Horror-Rama 2022!

Horror-Rama was back this year and I had an absolute blast. You never know how these events are gonna go in these uncertain times, but the turnout was great and people looked thrilled to be mingling again. On the Friday night, there was an extra special 40th anniversary screening of a film you know is very near and dear to my heart.

This was the very same Deadly Eyes print that used to play at Trash Palace back in the day. It has changed hands, but it still looks as hairy as ever. However, THIS time I was tapped to moderate the Q&A with special guests Lisa Langlois and Lesleh Donaldson. I'd never done one before, but confidence in the fact I knew the movie inside and out helped combat the nerves.

It went really well. I was amazed and excited that so many in attendance hadn't seen it. I thought that with the Shout Factory Blu-ray, it might have got more eyeballs on it, but I've come to find that was only a small run and now out-of-print. 

For the Q&A, because it was a two-reel, one-projector affair, we did it in three parts - intro, intermission and audience questions at the end. We talked about how they both came to work on the film, the various Toronto locations and just how God damn cold it was that winter.

Lisa Langlois, Lesleh Donaldsen and some schmo.

 

Someone brought up the Imdb trivia (that I'm currently trying to get removed) about a dog suffocating in his rat suit. I'd been preparing for this eventuality and we all had a lengthy discussion about it. I believe it untrue for not only the fact that the dogs were trained for months in LA to wear the rat suits, the headpieces had the jaws cut out of them. Tell me how a dog suffocates when its mouth isn't covered...

Lisa has said on several occasions that someone on the crew told her a dog had a heart attack from the anxiety of wearing the suit, but others state the opposite. If you listen to Al Apone (the FX supervisor for the suits on set) on the Blu-ray supplemental, he maintains that apart from one dog getting hospitalized from something it ate at the kennel they were being kept, no harm came to any of them. I also contacted the film's production manager (whom I met many years ago at TIFF and also worked on The Brain) and he corroborated this story.

But anyway, the night was awesome and it was just the first day of three! Saturday, I was basically there the entire day. There was a bunch of great Q&A's and I got to see people I hadn't seen in ages like Stacey from the OG Trash Palace, Brad from Poster-Mortem and Chris from Little Ghosts.

The Q&A with Thom Matthews was great and thankfully went beyond just his work on Friday 6 and ROTLD. There were actually multiple questions about his many films with Albert Pyun and how his contracting business led him to renovate Ozzy Osbourne's house, much of it while there were shooting their reality show.

Thom Matthews

The big get was Caroline Munro, who was absolutely lovely, an English rose of the highest order. Super humble and eager to talk about her experiences working with likes of Christopher Lee, Roger Moore and Joe Spinnell. Both her Q&A and screening event at the end of the day were fantastic fun.

Throw in the Adventures in Canadian Cinema with Langlois, Donaldsen, Lynne Griffin and Sean Sullivan and you have yourself some CanCon overload. I also got to catch up with Kier-La Janisse who was in town for the event. 

Lesleh Donaldson, Sean Sullivan, Lynne Griffin & Lisa Langlois

In terms of loot, it is true that was wallet was rendered significantly lighter come Monday. Not only did I get my hands on Vinegar Syndrome's Thriller release (which had eluded me at Fantasia), but also this random Beta tape.

I mean it was in such good condition, I couldn't let the fact I don't have a player stop me. I also got a Deadly Eyes long print from the only one of TP's four screenings that I missed, as well as a piece of art I first saw online many years ago and always wanted to own.

It really was a terrific weekend and totally worth battling the horrendous traffic both days. Congrats to Chris, Ali & Luis for putting on such a great show.

An Eh-Merican Nightmare.

I took another trip back into the Trash Palace last weekend to watch Don McBearty's 1983 flick American Nightmare.

A man (Lawrence Day) travels into the city's underbelly to find his missing sister.

Trash always announces their lineup ayear at a time, so I've had this date circled on my calendar for at least that long. It did not disappoint. I've heard this movie labelled as a Canadian giallo and that is certainly valid. It has a shadowy gloved killer, copious amounts of sexualized death and is at its core, a murder mystery. That would in itself have been enough for me to latch onto, but being that it was shot in Toronto garnered that extra level of familiarity.

As you know, I love horror films that are shot in Toronto, especially the ones where a half-assed attempt is made to set them in the US and American Nightmare is perhaps the most flagrant example. This was the most sleaziest and grimiest I've ever seen it, particularly the sequences Yonge doubled as 42nd Street. They found that area around the Zanzibar (also featured in the movie) and really ran with it. Also featured are the Channel 47/Cable 4 building, and a rooftop climax that does not even really try to hide The CN Tower.

That ain't the Space Needle!

Being that it was shot locally, there are also a lot of familiar faces, chief among them “Mike” Ironside. This film was shot in 1981, but released in 1983, so by that time he had already appeared in Scanners and Visiting Hours. I imagine his appearance as a detective would have been almost shocking. Conversely, Tom Harvey (who I grew up watching in comedies like Strange Brew and TV's Bizarre) shows up as an incestuous millionaire, so big 'ewwwwww' on that. Most amusing though was seeing now Canadian political figure Lenore Zann perform a strip tease while riding a pitchfork.

This actually makes the NDP seem more legitimate tbh

I was surprised by how much this movie reminded me of The Wizard of Gore in structure. If you replace the magic acts with strip tease numbers, they really are similar pictures. Then I realized that one of the producers on American Nightmare was the Wizard himself, Ray Sager and then it all made sense. -ed while writing my inadvertent 2019 review of this movie, I realized I was confusing Wizard of Gore with Gore Gore Girls. My mistake.

American Nightmare is another title you can add to the list of weird cinematic Canadiana. It is greasy, dark and grim and not generally the kind of fare us Canucks tend to shell out. Yes, even the Great White North can sometimes get the blues.

DKTM 292

All I can say is thank God I fell better this weekend than I did last! In the meantime, let's see that nightmares I can pull out of my hat.

Small Town Isolation.

About ten years ago, there was a solid Irish horror film about the perils of genetic modification that played TIFF called Isolation. It didn't end up getting seen as much as it should have, but the good news is that director Billy O'Brien's new feature I Am Not A Serial Killer is near completion. Here is the first image courtesy of Bloody Disgusting.

The film follows John Cleaver, (Max Records) a troubled teen who is obsessed with serial killers, but doesn't want to become one. He keeps to himself, until a killer sets up shop in his small town.

This premise is delicious and may scratch the same itch that Scott Schirmer's Found did a few years ago. When I was a teen, I was fascinated with serial killers, as well. When people would ask, I would say I was studying them, so that if I ever came across one I'd know to run in the other direction. My interest faded quickly subsequent to a viewing of The Fearless Vampire Killers and I saw Sharon Tate for the first time. Evil stole one of the most beautiful creatures that ever lived that night in Los Angeles.

Painted Horrors.

Artist Trevor Henderson's been doing a lot of one-off nightmares recently. Check out a bunch below.

For the rest of the series, check out his Tumblr here.

A Trash Farewell.

You've seen me talk a lot about Trash Palace here at THS. Recently, the founding cinephile Stacey Case announced that he is moving west to Hamilton, where he'll be setting up shop there. Never fear, as his two longtime compatriots Dan “Mouth” Lovranski & Jonathan Culp (both huge 16mm collectors in their own right - it is JC's Deadly Eyes print I've seen thrice there) are continuing the Toronto chapter. Last Friday was Stacey's going-away bash, but Mouth & JC also announced the coming lineup for this year. Some real doozies!