Graphic Novel • Lists • Fails • 70’s Cinema • K-Horror • Arthouse • Canadian Horror • Film Noir • Grindhouse • NC-17 • J-Horror • Exploitation • Sci-Fi • Pulp • Evangelical Horror • Favorites • Cult • Fantastique • Surreal • Animation • So-Bad-It’s-Good
Reviews & Commentary by Adam Groves
TREMORS
One of the stand-out horror fests of the nineties
MS. 45
Quite simply, one of the greatest films to emerge from the Grindhouse era.
CAPTAIN KRONOS: VAMPIRE HUNTER
A change of pace for the UK’s Hammer Films that still feels quite archaic
THE COLLECTOR
Two recently deceased talents, Terence Stamp and Samatha Eggar, has their breakthrough roles in this film
ORGY OF THE DEAD (Film)
From Ed Wood, a charmingly archaic sexploitation outrage that was apparently conceived as a loose sequel to PLAN 9 FROM OUTER SPACE
THE TAKE
The rarest novel by Australia’s Kenneth Cook, credited here as “John Duffy”
SAX ROHMER’S DOPE
Yet another vital release from IDW that despite some enthusiastic notices did a fast fade
THE MAN FROM THE GREAT NORTH
A beautifully designed English rendering of a graphic novel that’s considered a classic in its original Italian language form
UGLY MUG No. 8
The latest entry in House of Harley’s “Industrial Strength Comics Compendium” that, in the words of underground comics legend Ed Pinsent, is “laced with heavy doses of insanity, wonder, and escapades inside the dream house”
COMBAT SHOCK (Novelization)
A unique entry in Severin’s grindhouse novelization line: a 40-years-after-the-fact novelization of Buddy Giovinazzo’s notorious 1984 no-budgeter COMBAT SHOCK, written by the filmmaker himself
LITTLE GIRL LOST
In the category of memoirs written by fourteen year olds LITTLE GIRL LOST is about average
LEARN TO LOSE YOUR MIND
A parody of the self-help manuals that asserts “It’s smart to be psychotic”
MONSTER MIDWAY
A nonfiction anthology that explores all aspects of early Twentieth Century carnival lore, as observed by the late William Lindsay Gresham
HOLLYWOOD GOTHIC: THE TANGLED WEB OF DRACULA FROM NOVEL TO STAGE TO SCREEN
An ambitious undertaking: an examination of Bram Stoker’s immortal DRACULA and its bumpy road to pop culture immortality
MASTER OF HORROR: THE OFFICIAL BIOGRAPHY OF MICK GARRIS
This long-in-coming biography is as thorough a portrait of Mick Garris as anyone could desire
William Friedkin’s Films, Ranked
On August 7, 2023, film director extraordinaire William Friedkin, a.k.a. Hurricane Billy, passed away. Here’s my ranking of his 20 features.
Barbie, Movie Star?
On the Barbie headlined films SUPERSTAR: THE KAREN CARPENTER STORY, BARBIE (1977), COOL KIDS HIGH and DOLLA MORTE.
FLICKER vs. ANCIENT IMAGES
I’ve always believed that in the category of movie-themed fiction horror is the ideal genre, as proven by FLICKER by Theodore Roszak and ANCIENT IMAGES by Ramsey Campbell
Cult Fiction 3: XXX Fiction
Here I’ll be turning my gaze to the most widely derided format of them all: smut, or XXX, books
Cult Fiction 2: Movie Novelizations
Movie Novelizations: the good, the bad and the hard to find!