I watched Hellraiser (1987) the other day and quite liked it. Pinhead and his BDSM crew are way oversold in this movie. From the way everyone I've ever heard hypes them up, you'd think the movie was wall-to-wall Pinhead shredding people. Instead they're mostly offstage, though they are reasonably threatening when they do show up. The real villain ( Read more... )

Speaking of Liam Neeson, I just watched Ethan Frome while it's free on Netflix in order to see Neeson in his early or wolfhound-puppy stage of existence. Ended up liking the movie as a whole much more than I'd thought I would, and I recommend the experience. It's a lovingly book-accurate film that hits every high point from the Wharton book and ( Read more... )

I read this on the bus journey from Los Angeles to San Francisco. It beguiled the tedium of the journey. I don't know if I would have been able to hold still long enough to finish it if I hadn't been stuck on a bus ( Read more... )

The only thing I don't like about Eye of the Devil (1966) is its name. They're not really Satanists. I understand the movie was to be named "13" for a long time, but the production was fraught and it got a more lurid name late in the production process.

Kestrell and Alexx gave me this movie on a thumb drive back in October 2015, and I finally ( Read more... )

I've been taking the T to work lately, to give myself more time to read. I recently finished Trilby by George du Maurier, grandfather of the more interesting of the du Mauriers. This is the not-quite-supernatural-horror novel that gave the world the term "Svengali" for a hypnotist or a controlling older man with young female puppets ( Read more... )

I just saw The Woman in Black at the Davis Square Theatre, and it's excellent. There are two more performances left, tomorrow and Wednesday; they're putting the show on in a blaze of no publicity at all, during the nights the theater can spare around its other shows. It should get more attention. The actors, Brian Savage and Ben Lewin, play a ( Read more... )

I just read Edgar Pangborn's Davy, which I've had built up for me as a stylistic masterpiece. It didn't even start to live up to my expectations. It was a mildly interesting read about a teenaged boy being awesome and having improbable amounts of sex in the far future hundreds of years after The Apockyclipse, or something. I liked the made-up slang ( Read more... )

The production runs Sept. 17 through Oct. 4, at Salem Theatre, 90 Lafayette Street, Salem, MA. Dates and more details here.

I went to see the production on its second night, with my friend G. I had no idea what to expect, never having heard of Salem Theatre till this production occurred. The space is a tiny storefront theater, with no lobby and a ( Read more... )

sovay has established a Patreon, for the purpose of writing and posting film reviews. This is great news--I've enjoyed reading her reviews for years, but time and money concerns have often forced her to focus on other things recently. I'm delighted that this situation may soon change ( Read more... )

Two very solid horror/comedy movies from New Zealand, which is apparently full of horror nerd filmmakers with small amounts of money and lots of love for genre films. I'd had no idea.

I just got back from seeing What We Do In The Shadows, which spoofs every vampire movie I can remember seeing. Silly mockumentary about three idiot manchild ( Read more... )