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Reviews & Commentary by Adam Groves
DONKEY SKIN
A fairy tale adaptation from 1970 that despite a creepy incest angle emerges as a justified classic
COLOR OF NIGHT
I wish I could report that COLOR OF NIGHT, the final film directed by filmmaker extraordinaire Richard Rush, was a superior example of the erotic thriller format, but I’m afraid that’s not the cas
PRINCE OF DARKNESS
Some commentators would have you believe this film is one of John Carpenter’s biggest failures, while others maintain that it’s a masterwork—I say both views are wrong
GODZILLA MINUS ONE
It was inevitable that Japan’s Toho Studios, after decades of aggressively rebranding Godzilla for the international market, would finally get it right.
DISNEY’S A CHRISTMAS CAROL
Director Robert Zemeckis’ ambitious but deadening take on Chsrles Dickens’ clsssic
BEAUTIFUL DARKNESS
The vision on display in this graphic novel is a dark and unsettling one marked by blood, slime and decay
AFFAIRS OF A CARDIOVASCULAR NATURE
A collection about which the cliché “expect the unexpected” fits quite well
HEAD-TO-TOE PORTRAIT OF SUZANNE
An unspeakably demented concoction that could only have been dreamed up by France’s late Roland Topor
ON THE VERGE
A macabre anthology from France’s Maurice Sandoz that pivots on madness
MAGIC MIRROR
A worthy, if frustratingly little known, addition to the underground comics scene
A WRITER’S TALE
It’s a shame this book is currently so difficult to get a hold of, as it’s truly one of the finest-ever books about writing and publishing
WITCHCRAFT THROUGH THE AGES
This heavily illustrated volume is the first-ever English language book devoted to the making and reception of Benjamin Christensen’s 1922 classic HAXAN
WHO’S WHO IN HORROR AND FANTASY FICTION
This mini-encyclopedia is fairly obscure, but remains one of my favorite genre resources
WES CRAVEN’S LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT: THE MAKING OF A CULT CLASSIC
A solid, readable account of the making and reception of the original LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT as told to author David Szulkin
WAR EAGLES: THE UNMAKING OF AN EPIC
The “Greatest movie never made?” Not quite, but the 1939 production WAR EAGLES is an intriguing piece of film history
On EINSTEIN ON THE BEACH
There’s nothing else quite like EINSTEIN ON THE BEACH
A Tale of Two Terminators
Here I’ll focus on the sole element relating to THE TERMINATOR that hasn’t already been picked over and/or argued about to death: the two novelizations it inspired
What’s in My Halloween Bag…
What follows is a more-or-less random selection of Halloween-themed ephemera
Robert Forster: 1941-2019
2019 is shaping up as, among other things, a year in which quite a few vital character actors breathed their last breath
1988: The Year in Bedlam
I really hate to keep repeating myself in my year-end summations, but I just have to say it: 1988 was an abysmal year for movies