Hey, you guys, this is Harriet Von Lupin, and I'm so excited to be doing The MonsterGrrls' 31 Days Of Halloween with all my friends! I'm not really used to computers much, but I've been taking some typing lessons and I think I've got the hang of it now, so I'm gonna do my first post about The Ghastly Ones, a band that makes really cool monster-party music!
The Ghastly Ones are Sir Go Go Ghostly (bass), Dr. Lehos (guitar), Baron Shivers (drums/leader), Captain Clegg (keyboards) and Necrobella (go-go dancer). These swingin' spooksters hail from Van Nuys, California, and have been rockin' the California surf/garage rock scene since 1996. They first scored some national attention because of a guy named, uh, Rob Zombie (oh, I know who this is--he used to be a musician but now he makes those weird horror movies 
that the Mad Doctor doesn't like--pretty sucky) who released their first album, A-Haunting We-Will-Go-Go, on a record label called Geffen/Zombie Au Go Go. (Pretty good name 'cause this band really go-goes!) That record's now out of print, but the Ghastlies' groovy surf sound got them a lot of cool shows, playing with guys like Brian Setzer and Los Straitjackets (which are some other guys that the Mad Doctor likes, and I do too!) and earning them the title of "Slayer" of surf. (Okay, Slayer is that evil Devil band but these guys are not an evil Devil band so they must have been talking about something else.) They broke up for awhile after all that, but they got back together and have been making super-cool-groovy music ever since!
The Ghastlies' latest albums are Target Draculon, which has all new original songs on it, and Unearthed, which has a bunch of their old stuff from the first album re-recorded with Captain Clegg on organ. (Hey, he's an organ donor! Ha ha ha ha ha ha!) Unearthed is especially special to us, since it contains a groovy charged-up version of the song that we consider the official MonsterGrrls theme song--"Robot Atomico!" If you want to get these cool records for yourself, just go straight to www.ghastlyones.com to order 'em. And if you're planning a Halloween party, this is like the perfect music!
Well, that's all for that, but I'll be back soon 'cause we're all doing cool Halloween stuff all month, so stay tuned to our 31 Days Of HOWL-O-WEEN! OW-WOOOOOO!!!
Harriet Von Lupin
POST-MORTEM: The Mad Doc wants me to mention that Baron Shivers, the Ghastlies' drummer (whose real name is Norman Cabrera) has a great day job where he does all kinds of cool monster designs and sculptures for TV, movies and music videos, and recently did some stuff for the movie Hellboy II: The Golden Army. His website is at http://www.shadowmillproductions.com, so make sure you stop in and visit.
Also, me and all the Grrls wanna say HAPPY BIRTHDAY to Mr. Gary K. Lee of St. Louis, Missouri, who is an F.O.T.M. (Friend Of The MonsterGrrls) and a cool cello rocker! --H.V.L.
Good evening, darlings, and thank you for reading. As usual, we're all considering various Halloweeny items to post for our 31 Days Of Halloween, and since our Mad Doctor has already done an overview of various Stephen King films, I thought I'd check in today with my own overview about the most well-known vampire among humans, Count Dracula. Many of you may wonder why I've not previously dedicated a blog article to the Big D before, but you must understand that for vampires, Dracula is a bit like Elvis. Only a few of us have ever actually seen him or been in his presence, and if those of us who claim to have done so were gathered together, the line would be around the block as well as three deep. For myself, I find many vampires' stories about Dracula quite tiresome, but humans' tales are decidedly more interesting.
The legend of Dracula first began, of course, with Bram Stoker's novel Dracula, first published in 1897. Though several vampire tales had already come before it, Stoker based his characterization of Dracula on legends of a Wallachian prince, Vlad Tepes, whose main rule of the place was from 1456 to 1462. All accounts view him as a dreadful, atrocious person who was quite fond of impaling his enemies on stakes. Of course, the truth about Vlad Tepes is something I would never reveal (sorry, darlings), but Stoker did base his writing on the historical records of Tepes. The novel enjoyed much critical praise and has gone on to be the most favored Gothic romance of the period.
Of course, such a novel was ripe for adaptation into film when the movie industry came about, and the first film about Big D was F.W. Murnau's German-Expressionist Nosferatu (1922). Due to Florence Stoker's draconian hold over rights to her husband's novel, the film is largely an unauthorized version of the novel, omitting many of the secondary characters (which other films would do also) and changing the names of more important ones. Dracula, in this film, was called "Count Orlok," and was played by a German actor named Max Schreck. The word "schreck", before being absurdly misspelled and mostly identified with a green Scots-accented ogre, was another German word meaning "terror," and quite suitable for the clawed, rat-toothed visage of Orlok.
The Big D would not receive a more palatable treatment until 1931's 
Dracula, made for Universal Pictures and starring Hungarian actor Bela Lugosi, who had portrayed the character in theatre and contributed much to how humans view the character today. Dark, charming, and compelling, Lugosi's gentlemanly yet thoroughly evil portrayal was lauded by critics and unfortunately typecast this talented actor, whose authoritative presence still causes many to view him as the definitive Dracula. Though Universal would make several more films featuring Dracula (such as Son Of Dracula (1943), House Of Frankenstein (1944), and House Of Dracula (1945)), Lugosi himself would not portray the Big D again until 1948's Abbott And Costello Meet Frankenstein, now regarded as a classic and the most successful of Universal's "monster rally" pictures, which all established that Dracula, Frankenstein's Creature and a "Wolf-Man" knew of each other and kept company. Of course it's well known by monsterkind that such a meeting of powers really didn't happen until several years after the release of all these movies... but again, I digress. Better you not know everything.
Dracula resurfaced yet again on the big screen in 1958, due to the efforts of a little British studio called Hammer Film Productions, which had decided after some lucrative experiments (such as their Quatermass series) to create some Gothic horror films. Stoker's novel was only lightly touched upon in the resulting Horror Of 
Dracula, which starred actor Christopher Lee in a bestial and manic portrayal of the Big D, and Peter Cushing as his long-running opposite number, Professor Van Helsing. The success of Horror paved the way for a much-loved series of sequels, including Dracula, Prince Of Darkness (1965), Dracula Has Risen From The Grave (1968), Taste The Blood Of Dracula (1969) and Scars Of Dracula (1970), all of which portray Big D as an increasingly violent and animalistic character who speaks very little, mostly hissing and snarling at his victims and opponents. Hammer Films eventually tried to move Big D into modern times with 1972's Dracula A.D. 1972, which is remembered for its view into the British hippie culture and its oddly discoid dramatic score music.
Today, Dracula still enjoys popularity in films, as evidenced by recent works such as 
1992's maniacally overblown yet sympathetic and compelling semi-adaptation of the original novel, Bram Stoker's Dracula, and the millenium's attempt to capitalize on the horror-teen market, Dracula 2000 (which even spawned a couple of sequels on its own). While none of the films I have mentioned here are actual cinematic connections to the Big D himself, they are surely better than the absolutely unforgivable Dracula 3000 (2004) which I mention here only because I am completely convinced that you should avoid it at all costs. (I mean it. I've often considered that our Mad Doctor John had the most appalling taste in films, but even he couldn't stomach this one.) We will round out our overview of the Big D by mentioning the quite pleasant and often overlooked Shadow Of The Vampire (2004), which purports that the filming of 1922's Nosferatu involved a real vampire hired by F.W. Murnau himself to portray the character of Count Orlok.
The only thing I can say about it is that it's practically a documentary... but again, I've probably said too much. Anyway, this post should provide you with a good selection of films on one of history's most enduring vampires to enjoy during our festive Halloween season, so cheers all round.
By the by, about that Elvis thing? Well, there are some vampires who have on occasion stated that Dracula and Elvis were one and the same... and the truth is, they're very, very confused.
Regards,
Bethany Ruthven
It's Day 6 of our 31 Days Of Halloween, and today I thought I'd talk a bit about Stephen King. King's one of my favorite authors, and a guy who made me want to write in the same way that people like Mark Twain and Madeleine L'Engle did. Like those two worthies, he made reading and writing something I wanted to do not because it would garner me knowledge and fame and wealth but because it looked like a lot of fun, and he made me want to tell stories, which is something that not a lot of writers do, in my opinion. At least not anymore.
Because of his success in the publishing world, Hollywood thought that Stephen King would be a natural for horror movies. But here's the thing: King had enough pulp roots to know how to keep a good horror tale going, but he was also just literary enough in terms of his talent and writing to ensure that most of his stories would be epic in scope. This meant that many of the best elements of his stories were often completely eschewed in the films, and it also meant that a Stephen King film was instantly classified as "not gonna be that great." Eventually Hollywood figured it out and got him better directors (witness Pet Sematary, Stand By Me, Misery, Shawshank Redemption and The Green Mile) but for a long time Stephen King films were their own genre: scary enough to be watchable but not great enough to be cool (with some notable exceptions, of course--I mean, who could not like Creepshow?). But there were some hidden gems in the early films, and here's three: Cat's Eye, Silver Bullet and Creepshow 2. (I include this last one because it is one of the few sequels that I actually like, and I think it gets an unjust rap in horror circles. I'll explain more about this in a few minutes.)
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Cat's Eye (1985) links two King stories from the book Night Shift with an original tale written for this movie, "The General," in which the titular cat is prominently featured. The cat is the linking device for the first two stories, "Quitters, Inc." and "The Ledge," in which he is found and cared for briefly by characters in those tales before he continues his quest to find a certain little girl (Drew Barrymore). In "Quitters, Inc." a man (James Woods) who is trying a last-ditch attempt at quitting smoking goes to a doctor (Alan King) whose methods are "experimental" and also exceptionally brutal. In "The Ledge," the cat encounters a businessman (Kenneth McMillan) who forces his neglected wife's adulterous lover (Robert Hays) to walk a narrow ledge around his high-rise penthouse apartment. The cat completes his quest in the final story "The General", finding the girl and becoming her pet, and saving her life from a six-inch-high murderous troll who is attempting to steal the girl's breath each night. All the stories are directed well and overlap perfectly, with "Quitters, Inc." being the best of the lot due to the interplay between King and Woods.
Silver Bullet (1985), based on King's illustrated novel Cycle Of The Werewolf, stars Corey Haim as Marty 
Coslaw, a crippled boy living in the small town of Tarker's Mills, which is suffering from a spate of vicious serial killings. After four unsolved murders are committed, the townspeople consider mob-style justice but are calmed by the Reverend Lester Lowe (Everett McGill) who is himself tormented by dreams of brutal slayings. Meanwhile, Marty is given the gift of a custom-built wheelchair/motorcycle by his alcoholic but good-hearted Uncle Red (Gary Busey, in the film's best role), along with a quota of fireworks. When Marty goes to set off the fireworks that night, he encounters a werewolf and shoots it in the eye with one of his fireworks. Though no one believes Marty's protests that the killings are being done by a werewolf, he and his sister Jane (Megan Follows) conduct a search to find who in Tarker's Mills may be the werewolf, and discover that it is Reverend Lowe. The film then becomes a cat-and-mouse chase between Lowe and Marty as Marty tries to stop the killer. The werewolf makeup for this movie is fairly standard, but the performances by Busey, Follows, McGill, and even Haim (who at the time was simultaneously much-loved and reviled like all teen actors) are solid, making this a good little werewolf flick that stands up to its cousins An American Werewolf In London and The Howling. Also, if Gary Busey has ever done a performance that can be described as heartwarming, then this is probably it. It may seem strange to say that about a character who is portrayed as very flagrantly alcoholic and a committed ne'er-do-well, but his Uncle Red shows genuine concern and love for Haim's Marty.
Finally, we come to Creepshow 2. My main reasons for including this film are that while it's not my absolute favorite King film (that title goes to Salem's Lot), it's not as bad as people make it out to be, and I personally happen to like it. Also, it's sort of an underdog: when it came out fans who were so taken with the original Creepshow film (King writes! Romero directs! E.C. Comics-framing-style devices are used!) were expecting more of the same, despite the fact that Hollywood had already stopped doing that "more-of-the-same" thing somewhere around 1970. This time only three stories are shown, one of which is "The Raft," taken from the Skeleton Crew collection and often touted as the best of a bad lot by critics of this film. "The Raft" relates the tale of four college kids who go to an isolated lake on a swimming trip, only to be attacked and trapped on a dock in the middle of the lake by a mysterious oil-slick-like creature. The other stories, "Old Woodenhead" and "The Hitch-Hiker," were written for this film, and feature a decent amount of black humor and creeps if not real outright scares. The stories are connected by an animated wraparound tale that relates the exploits of a Creepshow comics fan (very obviously based on Stephen King's son Joe, who appeared as Billy in the first movie) who escapes from a group of bullies in a very unorthodox and horrifying manner.
So there's my sleeper hits of Stephen King films. Incidentally, one should check out Joe King, who has now grown up to be Joe Hill and written two great books, Heart Shaped Box and 21st Century Ghosts; he has learned his dad's lessons well. Hill's latest project is writing IDW Publishing's horror-fantasy comic series Locke And Key. Perhaps Hollywood will consider making some Joe Hill movies at some point.
Then again...
POST-MORTEM: To avoid confusion among our readers, we thought we should mention that the Sci-Fi Channel is also doing their own 31 Days Of Halloween. The difference between the Sci-Fi Channel's 31 Days Of Halloween and our 31 Days Of Halloween is that we're trying to do actual Halloween stuff.
Just in time for Halloween comes a reissue of a holiday classic--It's The Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown. This Emmy-nominated special, the third Peanuts cartoon to be produced, comes to us on a DVD reissue with new remastering and features.
It's The Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown was based on the seasonal "Great Pumpkin" saga from Charles M. Schulz's Peanuts comic strip, where Linus, under some confusion about holiday traditions, begins to espouse belief in "the Great Pumpkin" who rises from the 
pumpkin patch on Halloween night to bring toys to children. Many of Schulz's original jokes from the strip appear here, including Lucy and Linus's attempts to carve a jack-o-lantern ("You didn't tell me you were going to kill it!") and Snoopy's daydream of being a World War I flying ace. The content of the DVD has been significantly remastered, making the colors much sharper and allowing the viewer to see Bill Melendez's loving transfer of Schulz's art to animation. Also, Vince Guaraldi's score is fully heard in this new remaster, and most of the familiar themes are here. (For those who are interested, Apple iTunes has bundled a code with this DVD that allows you to download the score pieces "Great Pumpkin Waltz" and "Oh Good Grief" from the iTunes store for free.)
The DVD also includes a featurette on the making of Great Pumpkin and another special entitled It's Magic, Charlie Brown, a somewhat lesser offering which has Snoopy attempting to be a magician and accidentally turning Charlie Brown invisible. This feature is a far cry from the best of animated Peanuts, but significant for one scene where an invisible Charlie Brown finally kicks the football away from Lucy, then proceeds to get revenge for many years of football pranking. The glory does not last, of course, but this one scene is priceless; if you get tired as I did from the opening with Snoopy's inexpertly performed magic show, which reads less like a real story than a string of sight gags, just fast-forward to this scene. On the whole, I would have preferred You're Not Elected, Charlie Brown (which was included with the original DVD release of this special) to be included rather than this. Still, this DVD is worth having simply for the wonderful treat of the Great Pumpkin special, so the aforementioned trick's no biggie.
For true Peanutophiles, the book It's The Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown: The Making Of A Television Classic, which includes the original script, animation artwork, storyboards and other goodies is available from Amazon.com. Click the image to procure and enjoy.
Well, our Halloween juggernaut's just getting started (after all, it's only Day 4), but gosh all fishhooks, I've just seen the most inspiring thing, one that fits right in with what we're doing. It's the premiere episode of Cartoon Network's new show The Secret Saturdays, and I never thought I'd say this about anything, but... I'm feeling so chipper.
I found out about this show in one of my 
ongoing searches for monster culture stuff on the web, and after reading the concept I thought this would be a hoot. Now, after seeing the final product, which will be among the new series CN has on its Friday-night block of programming, I'm completely in love. This show, though it wears its influences on its sleeve with unabashed geeklike pride, has taken the best elements of Jonny Quest, The Herculoids, Challengers Of The Unknown, The Fantastic Four and The X-Files and distilled them into a completely original creation. No derivation of popular franchises here; Saturdays is its own game.
In this first episode, "The Hur Stone," we are introduced to all the main characters and the ongoing plot for the series. The show's conceit is that various scientists work together in an underground network across the globe to study and research the mysteries of the universe (i.e. monsters, unexplained phenomena, and just plain old weird stuff) in order to protect not only the world from the secrets, but the secrets themselves from anyone who would use them for evil or ill gains. The notion of ill gains has its manifest in the form of crypto-scientist V. V. Argost, who hosts the popular TV show 
Weird World and comes across like an unholy combination platter of Doctor Doom, Boris Karloff and Snidely Whiplash (if you don't believe this last part, just listen to him do his Evil Sneering Laugh). Argost's main concern in this episode is to gather the pieces of the Hur Stone, which will control all cryptids (or unexplained natural monsters such as Bigfoot and Chupacabra) and put them under his rule, with the goal of controlling the world.
Opposed to this, of course, are the Saturdays, a family of cryptozoologists who, along with two other scientists in their network, have a piece of the Hur Stone. The family consists of Doc Saturday, who prefers hard facts to speculative science, his wife Drew, whose expertise in mysterious artifacts makes her the Mulder to Doc's Scully, and their eleven-year-old son Zak, who has a strange power over cryptids and can control them, and wants to be accepted as a full-fledged member of Team Saturdays. The team is rounded out by the Saturdays' family pets: Komodo, a mutated monitor lizard who can become invisible at will, and Fiskerton, a gentle but clumsy seven-foot-tall "gorilla cat" who serves as an older brother to Zak and led a previous life as the "Fiskerton Phantom" before hooking up with the Saturdays. When the Saturdays learn of Argost's plot to recover the Hur Stone (which is done by Argost simultaneously blowing up the headquarters of the three scientists who have the pieces), Doc and Drew reveal their legacy of the Hur Stone to Zak, and suggest (much to their concern and discomfort) that his cryptid powers may be the key to retrieving it. With Zak in tow, the race is on, and the Saturdays head for a spot deep in the Amazon to recover their hidden piece before Argost can get his hands on it. This also serves as a method of picking up the sixth member of the family, Zon, the last surviving remnant of a prehistoric species of pterodactyl-like creatures, who has her nest unceremoniously destroyed by the Saturdays when their airship crashes after a dogfight with Argost. The subsequent battle and denouement sets the tone for the rest of the series, and shows a glimpse of things to come.
The series has a definite retro tone and feel, all the way down from its simplistic Sixties-ish character design and 
muted color palette to its percussive and sprightly bongo-jazz score, but it is in the writing and characterization that it truly shines. Doc and Drew, despite their passion for adventures and scientific discoveries, show genuine concern and love for their son, while Zak behaves as precociously as any other boy in a family of adventurer-scientists would. The family dynamic is palpable, and drives the show quite well, deriving much situational humor (when Drew is questioned by her husband about why she threw the TV at a villain ransacking their HQ, her response is, "I'm sorry, I just get in a zone") and creating a real bond between the viewer and the characters. Argost is a great villain with a hilariously slimy upper-crust demeanor (he drops various foreign-language words and phrases continually in his speech) that recalls some of Hanna-Barbera's best Saturday morning villains, and there is a certain not-too-subtle commentary made by Argost's status as a reality-show host. The Herculoids-like menagerie of Fiskerton, Komodo and Zon all provide great support and comic relief, and promise great times ahead (and I want a Fiskerton stuffed doll, if not a full set of Saturdays action figures). There's no doubt about it: this show is going to be a monster, and because it's animated is not an acceptable reason for not watching it. After the cancellation of Teen Titans and Justice League and the subsequent takeover of CN's adventure blocks by incomprehensible anime, this show may well be the redemption of Cartoon Network.
The Secret Saturdays is airing each Friday on Cartoon Network. Catch it and share with friends; it's worth your time.
Check your local listings for proper airtimes for The Secret Saturdays. More information is available at http://www.cartoonnetwork.com.
Creator Jay Stephens hosts the Monsterama blog, which records his fine body of comics and cartoon work as well as his expertise in monster culture. Visit it here and let him know how much you like the show.
Hello, everybody! Frankie Franken here, and Happy 31 Days Of Halloween to all of you! Gosh, we've been so busy planning our Halloween celebration that we nearly forgot to mention--The Secret Saturdays is premiering on Cartoon Network tonight!
The Secret Saturdays details the adventures of Doc, Drew and Zak Saturday, a family of 
cryptozoologists who travel the world solving the mysteries of Earth's strangest creatures to save them from the evil machinations of V. V. Argost, who's bent on finding them for his own evil purposes. Created by Jay Stephens, this super-cool cartoon is full of monsters of all types, and perfect for the Halloween season! We want this cartoon to become a major hit, so make sure you tune in and watch tonight! Click on the link in our blog title to go straight to the Cartoon Network's Secret Saturdays portal for games, clips and show information!
Also, check out Jay Stephens' blog Monsterama, which is hosted right here on Blogger. Click the handy link in our Graveyard section here on the Harbinger to meet the groovy-ghouly creator of the Saturdays and read his ruminations and remembrances on monster culture! It's cryptid craziness galore, so make sure you don't miss out!
Sincerely,
Frankie Franken
The Secret Saturdays premieres tonight on Cartoon Network. Join us in watching and help to make this cartoon a monster hit! And don't forget to keep watch here at the Harbinger for a review of the first episode among the special treats in our 31 Days Of Halloween!
Hey, y'all, and Happy Halloween out there! My name's Petronella Nightshade, but everbody calls me Punkin, and I am speakin to you through this here computer blog. We welcome you to The MonsterGrrls' 31 Days Of Halloween, which is us and our Mad Doctor (Mr. John) celebratin the season with a whole bunch of stuff, reviewin horror movies and writin essays and first one thing and then another, and we's all puttin it up on this blog all month. This here is my first review of a movin picture, Buffy The Vampire Slayer, and the reason I am doin it is cause Bethany read the title and didn't want to do it, even though it had vampires in it. I think it had somethin to do with the words vampire and slayer, and them bein so close together. Since Bethany is a vampire you can see how she wouldn't care for somethin like that. But she told me all about how to do movin picture reviewin, so I am givin it a go.
Vampires is uncommon strange folk. It's all that havin to be inside all the time durin the day and never seein the sun, I think. It wears on a body and gives them strange notions, and though most vampires I know in Morlock Heights has become fairly civilized, ever now and then you run across one of them that's got wrong in the head. The main vampire in this picture, Lothos, is like that, struttin around and posturin and talkin about destroyin the world. But I am gettin ahead of myself.
This picture starts with a girl, name of Buffy Summers, who is what educated folks call a Typical Teen. She lives 
out in California and is on the cheerleadin squad at her school, which means that she has a bunch of popular friends, a handsome feller who plays basketball on the school team, and goes out shoppin at the mall a lot. Everthing's fine until this shabby lookin feller called Merrick comes round and tells her that she's got her a destiny, which is to be a Slayer of vampires. But Buffy don't want to be no Slayer; instead she wants to do somethin else, and she tells Merrick that she ain't gonna be no Slayer and he got him the wrong girl. Merrick says she's got her a birthmark that says she's s'posed to be the Slayer, and Buffy tells him that she went round the doctor's and got it took off. Well, poor old Merrick just about faints at that, but he takes her out to the graveyard where a vampire's risin up, and even though she don't know what she's doin she kills it and finds out that not only is she a Slayer but durn good at it. Merrick tells her that she's got to start trainin, cause somethin bad's comin. And that somethin is Lothos, who's wantin to destroy the world with his mean old self and has got him up a whole passel of vampires, includin this one little feller named Amilyn who is like Lothos' best buddy and goes around for half the picture with just one arm cause this other feller named Pike that Amilyn thought he was gonna eat started fightin him and tore his arm off. Which is just what I would have done, cause I wouldn't want no vampire tryin to eat me, and anyway old Amilyn was more concerned about his jacket gettin tore up than losin his arm, which is just plain silly. I guess vampires is different out in California.
Anyhow, Pike, who ain't popular like all of Buffy's friends, starts hangin out with Buffy cause he's the only other one that knows about the vampires, and pretty soon Buffy starts likin him instead of the basketball-playin boyfriend, which is how things usually go when you meet someone that you got somethin in common with. She spends a lot of time savin his behind from evil stuff too, cause in most horror pictures it is usually the feller who saves the pretty girl, but since Buffy is a Slayer and got supernatural powers and all, in this picture it is different. When Lothos kills Merrick in front of Buffy, she knows somethin has to be done. She's got to get him, and get him she does, in a big old showdown at the school dance.
Kristy Swanson plays Buffy, Donald Sutherland is playin Merrick, and Rutger Hauer plays old Lothos. Luke Perry is the one that's playin Pike, who I thought was more interestin and a better match for Buffy than the feller what played basketball. Paul Reubens plays the little feller Amilyn, and I read up some on him and found out that for a long time he was playin this oddball feller in a suit named Pee-Wee Herman, and so I guess he was playin a vampire cause he wanted to do somethin else for a while. But in this movie he had a Stanislavski moment, cause when Bethany was tellin me how to write reviews she told me all about this feller named Stanislavski who was this great actin teacher and everbody wanted to study under him, and so when Amilyn gets staked by Buffy and dies he starts rockin back and forth and clutchin his chest and rollin his eyes and goin oooh eeee arrrooowww like some big old cat, so I decided he was havin a Stanislavski moment. It was one of the best parts of the picture, to my mind.
This movin picture wasn't no big hit when it came out like Star Wars or somethin, but there was them that really did like it, and after seein it I am one of them. Joss Whedon, who's the feller what created Buffy and wrote the picture, went on and got to do a TV show with it, and it got real popular and had T-shirts and posters and dime novels and DVDs and funnybooks and them little action figures that folks buy and don't take out of the package, and all kind of stuff about Buffy. So I figure old Buffy did all right for herself, even if Bethany did call her a bunch of names that I can't write down here because young ones might be readin this. Anyhow, I am done here with this review and hope y'all like it. Blessings be to all of you, and see you soon cause I will be writin some more this month.
Sincerely,
Petronella Nightshade
Good evening, darlings, and thank you for reading. The other MonsterGrrls and I would like very much to welcome you to our 31 Days Of Halloween, in which all of us will log in each day through the month of October to bring you various news, reviews and other items connected with this most wonderful time of the year. We're kicking off today with a review of a movie from 2006, An American Haunting, which, ostensibly enough, was released on our Mad Doctor's birthday that year.
An American Haunting is not so much a retelling as a reimagining of an old American 
folktale, the Bell Witch of Tennessee. In 1817, the family home of John Bell in Robertson County, Tennessee, was haunted by inexplicable noises and poltergeist-like manifestations which were thought to be the work of a ghost, the spirit of a woman named Kate Batts. The spirit took particular delight in tormenting the Bells' youngest daughter Betsy (shown at right), and it is from this tale that Haunting takes its meat.
In the movie, John Bell (Donald Sutherland) is taken to Church court for the theft of Kate Batts' land, and let off lightly by the judges. Known in the village for claims of witchery, the offended Batts (Gaye Brown) tells him to enjoy his good health and the health of his family while he can, an admonition that takes a dark turn when strange manifestations begin to pop up around his home (including the by-now customary Frighteningly Symbolic Evil-Looking Child, played here by Madalina Stan). Many of the spooky occurrences seem to be focused around the Bells' teenage daughter Betsy (Rachel Hurd-Wood, who also plays the disembodied voice of the Bell Witch), who bears the brunt of the haunting at the beginning. When the manifestations escalate into Betsy levitating from her bed, it becomes apparent that the Bells have a ghost on their hands. As John Bell slowly loses his mind and the family desperately tries to hold together during the gathering darkness, it becomes very apparent that the ghost may not be in fact a manifestation of the restless dead, but a different manifestation entirely--an entity created by Betsy Bell in order for her and her mother Lucy (Sissy Spacek) to remember an evil secret.
The movie is well-made but flawed, mostly due to its predilection that there was actually no ghost. Insteand of truly exploring the legend of the Bell Witch, the story is made into a rather spooky psychodrama by attempting to explain the "haunting" as a psychological manifestation of child abuse. While the actors all perform their parts well and the movie spins a decent yarn (including some very atmospheric and frightening scenes), once the spooks are explained away by the filmmakers' additions to the tale, it degenerates from a scarefest into some rather standard ruminations on The Evil That Families Do that sort of becomes an Early American version of Flowers In The Attic. An opening thread set in modern times concerning a troubled mother and daughter's discovery of artifacts from the Bell Witch hauntings, which bookends the movie and tries to create a 'shock' ending, does not help much either. I would have much preferred to see the original story as written down, performed as a 'period' horror movie of sorts. Still, the movie looks good, so I would recommend this for an off-evening, but not as the main feature of a Halloween celebration. Save only the best films in your collection for that, and for heaven's sake do avoid those godawful Freddy and Jason slasher films. Not Halloweeny at all, I'm sure. As for this, better luck next time.
BETHANY'S RATING:
A well-made and fairly acted film that is heavy-handed in its execution and tries to explore modern evil by unsatisfactory means. Not for kids, but the slowness of the film will ensure that they won't want to watch anyway.
I extend special thanks to Mr. Bob Collins, a friend of our Mad Doctor's who suggested this film for review quite a while ago. Do enjoy, darling, and we do apologize for being so late with this.
Regards,
Bethany Ruthven
The Morlock Heights Harbinger proudly announces a seasonal onslaught of manic proportions--The MonsterGrrls' 31 Days Of Halloween!! All month long in October, the Grrls (and their Mad Doctor, natch) will be logging on to present all manner of Halloween hoofaraw, including essays, news, monster movie reviews, and all sorts of stuff! Join the frightful foursome for the ongoing BOO-HAW-HAW each day here at the Harbinger!
After reading a slew of reviews on the new animated film Igor, starring the voices of John Cusack, Steve Buscemi, Sean Hayes, John Cleese, Eddie Izzard, Jay Leno, Jennifer Coolidge and Molly Shannon, I can say this: almost none of them get it.This is not to say that my review is better than theirs, but they just don't get it. You have to have a certain frame of mind to watch this film, and you can't go in expecting anything. (For instance, the soundtrack contains monster-movie-esque music, the songs of Louis Prima, and "I Can See Clearly Now" as sung by blind orphans. Yes, blind orphans.) I was immediately stoked by this film when I first saw the animated trailer online, and quite frankly, I'm still stoked by it. (I have since learned there will be action figures--yes!!)
Anyway, on to our review. The kingdom of Malaria has been transformed into a barren wasteland by a mysterious and unexplained cloud cover, causing near-constant rain and eternal darkness. Since nothing can grow there, the bullying and overbearing King Malbert (Leno) comes up with a novel solution to keep Malaria's economy afloat: create evil inventions of mass destruction and blackmail the rest of the world into paying Malaria not to unleash them on other countries. (If this scenario sounds at all familiar to you, you are most likely going to vote Democrat and will probably end up not liking this rather un-PC movie anyway, so be quiet.) This instantly creates two classes within Malaria: the Evil Scientists, who are treated like celebrities and live rent-free in huge, luxurious laboratories, and the Igors, whose collective job consists mainly of indentured servitude, taking abuse, and switch-pulling. Get born with a hunch on your back, and guess where you'll end up. Because of these circumstances, no one in Malaria is kindhearted, friendly, or even nice.
One Igor (Cusack) who describes himself as "better-looking than the others" (and he's right), is unfortunately cursed with both creative abilities and common decency. Though Igor dreams of being an Evil Scientist, he is in thrall to the temperamental and incompetent Dr. Glickenstein (Cleese), and must invent in secret, creating existentialist Scamper (Buscemi) a sarcastic, suicidal and unfortunately immortal rabbit, and painfully stupid Brain (Hayes), a clumsy brain-in-a-jar who can't even spell his own name right. When Glickenstein is killed during field tests for the upcoming Evil Science Fair, Igor grabs his chance at fame and notoriety and begins working on an evil Frankenstein monster that will destroy all the other inventions at the Fair and be selected for Malbert's blackmail scam. Unfortunately, something goes awry and the resulting creation is a dainty behemoth-sized sweetheart named Eva (Shannon) who quickly decides her own calling: to be an actress. Igor misleads Eva into participating in the Fair, but his secret gets out and he is courted by Dr. Schauenfreude (Izzard), a stylish blowhard whose multiple winning streak at the Fair is maintained by stealing other scientists' inventions with the help of snobbish girlfiend Jaclyn (Coolidge). As Igor struggles with Schauenfreude's temptations and his growing affection for Eva, he discovers a fiendish plan that could change Malaria forever, and not for the better.
This movie is a witty and raucously skewered take on the Frankenstein tale that is a splendid early taste of Halloween dark chocolate. While reviews have been mixed on the film's level of humor (no one seems to understand the concept of gradually building whimsical comic anarchy anymore; it's possible that the Scary Movie And Others oveure killed this), it manages to be both kid- and adult-friendly in the same way that Rocky 
And Bullwinkle was, while at the same time raising a few important questions about celebrity, fame, beauty, prejudice, and the nature of good and evil (especially with its underplayed theme of smart good-guy nobodies versus evil maladroit somebodies). Yeah, most reviewers are ragging on the Nightmare Before Christmas-like design, but enough generations of spooky kids have seen that film and others by Tim Burton that he can now be considered an influence, and some of those same kids probably grew up to work on this film. Plus, the film's designers have also seen enough of Metropolis and The Cabinet Of Dr. Caligari to properly get their German Expressionism going on, so it's all good.
The voice cast also kicks it live and knocks it out, with standout performances coming from Hayes and Buscemi, who steal the show with their team of Brain and Scamper. Izzard and Coolidge mug and posture their way through, with Coolidge stealing some of Izzard's villainous thunder through her Paris-Hilton-meets-Natasha-Fatale portrayal of Jaclyn. Leno is solid but strangely not particularly memorable as Malbert, and Cleese invokes some of his demons from Fawlty Towers in his briefly seen but totally clueless Glickenstein. And Cusack and Shannon, who may seem on paper to be odd choices for Igor and Eva, maintain a constantly high energy level and own their characters for the whole of the film, making them totally believable.
Screw the reviewers. Screw the fact that there's been almost no press for this film, and screw the grumblings about Burtonesque character design and the film's atypical nature as compared to other CGI animated offerings. Go see this film. See it twice so you can catch all the jokes; it's not a typical kiddie film, but a movie about Evil Scientists and Igors ain't gonna be anyway. And there's gonna be action figures.
PULL THE SWITCH!!!
POST-MORTEM: We've just learned from dreadcentral.com that the action figure line has been canned by the Weinstein Company, who made the film. Guess all the Evil Scientists moved to Hollywood.
Hello, everybody! Frankie Franken here, and we've just seen the trailer for the new film Igor, coming from MGM in September. Igor follows the adventures of a talented Mad-Scientist's-assistant (John Cusack) in the kingdom of Malaria, where Mad Scientists are celebrities who create evil weapons and monsters, and Igors are... just the
hunchbacked guys who pull the switch. In a way-cool take on Frankenstein, one Igor (who is much more talented than his master) must overcome prejudices and other Mad Scientists to achieve his dream of becoming a Mad Scientist himself. When he gets his chance, Igor's creation turns out to be a monster girl (wow!) named Eva, who has other things in mind than being someone's weapon.
Our own Mad Doctor John is hot to see this great movie, and we think it's going to be really cool too--a nice early treat for Halloween! Check out the trailer at http://www.igor-movie.com.
Note: The Mad Doctor is also providing information on this film at Notes From The Monster Shop, and his new animation blog The Powerhouse Files. Check them out.
Also, click the Igor poster to see a video exclusive from Dread Central with Igor director Anthony Leonidas!
Have seen the trailer for the new film Igor, and I'm looking forward with great anticipation to this film, coming from MGM in September. Igor follows the adventures of a talented Mad-Scientist's-assistant (John Cusack) in the kingdom of Malaria, where Mad Scientists are celebrities who create evil weapons and monsters, and Igors are... the hunchbacked guys who pull the switch. In a wild, wacky and very creative inversion on the Frankenstein story, one Igor (who is much more talented than his master) must overcome prejudices and other Mad Scientists to achieve his dream of becoming a Mad Scientist himself. Teaming up with sarcastic lab rabbit Scamper (Steve Buscemi) and the unfortunately stupid brain-in-a-jar Brain (Sean Hayes), Igor eventually gets his chance to create his own monster, Eva (Molly Shannon), who turns out to be exactly not what anyone expected.
Some wags on Youtube (which is where I saw the trailer) were blabbing on about how this seemed to be a monster-themed version of Ratatouille, but for my own part, I think there's much more at work here. It's arriving in theatres on September 19, just in time to open the Halloween season, so I'm throwing in with this cool-looking and inspired-sounding little movie. Further highjinks are sure to ensue, so I'll fill you in as it all becomes available. Check out the trailer for yourself at http://www.igor-movie.com.
Note: We will also be providing information on this film at The Morlock Heights Harbinger and The Powerhouse Files. Check them out.
Have seen the trailer for the new film Igor, and I'm looking forward with great anticipation to this film, coming from MGM in September. Igor follows the adventures of a talented Mad-Scientist's-assistant (John Cusack) in the kingdom of Malaria, where Mad Scientists are celebrities who create evil weapons and monsters, and Igors are... the hunchbacked guys who pull the switch. In a wild, wacky and very creative inversion on the Frankenstein story, one Igor (who is much more talented than his master) must overcome prejudices and other Mad Scientists to achieve his dream of becoming a Mad Scientist himself. Teaming up with sarcastic lab rabbit Scamper (Steve Buscemi) and the unfortunately stupid brain-in-a-jar Brain (Sean Hayes), Igor eventually gets his chance to create his own monster, Eva (Molly Shannon), who turns out to be exactly not what anyone expected.
Some wags on Youtube (which is where I saw the trailer) were blabbing on about how this seemed to be a monster-themed version of Ratatouille, but for my own part, I think there's much more at work here. It's arriving in theatres on September 19, just in time to open the Halloween season, so I'm throwing in with this cool-looking and inspired-sounding little movie. Further highjinks are sure to ensue, so I'll fill you in as it all becomes available. Check out the trailer for yourself at http://www.igor-movie.com.
Note: We will also be providing information on this film at The Morlock Heights Harbinger and Notes From The Monster Shop. Check them out.
Hey, you guys, this is Harriet Von Lupin, and I'm so excited to be doing The MonsterGrrls' 31 Days Of Halloween with all my friends! I'm not really used to computers much, but I've been taking some typing lessons and I think I've got the hang of it now, so I'm gonna do my first post about The Ghastly Ones, a band that makes really cool monster-party music!
that the Mad Doctor doesn't like--pretty sucky) who released their first album, A-Haunting We-Will-Go-Go, on a record label called Geffen/Zombie Au Go Go. (Pretty good name 'cause this band really go-goes!) That record's now out of print, but the Ghastlies' groovy surf sound got them a lot of cool shows, playing with guys like Brian Setzer and Los Straitjackets (which are some other guys that the Mad Doctor likes, and I do too!) and earning them the title of "Slayer" of surf. (Okay, Slayer is that evil Devil band but these guys are not an evil Devil band so they must have been talking about something else.) They broke up for awhile after all that, but they got back together and have been making super-cool-groovy music ever since!
The Ghastlies' latest albums are Target Draculon, which has all new original songs on it, and Unearthed, which has a bunch of their old stuff from the first album re-recorded with Captain Clegg on organ. (Hey, he's an organ donor! Ha ha ha ha ha ha!) Unearthed is especially special to us, since it contains a groovy charged-up version of the song that we consider the official MonsterGrrls theme song--"Robot Atomico!" If you want to get these cool records for yourself, just go straight to www.ghastlyones.com to order 'em. And if you're planning a Halloween party, this is like the perfect music!
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