Gerner and Spears Nominated For ‘Chainsaw’ Award

There was a sort of group think among males growing up in upper Westchester County, N.Y. in the 80s that by age 16 you had to:

1. Drive a Jeep

2. Decorate your bedroom with Sports Illustrated swimsuit pics

At age 18 (1992) I got a 1986 Pontiac Sunbird with 65,000 miles on it. As far as no. 2, I just couldn’t bring myself to insult my mother like that.

So my room was decorated with movie posters and horribly disturbing images from Fangoria and Gorezone magazines.

I knew the mags from neighbor and best friend Brian Spears, whose photo is at the top of this blog. Fango was his Bible.

I remember for one school year the fate of civilization didn’t rest on what would happen after the Berlin Wall fell — it was about “HOW THE HELL COULD THE MPAA REFUSE TO GIVE  A RATING TO “HENRY: PORTRAIT OF A SERIAL KILLER???”

Now, some 20 years later, Spears and his make-up effects partner Pete Gerner are nominated for an award for creating things very much like the weird crap that hung on my wall as a kid.

The G & S Effects make-up work in “I Sell the Dead” has been nominated for a 2011 Chainsaw Award from Fangoria magazine.

The news came out in issue no. 301 of Fangoria, which is on sale now.

It’s a very cool thing. Gerner and Spears work on East Coast indie horror flicks. They’ve gelled with Glass Eye Pix and MPI, the companies behind “I Sell the Dead.”

Their upcoming work will be seen in “Stake Land” and Ti West’s “The Innkeepers.”

Guilty Pleasure Television

New dad means more feces, vomit, breast milk — and television.

Here’s shows I’m afraid to admit I watch admittedly.

1. TMZ — I’m a reporter. The TMZ newsroom is just like a traditional newsroom, minus the back-biting, egos, layoffs and middle management incompetency.

2. Bad Girls Club.

3. The Jersey Shore: I’m late to the party. Amazed how far ‘The Real World’ concept has fallen since I was in high school (’92).

4. My Big Friggin’ Wedding: Show flew under the radar, but wow, was it watchable. ‘Tammie’ brought ignorance, even for reality television, to a new low.

5. Celebrity Rehab: Everybody likes a good train wreck. In previous seasons, you eventually felt empathy for the cast. Guys like that dude from Guns n’ Roses — or what’s his name from Alice in Chains.  This season, I find myself rooting for the demise of people like Janice Dickinson and that rich kid.

 

Rob Corddroy on Marc Moran’s WTF Podcast

Wow.

The New York Times did a profile of this guy Marc Moran last week. I can’t find the Times article at the moment. I’m not sure why.

No point in me explaining why this guy’s show is great.

Listen to his interview with Rob Corddroy. Very funny and insightful into about working at The Daily Show, the Boston-area’s white Catholic Irish rage, how children are boring — and how Oliver Stone is a true weirdo.

Click here to give a listen.

Saturday Nightmares — Finally!

The people at Saturday Nightmares yesterday announced the dates of their second show.

It’ll be held June 3 through June 5 at the Sheraton Meadowlands Hotel in East Rutherford.

The first Saturday Nightmares was a classic show — George Romero films, Romero himself, all in a historic, old-school movie palace.

As recently as September, the Saturday Nightmare folks were saying their show would be this March (last year’s show was in March). Happy to hear it’s coming back.

The guest list hasn’t been announced. Here’s hoping for a “Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer” reunion.

Rooker and Towles do conventions, right?

How ’bout a “Re-Animator” reunion?

Unfortunately, it’ll probably be freakin’ “Phantasm.”

Click there for the Saturday Nightmares Facebook page.

Click here for the official home page.

MOST OVERRATED MOVIES, 2010

1. Inception: I hate stuff that makes up the rules as it goes. ‘Lost,’ for example.

2. The Killer Inside Me: No it didn’t capture J. Lee Thompson’s books despite what you’ve read.

3. Scott Pilgrim v the World: Guess I’m old, unhip — or, more likely, not fooled by bullshit.

4. Shutter Island

5. Get Him to the Greek

TOP 10 MOVIES OF 2010

Here’s my list for  . . . I have a habit of repeating my headline in the first graf. Hard to break.

Anyway, my list leaves room for “The Social Network” and “True Grit” ’cause I’m figuring to like those.

8. JOAN RIVERS: A PIECE OF WORK

I interviewed Joan Rivers once, just before “Celebrity Apprentice” aired. She was signing books at a small store in New Milford, CT.

She signed for hours and took time to chat with everyone.

Then, at the end — and this was a Saturday night — she answered any and all questions myself and a weekly reporter could throw at her.

She was the damn nicest celebrity I’ve ever met.

According to this authorized documentary, she’s also riddled with low self-esteem and lives gleefully (almost) beyond her means. The doc, now making the rounds on pay cable, offers a different take on celebrity — I guess the grass isn’t always greener.

7. BEST WORST MOVIE

Trailer above. A must-see for anyone who attends horror cons. A doc about how “Troll 2″ became a cult fave. The insane Italian director must be seen to be believed. Truly a doc made with love.

6. CYRUS

Creepy, often unsettling comedy — but not from the unnaturally close bond between Marisa Tomei and Jonah Hill, who play mother and son here. It’s the awkwardness between Hill and the great John C. Reilly that sells the flick. Reilly plays Tomei’s new boyfriend.

5. I’M STILL HERE

Joaquin Phoenix is hilarious in a mockumentary that almost “ruined” his career, I guess.

4. THE HUMAN CENTIPEDE

Very funny dark comedy about a mad scientist who creates a . . . yup. Top horror journalists, who don’t get that it’s a comedy, revolted against its success.

3. BLOOD INTO WINE

I could give a rat’s ass about wine or the lead singer of the band Tool — yet this documentary made me care about both. And it’s funny! You won’t want it to end. Trailer:

2. EXIT THROUGH THE GIFT SHOP

Street artists are such weirdos! I almost spent $25 on one of those Andre the Giant/They Live posters after watching this. Almost.

1. RESTREPO

Documentary about soldiers fighting, killing, hanging and dying in Afghanistan — in a war we’re ignoring, by the way. The doc isn’t political — and the filmmakers DO NOT insert themselves into the story. It just is what it is.

FACEBOOK MARCH 15

Facebook is not shutting down March 15, Mashable reports:

There’s a silly rumor exploding on the Internet this weekend, alleging that Facebook is shutting down on March 15 because CEO Mark Zuckerberg “wants his old life back,” and desires to “put an end to all the madness.”

Click here to read the full report.

Notice the article does not mention anything about Facebook’s support of child molesters through that “make your profile your favorite cartoon character” campaign.

In other news, does anyone know of a simple, free way to get a Podcast online? I need an idiot’s guide, something that takes 15 minutes to learn, know what I’m sayin’?

THINGS I DON’T GET

Community.

Parks and Rec.

30 Rock.

How I Met Your Mother.

The Big Bang Theory (television).

Lost.

Two and a Half Men.

Family Guy.

American Family.

Comi-Con hype.

Pretty much anything on the first three ‘most popular’ pages of Hulu.com, I guess.

RJ MacReady Is On Twitter

John Carpenter’s ‘The Thing‘ isn’t just one of the top five horror movies of all time — I’d say it probably cracks the top ten MOVIES of all time.

I like that someone, somewhere has established a RJ MacReady profile on Twitter.

I also like that it is written like MacReady is up there, in Antarctica — with Childs, Fuchs and the gang — Tweeting about the mundane life at a scientific outpost that will one day be attacked by an alien shapeshifter frozen for thousands of years in the ice.

Sample Tweet — “Clarke? Get over here and lock this goddamn dog up, you (expletive deleted) weirdo.”

REVIEW: MACHETE

Lindsay Lohan in a nun habit. Steven Seagal as the bad guy. Cheech Marin and a double-barrel shotgun. Danny Trejo with the title prop.

Robert Rodriguez’ ‘Machete’ is a series of iconic images looking for a story.

The movie is fun, looks great — but it’s an overstuffed mess, people.

Rodriguez is a guy-movie God. ‘Sin City’ speaks for itself.

Watching ‘Machete’ made me want to grab hold of Rodriguez and scream SLOW DOWN, FOCUS AND REWRITE.

The plot — Trejo is Machete, wants to get revenge on Seagal, goes to battle with corrupt politicos Robert De Niro and Jeff Fahey, enlists the aid of Cheech, Jessica Alba and Michele Rodriguez while Don Johnson  . . . wait, what the hell is Don Johnson’s character doing in this movie?

Oh, and Lindsay Lohan, as Fahey’s daughter, has blond hair extensions placed carefully over her nipples.

PROBLEM #1: Too many characters.

Robert Rodriguez made multiple characters work in ‘Sin City,’ but he had Frank Miller’s structured source material. ‘Machete’ is more like the crappy ‘Planet Terror’ entry in ‘Grindhouse.’

Example of problem: Michele Rodriguez and Jessica Alba — why are BOTH their characters in the movie?

Seems to me that a script rewrite should have combined these two into a single character, who starts off the movie as Jessica Alba’s ICE agent, but ends as Michele Rodriguez’ Mexican militant. Instead, we get two thinly-drawn characters.

See what I’m sayin’?

PROBLEM # 2: Too many characters

By design, ‘Machete’ oozes the 70s grindhouse vibe. They didn’t have big budgets, but they were lean, mean and concise.

Think anything with Charles Bronson — ‘Mr. Majestyk’ or ‘The Mechanic.’  Think ‘The Getaway . . ‘ Hell, think any movie with Al Lettieri.

The movies always built up to the hero’s confrontation with freakin’ Al Lettieri, right?

Steven Seagal is one of the many bad guys in ‘Machete.’ He gives the best performance, hands down. That’s right, Steven Seagal gives a better performance than Robert DeNiro.

Yes, there’s a confrontation between Machete and Seagal at the climax of the movie. But holy crap is it weak.

How weak?

Seagal’s character tells Machete something like, ‘We used to be federales. We used to put bad guys away. Now I’m a bad guy.’

Horrible script-writing aside, the lines made me think, ‘WHERE THE FRIK IS THAT MOVIE?’

Where are the scenes where Seagal and Trejo are patrolling Juarez, Mexico as honest lawmen? Where’s the scene where brother betrays brother, setting up a collision course between the two B-movie icons?

Instead, we get bad guy De Niro doing his comedy schtick. Bad guy Don Johnson as I don’t know what. AND BAD GUY JEFF FAHEY GETS MORE LINES THAN ANYONE ELSE.

Less is more. ‘Machete’ needed less characters, more Seagal.