Writers defend horror films that have been trashed by film critics and horror film fans. Titles covered include Maniac (1934), Sh! The Octopus, Voodoo Man, Unknown Island, Scared Stiff, Indestructible Man, Rodan, The Tingler, Flesh Eaters, When Dinosaurs Ruled the Earth, King Kong (1976) and Dune.

Guilty Pleasures of the Horror Film

Humor & Entertainment

Svehla, Gary J.

Movies

Midnight Marquee Press

In this second volume of cinematic guilty pleasures, our writers again eloquently explain why movies which the majority of viewers consider subpar are so very special as movie experiences to them personally. These movies are not extraordinary in any way, and most of them contain fundamental flaws in craft, yet as filtered through the psyches of the writers involved, these guilty pleasures ultimately become something very special. And thus the reason why this book exists... to demonstrate the fact that the pleasures movies give far outweigh any guilt factor involved in selections such as The She Creature, Robot Monster, Omega Man, Frankenstein’s Daughter, Giant Gila Monster, Private Parts, Horror Island, Frankenstein Conquers the World, Strange Door, Juggernaut and many other curious choices.

Son of Guilty Pleasures of the Horror Film

Attack of the B Queens is a celebration of women in horror films. Editor Jon Keeyes begins the journey with an examination of the Birth of the B Film from the silent era through the 1950s. The trail is continued by scream queen Linnea Quigley who looks at Hammer Films, Brinke Stevens who discusses The Art of Screaming: the 1980s, Debbie Rochon continues with Sequels A Go-Go and the adventure continues with chapters on Corman Heroines, Glam Babes from Outer Space, Into the Post Modern Era and Queen Bitches of the Universe. Short interviews with B Queens such as Mamie Van Doren, Stella Stevens, Tura Satana, Barbara Leigh, Gail Harris, Ginger Lynn Allen, Jackie Lovell, Kathy Kurtz, Leslie Culton, Patricia Tallman, Sasha Graham and Tina Krause are also included.

Attack of the B Queens

Keeyes, Jon

The new printing of We Belong Dead has been revised and includes a new chapter by Gary J. Svehla, The Evolution of Hammer's Baron Frankenstein. This book stands as a testament to the durability of Mary Shelley’s original novel. The fact that today the name Frankenstein still elicits an immediate emotional response speaks of the universality of the Frankenstein mythos. Frankenstein’s Monster, over the course of the 20th century, became all things to all people. He was the social outcast who still had redeeming qualities. He was the loner, the tortured outsider to whom most of us could relate. He was the symbol of fear and of death, the creature better off dead who still stalked the laboratories of egocentric science. He became the metaphor for science gone bad... he was the Dark Side before Star Wars. He became a symbol that life, no matter how pathetic, was always better than death. The Monster represented a creature who sometimes wanted to die but could not. The Monster became the mirror in which the movie viewer could view the cruelty of an insensitive society that both created and later abandoned its own abominations. Whether we look at Frankenstein’s Monster as the bogeyman, as metaphor, as kindred spirit, or as society’s mirror, the fact remains that Mary Shelley knew not what she wrought during that haunted summer of 1816, and this volume is the latest effort in a relatively short line that tries to explain, looking at both cinema past and present, the meaning of Boris Karloff’s immortal words from 1935’s Bride of Frankenstein—“We belong dead!”

We Belong Dead: Frankenstein on Film

Dwight Frye's Last Laugh details the dramatic rise and fall of the actor who won immortality as the giggling Renfield of Dracula and the sadistic hunchback of Frankenstein. Authorized by Dwight's son Dwight David, the book includes detailed information of Frye's early stage work, his Broadway triumphs and his ghoulish typecasting in Hollywood—which ironically assured him a posthumous cult status among horror film disciples.

Dwight Frye's Last Laugh

Gregory William Mank

James T. Coughlin

Dwight D. Frye

Health, Fitness & Dieting

Jimmy Sangster proves the pen is mightier than the stake as he reflects upon his film career from his early apprenticeship in the British film industry to Hammer Films mainstay and then to a stint in Hollywood and television. “Mr. Sangster’s autobiography is written with the same flair that made him a successful and respected film writer, as he takes us on a witty, informative and honest ride from Hammer Horror to American network television.”—Tom Johnson, author Hammer Films: An Exhaustive Filmography

Do You Want it Good or Tuesday?: From Hammer Films to Hollywood: A Life in the Movies

Sangster, Jimmy

History

He has haunted our dreams and our waking hours, a fiend with a single purpose... to disarm us, to seduce us, to take the life from us. And Count Dracula, Bram Stoker's Vampire King, has been doing it for 100 years. As you will see in Dracula: The First Hundred Years, the image of Dracula is forever shifting and changing, reflecting not himself, but our own fears and secret longings. Include chapters on Dracula in film, the novel, and comics.

Dracula: The First Hundred Years

The Midnight Actors Series delves into pivotal films made throughout Lon Chaney's career (not only the mainstream Universal and horror classics, but his stunning performance in Of Mice and Men, his B Western career, his low-budget horror/exploitation movie career, his prestigious character performances in A productions, his television work, etc.), by having different authors offer distinct reflections and individual insights, and by including several firsthand interviews from people who worked with Chaney, Jr., we hope to offer the most complete and balanced portrait yet seen of Lon Chaney, Jr., working actor.

Lon Chaney, Jr.: Midnight Marquee Actors Series

Svehla, Gary

Biographies & Memoirs

The purpose of this book is to chronicle, critique and explore every theatrically released, English-language voodoo movie to date. Admittedly, sometimes the stories behind a film's making prove more entertaining than the movie itself, but such are the hazards of the job. While some are good, many are bad and a few are downright ugly, most voodoo movies contain at least the promise (occasionally fulfilled, more often not) of a glimpse into an alternate world view and spirituality that can be both fascinating and unsettling. Films such White Zombie, I Walked With a Zombie, Macumba Love, I Eat Your Skin, Angel Heart and The Believers are included in this fascinating film history.

Drums of Terror: Voodoo in the Cinema

Senn, Bryan

Each Christmas we shamelessly wallow in sweet sentiment brought to us courtesy of Hollywood, a glittering Tinsel Town filled with holiday spirit. It wouldn’t seem like Christmas if we didn’t spend some quality time with Jimmy Stewart and the folks of Bedford Falls or the March sisters—Jo, Beth, Meg and Amy. Scrooge is always a welcome guest in our home during the festive season, as well as newcomers such as the seemingly cursed but eternally optimistic Clark Griswold in National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation and Ralphie and his quest for a BB gun in the seminal A Christmas Story, a film that has justifiably attained classic Christmas status. Our love of Christmas movies goes back to our childhood as many of the chapters in this volume relate. Christmas is our favorite time of year, a time people seem a little friendlier, children more closely resemble angels and family ties are a little more important. We decided it was time we share our love of the season and our favorite Christmas movies with other holiday cinema fans

It's Christmastime at the Movies: An A-Z Guide of Our Favorite Holiday Films

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