Here's my last TPB appearance of 2020 (and the last one till December 2021!).
From TPB's site:
Special Guest: Miguel Llanso Guest Co-Hosts: Mark Begley, Chris
Stachiw
We're looking at
Miguel Llanso's Crumbs (2015),
the story of a post apocalyptic future where items from the past are given
special significance as our hero, Candy (played by Daniel Tadesse), goes on a
quest, first to see the witch and then to see Santa Claus.
A mish-mash recipe for your Thanksgiving holiday festivities. Two parts Why
Didn't I Rent This, one part Cleo, a sprinkle of watch list recs, and a dash of
DEVO. Happy(?) Thanksgiving from the WUH Family to yours!
And enjoy this TV spot for Motel Hell, and the video for DEVO's Freedom of Choice. Did both of these put the whammy on my 11-year-old brain in the Summer of 1980? We may never know the answer, but I'd like to think so.
WUH x TPB + Cronenberg = An Awesome October (Part 2)!
Just four years and two films later Cronenberg would direct what some consider
to be his first masterpiece, The Brood (1979). Drawing from his
own tumultuous divorce and custody battle Cronenberg chills viewers via the
frigid Toronto landscape and disquieting imagery of Frank and Nola Carveth's
upended world.
The Brood is the story of the Carveth family and how the sins of
the past visit the children of the next generation. Frank (played by Art
Hindle) and his wife Nola (played by Samantha Eggar) have separated. She’s
under the care of Dr. Hal Raglan (played by Oliver Reed). He’s the head of the
Somafree clinic and has mastered the art of psychoplasmics where negative
thoughts and feelings are manifested physically. These come in the form of
rashes or lesions or, in the case of Nola, a group of odd creatures who go on
a murderous rampage when her ire is raised.
I've teamed up with Mike White yet again, this time for a crossover event
between WUH and TPB on two films by acclaimed director David
Cronenberg. First up is Shivers (1975).
After directing two experimental films (Stereo and
Crimes of the Future) David Cronenberg realized that if making movies would be his vocation he
would need to do something "commercial." And at the time commercial, more
often than not, meant exploitation. Inspired in part by a nightmare he'd had
Cronenberg set about to write a screenplay for the Canuxploitation Pioneers at
Cinepix. What emerged was Shivers, which introduced audiences and critics to a new kind of horror film and
courted controversy not only for its subject matter but also for its manner of
funding. In Shivers Cronenberg's secular world view and body, or venereal, horror is
present from the start.
Shivers stars Paul Hampton as Dr. Roger St. Luc, Lynn Lowry as Nurse Forsythe, Susan Petrie as Janine Tudor, Allan Kolman as Nick Tudor, and Barbara Steele as Betts, all residents of the luxury apartment complex Starliner Tower. The film also features the inimitable Joe Silver as Rollo Linsky. Dr. Emil Hobbes’ experiment with "helpful" parasites has gone awry and now the tenants of the Starliner are under attack by the polyamorous creatures. Can the residents of the Starliner stop the infection from spreading to nearby Montreal and beyond? Or do they even want to?
This episode also features an interview with Luke Aspell, author of the Shivers monograph from Auteur Publishing. Purchase your copy here.
No, I'm not giving a clinic on Cronenberg (I wouldn't presume to be an
expert all of a sudden) although, since March of this year I think I've taken
one myself! This is more of a primer for the upcoming Cronenberg Crossover event
with
The Projection Booth Podcast. Having read, watched, and absorbed so much Cronenberg over the last seven
months it only seems natural that all the connections in his work would settle
in and demand exploring. Plus, the title is a nice little pun since so many of
his early films feature a Clinic of one sort or another. And I like puns! AND I
get to use this awesome player image again! Win, win.
Look Ma, I made it! Here it is, my first appearance on The Projection Booth
podcast. Here's the description from their site:
"On this special episode of The Projection Booth we're looking at the 2019 film
from director
Orçun Behram, The
Antenna. The film stars Ihsan Önal as Mehmet, an overseer of an apartment
building in Turkey. We begin the film on the day when a new satellite dish is
being installed that is part of a new era for the country where the government
can now broadcast directly to its citizens’ televisions. Let’s just say that
this isn’t the utopia that was promised.
David Rodgers
and Mark Begley join Mike to discuss the the film which will play in select
theaters starting October 2, 2020 and on VOD starting October 20, 2020."
The Sender (1982) is a horror film directed by Roger Christian and starring Zeljko
Ivanek as The Sender, Kathryn Harrold as Dr. Gail Farmer, and Shirley Knight as
Jerolyn. Two years before Freddy terrorized the kids on Elm Street, John Doe 83
would project the power of his dreams onto the patients and staff of a mental
hospital in the town of Corinth.
John Doe 83
aka The Sender tries to commit suicide by walking into a lake with rocks in his
pockets. He ends up in a mental hospital where Dr. Gail Farmer instantly
sympathizes with him. John Doe’s mother, Jerolyn, has convinced her son that
his was a virgin birth and keeps him locked up at home in fear he will leave
her. The Sender can telepathically transmit his dreams into others, which
causes the receiver to hallucinate.
Most of the WDIRT episodes have been about movies I passed on in the VHS days, or like last time with Visiting Hours, didn’t remember seeing. In this case, though, I thought I had seen it, but nothing hit my memory banks when I finally got to watch it.
It's strange, strange times right now, and it's affecting everyone in myriad ways. For me, it's made it a little more difficult to record regular episodes, so I'm fashioning these shorter hodge-podge shows to keep in touch and say howdy. There will generally be some movie recs, maybe a chat with my daughter about things we've watched, and even some feelings about sheltering-in-place. All episodes will be posted here.
In 1983* Sam Raimi and Co. took the horror world by the neck and shook it until it begged for mercy. The Evil Dead caught the attention of Stephen King at the 1982 Cannes Film Festival and his pull-quote, "The most ferociously original horror film of 1982," placed it on every genre fan's must-watch list. Coverage from Fangoria, along with great notice from a string of festival appearances, helped solidify its notoriety.
Made on a shoe-string budget in the woods of Tennessee by a bunch of friends from Michigan, the movie was an exercise not only in scares and gore, but in moxie and gumption. Before the film was even begun the trio of Sam Raimi, Bruce Campbell, and Rob Tapert formed Renaissance Pictures and took the business side of low-budget films seriously. They produced an instant classic that has withstood the test of time and spawned a franchise that has lasted 35 years.
Ash, his sister Cheryl, his girlfriend Linda, and they're friends Scott and Shelly take a little vacation to a dilapidated backwoods cabin and accidentally summon demonic forces. By the end of the night only Ash survives. Or does he? The Evil Dead may be short on story but it's long on dread, gore, and inventive film-making. Whether you're a die-hard fan of the original, like me, or a lover of the "better in every way" requel, like my guest, or even if you prefer Army of Darkness for some reason, you'll find something to like in this episode. Heck, I even like the 2010 reboot!
For this episode I am once again joined by Mike White from The Projection Booth Podcast. As mentioned in the episode you can also listen to Mike, along with Chris Stachiw, jaw on about Barney Miller and '85 Twilight Zone. And here's a video about the "Bollywood Evil Dead" Mike mentioned in the episode. Enjoy!
*The date of The Evil Dead is a bit confusing. The copyright date, which is what I'm using, is 1981. The film wasn't officially released until 1983. It played Cannes, and other festivals, during 1982.
The Tenant was directed by Roman Polanski, who also stars as Trelkovsky a mild-mannered file clerk looking for a new apartment in Paris during a housing shortage. He finds a not-quite-vacant room in an American-owned building, but the last tenant, Simon Choule, is clinging to life after throwing herself out of the apartment's window. When the apartment becomes available Trelkovsky moves in and his life becomes a nightmare of paranoia and delusion.
Much like Polanski himself, and Roland Topor who wrote the source novel, Trelkovsky is a Polish-Jew who has immigrated to Paris. His "otherness" becomes a source of derision for his neighbors, the apartment's management, the police, his coworkers, and even the denizens of a local cafe. Trelkovsky becomes convinced that everyone is trying to change him into Simone Choule and make him suffer the same fate. He finds solace with Mlle. Choule's friend Stella, played by Isabelle Adjani, but comes to believe she is in on the conspiracy as well. Are they trying to change him into Simone, or is it all in his head?
The Tenant has been lumped together with Polanski's other films, Repulsion and Rosemary's Baby, to form the so-called Apartment Trilogy. All three deal with isolated and insulated characters whose sanity cracks until they can no longer tell what is real and what is only in their imaginations.
For this episode I am joined by film journalist Anya Stanley. Ms. Stanley's work has been seen in Birth Movies Death, Rue Morgue, Dread Central, and several other film publications. She's currently a columnist for Fangoria, exploring horror from a gendered perspective with her column Rated XX/XY. You can find her on Twitter as @BookishPlinko. And here is her great piece Who Gives a Shit if the Oscars Don't Respect Horror?
It's the 30th anniversary of my semester in London and I've recently been thinking a lot about my time there. For a budding cinephile the repertory cinemas were a revelation to me and I formed many of my fondest movie going memories during my stay.
In this episode I run through the films I saw, and some I didn't, at those marvelous movie houses: the Scala, Electric, Phoenix, Riverside, and Everyman cinemas.
As I recorded the episode I noticed a few running themes based on my viewing history: American Indie films of the late '80s, New American Cinema classics from Scorsese and Coppola, and a slew of Wim Wenders, Russ Meyer, Jack Nicholson, and David Lynch flicks.
A brief look back at Wake Up Heavy's first full calendar year on the ol' podcast trail. A hazy look forward, plus some of my favorite "first time watches" from the year.
I mentioned Peter Ivers in the episode, and instead of making you chase down the articles I read, here they are:
