Astro Radio Z: Vice Academy 5 and 6

Published December 4, 2015 by biggayhorrorfan

vice academy

“Once there were three young girls…”

Okay, okay! In reality, once there was this group of degenerate dudes who liked to watch trashy films and sit around and talk about them…and then…worst of all…make you listen to them do it!

Yes, the charming lads of Astro Radio Z (including myself) have finally finished up our look at the Vice Academy series and, just like us, you’re sure to be thrilled with these accounts of sexless marriages, stripper bank robbers and other nut busting delights!

So, what are you waiting for? That vast, black pit before you contains the artificial delights of Vice Academy 5 and 6!

https://www.spreaker.com/user/astroradioz/episode-36-vice-academy-5-6

Until the next time – SWEET love and pink GRUE, Big Gay Horror Fan!

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Killer Pinata Premieres!

Published December 3, 2015 by biggayhorrorfan

Killer pinata 1Holy Boxer Shorts, Horror Lovers! The zany, bloody and totally fabulous Killer Pinata is having it’s premiere this Friday, 11/4/2015, at the Logan Theatre in Chicago.

Filmed as love letter to terror comedies and to the eclectic variety of the community of Logan Square, where it was produced, Killer Pinata not only sounds like loads of fun, but it is adding to the social order by featuring a strong and resourceful heroine – who just happens to be gay! Oh, and there is, also, handsome actor Nate Bryan (pictured above) fighting the titular monster in his skivvies. What more could you ask for?

Tickets are going fast, so if you are Midwest fabulous, be sure to reserve yours at KillerPinataMovie@gmail,com, as quick as you can.

 

….and be sure to keep the candy bursting at https://www.facebook.com/KillerPinataMovie, as well!

Until the next time, SWEET love and pink GRUE, Big Gay Horror Fan!

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Music to Make Horror Movies By: Ketty Lester

Published November 29, 2015 by biggayhorrorfan

Ketty 3Even though William Marshall put the bite on her tough talking cab driver Juanita Jones in Blacula, the exquisite Ketty Lester always knew how to put her mark on a song.

 

Best known for her golden hit Love Letters, used to macabre effect in David Lynch’s Blue Velvet, Lester  puts a smoky, subtle emphasize on the more sinister aspects of romance with her rocking take on Sweet Torture.

 

Slink into this blissful agony now!

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Until the next time – SWEET love and pink GRUE, Big Gay Horror Fan!

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Review: Knock ’em Dead

Published November 29, 2015 by biggayhorrorfan

knock em dead coverWithout a doubt, this is the All About Eve of terror films! In fact, director David DeCoteau’s fun Knock ‘em Dead introduces viewers to not one or two, but a trio of retired and/or washed up actresses who know that survival of the fittest often depends on a quick barb from a sharp tongue. As always, who needs mace when you have wit? Of course, there isn’t a Bette Davis, Anne Baxter or Celeste Holm in sight – (all dead, you know!) – but the considerable charms and talents of Rae Dawn Chong, Anne-Marie Johnson, Jackee Harry and Madtv’s Debra Wilson are in full bloom here and will make audiences wonder why these divine talents aren’t continuously headlining major projects.

Plot wise, this horror comedy brings these sassy lasses together at a seaside mansion to film a sequel to Freakshow, a popular horror film that they starred in, years previously. Of course, the insults and the murder weapons soon start flying and everyone quickly realizes that someone on the island is recreating the death scenarios from their major claim to fame – and this time it’s for real. Finally, Jenny (Chong), now the sweet owner of a struggling dog shelter, Alex (Johnson), the superior princess who has become actual royalty, and Darien (Wilson), a recovering addict desperate to jumpstart her career, realize that they have to learn to trust each other completely and work together to survive the night. Of course, it doesn’t help that the motivations of suspects like Savannah (Harry), the sequel’s writer, Tommy (Preston Davis), a reporter covering the reunion, Harley (Phil Morris), the film’s producer, and Louanne (Betsy Russell), the company cook, are all vague and ever changing. Just like Scream, which is boldly referenced on the DVD cover, there are, also, several twists and turns in writer Barry Sandler’s often sharp script, even after the true killer is revealed!knock 'em dead

Naturally, the film’s prime charm is its excellent cast and DeCoteau proudly lets them go for broke. No one downplays a line like Harry and Chong’s sunny demeanor is not only truly engaging, but a nice contrast to the more vicious elements on display, as well. Meanwhile, Wilson’s spastic drug stained reactions are hysterical and a delicious counterbalance to Johnson, still as stunningly beautiful as in her 90s Melrose Place days, and her icy smugness.  Nicely, all are given a chance to eventually color within the lines of the characters, providing varying shades to the roles. In fact, even when the bitchiness gets too repetitive in the film’s first half, these ever nuanced wonders are able to keep the humorous bits flowing at a laugh out loud pace.

More information on Knock ‘em Dead and DeCoteau’s other projects is available at www.rapidheart.com.

Until the next time – SWEET love and pink GRUE, Big Gay Horror Fan!

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Hopelessly Devoted to: Gladys Cooper!

Published November 26, 2015 by biggayhorrorfan

Gladys-Cooper mainShe provided all sorts of official mayhem as the regal Myrna Hartley in Universal’s fun 1941 horror effort The Black Cat, but the divine Gladys Cooper (1881-1971) truly created cinema’s evilest woman in a flick whose origins were dramatic not suspense filled. As Bette Davis’s manipulative, controlling mother, Mrs. Henry Dale, in the magnificent 1942 sob fest Now, Voyager, Cooper created a character whose black will was palpable. Determined to keep her meek daughter Charlotte subservient to her, Cooper invests Dale with an iron fisted bull headedness that makes audiences truly feel for her soft spoken offspring. Eventually, when Charlotte finally discovers the will to defy her mother, Cooper lets some admiration and playfulness seep into her characterization. But her commitment to Dale’s assessment that a late in life child must be a mother’s companion truly makes this one of the truest, scariest individuals ever brought to the screen.Gladys 1

Cooper, who was considered one of the most stunning women in England during her youth, brought a more modest haughtiness and a seeming nod to her fashion plate years with her presence, the previous year, in The Black Cat. Being cuckolded by Basil Rathbone’s sly and slimy Montague, of course, naturally sets her Myrna on a bad course and Cooper drips with casual venom as she causes (often deadly) problems for her co-stars, (the sweet) Anne Gwynne and (the impervious) Gale Sondergaard.

Gladys BC 3In her later years, Cooper graced such (often macabre) anthology shows as Alfred Hitchcock Presents, The Twilight Zone and The Outer Limits. In fact, her trio of The Twilight Zone episodes are among some of the highest regarded of the series. The most famous of these, perhaps, is 1962’s Nothing in the Dark, in which a young and beautiful Robert Redford welcomed Cooper’s Wanda Dunn to the hereafter as a very appealing version of death. She, rightfully, enacts Dunn’s controlling fear and suspiciousness there. Thankfully, both The Outer Limits and The Girl from U.N.C.L.E. utilized Cooper’s more mysterious charms to play mediums of varying degrees of authenticity in fun episodes of those series, as well.

Gladys 4But perhaps nothing establishes Cooper’s importance better than an appearance by her former co-star Davis on a 1971 episode of The Dick Cavett Show. Reminiscing about Cooper, who had just died, Davis marvels about what a beautiful person, inside and out, she was. A sincere appreciation from one diva to another? Has a higher honor ever been established?

Gladys BC 2

Until the next time – SWEET love and pink GRUE, Big Gay Horror Fan!

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As the Stab Burns: Denice Duff

Published November 23, 2015 by biggayhorrorfan

Denice 2

And she thought Anders Hove was bad!

Fans of Full Moon’s Subspecies would probably nominate Denice Duff’s sensitive (yet provocative) Michelle as their favorite vamp in that horror fantasy series. But Duff, currently, is receiving intense focus of another kind as Wendy on NBC’s Days of Our Lives. A concerned midwife, Wendy has recently been taken hostage by the increasingly psychotic Ben who, seemingly, plans to make her deliver his fiancé’s premature baby in woodsy, less than ideal circumstances.

Denice 3Of course Duff, whose terror credits include The Monster Man, Straun House (AKA Dr. Rage), Night of the Living Dead 3D: Reanimation and Vampire Resurrection (which she, also, directed), has been dealing with dubious gents for years now. Therefore, her calm yet frightened demeanor here not only signifies her wide acting range, but also allows hope that Wendy and her new found charge, Abigail, will most likely make it out of this situation alive.

Of course, there is only one way to find out for sure, and that is to simply tune in tomorrow!

More info on Duff can be gathered at www.deniceduff.com. Days episodes are available for viewing at http://www.nbc.com/days-of-our-lives.

Until the next time – SWEET love and pink GRUE, Big Gay Horror Fan!

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Music to Make Horror Movies By: Elke Sommer

Published November 22, 2015 by biggayhorrorfan

elke 2.jpg

The luscious Elke Sommer battled monstrous creeps and dodgy American editors in such Bava classics as Baron Blood, Lisa and the Devil (and its stateside reworking) The House of Exorcism. But according to one of the numbers on her euro-soaked MGM album, Love in Any Language, nothing haunted our fair lass more than unrequited love.

While it’s hard to believe anyone could deny this German born cupcake anything, one listen to her mournfully acknowledging I Know You Don’t Want Me – and you know it has to be true. elke album cover

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eW69kyICSlo

La sigh!

Until the next time – SWEET love and pink GRUE, Big Gay Horror Fan!

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Horror, She Wrote: Sandahl Bergman and Sally Kellerman

Published November 20, 2015 by biggayhorrorfan

Horror 2

Horror, She Wrote explores the episodes of the ever-popular detective series Murder, She Wrote, featuring Angela Lansbury’s unstoppable Jessica Fletcher, that were highlighted by performances from genre film actors.

Oh, creativity – that ever elusive muse. Even Angela Lansbury’s ever resilient mystery writer Jessica Fletcher must have sipped from an ever emptying cup of ideas every once in awhile!

But, in The Petrified Florist, a fun Season 9 episode of the redoubtable series, Fletcher lets the dizzying participants of a Los Angeles dinner party serve as inspiration for her latest unexpected thriller. Jet lagged, this well loved character falls into a dream-tale involving the murder of a flamboyant botanic renegade. Soon, Wizard of Oz style, her friends and acquaintances are given flowery motivations and all are, eventually, blooming with suspicious activity. Horror 4

The guest cast, this time, features Sandahl Bergman and Sally Kellerman, two distinguished performers who sidelined in plenty of exploitation fare. Bergman, whose involvement with Bob Fosse’s All That Jazz highlighted her beauty and grace, went on to be acknowledged as a foremost action star due to her participation in Conan the Barbarian and the fun Hell Comes to Frogtown. Her elastic physicality and forceful presence also lent much to her appearances on such shows as Swamp Thing and Freddy’s Nightmares and in such glorious cable and video store treasure as Programmed to Kill and the thriller Raw Nerve (featuring the legendary Glenn Ford and the iconic Traci Lords). Kellerman’s clipped and emphatic delivery, meanwhile, imbued such comedies as MASH, The Last of the Red Hot Lovers and Rafferty and the Gold Dust Twins with silken archness. But her sly mannerisms made her perfect for the mysterious activity and outright villainy of such 90s exploitation efforts as Doppelganger (with Drew Barrymore), Mirror Mirror II: Raven Dance (with Roddy McDowall) and Drop Dead Gorgeous (AKA Victim of Beauty).

Horror 3She plays into that acidic type with Junie Cobb, her impervious gossip maven here. As her character is threatened with the reveal of an affair, Kellerman double crosses and denies like she has just been outfitted with a pair of Barbara Stanwyck heels, proving, once and for all, that nobody should mess with a blonde with experience!

Bergman is allowed to have fun here, as well. Honing in on title’s none too so subtle take on the famous play (made movie) The Petrified Forest, she supplies what is most enjoyably theatrical about this episode. As Daisy Kenny, a police officer with dreams of a show business career, Bergman is eager and enthusiastic, showing her versatility as a performer. Self assured but far from the snarly kick-asses of her action pieces, this veteran performer shows she has a way with comedy – and the collar. Disguising herself as a blackmailing maid, Daisy helps Fletcher finally catch the backtracking Kellerman and proves that the character’s upcoming take on Miss Jean Brodie would be something that no true fan would ever want to miss.

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Until the next time – SWEET love and pink GRUE, Big Gay Horror Fan!

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Blacula and the 1970s Gay Male

Published November 19, 2015 by biggayhorrorfan

Blacula 5Some gays just can’t catch a break. They move into a neighborhood, fix it up and then are forced out when prices rise. Or like Blacula’s Bobby (the fluid Ted Harris) and Billy (an almost appropriately exaggerated Rick Metzler), they rescue a monster from centuries of imprisonment…and are, ultimately, killed for their troubles.  As purchasers of the estate of the notorious Dracula, these two interior decorators break the seals to the coffin of Mamuwalde (the Shakespearian William Marshall), one of the count’s erstwhile victims, and find themselves on the receiving end of his long delayed, very toothy hunger.

Blacula 4Soon, Mamuwalde is making a banquet out of a sassy female cab driver (the animated Ketty Lester) and buxom bar paparazzi like Nancy (the gorgeous Emily Yancy). Of course, his main attention is given to the beautiful Tina (a straight forward Vonetta McGee) whom he believes to be the reincarnation of his lost love. As her sister Michelle (the voluptuous, no nonsense Denise Nicholas) and her pathologist boyfriend, Dr. Thomas (an authoritative Thalmus Rasulala), begin to suspect that a vampire might be prowling the streets of Los Angeles; Tina falls further under Mamuwalde’s spell. Thomas and a police lieutenant (a flustered Gordon Pinsent) eventually track Mamuwalde to the warehouse where Tina is accidentally killed. Naturally, the terminally romantic, totally distraught Mamuwalde decides that he can’t live without her and allows himself to be burned up by the sun’s destructive rays, proving, with fiery impact, that heterosexual love has its downfalls, as well.

Blacula 2This classic example of blaxploitation made sweet with the money, spawning a sequel the following year, but it is, also, redolent with that era’s hatred and ignorance towards the queer community. Even the hero of the piece refers to Bobby and Billy as “two faggot interior decorators” and when the undead Bobby begins scouring the streets for necks to chew on, the police men trailing him, also, refer to him as a “fag” and remark on how all homosexuals look alike. Thankfully, the fact that this movie was made 43 years ago lends these comments an almost historical quality. Prejudice like this is definitely present today, but not often in such a focal quantity (especially in urban environments), and that, along with the film’s mention of Black Panther activity, its leveled looks at urban decay, and its music and costumes, give it a surprising social perspective. (Although, the fact that campaigns like “Black Lives Matter” are of vital importance today and that the transsexual community is under an ever present threat of violence proves how prescient this piece is, as well.)

Blacula 3Granted, one could imagine film historian Vito Russo, who examined the treatment of the GLBT community in film in such respected tomes as The Celluloid Closet, taking umbrage with Billy and Bobby’s stereotypical limp wristed antics. While actors Harris and Metzler definitely embrace the lighter sides of this duo’s personalities, it is, perhaps, just as significant to note that writers Joan Torres and Raymond Koenig, also, show some acceptance for that effeminacy, as well. Tina and Michelle are first introduced as they visit Bobby at the funeral home and make preparations to offer comfort to his grieving mother. This shows that Bobby, in particular, had a nonjudgmental community of family members to support him despite his perceived difference. It’s a small moment in the film, but pays homage to the characters’ real life counterparts whose kindness and strength meant the world to lavender blessed men and women the in those perilous decades and is still a comfort to many outsider types in too many parts of the world, today.

Blacula and its sequel Scream Blacula Scream were recently released in (crystal clear) remastered versions (with special features including interviews, commentary and photo galleries) by Scream Factory. More information is available at www.shoutfactory.com and https://www.facebook.com/ScreamFactoryDVD.

Until the next time – SWEET love and pink GRUE, Big Gay Horror Fan!

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Tell Tale Hearts

Published November 7, 2015 by biggayhorrorfan

tell tale
I used to catch hell from my mother when she found out that I showed the kids in the neighborhood bra ads from her bath soaked Glamour Magazine. So, do you think I’m letting her know about Tell Tale Hearts: Four Films of Love and Death, Elevated Film Chicago’s upcoming celebration of the more twisted side of relationships and day-to-day life? F—k no!!! The rest of the world, however, is hereby being put on call!

This dark evening of short films, featuring Spencer Parsons’ BITE RADIUS, Jennifer Reeder’s SEVEN SONGS ABOUT THUNDER, Judd Myers’ SON, and Harrison Atkins’ CHOCOLATE HEART, will be presented at Mary’s Attic, 5400 N. Clark in Chicago, on Tuesday, November 10th. I have been assured, by those closest to the insanity, that this stand-out presentation will contain lots of gore, nudity and (gulp)…directors’ Q and A’s!

So, what are you waiting for? Get your tickets and/or more information at http://bit.ly/1Ng7qJf and https://www.facebook.com/events/127835417577182/.

Until the next time – SWEET love and pink GRUE, Big Gay Horror Fan!

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