Playing with Fire (1975)After becoming an international sensation in 1974 with her for-the-ages erotic turn as the titular Emmanuelle, Dutch actress Sylvia Kristel had the European art world at her feet. Sylvia grew up in Utrecht, the daughter of hoteliers, before shipping off to Catholic boarding school, attending dance school, and finally making her way to Paris. There, she found small parts in movies, eventually winning Miss TV Europe, a title that would land her an audition for Emmanuelle. The film changed Kristel’s life overnight, bringing her both opportunities to bolster her sex-symbol image and break away from it. A new home video collection from Cult Epics—which includes Julia, Playing with Fire, Pastorale 1943, and Mysteries—highlights the delicate balance Kristel found between her sexy persona and art-house aspirations.Julia is the closest Kristel would stay to her Emmanuelle role outside of that franchise, and would itself become a video-store...
- 2/16/2022
- MUBI
Austin, TX – Mondo is excited to announce the new book release of Warped & Faded: Weird Wednesday and the Birth of the American Genre Film Archive, available for saleon November 16, 2021 from author Lars Nilsen, editor Kier-La Janisse, along with several genre enthusiast contributors. Nilsen, a longtime Alamo Drafthouse film programmer and now at Austin Film Society, and Janisse, genre scholar and author (House of Psychotic Women), programmer and documentary filmmaker (Woodlands Dark and Days Bewitched: A History of Folk Horror), have written a definitive guide to exploitation cinema.
At the dawn of this century, a scrappy one-screen theater in Austin, Texas became ground zero for a revolution in film exhibition. That cinema, the Alamo Drafthouse, took the seemingly foolhardy step of offering free screenings of exploitation and horror movies that had quite literally been consigned to the scrap heap. The idea began in the sleep-deprived mind of its co-founder, Tim League,...
At the dawn of this century, a scrappy one-screen theater in Austin, Texas became ground zero for a revolution in film exhibition. That cinema, the Alamo Drafthouse, took the seemingly foolhardy step of offering free screenings of exploitation and horror movies that had quite literally been consigned to the scrap heap. The idea began in the sleep-deprived mind of its co-founder, Tim League,...
- 8/4/2021
- by ComicMix Staff
- Comicmix.com
One of Fantasia 2020’s hottest premieres is Kriya, which comes from writer/director Sidharth Srinivasan of Reel Illusion Films (Soul of Sand), and producers Tejash Shah of Accord Equips Pvt. Ltd. (Headhunter) and B. S. Narayanaswamy (Court).
DJ Neel encounters the ravishing Sitara while working a club set one night and is transfixed by her. They return to Sitara’s place where Neel is horrified to see the gagged and shackled body of her dying father – Sitara’s grieving family keeping vigil around it. Caught completely unawares, Neel’s compassion is nevertheless aroused and he stays on. In India, patriarchal custom dictates that only a son can perform a parent’s last rites, but no such person exists in Sitara’s family. So when her father actually dies during the course of the night, Sitara coerces Neel to officiate the rituals of death. Thrust into a world of magic and transgression,...
DJ Neel encounters the ravishing Sitara while working a club set one night and is transfixed by her. They return to Sitara’s place where Neel is horrified to see the gagged and shackled body of her dying father – Sitara’s grieving family keeping vigil around it. Caught completely unawares, Neel’s compassion is nevertheless aroused and he stays on. In India, patriarchal custom dictates that only a son can perform a parent’s last rites, but no such person exists in Sitara’s family. So when her father actually dies during the course of the night, Sitara coerces Neel to officiate the rituals of death. Thrust into a world of magic and transgression,...
- 8/3/2020
- by Phil Wheat
- Nerdly
DJ Neel encounters the ravishing Sitara while working a club set one night and is transfixed by her. They return to Sitara’s place where Neel is horrified to see the gagged and shackled body of her dying father – Sitara’s grieving family keeping vigil around it. Caught completely unawares, Neel’s compassion is nevertheless aroused and he stays on. In India, patriarchal custom dictates that only a son can perform a parent’s last rites, but no such person exists in Sitara’s family. So when her father actually dies during the course of the night, Sitara coerces Neel to officiate the rituals of death. Thrust into a world of magic and transgression, Neel finally attempts to flee his waking nightmare. But as dawn breaks, it becomes evident that Sitara’s family is afflicted by an ancient curse. One that Neel is now very much a part of.
New...
New...
- 8/2/2020
- by Don Anelli
- AsianMoviePulse
Sit down before you watch this. With the fall festival season about to kick off, some exciting new films are about to premiere. Kriya is an Indian film described as "the nightmare odyssey of a young DJ named Neel (Noble Luke) who is picked up one fateful night by the beautiful Sitara, only to be thrust into a hallucinatory world of ritual magic surrounding the imminent death of her father." That sounds a bit vague, but perhaps it's best to leave it that way. "It's an aesthetically beautiful film, mystically atmospheric and imbued with a creeping unease that casts an uncommon spell." Co-Produced by Andy Starke (of In Fabric) and Pete Tombs (of Free Fire), with an unforgettable score by Jim Williams, "Kriya is a strange and wondrous nightmare odyssey of ritual magic. It demands to be met on its own terms and rewards the curious with unexpected charms. Light a candle and prepare yourself.
- 7/31/2020
- by Alex Billington
- firstshowing.net
The Fantasia International Film Festival will be celebrating its 24th edition as a virtual event accessible to movie lovers across Canada, with a wild assortment of scheduled screenings, panels, and workshops taking place online from August 20 through September 2, 2020. The decision to launch a digital edition of the famed genre festival was born from Fantasia’s desire to keep the health and safety of its attendees a top priority during the current global health crisis, while still offering daring, much-needed new genre entertainment to residents of Canada and supporting the breakout filmmakers of the year.
The festival’s full lineup will be announced in early August. In the meantime, Fantasia is excited to reveal a selected first wave of titles.
Makoto Tezuka adapts the legendary manga “Tezuka’s Barbara”!
One night, a famous novelist encounters a young, seemingly homeless woman in an overpass tunnel. He brings her home, which sets him...
The festival’s full lineup will be announced in early August. In the meantime, Fantasia is excited to reveal a selected first wave of titles.
Makoto Tezuka adapts the legendary manga “Tezuka’s Barbara”!
One night, a famous novelist encounters a young, seemingly homeless woman in an overpass tunnel. He brings her home, which sets him...
- 6/12/2020
- by Rouven Linnarz
- AsianMoviePulse
Swedish exploitation icon Christina Lindberg stars in supernatural thriller.
Toronto-based genre specialists Raven Banner arrive on the Croisette with sales rights to the Swedish-language supernatural thriller Black Circle from Here Comes The Devil director Adrian Garcia Bogliano.
The film screened at Glasgow Film Festival earlier this year and centres on two sisters whose lives change dramatically when they are hypnotised by a mysterious vinyl album recorded in the 1970s that releases a ghostly doppelganger.
Black Circle (Svart Cirkel) stars Swedish exploitation icon Christina Lindberg, whose performance in the 1973 Swedish revenge film They Call Her One-Eye served as a reference for...
Toronto-based genre specialists Raven Banner arrive on the Croisette with sales rights to the Swedish-language supernatural thriller Black Circle from Here Comes The Devil director Adrian Garcia Bogliano.
The film screened at Glasgow Film Festival earlier this year and centres on two sisters whose lives change dramatically when they are hypnotised by a mysterious vinyl album recorded in the 1970s that releases a ghostly doppelganger.
Black Circle (Svart Cirkel) stars Swedish exploitation icon Christina Lindberg, whose performance in the 1973 Swedish revenge film They Call Her One-Eye served as a reference for...
- 5/14/2019
- by Jeremy Kay
- ScreenDaily
“Weekend of Cult Comics and Fantasy Film from Indonesia: Film screenings, exhibition and discussions” 16-17 March 2019 at Soas (Centre of South East Asian Studies) University of London
Recently some shooting stars of action and martial arts cinema have managed to bring the attention of the public back to the cinematography of countries that had passed under the radar of most audiences. When the Iko Uwais bomb exploded with “Merantau” first and later with the two “The Raid”, many wondered what else had been produced in Indonesia, but I doubt that they managed to find an answer.
After digging into Indonesia’s film past, in 2014 French director and Artistic Director of Festival International des Cinemas d’Asie de Vesoul” Bastian Meiresonne put together an exhaustive documentary about the history of Indonesian pre-Raid popular cinema, “Garuda Power: The Spirit Within”. His film, a self-produced debut, is the result of great enthusiasm and passion,...
Recently some shooting stars of action and martial arts cinema have managed to bring the attention of the public back to the cinematography of countries that had passed under the radar of most audiences. When the Iko Uwais bomb exploded with “Merantau” first and later with the two “The Raid”, many wondered what else had been produced in Indonesia, but I doubt that they managed to find an answer.
After digging into Indonesia’s film past, in 2014 French director and Artistic Director of Festival International des Cinemas d’Asie de Vesoul” Bastian Meiresonne put together an exhaustive documentary about the history of Indonesian pre-Raid popular cinema, “Garuda Power: The Spirit Within”. His film, a self-produced debut, is the result of great enthusiasm and passion,...
- 3/15/2019
- by Adriana Rosati
- AsianMoviePulse
Happy Tuesday the 13th, everyone! While it may not be nearly as a good as getting to enjoy a Friday the 13th, genre fans still have a few good reasons to get excited, as there are some killer movies headed to both Blu-ray and DVD this week.
As far as new titles go, both The Meg and Lasso are hitting multiple formats on Tuesday, and cult film fans are going to want to grab The Blood Island Collection from Severin Films (all three films inside the set are being released separately on Blu-ray as well). Herschell Gordon Lewis’ The Wizard of Gore is getting the special edition treatment from the fine folks at Arrow Video, and The Satanic Rites of Dracula comes home this Tuesday, courtesy of the Warner Archive Collection.
Other notable releases for November 13th include Perversion Story, Bloodlust, House of Forbidden Secrets, 10/21, Alpha Wolf,and Teenage Zombies.
As far as new titles go, both The Meg and Lasso are hitting multiple formats on Tuesday, and cult film fans are going to want to grab The Blood Island Collection from Severin Films (all three films inside the set are being released separately on Blu-ray as well). Herschell Gordon Lewis’ The Wizard of Gore is getting the special edition treatment from the fine folks at Arrow Video, and The Satanic Rites of Dracula comes home this Tuesday, courtesy of the Warner Archive Collection.
Other notable releases for November 13th include Perversion Story, Bloodlust, House of Forbidden Secrets, 10/21, Alpha Wolf,and Teenage Zombies.
- 11/13/2018
- by Heather Wixson
- DailyDead
This November, Severin Films will take horror fans to "Blood Island" like never before with the release of a limited edition Blu-ray box set containing all four films from Eddie Romero and Gerardo de Leon's cult horror film series, with a special "Blood Oath Bundle" also available for collectors:
"On November 13th, Severin Films is plunging horror fans into uncharted waters with The Blood Island Collection, featuring 4 Blu-Rays and 1 CD. On October 30th, Brides Of Blood, Mad Doctor Of Blood Island, Beast Of Blood, & Terror Is A Man will make their eye-popping HD debut on home video, packed with a truly monstrous slate of new bonus features. This collection is a strictly limited, individually numbered edition of 3500 units. As a result, fans are encouraged to pre-order so they might avoid a hellish descent into a watery grave of their own making.
They’ve been called “defiantly lurid” (1000MisspentHours.com), “delightfully depraved” (FlickAttack.
"On November 13th, Severin Films is plunging horror fans into uncharted waters with The Blood Island Collection, featuring 4 Blu-Rays and 1 CD. On October 30th, Brides Of Blood, Mad Doctor Of Blood Island, Beast Of Blood, & Terror Is A Man will make their eye-popping HD debut on home video, packed with a truly monstrous slate of new bonus features. This collection is a strictly limited, individually numbered edition of 3500 units. As a result, fans are encouraged to pre-order so they might avoid a hellish descent into a watery grave of their own making.
They’ve been called “defiantly lurid” (1000MisspentHours.com), “delightfully depraved” (FlickAttack.
- 10/25/2018
- by Derek Anderson
- DailyDead
Second year of the event will see 16 titles presented at the Marché du Film.
A total of 16 projects have been selected to take part in the Frontières Platform at this year’s Cannes Marché du Film, with the second edition of the genre event set to run from May 12-13.
The Frontières Proof Of Concept Presentation on May 12 will include 10 projects in advanced financing stages, presenting completed teaser trailers to prospective partners. Among the 10 are Whitaker directed by Casey Walker, with the Rook Films team of Andy Starke, Pete Tombs and Ben Wheatley producing. It was previously one of the...
A total of 16 projects have been selected to take part in the Frontières Platform at this year’s Cannes Marché du Film, with the second edition of the genre event set to run from May 12-13.
The Frontières Proof Of Concept Presentation on May 12 will include 10 projects in advanced financing stages, presenting completed teaser trailers to prospective partners. Among the 10 are Whitaker directed by Casey Walker, with the Rook Films team of Andy Starke, Pete Tombs and Ben Wheatley producing. It was previously one of the...
- 4/17/2018
- by Ben Dalton
- ScreenDaily
Genre market Frontières Platform (May 12-13), the co-presentation between the Fantasia International Film Festival and Cannes’ Marché du Film, will this year feature projects from Denis Côté, Ben Wheatley and Can Evrenol. The Frontières Buyers Showcase (Sunday May 13 at 4pm in Palais K) will feature 6 films, with producers screening footage for potential buyers, sales agents and festival programmers. The lineup includes Denis Côté’s (Vic + Flo Saw A Bear) Ghost Town Anthology, Jovanka Vuckovic’s (Xx) Riot Girls, which is handled by Xyz in the U.S., and Antonio Tublen’s (Lfo) Zoo, which is handled by Seville International. The proof of concept presentation on Saturday May 12 will include Girl Without A Mouth, the new film from Baskin director Can Evrenol, and Casey Walker’s UK-Canadian project Whitaker, produced by Andy Starke, Pete Tombs and Free Fire director Ben Wheatley for Rook Films alongside Jonathan Bronfman (The Witch).
Wild Bunch...
Wild Bunch...
- 4/17/2018
- by Andreas Wiseman
- Deadline Film + TV
13 projects will participate in the second annual Frontières Finance & Packaging Forum.
Source: Cannes Film Festival
The Transfiguration
A total of 13 projects will participate in the second annual Frontières Finance & Packaging Forum, set to take place February 22-24 in Amsterdam. This is an expansion on last year’s total of 12 projects.
Having been initiated as part of the partnership between Fantasia International Film Festival and the Cannes Marche du Film, the forum will see industry experts assessing genre film projects from a packaging perspective, analysing finance, marketing and distribution strategies.
Among the selected features are works from directors Michael O’Shea (The Transfiguration), Neasa Hardiman (Happy Valley) and Can Evrenol (Baskin), producer Andy Starke and exec producer Ben Wheatley (Free Fire).
Julie Bergeron, Head of Industry Programs, Marché du Film, said: “After 5 years of continual development, growth, and innovation, Frontières has become the generally acknowledged leader in the genre film industry as a market and networking facilitator, and effectively...
Source: Cannes Film Festival
The Transfiguration
A total of 13 projects will participate in the second annual Frontières Finance & Packaging Forum, set to take place February 22-24 in Amsterdam. This is an expansion on last year’s total of 12 projects.
Having been initiated as part of the partnership between Fantasia International Film Festival and the Cannes Marche du Film, the forum will see industry experts assessing genre film projects from a packaging perspective, analysing finance, marketing and distribution strategies.
Among the selected features are works from directors Michael O’Shea (The Transfiguration), Neasa Hardiman (Happy Valley) and Can Evrenol (Baskin), producer Andy Starke and exec producer Ben Wheatley (Free Fire).
Julie Bergeron, Head of Industry Programs, Marché du Film, said: “After 5 years of continual development, growth, and innovation, Frontières has become the generally acknowledged leader in the genre film industry as a market and networking facilitator, and effectively...
- 1/18/2018
- by Jasper Hart
- ScreenDaily
Director and documentarian Mark Hartley scores both a film history and comedy success with this ‘wild, untold’ account of the 1980s film studio that was both revered and despised by everyone who had contact with it. The ‘cast list’ of interviewees is encyclopedic, everybody has a strong opinion, and some of them don’t need four-letter words to describe their experience!
Electric Boogaloo: The Wild, Untold Story of Cannon Films
On a double bill with
Machete Maidens Unleashed!
Blu-ray
Umbrella Entertainment (Au, all-region
2014 / Color / 1:77 widescreen / 106 min. / Street Date April 4, 2017 / Available from Umbrella Entertainment / 34.99
Starring: Menahem Golan, Yoram Globus, Al Ruban, Alain Jakubowicz, Albert Pyun, Alex Winter, Allen DeBevoise, Avi Lerner, Barbet Schroeder, Bo Derek, Boaz Davidson, Cassandra Peterson, Catherine Mary Stewart, Charles Matthau, Christopher C. Dewey, Christopher Pearce, Cynthia Hargrave, Dan Wolman, Daniel Loewenthal, David Del Valle, David Paulsen, David Sheehan, David Womark, Diane Franklin, Dolph Lundgren, Edward R. Pressman,...
Electric Boogaloo: The Wild, Untold Story of Cannon Films
On a double bill with
Machete Maidens Unleashed!
Blu-ray
Umbrella Entertainment (Au, all-region
2014 / Color / 1:77 widescreen / 106 min. / Street Date April 4, 2017 / Available from Umbrella Entertainment / 34.99
Starring: Menahem Golan, Yoram Globus, Al Ruban, Alain Jakubowicz, Albert Pyun, Alex Winter, Allen DeBevoise, Avi Lerner, Barbet Schroeder, Bo Derek, Boaz Davidson, Cassandra Peterson, Catherine Mary Stewart, Charles Matthau, Christopher C. Dewey, Christopher Pearce, Cynthia Hargrave, Dan Wolman, Daniel Loewenthal, David Del Valle, David Paulsen, David Sheehan, David Womark, Diane Franklin, Dolph Lundgren, Edward R. Pressman,...
- 4/8/2017
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
Welcome back for Day 6 of Daily Dead’s fourth annual Holiday Gift Guide, readers! Once again, our goal is to help you navigate through the horrors of the 2016 shopping season with our tips on unique gift ideas, and we’ll hopefully help you save a few bucks over the next few weeks, too. For today’s offerings, we’re taking a look at some fun ideas from Diamond Select Toys, Dark Bunny Tees, artist Chad Savage, the soundtrack for Bob Clark’s Black Christmas, a Zombie Science Kit for kids (includes fart putty!), and so much more.
This year’s Holiday Gift Guide is sponsored by several amazing companies, including Mondo, Anchor Bay Entertainment, DC Entertainment, and Magnolia Home Entertainment, who have all donated an assortment of goodies to help you get into the spirit of the season. Daily Dead also recently teamed up with Texas-based artist Dustin Pace of...
This year’s Holiday Gift Guide is sponsored by several amazing companies, including Mondo, Anchor Bay Entertainment, DC Entertainment, and Magnolia Home Entertainment, who have all donated an assortment of goodies to help you get into the spirit of the season. Daily Dead also recently teamed up with Texas-based artist Dustin Pace of...
- 12/1/2016
- by Heather Wixson
- DailyDead
Mad doctors! Mortiferous maidens! Horrifying hallucinations! A key early Euro-horror and one of the very first in color, this French-Italian production is a medical horrorshow crossed with a folk tale -- its centerpiece is a vintage carillon attraction in an old mill; creepy Scilla Gabel is the minatory seducer who bridges the gap between life and death. Mill of the Stone Women Region A+B Blu-ray Subkultur / Media Target Distribution GmbH 1960 / Color / 1:66 widescreen / 90, 95, 96 min. / Die Mühle der versteinerten Frauen / Street Date June 30, 2016 / Amazon.de Eur 24,99 Starring Pierre Brice, Scilla Gabel, Wolfgang Preiss, Robert Boehme, Dany Carrel Cinematography Pier Ludovico Pavoni Production Designer Arrigo Equini Film Editor Antonietta Zita Original Music Carlo Innocenzi Written by Remigio Del Grosso, Giorgio Ferroni, Ugo Liberatore, Giorgio Stegani from Flemish Stories by Peter Van Weigen (possibly apocryphal) Produced by Giampaolo Bigazzi Directed by Giorgio Ferroni
Reviewed by Glenn Erickson
2016 is shaping up as a...
Reviewed by Glenn Erickson
2016 is shaping up as a...
- 7/23/2016
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
Shock’s Chris Alexander looks back at the essential reference book that changed his life. I was 20 years old when I discovered Cathal Tohill and Pete Tombs’ essential examination of erotic European horror films and the fascinating men who made them, Immoral Tales, and it was indeed love at first sight. By the time it…
The post Bloody Books: Immoral Tales by Cathall Tohill and Pete Tombs appeared first on Shock Till You Drop.
The post Bloody Books: Immoral Tales by Cathall Tohill and Pete Tombs appeared first on Shock Till You Drop.
- 6/6/2016
- by Chris Alexander
- shocktillyoudrop.com
Welcome to the latest episodes of The ScreamCast! Each episode sees hosts Sean Duregger and Brad Henderson take a look at another slice of home video horror.
Don’t forget to check out TheScreamCast.com for the show notes and for more news and reviews of Scream Factory releases and make sure to follow them on Twitter too!
Episode 96: The Night Brings Bees, Vampires and a Guy Named Charlie!
This week brings a full plate of discussion as we cover Vinegar Syndrome’s release of 1978’s The Bees with our Lead Contributor to thescreamcast.com, Josh Obershaw! Also on the discussion board: Vinegar Syndrome’s February Bundle, Scream Factory’s Jeepers Creepers announcement, Sundown: The Vampires In Retreat (1989) and The Night Brings Charlie (1990).
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Episode 97: Mondo Macabro & A Lizard In A Woman’s Skin
We have a packed show for you today! After...
Don’t forget to check out TheScreamCast.com for the show notes and for more news and reviews of Scream Factory releases and make sure to follow them on Twitter too!
Episode 96: The Night Brings Bees, Vampires and a Guy Named Charlie!
This week brings a full plate of discussion as we cover Vinegar Syndrome’s release of 1978’s The Bees with our Lead Contributor to thescreamcast.com, Josh Obershaw! Also on the discussion board: Vinegar Syndrome’s February Bundle, Scream Factory’s Jeepers Creepers announcement, Sundown: The Vampires In Retreat (1989) and The Night Brings Charlie (1990).
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Episode 97: Mondo Macabro & A Lizard In A Woman’s Skin
We have a packed show for you today! After...
- 4/9/2016
- by Phil Wheat
- Nerdly
Cult film specialists Mondo Macabro have announced their next two home video releases and we're very excited, The first film coming out is Medousa (DVD), an adaptation of the story of Medusa set in '90s Greece which looks exceptionally bizarre and exciting. Next up is a collaboration between Mondo Macabro and the BFI in releasing Jose Ramon Larraz's Symptoms (Blu-ray), a film that has been rarely seen for many years. Both films are exciting, but I admit to being more excited about Symptoms because of Mondo Macabro's Pete Tombs' involvement with the release. You can check out more details, including pre-order information for Medousa in the gallery below....
[Read the whole post on twitchfilm.com...]...
[Read the whole post on twitchfilm.com...]...
- 2/21/2016
- Screen Anarchy
Hammer Horror
In the heyday of the ‘sex-vampire’ film, from the late 1960s to the early 1980s, the focus wasn’t on some squeaky-clean Robert-and-Kristen couple but on Eros and Thanatos – the mythical archetypes used to describe sex and death. Exploitation movie distributor Pete Tombs wrote about the sex-vampire phenomenon in his classic 1990s book, Immoral Tales: Sex & Horror Cinema In Europe, with Cathal Tohill. He also interviewed the films’ makers for celebrated Channel 4 series Eurotika!, and snapped up the rights to some of the movies for his company Mondo Macabro. He joins us on a short, heavy-breathing tour through one of the cinema’s most disreputable sub-genres…
“When vampires were first written about, they were like horrible, scuzzy, dirty old men really,” says my old pal Pete Tombs – who, given his lifelong love of the horror genre, really couldn’t have a more apt surname. “Horrible things that...
In the heyday of the ‘sex-vampire’ film, from the late 1960s to the early 1980s, the focus wasn’t on some squeaky-clean Robert-and-Kristen couple but on Eros and Thanatos – the mythical archetypes used to describe sex and death. Exploitation movie distributor Pete Tombs wrote about the sex-vampire phenomenon in his classic 1990s book, Immoral Tales: Sex & Horror Cinema In Europe, with Cathal Tohill. He also interviewed the films’ makers for celebrated Channel 4 series Eurotika!, and snapped up the rights to some of the movies for his company Mondo Macabro. He joins us on a short, heavy-breathing tour through one of the cinema’s most disreputable sub-genres…
“When vampires were first written about, they were like horrible, scuzzy, dirty old men really,” says my old pal Pete Tombs – who, given his lifelong love of the horror genre, really couldn’t have a more apt surname. “Horrible things that...
- 5/19/2015
- by Paul Woods
- Obsessed with Film
Welcome to the latest episode of The ScreamCast! Each episode sees hosts Sean Duregger and Brad Henderson review a Scream Factory release, however this week the ScreamCast gang are doing things a little differently…
This week we discuss Mondo Macabro’s stunning blu-ray of Eckhart Schmidt’s Der Fan with Mondo Macabro co-founder Pete Tombs. Also, some Nazisploitation lands on Sean’s doorstep, while some musical comedies and mediocre action movies arrive on Brad’s doorstep.
Don’t forget to check out TheScreamCast.com for the show notes and for more news and reviews of Scream Factory releases and make sure to follow them on Twitter too!
Podcast: Play in new window | Download...
This week we discuss Mondo Macabro’s stunning blu-ray of Eckhart Schmidt’s Der Fan with Mondo Macabro co-founder Pete Tombs. Also, some Nazisploitation lands on Sean’s doorstep, while some musical comedies and mediocre action movies arrive on Brad’s doorstep.
Don’t forget to check out TheScreamCast.com for the show notes and for more news and reviews of Scream Factory releases and make sure to follow them on Twitter too!
Podcast: Play in new window | Download...
- 4/16/2015
- by Phil Wheat
- Nerdly
"It's a love story, really," says Peter Strickland when we caught up with him in London late last year and asked him to tell us about his latest film, The Duke of Burgundy (2014), a wonderfully kinky exploration of a sadomasochistic relationship. "It's a domestic drama that has fallen out of the hands of a sleazier genre, perhaps. But really, it's circling these ideas of consent, compromise and coercion and observing two people having very different intimate needs and is it possible to make it work." It's a more intimate beast than his previous two works, Katalin Varga (2009) and Berberian Sound Studio (2012), and it riffs on the sexploitation films of the seventies. Burgundy began life as a commission from Andy Stark and Pete Tombs of Rook Films. They wanted him to helm a remake of Jess Franco's Lorna the Exorcist (1974).
- 2/20/2015
- by CineVue UK
- CineVue
I first encountered the work of Filipino action hero and tiny man-child Weng Weng at this very festival in 2007. Andy Stark and Pete Tombs ran an absolutely bonkers reel of money shots from their Mondo Macabro release label in front of a Pakistani slasher film they produced that was playing at Fantasia that year. There was more than enough "Wtf" splashed on screen for those wild 16 minutes, but the clips featuring a 2 foot 9 inch James Bond sporting a jet pack, or jumping out of high rise and floating down with just an umbrella, was a stand out. This was the same year that The Chuds' Weng Weng Rap video popped up on a nascent Youtube, also featuring loads of clips from For Y'ur Height Only and The...
[Read the whole post on twitchfilm.com...]...
[Read the whole post on twitchfilm.com...]...
- 7/28/2014
- Screen Anarchy
Earlier today, we posted a review for the Hindi independent film, Miss Lovely. While the film isn't a horror picture itself, it very much lives in the world of the cheap creature feature that was a staple of late '80s-early '90s Indian single screen rural theaters. Filmmakers like the Ramsay Brothers, on whom Miss Lovely's Duggal Brothers are very likely loosely based, could make very profitable careers with very meager capital. Like most of South Asian popular entertainment, Hindi Horrors passed by largely unnoticed in the west until Mondo Macabro's Pete Tombs took an active interest and released three of the most action-packed horror double features on the market today.Mondo Macabro's Bollywood Horror Collection is probably one of their most well-loved series, and with good...
- 10/25/2012
- Screen Anarchy
A small blurb on Deadline about an joining CAA pretty much confirms that the helmer behind personal favorites Katalin Varga (2009) and this year’s Edinburgh/Locarno/Tiff preemed Berberian Sound Studio is moving into the sought after talent sphere. Filmmaker Peter Strickland might now make The Beginning of Spring film project number three.
Gist: Based on Penelope Fitzgerald’s 1988 novel, The Beginning Of Spring centers on Frank Reid, a struggling printer in Moscow. On the eve of the Revolution, his wife returns to her native England, leaving him to raise their three young children alone. How does a reasonable man like Frank cope? Should he listen to the Tolstoyan advice of his bookkeeper? And should he, in his wife’s absence, resist his desire for his lovely Russian housemaid? How can anyone know how to live the right life?
Worth Noting: In a sit down with ScreenDaily, Strickland mentioned a...
Gist: Based on Penelope Fitzgerald’s 1988 novel, The Beginning Of Spring centers on Frank Reid, a struggling printer in Moscow. On the eve of the Revolution, his wife returns to her native England, leaving him to raise their three young children alone. How does a reasonable man like Frank cope? Should he listen to the Tolstoyan advice of his bookkeeper? And should he, in his wife’s absence, resist his desire for his lovely Russian housemaid? How can anyone know how to live the right life?
Worth Noting: In a sit down with ScreenDaily, Strickland mentioned a...
- 10/17/2012
- by Eric Lavallee
- IONCINEMA.com
One of the many reasons that Mondo Macabro is so revered among cult film freaks around the world is their dedication to digging up the best stuff from corners of the world usually ignored by the masses. In this case, I specifically asked Pete Tombs about his forays into the murky world of Latin American exploitation and horror. This is a subject that, while dear to my heart as a proud Mexican-American, is also an area about which I know shamefully little beyond what Mondo Macabro has taught me.When I sent off my query about Mondo Macabro's impressive collection of Latin American horror, his response was so detailed and such a pleasure to read that I thought it would be a pity for me...
- 7/27/2012
- Screen Anarchy
Sidharth Srinivasan
South Korean sales company Finecut has picked up international rights outside India to Sidharth Srinivasan’s horror film The Profane.
The film will be a co-production between India, UK and Korea. It will be co-produced by Andy Starke and Pete Tombs of UK’s Root Films, and Finecut’s Suh Young-Joo.
The synopsis of the film on Finecut’s website: A brother and sister, at odds with the world and one another, take their elderly mother to Varanasi to fulfill her dying wish–to be cremated and have her ashes scattered in the holy river Ganges. But, once there, the mother refuses to die. To find a way out of their dilemma, her two children are forced to resort to extreme measures. Measures that trap them in a world of strange magic and dark desires; a world ruled by the dead rather than the living.
The Profane, which...
South Korean sales company Finecut has picked up international rights outside India to Sidharth Srinivasan’s horror film The Profane.
The film will be a co-production between India, UK and Korea. It will be co-produced by Andy Starke and Pete Tombs of UK’s Root Films, and Finecut’s Suh Young-Joo.
The synopsis of the film on Finecut’s website: A brother and sister, at odds with the world and one another, take their elderly mother to Varanasi to fulfill her dying wish–to be cremated and have her ashes scattered in the holy river Ganges. But, once there, the mother refuses to die. To find a way out of their dilemma, her two children are forced to resort to extreme measures. Measures that trap them in a world of strange magic and dark desires; a world ruled by the dead rather than the living.
The Profane, which...
- 5/17/2012
- by NewsDesk
- DearCinema.com
Mondo Macabro, one of the most versatile independent video labels on the planet, has just signed an exclusive agreement with Danger After Dark for distribution. The first release of the new partnership will be UK slasher, Don't Open Till Christmas, fully uncut and featuring over an hour of bonus material, coming December 6th. I can't help but think that this is good news, Mondo Macabro has been fairly quiet this year, but the few titles they've released most recently have been fantastic, and hopefully this will usher in a new, more productive, era for Pete Tombs' and Andy Starke's amazing company.Danger After Dark to Distributemondo MacAbro Library In North AMERICAThe holiday fun begins with ultimate festive DVD release:1984's UK-slasher horror "Don't Open Till Christmas"re-mastered and...
- 10/29/2011
- Screen Anarchy
Locarno Open Doors will be held alongside the 64th Locarno International Film Festival from August 6-9, 2011. Open Doors 2011 that focuses on India, has selected 12 projects for its co-production lab. Sidharth Srinivasan’s Samaadhi (The Penance) is one of them. Srinivasan’s debut feature Pairon Talle premiered at Toronto last year followed by an European premiere at Rotterdam. In the first in the series, DearCinema brings to you details about the filmmaker and the project, in the words of the filmmaker:
Sidharth Srinivasan
I am an independent filmmaker who writes and directs his own material. My latest project Samaadhi (The Penance) is an elevated genre film – a truly Indian horror film that also plays as a family drama. It is a film that explores very rooted notions of transience, impermanence and family ties – notions that are so peculiar to the subcontinent.
This project is currently at an advanced stage of development.
Sidharth Srinivasan
I am an independent filmmaker who writes and directs his own material. My latest project Samaadhi (The Penance) is an elevated genre film – a truly Indian horror film that also plays as a family drama. It is a film that explores very rooted notions of transience, impermanence and family ties – notions that are so peculiar to the subcontinent.
This project is currently at an advanced stage of development.
- 8/3/2011
- by Sidharth Srinivasan
- DearCinema.com
News is just floating in that one of the most respected genre filmmakers of the French/European horror scene has died.
Jean Rollin, along with several other European filmmakers in the late 60's, began a trend of erotic and gothic horror films than inspired legions of underground followers and imitators. He broke new ground in France by directing films, mostly vampire films at first, that treated the age old foe of humanity with a new, more explicit sensuality than had ever been seen.
One of the best treatises on the work of Rollin and his contemporaries can be found in Pete Tombs' and Cathal Tohill's stellar exploration of European horror and art films, Immoral Tales. I highly recommend seeking this book out, even though it is out of print.
Rollin is one of those filmmakers who has many films that have been unavailable for years, but, by all means find those that you can,...
Jean Rollin, along with several other European filmmakers in the late 60's, began a trend of erotic and gothic horror films than inspired legions of underground followers and imitators. He broke new ground in France by directing films, mostly vampire films at first, that treated the age old foe of humanity with a new, more explicit sensuality than had ever been seen.
One of the best treatises on the work of Rollin and his contemporaries can be found in Pete Tombs' and Cathal Tohill's stellar exploration of European horror and art films, Immoral Tales. I highly recommend seeking this book out, even though it is out of print.
Rollin is one of those filmmakers who has many films that have been unavailable for years, but, by all means find those that you can,...
- 12/17/2010
- Screen Anarchy
One of the formative events in my journey toward cinephilia was finding a copy of Cathal Tohill and Pete Tombs' invaluable text on European art film and sexploitation, Immoral Tales. I would open it randomly to a page almost daily and find some of the most interesting sounding films at my fingertips. I haven't yet managed to watch all of them, I man never manage that, but it gave me a point of departure for exploring the very specific type of of film really only made in Europe in the late 50's through the 70's. The auteurs given greatest attention in the boook have turned out to be some of my favorites, the kind of people who could make a sexy horror or fantasy film that felt like a work of art. Sure, some of them were trashy, many of them were over the top, and some even were pornographic,...
- 10/26/2010
- Screen Anarchy
[Trailer disappeared briefly due to too many breasts for YouTube. It's back now with a happier home in the Twitch video player and this post back to the top of the page accordingly.]
Bringing more breasts per minute than any other film at the Toronto International Film Festival, or so I presume, Mark Hartley's Machete Maidens Unleashed does for the history of Filipino-shot B-film what Hartley's previous feature - Not Quite Hollywood - did for Australia.
From the early '70s well into the '90s the Philippines was a back-lot for a bevy of B-movie mavericks and cinema visionaries alike. The country was utilized for its inexpensive labour, exotic locations and distinct lack of rules. A large body of genre work emerged that somehow managed to capture the raw, chaotic energy of contemporary Filipino culture. These productions (a cavalcade of monster movies, jungle prison movies, blaxploitation and kung fu hybrids) were miraculously made at a time when the country's political situation was repressive at best.
Machete Maidens Unleashed! is the ultimate insiders' account of genre filmmaking in the Philippines. A role...
Bringing more breasts per minute than any other film at the Toronto International Film Festival, or so I presume, Mark Hartley's Machete Maidens Unleashed does for the history of Filipino-shot B-film what Hartley's previous feature - Not Quite Hollywood - did for Australia.
From the early '70s well into the '90s the Philippines was a back-lot for a bevy of B-movie mavericks and cinema visionaries alike. The country was utilized for its inexpensive labour, exotic locations and distinct lack of rules. A large body of genre work emerged that somehow managed to capture the raw, chaotic energy of contemporary Filipino culture. These productions (a cavalcade of monster movies, jungle prison movies, blaxploitation and kung fu hybrids) were miraculously made at a time when the country's political situation was repressive at best.
Machete Maidens Unleashed! is the ultimate insiders' account of genre filmmaking in the Philippines. A role...
- 8/17/2010
- Screen Anarchy
This year’s Fantasia is taking a while to get off the ground horror-wise, and it wasn’t until the second evening of the festival that we saw the first real horror related film of this year’s program, the documentary Herschell Gordon Lewis - The Godfather of Gore (review here).
The movie was thoroughly entertaining, containing tons of stories straight from Herschell, his collaborators, and high profile fans such as John Waters and Joe Bob Briggs. The screening was attended by the filmmaking team, Jimmy Maslon, Mike Vraney, and the always hilarious and informative Frank Henenlotter. The man himself, H.G. Lewis was also on hand to answer questions, and lead the Fantasia audience through a rollicking rendition of the 2000 Maniacs theme song! Yeeeeee-Haw!
Saturday was the first of many full-day movie watching sessions, and included the Greek zombie apocalypse flick Evil in the Time of Heroes, dysfunctional British family crime comedy Down Terrace,...
The movie was thoroughly entertaining, containing tons of stories straight from Herschell, his collaborators, and high profile fans such as John Waters and Joe Bob Briggs. The screening was attended by the filmmaking team, Jimmy Maslon, Mike Vraney, and the always hilarious and informative Frank Henenlotter. The man himself, H.G. Lewis was also on hand to answer questions, and lead the Fantasia audience through a rollicking rendition of the 2000 Maniacs theme song! Yeeeeee-Haw!
Saturday was the first of many full-day movie watching sessions, and included the Greek zombie apocalypse flick Evil in the Time of Heroes, dysfunctional British family crime comedy Down Terrace,...
- 7/11/2010
- by EvilAndy
- DreadCentral.com
The Final Girl: A Few Thoughts on Feminism and Horror By Donato Totaro
One of the more important, if not groundbreaking, accounts/recuperations of the horror film from a feminist perspective is the 1993 Carol Clover's "Men, Women, and Chainsaws". One of the book's major points concerns the structural positioning of what she calls the Final Girl in relation to spectatorship. While most theorists label the horror film as a male-driven/male-centered genre, Clover points out that in most horror films, especially the slasher film, the audience, male and female, is structurally 'forced' to identify with the resourceful young female (the Final Girl) who survives the serial attacker and usually ends the threat (until the sequel anyway.) So while the narratively dominant killer's subjective point of view may be male within the narrative,the male viewer is still rooting for the Final Girl to overcome the killer. We can see this...
One of the more important, if not groundbreaking, accounts/recuperations of the horror film from a feminist perspective is the 1993 Carol Clover's "Men, Women, and Chainsaws". One of the book's major points concerns the structural positioning of what she calls the Final Girl in relation to spectatorship. While most theorists label the horror film as a male-driven/male-centered genre, Clover points out that in most horror films, especially the slasher film, the audience, male and female, is structurally 'forced' to identify with the resourceful young female (the Final Girl) who survives the serial attacker and usually ends the threat (until the sequel anyway.) So while the narratively dominant killer's subjective point of view may be male within the narrative,the male viewer is still rooting for the Final Girl to overcome the killer. We can see this...
- 12/21/2009
- by Superheidi
- Planet Fury
The world is a better place because of films like Taiwan’s Thrilling Bloody Sword and better still because people like Colin Geddes - who owns and has preserved the print screened here in Sitges - and Mondo Macabro’s Pete Tombs and Andy Starke - who presented it to audiences - are here to point the way to find them. A ludicrously unauthorized remake of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Thrilling Bloody Sword has everything you could possibly want in a cult film: technicolored painted backdrops, evil magicians, a beautiful girl hatched from an egg, palace intrigue, a talking chicken, one-eyed demons, fire breathing nine headed serpents, dwarfs that are nothing but adult men walking on their knees and an invulnerable villain that can be killed only by stabbing him up the bum. I can’t say conclusively that director Cheung San-Yee was consuming large amounts of acid...
- 10/5/2008
- by Todd Brown
- Screen Anarchy
IMDb.com, Inc. takes no responsibility for the content or accuracy of the above news articles, Tweets, or blog posts. This content is published for the entertainment of our users only. The news articles, Tweets, and blog posts do not represent IMDb's opinions nor can we guarantee that the reporting therein is completely factual. Please visit the source responsible for the item in question to report any concerns you may have regarding content or accuracy.