No Brain, No Pain by Hellraiser

2009 (8 tracks, 42:43)

rock

 We’ll Bury You by Hellraiser

2009 (9 tracks, 44:28)

rock

Director – Clive Barker

Cast – Andrew Robinson, Clare Higgings, Ashley Laurence, Sean Chapman, Oliver Smith, Robert Hines, Doug Bradley

Release Year – 1987

Reviewed by John of the Dead

Clive Barker is a name known by all horror fans, and with great reason.  This unique graphic novelist/artist has put forth some of the storylines behind horror’s greatest films, including his breakthrough effort…Hellraiser.  Hellraiser is one of horror’s greatest flicks because it simply does everything right and leaves you with a much more interesting view of Hell than fire and brimstone.

This film follows a man named Frank Cotton, who completes a puzzle known as the Lament Configuration, which opens a doorway to hell with very unsatisfactory results.  Fast forward and his former lover and her current husband(who happens to be Frank’s brother) move into a home that bears the soul of Frank under the floorboards of it’s highest room.  One day Frank’s brother suffers a nasty gash, and blood from his hand falls onto the floorboards of the room and seeps to Frank’s soul which lies beneath.  The blood engages a reincarnation for Frank, but he needs more and more blood to complete his earthly body.  He enlists the help of his former lover, who must kill for Frank in order for him to achieve the amount of blood he needs to regain human form.  Unfortunately for Frank, the Cenobites, underworld sado-masochists, are aware that he has escaped from hell and are not happy.  When the Lament Configuration is engaged by the daughter of Frank’s brother, she is attacked by the Cenobites.  She then barters a deal for her soul when she agrees to lead them to Frank, which could still cost her her soul.

I had not seen this flick in quite a few years and honestly can’t believe how awesome it really is.  Right from the beginning we are thrown into the underworld kingdom of the Cenobites and the horrendous powers of the Lament Configuration.  Clive Barker’s storyline for this film is an awesome one and bleeds his genius mind all over it.  The idea for a man to escape from hell, where he was tortured by a group of sado-masochistic creatures, and then be chased down by them is amazing to me and downright scary.  I believe to this day we still have not seen another horror film touch on this subject(aside from this film’s sequels of course) and that goes to show the genius of Clive Barker’s writing.

Now if there is anything even more awesome than Barker’s writing, it’s the fact that he did such an awesome job in direction given this is his very first feature film.  The pacing is great, we get lots of gore, and the creature effects for this film are amazing.  Many horror fans and non-horror fans know the image of “Pinhead”(Doug Bradley), the leader of the Cenobites.  He is one of horror’s coolest characters and I really wish Mr. Barker had more attempts at directing horror flicks because I can only imagine the genius creatures and ideas he would come up with.  This film is true horror, from a true horror maestro.

I have absolutely no complaints for this film, although I really would have liked to see more action involving the Cenobites.  That is not really a complaint because the reason why I want more from them is because they are downright awesome, not because we are left unsatisfied.

Overall, this is one of horror’s most amazing flicks from a true horror genius.  I recommend this to all fans of the genre who want to see a gory and creative ride that will give them an experience few horror films can compete with.

Rating: 10/10

Episode 4: Vicis Interimo: 13 Ghost 13 Ghost the story about Arthur and his two children, Kathy and Bobby, who inherit Uncle Cyrus’s estate: a glass house that serves as a prison to 12 ghosts. It gets me speculating on the nature of ghost and the metaphysical. I talk a little about my love for magic but also how much it seems to SUCK when shown on TV. As a P.S. to this episode, if any of you have I idea on a contest to get rid of these Miskatonic T-shirts I have email me at madsaxxon@yahoo.com

http://www.podomatic.com/media/details/2465239

www.paintedpinups.com

www.americanfightclubalabama.com

Bon apétit!, You are who you eat. Captain John Boyd’s promotion stations him at a fort where a rescued man tells a disturbing tale of cannibalism. Full 30 minuets, ( But I cheated with some Steely Dan) After talking about the movie I talk a little about Dune the book, the movie and the mini-series. Also I read a email and talk about how I got into horror.

http://www.podomatic.com/media/details/2456639

www.doodadsweb.com/

Episode 2: Vicis Interimo: The Thing A slightly shorter episode and better one than the first one I hope. I take a short look at the movie the Thing, respond to some email and talk about what I hope to cover in future episodes.

http://www.podomatic.com/media/details/2454368

www.photographsofdreams.com

www.americanfightclubalabama.com

http://feeds.feedburner.com/Douchecast5000

My Fist Podcast, Horror Movie review: The Haunting in Connecticut

http://www.podomatic.com/media/details/2444107

Don’t worry sir, I’ll have your daughter back by 11

(Doug Bradley)

Picture by: dunno source Caption by: Ken%20R via Our LOL Builder

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I found this about 3 bloocks from my apartment:

This is the mattress from the film “Hellraiser 2: Hellbound”:

Anyone think I should worry?

Don’t worry, folks. I’m ready.

I’ve seen the films.

I’ll need to find an autistic girl who looks like Brad Pitt and a nice brunette lady who’s dad was skinned by her mother in law.

http://nicegirlmeanthoughts.wordpress.com/2009/09/02/brad-pitt-as-little-girl-i-know-right/

Consider it done.

Ok, I mean really? I am starting to totally rethink my fear of scary movies. I actually think that Hellraiser is more of a love story – a warped one. It is basically about a woman that takes on a lover, he is dead-ish and being tortured but trying to come back, and she will do ANYTHING to help him. For him to come back and become a real fully functional person again he needs to kill people and I guess suck the life out of them to regenerate himself. So his lover, Julia, tricks men into coming home with her for some hanky-panky and there Frank kills and “eats” them. It did have some bloody scenes but nothing too shocking or scary. The whole time I was waiting to see Pinhead, the master of evil and gang leader, and you only see him for about 5 minutes of the whole movie. I assumed the movie was about him and he would be featured throughout but that was not the case.

The second movie Hellbound: Hellraiser 2 was a continuation of the first story. Julia who dies in the first movie is resurrected by some weirdo doctor and his silent puzzle patient that opens and closes the box. They run around trying to close the gates of hell and fend off crazy Julia who seems to become the queen of evil. For me the movie was kind of confusing as far as following a plot. I guess I would need to watch them again to catch everything. But in the end, not really scary movies.

Ello everyone, there’s a new 16-Bit Boy article up on the Resolution site and a piece about one of my favourite horror films Hellraiser in the new edition of Leeds based arts mag Art Fist – check it out here.

xx

Em comemoração à sexta-feira 13, aí vão algumas dicas de filmes clássicos de terror para curtir este dia tão mitificado:

1. Sexta-Feira 13 (1980)– É claro, que este clássico não poderia ficar de fora. Não só pelo dia de hoje, mas porque Jason deve ter atormentado o sono de muita gente, assim como atormentou, um dia, o meu.
2. A Hora do Pesadelo (1984)– Freddy Krueger realmente conseguiu fazer os meus sonhos se transformarem em pesadelo. Até hoje tenho medo dele e não assisto a um filme desta franquia quando estou sozinha.
3. Pague Para Entrar e Reze Para Sair (1974)– Pouca gente conhece este filme, mas se quiser ficar uma semana sem dormir, confira. O filme todo se passa num parque de diversões, num trem fantasma. É horripilante.
4. Psicose (1960) – Clássico dos clássicos, serial killer vê e ouve sua mãe já morta e mata em nome dela, a cena do chuveiro é inesquecível.
5. Os Pássaros (1963) – De Alfred Hitchcock, os pássaros de uma cidade começam a atacar do nada os moradores e quando menos se espera eles vão ficando mais ferozes e em maior número.
6. O Bebê de Rosemary (1968) – Outro que não poderia deixar de entrar nesta seleção. Conta a história de um bebê filho do demo.
7. O Exorcista (1973) – Não precisa nem de comentar, melhor filme sobre possessão já feito. Dá medo só de lembrar da menina descendo as escadas de cabeça pra baixo.
8. O Iluminado (1980) – Tudo acontece em uma luxuoso hotel, onde uma família vai trabalhar enquanto está fechado pelo período da neve. O pai enlouquece e tenta matar a todos.
9. Halloween (1978) – Um jovem com deformidade facial e mental se torna um serial killer com forças demoníacas após matar quase toda sua família.
10. O Massacre da Serra Elétrica (1974) – Esse eu só vi o último remake, tenho pavor desse filme, gente correndo de um doido com uma serra elétrica e sangue jorrando pra tudo o que é lado.
11. Poltergeist  (1982) – Uma linda menininha começa a conversar com o povo da televisão, até que um dia vai parar dentro dela.
12. Hellraiser (1987) – Este eu tenho medo até hoje de lembrar daquele homem cinza com a cabeça cheia de espetos, só matança.
13. Colheita Maldita (1984)– Crianças dominam uma cidade do interior com uma seita secreta, matando todos os adultos em oferenda à aquele que caminha no milharal.

Como diria Elvira: A Rainha das Trevas: “Sonhos Terríveis!”

Roberta Mendes

Promocional del nuevo Hellraiser

Aunque el maquillista original de la serie Hellraiser había elaborado lo que sería su recreación de Pinhead, todo parece indicar que no será llamado para esta nueva versión. En este promocional, podemos ver lo que será el primer vistazo del nuevo personaje, que se ve incluso menos amenazador que el original. La cinta está siendo esperada con ansia por unos, y miedo por otros, pero hasta ahora no tenemos nada seguro. La cinta se espera que esté lista para el 2011, y si bien antes se creía que no había avences aún, esta imagen parece desmentir lo que se pensaba.

Ah, Hellraiser. A timeless staple in the Young household, I probably should have done this during my Halloween Spook-TACULAR, but I figured that the Halloween spirit would have been better served by me introducing rare movies into the world’s cinematic vernacular. Now that I think I have, it’s time to re-watch a movie I quite enjoy and give a more Eric-y (Eric-ish? Eric-like?) spin on the many schools of thought surrounding Hellraiser. I think Hellraiser might easily be one of the best mainstream horror films of the 80s, and without a lot of money or a leisurely shooting schedule, they somehow came up with a genuinely original look and feel that has lasted the test of time better than all the other franchise horror films. And while many people will consider this a slightly pedestrian stance on what is often called a boring and tenaciously dry British horror, you’ll find the longer you stick with me that I intensely encourage a distinction between what’s boring and what’s merely paced.

Hellraiser begins in London, where a man named Frank is obsessing over a mysterious puzzle box he bought at a bazaar. His obsession soon turns deadly, however, as the box, contorted into an odd position, opens and projects chains with hooks attached, ripping him apart. As he is destroyed, four ghoulish, leather-clad demons emanate forth and fix the box, leaving as mysteriously as they come. Some time later, Frank’s brother Larry and his new wife Julia move into his old house, assuming that Frank has disappeared and won’t be coming back, as was his usual habit in their youth. One day, while moving, Larry cuts himself on a nail, letting loose some blood on the floor. That small amount is enough to cause a chain reaction and Frank, unbound by the usual laws of life and death, begins a terrifying revival up in the attic. One day, after Larry has left, Frank confronts Julia in his hideous, half-revived form; he has bones and some muscles, but no skin or hair. He asks her to help him, revealing that they once had a torrid sexual affair in their youth. In spite of his despicable fucking appearance, she actually agrees, hoping to relive some of her more promiscuous days with her old flame. Here’s the rub, though; to fully revive him, she’s going to need more blood, and lots of it. So she begins seducing men, bringing them to her home for the slaughter under the pretense of some prim and proper British whoopie. The only person who can stop their insane scheme is Kirsty, Larry’s adult daughter living in the city, who has a sneaking suspicion about her shady stepmother, and the only key to Frank’s undoing appears to be the puzzle box that sits in the attic with him. But will opening the box be Kirsty’s undoing instead? Because what lies on the other side of the mysteries of the puzzle box is a world beyond her deepest nightmares, a world that Kirsty might not be able to emerge from alive…

Only Clive Barker could have come up with something like this. Not only did he direct this film, but he also wrote the script, as well as the book upon which the script was adapted, The Hellbound Heart. Everything about this is totally his, and the best part about it is its complete vision. He might not be the most accomplished director, but I have almost never seen a horror movie in which the scope was so dependent on one person’s intense personal vision. It helps a lot in sucking me in, enveloping me in this world where just beyond our own petty lives waits an existence too horrible to contemplate. It’s a provocative idea about the incarnations of our hearts’ deepest desires that is entertained with a methodical, almost perverted mindset.

The movie looks great for $1 million. The costumes, the effects, and the locations are all top notch. The score is spine-tingling, with that powerful experimental flare by composer Christoper Young that makes you dread the coming moments with each passing second the music pulses like a cold and distant god. The entire film, and the house especially, have an underlying mood that lends a lot to the freakier moments, such as when Larry and his wife are getting it on during a storm, and Frank appears to Julia in a corner and cuts a rat in half with a switchblade (!!!).  The sado-masochistic design of the demons, called Cenobites, and their twisted world gives both elements of the pleasure and pain. The leader of these Cenobites, named “Pinhead”, is the mascot of the series, and the real tonal anchor for this film. Like an angel, he descends at all the right moments to assure you that there are bigger things going on behind the scenes. He is played by Douglas Bradley, and is a sinister force indeed. Although he would later take the role to near-comical levels of ridiculousness (see Hellraiser: Deader (???)), here he is a serious force of destruction that represents the price to pay for the pleasures of the flesh. The other Cenobites are well-designed, although not as scary or as commanding; there’s a girl with a hook, a fat guy, and a guy with chattering teeth! Spooky, I know!

I liked Clare Higgins as Julia the most here. She’s very sensual, and I can’t deny my mental boner for her. Her role seems pretty demanding on her both emotionally and physically. It’s hard maintaining a love triangle in a movie when one of the other people in it doesn’t know there’s a triangle and another person is a skinless walking corpse. She is very alluring, though, and I really like her inner darkness as a woman who habitually sends men to their deaths. Ashley Laurence is Kirsty, the heroine, and I honestly thought she was good. She’s beautiful, she has a lot of personality, and, best of all, she’s playing a strong woman. I like her willingness to just leave any guy in the dust to go and figure this thing out on her own! You go, girl! And, of course, I must mention again that Doug Bradley is the man here as Pinhead (at least for this movie). There’s nothing quite like his pale visage creeping across a threshold to claim his victims. Very nice.

Hellraiser is a horror movie with great direction, a fresh and able cast, one of the best scores I’ve ever heard in a horror composed by Christopher Young, and a heart hung squarely in the macabre by a set of chains with hooks on them. It’s a breath of fresh air from all the slashers and the generic killer movies in Hollywood. It took a ballsy gay Brit in the 80s to get something like this pushed into the mainstream, and we’re forever in debt to Clive Barker for being brave enough to try something new. You’ll never forget this film; I don’t think you could even if you tried. I give Hellraiser 9 sawed-off rats out of 10. A high recommendation!

Tomorrow I indulge the artist in me with Gods and Monsters! See you then!!!

by Ryan – ReelzChannel.com

Despite pushing back production on Halloween 3-D due to possible financial woes within the company, The Weinstein Company is still keeping its fingers crossed about getting a Hellraiser remake off the ground after two years of attempts. At the American Film Market, ShockTillYouDrop reports that The Weinsteins included a synopsis for the remake, listing no director or writer but creator Clive Barker as Executive Producer in their AFM guide.

The re-telling of Clive Barker’s classic horror masterpiece. Based on Barker’s critically acclaimed novella The Hellbound Heart, Hellraiser tells the story of an unfaithful wife who attempts to assist her dead lover in his escape from hell. Having lost his earthly body to a trio of forsaken demons — lead by one of the most enduring horror characters of all time, Pinhead — he must force his former mistress to bring him the necessary human sacrifices to complete his body. Clive Barker’s Hellraiser promises to be a terrifying journey into the darkest corners of the soul.

Producer Bob Weinstein told Variety in September that he was planning to go “back to doing what I do best,” which apparently means sequels for franchises like Scream, Spy Kids, and a Hellraiser sequel in 3-D. Weinstein seemed confident that financing for the sequels wouldn’t be a problem.

“There is no question that financing is readily available to produce and market these films. I am eager to expand our scope in the 3D business.”

Looks like he is doing just that.

Amazon Specials!

THE TAKING OF PELHAM 123, THE AMERICAN FRIEND, HANNAH AND HER SISTERS, A CONFEDERACY OF DUNCES, DAWN OF THE DEAD, WILD STRAWBERRIES, PULP FICTION, THE BIG LEBOWSKI, 8 1/2, PSYCHO, TORN CURTAIN, CRIMES AND MISDEMEANORS,  BROADWAY DANNY ROSE, AN INCONVENIENT TRUTH, TIME INDEFINITE, DR. STRANGELOVE OR HOW I LEARNED TO STOP WORRYING AND LOVE THE BOMB, HALLOWEEN, A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET, HELLRAISER, DECONSTRUCTING HARRY, EYES WIDE SHUT

Jamie Delano was an old friend of Moore’s, a writer who had gotten into comics after his career as a cab driver grew stale. He had previously followed Moore as writer on a run of the English adventure hero Captain Britain. This would be the writer’s American debut, although the book itself would be distinctly British in its concerns. Originally the series was intended to be called Hellraiser, but there was a conflict with an upcoming Clive Barker film which resulted in a last minute change to the title Hellblazer.

Jamie Delano wrote the majority of the first 40 issues of the series, and has revisited the character a few times since his 1987-1990 run. There were a dozen artists visualizing Delano’s writing, the most notable of which are original series artist, John Ridgway who established the visual tone for the series. He illustrated most of the stories which are contained in Hellblazer: Original Sins, which collects the first 9 issues of the long-running series.

The tone of the series was nasty, and embittered reflection of Thatcher’s England. It was a portrait of an empire in remission. Hellblazer introduced to American comics the same cultural and creative tone that bands such as Shriekback, Bauhaus, and Joy Division offered. In other words, it was Goth before a name was branded on it. It was still free to do and express what it liked, and what it liked was to peer into the abyss, march through the decay, laugh when it could, and shed a tear only when it was all over and no one was looking. The comics were contrarian critiques of what had gone wrong salted with a a mixture of Sysiphian optimism.

Unlike many comics of the era, there was a stark realism to the character of Constantine that shone through tales of capitalist demons, and poly-limbed skinheads. He lived in a world of prejudice, greed, pernicious conservatism, homophobia, gluttony, and religious corruption. Early on a gay friend of John’s named Ray is introduced who has AIDS, a notable  first for American comics. That there was a gay character at all portrayed in a positive light in a comic that was not perceived as part of the Underground movement was astonishing for the time. That he was shown to have AIDS and have the character be presented at face value, with no cautionary tale, victimhood, or homophobia attached was unheard of in 1987 in any media that was not specifically directed at a homosexual audience. What readers were given was a gentle portrait of a man who had struggled and was dying in an era when AIDS was effectively an automatic death-sentence.

Delano takes this same story as an opportunity to spotlight the racism, homophobia and xenophobia present in the skinhead movement. As an American, it was my first exposure to “football hooligans”. The skinhead’s desire for purity and conformity is ironically presented as a demon fuses 4 skinheads together into 1 monstrous four-headed eight-armed monstrosity of hate. This was a far cry from the racist skins of the middle-American Punk scene that I saw in 1987. This was a brand of racism that only intense poverty can bring. A far cry from the working and middle class mix of punks at the all-ages show in Kentucky.

Other highlights include Salvation Army analogue the Damnation Army, a tale which uses the internet for chaos magic (in 1988!), and a spell that compels one to consume that which they love most all while wasting away, whether it be food, comic books, or in the case of a priest, a massive crucifix.

Delano walks a fine line with Constantine’s circle of friends. Some characters, like Chas, are close, but kept away from the chaos. Others, like Gary Lester, are right  the thick of the occult action, and pay the price. Then there is John’s family consisting of his sister Cheryl, her husband, and his niece Gemma. The extended family is portrayed like a real family. There is familial love of Gemma. Cheryl and John often have friction over different life paths. The brother-in-law is suspicious and begrudgingly accepting of John, viewing John’s occult activities through a Christian lens. It is in this family unit that John is the least guarded, but most protective.

Demonstrating so fully the different roles the lead character plays is an ingenious means to make what could be a distasteful character sympathetic to the reader. We all have different roles we play, and different masks we wear with different groups, particularly if we are behaving outside socially normative behaviors. John has his work friends, his real friends, and his family. Each set of relationships bring out different characteristics.

As most of John’s “work friends” die by story’s end, it could be easy to grow to dislike the character. However, Delano addresses this by showing that all the deaths his lead is responsible for in the cause of defending the disenfranchised from the empowered haunt him. Literally. In this, Delano establishes the character to have a conscience.

The exploration of relationships, the critique of culture, and the potent use of metaphor throughout Delano’s Hellblazer stories are what set the character apart from other genre-based series of the day, and form the template that keeps the character relevant 25 years later.

Delano is writing a new story as an original graphic novel with the character called John Constantine, Hellblazer: Pandemonium. It is illustrated by Jock, who worked on the character a few times with writer Mike Carey in the early 2000’s.

Comme j’adore le mois d’Octobre, l’Halloween et les films d’horreur, j’ai décidé de faire le premier Horreur-o-thon des Bipolaires! En effet, j’écouterai un film de peur par jour jusqu’au 31, alors revenez lire mes critiques quotidiennes…si vous en avez le courage! MOUAHAHAHAAA!

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De l’imagination détraquée de Clive Barker (Candyman), Hellraiser est un film d’horreur viscéral et perturbant, autant de par ses scènes de meurtres ou de tortures que de par l’univers affolant et extrême qu’il présente.  L’histoire présente Julia, une femme froide dans la quarantaine, qui a eu une liaison amoureuse avec le frère de son mari actuel.  Bien que tout ça sonne Top Modèles, le film prend une autre tournure quand son amant Frank revient d’un univers de torture sous la forme d’un corps en décomposition.  Il dit à Julia qu’elle doit lui amener des corps afin de se regénerer et l’empêcher de retourner dans l’univers infernal où il était, peuplé de créature cauchemardesques.

L’histoire est plutôt secondaire à l’univers que Clive Barker met en scène, avec des visions d’hommes accrochés au plafond par la peau ou de créatures grotesques sans yeux.  Ceci fait vraiment la force de Barker, qui mélange à la fois la violence avec le sexe et la religion, créant un monde dérangeant et irréel.

Note finale: 8.5/10

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Meilleure ctiation: “You solved the box, we came. Now you must come with us, taste our pleasures.” (Pinhead fait une proposition plutôt facile à refuser.)

Meilleure mort: Celle de Frank, avec une douzaine de crochets lui traversant le corps et le visage. Tu es fucké, Clive. (et tu as une fascination avec les crochets)

Y’as-tu des tits!?: Oui, si vous aimez les MILFs vraiment bitch qui ressemblent à David Bowie, vous allez être servis.

Saviez-vous que…: Le titre du film en production était “Sadomasochists From Beyond The Grave”.  Ca fittait bien.

Earlier this week I noticed that there seemed to be a larger number of horror films in the TV listings than usual.  Using my strong deductive powers I reasoned that this was probably due to the fact that Halloween was fast approaching.  I haven’t watched any of the films but I have been thinking about movies that have managed to instil in me a heart-pounding fear.

I’ve seen plenty of slasher type films.  Some of them did put a shiver down my spine, but when I was growing up and my peers were getting worked up about the latest instalment in The Nightmare on Elm Street franchise or arguing about whether Friday the 13th, Hellraiser, or Halloween was scariest I simply wasn’t that bothered.  Yes, I watched these films and did find them to contain startling and even frightening elements.  For some reason  though, they failed to capture my imagination.  Unlike most of the adolescent boys I was hanging around with I didn’t equate the amount of blood spilt on screen with my level of fear.

Then I saw The Shining. I wanted to hide behind the sofa, switch the telly off or run screaming from the room but I was too scared to do any of those things.  When the film ended I rewound it, made some more popcorn and watched it again.  I was just as scared.  After I returned it to the video store I visited the library and borrowed the book and read it in two lengthy sittings.  I was just as scared.  I’ve seen the film at least 15 times now and, you guessed it, every time I’ve been just as scared.

A few years after I discovered the shining I stumbled across The Exorcist.  Okay, I didn’t stumble across it, I sought it ought with some vague idea that I might find it just as frightening as Kubrik’s adaptation of King’s writing.  I was right.  Once again I found myself frozen in a rapture of fear.  This time I convinced some friends to watch the film with me.  They failed to engage with the film citing its, to their eyes, “old-fashioned” special effects and the spectacular lack of blood as reasons why it couldn’t possibly scare them.

Since then I have met more than a few kindred souls, people who share my fear and love of both of these films.  For a few years I assigned The Exorcist on a course I was teaching.  There were always a handful of students who had never seen the film and a few of those were always frightened.  On one occasion two of my students were so scared by their screening of the film that they were absolutely furious with me for having put it on the syllabus.  Their animosity was palpable; luckily it was also short lived.

I think the reason that these two films, and others, had and retain such a power to frighten me is because they are specific enough appeal to my hyperactive imagination, to set it moving in certain directions while also leaving my mind with enough room run wild.  Madness and possession are, in some strange way, easy states for me to envisage myself experiencing or witnessing.  The films that scare me most always leave some room for interpretation, never fully answer the questions they ask.  That allows me to provide myself with the answers and interpretations that will scare me the most, the ideas and possibilities that will unite my conscious mind with my subconscious, instinctive self.  I think that’s why I enjoy letting certain movies frighten me.

I’ve owned various copies of most of the films I’ve found truly frightening and gone out of my way to watch the others when I’ve had the chance to do so.  There is one film, however, that I’ve only seen once.  I wasn’t expecting to be terribly frightened.  In fact, I didn’t have any great hopes for it being a particularly good film.  It may be absolutely terrible.  In the event it filled me with such unreasoning, stomach churning terror that I’ve never had the courage to watch it again.

I was 17 years old when Event Horizon was released in the late summer of 1997.  I had a final year of high school left, was in the process of applying to various universities, knew what my first choice was and also had a series of AP exams to look forward to during the fast-approaching school year.  My mother and sister were away some place for a week at the close of that summer, my father was out of town on business and on that particular Tuesday my friends were all otherwise occupied.  I figured there were worse things I could do than go see the latest SF spectacular as a way of escaping a truly scorching and smog-filled  Southern California August day.

I figured wrong.  The plot and premise of the film isn’t particularly inspiring or original in general or for the genre.  It probably relies too heavily on special effects in a number of instances.  Most people probably wouldn’t find it that believable.  As I sat in that theatre in Anaheim Hills none of that mattered to me.

I’d never been so frightened in my life and I’ve never been so scared since.  I would have left the theatre but I was too scared to walk up the darkened aisle on my own.  When the film ended I had to wait until the lights came up before leaving my seat.  To get to my car I attached myself to the largest group of people I could find leaving the cinema and when they reached their vehicle I literally ran the rest of the distance to where I’d parked the Pontiac.  I was way beyond scared.  I was absolutely terrified and I still can’t explain why, at least not in any rational way.

When I got home I turned on all the lights in the house and sat in my room with a book scared of what I might see if I dared look up.  I couldn’t actually read, I just stared at the page.   I draped the mirrors  because, for some inexplicable reason, I thought they might betray a terrible altering of what I thought was reality if I glanced into them.  I was 17 years old and I slept, fitfully, with the lights on that night.  And the next.  And the next after that.  All the incandescent bulbs burned and all the mirrors stayed covered until about 15 minutes before my mother and sister came home three days later.  I’m sure they thought I was acting weirder than usual but I didn’t mention what happened.

Event Horizon terrified me in a visceral, animal way.  For some reason it bothers me that I can’t rationalise that fear to my own satisfaction.  Recently I’ve been thinking about getting a copy and watching it again to find out if it still affects me in such a powerful way.  One thought keeps stopping me from doing so: 30 year old men don’t need to sleep with the lights on.

Film:
Nightbreed (1990)
Rated: R
Written and Directed by:
Clive Barker
Starring:
Craig Sheffer as Boone/Cabal
Anne Bobby as Lori
David Cronenberg as Dr. Decker
Charles Haid as Cpt. Eigerman
Hugh Ross as Narcisse
Doug Bradley as Dirk
Simon Bamford as Ohnaka
Kim Robertson as Babette

By Count Vardulon

Pre-screening memories:  Like many teens, I went through a ‘horror’ phase at around age 13 (that it hasn’t ended yet isn’t the point). It was a common enough occurrence, the kind of thing where you start looking for things to define your rapidly-approaching adulthoood, and set yourself apart from the childish things you imagine you no longer have a use for.

 Horror movies are an incredibly socially acceptible way of going about this. Choosing to be scared is something that seems a lot more dangerous than it actually is to a young teen, but has the benefit of being somehting that a child would never do.

I worked my way quickly through the standards of the genre, your Halloweens, Fridays, and Nightmares while remaining largely unimpressed. These are the things that caused me to cover my eyes when the trailers came on in movie theatres? It seemed so ridiculous – they weren’t all that bad. Once the first tier was done with my friends and I started getting a little more random with our choices, which is how I ended up seeing Nightbreed. And wow, was I not prepared for Nightbreed.

The ads has made it seem like just another monster movie, but it certainly wasn’t that – from the early scene of David Cronenberg’s Leather Scarecrow slaughtering a family (including a child!) to a man tearing most of the flesh off of his head with his finger knives, to a trip to a haunted graveyard full of monstrosities that ends abruptly with the main character’s death at around the 20-mintue mark, there wasn’t a moment in the first act of this movie that didn’t have me fascinated and terrified and on the edge of my seat. I’d discovered that horror really could freak you out, and I wanted more of it. This is the movie that led me to find out more about Clive Barker, and see Hellraiser in a local repetory theatres… but that’s a story for another time.

Most recent screening: You may have noticed that in the above recollections of my first viewing I didn’t mention anything after the first twenty minutes of the movie. In point of fact, I didn’t have any memories of the rest of the film, save for a slaughter in a hotel and Cronenberg getting crucified at the end. There’s a reason for that.

Nightbreed is an ungodly mess for most the running time. After the masterfully-paced opening the film bogs down with many, many scenes of lengthy exposition and random nonsense about the monster world and their Jesus-style fated savior. Cronenberg’s always a pleasure to watch, but when he hooks up with a bigoted survivalist sheriff and a group of like-minded rednecks the film goes from being a relatively effective horror film to a supremely muddled holocaust allegory that leads to an overextended war scene that teaches us a valuable lesson – that the Jews would have had a better time of it had there been a few unstoppable armoured killing machines on their side. Of course, that’s true of anything, really.

That’s not to say that the movie is a complete disaster – there’s a really interesting theme in the film about finding your true face – one character has to pull of his skin to discover what he really looks like, and Cronenberg has to put on a mask to reveal himself. And there’s so much random craziness that it’s hard not to recommend a viewing of the film – the parade of monsters that appear in Midian are impressive, featuring more unique creatures than anything this side of Labryinth. Also on the down side, though, is the film’s score, which is wildly inappropriate for the content of the movie, and borrows far too heavily from Danny Elfman’s other major film of that year, Batman.

If nothing else, seeing this film again succeeded in putting me in touch with the younger, more naïve version of myself that was actually capable of getting scared by movies. It’s also reminded me that I really should start reading Clive Barker’s books, since he seems to have quite an imagination on him, that one.

Download Natsukashi’s ‘Nightbreed’ podcast here

or enter the underworld to listen on our on-site player right here:

Our featured guest: Simon Bamford

Actor/writer/director Simon Bamford is quite the study in contrast. On-screen, he’s collaborated with pal Clive Barker on four occasions — the first two Hellraiser films, Nightbreed and, most recently Books of Blood.

You would hardly recognize Simon as the rather rotund Cenobite Butterball in Hellraiser, a role that he would reprise in the film’s sequel, Hellbound. And even though he would portray another otherworldly creature in Nightbreed, he did not have to endure as many hours in the makeup chair.

Most recently, Bamford was in Barker’s Books of Blood, a piece of fiction that is very personal to him, as he reveals on the podcast. He is currently working on the Nazi zombie film, The 4th Reich with makeup legend Tom Savini.

On stage, Bamford has portrayed everyone from lead Seymour Krelborn in the first UK tour of Little Shop of Horrors to Pip in the Stockholm production of Great Expectations (a role which one him an Actor of the Year award.

Simon also travels the horror festival circuit with his Cenobite buds, including Pinhead himself, Doug Bradley. We are grateful that Simon joined us from acrosss the pond to recollect his time spent on the set of Nightbreed.

For more on Simon, check out his site, SimonBamford.com.