sat down in Bill's apartment, I think. We started in the evening after work, Friday evening. So we had a spaghetti dinner, because Bill was a very good short order Italian cook. He was hardly a gourmet cook, but he made terrific pasta dishes because they were cheap and filling. We sat down with beer and pasta and a couple of typewriters, or maybe just one typewriter, taking turns. We just went directly from the story treatment we had right into writing a script.

It was done and delivered I guess to Joyce Graff, who delivered it to the Desiderios. Checks came back, and that was it.

Trailer of the Week: The Giant Spider Invasion (1975)

2011-01-10T06:00:00.004-05:00

Best giant spider movie from Wisconsin ever? Maybe.

Canadians Censor Chain Saw Massacre

2011-01-04T18:00:00.001-05:00

From The Ottawa Citizen, Feb. 12, 1976

Morbid 'Massacre' Pulled Off Screen

Sarah Henry, Citizen Staff Writer

There will be a brief intermission before the shrieking resumes.

Following visits to both the Rideau Theatre and Britannia Drive-in by morality detectives, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, a low-budget screamer which shows every intention of becoming an underground classic of the macabre, has gone to join Ilsa, She Wolf of the SS in the city's celluloid graveyard.

But it is the great dorsal-finned one who will save the day for horror buffs -- Jaws starts Friday at the Rideau.

Drive-in patrons this weekend will be treated to the sexual antics of Fritz the Cat.

Rideau Theatre manager Sven Petersen said today Ottawa morality detectives came to the theatre Tuesday evening and advised charges would be laid unless the film was withdrawn immediately. Nepean police gave the same advise to the manager of the Britannia Drive-in Wednesday evening.

One year ago this month, Ilsa, an x-rated film which depicted gang rapes and torture, was withdrawn from the Rideau Theatre for the same reason.

Mr. Petersen estimates that in the 12 days Massacre was shown, 3,000 people saw the movie at his theatre.

Had the morality division not acted, the film, which was teamed up with Vice Squad Women, would have died a natural death Friday, when the new program began.

In the interim, the somewhat tamer double bill Up the Down Staircase and The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance is being shown.

Ottawa police morality inspector George Zhukow said the department acted on legal advice before recommending withdrawal. "We warned them if they continued showing it they might be charged."

Section 1592 of the Criminal Code forbids the undue exploitation of sex, violence and cruelty.

Jack Bernstein, director of programming at Famous Players Ltd., headquarters in Toronto, said he hadn't expected Chainsaw to get the axe for its sustained horror. "This is a surprise to me because we haven't had any problem in playing the movie anywhere in Canada."

The programmer characterized the film as "just a fun thing." He said he has seen it and feels "it's not to be taken seriously."

The "fun" of the movie is 90 minutes of solid nightmarish horror depicting the tale of five teen-agers, one an invalid, who become involved with a gang of crazies with an unusual predilection for human flesh.

Reminiscent of horror classics like Night of the Living Dead and Psycho, it has been hailed by some reviewers for its allegorical content. In the concluding scenes, good triumphs over evil, albeit with a bloodied face and shredded halter top.

There is no overt sexual content in the film and few scenes involving the standard horror flick spurts of blood and gore.

Trailer of the Week: Sleepaway Camp (1983)

2011-01-03T20:00:00.001-05:00

A high-profile, independent slasher flick from New York with a well-deserved reputation for its graphic kills and shocking ending. When it opened, it allegedly outgrossed Yentl in New York.

Trailer of the Week: Shriek of the Mutilated (1974)

2010-12-27T06:00:00.002-05:00

Ed Adlum and Ed Kelleher return with the killer yeti/cannibal flick Shriek of the Mutilated.

Christmas Evil (1980)

2010-12-24T10:03:00.007-05:00

Christmas Evil (1980)
Englewood and Montclair, New Jersey

Not only is Lewis Jackson's Christmas Evil (a.k.a. You Better Watch Out) one of my favorite Christmas-themed horror movies of all time, it's also one of my favorite movies of all time.

Santa-obsessed toy factory employee Harry Stradling (Brandon Maggart) keeps a list of who's been naughty and nice in his neighborhood, while struggling with the pressures of working for a company that, in his eyes, makes sub-standard toys. He finally snaps, donning a Santa suit and doling out old-fashioned holiday justice by passing out stolen toys to needy children and brutally murdering anyone who's wronged him.

Watch for "Walking Dead" star Jeffrey DeMunn as Harry's brother, "Home Improvement" star Patricia Richardson in a small role, and appearances by character actors Peter Friedman, Mark Margolis, and Raymond Barry, and E-Street band member Danny Federici. Maggart was a regular on the first season of "Sesame Street," and is also Fiona Apple's father.

The film was produced by former stockbroker Burt Kleiner and Pete Kameron, who had managed The Who and the founded of L.A. Weekly. Another producer, Ed Pressman, is the son of Pressman Toy Co. owner Jack Pressman (Pressman's factory appears in the film).

Trailer of the Week: Frankenstein Meets the Space Monster (1965)

2010-12-20T14:00:00.002-05:00

In honor of our impending trip to San Juan, here is the trailer for Robert Gaffney's Frankenstein Meets the Space Monster, which was filmed in Long Island and Puerto Rico. Watch for Bruce Glover (Crispin's dad) as one of the aliens (and allegedly as the space monster, too). I first saw this in an 8mm condensed (and silent) version from Castle Films.

Seeds of Sin (1968)

2010-12-17T18:00:00.001-05:00

Seeds of Sin (1968)
Staten Island, New York

To call Andy Milligan an acquired taste would be an understatement of immense proportions; suffice it to say that the films of New York's king of underground sleaze will either leave you gaping in wonderment or highly offended, or possibly just sleepy. Seeds of Sin (available on a DVD from Something Weird with Milligan's The Ghastly Ones) is actually a recut version of Milligan's original film Seeds, but with hardcore inserts shot by producers Allen and Rosily Bazzini (owners of a New York restaurant called The Grotto).

It features a standard Milligan plot: A family of dysfunctional oddballs and perverts gather on Christmas Eve to argue, preen, fondle and eventually die in horribly ironic ways. What better way to spend the holidays?

As a bonus, the Something Weird disc includes two reels of Milligan's original workprint of Seeds, including footage the Bazzinis snipped to create their hardcore version.

According to Milligan biographer Jimmy McDonough, Milligan married star Candy Hammond on the set of Seeds (it was a fairly short-lived union). Seeds is almost all that remains of Milligan's early career making black-and-white sexploitation films, and I couldn't find any clips available online, so I've opted to post The Ghastly Ones trailer instead. For more of Milligan's early work, you can check out Vapors (1965) on the Something Weird DVD for The Body Beneath (1970).

Trailer of the Week: The Flesh Eaters (1964)

2010-12-13T06:00:00.005-05:00

Early gore from New York in the Jack Curtis film The Flesh Eaters (1964).

Santa Claus Conquers the Martians (1964)

2010-12-10T09:55:00.009-05:00

Santa Claus Conquers the Martians (1964)
Garden City, Long Island, New York

The kiddie matinee classic, brought to you by busy TV director Nicholas Webster and executive producer Joseph E. Levine. There was also a book and record set (see below) so that kids could read and sing along at home.

The movie was shot over the summer of 1964, and hit theaters that November, and was still playing every winter through the late 1960s. It has since been turned into a musical, and is presented each year at the Maverick Theater in Fullerton, Calif.

Trailer of the Week: Guru the Mad Monk (1970)

2010-12-06T15:45:00.001-05:00

From the tormented mind of Andy Milligan, a period horror film shot at St. Peter's church in Manhattan.

Silent Night, Bloody Night (1974)

2010-12-03T09:48:00.009-05:00

Silent Night, Bloody Night (1974)
Oyster Bay, Long Island

This weird, fascinating, and somewhat confusing early slasher film has unfortunately slipped into the public domain, so I have a feeling that we may never get to see it in any form other than the murky prints populating so many horror-themed multi-movie DVD sets. It's still worth checking out.

The film details the bloody history of a former madhouse, the return of its mysterious owner, and an accompanying murder spree. It's a moody, atmospheric film marred by a confusing script, a few missing scenes (at least it appears something has been cut from the prints available), and Mary Woronov's somewhat disengaged performance. The cast is also a lot of fun, and includes Hollywood vets Patrick O'Neal, John Carradine and Walter Abel, along with Warhol Factory refugees like Ondine and Candy Darling.

Late director Theodore Gershuny (who was married to Woronov at the time), filmed this in 1972. Associate producer Lloyd Kafman worked with Gershuny again on Sugar Cookies (1973), and went on to found Troma Films. Both Kaufman and Frank Vitale (another producer on this film) also worked with Oliver Stone around the same time.

Producer and writer Jeffrey Konvitz was an entertainment attorney also wrote both the novel and film The Sentinel (1977), and produced Spy Hard (1996).

From the Uniontown, Pa., Morning Herald-Evening Standard, Aug. 8, 1974:

Trailer of the Week: A Taste of Blood (1967)

2010-11-29T14:00:00.001-05:00

H.G. Lewis goes high-brow (sort of) by tackling the Dracula mythos in A Taste of Blood.

Happy Thanksgiving, Blood Freak Style!

2010-11-25T09:00:00.002-05:00

Please enjoy your turkey responsibly.

Trailer of the Week: The Children (1980)

2010-11-22T06:00:00.005-05:00

Carlton Albright, producer of the Massachusetts film The Children (1980), returned to direct Luther the Geek (1990) in Iowa and Illinois.