Titans Terrors and Toys

Stop me if you heard this one: A group of people become stranded on a desert island . . . where they encounter a horde of monsters that viciously kill them one at a time! Oh, you have heard of that? Well, what if the island monsters were the product of MAD SCIENCE! BWHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! So you've heard of that one too. OK, Mr. Smarty Pants--what if the mad science was NAZI mad science and the monsters were MICROSCOPIC FLESH EATERS!!! That's the premise of The Flesh Eaters , a creature feature that was originally released back in 1964 and the only movie ever directed by Jack Curtis. The movie's plot follows a charter airplane pilot, an alcoholic actress and her comely assistant, a marine biologist and a shipwrecked beatnik as they struggle to find their way off of an uninhabited island that's surrounded by the titular flesh eaters, whose presence render the ocean water around the island acidic. For as grim and gory as this premise sounds, don't be fooled-- Th...

If you're a fan of The Fly movies, check this out: The cover story of the latest Rue Morgue issue is a retrospective devoted to the five Fly films. The retrospective's features include an interview with David Cronenberg, where he briefly mentions the "oblique" sequel script he has written to his 1986 version of The Fly , as well as a look back at the original Fly trilogy and its respective man-fly monstrosities. A noteworthy highlight in this issue is the interview with Chris Walas and Eric Stolz about The Fly II , which provides some fascinating insight into the production of this troubled sequel. Judging from Walas' comments about the original story that he had in mind, The Fly II could have been a much more worthy continuation of Cronenberg's movie had the studio heads just let him do what he wanted instead of forcing him to restructure his story to target a particularly desirable-yet-misunderstood audience demographic. Not to be left out of this...

Now that I have your attention, I just thought that I'd let you know that the fine folks over at the Fierce and Nerdy site have asked me to contribute a few thoughts about the best holiday of the year, Halloween. In my post, I write about how much I enjoy Halloween and why, how horror film fans can best celebrate the holiday, and suggestions of what you can do if you're stuck in a community that treats Halloween like Satan's annual membership drive. You can read the post here .

Last August, I saw on the Tears of Envy blog a link to a post in The Guardian 's Film Blog called "Where's the thrill in today's cookie-cutter monster movies?" by Phelim O'Neill. In the post, O'Neill bemoans the lack of creativity in recent movie monster designs. As his post states, "The big movies this year have been full of monsters, aliens, robots – all sorts of creatures and creations. On the surface, there's never been a better time for lovers of monster movies. But when you look closer at the beasties themselves, you see how similar they are to one another; how they look like they were clumsily Frankensteined together from existing ogres. In truth, there's never been a worse time for movie monsters." Personally, I think that O'Neill has it all wrong--not so much about movie monster designs, but about monster movies in general. The overwhelming majority of creature features are usually cheap rip-offs of superior films, both...

In last week's episode of Criminal Minds , "Painless", survivors of a devastating high school killing spree are being murdered by a similar killer on the eve of the spree's 10th anniversary. While the episode was probably written with real-life high school tragedies such as the Columbine massacre in mind, it was very similar in its style to slasher films where the killer is motivated to seek revenge against those who he/she believes to be responsible for some past trauma. Thus, this Criminal Minds outing reminded me of classic slasher flicks such as Prom Night and Happy Birthday to Me . It also reminded me of Epitafios , a 12 episode mini-series from Argentina that was produced by HBO Latin America in 2004. Epitafios follows ex-detective Renzo Márquez (Julio Chávez) as he investigates a series of gruesome murders that are somehow linked to four students who died during a high school hostage situation five years earlier. The series' title is a nod to the kil...

Being a horror movie fan requires a bit of effort to get the full benefits that this genre of cinema has to offer. There are the horror classics that everyone knows about (fan or not), classics that are usually easy to find for rental or purchase. Then there are the horror films that are heavily promoted by the big studios regardless of their actual quality; these too are easy to find and most people have heard of them. Yet there's another category of horror films, films that few people know about but are well worth seeking out because they provide shocks and shivers in ways that most mainstream and classic horror films don't. Such is the case of The Poughkeepsie Tapes , a found footage mockumentary film that was directed by John Erick Dowdle and written by Dowdle and his brother Drew Dowdle. I heard about Poughkeepsie Tapes back in 2007 when it was playing the indie film festival circuit. I didn't do much to look for it because on the basis of the brief plot summary t...

Check this out, and it's just in time for the second season premiere of AMC's The Walking Dead : According to the Omaha World-Herald , the Westlake Ace Hardware chain of stores in Nebraska have rolled out "Zombie Preparedness Centers". This Halloween season ad campaign involves posters, buttons, and store employees who offer advice on which tools, cleaners and locks are most effective at fighting off hordes of the ravenous undead. Click here to read the whole story. Also check out the official Westlake Ace Hardware Zombie Preparedness Center site . This site offers zombie defense and zombie proofing tips for humans, as well as bodily repairs and home and lifestyle tips for zombies. (Ace's site is "equal zombor-tunity", so it doesn't discriminate between the living and the reanimated.) This reminds me of the Preparedness 101: Zombie Apocalypse blog post that the Center for Disease Control (CDC) published last May, which later included an inte...

As a Wii owner from the days of its first release, I'm very familiar with the handful of titles that Nintendo has produced over the years to introduce gamers to what the Wii's motion-based controllers can do. First, Wii Play and Wii Sports were released to show the unique game play opportunities presented by the Wiimote. Then, Wii Fit was released to demonstrate the capabilities of the Wii Balance Board. When Nintendo modified the Wiimote with the Wii MotionPlus accessory, it was bundled with the Wii Sports Resort game so that gamers could see how the new accessory enhanced Wii game play through greater accuracy. Each of these titles are great to play, but they were obviously designed and marketed as software to demonstrate Wii's hardware capabilities. Wii Play Motion is a sequel to Wii Play , one of Wii's aforementioned demo titles. From what I've heard, Wii Play Motion is intended to demonstrate the Wii Remote Plus, which is bundled with the game. Th...

Last Halloween season, I published a post about the work of Georgette Gaynor, a self-taught monster maker who uses her creepy creations to benefit local charity events in southern Virginia. She's still at it and this time, her life-sized superfreaks are going to the theater! Gaynor's monsters will be available for bidding and purchase at The New Colony Theater in Portsmouth, VA during the following events: * The Monster Walks, which will be held from 6 to 8 p.m. on October 15, 28 and 29. Admission for the walks is $2 per person, and everyone is welcome. * The Zombie Party, which will be held from 6:30 to 9:30 p.m. Admission for the party is $25 per person and $40 per couple, and RSVPs must be made by October 7. Click here to see a copy of the invitation. The Zombie Party is aimed at adults (the dress code is "zombie chic") and it includes a performance by the award-winning Viginia Youth Symphony Orchestra (VYSO) , which will perform music from Phantom of th...

I don't know who'd have a scalpel big enough to look inside of these guys, but here are two full-color anatomical paintings of Godzilla and Hedorah (a.k.a. The Smog Monster). I found these over at the Monster Brains blog , although the original artist has yet to be identified. I'm guessing that King Ghidorah probably stepped on him before he could sign his work. Update, 10/7/11 : I just found some additional anatomical drawings of kaiju over at the Pink Tentacle site. This set includes another drawing of Godzilla, as well as pictures of Anguirus, Gamera, and Mothra larva.

Apparently, somebody doesn't like Dwayne. This commercial, which is titled "State of Chaos", relishes in kaiju humor, particularly with two of its 'victims' nonchalantly commenting on what the rampaging giant robot is doing to Dwayne's property--and finally Dwayne. Such humor suggests that the writer of this commercial took a page out of artist John Brosio's playbook when creating this ad for State Farm. If that is so, then I think that the folks at State Farm do not understand the Paul Verhoeven-esque satire that results from applying the style of someone like Brosio to an advertisement for an insurance company. Man, that robot does not like OCP executives. For more rampaging robot fun, go to State Farm's Chaos in Your Town site . (Trust me, it’s worth the visit.) You can also learn more about the commercial's production here and here .