It was 1983 and the age of MTV. If video had really killed the radio star, he was resurrected on film as one of the most stylish vampires since Bela Blasko changed his name and donned a cape. Casting David Bowie as centuries old vampire John Blaylock was the hook to lure the MTV audience but the real stars of director Tony Scott’s (Ridley’s younger brother) modern day “Symphony of Horror,” are Catherine Deneuve and Susan Sarandon as predator and prey. Deneuve as Blaylock’s vampire bride Miriam, and Sarandon as Dr. Sarah Roberts heat up the screen with so much sexual and emotional tension, that the eventual release is hot enough to melt a TV screen. However don’t be fooled. The Hunger is much more than just a retread of the Hammer vampire lesbian story.(read more...)

Some awful films become popular and successful, despite obvious technical and artistic flaws. Some great films suffer in obscurity undeservedly. Messiah of Evil (1973) is a case of the latter. Directed and written by Willard Huyck and Gloria Katz (screenwriters for American Graffiti and Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom), Messiah is a thoughtful, introspective, and very original entry into low-budget seventies horror. Available on a small number of budget labels (Diamond Entertainment has it available on DVD), it is a film undeserved of the meagerness of its reputation.(read more...)

The sky is dark hours before dawn over a lonely stretch of highway outside El Paso, Texas. Thunder rolls across the desert expanse and a match is struck. Jim Halsey takes a drag from a cigarette and drinks coffee from a thermos as he drives alone. Voices from the car radio give the slaughter cow report.(read more...)

So maybe the premise -- mutant babies with super-intelligence, super-strength, claws, sharp teeth and a penchant for overreaction -- is kind of silly and maybe the babies look like rubber blobs with a few pointy barbs the few times they are shown, but It Lives Again is actually a very good movie.(read more...)