Saturday, August 11, 2012
Recommended Double Feature: YELLOWBRICKROAD and ABSENTIA
These two films are as strange as they are scary in fact in many ways they are 'Weird Tales' in the purest sense.
As per IMDB the plot of 'Yellowbrick Road' "940: the entire population of Friar, New Hampshire walked up a winding mountain trail, leaving everything behind. 2008: the first official expedition into the wilderness attempts to solve the mystery of the lost citizens of Friar."
Thoughts: Good, strange, disturbing and original. Some folks weren't happy with the ending but sometimes the journey is more important than the destination.
As per IMDB the lor of 'Absentia' "A woman and her sister begin to link a mysterious tunnel to a series of disappearances, including that of her own husband."
Thoughts: The better of the two films. This one is one of my modern day classics, the kind of film I would show someone that dismisses the horror genre out of hand. This is what the genre can do if we just let it. Movies like this and 'Lake Mungo' and 'Triangle' stay with you long after you've seen them. The characters are excellent and really carry the story. And yes I crushed hard on Courtney Bell...
Friday, August 10, 2012
Thursday, August 9, 2012
(Recommended Reads) Classic Chills: ‘The Black Cat’ – Universal’s Decadent Film by Sam Gafford
There is little doubt that the first cinematic pairing of horror film giants Bela Lugosi and Boris Karloff, Universal’s 1934 classic The Black Cat, is their best film. It is a movie that is horrific, suspenseful, intelligent and incredibly decadent. That this film was made at all is amazing and that it was able to include so many strange and disturbing elements makes it doubly so.
The Black Cat was a movie that simply could not fail. With so much going for it, Universal saw little but growing bank accounts and didn’t pay much attention to what was actually going to be put in the film. The director Edgar G. Ulmer had convinced Universal producer Carl Laemmle, Jr. that teaming the two Universal giants of Lugosi and Karloff in a movie based loosely on Edgar Allan Poe’s short story would be nothing short of a certain hit. Even during the Depression, a studio could not pass up a movie that promised to make them so much money. Laemmle, haunted by visions of box office bonanza, gave Ulmer practically free rein to do anything he wanted and so he did. The result was a movie that simply amazes the viewer by its decadence...
THE LOCAL HEROES: A Final Appointment With Doctor Kjærlighet
THE LOCAL HEROES
A Final Appointment With Doctor Kjærlighet
by
Al Bruno III
It was midnight. The full time-Luchador and part-time crimefighter known as Fuego stood in the entranceway to the Guzmán Huerta Sports Arena. The pale hallway lights gleamed off his bare chest, his red tights were torn, his black fiery mask was stained with blood.
Up ahead the corridor widened out into the stadium seating that surrounded the wrestling ring. A crowd of mobsters and thugs armed with bats, knives and chains waited for him.
Fuego barreled into the midst of them, toppling the first wave of attackers like dominoes. He had no fear of these men, not after he had escaped the death of a thousand screams with three hundred screams to spare.
When there were just two criminals left he smashed their heads together and let them fall to the floor. That done he ran to the center of the arena leapt into the air and landed gracefully in the center of the canvas square. A single spotlight shone down on him. “Kjærlighet!” Fuego shouted, “You murdering coward! Come out and face me like a man.”
“That’s Doctor Kjærlighet to you,” a harsh voice said from somewhere in the audience.
“Then face me like a doctor!” Fuego roared, “Your reign of terror ends tonight!”
A tall man wearing white and black tights climbed into the ring. A silver cowl concealed Doctor Kjærlighet’s features, a thick gold belt encircled his waist; the masks of fallen luchadores hung from the belt like scalps.
Fuego knew those masks, they belonged to his fellow members of the League of Extraordinary Luchadores. This could only mean they were dead. Fuego weakened momentarily at the thought. Their names echoed through his mind- Tierra, Vivento, Agua, Demonio Amarillo, Gigante Maya and Phil... All gone forever, betrayed by one of their own.
“You were the world’s only Norwegian luchador,” Fuego’s voice quaked, “why did you sell your soul to the evil gods from space?”
Doctor Kjærlighet said, “Because I was the world’s only Norwegian luchador.”
The two men circled one another, sizing each other up. Fuego made the first move, a backhand chop that made his opponent double over. Fuego followed that attack up with an elbow drop. Doctor Kjærlighet fell to the mat. “You are no match for me!” Fuego placed his opponent into a chin lock, “No man in the world is!”
The traitorous luchador chuckled, “That is your final mistake then for I am no longer of this world.” Doctor Kjærlighet raised his left arm. It split apart from the elbow down. There was no blood, instead it bloomed, remaking itself into a three foot claw ringed with a nest of tendrils that hissed like serpents.
“Ay dios mio!” Fuego cried as he found himself tossed eight feet into the air. This was the ultimate foreign object in the ring!
Fuego crashed back down onto the mat with bone jarring force. He tried to stand only to find himself caught in an over the shoulder arm drag. He tried to slip free but the grip of Doctor Kjærlighet’s claw arm was unbreakable. The serpent-like tendrils snapped and bit at Fuego.
“It was so easy to destroy you all,” Doctor Kjærlighet placed the hero into a bear hug and slowly began to tighten his grip, “now die!”
“Never!” Fuego swung both his arms backwards boxing his adversaries’ ears.
“ARRRRRGH!”
Fuego rolled away towards the center of the ring and got back to his feet. Then he ran at his opponent again and delivered a flying scissor kick. Doctor Kjærlighet shrugged off the attack and threw Fuego into the ropes.
It was easy enough for Fuego to untangle himself. He scrambled back to the other side of the ring and waited. What would come first? An attack or a speech?
“Oh you fool! You microbe!” Doctor Kjærlighet began.
Right, Fuego thought, a speech it is.
Doctor Kjærlighet shook his human fist as he spoke, “Once I have destroyed you I shall go to America!”
“America?” Fuego readied himself. He pulled off his right glove where a wise professor had tattooed the dreaded Elder Sign.
“Yes, America. And in that land I will defeat every challenger until I am declared the supreme champion!”
“Supreme champion?”
“Then every wrestler in the world will bow down before me!” Doctor Kjærlighet threw out his arms in a gesture of triumph, “I will become more powerful than Ed McMahon himself!”
“Vince,” Fuego said.
That stopped the villain in mid-rant “Eh?”
“Vince McMahon is the man all the wrestlers in America bow down to. Ed McMahon was on the Johnny Carson show.”
“Are you sure?”
Fuego charged. Fuego leapt. He brought his tattooed right hand down onto the traitorous luchador’s demon arm.
The very air around the two men exploded. The blast radiated outwards destroying the Guzmán Huerta Sports Arena.
When the smoke cleared all that was left was Fuego kneeling in the center of the ruins. Doctor Kjærlighet and his henchmen were gone, incinerated.
“What have I done?” Fuego gasped.
To take a life was a betrayal of everything a luchador stood for, to kill so many at once and like this was impressive but unforgivable. He reached up to grab at his mask and began to pull at it. To remove the mask was to die but wasn’t that what he deserved?
Or would that give Doctor Kjærlighet the final victory?
The sound of sirens and commotion began to draw in around him. Fuego left his mask on but knew he could no longer stay in Mexico City. He would have to go somewhere else and redeem himself.
Perhaps someday he would return but for now he would go to America.
He had heard stories of a place overrun with crime, ghouls and random giant robot attacks, a place called River City. He vowed to save that city, to fight for truth and justice until its citizens had safety and prosperity in a headlock.
But first Fuego needed to remember where he had parked his car.
Tuesday, August 7, 2012
(Recommended Hotness) JUDGEMENT OF PARIS has some lovely ladies in swimsuits!
Stunning swimwear image of gorgeous Russian plus-size models, shot by Ilya Fedorov...
Monday, August 6, 2012
THE COLD INSIDE (a serial novel) Chapter Fifteen part two
The Cold Inside
Chapter Fifteen
part two
By AL BRUNO III
Tuesday November 15, 1994
Tristam sat near the back of the study hall trying to read his history textbook. As usual it was no use, he’d read and reread but still couldn’t remember a single fact. He yawned and rubbed his eyes. For all the sleeping he was doing he still felt tired, and not just regular tired, he felt painfully tired. Exhaustion was a constant ache; it was the price for he was paying for his out of body experiences. Not that Tristam cared, not after all he had seen since Saturday night. Nothing could hurt as bad as seeing Monique let Evan do things to her that he had only dreamt of.
A trio of girls glanced back at him and snickered. Tristam looked back down at his book and smiled. Let them laugh, let them throw their spitwads and insults. They didn’t know how vulnerable they were, they didn’t know that he could see all of them any time he wanted, that he could learn all their secrets. That was how he’d spent the day yesterday. He’d told his mother he was sick, and he’d performed the part so well that she had stayed home from work out of concern. Under a blanket on the couch he had self-sedated himself with a double dose of Nyquil. Free from his body he’d gone where he never dared before, the girl’s locker room.
There he’d seen a show that rivaled anything the Booby Hatch had to offer. It was strange in a way, Ariel and the other dancers knew men were looking at them and by the third song of their set they always ended up topless and gyrating to some power ballad or another. The girls of Blessed Heart were only stripping down to their underwear but for Tristam there was something undeniably sexy about the fact they didn’t know a boy was watching them- especially a boy they reviled. Greedily he flitted from girl to girl, delighting in the parade of flesh. The dancers of the Booby Hatch all pretty much looked alike but here in the locker room he saw short girls, thin girls, fat girls, skinny girls, girls who looked like they were twelve and girls that looked like they were twenty-one. He’d even seen his sister and Drew, and had been amused to note that they almost had the exact same shape. Tristam made note of who had the most intriguing birthmarks and who had the most risqué underwear- or, in the case of Linda Kaspary, who had no underwear at all.
And more entertaining than all the skin was the gossip; already he had learned more about the inner workings of the school’s ruling class then he ever had by being a member. Between shows he would soar through the school. That was how he had discovered Evan’s little side business and a few other things as well. He knew the student that was robbing the nuns on the school’s upper level out of sheer malice. He had spied on freshman and a senior sneak into the room set aside for band practice and have sex on the tile floor, their hall passes still clutched in their hands. Flitting from office to office, he had watched the teaching staff use their free time to work, sleep, drink and read. He had paused to listen to his science professor talk on the phone with his wife, the conversation beginning civilly enough but ending with the man shrieking and teary-eyed. Sometimes he would hover just above a congested hallway and watch the students flowing to and from class.
By the time the last bell had rung and the cold medicine had worn off, he had explored every corner of the school. The only places that he wasn’t comfortable in were the convent in the old building’s upper floor and the tiny cemetery and it’s ruined chapel.
That was all right though, he didn’t find those places particularly interesting anyway.
There was more mocking laughter, the girls were glancing furtively back at him. Tristam made a note to learn their home addresses.
Maybe someday soon... He thought smugly, You’ll shower with the Dog-Boy and not even know it.
Sunday, August 5, 2012
Who would win in a race- Superman or The Flash?
That's right! Another nerdy poll question. A question so contraversial they had to shut down the DC comics message board thread about it!
Stop by the WIT AND WEIRDNESS OF AL BRUNO III to cast your vote!
The Poll results are in and the majority of you wouldn't mind having POD versions of my works available.
Thanks for voting!
Now I have to figure out how to format these things so they don't look like deranged 4th grader's book report.
I'll keep you posted on how things go.
(Recommended Reads) 'Beyond The Theatre Of Hands' by Daentric
"He's not going to be asleep forever! Get the coin ready and wake him up!" A voice barked from outside my room. The sound of several people moving around barely seeped through the walls. What were they doing? What, "coin," were they preparing?
My room was anything but familiar; the walls, bed, and cabinets were colorless voids of white. Maybe this was a mental hospital of some kind, not that I recalled demonstrating unstable behavior. Actually, I didn't remember much of anything; where I worked and who I cared about didn't register. There weren't many clues available in that little white room, but there was something. My head had unexplainable pressure pulsing from the back; it wasn't painful, but once I noticed the pulsing I couldn't focus on anything else. Was it some kind of injury? The urge to reach back and feel the area was too much to pass up, so I carefully felt the back of my skull...
"Hmm..." I calmly stated to myself, "is this metal?"
FASCINATION WITH FEAR praises THE SENTINEL.
Greetings, horror lovers! I’m going to tell you all about a movie that if you haven’t seen, you must. It isn’t very well known among my generation, some people my age know only of the horror movies that rely on sound cues and jump-scares. They don’t know about the golden era of horror, the 1970’s, when the films were original and the scares were real.
This is a movie that can keep you up at night, cowering beneath your covers; a movie that can make you scream out loud not because of the deafening slam of piano keys, but by a figure walking out in complete silence. This is a movie that will make you cringe, giggle, gasp, and applaud by its end. This, my friends, is The Sentinel...
click here to read the rest of the article
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