TV Recap: SCREAM QUEENS Episode 11: ‘Black Friday’

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TV Recap: SCREAM QUEENS Episode 11: ‘Black Friday’

SHOCK recaps the 11th round of TV’s SCREAM QUEENS.

It’s Chanel’s second favorite holiday: Black Friday. She likes buying cheap trinkets as gifts for her friends, and bribing stock boys to let her into stores a half hour before they open so that the deal hunters lined up outside become enraged when she buys all the doorbusters. The dean isn’t happy that the Chanels are leaving Kappa house to go shopping. But while they do that, Wes, Grace, and Pete go down to the police station to report Gigi’s head turning up on their table, but the detective can’t be bothered. The entire police force, including the chief of police, has been fired due to gross incompetence.

At the mall, the Chanels are oblivious to the fact that they are literally the last people there. The lights go out and they discover all the doors are locked from the outside. The Red Devil is there, stalking them. The girls run and see a loading gate left just a little bit open. The girls slide through it, all but Chanel. She decides as Kappa president, it is her job to stand up to the Devil. So she does, taunting him. The Devil doesn’t care for this and shoots her in the shoulder with a crossbow. Chanel doesn’t stop her taunts, even as she tries desperately to crawl away, and the Devil reloads for another shot. Denise comes running in, announcing that she is the new chief of police and yammers on about nothing while the Devil shoots one of her officers dead and makes his escape.

This incompetence idea is, well, utterly incompetent. In what scenario, on what planet, is an entire police force fired? The police unions are way too strong for that to happen. And in what galaxy is Denise more competent than anyone else on that force? The whole thing is so beyond stupid it makes my teeth hurt. In a season full of stupidity, this one really bothered me.

Anyway, the girls all regroup at the Kappa House, and Chanel thinks it is clear that the dean is the Red Devil and decides they need to kill her. Zayday is a strong holdout, but Grace is on Chanel’s side. She gives another one of her ridiculous sisterhood speeches and the two girls decide they need to poison the dean.

Grace and Chanel visit the dean at her home and the girls concoct a story, asking the dean to teach them how to be more effective feminists. It is nonsense, but the dean bites and starts talking about her internship at Ms. magazine and other assorted nonsense. They toast over mason jars of homemade apple cider (the dean’s favorite drink) that they dosed with a whole bottle of puffer fish poison. Despite it being enough to kill three men, the poison cider doesn’t slow down the dean.

Chad calls a meeting of the Dicky Dollars, but he is the only one still alive. Pete is there because this meeting is the reading of Boone’s will, and he left everything to Pete. Chad thinks they were secret lovers, and Pete admits the truth: Boone was his source in the Greek system. Pete had tried to pledge the Dollars the year before, with the same nonsense of brotherhood that Grace has about her own sorority, but he was roundly refused. Chad invites Pete to join now, because “any secret friend of Boone’s is a friend of mine.” Pete declines, which according to the rules means that he and Chad must duel to the death. Pete leaves, which Chad tells him is a forfeit of his life. “You will get murdered to death!” he yells after him.

Grace goes to Pete and rants about how her first attempt at killing the dean failed. She promises she is killing to stop more killing, but he doesn’t want her to do it – he doesn’t believe she is a killer. He has to “tell her something:” Chad’s invite to join the Dollars. But he doesn’t need that; all he needs is his work and Grace. He says he loves her and wants to have sex with her, but she isn’t in the right headspace. He agrees she is worth the wait. Apparently Grace is a virgin.

Chanel holds another Kappa meeting, freaking out that the dean didn’t die and looking for a Plan B. Grace decides she no longer thinks it is a good idea to kill the dean, which angers Chanel and she decides to kick Grace out of Kappa. Grace expects Zayday to come with her, but she doesn’t. Now she thinks that killing the dean is a good idea. 

Grace storms out and goes home, where she finds Wes… with Pete. They are going over the info they were able to find on Gigi. It turns out that Gigi’s real name was Jess Meyer. Her sister, Amy, was the girl who took the bathtub babies, but a few months later, she killed herself. Gigi took over care of the kids, but had a nervous breakdown and they all went to the institution. She raised the kids to be killers in order to get revenge. Pete leaves, and Grace asks her dad for sex advice. It turns into a damned after school special. Pete goes back to his dorm and is packing when he gets a call. He tells the unidentified caller that he is leaving campus and he feels guilty and doesn’t want to be part of this. He warns the person never to call again.

Meanwhile, the Chanels and Zayday take the dean to the cryo-sauna (basically a sauna that freezes you). The dean goes first and steps into the chamber, which is cranked down to -220 degrees. The girls watch the door to make sure staff doesn’t come in, and they leave the dean in the chamber for nearly a half-hour. When they open it back up, they are shocked to find the dean – frozen and covered in icicles – alive and feeling great.

Chanel is beside herself. She has failed twice to kill the dean. After letting the minions give their asinine theories as to how the dean survived, Chanel has a new plan. She gives her minions their Christmas presents, smartphones that light up on the edge. When she calls they will get a red notification light. This means they are to meet Chanel and the dean at the pool, where they will drown the dean. Unfortunately, when Chanel sends out her notification, her minions are arguing with a retail clerk and totally miss the call. Chanel is alone when the dean comes to the pool, and she has to stumble through a terrible excuse about holding a lecture at the pool about feminism and bondage (to explain away the chains she brought) then go for a swim. The dean doesn’t buy this stupidity and leaves.

Grace goes back to Pete’s room and finds him anxious and out of breath. She doesn’t say anything because she is ready to have sex with him now. Pete pulls away uncomfortably, and Grace insists this is what she wants. “I don’t want your first time to be with a murderer,” he admits feebly.

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The Best Zombie Movie Ever Made? THE LIVING DEAD AT THE MANCHESTER MORGUE

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The Best Zombie Movie Ever Made? THE LIVING DEAD AT THE MANCHESTER MORGUE

SHOCK resurrects Jorge Grau’s terrifying zombie thriller THE LIVING DEAD AT THE MANCHESTER MORGUE.

This in an essay about the living dead so, for the sake of space, let’s start our story in Pittsburgh, 1968, with that too-tall, goggle-eyed grandfather of American horror, George A. Romero…

Taking his cues from Matheson’s seminal 1954 vampire plague novella I AM LEGEND (‘I ripped him off!’ the writer/director unashamedly told me once), commercial /industrial filmmaker Romero’s first feature was a nightmarish, grainy, black and white tale of undead apocalypse; a gruesome story of the fresh dead inexplicably reviving and groping their grey-eyed way to cannibalize the living. That picture, NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD, would slowly shamble its way into horror history, becoming a critical and cult favorite, a staple at midnight screenings and a massive international hit, especially in Europe where it was heralded as a Grand Guignol arthouse masterpiece.

Enter filmmaker Jorge Grau, a young, experimental Spanish director who, along with an equally visionary, French New Wave inspired pack of bratty celluloid slingers (the likes which include THE BLOOD SPATTERED BRIDE helmer Vincente Aranda) was, at the time, being championed as the avant-garde future of the Spanish film industry. In the wake of Grau’s violent, sexual and historically accurate telling of the Elizabeth Bathory legend, 1973’s THE BLOODY COUNTESS, producer Edmondo Amati approached the filmmaker to direct a movie that would blatantly ride the box office coattails of the Romero picture, but add the more immediate dimension of dripping, full blooded color, replacing the gritty, cheap, shadowy expressionism of NIGHT with a more garish, pulpy and stomach churning pallet. Grau, swayed by a larger paycheck and the chance to film in England eagerly obliged, taking the rather straight forward genre screenplay and giving it a re-write, grafting on his own, unique personality quirks, obsessions and style, borrowing from Romero’s creation but forging something completely fresh and deliciously offbeat…

Known on these shores under at least a dozen lurid (and occasionally ludicrous) titles, including DON’T OPEN THE WINDOW, BRUNCH WITH THE DEAD and LET SLEEPING CORPSES LIE, Grau’s resulting 1974 Spanish/Italian zombie shocker “Non Si Deve Profanare Il Sonno Dei Morti”, is a movie that I’ve always preferred to call by its UK moniker, THE LIVING DEAD AT THE MANCHESTER MORGUE. Because I just love the way it reads.

London antique dealer George (a bearded, badass looking Ray Lovelock from, among many other things Armando Crispino’s AUTOPSY) is on a cross-country motorcycle trip into rural England when, after a bike crushing accident, he regretfully hooks up with the beautiful, fragile Edna (Christina Galbo from WHAT HAVE YOU DONE TO SOLANGE?) who is also traveling into the sticks to visit her mentally ill sister. On route, the pair come across a strange machine; a whirring, pulsing metallic engine sitting squarely in the centre of a farmers field. Said machineis an agricultural device that sends out waves of low frequency radiation designed to provoke insects to go mad and cannibalize each other. Science!

Lanky haired, neo-hippie George balks at such underhanded environmental buggery, a position which only increases in intensity when he and Edna discover said supposedly harmless radiation is in fact stimulating the recently dead to get up and kill, with the people they kill then getting up to kill. As the local police (led by American stage actor Arthur Kennedy, in a cruel and cranky performance) attempt to pin the rash of violent zombie induced murders on the troubled couple, the evil crop-protecting, dead- provoking device keeps chugging and spinning and the corpses keep-a-coming, resulting in the inevitable tragic, violent, titular (emphasis on the tit!) morgue set climax.

When THE LIVING DEAD AT THE MANCHESTER MORGUE was released it almost immediately came under fire from critics for its then outrageous levels of graphic splatter, a truly shocking cavalcade of carnage designed by none other than Italian FX wizard Giannetto De Rossi. De Rossi is the latex and karo syrup slinging genius who would later find acclaim drilling brains, poking out eyes and regurgitating guts under the watchful eye of the late, great Fulci and though his art here was not yet quite state of, it’s still pretty damned fantastic: flesh is ripped from bodies, innards are torn out of heaving bellies, eyeballs are eaten and perhaps most notoriously, an unfortunate lass has her blouse ripped open and her left breast crudely removed by the clawing hands of a hungry ghoul.

And speaking of ghouls, the homicidal stiffs on display here are really terrifying; a mangy, slow and stiff lot of relentless red-eyed refuse (incidentally, the crimson contact lenses appear to be exactly the same as the ones utilized for the ‘infected’ in Danny Boyle’s 28 Days Later and its sequel 28 Weeks Later). And these zombies aren’t a bunch of amateur local yokels bumbling around in greasepaint but are in fact real actors, characters ripped right out of the worst (or best, as the case with us horror fans may be) nightmare; I can honestly say that Spanish actor Fernando Hilbeck’s, gravestone tossing, recently resurrected, drowned hobo Gutherie, with his sopping wet clothes, blotchy stare and stubbly lock jaw is one of the most frightening screen bogeymen I’ve ever seen and the damage he inflicts on his victims is just as shuddery.

But beyond the moldy monsters and the ample waste of human life on display, the real impact in Grau’s remarkable motion picture lies in the level of intelligence, of finely crafted human drama, of mounting dread and almost Hitchcockian suspense (and black humor) that so effortlessly guides the grue. We come to genuinely care for George and Edna, to believe in their blossoming love, their genuine connection that builds under the direst of circumstances. And when things take a turn for the worse in the final reel, there’s a palpable sense of loss that pushes the horror into an emotional level unseen in the post Night, non-Romero zombie efforts. The score, by Giuliano Sorgini (SS HELL CAMP) is another major source of the picture’s skin tightening power, a soundscape that deftly veers between string soaked British lounge pop (especially effective in the dazzlingly edited opening credits montage) and heaving, gasping, synth burbling experimentalism.

THE LIVING DEAD AT THE MANCHESTER MORGUE is an accessible, thought provoking and paralyzing Eurohorror classic whose ample flaws, frequent lapses in logic (does ANY of the action actually take place IN Manchester?) and many plot inconsistencies (how does Hilbeck manage to revive his fellow cadavers by wiping blood on their eyelids, exactly? Who cares! It’s creepy!) take a backseat to the movie’s many macabre and gruesomely elegant delights.

This isn’t the quasi- realist American horror of Romero and it isn’t the chunky in your face zombie opera shock of Fulci. This is the zombie film as dark, lyrical, melancholy fairy tale, a film that exists in a class of its own.

And it very well might be the best zombie movie ever made.

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Starz to Run Marathon of ASH VS. EVIL DEAD This Month

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Starz to Run Marathon of ASH VS. EVIL DEAD This Month

 

Juggernaut series ASH VS. EVIL DEAD to get December marathon treatment on Starz.

With the critic and fan approved Rami/Campbell/Tapert-sculpted series ASH VS. EVIL DEAD still chainsawing its way across the airwaves(or the digital equivalent of such), the network that birthed it has scheduled a mini-marathon of every episode, leading up to the season finale on Saturday, January 2nd at 9pm.

 

Here’s the schedule:

Monday, December 28th at 9:00 PM PT/ ET – “ASH vs EVIL DEAD” episodes 101-103

Tuesday, December 29th at 9:00 PM PT/ET – “ASH vs EVIL DEAD” episodes 104-106

Wednesday, December 30th at 9:00 PM PT / ET – “ASH vs EVIL DEAD” episodes 107-109

Saturday, January 2nd at 9:00 PM PT /ET – “ASH vs EVIL DEAD” episode 110 – Season Finale 

 

To learn more about STARZ and ASH VS. EVIL DEAD go to the official site.

 

 

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Blu-ray Review: 80’s Anthology Horror Classic NIGHTMARES

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Blu-ray Review: 80’s Anthology Horror Classic NIGHTMARES

SHOCK reviews classic 80’s anthology horror film NIGHTMARES on Blu-ray.

In many respects, director Joseph Sargent’s 1983 anthology horror film NIGHTMARES is the epitome of the 1980’s. Specifically, the early 1980’s. What I mean by this is that the first few years of every decade belong primarily to the previous one and cinematically, this is ever evident. In the case of NIGHTMARES, we have in fact 4 small films that exemplify the kind of craft and macabre quality of the best of the 1970’s telefilms (specifically the work of Dan Curtis) with a dash of slicker, pseudo-MTV, rock video style. Both aesthetics work together to create this unpretentious piece of vintage terror that many of this critic’s generation did indeed see on TV…

And famously, in fact, NIGHTMARES started its life as a TV movie, specifically as 4 episodes of the 1981/82 anthology series DARKROOM; when the network deemed those particular tales too extreme for prime-time, the producers pulled them and glued them together without any particular rhyme, reason or connecting thread as a feature film. Because of this, the only thing giving the stories any sort of cohesion is the style of director Sargent,a perfectly decent, no-bullshit filmmaker who had previously directed tons of TV before helming the crackerjack thriller THE TAKING OF PELHAM ONE TWO THREE and then, a mere four years after this, literally jumped the shark with the legendary JAWS: THE REVENGE. But his work here is solid, stylish and tough throughout and really, the shot on glorious 35mm flick plays better today than ever.

The first story, “Terror in Topanga” stars THE SENTINEL’s Cristina Raines as a stressed out housewife who ducks out one night to get her nicotine fix, the same night that a murderer is reported to be on the loose. As she cruises around looking for a place to buy a carton of smokes, she becomes increasingly paranoid that the killer is stalking her. Some decent suspense and an appealing performance by the beautiful Raines (as well as an appearance by BLADE RUNNER star William Sanderson) make this episode work.

The second tale has achieved near mythical status in the small circle of fans who swear by NIGHTMARES; it’s called “The Bishop of Battle” and stars a young Emilio Estevez (years before THE BREAKFAST CLUB) as J.J, a punk-rock and video game addicted teen who hustles kids in arcades to get enough quarters to beat the holy grail of games, The Bishop of Battle. Breaking into the local game joint one night, J.J aims to beat The Bishop…with unexpected results. No doubt Adam Sandler saw this film prior to making his recent comedy PIXELS but “The Bishop of Battle” aint to gag-fest. It’s cool and scrappy, with a great turn by Estevez, decent pre-digital optical effects and great use of music, especially by punk band FEAR. A mini-masterpiece with a great script by Christopher Crowe (who wrote all but the final segment of NIGHTMARES).

A typically haunted-looking Lance Henriksen stars as a priest having a crisis of faith in “The Benediction”. The troubled padre hits the road to find himself and instead runs up againts a ghostly truck that aims to flatten him. A moody blend of THE CAR and DUEL, this is an artfully made suspenser with a strong central turn by a pre-ALIENS Henriksen. Great climax too.

The final tale (tail?) is NIGHT OF THE RAT and it’s often cited as the worst of the quartet, usually due to the spotty blue screen effects of the titular giant vermin itself. But it’s actually a decent segment, with believable performances by INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS and ALIEN vet Veronica Cartwright and THE THING’s Richard Masur trying to save their daughter from the wrath of a screaming, pissed-off rodent.

From the eerie opening credits sequence (a creepy cracked-desert visual that mimics the poster design) to the final frame, NIGHTMARES is an immaculate bit of no-frills horror entertainment. Sporting a dynamite score by Craig Safan, a composer known primarily for his work on the small screen, but who also contributed wonderful soundtracks for A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET 4, REMO WILLIAMS and the end-credits piece used in Michael Mann’s THIEF, the film is far superior to that same-years gigantic budgeted anthology TWILIGHT ZONE: THE MOVIE, with stories that often feel like deluxe versions of Serling’s original series, even moreso than the legitimate 1980’s TZ revamp.

 Scream Factory’s Blu-ray is an equally in-and-out, get-the-job-done affair, looking crisp and sometimes lush, considering the age of the material and offering a few bonuses, including a trailer and a meandering but informative commentary with producer Andrew Mirisch and Raines. You can also watch the film in either 1:78:1 widescreen or full frame, if the need to get the real deal, old-school TV vibe should strike you.

Totally recommended, NIGHTMARES is quality escapism; like a firm handshake, covered in blood.

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Twisted Crispin Glover Shocker AIMY IN A CAGE Gets Release Date, Poster and Trailer

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Twisted Crispin Glover Shocker AIMY IN A CAGE Gets Release Date, Poster and Trailer

Head-trip horror flick AIMY IN A CAGE gets trailer and official poster.

In what has been referred to as a hybrid of Kubrick and Tim Burton (especially evident in the Danny Elfman-ish score), writer/director Hooroo Jackson’s mental-case horror meltdown AIMY IN A CAGE has just been announced as locking a release date of January 8th, 2016. The film will roll out on DVD and digital platforms from Osiris Entertainment.

AIMY IN A CAGE stars filmmaker, actor (BACK TO THE FUTURE, WILLARD, THE WIZARD OF GORE) and professional weirdo Crispin Glover and NURSE 3D and THE EDITOR vixen Paz de la Huerta in a tale of a teen who is taken to a demented behaviour clinic in some sort of distant future/alternate reality while a grim plague decimates the wold outside.

Filled with crazed, circus-steeped imagery and echoing twisted flicks like JACOB TWO-TWO MEETS THE HOODED FANG, WILLY WONKA AND THE CHOCOLATE FACTORY and A CLOCKWORK ORANGE, AIMY IN A CAGE is just the ticket for those more daring horror fans looking to have their heads shaken hard.

Check out the wild photo gallery below and then groove on the eyeball-crossing trailer below that:

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‘Ozploitation’ Flick SCARE CAMPAIGN Wins Awards, Reveals New Poster

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‘Ozploitation’ Flick SCARE CAMPAIGN Wins Awards, Reveals New Poster

New ‘Ozploitation’ shocker SCARE CAMPAIGN sweeps Monster Fest awards; reveals new poster.

Hotly anticipated ‘Ozploitation’ flick SCARE CAMPAIGN from writers and directors Colin & Cameron Cairnes (100 BLOODY ACRES) and producer Julie Ryan (RED DOG) just picked up four awards at Aussie horror festival Monster Fest and, while basking in the afterglow have revealed their official poster.

SCARE CAMPAIGN, which charts the increasingly extreme attempts of a horror-themed TV “prank” show to stay one step ahead of its nihilistic online rivals and stars Olivia DeJonge (The Visit) and Meegan Warner (Turn), picked up awards for ‘BEST FILM’, ‘BEST SOUND IN A FEATURE’, ‘BEST FEATURE SCREENPLAY’ and ‘BEST DIRECTION’.

SCARE CAMPAIGN stars Meegan Warner (TURN, THE VEIL), Olivia DeJonge (HIDING, THE VISIT), Cassandra McGrath (WOLF CREEK) and John Brumpton (THE LOVED ONES).

Here’s the official synopsis:

Popular TV prank show, Scare Campaign, has been entertaining audiences for the last five years with its mix of old school scares and hidden camera fun. But as we enter a new age of online TV, the producers find themselves up against a hard-edged web series which makes their show look decidedly quaint. It’s time to up the ante, but will the team go too far this time, and are they about to prank the wrong guy?

And here’s the official poster:

Be sure to follow these wild men and women via their official Facebook page.

And check out the batshit crazy teaser below…

https://youtu.be/7jVrh_t05DA

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Exclusive Interview: Actor Robin Ward on the ‘Lost’ Frankenstein Flick ‘DR. FRANKENSTEIN ON CAMPUS’!

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Exclusive Interview: Actor Robin Ward on the ‘Lost’ Frankenstein Flick ‘DR. FRANKENSTEIN ON CAMPUS’!

SHOCK tracks down actor Robin Ward to reflect on the ultra-obscure 1970 psychedelic horror film, DR. FRANKENSTEIN ON CAMPUS.

With the unfortunate VICTOR FRANKENSTEIN setting new highs for low box office openings (shame, really as the movie is really rather good) we decided to assume the role of the good Dr. Frankenstein. ourselves, sifting not into the soft dirt for corpses, but rather digging deep into horror’s maniacal past to find a film that time has seemingly forgot…

Indeed, a mere week or so before VICTOR FRANKENSTEIN saw release, SHOCK decided to stick our tongue deep into cheek and roll out a list of 5 Frankenstein films that failed to make the grade or effectively trade on the visions birthed during that fateful ‘haunted summer’ by Mary Shelley and her famous kinky friends. Sitting at number 3 on that list was the ‘lost’ Canadian psychedelic horror romp DR. FRANKENSTEIN ON CAMPUS, a totally daft 1970 melodrama about mad science, substances, sex and silliness that was in fact the first film funded by the Canadian government!

Free healthcare AND z-grade horror movies financed by tax dollars. Aint Canada grand?

Originally titled FLICK (we know this because the word FLICK remains on the bottom corner of the screen for the entire opening of the picture), DR. FRANKENSTEIN ON CAMPUS stars future Canadian TV weatherman Robin Ward as a young Baron Frankenstein, blacklisted from his native Austria and hiding out as a student at the University of Toronto. There, he conducts brain experiments on cats and dogs and has weird psychedelic sex with his comely girlfriend before launching a reign of terror on his classmates and the faculty. Oddly, the similarities between this and RE-ANIMATOR are interesting (and almost certainly accidental).

Briefly released theatrically in the US under its “FRANKENSTEIN” handle on a double bill with the skeezy NIGHT OF THE WITCHES, director Gilbert W. Taylor’s mad movie appeared occasionally on Canadian television but otherwise is about as obscure a horror film as you’re likely to (not) find. And while it’s not a great Frankenstein film, it is just so insane, so bizarre and so…so…Canadian, that watching it truly is a singular experience.

Ward is well known in Canada for his stint as a weatherman on National network CTV but he has had a long and interesting career in Canadian film and television including prominent roles in a slew of interesting genre projects like the noted Sci-Fi series THE STARLOST creepy “twinsanity” thriller MARK OF CAIN and SAW II; he even once channeled Rod Serling, serving as the narrator of the third season of the 1980’s revamp of THE TWILIGHT ZONE.

After penning that piece, the spirit moved me enough to make an effort to locate Ward and, with a little bit of effort, I did. The actor is currently in rehearsals for a new play but spared us some moments to chat about his stint making cinema’s strangest Frankie “flick”: DR. FRANKENSTEIN ON CAMPUS.

SHOCK: It’s rather amusing to think that DR. FRANKENTSEIN ON CAMPUS was funded by the Government, especially since it deals with mind control….

WARD: Yes the film was the first to get CFDC (Canadian Film Development Corporation) backing, which I think was ultimately a mistake because it set a doubtful tone. Because DR. FRANKENSTEIN ON CAMPUS was of course a ‘B’ horror film and would not normally have received the scrutiny or the reviews or respect that a pioneer CFDC project would and should have inspired. Consequently it was castigated by all and sundry…

SHOCK: How did you end up in the film?

WARD: I can’t remember how I got the role, whether I auditioned or just met the director. I was quite inexperienced as an actor, but I guess my work at the time suggested something that wasn’t quite real, hence my suitability for the role, perhaps?

SHOCK: The film opens with you fencing in Austria. Where were these sequences shot?

WARD: The Austrian scenes were all shot in and around Toronto, with the Scarborough bluffs substituting for the Alps!

SHOCK: It’s a demented film, truly. Was it always supposed to be sold as a horror movie?

WARD: God knows what the film was supposed to be! None of us really knew. I guess it was a horror film. It was certainly horrible.

SHOCK: Why did they change the title?

WARD: At some point it went from FLICK to DR. FRANK…I think they thought FLICK was too ironic and artsy. It got a limited release in the theaters, but went on to become a cult favorite on university campuses where it’s previously undetected satirical aspects were much appreciated.

SHOCK: The film is an extra curio in that noted Canadian rock band Lighthouse is the house band in the movie! Did you get to hang out with them?

WARD: We did see members of Lighthouse occasionally, especially Paul and Skip, who sometimes appeared during the shoot.

SHOCK: Any funny stories to tell from the shoot?

WARD: Well, I was supposed to wear an electroencephalogram on my head which they jerry-built from masking tape and which reduced the cast to tears of helpless laughter when they saw it perched on my head like an inverted jock strap. I remember we did take after take on a scene that had me wearing it because we kept breaking up.

SHOCK: What do you think of the movie now?

WARD: I haven’t seen the movie for decades. Years of therapy had almost erased it from my memory till you reminded me of its existence. As I said the film did have a kind of cult following and I sometimes am recognized for my part in creating one of the silliest films ever made. An honor I am not worthy of. It was a lot of fun to make; I think I laughed a lot during the film…especially during some of the actual takes when I wasn’t supposed to. Now it’s back to the shrink, I guess…

Here’s hoping that someone, somewhere puts some effort into making DR. FRANKENSTEIN ON CAMPUS available to strange cinema enthusiasts everywhere. It most certainly is a film that needs to be seen. And, once seen, I promise you…it cannot be unseen!

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