Billy! What did you do to one of my favourite movies, Billy?!?

“Thanks” to Cinematical for directing me to this teaser.

Twitch Film has the lowdown on Douglas Buck’s remake of De Palma’s Sisters, including the trailer. I’m not sure if this is the regular trailer or one cobbled together for potential distributors, but it’s quite lengthy and gives away a fair amount, so be warned, if you haven’t seen the original there are a few spoilers.

I’m interested to see how Buck’s flat, emotionally distant style translates to this story. The trailer makes it seem almost as if it will be filtered through Cronenberg in much the same way De Palma channels Hitchcock.

“I also work for bullets.”

Thanks to The Movie Blog for bringing this to my attention.

The latest poster for this year’s installment of the Saw series has been retouched with a deeper shade of crimson. Actor Tobin Bell has donated a vial of his blood to be included in the first printing of the poster.

“We decided to do a poster and he’s wearing a red cloak. I was talking to the printer and asked what we could do to get the deepest blood red. I asked if it would be possible to use actual blood. There was silence. He said, ‘We could try, but are you serious?’ I said I was dead serious,” Lionsgate marketing honcho Tim Palen said.

If you’re looking to pick one of these posters up, good luck. It appears that the batch of unsigned posters has already been snatched up and all that remains are the autographed ones, which are going for approximately $500 as of this writing.

I’m a little shocked that this news is getting as much play as it is, or that the posters were snapped up so quickly. While I’m glad this brings both funds and attention to the Red Cross and their blood drives, isn’t this all just a little lame? Is Tobin Bell that much of a presence to merit this kind of exposure? I mean, he’s no KISS. Maybe I should pour a few drops into the podcast and see what happens.

What do you think? Is it a fresh idea or would Bell have been better off donating his blood to the Red Cross himself? Let us know in the comments below.

“The fans demand nipples!”

Filming has wrapped on canuxploitation creature feature Prey For The Beast and screenwriter Jeff O’Brien was kind enough to send some gory pics my way. It’s nice to see Jody Haucke making an apperance. He was hilarious in My Dead Girlfriend.

As I’m sure everyone is sick of hearing, Hostel was my favourite horror movie of the past few years. Even though I’m looking forward to the sequel, it’s with some trepedition. Now it appears that producer Quentin Tarantino is stacking the deck, making it near-impossible for me to dislike this film. Ladies and gentlemen, DVD Trash has the scoop on the lovely Edwige Fenech’s return to the silver screen.

Quoted as saying that he “knows all about my films” she was only to happy to agree to the role. This will be a return to the big screen for her after many years as a producer.

Swoon!

I received my copy of The Criterion Collection’s Jigoku today, and tucked away in the case was a postcard promoting their upcoming release of Divorce - Italian Style. I was so taken by Jaime Hernandez’ artwork on the postcard that it took me a second look to realize how macabre it actually is.

Of all the shows premiering this Fall, my most anticipated is Jericho. I’m a sucker for apocalyptic fiction, and an entire season of it is right up my alley. Show writer Jon Steinberg nailed the appeal for me with this quote from an article on the show.

“[We wanted] to tell a very big story in a very small place. There’s a tradition of it in features and not that much in TV. Sort of the ‘28 Days Later’ and ‘Signs’ and those kind of movies, taking that and building on a world like that.”

The first episode has been making its way around the internet for weeks now, so CBS has decided to give in an post an official release. Enjoy.

I can’t believe I nearly allowed this to pass me by. A few weeks ago cult DVD company Panik House announced that they were going to be releasing a special edition of Chained Heat. They also revealed that they had even bigger news on the horizon. This was big news in itself, since what could possibly be more exciting than Chained Heat? Well, last week they finally revealed their latest project.

Panik House is entering into a production partnership with Synapse Films to release seven more films from the Toei vaults. Five proto-Pinky Violence films and two films of a new genre: Pinky Horror!

Kaidan Hebi-onna; aka Snake Woman’s Curse This was the first of the Pinky Horror films released by Toei. It was helmed by master director Nobuo Nakagawa, who has been called the Japanese Hitchcock, and Akemi Negishi (Sex & Fury, Lady Snowblood) stars.

There’s been a bit of a Rampo resurgence recently. I admit that I had never heard about him until recently, but after reading a piece on his work in Rue Morgue I tracked down a few of his translated short stories and enjoyed them immensely. Also, I have Panik House’s release of Sex and Fury and it’s pure gold, so I have high hopes for these releases.

Eli Roth. Some people like him, others can’t stand him. And a few seem able to both like him and dislike him simultaneously. Considering the fact that I named Hostel my favourite horror movie of the past seven years, it’s probably a good bet that I fall into the former category. Now it seems you’ll be seeing a bit more of him next year with the release of Grindhouse.

Quentin Tarantino has cast Michael Bacall (CSI: Crime Scene Investigation), Eli Roth (Hostel) and newcomer Omar Doom in his half of GRINDHOUSE, the highly anticipated double feature he is making with Robert Rodriguez, which will include two films joined by faux ads and trailers. Rodriguez’s movie is called PLANET TERROR, while Tarantino’s movie is DEATH PROOF, a slasher flick. Bacall, Roth and Doom are cast in DEATH PROOF alongside Kurt Russell and Zoe Bell, Rosario Dawson, Vanessa Ferlito, Jordan Ladd, Rose McGowan, Sydney Tamiia Poitier, Marley Shelton, Tracie Thoms and Mary Elizabeth Winstead who were previously announced in July at the 2006 San Diego Comic Con International.

Roth’s return to his role as Justin from Cabin Fever in 2001 Maniacs was arguably the best part of that movie, so I’m looking forward to this.

I live in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, the nation’s capital and have done so for over four years now. I fucking hate Ottawa. Situated partway between Montreal and Toronto, Ottawa is passed over time and time again when it comes to really cool stuff, particularly when it comes to the selection at the horrorphobic repertory theatres in town.

That said, there is one area in which Ottawa seems to excel. I wouldn’t swear to it, but Ottawa must have one of the largest amounts of low-budget and no-budget horror filmmaking per capita in all of Canada. There’s Lee Demarbre of Jesus Christ Vampire Hunter fame, Brian Singleton’s Forest of the Dead, and the recent production of Jack Brooks: Monster Slayer starring Robert Englund. And then there’s the prolific Brett Kelly, with his steadily improving output of backwoods masterpieces. His last, My Dead Girlfriend, is one of my favourite films in what is turning out to be a remarkably strong year for horror and will be available late October through Tempe Video.

Last week local alternative rag Ottawa Xpress ran a profile on his next project, Prey For The Beast, a film which screenwriter Jeff O’Brien calls “Deliverance meets Night of the Demon”.

Oh, fuck yeah.

I’ve been on a Kaiju kick recently, spurred on by X-Y-Z-Cosmonaut’s run of Godzilla soundtracks I mentioned a couple weeks ago. In fact, I’ve compiled about 20 Japanese monster films that I’ll be plowing through in September. So the recent news that South Park creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone will be helming an homage to those films makes for a nice replacement for Snakes on a Plane in my heart.

They plan to follow with “Giant Monsters Attack Japan!,” a film scripted by J.F. Lawton (”Under Siege”) that will combine live-action with the “rubber suit” techniques made popular in Asian imports like “Godzilla.”

Parker will direct each film and Stone produce; both will work on the scripts with the writers. Sean Daniel and Nickelodeon will also be producers on “Giant Monsters.”

Nickelodeon? Oh, my.

Found via Bloody Disgusting.

As you may be aware, a remake of Universal’s The Wolfman is set to be released sometime in 2008 with Benicio Del Toro as the lead. Those who doubt Del Toro’s ability to play a lycanthrope need only view Big Top Pee-Wee where he starred as Duke The Dog-Faced Boy, his first appearance on the silver screen.

Found via the Dread Central forums.

“It was what I thought it was and as long as it was what I thought it was going to be fine, which was the movie that I used to leave home for on Saturday afternoon and go and see so I could scream real loud, yell and freak my friends out and do stuff in. It was all about a Saturday afternoon excitement film.” - Samuel L. Jackson

Snakes on a Plane opens this Friday, and I couldn’t be more excited. However, seemingly unlike the rest of the world, I’m not throwing my hands up in forced ironic anticipation. It’s driving me crazy seeing this referred to as a “bad” movie when all reports point that it actually takes itself fairly seriously within its premise. Regardless of how it plays out you can be assured that many moviegoers hoping for another Scary Movie won’t be expecting the level of violence that has been promised.

What’s happening to modern audiences? Why are so many moviegoers attempting to be more “hip” than some of the movies they watch. And why horror movies? People can suspend their disbelief for a movie where a flying man wears his underwear on the outside of his clothes, but a plane full of snakes is pushing it. I regularly see people who can swallow Lord of the Rings and Star Wars without batting an eye organizing “bad movie” nights that are comprised of anything but. It’s gotten to the point where some amateur MST3K players have created a ridiculously unfunny script to be yelled out loud during screenings of Snakes on a Plane, not unlike The Rocky Horror Picture Show.

It may seem that my stance is at odds with the Samuel L. Jackson quote above, but it was his response in interviews that first enticed me into wanting to watch Snakes on a Plane. Since the demise of the Grindhouse and Drive-In circuits, the rise of a monolithic studio system and the retreat of independent horror movie mavens to video, it’s rare that a fast-paced, goal-oriented, exploitation film hits the local theatre. I crave something that delivers exactly what it promises with no frills or tacked-on moral or ulterior motive. And it’s not that I’m against screaming out loud or freaking out friends in the theatre, I just prefer it to be somewhat organic, responding to what’s actually happening onscreen as opposed to ignoring the movie entirely and trying to entertain a roomful of strangers with preconceived notions or, God help us, a script.

To help combat this trend, The Horror Blog will be spending the next week with an emphasis on Snakes on a Plane. Fasten your motherfucking seatbelts.

Impossivel! In a world of pointless remakes and vapid WB actors, the reemergence of legendary Brazilian director Coffin Joe is an occassion to be celebrated. In a roundabout fashion Twitchfilm has discovered that Jose Mojica Marins aka Coffin Joe will be helming a new film this October.

There is no word whether Marins will be starring in this film or if he is solely present as director but, as Gananian points out this is Marins’ first major project shot on 35 mm film in almost thirty years - his last directorial effort of any sort was in 1987 - and anything that brings a cult legend out of retirement is a good thing.

My recent passion for foreign horror cinema has been tempered by the fact that, outside of Asia, very few countries seem to be creating worthwhile work like they did twenty to thirty years ago. Between this and the upcoming Italian Masters of Horror series, is it possible that we’re on the cusp of a foreign horror renaissance?