THIS MODERN NIGHTMARE

JUMPING THROUGH TIME LIKE BILLY PILGRIM

Not a lot going on here. Otherwise, I’d post more. Didn’t do any new articles for FEAR ZONE this month (except for that Diary of the Dead review in early March), but that should change soon. Michael and I are doing Cinema Knife Fights for THE RUINS (coming out April 4th) and the PROM NIGHT remake (in mid-April). So more on those when they’re up on the site.

Otherwise, not much interesting going on. I went through a bout of the flu last weekend. Lots of soreness, aches and shivers. Could barely get out of bed for two days. I got a flu shot, but they say it doesn’t protect you from all strains. I found out the hard way. This was one of the worst bouts of the flu I’d gone through in a long time, but at least it didn’t last too long (about 4 days total before I got back to normal).

I saw the Bram Stoker Awards last night on the new videocam they had this year, and that was pretty cool. It was nice to see Michael Arnzen win another award, and Joe Hill won for Best First Novel for HEART-SHAPED BOX, which was cool. And it was really cool to see Sarah Langan win Best Novel for THE MISSING, since everyone was speculating it would either go to Hill’s Heart-Shaped Box (which was nominated in two categories) or Dan Simmons’s THE TERROR. Always nice to have a big surprise win like that. Jeff Strand did a fine job as the Master of Ceremonies for the event (this year it was in Salt Lake City) and we got to see lots of Gary Braunbeck as well. All in all, a good event, and since I couldn’t be there, it was cool to see it on video this year.

Haven’t seen much in the way of movies lately, although I did get a rare VHS tape of the 1946 movie HOUSE OF HORRORS through Amazon. It stars Rondo Hatton, who had acromegaly in real life and had a brief career as an actor in the 40s. The "Rondo Awards" are named after him. He was exposed to some gas in WWI and it caused a tumor to grow on his pituatary gland which caused the illness. Acromegaly makes parts of your body grow out of whack, so he had englarged hands, and a big, elongated head. After the war, he was a journalist (so we’re talking a pretty intelligent guy here) before Hollywood found him and he made a handful of films as the grotesque thug The Creeper. His first appearance was in one of those 40s Sherlock Holmes films with Basil Rathbone as a henchman before he and his character went on to star in films of his own. The Creeper stalked the streets and killed people by snapping their spines. Supposedly, Hatton was pretty sad about his acting career since it exploited his looks, and therefore his illness. A tragic story. If I was a big director, I’d do a film of his life. He was a pretty fascinating guy. HOUSE OF HORRORS (the title has absolutely nothing to do with the movie, btw) was his next to last film (his last was THE BRUTE MAN, also in 1946), and features the Creeper saved from drowning by a sculptor who was about to commit suicide himself. Instead, he nurses the Creeper back to health, and in return the guy kills off his enemies. A small little B-movie of the time, but I thought it was pretty interesting stuff, considering Hatton’s back story.

Also recently saw SLAUGHTERHOUSE FIVE again. I hadn’t seen that in years (it’s from the 70s). Based on Kurt Vonnegut’s classic novel, it’s about Billy Pilgrim, a guy who becomes "unstuck in time" and lives his life in random order, which was an idea way ahead of its time when the book first came out. In some of the new episodes of the show LOST, a few characters who escaped the island have been having similar experiences (and there was a mention of Vonnegut’s book in one episode), so it’s kind of cool that SLAUGHTERHOUSE FIVE is getting some attention again. The recent show JOURNEYMAN also picked up on the same idea.

That’s it for now. Until next time...

Infernally Yours,

LLS

DIARY OF THE DEAD REVIEW

My full-length review of the new George A. Romero movie, DIARY OF THE DEAD, went up on Fearzone.com this week. Go here to check it out.