Tonight's horror film is:

The Beyond

Okay...Not a hit. Don't get me wrong, it's got some great horror scenes and it meets the Italian horror weird-out criteria, but it just didn't live up to my expectations. I shouldn't be surprised. I said I'd only watch film I haven't seen and though this was shown at one point or another, I didn't actually watch it. I didn't understand it then, so I chalked that up to not paying attention. Well an attentive viewing didn't fix this.

"The Beyond" is essentially a ghost story. A woman inherits a hotel in Louisiana and moves in to try to restore it to it's former glory. However, way back in the past, a warlock was crucified in the hotel for trying to open a gate to hell. Later we find the hotel was BUILT to be a gate to hell. Madness ensues.

I watched it. I get it, but like other Fulchi films, he leaves out WAY TOO MANY bits of explanation and you are left to guess what happened or just accept it as is. So I accepted it and just watched the blood flow. Which, I might add, there is a lot of. Tons of good gory stuff. But don't look for deep, intricate plot.

This is another one of those video wallpaper films. PERFECT for a party or to have on at a video store. The soundtrack is also TOP NOTCH. Not a great film, but I've seen worse (that French clown vampire film, which we won't speak of, comes to mind.)

Tomorrow night's film: 1408

Tags: a month of horror, the beyond

Tonight's horror film is:

The Hills Have Eyes (Original)

Wow! I liked that. Not FANTASTIC, but quite passable. Very freaky, especially after I read that it's based on the legend of Sawney Bean. Sawney Bean and his clan were Scottish cannibals in the 16th century.

"The Hills Have Eyes" is about a family of back-to-the-wild feral cannibals that live in the rocky hills of New Mexico. They eek out a living robbing and trading with their grandpa that owns the only gas station in miles. One day a family of 7 on their way to California go off the beaten path and have a break down. Soon they are fighting for their survival and it's a desperate fight at that.

Too be honest, I didn't really like the family. I found myself rooting for the cannibals. Not that the family deserved to be attacked, but they did a REALLY shitty job of organizing themselves after the breakdown and defending themselves once the sun went down. It's hard to feel sorry for people when you spend so much time saying "No you dumbasses! Stay together! Don't split up! Argh! Save your bullets!!!" There were some pretty vicious moments and lots of tension. It's just a little sad when the family dog (Beast) is smarter and braver than the whole family put together. I liked that dog.

"The Hills Have Eyes" is worth the rental and you may even want to buy it. I totally see this as a good party film.

Tomorrow's film: The Beyond

Tags: a month of horror, the hills have eyes (original)

Tonight's horror film is:

Prom Night

Let me start this off by saying that I'm not a fan of "Halloween", the original film. I do like slasher flicks, but "Halloween" just doesn't do it for me. But, I figured I'd give Jamie Lee Curtis another shot with "Prom Night". Well, sorry to say it didn't rock my world. Hell it didn't rock my chair. But I'm now pretty sure that it isn't anything REALLY wrong with "Prom Night" or even "Halloween". It's Jamie Lee Curtis.

Corin and I discussed this and we think part of the problem is that she is not a believable teen. She looks more like a psych undergrad at best, but more like a mom or a teacher. I just can't roll with the idea that she's a silly teen that is gonna get in to harms way. I expect her to be in bed by 9 with a romance novel. In addition to this, I don't find her sexy or attractive or likable enough to care what happens to her. She's the same character in every movie. She's the "safe bet" kind of actress. I get the same vibe from Julia Roberts. Sorry, just not interested.

"Prom Night" has a solid enough story: a group of school children accidentally kill a kid while playing a game and swear to keep it secret and say it was an accident. Flash forward to senior year (and in Curtis's case I do mean senior) and it's prom season. Too bad all the kids involved are getting death threats. Hmmmm, I know what they did last summer....

I enjoyed the fat kid with the boogie van that gets laid. There were some awesome '80s shower scenes and they didn't do anything wrong with the death or gore. It just didn't add up to win. Sorry Jamie, I just don't buy it.

Tommorow night's film: The Hills Have Eyes (Original)

Tags: a month of horror, prom night

Tonight's horror film is:

Dellamorte Dellamore (or Cemetery Man)

"Dellamorte Dellamore" ("Cemetery Man" in the US release) is another Italian zombie film, with more than a few twists. Rupert Everett plays "Francisco Dellamorte", the cemetery keeper at the small Buffalora cemetery. He (and his sidekick Gnaghi) keep the place clean, water the flowers and kill the dead when they inevitably rise seven days after dying. All Dellamorte want's is a little love. Enter "She", played by the blood pressure raising Anna Falchi (NSFW). Alas Dellamorte learns love is lost easily and much like the dead, it returns again and again.

This film is at heart a black comedy with high quality gore and special effects (okay, the foxfire was a bit cheezy.) If you enjoyed the Sam Raimi "Evil Dead" films or Peter Jackson's "Dead Alive", you will love this. It is surreal and equal parts beautiful and gross. I love the dead motorcycle gang leader returning to the dead (complete with zombie motorbike). Naghi's doomed love affair was also a fun subplot. I really liked this one.

Tomorrow night's film: Prom Night

Tags: a month of horror, cemetery man, dellamorte dellamore

Tonight's horror film is...

Dead & Buried

Welcome to Potter's Bluff. It's a quaint little seaside village with a general store, a gas station and a diner. Sheriff Gillis keeps the peace and William G. Dobbs is the town mortician. Everything is idyllic, until people start dying. Sure their just strangers passing through, but Sheriff Gillis is determined to dig up some clues and get to the bottom of it.

I really liked this film. James Farentino play Sheriff Gillis (think Roy Scheider, but a little more paunchy). The murders get stranger and more mysterious. People start to act differently. There is a high creep factor, Grampa Joe from Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory and a young Freddie Kruger. On top of all of this (almost all) the effects are by Stan Winston. The directing totally reminded me of Jaws. The cinematography was good too, very eerie and unnerving.

Tomorrow night's film: Cemetary Man

Tags: a month of horror, dead & buried

October's here and that means scary movies! Now I love horror films and watch them all the time. However, this October I am setting up a personal challenge:

I will watch a horror film a day for the whole month! I'm going to go with films I haven't seen to keep it interesting.

Today's pick is Lucio Fulci's "City of the Living Dead". I'll be posting a review of each film. I may not put them up right on the day, but I will be editing the posts to include a review.

Feel free to leave suggestions, but understand that I've seen a lot of stuff, so don't be surprised if I have already seen it!

The City of the Living Dead

Fulci's "City of the Living Dead" is another Italian zombie movie and the first in his unofficial "Gates of Hell" trilogy (the second being "The Beyond" and the third being "The House by the Cemetary".) The running theme is that the gates of hell keep opening and dashing heroes have to keep closing them.

This time a priest (for reasons not explained) hangs himself on sacred ground causing all hell to break loose and brings the recently dead back to life. He keeps appearing to people just before they get eaten or brained by a zombie. The town of Dunwich (Lovecraft anyone?) isn't prepared for the horror Father Thomas unleashes. Obviously the plot is a little thin, but the sets are great and the special effects are top notch.

Lots of scares and memorable gore make this a fine pick for any zombie enthusiast. Just beware the last 5 seconds of the film make NO (ZERO, ZILCH) sense and almost wrecks the whole film.

Tomorrow night's film: Dead and Buried!

Tags: a month of horror, the city of living dead

WOW. Tweakbench.com has some AMAZING VST plugins. Small, efficient, unique. I *love* all the free VSTs out there that allow you to make really personal music. Anyone can make a 4/4 hard German techno song out of a 303 and a 909, but it's cooler to make abstract hip hop out of a bottle of wind and synthesized glass chimes.

I was so thrilled I made a little ditty using field and tapeworm. Headphones advised because there are some subtle effects and a little intro. Hint: The intro is...not real.

Banks and Tills

Tags: ableton, music, tweakbench

Tonight I played around making patches in the PlastiCZ (CZ101) and came up with a chill little hook. So I synced it up with the venerable Melvin Bliss beat, a little JB vocal sample and a few other synths. It totally sounds like a late night radio show intro or a podcast intro. "You're listening to the Concrete Jungle on the west coast's only independent listener sponsored radio, KOSS..." LOL. Enjoy.

Producers

Tags: music, plasticz, synths

I recently got a few new soft-synths. This little piece uses a Novation V-Station, the JunoX2 (Yay Juno!) and the omnipresent Waldorf Attack.

I really need to put more time into making music. Cleaning up the bedroom so I can work in some privacy would be a nice start. :)

Lonely

Tags: lonely, music

I just finished watching Freedom Downtime, a documentary about wrongly convicted and imprisoned hacker Kevin Mitnick. This was put together by Emmanuel Goldstein and 2600 magazine in 2001.

I thought it was excellent and did a great job of untangling the misinformation and falsehoods associated with the Mitnick case. The whole situation was so fscked up and draconian that I had my doubts that even 2600 could do anything to make a dent in the monolithic pile of bullshit that had accumulated since Mitnick's arrest.

The guy served a total of 5 years in prison. 4.5 years of which was served BEFORE he had a BAIL HEARING, let alone a TRIAL and 8 MONTHS of which was in SOLITARY CONFINEMENT. Not like "one guy to a cell". No...he was in "the hole". No books, no paper, no pencil, no TV, no radio, NOTHING. He got 1 hour of exercise (by himself) a day and was not allowed visitors. Because of his talents, he was banned from accessing a phone. He was barred legal council. He was fscked.

This wasn't gitmo, this wasn't Abu Ghraib, this was in the Metropolitan Detention Center in downtown Los Angeles, California, USA.

So what did he do? Blow something up? Kill babies? Eat the president?

Nope. He.....(ready for it?)....accessed a personal voice mail without permission. Yup, he was working for a private investigator and his work got him caught up in some "gray market" activity.

Okay, yeah he ran from the FBI based on the (quite reasonable as we all eventually see) assumption that he would never get a fair trial. Yeah, he had a copy of the netcom credit card number file (which every self respecting BBSer had). He was never violent, never stole, never even threatened anyone. He just pissed off the FBI and was made an example of.

Really interesting, especially for a pre-9-11 sentence. Check it out if you have any interest in hackers, computer crime or civil rights. It's available at 2600.com or on various BT trackers. Yup 2600 doesn't care if you d/l it. I love those guys.

Also check out Off the Hook, the 2600 radio show/podcast on iTunes. Always an interesting listen.

Tags: 2600, computers, crime, hacking, kevin mitnick, law

Here's a little iPod tip I discovered.

While charging, my ipod has the annoying habit of staying lit and flashing the big red "anti" (circle with slash) sign and "DO NOT DISCONNECT!". I used to just live with it and flip the thing over. However I found it only does this if the iPod is "mounted" (i.e. visible to iTunes and windows). If you "eject" it in the iTunes software, but leave the USB cable plugged in and connected to the iPod, it will continue to charge, but with the back light off. If you wish to remount the iPod, disconnect the iPod and reconnect it.

The reason for this is that the iPod is in "disc mode" when mounted and unplugging it without unmounting it could cause data loss. Taking it out of disc mode stops the warning.

*****

BONUS TIP!

To remove podcasts from the "artists" section of your iPod, simply delete the artist and album artist tags from the podscat. Now podcasts will only appear in the "podcasts" section and not the "artists" section as well.

Tags: charging, ipod, tips

Tired of alt-tabbing out of WoW to see what time it is? Would you like to put a clock in WoW anywhere you want? How about military time? All this is available in a free and simple little addon called myClock. Finally, I can feel bad about playing WoW for 6 hours at a stretch.

Tip: To access the clock features, type "/myclock" in the chat bar.

Tags: addons, myclock, world of warcraft, wow

There is this fucked up goody two-shoes TV shoe on in the mornings. It's basically a low-rent Regis and Kathy (or Kelly, I guess). They make up BS to talk about and how you NEED to know about some topic.

What are they bitching about now? The World of Warcraft. OH NO DEY DI'ENT!

Yup, their commercial shows people playing WoW and the teaser line is: "We talk about the underground world of online fantasy games and how BAD they really are".

FUCK THEM IN THEIR STUPID ASSES. (Quoting SB & J)

So you can go here and voice your opinion: http://www.mandjshow.com/contact.html

Here is my letter:

From: WoWFan
Email: fuckoff@you.nazis.com

WTF? Do you really think you have any right to judge how people spend their time and their money? Do YOU have 8 million viewers (as WoW has 8 million users)? Go back to what you're used to; vapid gossip about useless celebs and how god-damn-fucking-great it is to be white affluent cunts.

Fuck off.

Sincerely,
Babyshoes the Gnome.


I made this public, so...

**IF YOU CARE ABOUT THE HONOR OF WOW, SPREAD THIS LINK AND VOICE YOUR PROTEST!**

Tags: fuckers, mike and juliet, wow