We Interrupt Our Regularly Scheduled Programming.....

Check out the All Together Dead blog for Halloween recipes, decorations, and more!

Oh, and there's also this STELLAR contest as well:



She is giving away a set of her very fab, very cool, and very spooooky labels. My head hurts with ideas of all the coolio things I could do with these.

But hurry, Saturday the 24th is the deadline to enter!

-Mother Firefly

Day 22 Part II: 'Vinny the P' Double Feature

What would the month of October be without a little Vincent Price? BORING, I say!

I love almost all Price's films, so it's always hard for me to pick. I try to watch House on Haunted Hill every October, but I blogged about it last year, so I thought I'd go with something else.

And why not a double feature while we're at it? Twice Told Tales and Tales of Terror are Two Tastes that Taste good Together.




These two films are available as a double feature from MGM Midnite Movies.

Twice Told Tales features three short movies based on the stories of Nathaniel Hawthorne, and Tales of Terror features the same except based on the stories of Edgar Allen Poe.


Twice has three stories: (directed by Sidney Salkow)
Dr. Heidegger's Experiment (with Sebastian Cabot - Mr. French!)
Rappaccini's Daughter
The House of the Seven Gables

as does Tales: (directed by Roger Corman)
Morella
The Black Cat (with Peter Lorre)
The Case of M. Valdemar (with Basil Rathbone)

Of the two films, I prefer Tales over Twice - but only slightly. Probably because I have more memories of it - especially The Black Cat.

And the REALLY cool part is - this MGM double feature is part of the 2 for $10 horror movie sale going on at Deep Discount till October 26th. There are other Price double features in the sale as well : Fall of the House of Usher/Pit and the Pendulum, Abominable Dr. Phibes/Dr Phibes Rises Again, Oblong Box/Scream and Scream Again, Masque of the Red Death/Premature Burial (although this is Ray Milland, not Price), and Theater of Blood/Madhouse. That's FOUR Vincent Price films for ten bucks, or what the hell, buy them all, have a film festival.

Link is HERE.

Day 22: Lemora: A Child's Tale of the Supernatural

Heaven knows I'm bogged down with about 30 movies that I haven't watched yet - before graduate school I used to keep up - maybe in the near future -with school almost done (!) I'll be able to catch back up.

But instead of going with something unknown tonight, I wanted to take time to watch one of my Halloween standbys - films I crave every October. And one of them is this relatively unknown little gem:




I don't think this film is as well known as I think it should be - and I really think it should be seen and talked about more. It's just so deliciously creepy and out there - there's really nothing else like it. I had never even heard of it until it was released on DVD a few years ago - and the description of it sounded so wonderful that I bought it without as seeing so much as a trailer. And I wasn't disappointed.




The movie is about a girl named Lila Lee - whose father killed her mother (and her lover) when he found her cheating on him. Since then, Lila has been raised by the local Reverend and has become revered for her heavenly singing voice. When Lila receives a letter from a mysterious Lemora (calling herself a 'fellow Christian'), who says that she has Lila's father and that she must come and see him before he dies - and also to tell no one about what she is doing or where she is going.

Lila takes off for the strange town of Astaroth, and ends up taking a very creepy bus ride that ends up being attacked - and ends with her waking up a prisoner in a little stone house, with this weird old lady calling her 'Mary Jo' (claiming Lila looks just like her) and singing creepy songs to her:

Lila escapes and crawls under the house, where she overhears a conversation between her father and a woman she will soon meet, Lemora. Lemora finds Lila and brings her into the house and gives her a room:

Soon we're introduced to Lemora's five 'adopted' children, none of whom look very healthy. They all pass around a goblet of something that looks very suspicious:

It's soon apparent that Lemora has some kind of plans for Lila - plans which won't come as much of a surprise to horror fans - but the way that the movie is executed is so bizarre, sensual, and creepy - it's really a feast for the eyes.


There's a lot of talk from Lila about what is 'sinful' (drinking wine, vanity) and how Lemora attempts to convince her otherwise. It's also evident that Lemora has tried to recruit other young women (the infamous Mary Jo, whose diary is found by Lila) and has failed in the past.


The rest of the movie is a wonderful gothic mix of vampirism, witchcraft, and some not so subtle overtures from Lemora towards Lila. Will Lila succumb to Lemora's spell? If you're a fan of horror from the 60s or 70s, I really suggest you check this morsel out and find out for yourself.....

Day 21: Ghoulies / Ghoulies II

Ghoulies is your typical boy - born - to -Satanists story, with Papa wanting to make him into a sacrifice and Mama thinking that's probably not the best idea she's heard this week:

She puts some kind of amulet on him that makes it impossible for Papa to touch him without getting some kind of electrical shock, so Papa orders Junior to be taken from his sight, and he's rescued by fellow Satanist and caretaker of the family's property, Wolfgang (played by the late great Jack Nance).

Then, boom, we're treated to a voice over from Wolfgang saying he only felt comfortable bringing Junior back years later after his father 'suffered a horrible death'.

Which leads to all kinds of questions regarding where Junior's been, who raised him, etc, - but this is the 80's, man! Who gives two craps about the plot! It's time for a PARTY!

Calvacade of 80's Awesomeness:


Pretty soon all Junior wants to do is hang around the house, paint weird symbols on the floor and do rituals and stuff. Must be in the blood, because he's pretty nonchalant when he manages to wrangle some lil demons from the other side. And I do mean 'lil'.


Do you think it might have been a budgetary thing?

Later he decides that the lil' demons aren't enough, so he calls in the big guns:
Oh YEAH.
(This was also the point that Papa Cash came in the living room, looked at the TV, looked at me (my sickly self curled up on the couch with cats and blankets) and said, 'Napping to bad movies today?' LOL

And soon we find ourselves having another party - a sunglasses party, it seems.

Getting down with the Git Down:

And then things progress from there, with the partygoers turning into Ghoulie Chow and Papa joining us from beyond the grave:

I wasn't scared by Ghoulies when I was a kid, but I was fond of it. I have to admit that it hasn't exactly held up through the years- it's more amusing to me as a time capsule of the 80's than anything else. There are some fun things to be seen here - the cameo by Bobbie Bresee (watch out for that crazy tongue action!), the goofy guests, the over the top performance by Michael DesBarres as dead Papa, - and I'm always a sucker for good old fashioned Devil raisin'.

I didn't remember being overly impressed with the special effects when I was a kid - even then I thought the Ghoulies could have been improved - but I was surprised just how kind of crappy they are.

The Ghoulies are slightly improved in Ghoulies II - which I ended up watching just because it came packaged with Ghoulies I. I just assumed I had seen it at some point - but I didn't remember this 'Ghoulies Join the Carnival' kooky thing. However, I am a sucker for movies that take place at the carnival (Freaks, The Funhouse, She -Freak, etc) so it was somewhat amusing for me from that perspective.

The Ghoulies hitch a ride on a bus called 'Satan's Playground' which is the haunted house attraction on the carnival. They hide out and for a while become part of the attraction itself, which the patrons actually enjoy and think is just part of the show. Sales increase and for a while, all is well.
The Ghoulies apparently like it too:
Ghoulies High-FIVE!!!

But nothing good lasts forever, and eventually the Ghoulies get ticked off and quit playin' nice. Then we have the you-knew-it-was-coming wacky rampage through the carnival. Ghoulie HiJinks for Everyone!!!!

Ghoulies II wasn't awful - it's nothing I'd buy by itself and I probably would never have watched it if it weren't on the B-side of Ghoulies I.
I'm certainly not dying to check out the next episode in the Ghoulies story: Ghoulies III: Ghoulies Go to College (!) It goes without saying that Ghoulies IV is probably not going to be in my DVD player anytime soon either. I'll just have to live with the unknown......

Going back to my couch,
Mother Firefly

Day 20: Halloween III: Season of the Witch

Even though I watch this film every October, this wasn't what I had planned on doing today. But since I ended up coming down with whatever Papa Cash had last weekend (and is still getting over), I didn't do a whole lot of anything today. Drinking juice and watching H3 was really all I wanted to do.


I love this movie - it's so flawed but it's also so FUN.

I'm too tired for a full review - instead I'll just touch on some of the things I adore about this film and why.

Let us explore its awesomeness, shall we?


1. Tom. Tom Atkins in a lab coat. Yum.



2. Creepy F**kin' Masks.



3. Robots! That bleed orange!


4. THAT dang song. You know you love it!


5. Creepy staring townspeople. (Check out Shamrock Savings!)


6. Going undercover as a married couple so they can investigate the mask factory!


7. And then taking going undercover a little too seriously.......
"If you'd feel more comfortable, I could sleep in the car.....be better than this floor, anyway."

"Where do you want to sleep, Dr Challis?'

"That's a dumb question, Miss Grimbridge."



8. The announcement of the 6 oclock curfew. (time to take yer kittens in!)


9. Don't stick that bobby pin in the damn mask holy shit cut it out cut it out


told ya so.


10. Take this mask - it's been through FINAL PROCESSING.


Don't believe me? Take a look:


11. Yep, that's one big chunk of Stonehenge you're looking at. You wouldn't BELIEVE how they got it there! Nope, you sure wouldn't.....in fact, it's so unbelieveable, we're just not going to tell you at all....


12. Sequence that you shouldn't think too hard about:
Watch the magic pumpkin!


My shamrock is glowing and my head feels all funny...


The snakes are scary and all, but the real killing power lies in the crickets and roaches:


BEST. REACTION. TO. AN. EVIL-TAKE-OVER-THE-WORLD-PLAN. EVER!!!


13. This set of shots:


14. Weird backwards partially tied down arm somehow manages to whip the mask...


right on top of the camera...PERFECTLY.


15. Yay! You did a good job defeatin' me and all.


16. LOL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


17. Pretend wifey turns out to be a Real Robot.




18.
Realizing today (after seeing this film fifty times) that if this had actually happened when I was a kid, I would have never been in danger of putting on one of these masks and having bugs and snakes eat my head.

Because I would have asked for one, and my mom would have said they were too expensive and " I am going to make your costume and you will be Wonder Woman and you will have HUMONGOUS fake boobs. Even though you are only eight."


True Story.

Ten more days till Halloween,
Mother Firefly