Friday, December 20, 2013

Just saw this and wanted to share for any of us who have fond memories of great horror:

Today, In Topical News: New Friday The 13th Joins The 2015 Movie Pile, Spin-Off Web Series Also Coming

friday 13thSean S. Cunningham is the creator of Friday the 13th, the co-writer and director of the first instalment. While it’s not necessarily fair to say he’s also the creator of Jason Vorhees as we know him – that well-worn trivia about the first film in the series will tell you why – he has become a figurehead for the series.
And so he’s been doing some interviews to promote the Blu-ray collection of all twelve films in the series, inclusive of the 2009 do-over, and as well as much talk of the past, there was some forecasting of tomorrow.*
Sepaking with FearNET, Cunningham says that the next Friday the 13th film will “probably” get shot in the spring and then released early in 2015. Good, because I was wondering what would be on at the pictures in 2015 and was worried that there wouldn’t be anything big, flashy and well-branded to go see.
As to what shape the new film will take, Cunningham considered it unlikely that any characters would be carried over from the 2009 reboot:
That’s not likely, but it’s hard to know. It won’t be a continuation of that story, though. It’ll be a fresh story.
But that won’t be the end of it. There’s also some kind of TV spin-off coming, and it sounds a bit like they’re following the Bates Motel recipe:
I think there will also be Friday the 13th: Crystal Lake Chronicles, which is sort of a Smallville. We’ve been on-again off-again with that for years and there are a bunch of great stories to be told, but I think the way that it’s finally going to get delivered is not through a conventional television network, but through the Internet. I can’t tell you who the delivery people will be, but it won’t be the traditional route. There’s also the possibility of webisodes…
…It’s also more than just me saying, “You know, Friday the 13th would be a great series!” We’ve got a couple of really good writers that have been working and writing. It can’t be just Jason killing someone new every week. That’s not going to make it.
What’s the difference between a TV show on the internet and webisodes? That’s not entirely clear to me. Perhaps the former requires a paying subscription network, like Hulu or Netflix or Amazon, while the latter just has it’s own ads.
And, you know, just in case that’s not enough Jason for your small screen, Cunningham added:
and I think we even have an idea for a terrific Friday the 13th video game.
I’m not averse to slasher films, not by any means, but I never developed much of a taste for Friday the 13th. I’m much more of a Freddy Krueger fella, really.
Not that there can’t be good stories to tell about this character and his context. Maybe the Bates Motel idea is a really good one. I certainly want to know more.
*I don’t mean Saturday the 14th
I say:

I lived through the 90s waiting for a decent Friday the 13th after the miserable Part 9 (ugh) and the at-least-it-had-Jason Part 8 where Jason takes Canada, I mean New York for a few minutes. Jason X had a few fun moments but overall, again pretty dreadful. Freddy vs. Jason was fun, good stuff. Robert Englund is always a goof. The reboot had a great kill (machete halfway down the dude's head in the beginning) but sadly seemed more like Jason The Chainsaw Massacre for my tastes. Some good moments again. That said, I'm a diehard lover of the first four, though Part 6 is very, very well done as well. You remember the first batch, where Jason was actually pretty creepy?
The sad news: I've heard this 2015 Friday will be a found footage type of film which could be interesting...if only they'd give us a nice one with Jason in the woods, some great non-CGI kills and a lot of nudity. Give me the sleazoid feel of Part 5 anytime.
Time to go fire up The Final Chapter, pull my pants up high and find my corkscrew.

Tuesday, December 17, 2013

Peter O'Toole dies at 81: Film legend and Hollywood hellraiser who shot to fame as Lawrence of Arabia had suffered from long illness

By Sam Greenhill and Sara Smyth and Peter Lloyd

Tributes were led by Prime Minister David Cameron, who declared that Lawrence Of Arabia was his ‘favourite film’, with O’Toole’s performance ‘stunning’.

Legendary: O'Toole was one of the film industry's most well-respected stars


The actor’s agent, Steve Kenis, said: ‘He was one of a kind in the very best sense and a giant in his field.’
O’Toole’s daughter, actress Kate O’Toole, said: ‘His family are very appreciative and completely overwhelmed by the outpouring of real love and affection being expressed towards him, and to us, during this unhappy time. In due course there will be a memorial filled with song and good cheer, as he would have wished.’
A reformed but unrepentant hell-raiser, O’Toole long suffered from ill health, but continued to amuse and delight those he met. Broadcaster Michael Parkinson said it was hard to be too sad about the news of his passing. ‘Peter didn’t leave much of life unlived, did he? he said, chuckling.
Comedian David Walliams tweeted: ‘He was hugely entertaining. The greatest company. A legend on screen and off.’
Stephen Fry wrote: ‘Oh what terrible news. Farewell Peter O’Toole. I had the honour of directing him in a scene. Monster, scholar, lover of life, genius ...’
Irish President Michael D Higgins said Ireland and the world had lost ‘one of the giants of film and theatre’.

The charismatic actor – whose early life is something of a mystery – achieved instant stardom as Lawrence Of Arabia and went on to be nominated eight times for a best-actor Academy Award. However, he ended up with the unenviable record of being the most nominated actor never to win.
Following Lawrence Of Arabia, other nominations followed for Becket (1964), The Lion In Winter (1968), Goodbye, Mr Chips (1969), The Ruling Class (1972), The Stunt Man (1980) and My Favourite Year (1982).
In 2003 he was awarded an honorary Oscar, but initially refused to accept it on the grounds that he was not yet 80 years old – and might still win it for a movie  role.
He duly received his eighth best-actor nomination for Venus, but failed again and finally accepted his honorary award.
 The news of his death comes just one year after he formally retired from acting on the eve of his 80th birthday.
He declared it was time to ‘chuck in the sponge’, and said that his career on stage and screen had fulfilled him emotionally and financially – bringing ‘me together with fine people, good companions with whom I’ve shared the inevitable lot of all actors: flops and hits’.
He concluded: ‘It’s my belief that one should decide for oneself when it is time to end one’s stay.’
Despite this, he emerged from retirement this year to star in Katherine Of Alexandria, which is yet to be released.
O’Toole was raised in northern England and worked briefly as a journalist and then a radioman in the Navy during his National Service. He went on to attend the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, where his classmates included Albert Finney, Alan Bates and Richard Harris.
O’Toole began his acting career as one of the most exciting young talents on the British stage. His 1955 Hamlet, at the Bristol Old Vic, was critically acclaimed.
He also attracted rave reviews in the 1990s in the lead role in Jeffrey Bernard Is Unwell.


Legend: Peter O'Toole has died at the age of 81 - just one year after he announced his retirement


I say:
This is the last of the British lions of cinema. Sadly, he was also my favorite and is another on the long list of should-have-won-the Oscar greats. I remember first encountering the incredible Mr. O'Toole one Saturday afternoon watching tv as a young kid with my mother and grandmother as we watched this bizarre film. The lead actor was at first convinced he was Jesus Christ and later, Jack the Ripper. Towards the end of it he led out the most bloodcurdling scream I've ever heard on film. I vowed to always remember this actor and this film. The film was The Ruling Class from 1972 and goes onto (what I think) is much too short a list of great films for this great actor. For the O'Toole starter there's always Lawrence of Arabia, which is the definition of epic. Check out Beckett (1964), The Lion in Winter (1968), the aforementioned Ruling Class (1972), The Stunt Man (1980 and my personal favorite), and My Favorite Year (1982) for other incredible O'Toole performances.

This David Letterman appearance from 1995 is the greatest talk show entrance in history:
 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K561m7Nq7kk
 
"I believe that's called a stupid pet trick."

Tuesday, December 10, 2013

Sly & The Family Stone Multitrack Playback

Sly Stone Multrack Playback- Thank You (Falletin Me Be Mice Elf Agin)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ZBYdyLzZvs

Family Affair
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LQLweeUk8GE

I say:
These are treasures. Nearly the entire Family Stone in one room?! Hard to believe but true (No Larry, of course).  One of my old time favorite groups and favorite characters in the unpredictable Sly Stone. Hard to believe he's still alive...

Charlie Don't Surf, But Does He Marry?

Charles Manson, 79, to marry girlfriend ‘Star,’ 25? She says yes; he says ‘garbage’ 

Murderer Manson is still doing life in Corcoran Prison for the Tate-LaBianca slayings — His girlfriend wants the world to know that he is her "husband."

  Serial killer Charles Manson is to marry his 25-year-old girlfriend behind bars, she has claimed.
In an interview with Rolling Stone magazine, the young woman who calls herself "Star," tells the world that she is to be the next bride of the 79-year-old.
 "I'll tell you straight up, Charlie and I are going to get married," she told Rolling Stone. "When that will be, we don't know. But I take it very seriously. Charlie is my husband. Charlie told me to tell you this. We haven't told anybody about that."
 "People can think I'm crazy. But they don't know. This is what's right for me. This is what I was born for." The pair have been in a relationship since "Star" was 19. She began visiting him at Corcoran State Prison in California when she was still a teenager. She is originally from Missouri.
"Star" has even cut an "X" into her forehead, in an apparent twisted homage to Mason's swastika symbol. Manson has been incarcerated for 44 years since the cult leader was convicted of the murders of actress Sharon Tate and Leno and Rosemary LaBianco.
Manson, who has been married twice before, denied the claim of marriage.

I say:
Having read the piece in Rolling Stone I had some Charlie flashbacks. I'm not old enough to have been around for the original 1969 murders but I did grow up occasionally seeing a grizzly, bearded character (that I thought was Charles Bronson!) on tv every once in a while being denied parole. The fact that I would see him in a film and in jail never confounded my young brain; I just accepted it.
But anyway, the Rolling Stone piece is listed as the Last Confessions of Manson but I somehow doubt it. Prison is what he's lived most of his life, so why would he die soon? He's in the special convicts unit, not general population. The prison stopped allowing recorded interviews some 20 years ago so that's why we haven't seen the grinning Manson for a long time.
Every decade or so I have a Charlie binge and recommend the new book by Jeff Guinn for Manson starters. It does tell some interesting facts on his early life and goes into detail throughout the murder trials. However, it does skimp on his life afterwards and summarizes the last 44 years in few pages.
Morbid, but fascinating stuff.