Regular Columns

In our last thrilling episode, I talked about Vampyres as being one of the pinnacles of European erotic horror. I felt that I couldn’t very leave the topic without saying a few words about the man whose lengthy career has largely been built around this form: Jesús (Jess) Franco. Cult movie connoisseurs will already be very familiar with him, and should feel free to stop reading now. For the rest of you, consider this a brief, guarded, introduction.

The word “prolific” hardly begins to describe Franco…
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Let us consider the term “erotic horror.” This sub-genre doesn’t have a very strong tradition in North America, despite the best efforts of Seduction Cinema and Misty Mondae. I exempt the films of David Cronenberg from this consideration, as they are hardly designed with titillation in mind – they are much colder, analytical works, and the label once applied to them – “venereal horror” – is still more appropriate. No, there just hasn’t been that much on this side of the pond, relatively speaking. Perhaps in its stead…
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It lurks behind a poster whose taglines are deliciously over the top, arguably meaningless, grammatically dubious, and utterly misleading: “BEHIND THIS MEMBRANE… you will be driven to a point… midway between LIFE and DEATH!” (?!?!) Further: “The only people who will not be STERILIZED with FEAR are those among you who are already DEAD!” Now, there have been many films to promise/threaten heart attacks/strokes/what-have-you in their ad campaigns, but The Flesh Eaters (1962) is, to my knowledge, the on…
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Herewith begin my weekly musings on the field of cult movies. As an opener, it would probably behoove me to define exactly what is meant by a “cult movie.” I’m going to be a bit disingenuous here, and provide a definition arguably so nebulous that some might consider it useless. That’s fine. There have been many attempts at this sort of definition, and most founder on specifics once one moves much beyond the “I know one when I see one” type of description often applied to porn. That said, here goes. Generally speakin…
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