/horror runs to the theater for ‘Dark Harvest’ (2023)
My favorite thing about Dark Harvest is how masterfully Slade uses chiaroscuro. It’s evident in 30 Days of Night as well as his “‘Hannibal” episodes, but the man is just really really good at it.
Second Breakfast Octoberween: ‘Van Helsing’ Slays (Get It?)
Octoberween X. We’re all feeling very old and learned, looking back on reviews we posted and opinions we had a decade ago and wondering why we had them. As I scroll through the Rooster Illusion backlog and time and memory dreg up ponderous questions about this and that, one in particular confounds me: how, in…
Octubre-ween especial! Desayuno Segundo presenta un otro dobla funcion de Santo
I do not speak Spanish, so… not sure if the title of this post actually means anything. My apologies. Octoberween is a time for monsters, and where there are monsters, there really ought to be monster-fighters. Though I have repeatedly said—and maintain—that Peter Cushing’s Van Helsing is the greater monster-fighter ever put to screen, I’d…
Second Breakfast Octoberween: The Lives and Deaths of Count Dracula, Part 3
When we last saw our dear Count Dracula, he’d just died the illest death. So sick. Scars of Dracula (1970) gave Count Dracula plenty to do: savage murders, commanding animals, drinking blood, and—most importantly—he overcame that most horrid of existential obstacles: teenagers named Paul. Capping that all off with pretty rad demise, the Count was…
Second Breakfast Octoberween: The Lives and Deaths of Count Dracula, Part 2
Last week, we began by watching one really good Dracula movie and one pretty good Dracula movie, and we learned that with the absence of Peter Cushing’s Van Helsing, Christopher Lee’s Dracula is unable to die in a particularly dignified fashion. But, he has five more appearance in this franchise, so plenty of opportunity to…
Second Breakfast Octoberween: The Lives and Deaths of Count Dracula, Part 1
By 1958, American movie studios had largely gravitated away from the classic monsters that ruled the horror genre in the ’30s and ’40s. Until slashers became dominant in the late 1970s, American horror merged in elements of sci-fi, and plucky young heroes battled aliens and nuclear mutants instead of the supernatural, for the most part.…
Second Breakfast Octoberween: Quoth the Raven, “Please Stop”
Unfortunately, I already used the headline “Edgar Allan Poesers” (for which I cannot take credit) back in 2016 while reviewing Extraordinary Tales. It would apply extremely well here. The Raven (2012) The Plot: When a string of grisly murders mirroring the work of Edgar Allan Poe hits Baltimore, police inspector Fields (Luke Evans) enlists the…
