Wendigo

The girlfriend and I are about to sit down to the 2001 Larry Fessenden film, Wendigo.

 Not this particular Wendigo, though this one is the first thing I think of when I hear the word.

We've been on a slow Fessenden kick since having discovered his 1996 vampire film Habit a few months ago, which I ended up liking a lot. It was thoughtfully paced, had believable characters, and was set against an unmistakable and atmospheric 1990s New York City backdrop. It also had a very well-played "is she or isn't she an actual vampire?" angle that brought George Romero's Martin immediately to mind.

Wendigo has gotten some great reviews, so we're looking forward to it.

Bonus: Here's a great Onion A.V. Club interview with L.F.

"And now, the spider gets to give the bug a biiiiiig sting!"

This month's Film Club selection at Final Girl is the insane Jack Hill "classic," Spider Baby. As is mentioned in her update, you can get it via Netflix instant-watch, or even watch it fo' free right here, if you dare. Me and the girlfriend had the incredible good fortune to see this one on the big screen, at part of last season's Summer Camp Cinema Pay-to-Get-Out Horror Marathon, at the Cinema Arts Centre in Huntington.

Watching this flick in a dark, sweaty theater full of likewise sleep-deprived, overly-caffeinated movie fanatics was an unforgettable experience. It was as much an exercise in hilarious audience participation as it was a primal fight to maintain basic sanity. Absurdly fun.

Tonight on Syfy: Dinoshark

9pm Eastern! Roger Corman presents: Dinoshark!

Look at this thing. It's like a tyrannosaurus head stuck onto a shark body.

How can you even think about watching anything else?

Apparently Corman himself has a cameo as a marine biologist.

I still think the name "Syfy" looks like the hip new re-branding of The Syphilis Channel.

"So, how do you make a picture called Sharktopus?"

Roger Corman explains:

I started with this: The first one was DinoCroc and then DinoShark. And you could assume that there was a prehistoric crocodile and prehistoric sharks, so maybe there could have been dinocrocs and dinosharks. But there never was... a half-shark, half-octopus doesn't exist. So I had to come up with some way to justify this. My theory of this type of picture is, the audience wants to see it, based on the title, or they wouldn't turn on the channel.

Damn straight, I want to see Sharktopus.

Quote of the Day - February 22nd, 2010

Reason's Tim Cavanaugh, on the fact that the quality of the 1974 film Killdozer is guaranteed in its title:

You see Killdozer, you can rest easy, because you're gonna see a bulldozer that kills. Nobody ever watched Killdozer and then said, "The trailer made it look like there'd be more sex," or "I expected the puppetry to be better."

That brother's bite was outta sight!

Went to the charming video shop Mother's Movies in Patchogue today with the girlfriend, and we picked ourselves up a nice little smorgasbord of cinematic delights.

I snagged a double-feature of "Blacula," and the sequel with Pam Grier, "Scream, Blacula, Scream" on one disc, as well as the 1977 classic (not really a classic), "Tarantulas: The Deadly Cargo," which should pair nicely with a viewing of "Kingdom of the Spiders" (starring none other than Captain Kirk himself) later tonight.

Alli picked up a copy of "Food of the Gods," as well as a 1980 movie she'd just read about someplace, called "Without Warning." It's supposed to be a sort of proto-"Predator," inasmuch as it's about an alien coming to Earth and hunting people. The kicker is that apparently Kevin Peter Hall, who wore the Predator suit in both of those movies (as well as the sasquatch suit in "Harry and the Hendersons!") plays the alien in this movie, too. Fun!