Amy Cross was a name I hadn’t encountered before in the realm of horror fiction, but doing some research into her work demonstrated that I probably should have heard of her before now, because she’s written a metric shit-ton of books, mainly in paranormal horror and fantasy. She’s a British writer who looks to have … More Books: The Ghost in Room 119 by Amy Cross
1979 was another hell of a year for amazing horror, giving us everything from what is easily one of the best sci-fi horror movies ever made to a bizarre and original new franchise starter; from a coldly grotesque body horror epic to a gut-munching gore masterpiece; from two stellar but very different adaptations of the … More My Favorite Horror Movies from Every Year Since I Was Born: 1979
Imagine, if you will, a largely forgotten, late 80s psychological horror film with sci-fi and paranormal elements that legitimately feels like a very low-budget, proto-Inception that also tries to dabble in as many different subgenres as possible, containing flavors of Altered States, Alien, From Beyond, A Nightmare on Elm Street, a haunted house tale, a … More Movies: Nightwish (1989)
Quite by accident, today’s double feature happens to consist of two films from the UK: the 2011 classically-structured English mystery/ghost story The Awakening, and the more modern-expressionist Irish murder-demon tale from 2014, The Canal. While neither of them was particularly original plot-wise, there was a great deal to enjoy in both films, and I have few qualms … More Double Feature: The Awakening (2011) and The Canal (2014)
Well, today’s random pairing was really nothing to write home about, but it was enjoyable enough to write a post about, so let’s get right to it. First up, 2016’s Beyond the Gates, directed by Jackson Stewart, and winner of the midnight-movie audience award at the Los Angeles Film Festival the year it came out. The … More Double Feature: Beyond the Gates and Dead Silence
Not too long ago on this series, we watched the Swedish-Danish witchcraft classic Häxan, and today we’re continuing the Swede theme with the spooky 1921 drama The Phantom Carriage (known in Swedish as Körkarlen), directed by and starring Victor Sjöström. This is really a beautiful film, with innovative ghost effects for the day and a surprisingly modern narrative structure, … More Silent Movie Watchalong: The Phantom Carriage (1921)
Upon opening her eyes, Lorna would always see the same thing: The floors, the walls, the ceiling, all sparkling with frost in the darkness like the inside of a candy sugar house, still and white and glinting in the light of the silver moon. Icicles dangling like delicate blown glass, reflecting her image in miniature, … More Fiction: Winter House
A while back, over on my other channel 13 O’Clock, I did a review of Adam Nevill’s 2015 chunker of a novel, No One Gets Out Alive, which I absolutely loved; it was one of my favorite horror novels in recent memory. Not only were the setting and the characters so vividly drawn that I … More Adaptation Breakdown: No One Gets Out Alive
Back around Halloween of 2021, I made a video talking about Something Wicked This Way Comes, the 1983 film adaptation of the classic Ray Bradbury novel that was part of what is sometimes termed Disney’s “Dark Phase.” This period in the studio’s history has always fascinated me, as despite the financial failure most of these … More Disney’s “Dark Phase” and The Watcher in the Woods (1980)
Ever since I started getting back into reading horror fiction over the past couple of years, I kept noticing the name Darcy Coates popping up all over the place. I don’t know a great deal about her, other than the fact that she’s Australian and seems to write a shit-ton of books in the gothic … More Books: The Haunting of Leigh Harker by Darcy Coates
The Scare Salon 