R.I.P. Bob Wilkins of ‘Creature Features’

I grew up watching Bob Wilkins every weekend and have many fond memories of spending time with friends sitting around the TV not knowing just what kind of weirdness would show up next. Jett Loe over at thefilmtalk.com has an epitaph for one of the original geeks…

As a little kid growing up in Oakland – somehow managed to stay up late on Saturday nights and watch Bob Wilkins hosting Creature Features. He passed away yesterday and I find myself melancholy at the thought of Bob not being around anymore.

To my 7-year-old-eyes Creature Features was forbidden cinema. Bob himself would often warn you against watching the often terrible films he would screen. The joy that can come from bad cinema, trash art, obviously rubbed off on me – as, often on TFT, I seem to be more exercised by poor films than good ones.

As far as I can see the late night horror movie host format is dead and gone now – and with it the low-production values, (I mean look at that set! though as a kid it was dark, inviting, a window into an unknowable realm), and charm that comes from someone inviting you to watch a movie with them just for fun. These local TV shows often had charm, a low key wit and weren’t burdened by the graceless ambition of modern day programming.

I’m going to stay up late tonight and watch Matango, (aka Attack of the Mushroom People, aka Curse of the Mushroom People, aka Fungus of Terror, aka Matango the Fungus of Terror, aka Matango: Fungus of Terror, a film I remembered scared the ever-loving bejeesus out of me when I saw it on Bob’s show.

(Additional notes: as JHarris says in this thread – the fact that Bob had to hock DVDs of his show to pay for his medical treatment shows that the Health Care system in this country is far scarier than anything we saw in Creature Features.

Also so I don’t leave you on a somber note – please watch the opening credit sequence of Creature Features at the beginning of the clip below – note how practically the only lyrics of the title song are the words ‘Creature’ and ‘Features’ !) Read more

Video Interview – Jackson Rathbone Talks “Dread”

This is a video interview from early December with Jackson Rathbone talking to MTV about his latest project.

Twilight’s Jackson Rathbone is transitioning from the world of Stephenie Meyer’s vampires to starring in the Clive Barker adaptation Dread. And MTV had a chance to chat candidly with the young star about his leading role in Anthony DiBlasi’s film. Click on the video player for more.

In the film three college students set out to study other people’s fears. As the study progresses, one of the students, Quaid, begins to seek salvation from his obsession by exploiting the terrors of his fellow participants. Read more

George Romero’s "…Of The Dead" Movie Trailer

Bloody Disgusting has the first promotional movie trailer for George Romero’s next zombie film “…Of The Dead“. Looks like a pretty low budget effort, but it has to be better than Diary of the Dead, right? Devonshire Productions also released the official plot synopsis for the film:

“On a small island off North America’s coast, the dead rise to menace the living. Yet…the islanders can’t bring themselves to exterminate their loved ones, despite the growing danger from those the once held dear. A rebel among them hunts down all the zombies he can find, only to be banished from the island for assassinating his neighbors and friends. On the mainland, bent on revenge, he encounters a small band of survivors in search of an oasis on which to build a new life. Barely surviving an attack from a mass of ravenous flesh-eaters. They commandeer a zombie-infested ferry and sail to the island.

There, to their horror, they discover that the locals have chained the dead inside their homes, pretending to live ‘normal’ lives…with bloody consequences. What ensues is a desperate struggle for survival and the answer to a question never posed in Romero’s Dead films: Can the living ever live in peace with the dead?”

…Of The Dead was a funny in-production title, but I don’t understand why they don’t just call it “Island of the Dead”, which seems a better fit considering the story. Watch the trailer linked below. Read more

George Romero Presents: Deadtime Stories 2 is Now Filming

Even though there is no definite word about distribution for George A. Romero Presents Deadtime Stories a sequel is, at the time of this writing, in principal photography.

Pennsylvania native Jeff Monahan is back to produce, co-write and co-direct the next anthology horror feature film under his 72nd Street Films production banner. Also returning, director Matt Walsh of 555 Films. George Romero and Christine Forrest reprise their duties as executive producers with the former serving as the film’s “storyteller.”

Once again, Deadtime Stories 2 will feature three tales of terror by three directors. According to The Valley Independent, a Pittsburgh paper, Monahan was in Monongahela, Pennsylvania this week shooting a scene for one tale involving a werewolf flipping a car over with a young couple inside. No other plot details were revealed other than one chapter takes place in Connellsville where more people have disappeared from than any small town in the world.

Walsh tells the paper George A. Romero Presents Deadtime Stories is due on DVD in April, but he doesn’t say who acquired the film which made the rounds last month at the American Film Market. The sequel can be expected in November. Deadtime Stories 3 is said to start rolling next summer! These guys are on a roll.

More info on part two as it comes in. For now… Read more

Paramount Announces ‘Tales From The Darkside’ DVD Release

Source:Paramount Home Entertainment
November 17, 2008

“Man lives in the sunlit world of what he believes to be reality. But, there is, unseen by most, an underworld, a place that is just as real, but not as brightly lit…a dark side.”

Paramount Home Entertainment will finally give Tales from the Darkside a home on DVD. The complete first season is arriving on February 10th!

This 30-minute horror anthology series followed in the vein of Creepshow with George Romero on board to executive produce for Laurel Entertainment. The show ran from ’84 to ’88 delving into original stories and adapting works from writers like Stephen King and Clive Barker. A feature anthology film, Tales from the Darkside: The Movie, opened in theaters in 1990.

We’ll bring you a look at Paramount’s DVD art as soon as it is made available.

Source: ShockTillYouDrop.com

The Horror Stories Of Robert E. Howard – Shipping 11/05/08

I have an old paperback copy of Robert E. Howard’s Cthulhu Mythos stories and I’ve pretty much just about worn it out. It is my favorite horror collection (Stephen King does come a close second) and I will pull it out a couple of times a year and immerse myself in its shear gut-wrenching terror.

Shipping this Wednesday, November 5th, 2008 is Howard’s horror stories published by Del Rey. I can’t wait for this one. I’ve read some really creepy horror stories by the likes of Stephen King, Graham Masterton, Robert McCammon, and others, but Robert E. Howard gives you a non-stop, look over your shoulder, creepy, gut-wrenching ride that I’ve yet to see repeated.

Here are Howard’s greatest horror tales, all in their original, definitive versions. Some of Howard’s best-known characters–Solomon Kane, Bran Mak Morn, and sailor Steve Costigan among them–roam the forbidding locales of the author’s fevered imagination, from the swamps and bayous of the Deep South to the fiend-haunted woods outside Paris to remote jungles in Africa.
The collection includes Howard’s masterpiece “Pigeons from Hell,” which Stephen King calls “one of the finest horror stories of [the twentieth] century,” a tale of two travelers who stumble upon the ruins of a Southern plantation–and into the maw of its fatal secret. In “Black Canaan” even the best warrior has little chance of taking down the evil voodoo man with unholy powers–and none at all against his wily mistress, the diabolical High Priestess of Damballah. In these and other lavishly illustrated classics, such as the revenge nightmare “Worms of the Earth” and “The Cairn on the Headland,” Howard spins tales of unrelenting terror, the legacy of one of the world’s great masters of the macabre.

560 Pages
Softcover Read more

New Comic Book Series – Vincent Price Presents

The legacy of legendary horror film actor Vincent Price will soon stalk the comic aisle.

Bluewater Productions, Inc., has entered into an agreement with the estate of film icon Vincent Price to produce a new monthly comic book series titled, “Vincent Price Presents.” The series will feature the iconic Price in a myriad of roles including host, muse, background player, and protagonist.

The on-going series will showcase classic gothic horror elements, but will also include themes from Price’s past work in the mystery and suspense genres.

Source

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