Every time I say I’m not going to write and focus on music, I end up coming back to writing about horror. My first almost-publication was a Halloween edition of my sixth grade school paper. I wrote movie reviews and drew pumpkins for a rating system. They got printed (on orange paper!) but were never … Continue reading Black Lodge Review Over at HorrorDNA
Artaud’s manifestos on the Theater of Cruelty. Certainly transferable to other art forms. I read this 20+ years ago after discovering various early-20th Century avant-garde manifestos. Worth a reread with fresh eyes and more experience. Holbein’s paintings are favorites and I’ve always wanted to track these down. Functions like a Memento Mori Tarot. Le danse … Continue reading Marginalia #7
More interesting and insightful than I thought it was going to be. Australian folk horror from the early 80s. A precursor to Hereditary, maybe? Genuinely bad, but possibly fun for those with a penchant and the patience for horror on a low budget in the 80s. Takes on apartment horror/possession. Some hilarious dialogue hilariously delivered. … Continue reading Marginalia #5
An epic about change and organized around the history of the world. I can’t imagine any reader not knowing some of these stories. I had been meaning to read the whole thing for years, especially after coming across Samuel Beckett’s enthusiasm for it. I can only remember offhand Beckett celebrating Proust, Joyce, and Ovid. Beckett’s … Continue reading Marginalia #2
Destroy Your Sight With a New Gorgon: “Don’t Look Now” and Macbeth Originally written for Episode 61 on Don’t Look Now (1973) and C.H.U.D. (1984). “Do you fear/ things that sound so fair?”~ The Tragedy of Macbeth, William Shakespeare “Just chance, a flick of a coin.”~ “Don’t Look Now,” Daphne du Maurier In all my viewings … Continue reading From the Archives: The Terror Test: Test Prep #16
Carveth vs. Carveth Originally written for Episode 60 on The ABCs of Death (2012) and The Brood (1979). “I think the reason why Mommy left… was because for a long time… I kept trying to make her be a certain kind of person. A certain kind of wife that I thought she was supposed to … Continue reading From the Archives: The Terror Test: Test Prep #15
I wrote this a while back when the podcast was investigating French horror. Let me know what I missed and what I should check out, especially in the last five years or so. Continue reading From the Archives: The Terror Test: Test Prep #14
Slicing Up 8 ½ Eyeballs Originally written for The Terror Test: Episode 44. Contains A Cat in the Brain (1990) and 8 ½ (1963) spoilers. “You can’t make love stories.” ~ 8 ½ “If I made Romantic movies nobody would go see them.” ~ A Cat in the Brain Around age twelve, I started … Continue reading From the Archives: The Terror Test: Test Prep #12
The Terror Test is a podcast made by teachers about horror movies. They are currently doing a series of episodes related to Sady Doyle’s book Dead Blondes and Bad Mothers: Monstrosity, Patriarchy, and the Fear of Female Power. As part of the series, I interviewed Southern root-worker/Tarot reader EllieMae Plantagenet about the influence of the … Continue reading Some Terror Test Updates
Stephen McClurg 