Enter the Chamber

Hello all! Just popping into let you know the movie I worked on during the pandemic is now out on Tubi. Click the pic to check it out!

I'm super proud of Mikey and everyone who put their time and effort into this little project. My beloved car (my version of Raimi's “Classic” Olds) even makes an appearance. This was shot over three years ago and it's still kicking, just clocked over 300,000k in fact. It is proving to be as resilient as ol' Nash Carruthers himself. Anyhoo, for those in the Great White North, have a great Thanksgiving.

13 for 2024!

Hello all. Hope your hangovers have subsided. Rather than do a 2024 Preview, I'm attempting something new for this year. Shit, maybe I've done this before and forgotten, I'm too lazy to look.

I'm going to list 13 movies that I plan to see this year, and then 12 months from now, I'll check back in and see where I'm at and perhaps offer a few thoughts. Hell, play along if you like.

The first three titles are highly anticipated titles from well regarded soldiers of the genre.

Pearl was my fave film of 2022 so Maxxxine has been at the top of my wish list ever since the teaser played at Midnight Madness to an MCU level ovation. Robert David Mitchell held off for a decade to hit us with a sequel we likely didn't need, but always (at least me) hoped would come. With Maika Monroe (and hopefully Disasterpiece) in tow, there's no reason to think They Follow won't be worth the wait. Robert Eggers is a titan when it comes to dark period pieces and Nosferatu is smack bang in the center of his wheelhouse.

The next three are films I missed when they were touring the festival circuit, but am eagerly awaiting their release on streaming or Blu-ray.

Ir should be no surprise to anyone that I am chomping at the bit to see Robert Morgan's debut feature, Stopmotion. Much like his short Invocation, I believe this also mixes stop-motion and live action. Sign me up. I'm also chuffed to see Late Night With the Devil. I'm definitely getting Ghostwatch vibes from this latest effort from the Cairnes Brothers. Lastly, The Man in the White Van just sounds like a cool, ripped-from-the-headlines horror movie. I have no idea of its status, the Web seems to suggest it came out around Halloween, but I have no record of its playing anywhere, except for a handful of canned reviews.

The next three I reserved for old eighties movies that, for whatever reason, I have just never got around to watching.

The Dead Pit is one I remember because of the flashing green eyes on its coverbox. I've been trying to watch it with my buddy Schwartz, but rug paternal duties and a pandemic have been putting it off for the better part of a decade. I believe the time has now come to cross it off the list. Xtro was just another Alien knock-off I passed over, but recently I saw in one of those In Search of Darkness docs on Shudder, just how many bonkers effects there were so now I'm onboard. Flowers In The Attic is one I constantly hear about how fucked up it is - or at least when they saw it way too young - and I'm all about that. Plus, Kristy Swanson.

The next three are just ones I've put on my list in the last couple of years.

During one of my friend's 24 hour Horror Marathons on Twitch, I saw a weird faux-doc called The Nobodies that was oddly engaging despite its micro budget. It was some time later that another pal told me that Jay Burleson had since made not one, but two equally genre-bending slashers called The Third Saturday in October Part 5 & 1 (yes, in that order). That's just too good to pass up.  Then, there is Dawn of the Mummy, which I saw during Nathan Boone's Trailer Trash events. It looks like weird Lenzi/de Ossorio hybrid madness from Egyptian filmmaker Frank Agrama.

Then, last but certainly not least;

My good friend Chris Nash has been slaving away in the forests of Northern Ontario for the last few years in order to bring you In A Violent Nature. I am thrilled that it will be unleashed at Sundance this month and I can't wait to get my eyeballs on it.

So, that's the 2024 Thirteen. Let's re-adjourn in December and discuss. 

2023 Wrap-up.

Greeting kiddies. We made it through another one. The Big C is finally on the run, or at least ignored for the time being while we deal with more pressing atrocities. Me, I've been trudging along, making regular visits to the Revue Cinema to soak in my gal pal Serena's terrific programming.

The trivia business is booming. At one point, Pat & I were doing it three times monthly at two different venues. We've now amassed a pretty decent roster of regulars as well as constant walk-ins. In the New Year, we're going to strive to make streaming the event a more common thing so those of you outside the Big Smoke can partake. On the Rue Morgue side of things, I have taken over the Short Cuts column from the exiting Bryan Christopher. With me already watching a thousand short films a year for various film festivals, it made sense for me to slide in there. My first go at it is in the Jan/Feb 2024 issue hitting stands (or your mailbox/inbox) imminently. I have another couple of things I'm cooking up for 2024, but maybe I'll leave them unsaid for now...

As for absorbed media, I think it was more quality over quantity this year. Don't get me wrong, there are many things I enjoyed in 2023, but I'm just going to leave you with the Top 5, because I'm lazy. See you in 2024!

A masterpiece, the gold standard of adaptation.

The rawest realization of waking from a nightmare I've ever seen.

This guys get what makes ED great & what it needs to be going forward.

Nostalgic, yet topical. And so, so intense.

Flanagan's Netflix swan song is up there with his best.

Happy October!

Good morning kiddies! I just wanted to pop in and say hello! I know this place of late has just seemed like a dumping ground for my trivia events, but holy hell has it been a busy time for me the last several months.

It seems really surreal to me that I had time to post about a movie almost every day in October last year. Now, between all the trivia events, film festival obligations and movie screenings, I barely even have enough time to shit. Good problem to have of course, but you know... I always feel a certain pull toward keeping THS alive.

I do intend to pick up VHS Fridays & The Movie Guide posts again, but just waiting for a lull, which I hope will arrive once the snow falls. Anyway, enjoy your spooky season! 

In My Element.

Photo courtesy Nathan Boone

I'm Baaack...

Well that was a sizable hiatus. Longer than I was expecting, but just what I needed. So, I must ask...

I'd been mulling over returning this October and even though I've got a shit-ton of things on the go, I decided to say fuck it and do it anyway. My plan is to use the next few days to catch you up on what I did this summer and then dive into a series I have dubbed “Alphabet Slop”. Essentially talk about a movie a day whilst making my way from A to Z. That's the goal anyway...

See you tomorrow!

Glad + Sad.

A banner weekend is upon me. Not only is The Quarry out, but it's also my niece's 25th birthday as well as the Spooky Flea Market, TSFF, the Sigur Ros show and my gal Valentina is fighting.

However, heard about Julee Cruise and that's a big bummer.

Rest in peace Ms. Cruise, hope you find the White Lodge.

The Doctor Is In.

Happy Halloween everyone! Here's my costume for this year.

Well, technically it was supposed to be last year's, for Nightbreed's 30th anniversary, but you know, the big H was cancelled last year. Hope you all have a fantastic night!

I'm Back... Sort of.

Hey all! It''s been a minute. Things got a bit hectic last month when I was hit with an unexpected eviction, but the dust has now settled and I've fortunately landed on my feet. Big B and I have successfully relocated and I'm about ninety-five per cent settled at the time of this writing.

I do have some upcoming archive posts planned, but beyond that the future of THS remains uncertain as the drive to wax nostalgic about old VHS movies just isn't what it was. TBH the same can be said about pretty much anything. You add February blues to Lockdown blues and the result ain't too peachy. If not for Zoom and YouTube, who knows where I'd be right now.

Anyhoo, enough with the doom & gloom. Stay safe, kiddies.

I Float Too!

My buddy Phil & I mucked around with VR Rec Room last night. After getting our asses handed to us at Paintball and Laser Tag, we checked out some other stuff. Here's me outside the It Mirror Maze attraction.

The Quest is definitely one of the best purchases I've made in quite some time.

Gifrific: ...Just uninspired

Reservoirdogs Tarantino GIF from Reservoirdogs GIFs

Go West Part II

Well, I'm off to Saskatoon for SFFF. Stay out of trouble while I'm gone.

The Doctor Is In!

Danny (Tony) says go see Doctor Sleep this weekend. It rules.

HNY 2019!

Happy New Year folks! No preview post, but just stopping in to say you can expect the same kind of frequency this year with the usual emphasis on short films and old VHS titles.

I am also expecting to do a lot of archiving this year, mainly old commercials and newscasts from circa 1986-1995. I have a couple of totes worth of that stuff that I'll be digitizing over the next few months. Some of it might make it on here, or maybe I'll just throw it over to Retrontario and see if  they want it.

I have aspirations of making my next short film this year, but early days yet. It will be something fairly simple and manageable so that even I won't be able to fuck it up. 

Anyhoo, as you were!

CUFF '18

Wow, what a fantastic trip that was! I was only gone three nights, but boy did I fill it up with some bangin' stuff, including sampling some Alberta beef, a side road trip to Banff with an old friend and the usual festival schmoozing.

The festival really took care of me, putting me up in a fancy hotel and filling my pockets with cinema food & drink tickets. The Globe Cinema is a great little movie house with a pair of sizable theatres one on top of each other. CUFF turned fifteen this year and you can tell there are lot of regulars and sponsors eager to be involved with the fest.

My screening went really well - anytime no one boos is a win - and there were a surprising number of questions during the Q&A. I never thought I would have to explain the difference between Canadians & Americans, always just assumed it was common knowledge, but there you go. 

CUFF programmer Brennan Tilley & I at Saturday's Q&A.

Both shorts programmes were really strong, but I'll elaborate on them in a later post. In addition to the special events at the fest like the Saturday Morning Cereal Party - that involved me chasing after Toucan Sam all morning - and the most recent iteration of the Found Footage Tour, I also took in some cool flicks including the half crime movie, half crime doc American Animals and a rewatch of Coralie Fargeat's Revenge. I recommend both. And Tigers Are Not Afraid. That movie is still aces.

The dark princes of VHS Nick Prueher & Joe Pickett. 

And there's also this random Teletubbies penis sculpture in town for some reason.

So yeah, I had a blast. I am so thankful to CUFF for inviting me and being such gracious hosts. You guys rock!

To The West!

I'm headed out west this weekend for the Calgary Underground Film Festival. 

I'll be representing my latest project The Good Samaritan which plays today as part of the A Turn For The Worse shorts programme. More to come!

Go West!

I have some great news. My latest short The Good Samaritan will be playing the 15th edition of the Calgary Underground Film Festival next month.

I was lucky enough to have The Monitor play there in 2015, but this time I'm going to fly out there to be part of the festivities. I'll get to partake in another one of Kier-La Janisse's Saturday Morning Cartoon Cereal parties, as well as some other great programming, including a probable re-watch of one of my 2017 faves Tigers Are Not Afraid.

I'll also get to sample Alberta beef right from the source! Excited!!!

DKTM 360

It's incredible to think that since January 2009 I have done three-hundred-and-sixty of these news post things. In the interest of symmetry, I think it's time to close the loop on them. While part of the regimen was about archiving cool stuff that was going on, as an actual news delivery device it's largely redundant as there are a million other places you can get your news.

The shutting down of DKTM is the first step in a Horror Section overhaul that I'll elaborate more on in 2018. Rest assured I'm not going anywhere, but the coming year is going to be a busy one, so I mean to take steps to streamline things around here.

Have a great NYE and I'll see you back here later in the week.

Black Tuesday.

Tonight's the night! My compadre Tal & I will be participating in the latest Black Museum debate, arguing that Sally Hardesty is the Greatest Final Girl.

It should be a bloody affair and when the dust settles I will attempt to give you a blow-by-blow as impartially as possible -- no promises.

Wish me luck and I'll see you back here at the end of the week.

10 Years!

Can you believe it? This humble blog I started as a VHS coverbox archive has been chugging along for a decade now. I've recorded hundreds of covers from the home video era, along with documenting everything that has come along in horror since 2007. It's been pretty wild.

I've made a lot of friends and contacts since then that have allowed me to start making my own films as well as program shorts for three festivals. In celebration of The Horror Section's tenth anniversary I wanted to look back at my most visited posts over the years. Let's dive right in, shall we?

Coincidentally, number ten – with over 1400 looks - was an anniversary post itself. Posted three years ago today, it was another reflective list of seven significant accomplishments I'd made since I'd started THS that included finally archiving my mass collection of horror junk, being accredited for film festivals and keeping a regimented routine of writing at least two-hundred posts a year. 2014 was a really good year for me.

You are going to notice that a lot of my top ten posts are reviews of world premiere screenings, mostly from TIFF's Midnight Madness or Montreal's Fantasia. Number nine was for Mike Flanagan's 2013 film, Oculus.

I really love this film because it focuses on the things that make great horror – simplicity, atmosphere and supporting performances. Flanagan has since gone on to further cement himself as one of the genre's top filmmakers. I mean, Gerald's Game! You need mad skills to put that off.

At almost 1600 views, number eight was my review of V/H/S, the 2012 anthology. Toronto After Dark put on a special screening of that in the summer and man, was The Bloor packed that night. Even though the reception of V/H/S was lukewarm, there was some major anticipation for the film. I know I was pumped. I think I prefer Part 2 overall – mainly because of Timo's Safe Haven – but it was great experience, no less.

Number Seven on the list goes to a review of one of my favourite documentaries of recent years, Jake West's Video Nasties: Moral Panic, Censorship and Videotape.

As I commented in my post, the sheer amount of content in this set was ridiculous. In addition to the doc, you had separate features including trailers for every single title on the UK's infamous list. That's seventy-two trailers! I believe this set was initially an import, so for a time it may have been somewhat rare on this side of the pond – hence the almost 1700 views.

The sixth highest hits was for one of my first posts, coming only three days after THS's inception. It was a list of Ten Great Modern Horror Films that included the likes of The Descent, Session 9 and The Devil's Backbone. I had previously written about these movies on different review sites (now long gone) but at the onset, I wanted to pull together a best-of-the-best into one definitive list.

Number Five is a bit inexplicable, but the first of three Fantasia posts was for Patrick Laugier's follow-up to Martyrs, The Tall Man in 2012.

This film gets a lot of disinterest or disdain, mainly for not being Martyrs 2, but I remember Jessica Biel's performance really knocked my socks off. It was a good precursor to the great work she did more recently in The Sinner.

Coming in at over 2000 views at number four, is my post for Fantasia's world premiere in 2014 of Leo Gabriadze's film Cybernatural. This film was really wild, in that it didn't seem to care that it was infringing on so many copyrights it made my head spin. Google, YouTube and Facebook were all utilized in this micro-budget flick about a vengeful spirit killing teenagers off via Skype.

It was later released in an altered form as the re-branded Unfriended, which judging from the people who saw both was highly inferior. I imagine the high amount of my hits were due to the fact I would've been one of only a few hundred people that would've seen this first cut. I'll never forget that bat-shit scene where a girl is murdered within her Facebook feed, her animated sprite banging around inside her own desktop.

At number three, with over 2500 hits, is my most viewed Midnight Madness review for 2010's Insidious.

It's a franchise now, but seven years ago, the horror community was buzzing over this creeper from James Wan & Leigh Whannell. They had taken the festival circuit by storm six years earlier with Saw and everybody was curious to see whether they could repeat. I actually re-watched Insidious from my Ithaca hotel room last month and I was glad to see that it holds up. I believe the ending was changed from the premiere, but a lot of what these guys executed in this film have become Blumhouse touchstones.

Runner up, is my most viewed review was that of Steven R. Monroe's 2010 remake of I Spit On Your Grave.

An unpleasant film to be sure, but as a remake it's mostly successful because it fixed the problem I always had with the original. The focus of the 1978 movie was the rape, and not the revenge whereas Monroe took a more balanced approach. It made sitting through the nasty stuff a bit more palatable when subsequently the bad guys get it back just as good.

I Spit's reputation continues to live on (with two sequels to boot) so I guess it is not surprising almost 3000 people have looked in over the years.

Numero uno on the list with triple the hits of the closest competitor is my piece on James Herbert's Rat Trilogy that kicked off Rat Week.

I guess it makes sense, as I'm always prattling on about James Herbert. He has never been as popular over here as he should have been and I suppose people searching for info would naturally hit on my blog entries. My first Herbert post connected me with esteemed blogger Mermaid Heather and we've continued to keep in touch over the years as we creep by milestone after milestone.

I definitely plan on writing more about rodent-based horror in the future, but one thing at a time. For now, I'll just keep on keepin' on. Stay safe, kiddies.