The Loft adds another title to their annual All-Nite Scream-O-Rama

The Loft's All-Nite Scream-O-Rama




Yes, I am VERY excited about this. Fulci's Gates of Hell has been one of my favorite films since I first saw it back in 1980.



























--Nickolas Cook

THE ALL-NITE SCREAM-O-RAMA 2010!

Finally, The Loft announced the lineup for their annual ALL-NITE SCREAM-O-RAMA 2010 . Some great titles this year. I’m really looking forward to this one—although we’ll probably skip Cannibal Holocaust; I’m not into watching animals being killed for my entertainment.
If you're in the Tucson area on August 13th, stop by and join in the fun, with a bunch of horrorheads enjoying the best things in life--horror that doesn't suck!







CANNIBAL HOLOCAUST / 30TH Anniversary (1980)
The original “cannibals in the jungle” gross-out shockfest from Italian filmmaker Ruggero Deodato, guaranteed to make you lose your lunch. Banned in over 50 countries!






THE DESCENT (2005)
Neil Marshall’s terrifyingly claustrophobic thriller pits tough female spelunkers against cave-dwelling albino freaks, hundreds of feet below the ground!






THE HOWLING (1981)
Werewolves run amuck in Joe Dante’s frightening, funny and downright freaky lupine horror flick! Featuring pulsating SFX from the legendary Rick Baker and Rob Bottin!






THE BROOD (1979)
The one-and-only David Cronenberg spins the charmingly disgusting tale of divorced parents and their monstrous mutant children! You’ll never look at fetus the same way again.






SQUIRM (1976)
Mother Nature gets her nasty revenge on mankind with a little help from millions of slimy, squirmy killer earthworms in this creepy-crawly shocker from Blue Sunshine director Jeff Lieberman!






TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSCARE PART 2 (1986)
The buzz is back! Tobe Hooper’s insanely over-the-top sequel to his original terror-fest features the legendary Dennis Hopper battling Leatherface and the whole happily depraved gang in a bloody dust-up of chainsaws, severed body parts and bad-ass barbecue!



--Nickolas Cook

Why, she wouldn't even hurt a fly...

Psycho (1960)

Last night we made yet another trek to The Loft. This time to see a once in a lifetime showing of the 35MM print of the original Alfred Hitchcock horror classic PSYCHO (1960). This week marks the 50th anniversary of this genre-shattering release upon an unsuspecting middle-American audience. I can only imagine what monstrous effect it had on such homogenous sensibilities all those years ago. Talk about really messing up June Cleaver and “The Beav”.








There is no other movie like Psycho. Even that useless 1998 remake by numbnut, uber-pretentious Gus Van Zant didn’t get anywhere near the same response; in fact, if anything, it caused some fairly angry reactions among Hitchcock fanatics and horrorheads. Probably the closest thing we’ve had happen to horror since Psycho would be John Carpenter’s classic slasher, HALLOWEEN (1978). What struck me (although I guess this should not surprise me by now) is that the younger people in the audience seemed to find certain frightening parts funny—parts which most horror fans would agree are some of the greatest scenes ever shot by Hitchcock.








Of course sensibilities have changed.
Moviegoers have inevitably become more jaded by several decades of gratuitous violence, both in cinema and the news. Although some would say, with very little argument from me, that these mediums are sometimes one in the same.
But the scenes that still worked and got startled screams from this mixed audience?
--“Mrs. Bates’” sudden knife attack on private dick Arbogast at the top of the stairs got probably the most vocal reaction of the night.
--Another one that got a big reaction was the end scene of Norman Bates’ creepy and terrible smile into the camera.





Personally, I think there is a certain huge quality to Hitchcock’s films that make them perfect for the big screen. I was lucky enough to have seen on the big screen what I consider his greatest film, VERTIGO (1958), back in 1996 in Orlando.
Not to get off on a tangent, here, but Jimmy Stewart’s performance in Vertigo is nothing short of heart rending. Even to the point at which he wants revenge for having been played by a woman whom he loved with all his heart.
But back to last night. We once again met up with our buddy RJ Cavender and we got a chance to meet another of our mutual Facebook friends, Eric Grizzle and his wife. Unfortunately, the place was so packed we didn’t get a chance to really talk much with them. Although I believe his wife won a cool DVD set during the pre-show raffle. Congrats to her!
Maybe we'll get a chance to talk with them next time.
But we had a great time watching the film and a great time hanging with RJ for a bit. We plan more excursions to The Loft. We know for sure we'll be there for their annual Scream-O-Rama (more on that later as details become available), so maybe we'll meet some of you there in August.

Before I go, here’s a little something for the Nick Cave fans out there. This is his version of “Something’s Gotten Hold of My Heart”. i love this song and love Nick Cave. He's a unique kind of intellectual rockstar, with a voice like no one else.



--Nickolas Cook

Petey Wheatstraw: You better signify, sucker!

Last night, we went to The Loft to partake of their weekly Mondo Monday feature. In the past we’ve enjoyed some pretty bad movies on Mondo Mondays. This week’s exercise in terribleness was Petey Wheatstraw: The Devil’s Son-In-Law (1978), starring the greatest poet in all blaxploitation cinema, Rudy Ray Moore (star of that black Kung Fu classic, of 1975 Dolomite). Calling Moore a poet is sort of an in-joke for blaxploitation fans. After all, how many words can one find that rhyme with ‘motherfucker’. I mean, once you’ve exhausted the obvious ones, like ‘sucker’ and ‘trucker’, what’s left that doesn’t feel like a long stretch?
But we did not laugh our asses off at this Rudy Ray Moore wonder by ourselves. No, we were lucky enough to meet our good friend, fellow writer/editor, and general all around horrorhead, R.J. Cavender.
We got the big red leather sofa right up front, sat back, with our cold beers, and spent almost two hours rolling on the floor as Moore rhymed, sneered, danced and kung-fu asskicked his way through the film.








If you’ve never seen the movie, it’s about a standup comedian named Petey Wheatstraw, who just happens to be one stone cold motherfucker of a ladies man and a badass street fighter (taught ancient martial arts by an elderly bum, don’t you know), and a highly successful, if foulmouthed, comedy genius. But he’s so good, see, that he’s ruining business for a couple of ‘fat, lardass, no good motherfuckers’ called Leroy and Skillet. So naturally they have him killed by some ghetto hitmen. But the devil, Lou Cipher, makes a deal with the dead Petey. If he will only marry his ‘ugly ass’ daughter (a woman so ugly, in fact, that Petey suggests she could scare daylight away) and bear him a son, then Old Scratch will bring him back to life so he can get revenge. Petey agrees, although he dreads the eventuality of marriage to the ugly daughter. Lou Cipher also gives Petey a magic pimp cane, something to give him as much power as himself, in his plot to gain vengeance.








Well, there’s a lot of fake fighting, boom mics in the shots, really terrible acting, and just plain general blaxploitation fun, until Petey gets his revenge and the devil attempts to exact his part of the bargain. Petey tries to outsmart the devil, but the old guy isn’t as dumb as he looks. Needless to say, by movie’s end Petey pays the devil his due.
I ad a great time, and I’m sure RJ did as well. However, I’m not so sure Kim had as good a time. Her response when I asked if she liked the movie was a decidedly glum, “I didn’t get it.”
And that, as good as any phrase, sums up the fact that you either understand what makes a movie like Petey Wheatstraw hilarious or you don’t. It’s fun, filthy, most definitely not PC in the least, and they do NOT make them like that anymore!
Oh, well, perhaps we’ll have better luck Wednesday night for the 50th Anniversary presentation of Alfred Hitchcock’s ‘Psycho’ (1960), a film that pretty much created its own sub-genre of horror and thrillers.



--Nickolas Cook