CONCLUSION: DINOSAURS

THE MAIDEN

Photo of the “Llullaillaco Maiden,” a 15-year-old girl sacrificed during the Inca Empire for both purposes of religious rite and social control. She was chosen a year prior to her death, fed a ritualistic diet for an approximate twelve months to make her gain weight, then was drugged and left on the shrine at Volcano Llullaillaco, where she was left to die of exposure. For five hundred years, her body had been preserved at 82 ft. She is considered to be the best preserved Andean mummy uncovered.

UNSUNG HORRORS: JOY RIDE

Every once in a while, a genuinely great horror movie—one that would rightfully be considered a classic, had it gotten more exposure and love at the box office—makes an appearance. It comes, no one notices, and it goes. But movies like this are important. They need to be treasured and remembered. If intelligent, original horror is supported, then that's what we'll begin to receive, in droves. We need to make these movies a part of the legendary genre we hold so dear. Because these are the unsung horrors. These are the movies that should have been successful, but were instead ignored. They should be rightfully praised for the freshness and intelligence and craft that they have contributed to our genre.

So, better late than never, we’re going to celebrate them now… one at a time.

Dir. John Dahl
2001
20th Century Fox
United States

“Storm’s coming. I like the rain. Keeps everyone inside. Washes everything clean.”

Though I’m a lover of all things horror in general, there are very specific sub-genres that I will gravitate toward more than others. Firstly is anything paranormal. If you’ve got ghosts in your film, made by people who seem to have given a damn, I’m there. Secondly is anything killer shark…or at least it was until the mid-2000s, until shark movies started being terrible on purpose. (That’s cheating; plus that approach never works.) Thirdly is horror on the open road. I’ve been fascinated by this kind of story for years. For someone like myself who is so completely embittered by having to contend with every manner of completely incompetent driver, I actually love being out on the road late at night. Years back, when immediate family temporarily lived a few states away and I would go to visit, I always made that drive late at night. For obvious reasons, traffic was always much lighter, and therefore caused me less strife, but there was another reason: Being out on the road so late into the night made it feel like a different world entirely. Something about the night sky and late hour made it feel as if you weren’t so much driving across state lines as you were sneaking across under the cover of darkness. Your only company was semi-trailer trucks and the few civilian sedans. I love stories that take place in this environment. Late at night in a foreign environment without access to immediate help, anything can happen. With your only line of defense being your car (if you’re lucky), you’ve got only your wits and your talents behind the wheel to depend on.

I remember going to see Joy Ride in theaters for the wrong reason – because, on paper, it sounded like an enjoyable piece of shit at which I could laugh and belittle, which is something I often did back when I had disposable income. I had seen the trailers for the film, all punctuated with a close-up on a CB radio as Ted Levine’s voice bellowed “CAAANDY CAAANE!” But a funny thing happened about ten or so minutes into the film: I was enjoying it quite a bit, and not in any kind of ironic way. It was just…good. Great, even.

Lewis (Paul Walker) has had a crush on his childhood friend Venna (Leelee Sobieski) since forever. Though both have torn off to different colleges, and separated by half-a-dozen states, the two have been quite consistent at keeping in touch, mostly with late-night phone calls. One particular night, at the end of the semester, Venna confesses she’s recently broken up with her current boyfriend and verbally wishes that Lewis owned a car, so he could stop off in Boulder, Colorado, and pick her up, so they could make the trip home to New Jersey together. Lewis looks down at his airplane ticket and lies to her, saying he does, indeed, have a car, and he’d be happy to stop off on his way home cross-country. After procuring a car, Lewis begins his drive…until hearing from his mother, who informs him that his older brother, Fuller (Steve Zahn), has been arrested in Salt Lake City for drunk-and-disorderly. Lewis, being the dutiful younger brother, amends his plans to stop by and bail him out. Since Fuller hasn’t been home in years, nor even really keeps in touch with their parents, Lewis assumes he’ll be dropping off Fuller somewhere between Salt Lake and Boulder, but Fuller opts to stay with Lewis for the entire trip, as it would seem he, too, wants to go home to Jersey.

Along the way, the brothers stop off to have the car serviced, and while doing so, Fuller takes it upon himself to have a CB radio installed in the car. For a paltry $40, Fuller figures they can use the radio to keep in touch with truck-drivers to ask them for any potential cop sightings, thus making the trip go by just a little bit faster. While doing so, one particular truck-driver with the handle of Rusty Nail catches their attention; the brothers create alternate ego CB handles, Fuller being a southern guy named “Black Sheep” and Lewis putting on a female voice for “Candy Cane.” The two play-act with each other, hoping to bait Rusty Nail, which they soon do, and they talk him into “meeting” Candy Cane at a roadside motel where the brothers are really staying, which they do for nothing more than a laugh and some spiteful revenge against a rude guest also staying at the same motel. Rusty Nail does eventually show, as promised, and a violent altercation leaves the rude motel guest hanging on for deal life. Lewis feels genuinely bad, but Fuller refuses to recognize his culpability in bringing these two random strangers together and it ending badly.

In one of those great “oh shit” movie moments, Rusty Nail soon inserts himself directly into the brothers’ lives, letting them know that he’s figured out he was made to be the butt of their joke, and he isn’t going to let them get off so easily. From one cheap motel to the next, and no matter what road the brothers take, Rusty Nail seems to be both one step ahead while also being directly behind them.

To quote one eccentric character in the film, what eventually unfolds isn’t “comely.”

Joy Ride is perhaps the best addition to the open road sub-genre that likely began as far back as Steven Spielberg’s TV movie Duel. It’s thrilling when it wants to be, and fun/funny when it wants to break the tension. It drifts back and forth from horror to humor as effortlessly as I’ve ever seen, and that’s a tough act to pull off. Duel’s mood was soaked in paranoia (and slightly hampered by the film’s unlikeable lead), and Road Games was a gonzo Australian-outback with an absurd noir approach, but the superior-to-both Joy Ride endeavors to be just a flat-out conventional thrill ride, one that doesn’t have much to say or a moral to imbue, other than, “Just be nice to strangers, you idiot.” (I believe Ghandi once said that.) (No, really. He did.)

Paul Walker’s recent passing was one of the main reasons I wanted to highlight Joy Ride, which certainly belongs in the upper echelons of the late actor’s filmography. Though he’ll forever be linked to The Fast and The Furious franchise, which represents neither his best output nor his finest acting, it would seem films like this and 2006’s insane Running Scared often fall by the wayside in the actor’s obituaries. Walker, a handsome guy and by all accounts a likeable and charitable person, seems to be the most comfortable here that he’s ever been as an actor. In the course of Joy Ride’s running time, Walker needs to play normal, smitten, loyal, fun-loving, fearful, fearless, heroic, weak, and most importantly, sympathetic – at all times. He offers a lot of range for something as ultimately high-concept and sadly dismissed, but the film is all the better for having him aboard. One of my favorite moments involving Walker is when he uses his faux female voice to lure Rusty Nail to the motel where the brothers are staying. At Fuller’s urging, Lewis agrees to take part in this prank and does it with a sly smile, but when he hangs up the radio at the end of the conversation, the smile drips off his face with realization and he says, with tremendous guilt, “That was really mean.” It’s moments like this that make you realize fictional on-screen characters can be just as flawed as the rest of us – that we succumb to pressure and we do and say dumb things, only to know moments later just how dumb those things were.

Playing the foil to Walker’s soulful Lewis is Steve Zahn as Fuller, who had probably the best time on set, and certainly had all the best lines. Zahn manages to do something incredibly difficult, and he does it with little effort: the character of Fuller, in actuality, has no real redeeming value. He’s a shiftless and selfish troublemaker who is not only directly to blame for inviting the wrath of Rusty Nail into their lives, and who not only refuses to accept that blame, but he even has the audacity to try and get his groove on with a very drunken Venna, a girl with whom Lewis is clearly in love. This isn’t just one friend trying to cuckold another – it’s his brother, and that’s pretty fucked up. But it’s Zahn’s extreme likability and affability that makes us not only put up with him, or root for him, but actually miss him when he’s not on screen. I’ve known real-life Fullers whom I once called my friends, but whom I eventually came to loath; Zahn’s version of Fuller makes me wish he were my best friend.

Walker and Zahn’s on-screen chemistry is fantastic. From the minute they are reunited when Lewis goes to bail out his brother, they genuinely feel like real-life family. And even though you, the audience, know how bad of an idea it is to begin fucking with Rusty Nail on that damn CB radio, the brothers have such a fun time doing it that it does become legitimately funny. We’ve all done what they are doing, whether it be via CB radio, phone, chat room, or whatever other devices we use to engage in temporary tomfoolery. We remember the rush we got, regardless of whether or not our conscience caught up with us afterward. At the end of their prank, when Lewis quotes one of Rusty Nail’s responses – “I’d take off your bra.” – and laughs about it, the humor is palpable. The comedy aspect of it is infectious because the circumstances feel real.

Leelee Sobieski is your typical and not-so-typical damsel in distress. She becomes the realized version of Rusty Nail’s infatuations – the Candy Cane whom the brothers tried to convince him did not exist. What’s interesting about her character is that she had nothing to do with the brothers’ poor choice in attempting to victimize Rusty Nail over CB, but yet she’s here heaving to deal with the situation they have created for her. Naturally she shows fear where it’s appropriate, and exhibits the kind of strength we’ve come to expect from our “final girl,” but she also manages to show empathy toward their stalker. As a tear rolls slowly down her cheek, she tells him over the radio that she doesn't think people  realize their actions have consequences. It feels less like she’s trying to butter him up and more like she’s trying to reason with him on a human level.

It doesn't work:

Ted Levine! This guy…If you’d seen only one film previous featuring Ted Levine in some capacity, you would instantly recognize him the first time his voice blares through that radio. Though most well-known for his demented turn as Buffalo Bill in The Silence of the Lambs, Levine has consistently contributed reliable character actor work for years since. Confined here only to voice-work, Levine does not let that confinement affect his performance. The menace comes easily enough for him, but before he goes totally off his rocker, a line here and there aids the audience’s transition from understanding the psycho trucker’s action while certainly not condoning them. “Now they know how it feels to be the butt-end of the joke...Now they know how it feels to be the fucking punch line.”

Genre-fan favorite Jim Beaver shows up in a fun cameo as Sheriff Ritter, a profanity-spewing no-nonsense local lawman who offers the most entertaining diatribe in the entire film. Not only is he providing a natural reaction to what has now become a major problem due to a stupid prank, but in a way he’s also personifying the audience’s grasp on the conflict up to that point. Though he’s showing it with anger, both he and the audience are expressing the same kind of frustration: simply put, they could have so easily not picked up that radio, and not taunted that truck driver, and now that they have, everything is now coming apart. The hell they have created for themselves has derived from the easiest of choices earlier presented to them – and they both chose to be stupid.

John Dahl, simply put, directs the hell out of this thing. He manages to wrangle every piece of fear and suspense out of the film’s on-screen happenings, and he does it with something as simple as a spray-painted road-sign, or a slow zoom in on a shitty motel painting. My favorite sequence has the brothers seeing the finished product of their arranged meeting between the motel guest and Rusty Nail—the man lies comatose in a hospital bed, wrapped from head to toe in bandages, and his bottom jaw torn clean off.  Shot in slow motion, and lingering on the brother’s horrified faces for several moments before we see what they are seeing, it’s affecting not only for the shock, but because they now can see what their fun little prank has manifested into. Fuller, who up to that point refused to admit any wrongdoing, looks far more horrified than his brother.

Joy Ride’s gimmick recalls Hitchcock’s Rear Window, and so it’s only natural for Dahl to include a fine collection of Hitchcock-like shots and sequences. The fake-scare scene, in which Lewis and Fuller are terrified by perhaps the friendliest ice-truck driver in existence, drips with Hitchcock humor – not to mention the scene composition itself. (See the shot where the ice truck pulls up directly behind their car, headlights blaring – all captured from inside the back windshield.) But there’s another homage snuck into the film’s final act that you might not have expected, and though it honors one very famous Spielberg film, funnily enough it’s not the aforementioned one about a man being terrorized by an anonymous truck driver, but rather, the one about the killer shark. Our kids in peril soon find themselves stranded in a cornfield, surrounded by a sea of high stalks, as Rusty Nail pursues them in his truck. As he barrels toward them, only the top of his truck can be seen poking out through the tops of the cornstalks, like the fin of a shark, and the kids blindly run in every direction, desperate to get away from him. You can’t get further away from the waters of Amity Island, New England, than a cornfield in Middle America, but yet director Dahl still manages to successfully homage Jaws all the same.

Dahl and his screenwriters, Clay Tarver and soon-to-be Hollywood powerhouse J.J. Abrams, take a huge gamble during the second act. After the brothers’ first face-to-face (kind of) confrontation with Rusty Nail, it ends with him laughing and saying, “Hey, I was just messing with you, man,” and then disappears into the night. We, the audience, know there’s still half the film to go, and we know the brothers' paths are going to cross with that of Rusty Nail again, but our filmmakers do something nearly unheard of: For much of the second act, there is no Rusty Nail. No voice, no eerie threats, not even temporary cuts back to his character driving or an establishing shot of his truck. Nothing to refresh your memory that he is still out there and still pissed off. Because of this, the film allows us to calm back down and get acquainted with Sobieski’s character, who has finally joined the plot. The humor makes a welcome return, and the filmmakers allow Lewis and Venna time to grow closer and establish a relationship – one on which the film is depending to base the effectiveness of the entire last act. You simply do not see this kind of approach anymore. Once a horror film has begun the horror, it does not turn off for most of an entire act. But Dahl et al. pull it off, and with great reward, as the entire last act does not let up once it begins.

Based on the moderate success of Joy Ride at the box office, and its two direct-to-video sequels (one already out/one coming soon), it would seem that Joy Ride did indeed find an audience upon its release. It may not be as unheralded as the other films featured here in Unsung Horrors, but it’s certainly no less worthy for the attention and praise it deserves.

BOO!

(Evil laugh.)

GOOD SHOT

Charlie Noonan was an amateur folklorist who traveled throughout the South and Southwestern United States during the early years of the 20th century, collecting tall tales and stories of the supernatural. According to his wife, Ellie, Charlie was told a story one day by an Oklahoma farmer about a strange woman who lived alone on an isolated property in the panhandle. The farmer claimed the woman was not a woman at all, but something else, something that hid its true nature beneath a headscarf and was never seen without a large dog by its side. Noonan was apparently intrigued enough to try searching for the woman during one of his research road trips. He was never seen again.

Ellie Noonan was later contacted by a Tulsa pawnbroker who remembered reading about her husband’s disappearance in the papers, after finding his name engraved on a camera sold to him by an itinerant. The pawnbroker returned the camera, and Mrs. Noonan had the film inside developed in the hopes of finding a clue as to his whereabouts. This was the only photo on the roll. Unfortunately, neither the location of the property, nor the name of the farmer who told him the story was recorded in Noonan’s notes.

Story and image source.

HITCH

Aquatic Hitchcock. Cannes, 1963.

PHANTASM EXHUMED: AN INTERVIEW WITH AUTHOR DUSTIN McNEILL

When someone says the word “franchise” or “series” to a horror fan, inevitably that fan will immediately think of Friday the 13th, A Nightmare on Elm Street, and Halloween. Jason, Freddy, and Michael have been infamous horror genre boogeyman for approaching forty years. They are the next generation’s Dracula, Wolf Man, and Frankenstein’s Monster. But they are also, with all due respect, half-ideas and whisper-down-the-alleys. Their imperfectly perfect originals (each film for different reasons) have been fleshed out, explored, expanded upon, and exploited with multitudes of sequels and remakes, none of which had the input from the creative team responsible for bringing the groundbreaking original to screens. Their tangential mythologies have traversed such differing directions that they eventually no longer embodied what their original creators had established.

That cannot be said for the Phantasm series, which has seen the same writer/director on all four films, as well as most of the cast. In 1979, series creator Don Coscarelli unleashed upon the world an absurd and bizarre fever dream called Phantasm. And its main cast of A. Michael Baldwin, Reggie Bannister, Bill Thornbury, and the immeasurable Angus Scrimm have been along for the ride ever since. (I suppose we can “forgive” the presence of James LeGros as Mike in Phantasm II, but no forgiveness is necessary, as he was great in the role.)

Getting back to those aforementioned horror franchises, they have been lucky enough and beloved enough to receive respectful and definitive retrospectives with an assemblage of books (Crystal Lake Memories; Halloween: The Complete History) and video documentaries (Halloween: 25 Years of Terror; Never Sleep Again: The Elm Street Legacy).

Up to this point, beyond special features on DVD releases, no such attention has ever been paid to the Phantasm series, consisting of the original, Phantasm II, Phantasm III: Lord of the Dead, and Phantasm: Oblivion.
 

Enter Dustin McNeill, owner of the Phantasm Archives, moderator of the Phantasm Community, longtime Phantasm fan (er, phan, as we're often called), and now author, who has penned Phantasm Exhumed: The Unauthorized Companion, which streets late March from Harker Press. In the author's own words, Phantasm Exhumed is "a meticulously researched look at the chronological day-by-day making of the four Phantasm films from script page to world premiere as told through the stories and anecdotes of cast, crew, producers and effects makers. In addition to the four film sections, Phantasm Exhumed contains a Primordium chapter that covers in less detail the making of Don Coscarelli's first two films, Jim the World's Greatest and Kenny & Company...The book also benefits greatly from the inclusion of rare and unpublished journals by Angus Scrimm and Kristen Deem that collectively span all four films."

To quote the book's author, let's do a little more digging...

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Tall Man in Desert: Guy Thorpe

The End of Summer (TEOS): At what age did you discover the weird and wild world of Phantasm? Where were you, and which film was your first?

Dustin McNeill (DM): I was fifteen when I happened upon the original at my local video store. I thought it was terrific, but never gave any thought to there being sequels. When I discovered two years later that sequels existed, I very quickly tracked them down and thought they were just as great. Phantasm: Oblivion is my absolute favorite sequel. Parts II and III I dig almost equally, with a slight edge going to Phantasm II.

TEOS: What was it about the Phantasm series that drew you in?

DM: The Tall Man! What a great horror villain! He barely spoke, but when he did I hung on his every word. I immediately recognized that the series wasn't spoon-feeding the audience answers about him or the other weird goings-on. The mythology required that you figure out certain things for yourself. I loved that.

TEOS: I recall reading your excellent Phantasm article in a 2009 issue of HorrorHound Magazine. Was this you testing the waters for a run at a potential Phantasm book? Or did writing the article parlay into the idea that you could potentially write an entire series retrospective?

DM: Thanks for the kind words. It came together very quickly and I would've loved to have had more time on it. In 2009, I was just beginning work on my book when the HorrorHound opportunity presented itself. I wasn't really sure what the focus of my book was yet, though I sensed there was a huge demand for it. That the issue completely sold out and is now only available from collectors reinforced to me that there is a major audience waiting. That doesn't happen to every HorrorHound issue.

TEOS: Though Phantasm isn't as well-known a horror franchise as, say, Halloween or A Nightmare on Elm Street, phans have had the opportunity over the years to delve into publications like Fangoria, or your HorrorHound, or the expansive documentaries found on special edition DVD releases, to access a wealth of information on the making of the Phantasm films. What will your book be offering that previous sources have not?

DM: Great question. Everything you've read or seen about Phantasm so far has been in a general sense. Everything. My book is going to take a very detailed, chronological look at the making of these four films… meaning I take you back to March 20, 1977, when they shot the Tall Man chasing Mike through Morningside Mortuary for Phantasm. Or January 5, 1987, when they filmed Mike and Reggie raiding the hardware store for supplies for Phantasm II. Or February 23, 1993, when they filmed the Demon Nurse's attack on Mike and Reggie for Phantasm III. Or November 22, 1997, when the Tall Man tried to remove the sphere from Mike's head in Phantasm: Oblivion. Basically, this book is really digging deep with the details.

A huge inspiration for me in taking this direction was J.W. Rinzler's fantastic books on the makings of Star Wars and Indiana Jones. Being able to excerpt Angus Scrimm's unpublished Phantasm set journals also help set this book apart from everything that has come before. I think phans are going to really enjoy seeing those.

Liz and the Creature: Mark Shostrom

TEOS: Have you managed to attract previous members of the Phantasm phamily who have never before shared their experiences working on the films?

DM: Yes, very much so. I was surprised to be the first person to interview a number of people associated with the series. Ken Jones, the original sphere victim, has never had the opportunity to speak publicly about Phantasm. There are also people who've shared their experiences before, but not often and not in a long, long time, such as Kevin Connors and Gloria Lynne-Henry (Tim and Rocky from Phantasm III).

TEOS: You've previously shared that series creator Don Coscarelli is not involved with the book. Why did he refrain from participating?

DM: I can only speculate. I know he heard about the project years ago before I approached him, which did not bode well. Prior to the book, my main communication with Don were emails asking that I remove information or videos from my website, the Phantasm Archives, when I was posting news too early or something they wanted to save for a future DVD release. So I was never tight with him like I was the cast. Obviously, it would have been incredible to involve him. I imagine he will eventually read it and I hope he will like it. It is, after all, a warm tribute to his work.

TEOS: Besides Don, were there any other individuals from Phantasm history who proved elusive that you wish you could have interviewed?

DM: Willard Green, father of the original silver sphere! I grabbed a local fortuneteller and attempted a séance in hopes of getting an interview, but nothing came of it. Sadly, Green died before the original Phantasm saw release. He never had the opportunity to see his work on the big screen.

TEOS: Just out of personal curiosity, did you manage to score an interview with Kenneth Tigar, who played Father Meyers in Phantasm 2 ? I love that guy!

DM: Yes, Father Meyers is in here. Kenneth was terrific and had some great things to say about making Phantasm II. Of his character's silver-sphere demise, he said, "It was one of the most interesting things I've ever done in my entire career." I was excited to see him appear in The Avengers shortly after our interview. He played one of the few mortals that ever stood up to Loki!

TEOS: The book will be including rare and never-before-seen photographs from the productions of the Phantasm films. Where did you obtain them?

DM: The crew! A handful of interviews I did ended with someone saying, "Hey, I think I have some photos in storage somewhere if you want them." I wound up collecting more than a thousand unpublished photos from these films. Phantasm Exhumed is set to include more than 200 of them. The great thing is that a majority of these images, such as those from makeup effects creator Mark Shostrom, were digitally scanned in from their original negatives and look fantastic.

Mike Hanging: Guy Thorpe

TEOS:  Will you be delving into the unproduced script by Roger Avery, referred to as Phantasm: 1999?

DM: Yes, the book has an entire section dedicated to just that project. I don't want to say too much here because it's all there on the page - the multiple drafts, the changes, the cast reactions and the different reasons for it ultimately not being made. Exhumed also has sections dedicated to the aborted remake that New Line Cinema attempted and the Phantasm V project from a few years back—the one that generated the infamous cast reading.

TEOS: The trend seems to be, first, publishing the massive retrospective book, and then turning it into a video documentary, as was the case with Crystal Lake Memories, and Going to Pieces: The Rise and Fall of the Slasher Film. Have there been any preliminary discussions about that?

DM: Not at all. I've been so engrossed in the book that I can hardly see anything beyond it. I was happy to have been involved in the Phantasm II blu-ray documentary a year back, but I think that will mark the extent of my documentary contributions to Phantasm. Not that there isn't ample footage/material out there with which to make a new documentary.

TEOS: Being that you maintain a close relationship with the cast, you would be privy to certain details that the general public are not. The possibility of a Phantasm V has existed for going on two decades. While I'm certainly not asking you to spill the beans on anything you may or may not know, instead I am asking, do you think phans will ever be blessed with a Phantasm V? 

DM: Yes, absolutely. You will totally see it. I've been saying on the Phantasm Archives and Phantasm Community that the official Phantasm camp have been filming it since 2008, but no one seems to pay attention to that. Heck, I even debuted the first photo from the project of Reggie on the Archives. It's been a grueling wait, but you will eventually see it. Can't spill any more beans on it than that.

TEOS: Why do you think the Phantasm series endures?  

DM: I think it endures for a number of reasons. So many elements come together to make these films work. You've got endearing performances from a terrific cast, a wonderfully intriguing story, solid direction, dazzling special effects, top-notch makeups, and unforgettable music. This is a franchise that, despite having gone direct-to-video, has yet to compromise itself. Few horror franchises can honestly claim that. There's also a timeless quality to the series in that these films don't really date themselves all that much. It endures for these reasons and more.

Mike and Tall Man: Mark Shostrom

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Phantasm Exhumed purchase details are still being worked out, though it will likely be available via Amazon, Barnes & Noble, directly from the publisher, and from the usual dotcoms. For the time being, keep an eye on the Phantasm Exhumed site for the latest details. That is, if you've got the...balls? (Yep, I did that.)

CRAPPYPASTA: VOO DOO DOCTOR

It was a cold winter day I was walking through the forest and I heard screaming. I looked around but nothing was there I just kept walking suddenly I felt dizzy I tried to keep my balance but fell over I looked up and I saw a small toy next to me I ran away from that place I ran to my house and locked the door

The next morning I was sitting in bed I was about to brush my teeth but I looked in the mirror and I saw a lot of scars on my face

I was running to my parents room but they weren’t there

I opened the door and saw two dead bodies on the floor

I fell back and screamed suddenly something stabbed me in the back it was a needle

It was in my hand though

Did I just stab myself

I remember a few days before there death my mom and dad were arguing they would have killed each other I felt like killing myself

I felt madness going through my veins I didn’t fell like the sporty girl that I used to be but know I feel like a mad person

I was walking in the forest because I was trying to run away (or at least see if slenderman would take me) but I had to go back

CURRENT DAY
today the police are seeing who did this they could tell it was a murder but they don’t think it’s possible for them to kill each other

Cop: we’ll we have the fingerprints and it says that it’s you

Me: how is that possible I was asleep the whole time

I was crying

Cop: I’m afraid that you’ll have to go to a mental hospital

Me: this isn’t  fair it wasn’t me

Again I felt rage and madness I suddenly grabbed a kind and stabbed the cop they all had there guns to me I had about three knifes and I threw them all at them

While I was running away from all the dead bodies I tripped over a rock and cut myself

As I was running I saw a note on a tree I just kept running I stabbed every live thing I saw I kept a smile in my face the whole time

Eventually I got tired and at down there was a lot  of blood on my hands this madness in my head wasn’t going to stop I was a monster people feared me I have dolls of everyone including you

And everywhere I go there will be blood

Source.

NEW GODZILLA TRAILER

HOLY SHIT!

HOUSE OF HER NIGHTMARES

All Margaret wanted was a nice home where she could raise her small daughter. An ad for a colonial house seemed like a dream come true, but upon stepping inside, it felt more like a nightmare - a nightmare that didn't quite end when she walked away. This is Margaret's story...

I was living in Houston, Texas, and my daughter was only two years old. I wanted a house very badly, but couldn't afford one. That did not stop me from looking at the Sunday paper, however, and dreaming.

One Sunday, I read an ad for a house for rent: a two-story colonial with a large yard, mature trees, and a garden. The best part was it was only fifty dollars more than I was paying for my apartment. I couldn't resist. I called the number listed and the lady told me that she and her husband owned a plant nursery not far from the house. She said if I drove to the nursery, I could follow her to the house.

I wasted no time in getting dressed and heading over. It was a bright day in June, the sun was shining, the birds singing, the grass was green, and there was just a hint of a breeze. It was the perfect day to find a home.

I arrived at the nursery and met the lady and her husband. They were wonderful people. If I were going to have landlords, these were the people I wanted to have. They told me the house needed some painting, and if I wanted it they would let me pick the colors. Also, if I wanted to do anything to the yard, I could come to the nursery and pick out anything I wanted free of charge. They would also let me have the third month rent free so that I could make some improvements I might want to do.

A BAD FEELING

It seemed too good to be true. I followed the woman to the house. Sure enough, it was a large white colonial with black shutters and gigantic oaks in the front yard. As I climbed out of the car, I caught just a glimpse of what appeared to be a garden gate on the side. There was no grass in the yard, maybe because there was too much shade, but I could overlook that. I had a full nursery where I could choose shade-loving plants.

The woman opened the front door and went inside. I took a step to follow her and froze. A chill ran through me. Goosebumps broke out on my arms and the hair stood up on the back of my neck. Even my breath caught in my throat. Everything in me said, Do not go into this house…, but that was ridiculous, wasn't it? I had come all this way. The lady was inside waiting for me. How could I explain it? I had to go in.

I pulled myself together and tried again with the same results. Something deep within me rebelled at the idea of going inside. I realized I was afraid - very afraid. I could hear the lady saying something to me from inside, but I couldn't make out the words. I couldn't just stand here outside the threshold, I had to go in. I didn't want to, but I couldn't come up with a logical reason to leave.

A CONSUMING DARKNESS

I gathered my courage and stepped inside. The first thing I noticed was how dark the house was. Outside it was bright and cheerful, but inside there was no light. I couldn't even see the walls. I could barely make out the vague shape of the woman who had led me here. She knew the house and flicked on some lights, but it hardly made a difference. It was as if the house sucked up all the light, releasing only shadows and dark corners. I couldn't understand it... the windows were huge. Where was the light?

Add to this the feeling of being watched. I felt there was something there quietly watching us. She showed me the living room and the kitchen, for all the good it did. It was as if I were going blind and couldn't force my eyes to adjust. She showed me the backyard, which did have grass and another large tree. I was puzzled. I could see the light outside and couldn't imagine why it did not pierce the darkness inside.

There was a shed in the yard, and she explained to me that the man who lived here before had left unexpectedly without any notice and had left all his clothes and furniture behind. She told me that she and her husband did not know what to do with his things and they didn't want to throw them away in case he returned for them. They had put everything in the shed. She told me not to worry, that they had changed the locks on the house, and if he didn't come back in a couple of months, they would empty the shed.

THE SYMBOLS ON THE FLOOR

She showed me the little gated garden I had glimpsed from the front yard. I liked the garden and could imagine planting it with my daughter, yet I could not see us living here. She led me into the dining room, complaining the entire time that she couldn't understand why anyone would paint the walls black, not only the walls but the windows as well. The former tenant also had drawn some weird symbols on the floor in some sort of luminescent paint. She had no idea what they were.

I did. I have never been a devil worshiper, of course, but I have seen enough movies to know what a pentagram looks like. It was beginning to make a little sense.

She took me upstairs, a bare blub barely brightening the way. It lit perhaps two steps before losing to the darkness. As I followed her up the stairs, I kept looking behind me. I was certain something was there - something that was watching me on its best behavior because it wanted me to move in. Something frightening that was not in the dark, but was the dark.

She showed me two equally dark bedrooms, and when she opened the door to one small room no bigger than a large walk-in closet, I had to blink. It was filled with light! A charming little pink room that could be my daughter's, if not for the fact that I kept imagining the two of us huddled in this room afraid to leave and venture out into the rest of the house. I thought of me clutching her in the middle of the night, staring at the doorknob, watching it turn. The image was a little too real.

I left the house. Needless to say, I didn't rent it, and the story might have ended there as the amusing tale of an active imagination were it not for a dreary rainy day in November five months later.

THE THING IN THE ROAD

I was taking a friend to work at a bar in small suburb just outside Houston. It was a cloudy, drizzly evening shortly before Thanksgiving. The days were getting shorter, and even though it was not quite six-thirty it was already dark. I had dropped him off and I was driving home with the radio playing, planning for the holiday. I was on a little blacktop road that was barely large enough for two cars to pass. This nondescript road connects Houston to this little suburb, so it is very busy during rush hour. The headlights of workers heading home to the burbs rushed toward me like an endless string of pearls. Almost no one was going in my direction.

Suddenly, from out of nowhere, something stepped in front of my car with outstretched arms. Something huge. Eight or nine feet tall with glowing red eyes. I swerved to miss it. My worst nightmare is to hit a person while I am driving. My mind told me it couldn't be a person, but I ignored it. It must be a person. I cannot miss it... it is too close.

I closed my eyes for the terrible bone-cracking impact, but there was nothing. I waited for the bump of the wheels bouncing over the body... but again nothing. The tires caught the mud and wet grass on the side of the road and the car spun out of control and was heading for a wide oak tree. I prayed for help and managed to regain control of the car in just enough time to miss the tree by the skin of my teeth.

I got back on the road and turned into a convenience store just up the road. I was shaking. Did I really see what I just saw? It had both arms outstretched, the fingers spread wide. What passed for hair were actually five pointed horns standing out on its head in the same way a child draws the sun. Its eyes were glowing red slits. It couldn't be. It had to be a person, and if it were a person, he could be lying in a ditch on the side of the road.

WHERE IT CAME FROM

I got out of the car in the drizzle and starting walking down the road, retracing the way I had come. It was uncomfortably cold and wet, but I had to check. As I walked, I noticed that none of the cars had slowed. No one was avoiding anything in the road. I looked in the ditch past the wet, drooping leaves. Nothing.

I came to the tree I had nearly hit. I could see the tire tracks in the mud, but no body… no nothing. Confused, I stood there for a moment and was about to head back to my car when I saw, directly across the road from where I had nearly hit the thing I saw, was the house I had seen in June!

Whatever it was had come from that house! It somehow knew that I was there. And since I had not moved in, it had tried one last time to take me. It had tried to kill me! The guy who had lived there had dabbled in some form of Satanism and conjured up something he couldn't get rid of and he had left... or worse, he was still there, somewhere within its walls.

The house was still empty that rainy night. No one had moved it. I fear for anyone who does. I never saw it again. I would never go that way. I told a few people this story, but not many. One asked if I would take him there, but I refused. I told him I'd give him directions, but I would never go there.

Story source.

REVIEW: BIRDEMIC 2: THE RESURRECTION

Though I am madly in love with the first Birdemic, I did not even attempt a review for it once it hit video – not for inclusion in Shitty Flicks, nor in any kind of general review capacity. There are some films you simply cannot review. Some films need to be experienced instead. A review saying that Birdemic is legitimately and unironically good does not exist. That’s science. The reviews for the film that do exist call it the biggest piece of shit ever made, or the biggest piece of shit ever made that has caused mountain-sized smiles and non-stop gobs of unintentional delight. I rest proudly in that latter camp. Birdemic makes me feel like I can soar, as if I am being held ever-so-gently by Leonardo DiCaprio on the bow of the Titanic. To attempt a review about Birdemic, which would be heaped in painstaking recreations of my favorite parts, would’ve been simply foolish. When I review films for my Shitty Flicks banner, my goal is to amuse you with carefully chosen verbiage as much as I was amused by the actual films. I want you to be as entertained as I was. With Birdemic, I didn’t even bother. It simply just is. And if you haven’t experienced its madness yet, it’s waiting for you.

Writer/director/master of the romantic thriller^TM James Nguyen was likely not expecting the type of response Birdemic received. The director, who famously covered a van in rubber birds and played bird screech noises through a loud speaker as he drove around Utah theaters when his film was not accepted for submission to the Sundance Film Festival, likely did so not because the festival refused to acknowledge his purposely bad, tongue-in-cheek film, but likely because he thought he’d made something great, and the Sundance committee simply did not know what they were missing.

With this, Birdemic 2: The Resurrection, Nguyen is both somehow just as innocent and wide-eyed as he was, but also in on the joke. His direct sequel to his previous film about a flock of birds (specifically eagles and vultures) destroying Half Moon Bay, California, brings those birds back in all their animated .GIF glory. Nearly every person from the previous film returns, either playing his or her original character, or a brand new one. Even Damien Carter, singer/songwriter who serenaded our main characters’ first date, makes another appearance – on the tiniest stage in the world.

Let’s just get this out of the way right now: Birdemic 2: The Resurrection is every bit as entertaining as the previous film. The awful plot, awful acting, awful bird effects, awful characters – the awfulness is back in a big way. But also along for the ride this time is Nguyen’s willingness to go along with his film’s “so-bad-it’s-good” reputation and attempt to aid the audience into having even MORE unintentional fun. In an interview with Empire Oline, Nguyen said, “For Birdemic 2 I took what people loved in the first one and delivered it again. It's just my way of building the romance. People seem to like it. Like James Bond or any other franchise, you have to give the people what they want.”

If you enjoy bad movies in the same way I do, then you know this wasn’t the best idea. At several points, Nguyen sends up his own film – he recreates the unending clapping scene, or the numerous scenes in which a character approaches a dead body, examines it, and says, “he’s dead.” There’s a scene where the characters stop to grab some Pepsi product sodas from a vending machine, all so he can insert some purposely bad continuity so they are suddenly consuming Coke products. (Although if he managed to receive sponsorship financing from both Pepsi and Coke, then good for him – he might be the first filmmaker in history to pull that off.) There's even a scene involving fucking cavemen – literally.

Despite my misgivings about the tongue-in-cheek approach, Birdemic 2: The Resurrection is fucking fantastic.

You want more scenes of people swinging hangers (and now camera tripods) at flocking birds?

You got it.

You want more scenes of people walking endlessly?

Here you go!

You want more too-long scenes of people dancing?

Get ready.

You wanted full-frontal nudity this time?

Enjoy!

You wanted to see what that wacky beach scientist has been up to since the first film?

You will.

"Here I am!"

Though Nguyen revisits these mainstays from the first film, luckily he gives us plenty of other brand-new mind-boggling additions to enjoy this time around.

Among the best is a scene featuring a swimmer being attacked by a giant jellyfish, who in reality is an actress plopped in front of a green screen and kicking her legs to feign she were treading water in the ocean, all while a very Pixar-ish jellyfish attacks and rubs its tendrils all over her. Said girl is soon rescued and eventually put into the back of an ambulance, which when driving way, is somehow just as Pixar-ish as the jellyfish. (Could you really not hire an ambulance for a fifteen second shot?)

Look for yourself:

Returning cast members Alan Bagh as Rod and Whitney Moore as Nathalie certainly seem to be in the joke this time, especially the latter, who grins and mugs for the camera at every possible opportunity.

Whitney Moore: Adorable.

Birdemic 2: The Resurrection is every bit a worthy successor to Birdemic, though I guess that depends on how you define "worthy" in this regard. If you enjoyed the first film, you'll enjoy this one. And if you enjoyed this one, you'll likely enjoy...Birdemic 3: Sea Eagles.

Think I'm kidding?

Straight from the director's beak:

"The subtitle for Birdemic 3 is going to be Sea Eagles...The script is being developed right now, but I can tell you that it's going to take place in New York. There are islands there, the Statue of Liberty, Time Square - it's the perfect scene for a birdemic."

Get ready for wonderment.

TONE DEAF

GOLDEN

MYSTERIOUS STATUE

A mysterious statue placed quietly at a construction site has employees of a New York Library asking a lot of questions, and appealing to the public for help solving the mystery.

The director of the East Hampton Library, Dennis Fabiszak, told Patch that the strange statue was left on an old fountain in the library’s construction area sometime in the wee hours of last weekend, but they haven’t the slightest clue who it could have been or why. It’s fairly light for a statue, weighing in at about 50 lbs, and seems to be made out of red clay that has been painted over. It’s not a particularly new creation either, as at one point a piece had broken off and birds made a nest in the back. It could also be hollow.

But perhaps the most intriguing part of the odd find is the inscription on the back of the statue, a well worn and barely visible cursive scrawling of the words ”My Wife Forever Della Penna”.

The library staff have reached out to the public via their Facebook page in an effort to see if anyone might have any clues about the disembodied gift, and one of the possible answers is certainly an eerie one.

Local man Steven Rothman pointed out that the name Della Penna matches the victim in a grisly murder that occurred just a few hours away in the 70′s, a murder that to this day has not been solved. 

From wikipedia:

Dolores Della Penna (December 13, 1954 – July 1972) was a 17-year-old Philadelphia schoolgirl who was tortured, gang raped, murdered by dismemberment and beheaded in the Kensington neighborhood in July 1972. Della Penna’s torso and arms were later located in Jackson Township, New Jersey, while her legs were found in neighboring Manchester Township near the border with Jackson. 

The young girl’s head is believed to be located within a wall in “Turtles” former home in Tacony and the house has yet to be searched by law enforcement, and no bikers have yet been arrested in the case.

Official police reports state that Miss Della Penna was killed by drug dealers who believed that her boyfriend had stolen some of their drugs, but as the crime has remained unsolved this version of events will not be verified by law enforcement and is hotly contested.

Please note the fact that the girl’s head is still missing. The library might want to go ahead and have that statue x-rayed before they decide to put it up for display. Maybe it’s a stretch, but bodies encased in statues are nothing new.

Story and images source.

ALERT

PRESIDENTS' DAY

UNKNOWN CHILD

Recently, my town (a city in Northern Kentucky, just across the river from Cincinnati, Ohio) started “ghost tours” during the month of October. Until the late 1950s, my city used to be full of gangsters, mafia, and gamblers, so there were plenty of murders, suicides, and other weird happenings going on to ensure a history full of tragedy.

Last month, my wife, my parents and I went on this particular walk that consisted of walking around a few blocks of the city, looking at old buildings and listening to stories that took place at these locations. My parents grew up on one particular street that was included in the walk, so they were able to verify most of the stories for us. When we got in front of the building my mom grew up in, the woman guiding the tour told us a really creepy story that I’ve been trying to verify for over a month now, but I can’t seem to find any information online about it.  

As the story goes, three or four years ago in the dead of winter (I think it happened on Christmas Eve, but I’m not sure) the police found a young boy around age 10 standing outside the door of the building that used to be my mom’s apartment. A couple of murders have taken place in that building, but that’s another story for another time. Anyway, the young boy that the police found was wearing only a thin pair of shorts and nothing else. No shoes, no shirt, despite there being snow on the ground and temperatures below the freezing mark.

The police tried to ask the boy questions about where he had been, who his parents were, why he was standing there, etc., but the boy either refused to answer or said he couldn’t remember anything.

The police ended up taking him to Cincinnati Children’s Hospital, and posted police bulletins throughout the county in an attempt to locate the boy’s parents and bring him home. Oddly, no one ever showed up to claim him.

After he was taken to Children’s Hospital, he began to exhibit strange and disturbing behavior and was taken to a psychiatrist where he underwent some form of psychological testing. This is where the story gets even weirder, but being as though I’m not a psychiatrist, I don’t know the exact names for terms, etc. On this particular test that he underwent that diagnosed psychoses, he was found to have scored a level of 7. Our guide then told us that Ted Bundy had undergone the same test and scored a level of only 4.

Despite being in the system now for a few years, the child has never been claimed by anyone, and has in fact begun to exhibit stranger and more disturbing behavior as the years go on. In fact, the tour guide told us that the county who has custody of the now teenager is so disturbed by his behavior that they have recommended keeping him in custody until the age of 18, and afterward transferring him to a secure location because they’re so concerned that when he is released he will harm someone.

Granted, this could have been a great spooky story that was merely intended to scare willing patrons, until a member of our group spoke up and told us that he was a psychology student at the University of Cincinnati, and that his class had been discussing this child’s case.

Last but not least, let me add one more detail. The street that we were on is reported by some paranormal societies to be one of the most “evil” streets in America, due to the number and nature of some of the deaths that have occurred there. Does the fact that this child was found in one of the most “evil” locations in the USA have anything to do with his disturbing mindset?

Story source.

REVIEW: MISS PEREGRINE'S HOME FOR PECULIAR CHILDREN: THE GRAPHIC NOVEL

 

Perhaps I'm not the best person to lend his opinion on a graphic novel. I can't say it's a format in which I've invested myself too much over the years. Except for the occasional Batman adventures a chum insisted I read (and despite my devouring of EC comics in my youth, which, before you slap me, I know do not count), I just never paid that much attention to this mode of artistic expression.

Still, I was given the chance to take a look at the graphic novel version of Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children, and being I am so smitten with those damned kids, I jumped at the chance.

I hope you're not thinking that my confession-like intro is a disclaimer I'm using to segue into complaining for the rest of this review, because I surely have no intentions of doing that. It's just that I likely won't be able to properly praise this new version of the story the way it deserves.

Obviously the biggest change is the prose. Gone are huge, massive chunks of text from author Riggs' original narrative. Well, no shit. That's the nature of the graphic novel. It's the text that drives the story, but it's the images that bring it to life. Yes, I do recall recollecting certain passages from the original text when stumbling upon their drawn-upon counterparts in this new version, sadly seeing its demise in this form, but now it's artist Cassandra Jean doing the heavy lifting and transferring all the novel's emotions into these re-realized characters. It's time for the text, however essential, to take a backseat to this new visualization of the story.

And speaking of, sometimes the most obvious choices are the ones that can still surprise you and bring a smile to your face.

The original offbeat and absurd vintage photographs that peppered Riggs' novel are still here and accounted for; each peculiar child has his or her photograph alongside their first emergence in the text. And though I suppose it was inevitable and likely unavoidable, to see the images of these children then realized again and again throughout the story, painstakingly recreated in ink and color as they appeared in their photos, was surprisingly rewarding. Though Riggs did a fine job of fleshing out his inspired creations in the novel, the consistent visual representation of the kids reinforces your image of them as you reinvest in this new version of the story. (The character of Olive, especially - a tiny urchin with a slight frown in her levitating photo - has been recreated with her same stature and her same outfit, but now bearing that full-blown smile her character must often sport in this make-believe landscape. The nature of her bubbly and idealistic personality nearly defies you to picture the lemon-faced grimace shown in her vintage photo.)

Do I miss some of Riggs' original narrative? Sure, I do. Some of the best suspense comes not from the monstrous wights or hollowgasts, but the burgeoning relationship between Jacob and Emma. But it's the art by Cassandra Jean that's made me see these peculiar children in an all new light.

The book ends with a teaser look at the graphic novel version of Hollow City.

I can't wait.

V.D.

HELL GARDEN

Wang Saen Suk, 90 minutes outside of Bangkok on the way to Pattaya, is a garden full of statues depicting what is supposed to be Buddhist hell.

While the garden attracts plenty of families, there are gruesome scenes depicted there. After passing a “Welcome to Hell!” sign, visitors encounter sinners boiled in copper cauldrons, sinners being torn apart by hell’s dogs, and emaciated sinners with protruding ribs. “If you meet the Devil in this life, don’t postpone merit-making which will help you to defeat him in the next life,” a sign in the garden reads. “Donate a little each day and you’ll have a happy life.”

According to the “Traibhumi Phra Ruang,” when a Buddhist dies, he or she goes before four celestial beings who check the dead’s record of good and bad deeds. If your good deeds outweigh the bad, you will go to heaven; if your bad deeds outweigh the good, you will be punished.

Punishment in Buddhist hell varies depending on the sins committed, but every form of punishment is a torture, and many of those are depicted in the garden. Hell has 136 pits, but individuals are able to be reborn from each. Loganta, a special pit reserved for those who have hurt their parents or monks physically, is the only cold pit and those sent there are said to remain until a new Buddha is born.

Story and images source.

HOUSE OF THE PAST

The House of the Past, 1947 

Clarence John Laughlin

FACT

When you wake up around 2-3 A.M. without any reason, there's an 81% chance that someone is staring at you.