On October 24, 1981, horror classic Dark Night of the Scarecrow premiered on CBS the CBS Saturday Night Movie at 9pm EST. This Sunday, the 40th anniversary of the original air date, Bubba returns.
This made-for-TV turned classic was written and directed by Frank De Felitta, and stars Academy Award nominee Charles Durning (Tootsie; When A Stranger Calls) and Emmy winner Larry Drake (Darkman; L.A. Law).
Plot:
In a small Southern town, four vigilantes wrongfully execute a mentally-challenged man, but after the court sets them free mysterious “accidents” begin to kill them off one by one.
Original Trailer
When and where can you catch this underrated gem? Sunday, October 24 at 9pm EST.
Fans of 80’s slasher films rejoice, Axeman At Cutter’s Creek is the trip back to the days of dark comedy and gore the genre has needed. Cinephiles, especially those fond of the horror genre, shutter at the work “reboot”, but this is a reboot worth watching.
Slasher films are known for specific characters, and they aren’t always just the killer. Axeman At Cutter’s Creek took me back to Friday the 13th Part III and the practical joke loving Shelly; the character Randy is very much the same. This only added to the enjoyment of the film.
The element of realness is refreshing. It’s not a ghost story or a legend of an unstoppable force, it is friends at a cabin in the middle of nowhere, aware of a legend of a man stalking the woods. This helps bring the 90’s slasher into the mix. The axeman may be just a man, but Scot Pollard (who stands roughly 6’11”) makes for a terrifying foe. Each member of the group will remind you of someone you know making it even easier to enjoy the film and connect to the characters.
The plot is well thought out and the script is well written, and both are translated on screen in slasher film dream. The kill scenes were original and imaginative (not to give away too much, but there is a scene that includes a rib bone, disgusting and amazing).
If you like your horror films to include a group of friends practically stranded in the middle of nowhere, drinking, sex, comic relief and vicious kills, Axeman At Cutter’s Creek is a must watch.
Axeman At Cutter’s Creek stars Tiffany Shepis (Victor Crowley), Brinke Stevens (The Slumber Party Massacre), Elissa Dowling (Girl on the Third Floor), Jamie Bernadette (I Spit on Your Grave: Deja Vu), Erin Maria Hogan (Hold Your Breath) and NBA star Scot Pollard.
Experience the laughs and the splatter yourself on May 7th.
Fans of 80’s slasher films and the new films inspired by them can rejoice as #SinningWorks and filmmaker Joston “El Rey” Theney have announced a release date for their project, Axeman At Cutter’s Creek.
The film stars veterans such as Tiffany Shepis (Victor Crowley) and Brinke Stevens (The Slumber Party Massacre). Other names gracing the credits include Elissa Dowling (Girl on the Third Floor), Jamie Bernadette (I Spit on Your Grave: Deja Vu), Erin Maria Hogan (Hold Your Breath) and NBA star Scot Pollard.
If this legend sounds familiar, it may be because you have heard its previous title, Axeman. Axeman At Cutter’s Creek will serve as a reboot to the franchise. When asked about his film, Theney had this to say,
“Axeman was a fun movie to make and I’m so appreciative of the super supportive fanbase. But, to no fault of the cast and crew, it got rushed and we never really put our movie’s best foot forward. This one’ll include never-before-seen footage and a slicker, faster 80 minute run-time”
“What really killed me was not wrapping up the film as originally intended. It was envisioned as a trilogy from the outset and the ending we were forced to go with painted us into a corner. But this release of Axeman At Cutter’s Creek course-corrects the ship and is our first step to putting us on a path to finishing the franchise strong.”
Axeman At Cutter’s Creek will be released to major VOD platforms May 7, 2021. Review coming soon.
The slasher film may be the most popular sub-genre in horror, but lately it seems like all most can deliver is a remake or a cheap knockoff of one of the greats. Eric Liberacki is here to rescue slasher fans with his new film The Lurker which is heavily inspired by the Golden era of slasher films.
When asked about the film, Liberacki said:
“my screenwriting always gravitated toward slasher films of that time period (’80s, ’90s).” This was the pivotal time for slashers and their many sequels. The Lurker was also a team effort: “while I was shooting the feature film the Pale Man the director, John Lerchen, gave me a copy of the script for The Lurker. After years of trying to find the right script for my thesis, I had found it.”
The Lurker stars Scout Taylor-Compton (Halloween, 2007), Naomi Grossman (American Horror Story), Ari Lehman (Friday the 13th, 1980) and Adam Huss.
Synopsis:
A group of high school students, celebrating their final performance of Romeo and Juliet, begin to slowly disappear one at a time. As students and faculty begin to die at the hands of a savage killer, it’s a race against time for the cast to find the killer and escape with their lives or face their final curtain call.
Trailer:
The Lurker is available for pre-order this March and will hit DVD and digital platforms (Amazon Direct, Fandango Now, iTunes, FlixFling, Google Play, Redbox, VuDu and YouTube Movies) on April 14, 2020.
In 1992, a film called Candyman was released, and it made everyone think twice about urban legends and saying someone’s name 5 times. The film is a major cult classic among the exploitation and horror communities, now fast-forwarding to 2020, it is getting a “spiritual sequel” from producer Jordan Peele (Get Out) and director Nia DaCosta (Sleeping with the Enemy).
Candyman stars Yahya Abdul-Mateen II (Aquaman), Teyonah Parris (Dear White People), Nathan Stewart-Jarrett (Adulting) and Colman Domingo (Fear the Walking Dead).
Synopsis:
For as long as residents can remember, the housing projects of Chicago’s Cabrini Green neighborhood were terrorized by a word-of-mouth ghost story about a supernatural killer with a hook for a hand, easily summoned by those daring to repeat his name five times into a mirror. In present day, a decade after the last of the Cabrini towers were torn down, visual artist Anthony McCoy (Yahya Abdul-Mateen II; HBO’s Watchmen, Us) and his girlfriend, gallery director Brianna Cartwright (Teyonah Parris; If Beale Street Could Talk, The Photograph), move into a luxury loft condo in Cabrini, now gentrified beyond recognition and inhabited by upwardly mobile millennials.
Arrow Video is proud to announce that Why Don’t You Just Die! will be making a limited theater release in several cities across the US in April. The film is the feature debut of writer/director Kirill Sokolov, and is described to be a black comedy in the vein of Quentin Tarantino and Edgar Wright.
When asked about the film Sokolov said:
“Despite our exaggerated use of genre tropes and all the flashy effects, Why Don’t You Just Die! remains, for me, an incredibly personal and sincere story. The film’s inherent violence is the result of reflection on the realities of life in Russia, modern relationships, and societal attitudes. The gallows humor which pervades the film is the only true reaction whatsoever to all of this. The film is intended as an emotional rollercoaster, making the audience laugh, cry, and laugh again – but then immediately feel a sense of unease for having laughed.”
Why Don’t You Just Die! has received high critical praise from festivals around the world.
Synopsis:
Matvey (Aleksandr Kuznetsov) has just one objective: to gain entry to his girlfriend’s parents’ apartment and kill her father Andrey (Vitaliy Khaev) with a hammer to restore her honour. But all is not as it initially seems, and Matvey’s attempts to bludgeon the family patriarch to death don’t quite go to plan as Andrey proves a more formidable – not to mention ruthless – opponent than he anticipated… and Matvey, for his part, proves stubbornly unwilling to die.
The film is in Russian with English subtitles and has a run-time of 95 minutes.
Why Don’t You Just Die! will be released in select theaters in the US in April 10, 2020. The cities that will be showing the film include Los Angeles, New York, Chicago, New Orleans, Pittsburgh, Columbus, Knoxville, Ithaca, Houston, Lubbock, El Paso and Phoenix. Check local listings for theaters and showtimes.
Genre sales specialist Devilworks has acquired International rights to Eric Horde’s adventure fantasy, Trolls World. The film is a German production shot in English produced by Fantomfilm GmbH with Eva Habermann and Alexander König leading the production.
Synopsis:
Trolls World follows an evil troll who is accidentally brought back to life and is out for revenge for his 700 years of suffering. He possesses the body of a young woman and sets his sights on unleashing an army of trolls to take over the world.
Samantha Richardson, President at Devilworks, said:
This is entertainment all the way; creatures, trolls, witches, legends….Trolls World is brimming with fun and adventure.
Trolls World will be launched at EFM in Berlin.
Devilworks will be exhibiting at Marriott Hotel, Suite 248 (Feb 20th – 25th).
One of America’s most popular cryptids, Mothman, is getting a bookend to a trilogy with The Mothman Legacy. A trailer and a new one-sheet have been dropped to promote the film’s crowdfunding campaign. The film is the latest work of cryptid documentarian Seth Breedlove and the one-sheet artwork is from artist Christopher Shy (Godzilla: King of Monsters).
For anyone that may not be familiar with the Mothman legend, many believe the Mothman to be a 1960’s phenomenon, an omen only appearing before tragedy, and disappearing after a flap of sightings and the subsequent Silver Bridge collapse in 1967. But what if there’s more? What if the origins of this omen trace back much further and go much deeper than anyone realized? And what if…the sightings never ended?
The Mothman Legacy provides a glimpse into the dark, haunting landscapes of West Virginia and includes sound clips from witnesses that were interviewed for the film.
As mentioned above, a crowdfunding campaign will be launched today, February 6, 2020, via Kickstarter. Rewards for contributing to the campaign include copies of the film on DVD and Blu-ray, posters, t-shirts and more.
Small Town Monsters made waves in 2017 with their documentary The Mothman of Point Pleasant, followed by 2019’s Terror in the Skies. The Mothman trilogy will conclude with the release of The Mothman Legacy, set to premiere in Fall 2020.
A group of people went into the woods in Tennessee not knowing that in 1981 they would release one of the horror genre’s biggest films, The Evil Dead. Not only is the film a classic, but the events of production of the film itself has brought some of the most bizarre and interesting stories of any other film. Here are 10 trivial facts about The Evil Dead.
10. Tape Scene Re-shoot
The script called for the characters to be smoking marijuana during the scene where they are listening to the tape; the cast decided to take it a step further and decided to actually smoke. This lead to the scene having to be later re-shot due to uncontrollable behavior.
9. Bruce Campbell and the Broken Shirt
The blood used in the film was made up of a concoction of Karo syrup, non-dairy creamer and red food coloring. During the course of filming, Bruce Campbell was completely drenched in the mixture, and after attempting to dry his shirt, the mixture solidified and when Campbell tried to put the shirt back on, it broke.
8. Missing Teeth
Since filming took place in a wooded area and inside of a small cabin, moving around proved to be complicated at times. While filming, a cameraman tripped and his camera smashed into Bruce Campbell’s face resulting in him losing several teeth.
7. King was a Fan
The film was shown to Stephen King and it was his praise that really sold the public and would later grace the poster. His praise even aided in the funding for Evil Dead II by the same company that worked with him on Maximum Overdrive.
6. Blood Donations
At the premier, blood donor stations were giving out free tickets in exchange for a blood donation. Participants also received pins that read “I bled for The Evil Dead”.
5. Workplace Hazards
Several actors were inadvertently stabbed or thrown into objects during production.
4. Video Nasty
The Evil Dead was one of the first films to be labeled a “video nasty” (a term used in the UK to describe a film that has been released to VHS that was criticized for its violent content by the press, social commentators and religious organisations) and was banned in the UK because of it.
3. Real Boomstick
When Ash shoots a Deadite through the window of he cabin resulting in an explosion of blood, Bruce Campbell was firing a real gun at a dummy for a more realistic shot.
2. Real-Life Cabin Horror Story
Raimi stated that the cabin’s eerie vibe was completely justified. During an interview, he recounted a real-life horror story that unfolded in the cabin years before:
“One night, during a thunderstorm, this little girl woke up and was scared by the lightning happening around the cabin. She ran into her mother’s room and pulling back the covers climbing into bed with her, she found that her mother was dead. She was so frightened she ran into her grandmother’s room and somehow that same evening, she had died also,” Raimi recalled. “The little girl ran into the storm … to this little farmhouse and [the family living there] found her screaming and banging on the doors. They took care of her after that and no one lived in the cabin since. The [little girl], who’s now an old woman, during thunderstorms after that … would often be found wandering around the woods.”
The kicker, however, was that story came to life during the film’s shoot. Raimi continued, “As we were shooting, this fella [from the farmhouse that took in the little girl] was looking for the [now old] woman, saying that because there was a thunderstorm the night before, he was looking for this woman, because it was possible that she had returned to the cabin … As far as we know, they never found [her.]”
1. Homage Tag
The Hills Have Eyes poster seen in The Evil Dead was Raimi’s way of paying tribute to the ripped Jaws poster that can be seen in Wes Craven’s The Hills Have Eyes. Craven responded by having Nancy watch The Evil Dead in A Nightmare on Elm Street to which Raimi responded by hanging a Freddy glove about the tool shed door in Evil Dead II.
CONDWG Films (Daniel Goad and Constance Medrano) and RAD Entertainment (Tony Walters and Rebekah Erb) have teamed up to create a new addition to independent horror with Parallels.
What is Parallels?
Parallels follows two Monster-Hunters, Patrick and Albert, trying to save a woman who is possessed with a wicked entity. These money-for-hire Monster-Hunters are part of a larger collection of people tasked with keeping the world safe from things that go “bump in the night.” This next job is personal as the woman possessed his Patrick’s niece, Amelia, and they have to save her before it’s too late for everyone.
Parallels will star Ember Burns (Kill Dolly Kill), Jason Crowe (Don’t Fuck in the Woods 2), Christian Mahon (Black Bear) and will introduce James Bailey– a 20 year US Army Veteran, Tank Commander with 3 tours in Iraq (Documentary Fallout: Coming Home from the Iraq War).
The film is planned to start filming in July and August of 2020.
The Indiegogo Campaign will launch on January 31, 2020.
For more information and up-to-date news on Parallels, be sure to like the CONDWG Films Facebook page and follow @condwgfilms on Instagram and twitter.
Lipstick and Gore 