Describe your favourite fictional depiction of the Devil.

Bill Cunningham - DisContent

NSFW.

Curt - Beyond The Groovy Age of Horror

Hands down, flat-out, no competition whatsoever, the mold to break all other molds: Satan from Milton’s Paradise Lost.

Here’s a nice little article that outlines some of the character’s appeal.

On the other hand (waaaay on the other hand!), here’s a nifty little fragment of a folktale which I believe was probably simply invented by Haruki Murakami:

The aged Devil sat on a rock by the side of a Finnish country road. The Devil was ten thousand, maybe twenty thousand years old, and very tired. He was covered in dust. His whiskers were wilting. Whither be ye gang in sich ‘aste? the Devil called out to a Farmer. Done broke me ploughshare and must to fixe it, the Farmer replied. Not to hurrie, said the Devil, the sunne still playes o’erhead on highe, wherefore be ye scurrying? Sit ye down and ‘eare m’ tale. The Farmer knew no good could come of passing time with the Devil, but seeing him so utterly haggard, the Farmer–

Paul Corupe - Canuxploitation

There’s lots of good ones, but you gotta pick Ernest Borgnine in The Devil’s Rain. Why? 1. It’s Ernest Borgnine, for chrissakes, 2. he’s goat-faced, and 3. his goat face melts. Let’s see Tim Curry pull just one of those off.

Honourable mention: Captain DeZita in Glen or Glenda? and Billy Crystal in Deconstructing Harry (now you know how he keeps getting work!)

Sean T. Collins - Attentiondeficitdisorderly Too Flat

I’m a pretty big fan of Randall Flagg from The Stand, Pazuzu from The Exorcist, and the big evil demon guy from the “Night on Bare Mountain” segment of Fantasia. None of them are the capital-D Devil per se, but the essential idea is there.

Jeff O’Brien

Belasco in the old Ka Zar comic where Ka Zar goes through Dante’s levels of Hell. Follow up would be Al Pacino in The Devil’s Advocate.

Eric - Bloody Good Horror

Hands down it’s Al Pacino in “The Devil’s Advocate.” He is so good in that movie, that even Keanu Reeves and his disappearing accent couldn’t ruin it for me. His monologue at the end gets me every time. Pacino was by far the coolest depiction of the devil, but Tim Curry as “The Lord of Darkness” in “Legend” definitely gets an honorable mention for the best literal translation. The makeup job for that character is TERRIFYING.

Joakim - Mexploitation

Peter Stormare as Lucifer in “Constantine” is very good, as is Al Pacino in “The Devil’s Advocate”. Those are the more light-hearted ones, I can’t really think of a good “serious” fictional portrayal, although I’m totally convinced it should be possible to do and make very scary.

Donald May, Jr. - Synapse

Well, THE EXORCIST is one of my all-time favorite movies, but “the Devil” wasn’t really depicted as a visual being in that… but the atmosphere, and the Satanic reference, are the best in any film, in my opinion. As far as a “visual” depiction of “the Devil” I’d almost have to go with Alex de la Iglesia’s DAY OF THE BEAST… that scene with the circle and the demon was really amazing. Not too scary… just amazingly done. And the make-up was pretty awesome.

Nathan - MicroHorror

You know, it’s so easy to depict Satan as an over-the-top, cackling fiend. But if we posit that his goal really is to persuade all of humanity to bend to his will, don’t you think that he’d be a bit more suave? A bit more seductive? A bit more… polite?

Please allow me to introduce myself;
I’m a man of wealth and taste.

Jagger said it best.

Dave - Rue Morgue’s The Abbatoir

I love the woodcuts in old books depicting the devil as goat creature — always freaks me out a little. As such, I find the depiction of the Devil, using an actual goat, in Incubus (the Esperanto Bill Shatner flick from 1965) fantastically unnerving. Runners up: De Niro in Angel Heart, Peter Stormare in Constantine and some pieces of paper and the voice of Trey Parker in South Park.

Tim - Mondo Schlocko

Not the most frightening or most realistic but Peter Cook from the original BEDAZZLED. That man had so much charisma and charm and yet at the same time you never knew what sort of card he had up his sleeve.

Kimberly - Cinebeats

I have to go with Peter Cook in Bedazzled. He cute, charming and really wicked. Everything I imagine the Devil would be if there was such a thing.

JA - My New Plaid Pants

As opposed to my favorite non-fictional Devil?

Fiction: It’s a toss-up between Tim Curry in Legend and Lucifer in the Bible, I guess. They both have such sculpted and smooth crimson pectorals, I dare not choose.

Smartass. Thanks to all my diabolical cohorts for another edition of the Horror Roundtable. Make sure you check out their sites, and if you can think of other worthy contenders please consider sharing them with us in the comments below.

I’m off to Trash Palace in Toronto this Friday for a screening of the Bud Spencer poliziotteschi Flat Foot, which reminds me that I never did get around to talking about this wonderful cinematic experience.

In order to gain access to Trash Palace, you first have to buy a ticket at the Suspect Video store on Queen St. The ticket describes how to get to the secret location where the screening will take place. Dependent on how late you get there, the proprietors may throw the keys down to you so you can let yourself in. After climbing a set of stairs, you enter a darkened studio filled with screen printing equipment, Mexican movie memorabilia, folding chairs, gym mats and a makeshift screen against one wall. A small alcove to the side of the room contains the snack bar, where you can purchase popcorn in beautiful screen printed bags, assorted pop and candy and, most importantly, beer. This is truly the classiest movie theatre in all of Toronto.

What really sets Trash Palace apart from the vast majority of cinematic experiences I’ve had is the unbridled enthusiam of the hosts, Stacey Case and Matt Mullen. Before each screening they take a few moments to describe what you’re about to witness and why it’s worth watching, often interrupting one another in a manic effort to get the crowd riled up. Both before and after the film they present assorted educational shorts and trailers, letting things slide well past midnight like a party no one wants to be the first to leave for fear that they’ll miss something cool. I have never seen a movie presented with as much passion as the screening of Deathsport J. and I attended a few months back, with the duo going so far as to sincerely thank everyone for attending and making their dream of running a movie night come true. Their love for these films, and their glee in presenting them, is so overwhelming that during the credits for Deathsport Stacey came up to my seat and began discussing the merits of the score based solely upon catching me nod my head to the music.

If these guys weren’t able to share these treasures with others I think they’d explode. If you get a chance make sure you check it out, no matter what they’re showing.

Movies
D-War to get a sequel.
Rob Zombie on Superbeasto.
Midnight Meat Train trailer available.
Duchovny claims X-Files sequel ready to shoot.
Arguing about ‘torture porn’ sooo three weeks ago.
Uwe Boll returning to sub-genre that made him famous.

DVD
Children Shouldn’t Play With Dead Things DVD recall.

Interviews
David Cronenberg - C.H.U.D.
Jonathan Maberry - Blogcritics. Part 1. Part 2.

Movie Reviews
Death Proof- Spiked.
Dolly Dearest - Final Girl.
Death Note 2 - Comic Book Bin.
Spider Baby - Monsters and Critics.
The Dead One - Horror Movie A Day.
The House of Usher (2007) - C.H.U.D.
Reform School Girls - Horror Yearbook.
Resident Evil: Extinction - The Maneater.
Images in a Convent - Mad Mad Mad Mad Movies.
Satan’s Baby Doll - I’m In A Jess Franco State of Mind.

Television
Film.com investigates Moonlight.

Literature
Grip, an inspiration for Dickens and Poe.
IESB digs into Guts: The Art of Marketing Horror Films.
SkullRing bones up on The Encyclopedia of the Undead.
Stephen Bissette on Mario Bava: All The Colors of the Dark.

Comics
Kirkman on Marvel Zombies’ Civil War.
Artist Sean Phillips contributes his side of the story.
And Marvel Zombies cover artist Arthur Suydam for the win.

Gaming
Oh snap! Clive Barker disses Roger Ebert!
More on the Resident Evil 5 racism debate.
Demo for Clive Barker’s Jericho released today.
Domincan Today on the Resident Evil 5 racism flap.
Clive Barker’s Jericho may not be released in Germany.

Theatre
The Trades tackle Creatures From The Pink Lagoon.
Tobias Andersen, Ray Bradbury’s theatrical collaborator.

Magazines
Rue Morgue celebrates ten gruesome years.

Events
Edward Gorey exhibit in Toronto.

Misc.
Mutant space bacteria!
Five things about zombies.
Frankenstein as cultural icon.
Louis Fowler: Moral Crusader?
America’s Only Monster Fan Club.
And now, a message from Lamberto Bava.
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s seance obsession.
Grabm, I-Oneman, and more luminous monsters.
Just in time for tomorrow’s Roundtable, Satanic Vogue!
10 worst places to be trapped with a horde of vampires.

It was announced yesterday that the team behind Masters of Horror would be taking the concept to network television under the title Fear Itself. The wording in most of the news releases that I’ve seen have been ambiguous enough that many people firmly believe that this is a sanitized spin-off of Masters of Horror and not a replacement. Considering that each of the previous seasons of Masters of Horror have begun the week before Halloween, and the third season hasn’t been announced yet, I wouldn’t get my hopes up.

The main complaint this announcement has drawn is that the relatively relaxed guidelines of Masters of Horror will be lost on a network program. From a purely cynical standpoint, I think it’s genius. The version that actually airs on television will reach a much larger potential audience than the cable version and will sell to a completely different market when the unrated, uncensored DVDs are released. It will probably be the biggest divide between the original screening and the home release possible.

Mercenary reasons notwithstanding, I’m at least partially interested in this venture because there seems to have been very few anthology horror programs on network television in the past few years. That may seem very specific, but at least part of the reason I even got into horror was because there were programs on television that my parents had no problem letting me watch that came just up to the line without crossing it, yet still managed to pack a punch, if only to my underdeveloped mind. Shows like The New Twilight Zone, Amazing Stories, and Monsters, not to mention reruns of the original Twilight Zone and Night Gallery, none of which required tuning in each week to avoid losing track of the continuity. It’s one of the reasons I can respect a show like Supernatural even if it has a hard time retaining my interest. These shows aren’t necessarily meant for me. It’s the initiation for the next generation of horror fanatics.

Datajunkie has posted an article from an issue of TV Guide from 1958 concerning the burgeoning horror host phenomenon of that era. It never really hit me how popular these shows were.

“In staid Philadelphia, for example, a weirdie named Roland (he has an unseen creature named Igor who devours mailmen) presides at WCAU-TV. Roland has really become a Frankenstein. When he held a reception at the studio, devotees blocked traffic for hours, carried away Roland’s collection of shrunken heads and other trinkets, and threatened, for awhile, to dismantle the studio brick by brick.”

It’s a short but entertaining glimpse into another world, with pictures of the 13, 000 attendees from the above rally and portraits of Miss Tarantula Ghoul, Terry Bennett, Milton Budd and more.

Karl Hardman Schon has passed away at the age of 80.

Night of the Living Dead has often been cited as one of the turning points in Horror cinema history, if not the one great demarcation defining the latter half of the 20th century for the genre. With a legacy that colossal it’s sometimes easy to forget that it took a lot of faith and sweat just to get it made. Karl Hardman Schon was one of the architects instrumental in the creation of Night of the Living Dead. It’s easy to just cite his role as an actor in the film as the stubbornly antagonistic Harry Cooper, but his participation behind-the-scenes, while not as glamourous, is certainly worth pointing out. One of the ‘ten’ in Image Ten, the production company formed around the film, Hardman not only contributed cash to the budget, shot the production stills and helped with casting, but he also chose and edited the score and, with the help of his partner Marilyn Eastman, the sound effects. It’s safe to assume that without Mr. Hardman Night of the Living Dead, and modern horror cinema, wouldn’t be as we know it today.

A remembrance by his daughter, Kyra Schon, can be found here, and the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette has a guestbook in which people can leave their sympathies. An interview with Karl Hardman Schon and Marilyn Eastman can be found here.

Rest in peace, Mr. Hardman. And thanks.

It’s nice having a Project Wonderful ad that’s horror-related for a change.

Movies
Hellboy 2 set visit.
Teeth gets a release date.
Man, I love killer pig movies.
They Call Her Archive concludes.
Jack and Diane delayed. Dammit.
April Fool’s Day remake has begun shooting.
Eli Roth on Hostel 2 being banned in New Zealand.
Resident Evil: Extinction tops the weekend box office.
Eli Roth and Michael Dougherty to contribute to Heroes spin-off.
The Globe and Mail profiles Toronto’s Terrorfest at the Brunswick.
Is it wrong that at first I thought this was about Turkish Star Wars?
Kaufman made chairman of the Independent Film & Television Alliance.

Interviews
Dani Filth - Oh My Gore.
Uwe Boll - Onion AV Club.
Mike Carey - Nashua Telegraph.
Greg McLean - Shock ‘Till You Drop.

Reviews
Cujo - Arbogast on Film.
D-War - Stephen Bissette.
Death Proof - Darkmatters.
Yongary - Sci-Fi Japan. (Via)
Resident Evil: Extinction - The Toronto Star.
Resident Evil: Extinction - Horror Movie A Day.

Comics
The Origin of Marvel Zombies.
Ressurection explores alien invasion aftermath.

Gaming
Five things that suck about Bioshock.

Misc.
World’s strangest magazine filing system.

Name the horror-related item which you have spent the most money on.

Nathan - MicroHorror

Oh, that’s easy. I know I mentioned the Supernatural Law impulse buy a while back, but the single most expensive item is my complete series of the black-and-white hardcover Gemstone reprints of Tales From the Crypt, The Vault of Horror and The Haunt of Fear. The black-and-white editions are out of print now, and Gemstone is releasing reprints in full color, but the oversized black-and-white printing just makes Graham Ingels’s inks look so damn good. The set cost me about $300 all told, but it was worth every penny.

Sean T. Collins - Attentiondeficitdisorderly Too Flat

If I had to guess–and I do have to guess because I don’t keep track of these things and don’t really purchase anything more expensive than a DVD box set pretty much ever–I’d say the omnibus hardcover edition of Clive Barker’s Books of Blood. But now that I look I see that that was only $40, maybe $50 with shipping. So maybe the three-disc Dawn of the Dead set? But looking on Amazon that’s got a $50 list price, and there’s no way I paid list for it. Hm. I guess I’ve just never spent a lot of money on horror-related items.

Don May, Jr. - Synapse

I’m not big on memorabilia anymore (too much crap in my basement) but i remember spending a few hundred bucks on a really good looking “Freddy Glove” about 12 years ago. It was hand-made and had real sharp knives for fingers. It was amazingly dangerous… and, of course, still sits on a child-accessible bookshelf in my place. HAH! No worries, though… no kids live here!

Eric - Bloody Good Horror

Ooooh, this one’s easy. I’ve always been a huge fan of Chuck Jarman and “Bump in the Night Productions.” They’re a great little outfit that does some amazing mask and prop work (among lots of other stuff). Once they had some replica severed heads on sale that I think were left over from a movie shoot. The damn thing was like 275$, and I had no use for it whatsoever, so of course I picked it up. I did try and use it for a short film, but that never got finished and now it just sits in a box in my attic. It does make for a great story though, and I always get a laugh whenever I’m digging through boxes and I scare the shit out of myself when I find a severed head in one. Now, explaining this to new ladys in my life, that’s not quite as fun.

Dave - Rue Morgue’s The Abbatoir

Aside from the mummified body of Vincent Price, which I use to drive in the carpool lane, I think it’s the original French/ Eyes Without a Face/half-sized poster I picked up at ComicCon this year. The seller marked it down to $125 from $180, and I spent almost $200 more getting it framed. I love it!

(As far as my Price corpse goes, I don’t even wanna tell you what I shelled out for the hermetically-sealed case to keep it in mint condition. Getting it dipped in UV-coating alone almost broke the bank!)

Jeff O’Brien

Probably my first GOOD VCR back in the day so I specifically watch cool horror films like American Werewolf, The Thing, Dawn of the Dead etc.

Louis - Damaged 2.0

I have been lucky enough to find most of my horror junk at reasonable enough prices. I’ve probably spent the most on DVDs–box sets, bootlegs, etc. The Nightmare on Elm Street and Friday the 13th box sets come to mind immediately.

That’s a boring answer, I know.

OK. If it was possible, I’d totally pay a couple of hundred bucks for a night with Tiffany Shepis.

Bill Cunningham - DisContent

Ya know, thinking about it all, I would have to say my major horror expenditure over the years has been all the horor mags I’ve purchased. Individually not a lot (unless I’m looking for that one must-have thing to fill out a space in my Famous Monsters or Eerie collections) but overall it adds up into a big amount. I’ve been reading Fangoria since the beginning so yeah… oh my god.

I need to go throw up…excuse me.

And on that shameful note, we conclude this week’s Roundtable. Please show your appreciation by checking out the sites linked to above, and we’ll see you next week.

Movies
Horror director has competition to find new screenwriters.
The Horror Film and the Remake.
Tom Savini: The Motion Picture.
Joy Ride sequel! (Via)
Fright Night remake.
Mulberry Street joins Horrorfest 2!
A brief history of Space Vampires in the movies.
The Herbie-Scary Movie-Evil Dead 2 conspiracy.
Well-Made Monsters.
Satan vs. Atticus Finch.
The Mondo Esoterica Guide to Amicus Productions.

DVD
Could strong DVD sales prompt a second 28 sequel?

Interviews
Larry Fessenden - IFC.
David Cronenberg - Toledo Blade.
Milla Jovovich - Reelz Channel.
Milla Jovovich and Ali Larter - MovieFone. (Via)
William Friedkin - Greencine.

Reviews
Dragon Wars - ADDTF.
Dragon Wars - DisContent.
Halloween (2007) - Port Folio Weekly.
The Mist - AICN.
Wurdulak, a segment from Black Sabbath - The Hooded Utilitarian.
Dragon Wars - Damaged 2.0
Roger Corman Collection - LA Times.
Alligator - Fangoria.
The Witches’ Mountain - Horror Movie A Day.
The Ghost - Mad Mad Mad Mad Movie Reviews.

Comics
Marvel Zombies milked for all it’s worth.

Events
Zombie Olympics.
Night of the Creeps in Toronto tonight!

Misc.
Slime City director Greg Lamberson starts new horror site. (Via)
30 Days of… Zombie! (Via)
The kids love the Mothman.
Awesome Conquerer Worm ad.

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I just received a press release for a thriller called Deadly Suspicion. One part of the description caught my eye.

It’s not long before Heather discovers a fearful but manipulative matriarch and a house full of family skeletons that may prove deadly.

Wouldn’t it be nice if, just once, they really were skeletons? And not just ordinary skeletons, but magical reanimated skeletons, like in Jason and the Argonauts? How cool would that be? You could write copy just like the above, no one would see it coming, and the unsuspecting audience would flip the fuck out.

Jay, let’s get on this!

J. was adamant that we line up early for the Diary of the Dead premiere and for once not only were we on the same page but we actually made it work. We scoped the line three hours before the event, and already there were two people waiting. An hour later we returned and managed to snag a spot a few dozen people back. Quick film festival tip: You can usually count on the amount of people in front of you to expand by 50% to 100% by the time the doors actually open as friends let friends who let friends cut in with them. Never before have I stood in line for a movie longer than the running time of the screening itself. Considering that this was the world premiere of the latest film by the director of my favourite horror movie of all time I was willing to make an exception.

By the time we finally made our way inside, our line had wrapped around half a sizable city block and the rush line, that last great hope for people who couldn’t get tickets beforehand, had stretched out to well over one hundred people, only a handful of whom would be getting in. J. and I ran into the theatre and, while we still didn’t get the best seats in the house despite our preparations, we did manage to snag a couple of choice seats. Our appoach was slightly more practical than the crowds I saw standing in the aisles futilely trying to find both good seats and enough to accomodate their crew. I swear, I overheard one couple who, in the span of mentioning that they didn’t want to take two seats off to the side, realized that those seats and every other two-seat combo had already been taken. It was a madhouse.

This is all just preamble to set you up for what happened next.

There were two empty seats beside ours, right up against the aisle. Less than a minute after we sat down this guy comes over and asks us if we have an extra ticket. He said he managed to get in through the rush line, but his girlfriend had no such luck. In hindsight, his story doesn’t make much sense. Did they let the rush line in at the same time as the regular line? Why was his girlfriend in the regular line but not in the rush line with him? Regardless, I could relate, having been in tight spots similar to his, so I gave him a ticket to give to his girlfriend. Of course, now that he had the ticket he had to go outside and give it to her, thereby losing the two empty seats beside us. So he asked us, two complete strangers, if we could hold onto both highly accessible seats for more than ten minutes in the most chaotic theatre I had ever visited for the movie voted “most anticipated of the festival”. So we refused. He offered to leave his wallet as an assurance that he would be back. We refused even more forcefully, not wanting to take on the responsibilty of looking after a stranger’s wallet. We tried to explain that the theatre was entirely too busy to be saving seats. He ignored us, explained again that he would be right back, and took off.

We gave the seats to the first couple who asked.

About fifteen minutes later the guy returned and he was furious. He kept repeating that he had offered to leave his wallet and that the seats would have been his if only we had accepted it. He continued hollering about it for a few minutes, puffing up his chest, waving his arms around and glaring at the poor people who had taken the seats and who had no idea what was going on. I have to admit, I was at a total loss. I actually started laughing, which probably didn’t help any. Later J. claimed that it looked like he had wanted to start an actual fistfight. She says I could have easily shoved his enormous sense of entitlement down his throat (she’s so sweet), but I somehow doubt I could have taken a fight like that seriously enough to actually win. He finally ran out of steam and skulked off, and we explained the backstory to the people sitting beside us. A few minutes later one of our neighbours pointed out that the guy had crossed the theatre and was pleading his case with some of the volunteers. I missed it, which is too bad because if I hadn’t I would have taken a picture. Now that would have set him off.

And that’s my favourite memory from the Toronto International Film Festival Midnight Madness.

The Brooklyn Rail has posted a terrific little interview with Death Note director Shusuke Kaneko.

“At the same time the creepiest part of shooting was when Light was actually writing down the name. I was focusing on his hand; it’s only writing but at the same time it means he’s killing someone, it kind of symbolizes the death of another person. So for me it was a stressful procedure just to shoot that particular scene.”

What’s especially gratifying about it is the interviewer’s knowledge of the director’s intriguing career choices and Kaneko’s willingness to talk about it. They run through Kaneko’s past as a director on roman-porno, his miraculous revamp of Gamera, their favourite kaiju, and even talk about Death Note a little. The only thing missing is a discussion of Kaneko’s Godzilla, Mothra and King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack, possibly the best of the Millennium Era entries.