Tough Films For The Rough Crowd

  Robert Martin came onto my radar when I picked up Fangoria #9 – in a grocery store, of all places. The magazine was full of gory photos from the horror movies just out, or still in production. But balancing the grue was a sharp and satiric sense of humor, courtesy…

  In a crucial scene during the first act, Meryl Streep’s Madeline Ashton saunters out of her mansion shared with her husband, Ernest (Bruce Willis), whom she stole from Helen Sharp (Goldie Hawn), to meet up with a young stud for a routine tryst, only to see that the man…

    There’s truth in packaging, and then there’s this: Oakland-based cartoonist Mara Ramirez’s recently-released debut graphic novel, MOAB — which comes our way courtesy of Freak Comics — is formatted to look like a sketchbook/diary with a lush moleskine cover because, well, it is a sketchbook/diary with a lush moleskine…

    Critics like to say that the horror genre was basically dead in the ‘90s, with most long-running horror franchises like HALLOWEEN, FRIDAY THE 13th, and A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET going dormant, replaced by quiet direct-to-video stuff or the bigger glories going to prestige thrillers like THE SIXTH…

  THE RENTAL’s greatest crime isn’t that it constantly reminds viewers of other films, but that it borrows so many elements in order to combine them into meaning so little. Watch enough movies and people will start noticing more and more recycled plots, characters, shots, and other beats. Sometimes this…

        Disney’s THE BLACK CAULDRON was released 35 years ago today on July 24th, 1985. The rare Disney film to have an army of the undead and a horned necromancer, it stood out as possibly too dark for some audiences. To celebrate this undervalued ghastly gem, what is…

      Whatever your opinion on ’90s horror may be, it can’t be argued that it was distinctive, in its extravagant, largely-CG special effects, extraordinarily attractive casts, and stubborn commitment to distancing itself from “traditional” horror. In keeping with this were a number of in-name-only remakes of horror classics,…

  In the horror film documentary THE AMERICAN NIGHTMARE, Wes Craven talked about what it was like being in the presence of a “dangerous filmmaker.” What that meant was to be watching a film, directed by said filmmaker, that was willing to do anything — include any taboo — to unsettle the…

I first came across the work of Samuel Benson when, in fairness, he came across me and sent me a copy of his impressively strange full-length comic A Different Sky, a post-psychedelic exploration of altered consciousness, sci-fi high weirdness, and quasi-magical birds from a stoner/slacker perspective that struck a chord with its…

  Before we get into the weeds with YOU DON’T NOMI, let’s be clear about one thing: YOU DON’T NOMI, despite its marketing and its cataloging on the World Wide Web, is not a documentary. And that’s because a documentary generally has two things: facts, and a goal. YOU DON’T…

  For centuries, storytellers have conjured boundless horrors hailing from distant lands, dimensions, and even worlds, but, when it comes right down to it, nothing is scarier than the human beings surrounding us. Rarely is this fear as immediate as it is in the case of apartments, where we share…

  RELIC originally delighted genre fans at Sundance in January 2020 as one of the standouts in the Midnight section and was tentatively scheduled to be screened at SXSW this year as part of their own Midnighters program. Written and directed by Natalie Erika James in her debut film along…

  In 2009, Michael Mann had hoped to tell the definitive story of the most famous bank robber ever — PUBLIC ENEMIES. With Johnny Depp as the John Dillinger, Marion Cotillard as his love, and Christian Bale as “G-Man” Melvin Purvis, the potential was there for not just another solid…

  I have a recurring nightmare. In this nightmare, I am in my house, but I am lost. I know it is my house, but new tunnels have appeared, new doorways, and new rooms. I wander these halls looking for something familiar, only to be sucked even further into the…

  Burt Reynolds and Raquel Welch worked together a handful of times — first in 100 RIFLES (1969), then in FUZZ (1972), and again in 1993 in an episode of Evening Shade which Burt directed. Finally, they costarred in a 2006 movie called FORGET ABOUT IT, which everyone besides me…

    Every horror fan has a certain time period of genre film that they enjoy the most.  Some fans like the gothic style of the classic Universal monsters of the 1930s. After all, DRACULA (1931) and FRANKENSTEIN (1931) are the touchstones of this genre. Others prefer the sociopolitical subtext…

    “Roll on, thou deep and dark blue Ocean—roll!   Ten thousand fleets sweep over thee in vain;   Man marks the earth with ruin—his control   Stops with the shore;—upon the watery plain   The wrecks are all thy deed, nor doth remain   A shadow of man’s ravage, save his own,   When…

  This was an impulse-watch off of my Netflix queue, back when Netflix queues were a thing. You can watch it now on Amazon Prime. I thought seeing this movie might be interesting because it came out not long after THE GODFATHER (actually, right around THE GODFATHER PART II) and…

  Often when you find yourself thinking of other movies while watching one, it’s because the currently screening title is derivative or making a reference. “Oh this is just POINT BREAK, but with street racing and cars.” “That sound effect is from FLASH GORDON.” “I wish I were watching ISHTAR.”…

  Again, we don’t often do these cut-and-paste jobs at Daily Grindhouse, because they take more energy than you might think and we don’t get any credit for how cool the contents are, but these contents are intensely fucking cool, man. Take a gander at this line-up, which includes a…

  Caution: Several one-syllable words of the four-letter variety ahead.     WINNEBAGO MAN is a documentary that follows the efforts of its very likable director and the Boswell of the piece, Ben Steinbauer, in his unusual quest to locate his own personal Great White Whale: Jack Rebney, the corporate…

Hailing as she does from Stockholm, Sweden, Moa Romanova’s name isn’t one that is particularly well-known here in the US — but I have a distinct feeling that her Fantagraphics-published debut graphic novel, Goblin Girl, is going to change all that in a hurry. Toeing a tightrope-line between pure autobio…

  The horror genre exists in ebbs and flows, putting away certain concepts like the slasher flick or the haunted house movie until something comes along and reinvigorates it for a new generation, similar to how SCREAM revived the slasher in the mid-‘90s and PARANORMAL ACTIVITY resurrected both the haunted…

    July 4th in the United States usually means awkward parades, far too many tiny flags, and an evening of explosions in the sky. Due to the ongoing pandemic, most fireworks displays have been canceled this year (except the ones going on late at night in most major cities…