Brief list of bad horror flicks. I thought the Amityville Horror franchise flicks were really bad. But these appear to be a heck of a lot worse according to the reviewers.
Basket Case
In Basket Case, a baby is born with a parasitic twin. A small, evil parasitic twin the size of a basket ball. It grows out of the boy’s shoulder. The boys parents decide to save the “normal” twin by having the parasitic twin surgically removed.
Fast forward a few years and now the twins are all grown up. And like all siamese twins separated at birth, in which one twin was brutally removed from the other and thrown into the garbage to die, they dream of nothing else than revenge against the surgical team that separated them. Murderous mayhem ensues.
Frankenhooker
“She’s hot. She’s Sexy. And she’s sutured to please.” When a mad scientist loses his girlfriend to a freak lawn mower accident he decides that the best way to get a new girlfriend is to chop up some prostitutes and make a new one out of spare parts. Stupid mysogynistic trash masquerading as a horror comedy.
Cannibal Ferox (a.k.a Make Them Die Slowly)
The subtitle of this movie is “make them die slowly” and the movie certainly lives up to its name. The mindless plot involves some Americans captured by cannibals in the Amazon. There is not much plot except a series of mutilations, eye removals, and gory torture.
Eaten Alive
This is yet another Italian horror movie with a cannibal theme. Americans venture into the jungle where they encounter cannibals. Eating ensues.
Erotic Nights of the Living Dead (1979)
A sleazy zombie cheesefest with horrible dubbing of English over the original Italian dialogue. The mouths are out of synch with the sound which adds to the fun.
A classic in the Euro-Horror zombie genre. Gratuitous sex and horrible acting. So bad its almost good.
A Night to Dismember
A female murderer is released from an insane assylum, suposedly cured. Then the body count begins. The film is dreadful on almost every level: the sound is awful (where are the foley artists when you need them?), the cinematography is lousy, the plot and acting are D-grade. The whole mess doesn’t make sense, so the director added a narrator that valiantly tries to make sense of the movie and explain the plot to you. The movie must be seen in order to appreciate just how brilliantly awful it is.
Night of the Bloody Apes
It’s the night of the Bloody Apes – well, actually, only one bloody ape. And he’s not really all ape, either.
You see, it seems that a mad scientist had a son with a heart defect. So he gives his son a heart from an ape, which naturally turns his meek, weakling son into a ferocious, murdering, sex crazed monkey man. What else would you expect? 🙂
Cannibal! The Musical
You may think that the title says it all. But no, there’s more.
The movie tells the fictionalized story of Alfred Packer, a real life 1890s pioneer who got lost in the Colorado wilderness and ended up eating his fellow expedition members. The story shifts incongruously from schmaltzy musical numbers to gory scenes of human hors d’oeuvres. One reviewer described the movie as “The Musical is Oklahoma meets Bloodsucking Freaks.”
Gingerdread Man
The ashes from an excuted killer are mixed into some cookie dough and naturally the killer comes back as a huge knife wielding murdering Ginger Bread Man. Awesome schlock, made even “better” by the fact that Gary Busey plays the part of the Gingerbread Man. Just try to picture it. The horror, the horror.
Santa’s Slay
It seems that truly bad horror movies always try to be clever by using an obvious pun in their title. For example: Gingerdread Man, or the awful Santa’s Slay, about a murderous Santa Claus.
What’s even funnier is that the killer Santa is played by talented actor and former wrestling star Bill Goldberg. Need I say more?
That’s all folks!
Posted October 31, 2010 by markosun in Uncategorized
I have always been amazed how Janet Stewart, the current supper time TV news anchor at CBC Winnipeg, moves her mouth during her newscast. Sometime during her career she must have taken speech lessons. And the Instructor must have grilled into Janet that to have clear enunciation one has to exaggerate the mouth movement.
And Janet doesn’t disappoint. My jaw gets sore when I watch her. It looks like she is chewing on a less than desirable cut of half cooked moose meat. I can just imagine Janet at home in front of a mirror with clamps attached to each corner of her mouth doing a stretch exercise. And Tom Cruise has nothing on those pearly whites that Janet diligently exposes.
But one problem that this hyperbolized enunciation seems to cause for Janet is that she can’t read the teleprompter properly. Janet makes faux pas after faux pas as she verbalizes the news coming across the teleprompter. Sometimes I think her mouth is going south, when her brain is going north. Or maybe she just needs glasses.
Posted October 29, 2010 by markosun in Uncategorized
The City of Winnipeg has built a bikeway along Assiniboine Ave. in downtown Winnipeg. That quiet little street will never be the same. I walked down the street the other day and studied the new construction, also taking pictures. And I was still very confused as to what actually was happening on the street.
The bikeway is easy to figure out. It is separated from the car part of the street by a round curb. And it does have a yellow line down the middle. But the car part of the street has been turned into one-ways on different segments of the street. Very confusing. But I did find a map on Chrisd.ca that does straighten out the confusion. One problem that may arise from this is the back lanes closer to Broadway are going to be very congested with traffic. But the cyclists should be safe from aggressive drivers. Maybe cross country skiers can use it in the winter.
The Assiniboine Bikeway will enhance transportation for cyclists, pedestrians and motorists and provide better connections between the Assiniboine Avenue neighbourhood and areas like Wolseley, Osborne, The Forks and downtown. The Bikeway will feature a 3.0-metre wide cycle track placed on the south side of the Assiniboine Avenue between Kennedy and Garry streets. The track will connect to an off-road bike path between Garry and Main streets alongside Bonnycastle Park.
Posted October 27, 2010 by markosun in Uncategorized
Most experts regard Albert Fish as the most disgusting, horrible and evil serial killer of all time.
There are few killers in American history that are remembered today as being as deranged and fiendish as the seemingly kind and harmless, Albert Fish. He looked like every child’s favorite grandfather but behind the quiet facade of his silver hair and mustache lurked a hideous monster who preyed on the young and the innocent with his horrific “instruments of hell” — a meat cleaver, a butcher knife and a saw. He was the self-admitted molester of more than 400 children during a span of 20 years and in the words of one of the shocked psychiatrists who examined him, he lived a life of “unparalleled perversity.” Albert Fish remains one of the oldest men ever executed in the electric chair but it was a death that came too late for many of his victims.
On night of the full moon, his children later testified, Fish would consume huge quantities of raw meat. Over the years, he collected a great amount of published material on cannibalism and he carried the most gruesome articles with him on his person at all times. Before he ever turned to murder, Fish was examined several times by psychiatrists at Bellevue but he was always released and judged “disturbed but sane.”
When and where Fish first became a murderer is unknown. He confessed to six killing and referred vaguely to dozens more, although the victims, dates and places were lost to his hazy memory. He did confess to murdering a man in Wilmington, Delaware; mutilating and torturing to death a mentally retarded boy in New York in 1910; killing a Negro boy in Washington also in 1919; molesting and killing four year-old William Gaffney in 1929; and strangling to death five year-old Francis McDonnell on Long Island in 1934. The most sensational murder carried out by Fish was the abduction and horrific slaughter of Grace Budd in 1928. Her abduction led to a man hunt that lasted for six years.
Fish was examined by teams of doctors and he relished the notoriety. He described his fetishes and perversions to the fascinated psychiatrists, telling of inserting needles into his scrotum (later X-rays revealed 29 rusty needles in his body) and inserting wool that was doused with light fluid into his anus and setting it on fire. One psychiatrist in particular, Dr. Frederic Wertham, got remarkably close to Fish before and after his trial. He later wrote that Fish “looked like a meek and innocuous little old man, gentle and benevolent, friendly and polite. If you wanted someone to entrust your children to, he would be the one you would choose.” However, he then went on to describe Fish as the most complex example of a “polymorphous pervert” he had ever known — someone who had practiced every perversion and deviation known to man, from sodomy to sadism, eating excrement and self mutilation. He even confessed to Wertham that he had carried Grace’s ears and nose back to New York with him, wrapped in newspaper. He placed the bundle on his lap as he traveled by train and quivered with excitement as he thought about what was inside.
On May 25, 1928, Edward Budd put a classified ad in the Sunday edition of the New York World that read: “Young man, 18, wishes position in country. Edward Budd, 406 West 15th Street.” On May 28, 1928, Fish, then 58 years old, visited the Budd family in Manhattan, New York City under the pretense of hiring Edward. He introduced himself as Frank Howard, a farmer from Farmingdale, New York. When he arrived, Fish met Budd’s younger sister, 10-year-old Grace. Fish promised to hire Budd and said he would send for him in a few days. On his second visit he agreed to hire Budd, then convinced the parents, Delia Flanagan and Albert Budd I, to let Grace accompany him to a birthday party that evening at his sister’s home. The elder Albert Budd was a porter for the Equitable Life Assurance Society. Grace had a sister, Beatrice; and two other brothers, Albert Budd II; and George Budd. Grace left with Fish that day, but never returned home.
The police arrested Charles Edward Pope on September 5, 1930 as a suspect in the kidnapping. He was a 66-year-old apartment house superintendent, and was accused by his estranged wife. He spent 108 days in jail between his arrest and trial on December 22, 1930. He was found not guilty.
Six years later, in November 1934, an anonymous letter was sent to the girl’s parents which led the police to Albert Fish. Mrs. Budd was illiterate and could not read the letter herself, so she had her son read it to her. The unaltered letter is quoted below, complete with Fish’s misspellings and grammatical errors:
Dear Mrs. Budd. In 1894 a friend of mine shipped as a deck hand on the Steamer Tacoma, Capt. John Davis. They sailed from San Francisco for Hong Kong, China. On arriving there he and two others went ashore and got drunk. When they returned the boat was gone. At that time there was famine in China. Meat of any kind was from $1–3 per pound. So great was the suffering among the very poor that all children under 12 were sold for food in order to keep others from starving. A boy or girl under 14 was not safe in the street. You could go in any shop and ask for steak—chops—or stew meat. Part of the naked body of a boy or girl would be brought out and just what you wanted cut from it. A boy or girl’s behind which is the sweetest part of the body and sold as veal cutlet brought the highest price. John staid [sic] there so long he acquired a taste for human flesh. On his return to N.Y. he stole two boys, one 7 and one 11. Took them to his home stripped them naked tied them in a closet. Then burned everything they had on. Several times every day and night he spanked them – tortured them – to make their meat good and tender. First he killed the 11 year old boy, because he had the fattest ass and of course the most meat on it. Every part of his body was cooked and eaten except the head—bones and guts. He was roasted in the oven (all of his ass), boiled, broiled, fried and stewed. The little boy was next, went the same way. At that time, I was living at 409 E 100 St. near—right side. He told me so often how good human flesh was I made up my mind to taste it. On Sunday June the 3, 1928 I called on you at 406 W 15 St. Brought you pot cheese—strawberries. We had lunch. Grace sat in my lap and kissed me. I made up my mind to eat her. On the pretense of taking her to a party. You said yes she could go. I took her to an empty house in Westchester I had already picked out. When we got there, I told her to remain outside. She picked wildflowers. I went upstairs and stripped all my clothes off. I knew if I did not I would get her blood on them. When all was ready I went to the window and called her. Then I hid in a closet until she was in the room. When she saw me all naked she began to cry and tried to run down the stairs. I grabbed her and she said she would tell her mamma. First I stripped her naked. How she did kick – bite and scratch. I choked her to death, then cut her in small pieces so I could take my meat to my rooms. Cook and eat it. How sweet and tender her little ass was roasted in the oven. It took me 9 days to eat her entire body. I did not fuck her tho [sic] I could of had I wished. She died a virgin.
A 4-year-old child named Billy Gaffney was playing in the hallway outside of his family’s apartment in Brooklyn with his 3-year-old friend, Billy Beaton, and Billy’s 12-year-old brother on February 11, 1927. When the 12-year-old withdrew into the Beatons’ apartment, both of the younger boys disappeared; Billy Beaton was soon found on the roof of the apartment house. When asked what happened to Gaffney, Beaton said “the boogey man took him.” Initially Peter Kudzinowski was a suspect in the boy’s murder. Then, Joseph Meehan, a motorman on a Brooklyn trolley, saw a picture of Fish in the newspaper and identified him as the old man that he saw February 11, 1927, who was trying to quiet a little boy sitting with him on the trolley. The boy was not wearing a jacket and was crying for his mother and was dragged by the man on and off the trolley. Also, the younger Beaton described the “boogey man” as an elderly man with a slim build, gray hair and a gray moustache, which matched Fish’s description. Police matched the description of the child to Billy Gaffney. Gaffney’s body was never recovered. Gaffney’s mother visited Fish in Sing Sing to try to get more details of her son’s death. Fish confessed the following:
I brought him to the Riker Ave. dumps. There is a house that stands alone, not far from where I took him. I took the boy there. Stripped him naked and tied his hands and feet and gagged him with a piece of dirty rag I picked out of the dump. Then I burned his clothes. Threw his shoes in the dump. Then I walked back and took the trolley to 59 St. at 2 A.M. and walked from there home. Next day about 2 P.M., I took tools, a good heavy cat-of-nine tails. Home made. Short handle. Cut one of my belts in half, slit these halves in six strips about 8 inches long. I whipped his bare behind till the blood ran from his legs. I cut off his ears – nose – slit his mouth from ear to ear. Gouged out his eyes. He was dead then. I stuck the knife in his belly and held my mouth to his body and drank his blood. I picked up four old potato sacks and gathered a pile of stones. Then I cut him up. I had a grip with me. I put his nose, ears and a few slices of his belly in the grip. Then I cut him through the middle of his body. Just below the belly button. Then through his legs about 2 inches below his behind. I put this in my grip with a lot of paper. I cut off the head – feet – arms – hands and the legs below the knee. This I put in sacks weighed with stones, tied the ends and threw them into the pools of slimy water you will see all along the road going to North Beach. I came home with my meat. I had the front of his body I liked best. His monkey and pee wees and a nice little fat behind to roast in the oven and eat. I made a stew out of his ears – nose – pieces of his face and belly. I put onions, carrots, turnips, celery, salt and pepper. It was good. Then I split the cheeks of his behind open, cut off his monkey and pee wees and washed them first. I put strips of bacon on each cheek of his behind and put them in the oven. Then I picked 4 onions and when the meat had roasted about 1/4 hour, I poured about a pint of water over it for gravy and put in the onions. At frequent intervals I basted his behind with a wooden spoon. So the meat would be nice and juicy. In about 2 hours, it was nice and brown, cooked through. I never ate any roast turkey that tasted half as good as his sweet fat little behind did. I ate every bit of the meat in about four days. His little monkey was as sweet as a nut, but his pee-wees I could not chew. Threw them in the toilet.
Fish arrived at prison in March 1935, and was executed on January 16, 1936, in the electric chair at Sing Sing. He entered the chamber at 11:06 p.m. and was pronounced dead three minutes later. He was buried in the Sing Sing Prison Cemetery. He was recorded to have said that electrocution would be “the supreme thrill of my life”. Just before the switch was flipped, he stated “I don’t even know why I am here.” According to one witness present, it took two jolts before Fish died, creating the rumor that the apparatus was short-circuited by the needles Fish previously inserted into his body.
Posted October 25, 2010 by markosun in Uncategorized
Dexys Midnight Runners are a British pop group with soul influences, who achieved their major success in the early to mid-1980s. They are best known for their songs “Come On Eileen” and “Geno”, in which both singles went #1 on the UK Singles Chart.
Lyrics and video below:
Come on, Eileen.
Come on, Eileen.
Poor old Johnny Ray, sounded sad upon the radio;
Broke a million hearts in mono.
Oh our mothers cried, sang along, who can blame them?
You’ve grown (You’re grown up)
So grown. (So grown up.)
Now I must say more than ever.
(Come on, Eileen.)
Toora, loora, toora loorye aye.
We gonna sing just like our fathers.
Come on, Eileen,
Oh I swear (well he means) at this moment
You mean ev’rything.
You in that dress,
my thoughts, I confess,
verge on dirty.
Ah, Come on Eileen.
Come On, Eileen.
These people round here
Wear beaten down eyes sunk in a smoke dried face
So resigned what their fate is,
But not us (no never),
no, not us (no never),
we are far too young and clever.
Come on, Eileen,
Oh I swear (well he means)
Ah come on let’s
take off everything,
that pretty red dress, Eileen (Tell him yes)
Ah come on let’s, ah come on, Eileen,
Pleassse …
Come On, Eileen, Tooloorye aye
Come On, Eileen, Tooloorye, aye, toora.
Now you’re all grown (toora), Now you (toora) have shown (toora),
Oh! Eileen.
Said, you’ve (You) grown (toora) (it’s strange that our feelings have grown),
so grown (toora) (about how you feel)!
Now (toora) I (toora) must (toora) say (toora) more (toora) than ever,
things round here will change.
Recently there has been some controversy relating to the Canadian governments decision to replace the current CF-18 fighter fleet with 65 new F-35 Lightning fighter-bombers. All the negative diatribes are coming from left-wing groups who have basically no understanding of military needs and strategies. And the federal Liberals often jump on board to gain political points.
Some of the ideas being put forward by these “progressive” groups are cockeyed and nonsensical.
A report released by the left-leaning Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives says the multibillion-dollar purchase isn’t based on the country’s real needs.
Liberal MPs agreed, saying they will kill the deal if they get the opportunity.
Steven Staples of the Rideau Institute, who wrote the report, said the aircraft doesn’t fit the roles Canada needs to address.
“This is a massive commitment of defence spending on ‘flying Cadillacs’ that is being driven by defence contractors, not by a clear-eyed view of Canada’s defence needs,” he said.
The government wants the pricey new planes to replace the existing CF-18 fleet, which is approaching the end of its service life. The deal could cost as much as $16 billion, once a long-term maintenance contract is added in.
But Staples said the F-35 Lightning II is too much plane.
Canada doesn’t need high-tech stealth jets to defend North American airspace, he said.
“The main point is that we have time and we need to change the way we think about our aircraft,” he said. “We don’t need them for bombing missions and there is no real Russian bomber threat.”
He suggested Canada abandon the idea of using air power overseas and extend the life of the existing F-18 fleet for North American surveillance.
He also said technology is overtaking the F-35, a joint strike fighter being purchased by the United States and several allied nations.
“Let’s also investigate the acquisition of the next generation of unarmed, long-range, long-endurance, pilotless aircraft.”
The Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, created in 1980, is a non-profit research institute funded by more than 12,000 members. The centre describes itself as a “progressive” voice focused on issues of social, economic and environmental justice.
First of all the CF-18’s are getting very old. The first models began operating with Air Command in 1982. Thirty years is the limit in the life span of a fighter jet. Keeping them flying after that time period is dangerous and illogical as you would practically have to replace every part in the aircraft.
In terms of long-range drones this group is out to left field again. Currently the U.S. has a long-range drone in the Global Hawk. But the aircraft is designed only for reconnaissance. It does not have interceptor or attack capabilities. The much smaller Predator and Reaper drones that are wreaking havoc on the terrorists in Pakistan have limited range and very limited weapons carrying capabilities. None of these ideas are practical.
And today on CBC radio another academic suggested we trash the F-35 deal and purchase a less sophisticated and smaller aircraft to replace our CF-18 fighter jets. Below is a picture of this plane.
This fellow contends that the plane is much less expensive therefore we could buy many more. Many more that the enemy could shoot down! What would this thing do against state of the art fighter jets?
The plane is the A-29 Super Tucano. It is designed as a trainer and counter-insurgency ground attack aircraft. The professor who came up with this lame brained idea suggested that the plane could keep up with terrorist controlled or hijacked airliners. What he seemed to have missed is that modern airliners can fly at 530 mph. The Tucano peaks out at 346 mph. The terrorists would leave the Canadian Air Force in their dust as they fly on towards the Parliament Buildings.
Many lefties have good righteous intentions. They basically mean well. But most of the time they are not the type of people that are students of military and geo-strategic issues. They are concerned with feeding and clothing the poor and saving the polar bears. They tend to stay away from analyzing the newest Russian torpedo technology or American laser beam weaponry. So they get these ludicrous ideas regarding military issues and plop them onto the table.
In terms of everybody’s safety these people should stay mum on these topics until they do the proper research. Or maybe have a long sit down with Gwynne Dyer.
Posted October 22, 2010 by markosun in Uncategorized
When I was growing up in a small prairie town as a little kid, one of my favourite things to do was to bicycle to the movie theatre and check out the movie posters on the front of the building. I would analyze every corner and detail of the poster. Especially if there were scantily clad women illustrated in the poster. Horror and Science Fiction movie posters were also some of my favourites.
The posters would make you imagine what the movie was about and what the visuals would instill in your head. The posters would create the curiosity that would motivate you to see the film or not.
Below are some of the more engaging posters.
Rosemary’s Baby
This poster REALLY caught my attention. Great scary movie.
Posted October 21, 2010 by markosun in Uncategorized
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