So, what goes up has to come down I guess.
What do you do when you have a runaway success? You greenlight that sequel as quickly as you can and knock it out the next year. Now does that speak to the quality of the movie? Well…yes. Yes it does.
Night #5: The Blair Witch Project (1999)
So where was I?
Oh right, I was watching stuff and writing about it. I got the watching done, but not so the writing. Those who follow me on Twitter know I’m working on some other things so updates to this might be a bit sporadic. Anyway, without further ado, let’s go to the woods and get crazy!
Night #4: The Town That Dreaded Sundown (1976)
I hadn’t intended to watch this originally, but one of the pleasures of browsing Netflix is where you stumble across this previously hard to find movie that was lumped in with the slasher genre, even though it preceded it by a good few years.
Based upon the true story of The Moonlight Murders, a spree of killings that haunted the town of Texarcana, Texas, The Town That Dreaded Sundown strings them together in some sort of loose narrative. The opening narration promises that “Only the names have been changed“. That’s largely untrue and a lot of ‘facts’ about the case have come as a result of stuff they made up for the movie, but the end result ends up being a sort of precursor to David Fincher’s Zodiac. Continue reading
Night #3: Evidence (2013)
This is the second movie I’ve covered that’s called Evidence and unsurprisingly it’s also another to add to the found-footage pile. It’s also the third Evidence in the last 3 years. I’m not sure if there’s another one in production for 2014, but come back next year to find out.
Night #2: You’re Next (2011)
With The Guest currently in cinemas wowing crowds (Seriously, it’s a lot of fun), it’s time to look at the previous movie from the Director/Writer duo of Adam Wingard and Simon Barret.
Night #1: The Den
Welcome faithful reader. It’s that time of year again, a time for pumpkin spice latte and walks in the park. The nights are coming in earlier, and the temperature is dropping. It’s the best time of the year and, more importantly, it’s time for 31 Nights of Frights (Alternate titles: Shocktober, Horrorthon, Halloween Havoc). So without further ado, lets get to it.
Here’s The First Chapter From My Book.
I wanted to say here’s the first chapter from my new book. But that doesn’t seem right when I’ve not put a book out yet. So here’s the deal: I’m about halfway through this tome at the moment but I thought I’d put out a little preview. The title, tentatively, is DEAD BODIES IN A ROW. I don’t know what it means, but it sounds hardboiled. I guess that’s the idea. I love crime stories, but they’re always set in New York or LA or Boston. So why not try setting one in my fair city? I have to admit it’s been strange writing about places that I walk past, and I’m not sure the fit works yet, but I’m willing to give it a try. If nothing else it’s been a lot of fun to write.
Another thing to keep in mind is that this is only a first draft (I usually write about five) so this can and will probably change. I think there’s parts here that don’t work and language that doesn’t flow right, but it should at least give an idea of what I want to do.
So without further ado. Here’s Chapter 1, and sorry for the formatting but WordPress doesn’t care for paragraphs.
They caught Jack the Ripper…again
One of the more enduring mysteries of time, like who built the pyramids or how does Gwyneth Paltrow have a career is, who the hell was Jack the Ripper? It’s unlikely that we’ll actually ever really know: Too much time has passed and evidence is scant, but that doesn’t stop speculation and accusation from running wild and out of that world comes someone claiming that, for real this time, they’ve got the guy.
Men in Summer: The Do’s and Don’ts
Look out of the window right now (unless it’s night time which would make this a pointless exercise). What’s that you see? Some kind of light? Rainclouds? A strong gust of wind? That’s right, it’s summertime. It’s the time of year where we have a good four days of sunshine, so with these handy do’s and don’ts I’ll make sure you men out there make the most of it.
Twitter Outrage, Or; How To Get Offended At A Joke That Didn’t Happen.
A funny thing happened today on Twitter. Comedian Patton Oswalt tried an experiment wherein he created some faux outrage, just to see the results. Unsurprisingly for the Internet, the results were exactly as you might have expected.
Is This Thing On? 