Movie Review: From Beyond

Directed by Stuart Gordon
Starring Jeffrey Combs, Barbara Crampton, Ken Foree, Ted Sorel, Carolyn Purdy-Gordon, Bunny Summers

For horror fans, the ‘80s were a time of sheer wonderment when it came to special effects. With the constant advancement of special makeup effects, it was a time of foam rubber, latex, and slime, with the only boundaries being imagination. One film that represents that more than most is Stuart Gordon’s From Beyond.

When I worked at the theater back in the ‘80s, Re-Animator (1985) played there and it just blew me away, between the gore and just the outrageousness of the whole story. I had already been reading Fangoria by that time, so when From Beyond was coming out, I was already excited about seeing it. And luckily for me, it played at my theater as well, so I spent a lot of time in there watching it over and over. I had recently started reading horror fiction, and thanks to Stephen King, had already started to dive into the works of H.P. Lovecraft, and had read the very short story that From Beyond was based on. In fact, the pre-credit sequence in the film is pretty much the whole story. But I think writer Dennis Paoli, along with producer Brian Yuzna and director Gordon, fleshed out the rest of the plot that, while way gorier and gooier than Lovecraft would have spelled out, I think it still felt it could be in the same universe.

Why We Need to See Films in the Theater

Last night, I ventured into Chicago to the Music Box Theatre for The Creepshow, a Stephen King film festival, where they had a bunch of King movies being screened over 3 days. Friday night, they were screening the original The Shining (1980) and Doctor Sleep (2019), which I had originally planned to go but didn’t make it. Which kind of worked out for the best, since I heard it sold out early in the day. But I did go last night because they were screening Creepshow (1982), which happens to be one of my favorite films of all time. They were also screening 1408 (2007), and Christine (1983), which we planned on staying for as well.

When we (myself and my partner-in-crime for the evening, Brian Martinez) drove up to the theater, we could already see a huge line outside the theater. I lucked out in finding a parking space right in front of the theater. Any locals know just how lucky you are when that happens. In fact, we were so excited, I completely forgot to pay the parking meter. So, after over 30 years of coming into the city for movies and such, I ended up getting my first parking ticket! But back to the real story.

Monster Bash 2016 Report…The Final Chapter

Sunday July 10th

Sundays at a convention tend to be a sobering wake-up call. And that has nothing to do with alcohol, but just the fact that the weekend is almost over and soon we’ll be packing up, loading the van back up, and hitting the road. And when you have an eight our ride looming over you, it makes it even more daunting. Plus, it also means that we’ll all soon have to go back to reality, leaving our monstrous weekend behind. What makes it even more difficult is when you’ve had such a great time these last few days at a show like Monster Bash. It really does make you start counting the days until the next one.

Movie Review: Beast Wishes

Directed by Frank Dietz and Trish Geiger.
Starring Bob & Kathy Burns, Rick Baker, John Landis, Greg Nicotero, Joe Dante, William Malone, and many more!