Categories
Creepy Critters Female Horror Life and Horror Mini Posts Podcast Scares

Mini Post 1: The Cryptid Keeper Podcast

Let me start by saying The Cryptid Keeper WILL GET A FULL POST SOON. I am not using them as my first mini-post because they don’t deserve a full post, but mainly because I love them so much and have so many things to say that I’m fairly certain I could write a novel length post with all the reasons you should listen to them.

So, to ensure you all know how wonderful they are I’m giving you a quick post to make sure I get it out there.

The Cryptid Keeper Podcast is a show about, you guessed it, cryptids. What’s a cryptid, you may ask. Well according to the Oxford English Dictionary a cryptid is “an animal whose existence or survival to the present day is disputed or unsubstantiated; any animal of interest to a cryptozoologist.” Basically creatures like Bigfoot, Nessie, Skinwalkers, Werewolves, etc. Each week listeners are introduced to a new friend by hosts Addison Peacock (who also is a voice actor on The NoSleep Podcast) and Alex Flanigan. The podcast is both extremely entertaining and funny, while also bringing new information about cultural lore and legends.

If you, too, are as in love with Bigfoot as I am and you aren’t listening to this show you are missing out. Addison and Alex have created a community for all of us out here trying to live our lives and love our cryptids, and I’m so much better off with both this show and the community that I’m not a part of.

Listen to The Cryptid Keeper wherever you listen to your podcasts!

The Cryptid Keeper Twitter

Alex Flanigan Twitter

Addison Peacock Twitter

The Cryptid Keeper Etsy

The Cryptid Keeper Patreon

Categories
B Calm Female Horror Netflix Original

Lights, Cam, Action

Isa Mazzei’s debut film hit Netflix in November of 2018. Cam is full of sex positivity, female empowerment, and terrifying online doppelgangers that take over your identity and ruin your career. The protagonist of the film Alice, played by the extremely talented Madeline Brewer who some of you might recognize as Mercy from Orange is the New Black, is a strong and ambitious cam girl who is desperately trying to work her way to the very top.

Camming, for those of you who might not be familiar with the term, is a type of live sex show put on by both women and men. Typically, the performances are solo, but there are often collaborations between two or more performers as well. As the viewer watches her story unfold it is easy to forget that Alice is not an average woman with a run-of-the-mill job who has the drive and desire to be top of her field. While a movie about a cam girl may make many horror fans take pause, Mazzei herself worked as a cam girl for many years and was ready to craft a narrative that shines a positive light on the profession.

In an interview on the podcast Switchblade Sister’s Mazzei delves into details about the autonomy Brewer was given over her own body during filming. While it’s inevitable to have nudity in a movie about sex workers, it becomes clear very quickly that this is not a movie made for straight men to sit on their couch with a bottle of beer and ogle the actresses while ignoring the larger plot. Brewer was in complete control of when she was and was not naked on set, and her comfort is evident in her performance.

Horror fans are no strangers to the allegations of misogyny and sexism within the genre, and there is of course truth to that stereotype. However, the same can be said about comedies and dramas and science fiction. Cam is a shining example of how horror can be utilized to completely flip stereotypes on their head and use them to the advantage of, in this case, women. Alice is a complex and three-dimensional character, with a family she is scared of disappointing and a career goal that so far seems completely unattainable.

Meagan Navarro discusses the ways in which horror fans, particularly female horror fans, are looked down upon by much of society because of the stereotype that horror is inherently sexist in her article for Bloody Disgusting “In Defense of the Modern Slasher Film and Female Horror Fans”. Cam, while not a slasher film, takes the power and gives it all to a female protagonist much like the “final girl” in the slasher genre. The concept of the final girl has gotten a bad reputation, Navarro points out, even though in films like Halloween, Texas Chainsaw Massacre, and the more modern Happy Death Day our hero is the female protagonist who triumphs in the end.

Cam is not here to give viewers a cautionary tale about premarital sex like many early horror films delivered, but rather quite the opposite. Alice and the other women in the film are sexually liberated and in complete control of their performances. The major condemnation is of the men that come to these sites and leave thinking they have some sort of ownership over the performers simply because they, at one point, have paid them for a service. With these nuances Mazzei adds to horror, Alice is fast on her way to joining the ranks of such horror icons as Lauri Strode, Sally Hardesty, and Nancy Thompson as an icon of the horror genre.

You may be asking yourself: “Okay, but where’s the scary?” The horror of Cam comes from the look-a-like Alice awakens to find taking over her channel one day. She is perplexed by why and how her exact duplicate has taken over, and is now far surpassing her in, everything that she has spent her time working so hard to achieve. Alice is tormented trying to get to the bottom of what sinister entity is lurking within the cam site where she has built her career, and the film works its way to a shocking and frenzied ending.

For fans of horror and female empowerment, Cam is worth the devotion of 1hr and 34mins of your life. And if you’re anything like this horror fan, you will go back for a second, third, and maybe fourth viewing.

Cam Trailer 

Cam IMDB

Cam Wiki

Madeline Brewer IMDB

Isa Mazzei IMDB

My Article in This Wonderful World Magazine 

 

 

Categories
Blood-n-Guts Box Office Bangs Comedic Scares

They’re Us *SPOILERS*

UsSo…

I needed some time to sit and process Us before I could fully articulate what I think. This is a movie that can’t really be talked about without spoilers, so I’m giving you one more chance to bail before anything is ruined.

3…

2…

1…

Okay, I’m assuming if you’re still reading that means that you have either already seen the movie or you’re a masochist who doesn’t mind spoilers.

Let me start off by saying I really, truly enjoyed Us. It was scary and different and the cast was absolutely incredible. Jordan Peele is a genius at merging horror and comedy in a way that I haven’t seen before. Even in the most intense scenes a well-placed and well-timed joke can release some tension, and give the audience a well deserved break before things get even more tense.

So what exactly is this clone/doppelganger horror flick really about?

The trailer did an incredible job of giving just enough without showing all the best scenes, which is a problem that plagues many horror films. There’s either too much, or it makes the movie look like something completely different than what it actually is.

The follows the Wilson family as they go to they head to their beach house for the summer. The family consists of mom Addy (Lupito Nyong’o), dad Gabe (Winston Duke), daughter Zora (Shahadi Wright Joseph), and son Jason (Evan Alex). The Wilson’s aren’t there for more than 12 hours before their exact doubles show up, and attempt to kill them.

The opening of the movie takes place in 1986, and we see a young family at a carnival on the Santa Cruz pier. Tension between the mother and father is clear, and the young girl with them seems extremely aware that things are unhappy between her parents. When her mother leaves to go to the bathroom and her father plays Whack-a-Mole the little girl wanders off and finds herself in a fun house. On the way, she passes a man holding a sign that says “Jeremiah 11:11”.  Inside the fun house the girl gets turned around because of all the mirrors, and the scene ends with her bumping into what at first appears to be another mirror with her reflection only for her to turn around and the “reflection” to keep it’s back turned.

The audience is the thrown back into the present, and we join the Wilson family. When Gabe announces they are going to meet their friends at the Santa Cruz beach, Addy becomes visibly anxious. They bicker back and forth about whether or not the family will go to the beach, but eventually Addy gives in when Gabe agrees that they will be home by dark. This is the first moment it becomes clear that Addy was the young girl from the opening scene.

On their way to the beach they pass an ambulance loading a dead body into the back. The body has bleeding wounds, and carved into his forehead is “11:11” indicating that he is the man Addy saw when she was young. This is the first tip off (in modern day at least) that something is very, very wrong in Santa Cruz. Later at the beach, Jason goes to the bathroom by himself and sees a man standing with his back to him, with his arms out stretched, face to the sky, and blood dripping off his hands. Addy is in hysterics, and chastises her son for leaving without telling her where he is going, and the Wilson’s head home.

Once they’re home, Addy recounts her childhood experience to her husband. The flash back cuts off right as she and her doppleganger come face to face and adult Addy says “I ran as fast as I could.” And here in lies my first qualm with the story telling.

Let’s all be very honest for a moment: Jordan Peele, while an incredible horror writer and director, is still very new to horror. He has mastered so many specifics of the genre, and I’m so impressed by his work. That being said, Us is only his second horror film and with the genre comes  so many nuances that I don’t think any first time horror director is able to perfectly master all of them. Peele tries to leave us a few bread crumbs to indicate that (and here is the first SPOILER) Addy is, in fact, the doppleganger we saw earlier who took her under ground and switched places with her. Where the flash back is cut off, the fact that we find out Addy did not speak once her parents found her, and her mother telling the child psychologist “I just want my daughter back.” were all supposed to be crumbs…in my opinion, however, they were more like neon arrows pointing to the switch that was made.

Of course! This is just my feelings towards it, and it may be different for other viewers. I will say that I feel as though Get Out was much more subtle in leading us towards the deeper sinister goings on.

So, we finally meet the other family. Let me skip right to the point: the Other Addy tells a story of “the girl and her shadow”, which is the only time I thought maybe I was wrong about Addy being replaced with the doppleganger. Later, once Addy has made it down to the facility where the dopplegangers were being kept the Other Addy explains that the were created to be “tethered” to the people above, and she thinks it was in order to control the people above. But jokes on them, because the the Tethered wound up being controlled by the people above. There are scenes that show what happens above and how the Tethered are controlled by the above ground people that are absolutely stunning. Tethered Addy, once she is above ground, is put into dance by her parents to encourage her to express herself. Peele choreographs a scene that cuts in scenes of Tethered Addy dancing on a stage above, and the fight between Tethered and Other Addy that is one of the most stunningly choreographed scenes I have ever seen on camera, and Black Swan is one of my favorite horror movies.

I have a lot of back and forth on this movie: on one hand, it is a stunning example of horror married with comedy, and it’s some of the most beautiful film making I have ever seen, but on the other hand there is a lot of rabbit trailing and some loose ends I would have loved to see better tied up.

BUT…

All that to say, I enjoyed it SO much. I was scared, I was moved, I was challenged to think about deeper issues…and that is everything a horror movie should do for you. Also, Lupita Nyong’o gave one of the most incredible performances that I have ever seen. I have been thinking about it ever since, and honestly I want to watch it a million more times specifically for her performance. The fact that she is portrayed both our “protagonist” and our “antagonist” (though both Addys could be pro- and antagonist depending on your view) and you really feel like you are watching two completely different people’s performances is absolutely incredible. Regardless of how you feel about this movie, there is no denying her talent and the life she brings to these roles.

This is a movie I would really love to hear thoughts on. You can DM me on Instagram (@wickedlittleblog) or email me (sarahkrodden@gmail.com) with your thoughts. Please specify in the subject line that it’s about this if you email me!

Us Trailer

Us IMDB

Us Wiki

Jordan Peele IMDB

Jordan Peele Wiki

 

 

Categories
B Calm Female Horror The Horrors of Life

The Art of Revenge

Revenge*Trigger Warning: Discussions of rape and sexual assault*

I’ve never been into rape revenge films.

Sexual violence has always been the one thing that I can’t stomach in movies. From a purely horror story standpoint, I’ve always thought of rape and sexual assault as the lowest hanging fruit that a writer/director can use to scare their audience. As women we already have to go about our daily lives with the very real understanding that, quite literally at any moment, we could be raped; therefore, I don’t like to spend time consuming media where that is the driving force behind the entire story.

But then Shudder added their exclusive film, Revenge, and I was intrigued.

The synopsis of the film was vague enough that, while I knew the implication was rape, it drew me in. Director Coralie Fargeat talked about the film in an interview with Mick Garris on his podcast Post Mortem. In the interview Fargeat and Garris both agreed that the traditional rape revenge formula of 90+ minutes of the female character being tortured with 10-20 minutes at the end of her getting payback is a lot to stomach. That’s where Revenge deviates from the beaten path.

The main character Jen, played by Matilda Anna Ingrid Lutz, arrives in a remote and unnamed desert to spend a long weekend with her married lover, Richard who is played by Kevin Janssens. When her Richard’s friends arrive for their hunting trip early things take a turn for the worst. After one of the friends assaults Jen, a chase ensues through the dessert that will keep you on the edge of your seat the entire time.

The thing that I really admire about the way that Fargeat handles the assault and the subsequent chase does not make the viewer feel worse at the end. The amount of pure torture most women in rape revenge sagas go through is hard to stomach, and tend to just leave me feeling dirty and gross by the end.

In Revenge the audience is introduced to Jen as a stereotypical horror movie floozy. She’s sleeping with a married man, she wears risque clothing, she flits with her lover’s friends, and uses her sexuality to her benefit. However, the moment the viewer can tell the assault is coming, she is thrust into our sympathies. It’s one of those moments that you really don’t want to watch, but you can’t look away from. We get a brief couple of scenes in which Jen has to deal with the aftermath of the assault; we watch as she lays in bed, staring blankly ahead of herself, unable to wrap her head around what happens.

Our sympathy for Jen quickly turns into murderous rage for the three men whose mercy she is, seemingly, at. Her lover returns back to the house, and finds out what has happened, he rages at the man who has raped Jen but refuses to let her go home. Instead of truly taking action, he offers his mistress a large some of money. After Jen refuses and threatens to expose their affair, Richard slaps Jen and she runs away as the three men chase her.

That, in my opinion, is where Revenge truly begins.

The cat and mouse game in the dessert devolves into a bizarre and almost fantasy like sequence as Jen deals with bodily injuries, dehydration, exhaustion, and emotional trauma while trying to get back at the men. The social and gender commentary in this movie are beautifully incorporated into a nail biting epic as Jen becomes a proverbial superhero out to save herself.

One of the most poignant and stomach churning scenes is the conversation that leads up to Jen’s assault. The man who rapes her tells Jen that she was coming on to him earlier in the weekend, and that she clearly wants what is about to happen. This is an all too familiar excuse used in rape and sexual assault cases all the time. Everything from “If she didn’t want it she wouldn’t dress that way” to “If you hadn’t been drinking so much it wouldn’t have happened.” Women have always been blamed for their own rape and sexual abuse, and Fargeat does an incredible job of taking that horrible reality and flipping it onto the men who truly deserve what they get.

I highly recommend this film to those that are able to stomach a brief scene of sexual violence.

 

Revenge Wiki

Revenge IMDB 

Revenge Trailer

Categories
B Calm Blood-n-Guts Old vs. New

Cabin Fever Needs a Vaccination (spoilers, kind of)

Let me start this off by saying I am NOT an Eli Roth hater: on the contrary, he has been my favorite director for several years now. If Eli Roth is attached to a project, I WILL watch it. So it truly pains me to say that the remake of Cabin Fever was one of the worst movies I’ve seen in a long time. If you’ve seen the original film, then there isn’t much to spoil, but if you haven’t and don’t want key plot points ruined come back after you’ve watched the 2002 original.

The new filmmakers used the exact script from the original, 2002 Roth film and it was more or less a shot for shot remake. We all know we are living in a time of remakes: Evil Dead, Pet Sematary, Child’s Play. Reboots and remakes are everywhere you turn, but Cabin Fever – in my opinion – did not need a remake. For starters, the film was not even 15 years old at the time that it was redone by director Travis Z. Second of all, it was 95% a shot-for-shot remake of Roth’s original teen horror film.

I’m well aware that shot-for-shot remakes can, and have, worked. However, the brilliance (and absurdity) of the original Cabin Fever was the way in which Roth constantly shocked the audience with the frantic pace and bold body horror. The film worked because of its originality, and a exact remake is anything but original. Remakes like Evil Dead or The Thing took brilliant pieces of original cinema and made enough changes that they felt fresh and inventive to both new fans and fans of the originals.

Obviously I can’t speak for people coming to this movie without having seen Roth’s original movie, but I’m not even sure a new viewer would enjoy this movie. The pacing seems off from the very beginning, the actors don’t deliver the dialogue in a convincing way, and the beloved comic relief sheriff was changed to a blonde sex pot whose laugh lines feel forced and uncomfortable.

The thing that I have always admired about Roth is that he doesn’t hold back in his film making. The point in his movies is often how much can you watch before turning off the TV? With an exact remake the fans have already experienced everything there is to experience from that story. The shock and the rush viewers got that first time watching Cabin Fever is gone.

The few things they did try and do different did not add anything better to the plot, just made things more unrealistic and corny. The main character Paul, played by Samuel Davis, finally gets a shot with his childhood crush only to find out she has gotten the flesh eating disease ravaging the small community. By the end of the movie Karen, played by Gage Golightly, has barely any skin and has been attacked by an infected dog. She is laying in the boat house where they quarantined her begging for Paul to kill her. Paul stands there for far too long dealing with his inner struggle. When he finally decides to put Karen out of her intense agony the gun won’t fire, so Nick takes a shovel and shoves it into Karen’s mouth and severs her jaw which, shockingly (that’s sarcasm), doesn’t kill her. He then SETS THE SHED ON FIRE AND BURNS HER ALIVE.

The original Paul, played by Ryder Strong, also chooses a shovel to help end Karen’s misery. However, rather than stab her in the face with the shovel he bludgeons her with it. Bludgeoning is still a pretty nasty way to end someone’s life, but at least Paul 1 didn’t set her on fire. The remake of Karen’s death scene is frankly one of the strangest scenes in a movie I have ever seen. The pacing is awkward and weird and you just wind up feeling sick in the worst way for this poor girl who keeps begging for him to kill her.

Roth endorsed this remake, and for that reason alone I wish I was able to say I enjoyed it. I think everyone who is a hardcore Eli Roth fan can admit that Cabin Fever (2002) has its own problems. It is a clear debut film, but it was a debut film that set him on a trajectory within the horror community that everyone was dying to see. He followed it up with films Hostel, Green Inferno, and Knock Knock all of which kept on the same path of “how long can you watch” as Cabin Fever.

I don’t really like to write negative reviews like this because in most situations I want to credit artists for their creation rather I like it or not. In this situation, however, with it being a shot-for-shot remake I don’t feel nearly as bad saying this: Do NOT waste your time on this remake. If you want to watch a remake of a classic go with Evil Dead instead: even more blood and a fantastic amount of originality. If you’re in the mood for Roth-like body horror just watch the original Cabin Fever (and the original has added bonus of Ryder Strong and his face). But I’d strongly recommend giving the new Cabin Fever the pass the next time you’re ready for some gore.

*Also, Eli Roth’s History of Horror is absolutely incredible. If you don’t have a Shudder subscription it is worth the 4.99 a month alone.

Cabin Fever (2002)

Wiki

IMDB

Trailer

Cabin Fever (2016)

Wiki

IMDB

Trailer

Eli Roth

Wiki

IMDB

Categories
Bumps in the Night Podcast Scares

I Promise: Alice isn’t Dead

img_0130I’m sure everyone that would be interested in a blog such as this has become familiar with the incredible world of Night Vale Presents and all the audio magic they do. Before I was as die hard about podcasts as I am now a friend of mine told me about Welcome to Night Vale because she was sure that I would be obsessed instantly…

This is, unfortunately, the part where I have to admit that I was not instantly obsessed with Welcome to Night Vale. It was delightfully strange, and absurdly weird but it didn’t quite hit the spot I needed out of a podcast at that moment. Shortly after, though, the same friend introduced me to another of Night Vale Presents audio dramas: Alice isn’t Dead.

Now, to say that I was instantly obsessed with Alice Isn’t Dead would be an understatement.

I remember sitting in the passenger seat of her car, listening to the narrators incredible voice, delighted to hear that it was about a lesbian couple, and sufficiently creeped out by the arrival of one of the series several big bads. It was the horror that I was looking for. It gave me a pit in my stomach when I listened to it at night, and I had to be careful of how much I listened to when I was driving.

The basic premise of the show is that the narrator (who remains nameless for nearly all of season one) has completely abandoned her life to become a truck driver and search the country for her wife, Alice, who she had thought was dead. While the narrator is on the road, she encounters a man that isn’t quite a man who she refers to as “The Thistle Man”.  As she makes her away through the United States the narrator begins to encounter unexplainable, and seemingly supernatural, events that become increasingly more life threatening as the show progresses.

With it being a three season series, that’s about all I can explain without giving any spoilers.

But one of the things I can definitely talk about is the incredible lesbian representation within this show. The narrator, played by the incredibly talented Jasika Nicole, is a lesbian truck driver with an anxiety disorder and possibly one of the most amazing voices I have ever heard. It’s a unique show in that Jasika Nicole is the only voice actor throughout the entirety of the first season. The whole thing is delivered through the CB radio in her truck, and all of the conversations are retold by the narrator rather than acted out by multiple voice actors.

I’m accustomed to podcasts like The NoSleep Podcast or The Black Tapes where each part is acted out by a different voice actor, so when I fist started Alice I was surprised to hear only Jasika Nicole’s voice throughout the entire episode. However, as you fall more and more in love with the narrator as a character it because easier to image yourself sitting in the passenger seat of her cab and listening to her retell her stories in real time.

Alice isn’t Dead mixes the delightful absurdity of Welcome to Night Vale with the genuinely terrifying that is more expected from a network such as Shudder. If you’re looking for a whimsical horror story, Alice isn’t Dead is the perfect podcast for you.

But be forewarned, you will absolutely want to binge the entire three seasons in a row.

Don’t say I didn’t warn you!

*And a quick side note*
The creator of Alice isn’t Dead has also written a novel of the same name that is a stand alone adaptation of the podcast. I have not had the opportunity to read the novel yet, but it is slowly creeping closer to the top of my reading list. Once I have finally sat down and read the entire thing I will update on how the novel compares to the podcast.

Night Vale Presents: Alice isn’t Dead 

Alice isn’t Dead Wiki 

Alice isn’t Dead Novel Alice isn’t Dead Novel 

Categories
B Calm Blood-n-Guts

The Neon Demon burned into my mind (SPOILERS!!!)

The Neon Demon.jpgSo since this is my first post since returning to the life of blogging I need to tell you there are going to be some changes in some of my posts.  Before I attempted to keep them spoiler free so that you would be compelled to go watch the movie, but there are just certain films that I just can’t possibly give you my full impression of without giving some spoilers.  So I’m giving you ample time to click away and go watch The Neon Demon staring Dakota Fanning, form your own opinions, and then come back over here and hear mine.

Here we go:

5…

4…

3…

2…

1….

Okay if you’re still around, thank you and hello!

The Neon Demon is a horror thriller from Nicolas Winding Refn who you may know from his 2013 film Only God Forgives and it focuses on 16 year old aspiring model, Jesse played by Elle Fanning, who is fresh off the bus to Los Angeles from Georgia after her parents die.  Sounds cliche, I know, but I promise you the tropes end there.

The film is beautifully shot from start to finish.  It opens with Jesse lying on a couch staring blankly at the camera, her throat appears to be cut.  At first it’s unclear if Jesse is, in fact, dead or not.  The shot pans out to reveal it’s merely a photo shoot, and we’re quickly introduced to three of our major characters: Jesse, Ruby (Jena Malone), and Dean (Karl Glusman).  It is clear from the beginning that Ruby, who is a makeup artist, is sexually attracted to Jesse.

She goes to meet with a prestigious modeling agency where we get the first glimpse at the horrifying world of being a professional model.  There, she meets with Christina Hendricks.  Jesse is instructed to tell people she’s 19 if asked, despite the fact that she has yet to even hit 17.  As she leaves the modeling agency, we see Hendrick’s character send a young girl away without even so much as meeting with her.

Here’s the deal, I am very against the modeling industry in general and this movie did absolutely nothing to change my mind.

Jesse is portrayed to have some sort of alluring quality that juts seems to radiate from her.  It is unclear if there is some sort of other worldly quality or something supernatural, but what is clear is that nobody can resist her and no other model can like her because she overshadows them.

Ruby takes it upon herself to take care of her, and through her Jesse meets two other models Gigi (Bella Heathcote) and Sarah (Abbey Lee).  The two automatically have animosity toward her because of how quickly she is progressing in the modelling field, and how old the two of the are considered for models.

There is a lot that happens between the meeting of the two other girls and the climax.  Including Jesse listening to the owner of the motel where she’s staying, played by Keanu Reeves, brutally rape the 14 year old run away living in the room next door and not calling the cops, to Ruby essentially attempting to rape Jesse herself, to Ruby having sex with a corpse at the morgue were she works while thinking of Jesse.

Now let me tell you, this is one of the first movies I’ve watched in a long time that at the end I sat in silence for quite awhile and just thought: “What the f@#& did I just watch?!”, but when I was researching afterwards and realized that this movie was in part inspired by Elizabeth Bathory. If you aren’t familiar with this particular piece of history here’s a really quick, terribly simple rundown: Elizabeth Bathory was a countess in 14th century Hungary who decided that in order to stay young she needed to bath in the blood of young girls. Gruesome, I know. Bathory has been an inspiration for a lot of stories throughout horror history, including Bram Stoker’s Dracula himself.

The Neon Demon is a heavy handed, disturbing, graphic cautionary tale about the dangers of our cultures obsession with youth and beauty. Jesse suffers a horrific fate at the hands of women who are, probably, only ten years her senior who are so jealous they are driven to murder, and the ultimate crime of cannibalism (if you weren’t convinced of how f***** up this movie was before, I’m sure you are now).

Overall, The Neon Demon is worth a watch if you can handle gore and utter hopelessness. I haven’t been able to stomach a second viewing, though it’s one that might leave you needing a second to fully form an opinion for yourself.

The Neon Demon IMBD

The Neon Demon Wiki 

The Neon Demon Trailer 

Categories
Life and Horror Podcast Scares

NoSleep, no problems!

The NoSleep Podcast has been around for a long time, and so I’m sure that there have been many people many times who have written blog posts, articles, and what have you’s about the horror anthology18955 podcast.  The thing that I love so much about this podcast is that they showcase writers at literally every level.  There are people whose first story was literally for the podcast, and people who have gone on to have novels published.  It’s all inclusive, and all encompassing of the many facets of the broad umbrella of “horror”.

NoSleep started out as forum to bring to life the top stories on the Reddit subforum “NoSleep”.  It has since evolved into so much more, and authors can now submit stories through email for consideration.  One of the things that I think is so fascinating about the NoSleep podcast is its unique format.  Every episode has at least two stories that are available to the public, making each free/public episode at least one hour long.  In order to get the full, over two hour long episode, people can buy “season passes”.  You can purchase individual episodes or the entire season, but if you’re a broke college kid like me don’t worry!  The NoSleep podcast, as I said, offers at least two of their stories from each episode as their own individual episode for free.

The NoSleep show runner is David Cummings, and they have 30+ voice actors that contribute to the podcast from all different walks of life.

On a more personal, less informationy note:

The thing that I have come to appreciate so much about this podcast is the way that people are exposed to every subgenre of horror.  There are stories about creatures, killers, demons, and so many  more.  If you want to be unsettled, darkly delighted, or anything in between there will always be an episode for you.  I’ve been listening long enough now that I even have my favorite voice actors, and am learning to identify their names! (I realize that there is no way top put emojis, but picture that laughing crying face emoji here…)

I have even submitted my own story to them, and I plan to work on and submit more.

I think I will start posting some more specific reviews/discussions of the individual episodes eventually.  Right now they are at the end of their 10th season, and so I will probably wait until the 11th season starts up to do this.

Below are some links you might like!

As always: keep it horrifying, friends.

NoSleep: http://bit.ly/2rG6dVw

NoSleep Reddit: http://bit.ly/2wxwriI

Wiki: http://bit.ly/2rDR7A1

Categories
Blood-n-Guts Bumps in the Night

Sinister feelings from Sinister

Sinister.jpgI know you’re probably wondering why I’m writing about a movie that’s been out for four years. I saw this movie from director Scott Derrickson in theaters back in 2012, but I was not a fan. This was a time in my life when I was adamantly against horror films that didn’t wrap everything up with a nice little bow at the end.  Yet, when Sinister 2 came out I still insisted on going to see it when it was in theaters.

I thoroughly enjoyed the second one.

The premise of the first Sinister is easy enough to understand. Ellison Oswald, played by Ethan Hawke, is a true crime novelist who moves his family to a home where a family was murdered in their backyard. In the attic Ellison discovers a box of film canisters and an old-school projector.

When he loads the film onto the projector and begins to watch he is confronted with gruesome movies of various family’s elaborate murders. Strange things begin to happen in the Oswald household, and Ellison soon discovers a demonic apparition in the films. When he contacts a demonology professor he is told that this apparition is a pagan deity known as Bughuul: the child eater.

When I first saw this, as I said, I was not pleased with the ending. Once I found out they were making a second film, however, I was much more at ease with the ending of the last one. It didn’t matter than things weren’t wrapped up because they expanded on the story even more.

What do you think about movies that set up for sequels that don’t come out for years? Does it annoy you too?

Sinister Wiki:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinister_(film)

Sinister IMDB:

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1922777/

Sinister Trailer:

 

Categories
B Calm

Jug Face pours out creepiness

Jug FaceOK, so let me tell you why I decided to watch this movie in the first place.

STORY TIME!

This movie was on Netflix for quite some time, and I looked at it over and over again trying to decide if I wanted to give it a chance or if it was something that would really appeal to me. I decided to hold off until I had some time to look into it more and the story-line and really see what I would be getting myself into. Unfortunately, I waited just a little too long and it was taken off of Netflix and I honestly forgot about it.

But then something absolutely fantastic happened.

During our CMA Edu event with Scott Scovill I got the opportunity to talk with his personal assistant, Katie Groshong, who is an actress/producer who runs the small production company GypsyRoot with writer/director/cinematographer Jeff Wedding. We were talking about horror films and she was writing a list of movies her company had made and that she had acted in and guess what movie was on that list…

That’s right!

Jug Face!

(I hope that was the conclusion you got since that’s the film this entry is about.)

Katie was one of the actresses in this film, and that was enough to get me to check it out. Unfortunately, as I mentioned before, it was taken off of Netflix and I was forced to rent it on AmazonPrime. I guess this is a prime example of “You snooze you lose”, don’t you think?

I suppose I should tell you about the movie in this film instead of just talking about how I have met one of the actresses, and sounding like I am bragging.

So, Jug Face is a fantastic example of Southern Gothic horror. The basic plot of this movie is creepy enough without any of the actual conflict. The movie follows a Southern backwoods community that has some sort of magical pit (there may or may not be some sort of creature living in it, if there is we never see it) as their god. Ada, played by Lauren Ashley Carter, is a young girl who we quickly find out has a sexual relationship with her brother.

Ada is arranged to be “joined” with the son of another family, but she finds out that she is pregnant with her brother’s child.

Gross, I know.

Meanwhile we have the story of the jug faces slowly being revealed to us. Dawai, played by Sean Bridgers, is a member of the community who is spoken to by the pit. He creates the jug faces which reveal of a face of a member of the community who is to be sacrificed to the pit. One day Ada goes to visit him, and before going in she retrieves the latest jug face from the kiln which, to her horror, is her own face staring back at her.

What would you do?

Well, she hides it.

And then all hell breaks loose.

This movie couples the creepy feel of cult life with the actual imminent danger of a very real threat within the pit. Director/writer Chad Kinkle does a beautiful job of making the audience feel conflicted about whether or not Ada is doing the right thing. Since she has angered the pit, it begins to take the lives of other members of the community while she has visions of the gruesome deaths. We are stuck in a place of complete understanding and irritation at her selfishness.

I haven’t seen a lot of Southern Gothic horror films but this definitely has me hooked and I can’t wait to watch more.

On a side-note I would like to share something with you having to do with Katie Groshong, the actress/producer I mentioned earlier.

In July I will be interning with her production company while they film their newest horror film. I am ridiculously excited about this amazing opportunity to no longer just be a viewer of a horror film, but to be able to be a part of the process of making it come to life.

Have you seen any good Southern Gothic films? What is your opinion about the genre if you have? How do you feel about the cult type creepy that is used?

Jug Face Wiki:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jug_Face

Jug Face IMDB:

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2620736/

Jug Face Trailer: