30 Days of Night
Steve Niles originally conceived the story as a film. After years of rejection by studios, it was reworked into a comic book. Eventually, a studio that rejected the original screenplay went for the comic version.
Sneak Peek: 30 DAYS OF NIGHT #9 (Out this week)
http://www.newsarama.com/php/multimedia/album.php?aid=47056&utm
Daredevil reborn
Pretty exciting news: check out the article below from Empireonline.com
Fox has been quietly developing a newDaredevil film for a couple of years now. 30 Days Of Night and Twilight: Eclipse director David Slade has been attached since last spring, and there have been screenplays by David Scarpa (The Day The Earth Stood Still) and Brad Caleb Kane (Brooklyn’s Finest).Now though, there’s word of yet another draft, this time by David James Kelly.
The plan is still to adapt the Frank Miller saga Born Again, first published in Daredevil issues 227-233, in 1986. The story sees Matt Murdock outed as Daredevil by former secretary Karen Page. She has, shall we say, fallen on hard times since leaving the Nelson & Murdock law firm, and sells the info for a shot of heroin. It eventually reaches crime boss The Kingpin, who proceeds to creatively dismantle Murdock’s life and send supervillain Nuke into Murdock’s stomping ground of New York’s Hell’s Kitchen.
Stark Terror: My Top Ten Horror Movies
An American Werewolf in London
First real werewolf movie I saw. Probably had a very deep effect on me as I was about seven at the time and my only experience of the werewolf genre had been “Teen Wolf” and cartoons. The early scenes terrified me, particularly the nightmare sequences. The visitations from the undead victims made me laugh (probably my first experience of dark humor as well) then the transformation scene completely blew me away. This is probably the horror film I’ve seen more times than any other and I’ve owned it on practically every format. Never gets old for me.
Kill List
An unsettling, eerie genre mash, with no easy answers, that takes a hammer to typical conventions and shoots expectations in the back of the head. This movie may upset some, frustrate others, but one thing is certain - it will haunt you long after the credits roll. It certainly did me anyway.
The Collector
Another fairly recent one here so I don’t know if it’s going to stand the test of time for me. But I thoroughly enjoyed this flick all four times that i’ve watched it. I love the simplicity of the set up, I love its unprediactbility, I love its scuzzy, raw looking visuals and its soundtrack. I love that the main character isn’t a shy, but independent and resourceful teenage girl played by a twenty something woman and I love just how gleefully vicious it is.
Halloween
The very first horror film I saw, not long before I caught American werewolf for the first time. This absolutely terrified me. Until then life had been Star Wars, Superman, James Bond and cartoons. There would be an adventure, some humor, a bit of danger but there was always the certainty that the good guys would win. Seeing a movie about a silent killer murdering strangers for absolutely no reason AND THEN GETTING AWAY AT THE END not only gave me a week of sleepless nights but completely destroyed my image of the world. Thank you Mr Carpenter
30 Days of Night
The movie which gave vampires their teeth back and my favorite vampire movie. Ignoring what had come to be the standard depiction of vamps as good looking, seductive people, who often tend to know Kung Fu, largely thanks to the Lost Boys and Buffy, this movie provides malicious, sadistic, animalistic vamps who descend on an isolated Alaskan town during a thirty day polar night and have a feeding frenzy on the helpless locals. Downbeat, upsetting and genuinely scary, these qualities probably prevented it from being the hit it deserved to be, but it’s these very qualities which make it one of my top horrors of all time.
The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974)
I absolutely detested this when I first saw it at the age of sixteen. It really, really bothered me. Not because it was bad, because it’s so fucking good. I’d never been made to feel so uncomfortable watching a film before (or since) and I squirmed, shouted at the TV and resolved never to watch it again. Eventually I did, and found there was great pleasure to be had in inflicting this movie upon friends and girlfriends over the years. Watching them watching this always gave me something to laugh at and led me into fully appreciating the movie for what it does. TCM is a nerve shredding, assault on your senses.
Dawn of the Dead (2004)
Yes, “sacrilege” maybe, but I just found this version to be superior in so many ways. For a start the characters, there are much more of them and they’re far more interesting, likable, hatable, funny, quirky, sympathetic and layered. The Zombies are now fast (following the trend set by 28 days later) which provides much more intense chase and action sequences. The dialogue is memorable ” You can take your ass over to the Quality Inn if it’s still there, Shaq! ” the music is excellent - Jim Carroll’s “People who died”, Johnny Cash’s “The man comes around”, The Stereophonics “Have a nice day”, Richard Cheese doing Disturbed’s “the sickness”, the Disturbed doing the Disturbed’s “The sickness”, and most importantly the central message of the original remains intact.
The Descent
My favorite British horror flick. Claustrophobic, intense, gory, thrilling. Another movie with a cast of memorable, and mostly likeable, characters in peril whose scares are all the more potent for it. The first half is shadowed by a looming dread, the second induces cold sweats and the third is all out carnage. I especially love that the whole group are capable individuals who don’t fall to pieces when things go more than a little awry. I’ve liked all of Neil Marshall’s efforts (Doomsday, Centurion, Dog Soldiers) and consider him something akin to a British John Carpenter, but this is his best work so far.
The Midnight Meat Train
The movie that made me love Clive Barker. I had seen most of the Hellraisers, enjoyed a couple of them, thought Candyman was pretty good, but never really got what all the fuss was about. I was too young I guess, too immature to appreciate the subtexts. Then I saw MMT which took me on a ride that I’m still on. After that I began reading Barker’s horror stories and novels, I collected up the Hellraiser comics and I even played one of his video games. Anyway I love the movie, Vinnie Jones is actually really good in it, and it will always hold a special place in my heart. The title says it all, it’s a vicious gore soaked, gem of a film and if you haven’t seen it I urge you to do so.
NOW.
Manhunter (last on my list so I went on a bit)
Overshadowed by its more theatrical follow up “Silence of the lambs” and diminished by its by-the-numbers remake “Red Dragon”, Michael Mann’s “Manhunter” really doesn’t get the attention it deserves as arguably the best Hannibal Lecter film.
Like Silence, it’s the pervading atmosphere which provides Manhunter its power, the constant tension and drip fed sense of dread-which in this adaptation is given a far more satisfying and explosive release through its climax than the admittedly more faithful Red Dragon. William Petersen has never been better than here as the talented Will Graham, haunted and frightened by the very gift which makes him a hero, his ability to understand a killer’s perspective. He’s an unpredictable, mumbling presence prone to explosive bouts of rage and impulsive behavior but he’s also a true hero for facing what he fears the most in the world (and in himself) in order to try and save others.
As much as I love Anthony Hopkins as Lecter, and in many other things, I think that Brian Cox’s version is superior. Cox imbues his “Lektor” with icy charm and british politeness, but also with a moral absence in his dead eyes and slack jaw. In his limited screen time he picks at Graham in a friendly and conversational way that hints at how disarming he may have been to his victims. Upon first viewing the exchange can be seen as perfectly civil, it’s only if you already understand Lecktor’s nature, or watch it again, that you can see the subtle game he’s playing, squeezing as much information out of Graham as possible with purely malicious motives in mind.
Last but not least we have Tom Noonan’s killer “Dollarhyde”, a truly intimidating figure but also a tragic one whose history doesn’t need to be thrown in our faces; we can imagine some of what he might have been through (and be going through) based on Noonan’s performance-he doesn’t need to be arguing with an invisible Grandma for us to get it. In my opinion anything left out about Dollarhyde’s background and motives serves to enrich the film, since I feel the more obscure his behavior seems the more frightening he is. It’s better to learn about him from Graham’s perspective than have him arguing with the dead Grandma cliche.
Mahunter’s fine list of supporting characters includes Stephen Lang as a sleazy journalist, Joan Allen as the object of Dollarhyde’s affection, along with Dennis Farina turning down his motormouth delivery to the right side of convincing as FBI head Jack Crawford and Kim Greist as Graham’s long suffering wife.
The plot is solid, with a lot of the flab trimmed from the novel and the action feels all the more violent and shocking for how infrequent it is. Although this is not necessarily a movie people love the first time, and I have to admit it’s taken me a few years to truly take to it, Manhunter is a claustrophobic classic with a twist of 80’s cool courtesy of Michael Mann, and post “Drive” I think it should find a whole new audience to appreciate its power.
