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spoontoof · 1 year ago

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october 4th, 2023 5:50pm evil telephones

some archived short stories of mine:

uploaded on march 27th, 2023 8:51pm

Crap Poem

By Just Cabrera

one day after eating a bean burrito snack

i felt the urge to take a large crap

and so i ran to the toilet and sat

letting the poop slip out, which means that i shat

i crapped so much that my ass bled blood

it was almost like my toilet was gonna flood

after many long minutes, i got bored as fuck

so i took out my phone and began scroll for luck

youtube shorts doesn’t help my adhd

the phone was so bright that i couldn’t see

then i felt like i wanted to jump up with glee

there was no more crap

the shit had ceased!

i wiped my ass so fast like i was mrbeast

but when i tried to get up, my face filled with horror

my butt was glued to the toilet staller

i had sat down too long, and now my butt was fused

to the toilet so hard that it felt abused

the phone battery died, and i was very sure

i would stay on that toilet

FOREVERMORE

uploaded on march 24th, 2023 8:33pm

My name is Jay Squashnuggets. I had just moved into my college dorm room, when I saw who my roommate was gonna be. It was a friend I had known since 9th grade. He wasn’t my best friend, but, he was a good friend. I would call him the kind of friend I would watch a movie with, or sneak out to a party, but I wouldn’t call him the kind of friend I would tell ALL of my secrets to. I don’t wanna reveal his real name, but for the sake of this story, I’m gonna call him Stu.

Now, our college was very close to the high school I went to, which means a lot of guys that I knew from my high school, or guys that I didn’t even know but still went to my high school, went to my college. A group of popular kids were having a 1st year party for college. “Come on, we should go!” Stu repeatedly asked me. I was hesitant, but I agreed. The party was in a house outside of college grounds because everyone wanted drink. We were all under 21, so we didn’t any college security guards to come, and start calling the real cops on us. The party was at 3:00am. Great, when all the scary, supernatural stuff happens.

It was a 10 minute drive from the college, I didn’t have a drivers license, but Stu did. We pulled up at the house. I want to keep this story PG-13, so I’ll skip all the alcohol and stuff and go straight to when poop gets real. I think I drank a little too much, because my vision got a little blurry. It wasn’t until I went into one of the bedrooms, and passed out. The last thing I remember before passing out, was the music being turned off, and a woman screaming.

I woke up and looked at the clock. 3:30. I had been sleeping for about 10 minutes. I went downstairs, and screamed in shock. There were 3 dead bodies on the rug. Then, I felt a hand drag me under the couch. It was Stu. “Shhh!!! They will hear you.” Said Stu. “Who’s ‘they’” I said. Half a second later I heard someone walk into the living room. “I know your here, Jay Squashnuggets.” How did this person know my name. Correction, KID. Yes, it was a kid. A girl. Sounded like she was 9. I wasn’t scared anymore. I realized I could fight this 9 year old. I started get out of the couch when Stu whispered, “No!” I ignored him, and I stood up in front of the girl. Then I realized something. Her eyes were completely black. No white parts. Just black.

“I see you have a friend in the couch with you.” Said the girl. I kid you not, she ran so fast under the couch, she was under there in less then 2 seconds. But I clearly saw her run. I then heard something. Snap! She sped out of the couch holding something. It was dark, so I couldn’t see what she was holding. I made out something. She was holding Stu’s head. No body, just head. Her tongue extended out of her mouth, went into Stu’s ear, then his eyes turned black. A body extended out of his head. It stuck to his head. Then legs extended out of the body, then stuck to his body. Same thing with his arms. His face morphed into an 8 year old boy’s face, but eyes stayed the same. Completely black. The girl stuck her tongue out of his ear. Stu had became a black eyed child.

I was so scared of what I had just saw. I booked it to Stu’s car. I tried to remember how to start the car from the drivers test I had failed. I eventually started the car and drove as far away as possible. “Am I even driving the right way?” I thought to myself. I was originally gonna drive back to the dorm, but at this point I had no idea where the hell I was. All I knew was I was on a road with woods in every direction. Eventually car ran out of gas. “Flip!” I said. I then saw what I thought was a miracle. Another car with its headlights on in the distance. I started to wave my arms like a lunatic. The car tried to avoid me, but I wouldn’t let it. It stopped. Then, 2 big guys got out of the car.

Okay, when I tell you these guys were big, I mean they were BIG. I mean, not fat-big, but, buff-big. One of them came over to me and started choking me. The other one came over and took out a gun, then he looked in all of my pockets. He took out my phone, but it didn’t turn on, and I knew why. “Battery’s dead.” He said while he threw the phone away, and he was right. The battery was dead. That’s why I didn’t call for help. Then, their trunk opened. I didn’t seem like they noticed. Then, one of the black eyed children stepped out of the trunk.

One of the big guys suffered the same fate as Stu. He became a black eyed child. The black eyed child looked at the other big guy. “I’ll kill you instead.” She then ate all of his organs in one millisecond. I immediately ran into the woods. She ran after me at full speed. I saw a ravine. I knew what I had to do. I jumped into the ravine and landed in the water. She too landed in the water and continued to chase me into a cave. She was going to fast and rammed into a wall. I heard many rocks fall onto the exit of the cave. I was caved in.

Now I am stuck in this infinite labyrinth of caves with no way of getting out. I have been surviving from eating beatles and drinking cave water. I’m stuck in here with this black eyed child somewhere in here. I’m writing this in a journal, hoping to be found dead by someone. I don’t wanna become a black eyed child for all of eternity, so…

This is a suicide note now.

The End.

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willel · 4 years ago

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Oh. You know a movie Stranger Things took inspiration from that takes place in California?

I totally forgot about this. 👀

It's called.... Poltergeist! Shocking right?

If you haven't seen Poltergeist (1982), you definitely should. It's almost required watching at this point. Don't expect it to be super scary by today's horror movie standards. At best it'd be PG-13 and it was made before PG-13 was a thing so it's just PG.

If you haven't seen the movie, SPOILERS!

Poltergeist takes place in a newer housing development in California.

The movie starts off similarly to Stranger Things. We see the every day lives of these characters living their best life, chilling during a sunny afternoon. The dad is watching a football game with the boys. The mom is cooking food I think. The kids are playing around. Etc.

As the movie progresses, weird stuff starts happening throughout the home. The daughter, Carol Anne, starts hearing voices throughout the house and the TVs. Their kitchen becomes a weird playground for the ghosts where they rearrange the seating and even send you flying across the room (in a good way) if you sit in the right spot. It's all innocent fun.

Until one night, a not so friendly entity seems to make itself known. During the night of the storm, the tree in their yard becomes possessed and literally tries to eat their son. While they're distracted with that, the evil spirit kidnaps Carol Anne through her own closet to another dimension.

From there, the plot plays out similarly to Stranger Things. Carol Anne (aka Will Byers) still somehow makes her presence known to her family, but mostly her mother Diane (who is confirmed in sequel films to be supernaturally sensitive, as is Carol Anne herself hence the kidnapping by the spirits)

With the help of an "expert" supernatural team, Diane braves entering the dimension herself to get Carol Anne out.

The peace doesn't last long though. Angered that Carol Anne was taken from it, the main evil spirit goes nuclear, attacking the family while the father, Steven, was away for a few hours. The spirit tries again to drag Carol Anne AND her brother back to the other side.

Diane, in trying to rescue her babies, does everything she can to get to them. At some point she ends up outside and falls into their half built pool. Bodies them float out of the pool all around her. It's pretty scary.

Unbeknownst to the main characters and their neighbors, the houses were built on top of a cemetery. Problem is, they only moved the headstones, not the bodies. That's why all the spirits are around, good and bad.

They manage to narrowly escape the house with the children as the house starts to collapse in on itself until it quite literally disappears. The rest of the neighborhood also starts to fall apart as caskets and skeletons just start shooting out of the ground like a zombie movie except the zombies don't actually move, they just wanted to let you know they're chilling down below. Lol

But back to the main reason I wrote this post...

Wouldn't it be interesting if the Byers got this awesome deal on this awesome house in California, something they wouldn't normally be able to afford. But then everything starts falling apart in the house or something?

Like "Wow, for some reason, this house is weirdly close to the boundary between the upside down and right side up!"

How that would be possible, I dunno. Maybe the houses were build on some old military or government facility that wasn't properly cleaned or sealed up. That happens right?

I just looked it up. Yep. The Department of Energy (aka the same people from Hawkins Lab)

The Santa Susana Field Laboratory is a complex of industrial research and development facilities located on a 2,668-acre (1,080 ha)[1] portion of the Southern California Simi Hills in Simi Valley, California. It was used mainly for the development and testing of liquid-propellant rocket engines for the United States space program from 1949 to 2006,[1] nuclear reactors from 1953 to 1980 and the operation of a U.S. government-sponsored liquid metals research center from 1966 to 1998.[2] The site is located approximately 7 miles (11 km) northwest from the community of Canoga Park and approximately 30 miles (48 km) northwest of Downtown Los Angeles. Sage Ranch Park is adjacent on part of the northern boundary and the community of Bell Canyon along the entire southern boundary.

Apparently the site is/was still there and is very contaminated, affecting the communities surrounding it.

So here's a... theory, I guess? Or just a fanfiction idea. The Byers get this awesome deal for this brand new house. The Byers, the people who usually can't afford anything, gets this new house and it's SO nice. Despite all the angst they probably still feel after season 3, they all gotta admit a new house is pretty awesome and they love it?

But the longer they live there (which I imagine won't be too long), weird stuff starts happening around them. Maybe El gets nightmares. Maybe they feel like they're being watched. Maybe Will continues getting the horrible chill down his spine.

And they soon realize not only is the Department of Energy down the street (the same government agency behind El's horrific childhood), they also have secretly contaminated the entire surrounding area and have possibly weakened the barrier between the real world and the Upside Down or something???

I dunno. Like I said, at least it'd be a cool fanfiction idea!

Like seriously, I would totally read this.

The Byers get this weird house deal in California. They love it. Joyce and Jonathan get jobs. Jonathan gets a friend, Joyce too maybe. Everything seems kinda ok for once.

But El and Will's school sucks. El starts having nightmares. Will starts getting chills he can't get rid of. Jonathan's friend starts telling him strangely familiar weird things he saw once while he was high. Joyce notices someone is following her around.

Yessssssss

Hard part is, I have no idea how I'd tie a fic like that back into Hawkin's or the whole Hopper plot. Hm.

#stranger things #poltergeist #will byers #el hopper #jane hopper #joyce byers #jonathan byers #theory

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creeped-out-ranked · 5 years ago

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Creeped Out is a horror anthology series shown on CBBC in the UK and available on Netflix elsewhere. It’s an excellent show, fun for kids with loads of crossover appeal for adults. But the big entertainment sites tend not to cover it, and I haven't been able to find a definitive ranking of all the episodes anywhere. So I decided to create my own, because why not?! This list includes season 1 and season 2; I’ll add further episodes as they’re shown.

Before we get into this: there are some spoilers in here. I’ve tried to keep them to a minimum but sometimes, to describe what's good (or bad) about an episode, I need to discuss elements of the plot.

Every episode of Creeped Out, ranked from best to worst

1. ‘Slapstick’ (Season 1, Episode 1)

The first episode of a series is rarely the best, but Creeped Out bucks the trend—‘Slapstick’ hasn’t yet been bettered. It’s the perfect combination of cozy and creepy, with a quintessentially British setting (a seaside town complete with Punch & Judy shows), a puppet antagonist who’s somewhere between unnerving and amusing, and a relatable main character. Even the score is the best of the bunch: its sinister take on fairground music really adds to the atmosphere. The plot—Jessie wishes her parents were ‘normal’, and lives to regret it—is compelling, and in contrast to some of the weaker episodes, you actually understand why the characters do the things they do (even the bully is given a bit of a backstory). ‘Slapstick’ is a gem, and more than any other episode, it stands up to repeated rewatches.

2. ‘Trolled’ (Season 1, Episode 3)

Sam leads a double life: he’s secretly NoFace, an online troll who often targets his closest friends. When he ignores a message warning him to stop trolling, things start to go very wrong. This episode is set in the plush surroundings of a boarding school (one of Creeped Out’s more notable backdrops) and the contrast between Sam’s environment and his online life is both palpable and believable. The dynamic between Sam, Fitzy and Naini is established very effectively—you really feel Sam has something to lose. Extra points for the properly bleak ending, too.

3. ‘Kindlesticks’ (Season 1, Episode 9)

This episode is a fan favourite, and it’s not difficult to see why. ‘Kindlesticks’ came out of nowhere, landing in the middle of a few mediocre episodes, and doesn’t seem at first glance to have the most exciting setup: a bad babysitter getting her comeuppance. Yet you’ll likely find that the tale of Esme, her charge Ashley and his imaginary friend Kindlesticks will drag you in, spit you out and leave you reeling. It’s a simple idea executed perfectly, with what is undoubtedly Creeped Out’s best delivery of a twist. Seriously, I didn’t see that coming at all.

4. ‘Splinta Claws’ (Season 2, Episode 10)

Admittedly, it isn’t difficult to make a Christmas episode good—add lots of sparkly decorations and a bit of ‘Carol of the Bells’ and you’ve already nailed the atmosphere. ‘Splinta Claws’, in which two boys get trapped in a department store along with a possessed animatronic Santa, builds on that to create an inspired take on PG-13 seasonal horror. It’s the self-aware script that really makes this episode; the ‘frenemy’ relationship between anxious Mikey and street-smart Lawrence, plus the characters’ recognition that the slow-moving Santa isn’t that scary (despite its nightmare-fuel face). An effective combination of action, emotion and humour results in a spooky festive treat.

5. ‘Tilly Bone’ (Season 2, Episode 9)

Telling a story backwards is a bold move, and initially, it makes ‘Tilly Bone’ confusing. Some viewers might find themselves wanting to switch off as they wonder what the hell is going on. But stick with it, and a fascinating tale unfolds, with layers, details and clues to be picked apart, nods to classic horror, great performances (especially Alice Franziska Woodhouse as the disquieting Junebug) and some of the series’ most original and surprising ideas. It’s formally innovative, daring and altogether one of the most impressive pieces of work Creeped Out has yet produced.

6. ‘Marti’ (Season 1, Episode 4)

Kim is initially delighted when her new phone’s AI helps her to become more popular, but things take a turn for the sinister when ‘he’ claims to be in love with her. ‘Marti’ cleverly uses this premise as a kid-appropriate way to explore themes of coercive control and abusive relationships. I have a feeling this episode may have been inspired by the 2016 movie Bedeviled—there are lots of similarities, right down to Marti’s voice—and it says a lot that in 25 minutes it crafts a better, more meaningful story than a full-length horror movie for adults was able to manage. Often unfairly slept on, ‘Marti’ is the talented underdog of the series.

7. ‘Takedown’ (Season 2, Episode 8)

‘Takedown’ is intriguing because it departs completely from the series’ typical aesthetic—there's lots of shakycam, a grainy feel to the cinematography, a muted colour palette. It’s shot more like an indie film than an episode of a kids’ show. It focuses on Alexa, the only girl on her high school wrestling team, who uses a weird chain text to wish for more strength. Since this is Creeped Out, it’s no surprise that her ‘gift’ comes at a price. With its gritty feel and the authentic friendship between Alexa and Lucky (‘cheers to root beers’, anyone?), this episode is something really different, and all the more memorable for it.

8. ‘No Filter’ (Season 2, Episode 6)

Like ‘Trolled’, ‘No Filter’ is a thoroughly enjoyable example of what a series like this should be aiming for, which is essentially a junior version of a Twilight Zone episode. There’s a recognisable starting point—who hasn’t used filters or Facetune to make their selfies look better, and who bothers reading all the T&Cs?—and when Kiera’s eroded face is revealed, it’s one of the few moments in the series to create a genuine shock. Plus there’s a proper pantomime villain, just as it should be. The ending might be a little jumbled, but it’s entertaining enough that that can be forgiven.

9. ‘Cat Food’ (Season 1, Episode 2)

Happy-go-lucky prankster Stu pretends to be ill so he can skip school, but gets more than he bargained for when he discovers the elderly neighbour, Mrs McMurtle, is actually a shapeshifting monster. ‘Cat Food’ is a fun, comedic episode (the only one yet to make me laugh out loud) and, while there isn’t a great deal of substance to the story, it’s efficiently told and neatly resolved. Rhys Gannon is great as Stu and it’s just an all-round fun time.

10. ‘The Traveller’ (Season 1, Episode 11)

While the vast majority of Creeped Out episodes take place in a distinctly middle-class milieu, ‘The Traveller’ switches things up by focusing on Jodie and Brandon, troublemaking kids on an inner-city estate. They come across a device that can pause time, and it’s all fun and games until a blue-skinned man starts hunting them down. The plot is a bit more Doctor Who than your average episode, and the combination of urban setting and sci-fi story is surprisingly successful. There’s also an emotional gut-punch of a moment when Jodie finally understands the problems she’s been creating for her mum.

11. ‘The Call’ (Season 1, Episode 6)

‘The Call’ isn't one of the strongest stories in Creeped Out’s repertoire. An unpopular girl is drawn to an environmental activist and discovers she’s a siren, gaining powers into the bargain—interesting enough, but not enormously original, and inevitably a gateway to slightly tedious lecturing about plastic etc. It stands out mainly because of a stellar performance from Rebecca Hanssen, who reminds me of a young Olivia Colman. Hanssen really inhabits the character of Pearl, and shows how excellent acting can elevate an ordinary plot and script.

12. ‘The Many Place’ (Season 2, Episode 4)

With their holiday scuppered by torrential rain, three siblings wander a hotel and find themselves lost in a maze of realities. ‘The Many Place’ is designed as an homage to Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining, and spotting the references is part of the enjoyment here. The story takes advantage of the liminal, disconcerting nature of a large hotel to craft a series of alarmingly plausible terrors, and the ending features the best twist since ‘Kindlesticks’.

13. ‘One More Minute’ (Season 2, Episode 1)

‘One More Minute’ kicks off the second season with a pure hit of enjoyment that doesn’t take itself too seriously. When Jack can’t tear himself away from his favourite videogame, he finds time passing quickly—scarily quickly. While it may not be among the best, everything about this episode is solid: it’s (appropriately) well paced, the relationships are soundly fleshed out, and it’s all wrapped up well.

14. ‘Itchy’ (Season 2, Episode 2)

It may have one of the show's sillier premises—the villains are... head lice—but I have a soft spot for ‘Itchy’. Perhaps it’s the setting: a military academy on an English island feels fresh when you compare it to the many identikit homes and high schools in the series. Perhaps it’s the strong performance from Oliver Finnegan as protagonist Gabe. Either way, there’s something low-key charming about this episode.

15. ‘Side Show’ (Season 1, Episodes 12 and 13)

This two-part season finale is set in the early 20th century and centres on a troupe of circus performance whose ringmaster won’t allow them to venture beyond a magical barrier. Overall, ‘Side Show’ isn’t especially creepy; it’s more of a fantasy story that feels like it could have been its own separate series. The advantage of this is that there’s more space for character development and worldbuilding. The disadvantage is that it doesn’t truly feel like part of the Creeped Out universe.

16. ‘A Boy Called Red’ (Season 1, Episode 5)

Vincent and his dad aren't getting along, but when they go to stay at the latter’s childhood home, Vincent finds an unusual way to reconnect: via a time-travelling portal. The switches between past and present are handled admirably, and Boris Burnell Anderson is a standout as AJ. There’s a lot to like about ‘A Boy Called Red’; it just doesn’t stand out as especially memorable when compared to some of the stronger Creeped Out stories, perhaps because there’s no real antagonist.

17. ‘Bravery Badge’ (Season 1, Episode 7)

A troop of Girl Guides—sorry, ‘Hedgehog Rangers’—head into the woods for a camping trip. When the girls start falling into a strange trance, it’s up to a moody, reluctant Ranger to save the day. The setting here is promising, the campfire scene is a highlight, and the urban legend about the missing troop is a great touch. Unfortunately, the good stuff is undermined by questionable acting and a somewhat ridiculous supernatural menace. Though I will admit the singing is quite creepy.

18. ‘Shed No Fear’ (Season 1, Episode 10)

Set in the 1970s, with some decent period detail, this episode follows two boys as they battle a mysterious shadow-creature inhabiting an old shed. It’s cute to see Greg and Dave rekindle their friendship and tell the smarmy football captain to get lost, but the threat of the Shade is never particularly well-developed. The title also annoys me. Outside the context of this episode, nobody has ever uttered the phrase ‘shed no fear’. It isn’t even a good pun!

19. ‘The Unfortunate Five’ (Season 2, Episode 5)

Five kids in detention meet their match in a seemingly sweet, yoga-loving teacher who pits them against each other. Establishing five protagonists and two villains within the space of 25 minutes is a tall order, and it’s one this episode doesn't meet. ‘The Unfortunate Five’ has a good concept and also boasts one of the series’ goriest images (when Faye attacks Hawkins and blood spatters across the glass—I’m kind of surprised CBBC didn’t cut that). But the flimsy, unmemorable characters doom it to the lower reaches of this list.

20. ‘Only Child’ (Season 2, Episode 7)

This could have been great: the story of a girl being menaced by her demonic baby brother, while her parents are convinced she’s just jealous, has lots of potential. Yet ‘Only Child’ doesn't really work. The denouement is rushed and muddled (exactly how does Mia identify the link between the baby’s power and the feedback sound?) and the low-budget special effects don't help. It also suffers from being set entirely within the Tuthill family’s apartment, which looks like a cheaply decorated show home.

21. ‘Help’ (Season 2, Episode 3)

A very meh installment about a brother and sister who are overly reliant on their family’s Amazon Alexa-like virtual assistant. It’s basically a weaker version of ‘Marti’ with a much less impactful message. The siblings are barely fleshed out, and the episode shares with ‘Only Child’ a sterile-looking set that doesn’t resemble a real family home at all.

22. ‘Spaceman’ (Season 1, Episode 8)

If episodes like ‘Trolled’ and ‘No Filter’ represent what a show like Creeped Out should be, ‘Spaceman’ is exactly what it shouldn’t be. If ‘Cat Food’ proves how well humour can work within a scary story, ‘Spaceman’ shows exactly how it can go wrong. The tale of unlikely pals Spud and Thomas finding a crashed spaceship is by far the worst thing Creeped Out has come up with—it’s implausible, unfunny and not remotely creepy. Avoid.

#creeped out #creeped out ranked #creeped out episodes #creeped out episodes ranked #cbbc #netflix

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letterboxd · 5 years ago

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Play Fright.

“It’s fun-scary, as opposed to you feeling scared because it's disgusting or something.”

We talk to Scary Stories To Tell In The Dark and Troll Hunter director André Øvredal about working with Guillermo del Toro, finding the line with tween-friendly horror, and the good-and-bad of anthology films. (And, yes, we threw in a few Troll Hunter questions.)

Produced by Oscar-winner Guillermo del Toro, who also has a Screen Story credit on the film, Scary Stories To Tell In The Dark is a new PG-13 horror adapted from the three-book series of the same name first published between 1981 and 1991.

Prefiguring the likes of Goosebumps and its many imitators, the original Scary Stories books, written by Alvin Schwartz and illustrated by Stephen Gammell, presented short horror tales aimed at a young-adult readership. Many of the stories were inspired by (or perhaps the source of) widely known urban myths.

Despite the stated target audience, the stories—with assistance from some deeply disturbing illustrations (see below)—struck a nerve and traumatized readers of all ages. They were controversial to the point where there was, briefly, a minor movement to have the books removed from schools.

A movie adaptation would seemingly point to a classic horror anthology film, but del Toro and his collaborators have instead constructed a singular narrative around a group of young teenagers in 1968.

After learning the tragic story of a girl who was murdered in their sleepy little town many years earlier, Stella (Zoe Margaret Colletti) and her friends start encountering supernatural events that allow for various Scary Stories to come to life on screen.

The film’s director is Norwegian filmmaker André Øvredal, the man behind 2016’s The Autopsy of Jane Doe, and the inventive 2011 found-footage fantasy epic (and Letterboxd community favorite) Troll Hunter.

Guillermo del Toro, star Zoe Margaret Colletti, and director André Øvredal on the set of ‘Scary Stories To Tell In The Dark’.

What was your relationship to Guillermo del Toro before you worked together on this film? André Øvredal: I was a big fan of his from when I went to film school, because I used to live with a Mexican friend and he showed me Cronos when it came out. I was floored by the beauty of that film. Mimic terrified me, I loved it. Even though I know there is a tough history behind that film and the cut that came out, I still found it terrifying. And then Blade II was just one of those amazing sequels that stood out beyond the original.

That didn’t really happen very often back in those days, that the sequel was better than the original. And on and on with Pan’s Labyrinth and one great movie after another, culminating with The Shape of Water. But our relationship started on Twitter; he tweeted about The Autopsy of Jane Doe, that he enjoyed it. And we had a Twitter exchange about that.

Had he seen Troll Hunter? It seems like it would be right up his alley. Yeah he had, and he liked it. Obviously I’m sure he’s paid attention to other people’s love for monsters and creatures.

Illustrated by Stephen Gammell, ‘The Pale Lady’—from Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark story ‘The Dream’—is a favorite of both Øvredal and del Toro.

So how did you end up getting this job? He was supposed to direct Scary Stories himself. It was supposed to be his next movie after The Shape of Water, and then he decided not to make it his next movie and they decided, well, let’s find another director. He proposed me to the other producers on the film, Sean Daniel and J. Miles Dale, and they all agreed that I would be a good fit.

They offered me the script to read and of course I fell in love with it immediately. It’s the kind of movie I grew up loving, like an Amblin-esque movie, but the idea being to do it with a horror sensibility and make it really scary. I thought it would be a great movie for me to be able to make. And speaking of the PG-13 audience, it was what I grew up with as well. When I was a kid in my teens, those were the movies I got to see. So I felt very close to this movie through the whole process.

There is indeed a nice Amblin vibe informing this movie. How would you describe that vibe, if you had to put it into words? There is a sense of humor. It’s out to entertain more than it’s out to hurt you as a horror movie. It’s not an existential horror. It’s not out to grind you down. It’s out to use horror as fun; there’s a playfulness. It’s oftentimes several characters, a group of friends, that these movies are about. It has a high energy and it can go from intense, suspenseful, or in this case very scary and horrible, to playful banter between friends. I think that broad range creates a feeling of real life.

All the characters in those movies back then were very grounded; even though they were fun and had a lot of energy, they also had real issues in life, they also came from a background where there were serious things they were dealing with. I found that very interesting, especially about the character of Stella, who has a lot of things in her life that are profoundly affecting her. And how that also relates to the life of the antagonist, Sarah Bellows. And in some ways how it feeds into today. I think the social commentary thing is clear in Amblin films as well.

How challenging was it to make this good ’n scary without it ever spilling over into being too ‘adult’? It’s about playing with the audience. The audience should know that they should enjoy being… tormented, if you will. So it’s kind of trying to communicate both ways. So I’m like, setting something up, I’m always thinking of the audience, shot-by-shot-by-shot. How does the audience feel? If we put the camera here, what will the audience feel then? If we put it up here, how will the audience react then? And if we cut from there to there? It’s all about communication. I’m trying to imagine how it’s going to make the audience feel, so it’s about back and forth. I think that creates a playful tone. It’s fun-scary, as opposed to you feeling scared because it’s disgusting or something.

What do you think this film gained from tying together the various short stories into a single narrative, as opposed to having them play out in the traditional anthology format? Guillermo has said something that is kinda true about anthology films, which is that they’re never as good as the best [story], and they’re always as bad as the worst [story]. So you always have one story that isn’t great, and it kind of deflates the whole experience. In a way, [a traditional anthology movie] isn’t a whole experience because you never get to engage in characters for a long time and feel all their dilemmas, because as soon as you’re out of [each story], you’re on the next one. And that can work, but I’m not attracted to that as a storytelling form, it’s just a personal thing. Many other people are, and thank god for that, because then we get a diverse set of movies.

I love a full narrative. When I received the script for Scary Stories To Tell In The Dark, I thought it was an anthology, so when I opened it, I was so happy when it wasn’t, because by page ten I was in love with the characters and then I saw that I was going to follow them all the way.

An image from André Øvredal’s ‘Troll Hunter’.

We’re massive fans of Troll Hunter at Letterboxd. That’s fantastic, that’s great. It’s a great site. I go there a lot to see people talking about the movies.

What kind of life has that film had since it was released? Everyone who sees it loves it, but it deserved a much bigger audience. Was a remake or sequel ever considered? There was talk of a remake. Chris Columbus [writer of Gremlins and The Goonies, and director of Home Alone and the first two Harry Potter films], and a company called CJ Entertainment, bought the rights for it years ago. So I was in awe—one of the heroes of my youth, Chris Columbus. So I was sorry to see that that never came through. We talked about a sequel of course, but I feel like I told the story of this world, and anything else would just be more trolls. The way you used scale in that film was amazing. No blockbusters made since have come close to how effectively you conveyed the gargantuan size of the creatures. That’s great to hear. I don’t know how other people shoot movies but it was shot so much in reality. I mean, we CGI-ed in the creatures, but everything else was so grounded and real with a hand-held camera. We were just running around in the wilderness shooting it for real. So we naturally had to position it, physically, in some natural way, a very simple natural way, and maybe that helped.

‘Scary Stories To Tell In The Dark’ is in US theaters now, and rolling out globally over the next few months. Comments have been edited for clarity.

#troll hunters #scary films #horror #anthology #gdt #guillermo del toro #andré Øvredal #letterboxd

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thisguyatthemovies · 6 years ago

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Slender premise

Title: “Slender Man”

Release date: In theaters Aug. 10, 2018; on disc/streaming Oct. 30, 2018

Starring: Joey King, Julia Goldani Telles, Jaz Sinclair, Annalise Basso, Javier Botet, Alex Fitzalan

Directed by: Sylvain White

Run time: 1 hour, 33 minutes

Rated: PG-13

What it’s about: Four high school girls in Massachusetts set out to prove internet urban legend the Slender Man does not exist.

How I saw it: This is the worst movie I have seen this year. And I have seen 246 movies (films I had not watched before, not necessarily films released this year) since Jan. 1. “Slender Man” has many issues as a movie, but the most egregious one is this: It is a horror film, but at its best it is only mildly scary, and then only in rare moments. Mostly it’s dull. And about six or seven years too late to the party.

In case you didn’t have access to the internet during the past decade, the Slender Man is a modern-day boogeyman, an urban legend who was introduced in a creepypasta meme on a message board in 2009. Internet users took care of the rest, spreading him across the web where, as any bit of folklore does, the story and character became fluid, changing to fit the needs of those perpetuating the story. As such, Slender Man -- who usually appears as a tall, thin creature without a face but with many tentacles – is difficult to define with any certainty. And perhaps that is part of the problem with the movie. Slender Man can become many things to many different people on the internet, but a movie is a fixed medium. That left French filmmaker Sylvain White (“I’ll Always Know What You Did Last Summer,” “The Mark of the Angels – Miserere”) in a tough spot. A horror film needs a well-defined monster, and Slender Man is not.

Slender Man (played by Javier Botet) doesn’t spend a lot of time out front in his own movie, instead mostly lurking in the background, usually in or on the edge of woods. The film centers on four Massachusetts friends (Joey King, Julia Goldani Telles, Jaz Sinclair and Annalise Basso) who, after their male counterparts back out of an effort to summons Slender Man, decide to take matters into their own hands. They find a video that, if they watch it, will bring Slender Man, if they believe everything they read on the internet. At this point they could have opted not to watch the video and then went on to lead normal teenage lives, but then we wouldn’t have a movie, would we? They watch, and from that point on they are infected and, in various ways, affected by Slender Man. Since “Slender Man” stays frustratingly close to the established teen horror movie formula, the rest of the film is just a matter of Slender Man making the girls his victims one by one. There is not great twist, unless you count the voiceover in the final scene from a character who wasn’t a major player until the waning moments.

Want real scares? Good luck. Seeing people with blank faces is kind of interesting and creepy, but not so much scary. The film includes little actual violence and gore, in keeping with they way Slender Man usually is depicted in internet literature. The film’s most intense scenes are its best. In one, Wren (King), the character most curious about Slender Man’s origins, goes to a library to read up on supernatural phenomena, and guess who happens to stop by? The scene uses changing perspective to create the movie’s most unsettling moments. In another scene, Hallie (Telles) walks in a hospital hallway, and other people start appearing as if they could be the Slender Man, though she (and we) can’t be certain.

But those are the highlights. Perhaps it’s the 57-year-old man in me, but the four main characters were annoying about 30 seconds in, and I found myself hoping they would meet a quick demise. None of the young actors is particularly good, either. One segment in which teenage hormones rage seems forced into an already weak script. The film is not particularly well made or clever. And much of it is shot in unnecessary darkness, perhaps working under the assumption that darker is scarier. Or perhaps the thinking was that the less of this movie was visible, the better.

My score: 6 out of 100

Should you see it? Only if your curiosity gets the best of you.

#movies #movie review #slender man #horror movies #bad movies

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booksaremyoxygenn · 7 years ago

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Ready Player One: Book Review & Discussion

“We’d been born into an ugly world, and the OASIS was our one happy refuge.”

If you love video games and the 80s, you MUST read this book. USA Today’s comparison of Ready Player One to Willie Wonka & the Chocolate Factory couldn't have been more spot on, but instead of the inheritance of a man who owns a chocolate factory he is playing for the inheritance of a video game creator.

Overall Rating: 4.5 / 5 Stars

My biggest argument is that because there was so much info and teaching about the 80s and video game references it felt choppy and it was hard to get lost in the book. However I absolutely loved learning all of those fascinating pieces of information. There were surprisingly many great life lessons in this book and I feel like I am walking away more knowledgeable.

Age Recommendation: Well.... it depends on the child. It does curse a few times (but let’s be honest the kids already know the words, the aim isn’t for them not to learn it but to know not to use it.) However there is a bit of a lengthy section on things I would not even want my 13 year old sister reading on 193-194 so I recommend you take their book, rip that page out and then they are all ready to go. They will never even miss it. I think there are great life lessons in this book though for a young teen age group like the importance of logging off and living offline and not getting wrapped up in trying to constantly escape the real world. It talks about how people should be judged by their personality not their appearance. If we could simply choose out skin color, gender, and appearance like an avatar, life would be easier but life doesn’t work that way so accept people the way they are. You may surprise yourself with who your closest friends up being.

Spoiler- Free Review:

Wade just really doesn’t like his lot in life, whether that be in the real world when he’d rather be in a video game or that he is in the 2040s when he’d rather be born in the the 80s, or at the least before the Global Energy Crisis. Though he doesn’t mind living in OASIS soaking up the endless knowledge. The vast source of all books, movies, art, history, videogames, and, most importantly, information on James Halliday. OASIS is like the internet but with VR glasses only 10x more detailed, advanced, and infinite. Wade doesn’t even go to a real school he goes through the virtual reality of OASIS. “In OASIS, you could become whomever and whatever you wanted to be, without ever revealing your true identity, because your anonymity was guaranteed.” (pg 57) When James Halliday, inventor of OASIS, dies and leaves his fortune (240 billion dollars) to the first player to find the three keys hidden within his own video game, the world goes crazy in pursuit. Though after numerous years no one had found a single key, until Wade. That’s how the story begins.

I loved that Cline’s writing encourages readers who know nothing about the 80s or video games to read this book. That has been a massive concern for people before they pick up this book, that they won’t understand the references. To be honest, there were many hidden “eggs” in the text that I saw that I knew were references that I just didn’t understand. (Which was still cool and I enjoyed looking them up and learning more.) However, all of the big, important references he explains in the book and he doesn’t make you feel stupid for not knowing but explains it clearly for those of us who aren’t experts. I genuinely feel more intelligent by reading this book and now know a lot more about pop culture in the 80s. Who knows this all may come in handy on Trivia Night? I highly recommend this book for a fun, nostalgic read.

SPOILER Review / Book Discussion:

Isn’t it scary how possible this all could be? With virtual reality continually advancing (in real life) how much longer will it take until people go to school in virtual reality like Wade or before the internet takes on this new form?

Though obviously in Wade’s world as technology has advanced his real world has been given up on. The stacks, while a great concept and super cool looking on the front cover, are atrocious living conditions. Though I must give Wade kutos on his battery powered heater and computer but really just his van in general. It makes me want to make my own Bat Cave inside a van. This was when I knew what his advantage would be in this game, he was a self-teacher, self-motivator, and dedicated his whole life to the hunt.

One of my favorite parts about Cline’s writing was how it was constantly breaking stereotypes and speaking about important topics. I really appreciated the backstory that he gave Halliday. Especially how even though he wasn’t good at school he became a multi-billionaire. I am so tired of the assumption that being good at school has a direct correlation with future success. So many people who have changed the world never went to college, dropped out, or did poorly in high school. Another thing that I loved was the fact that this whole story wouldn’t have happened if Ogden Marrow (Og) wouldn’t have walked over to Halliday when he was sitting alone and invited him to play Dungeons and Dragons. It reminds me how much can change by a simple act of kindness and stepping out of your comfort zone to talk to new people. This whole story wouldn’t have happened, their world may have been drastically different if it wasn’t for Og’s invite. My favorite part though was how he had Asperger’s autism because my older brother has it as well and I could see the connections. Halliday’s lack of desire to express social skills, inability to step into other people’s shoes, and his few unhealthy obsessions were the most common traits. However I wish he wouldn’t have made the connections between Halliday’s crazy side and his Aspergers because that gives a bad name to this type of autism. (I mean you can’t win every battle right?)

One thing that really bothered my is how indifferent Wade was to risking everyone’s lives in the Stacks during his meeting with IOI. Once he realized he wasn’t actually gambling his own life because he wasn’t at home then it didn’t bother him anymore. He was willing to risk that. I understand that his aunt was cruel to him and that there were thieves and rapists roaming around the stacks but that’s not a good enough excuse as to why his conscious was clear about all those people he played a part in murdering. He said that there were no survivors. I understand that his other option was be enslaved to IOI but he is very smart, he could have figured out an alternative where hundreds of uninvolved people don’t die. (pg 146)

I personally love when authors put deep meaning into characters, places, animals and other things’ names. I loved that Art3mis was the greek god of the hunt and that Wade was Parzival. “On the day the Hunt began, the day I’d decided to become a gunter, I’d renamed my avatar Parzival, after the knight of Arthurian legend who had found the Holy Grail.” (pg 28) I love when author’s twist different stories together like that and give character’s deeply meaningful names. Like Alaska in John Green’s Looking for Alaska, or Katniss from The Hunger Games whose name is from a plant that is latin for archer. I prefer a bit more meaning than when Rainbow Rowell named the twins in Fangirl Cath and Wren because the mother didn’t know she was going to have twins so she split up the name Catherine. Though I do apprecaite it more than when authors just randomly name thier characters. (Also, Darth Vader’s name is literally Dark Father in Dutch so his name is a spoiler in itself.) I applaud Cline for his good choice in names.

The first task was where players went into the Tomb of Horrors from Dungeons & Dragons to play Joust against Acereak. It was amusing to me but as someone who doesn’t know the first thing about Dungeons and Dragons the references were lost on me. However this line really stuck me as funny..... “It suddenly occurred to me just how absurd this scene was: a guy wearing a suit of armor, standing next to an undead king, both hunched over controls of a classic arcade game.” (pg 82) The whole time after he met Acererak I just imagined him going from his scary, glowing eyes to his best friend playing a video game and them fist bumping each other. Like I genuinely wanted them to become friends. Haha.

The first gate was where players played Dungeons of Daggorath to open the gate where they had to say and act all the lines of the character David Lightman in the film WarGames. This was my favorite task / gate he had to do and I wish I had my own version for The Hunger Games where I could be Katniss. Anyone else agree? They called them “Fliksyncs” (112) and I genuinely think if they make something like it in real life, it could be my favorite invention of all time. You would get to walk, talk, and live the life of your favorite character, your heroes, or be 1/2 of your favorite OTPs. ( I would gladly be Clary to play besides Jace from The Mortal Instruments... just putting it out there.)

A really important message that spread throughout the span of the book was that the internet (OASIS in RPO’s case) can take over our lives. ”It had become a self-imposed prison for humanity,” he wrote, “A pleasant place for the world to hide from its problems while human civilization slowly collapses, primarily due to neglect.” (pg 120) How much truer does that get?? Than once Wade won the egg even Halliday admitted that that was one of his biggest regrets, not logging off and living life the way it was meant to be, truly using your senses and awakening your body instead of constantly trying to mute it and hide yourself. “I created the OASIS because I never felt at home in the real world. I didn’t know how to connect with the people there. I was afraid, for all all of my life. Right up until I knew it was ending. That was when I realized, as terrifying and painful as reality can be. it is also the only place where you can find true happiness. Because reality is real. Do you understand?” (pg 364) I think that is something people across the globe can relate to. We could all use a lesson in learning when to turn off our screens and fully engage in the world around us.

Another really important message was during that OH MY GOSH! AECH REVEAL!.... which at first I felt like it changed everything but that’s the whole point, it didn’t change anything. She was still the same person she had always been. We see what we want to see in a person when we make assumptions about them from what they look like. It’s just a genuine reminder of how the lines between gender are so fluid and it doesn’t matter what you are born but how you act. I’m not even referencing transgender specifically but just boys being free to like pink and girls feeling free to be obsessed with Star Wars and video games. Though there was another lesson in this which was how she chose to be a white, male avatar, because her mother told her it would help her get treated better, even in the virtual world. “In Marie’s opinion, the OASIS was the best thing that had ever happened to both women and people of color. From the very start, Marie has used a white male avatar to conduct all of her online business, because of the marked difference it made in how she was treated and the opportunities she was given.” (pg 320) Why is this so painfully true?? I really loved what Wade said after he found out, “We’d connected on a purely mental level. I understood her, trusted her, and loved her as a friend. None of that had changed, or could be changed by anything as inconsequential as her gender, or skin color, or sexual orientation.” (pg 321) Though I will admit I am glad that Cline made Ache a lesbian because I was worried she was going to confess her love to him and then Wade would have to choose.... and there just wasn’t enough pages left in the book for all that drama. Plus I really love when books allow guys and girls to just be friends without every liking each other romantically.

The final thing, that I wouldn’t dream of ending this review/discussion without talking about is... Art3mis. Can we talk about how she started out such a strong character who was a fighter, independent blogger and full time badass who knows exactly how she plans on saving the world with the prize money from the egg. But then as time goes on she transforms more into a love interest than a fierce competitor. I think she sees this as well which is why she leaves him to focus on the competition. Though at the very end when she finally meets Wade in person she does that thing that Reese Witherspoon talks about in her Woman of the Year speech. Where Art3mis, the female, turns to Wade, the male, and pretty much says, what do we do now? This is a phrase Reese says she hates reading the most and is usually written by scripts with no female involved in the writing. She says “Now you do you know any woman in any crisis situation.. who has absolutely no idea what to do?” Reese made a good point in saying that it’s top woman stop playing the damsel in distress because we so rarely are. Art3mis went from this total badass who could carry her own to a self conscious, love interest. However, I am so glad that Art3mis gave up Wade for the hunt in some ways because if she would have given up her passions and her life long goal for a boy, I would have been more insulted. Personally, I just really like strong, female leads and am getting tired of women being accessories to males. I’m also tired of the never ending line of self conscious characters (both female and male) who find their self worth and beauty once their romantic interests informs them that it exists. So thank you to characters like Celaena Sardothien, Alaska Young, and Margo Roth Spiegelman for showing the world that it’s cool to love yourself and know you are amazing. Though I was still rooting for Art3metis because of her strong will and good intentions for the prize.

In the end everything seemed to fall perfectly in place which made me so happy. No loose threads and a beautiful, sappy, happy ever after. The character development for Wade was so great and I felt happy walking away from this book knowing that things were going well for him.

Favorite Quotes:

1.) How the protagonist, Wade, feels about video games is how I feel about books...

"Playing old video games never failed to clear my mind and set me at ease. If I was feeling depressed or frustrated about my lot in life, all I had to do was tap the Player One button, and my worries would instantly slip away as my mind focused itself on the relentless pixelated onslaught on the screen in front of me. There, inside the game's two-dimensional universe, life was simple" (pg 14)

2.) Me when I get into a good book series....

“I was obsessed. I wouldn’t quit. My grades suffered. I didn’t care.” (pg 63)

3.) “Spending time with her was intoxicating. We seemed to have everything in common. We shared the same interests. We were driven by the same goal. She got all my jokes. She made me laugh. She made me think. She changed the way I saw the world. I’d never had such a powerful, immediate connection with another human being before. Not even with Aech.” (pg 174)

4.) “I was watching a collection of vintage ‘80′s commercials when I paused to wonder why cereal manufacturers no longer included toy prizes inside every box. It was a tragedy, in my opinion. Another sign that civilization was going straight down the tubes.” (pg 176)

5.) “And then one night, like a complete idiot, I told her how I felt.” (pg 179)

6.) “No one in the world ever gets what they want and that’s beautiful.” (pg 199)

7.) “I stood outside her palace gates for two solid hours, with a boombox over my head, blasting “In Your Eyes” by Peter gabriel at full volume.” (pg 203)

8.) “Art3mis had led me to believe that she was somehow hideous but now I saw that nothing could have been further from the truth. To my eyes, the birthmark did absolutely nothing to diminish her beauty. If anything, the face I saw in the photo seemed even more beautiful to me than that of her avatar, because I knew it was this one was real.” (pg 292)

9.) “In Marie’s opinion, the OASIS was the best thing that had ever happened to both women and people of color. From the very start, Marie has used a white male avatar to conduct all of her online business, because of the marked difference it made in how she was treated and the opportunities she was given.” (pg 320)

10.) “We’d connected on a purely mental level. I understood her, trusted her, and loved her as a friend. None of that had changed, or could be changed by anything as inconsequential as her gender, or skin color, or sexual orientation. (pg 321)

Discussion Questions:

1.) Would you apply for the virtual OASIS education like Wade?

When Wade talks about his classes and how he is able to travel through a human heart, visit the Louvre, Jupiter’s moons and more it makes me think that our education system could be so much better with this technology. For one, he discusses how discipline isn’t a problem, how Wade can mute out bullies, and how even the teachers liked the system so much more. It gives students the ability to do things like Wade did and go to chat rooms with his friends in his free time and hang out with people he likes and avoid / mute the ones he doesn’t. I think there are major problems like affordability and the fact that you miss out on real human interaction that scientists have proven is needed for a healthy mind, body, and soul.

2.) If you were a gunter, would you join a clan or stay solo?

In the end I think that part of the lesson Holliday was trying to teach is that you need other people to succeed. You need help and can’t do everything on your own. Why else would he have made the door only open with three keys?

3.) If you were Wade would you sell out to sponsors, movie and book people, and the Suxors? or would you risk it all on the chance of being the first to find the egg?

4.) What movie would you want to enter into like Wade did for the first gate for a “Syncflik”? Could you complete the dialogue for a whole movie?

5.) Did they fake drink at the bar at Og’s party because they hadn’t ever been able to eat or drink inside the OASIS before?

6.) Has social media become obsolete in their world or is the avatar practically their form of social media? Or instead of trying to impress people with how they went to the beach or the expensive Louis Vuittons they just bought, do they put their energy into impressing through their OASIS accounts?

7.) Doesn’t IOI trying to capitalize on OASIS sound a lot like the government trying to end net neutrality? I think this whole story is a lot more realistic than most of us would like to admit to ourselves. (pg 33)

Movie Trailer:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cSp1dM2Vj48

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Scj3wiIcSu0&t=115s

I really hope they keep the Rocky Horror Show scene (pg 179) in the movie because I want to see them have fun and be laid back together. Plus it would be really funny. It was super entertaining in Perks of Being A Wallflower when Charlie has to be in the show. Also, I saw the zero gravity dance floor and the revamped Delorean in the movie trailer and can’t wait to see more of that. (pg 182)

The only thing that would make me immediately hate this movie is if they don’t give Art3mis her birthmark and so far in the trailer I noticed that they have only distinctly shown one side of her face but in the clip where she is sitting in a chair across from Wade you can see most of her face and I didn’t see any scar. What a missed opportunity? Unless they are having her cover it in the first half of the movie with makeup or something. The greatest parts of this book were the lessons learned and I think him meaning that he would love her no matter what she looked like in person because he loved who she was is a crucial part of the story and the birthmark plays a large role in that. It was an opportunity to give people who had similar situations like birthmarks have someone that looked like them in a movie to relate to. I think it really could have been something special.

The other thing that is a bit of a turn off is the body form they gave Ache in the movie because it means that she won’t be able to have that moment talking about how she chose a white, male avatar because of how she felt at a disadvantage as a African American woman and wanted her avatar to be able to escape that. Also the actress they cast is thin so it is another missed opportunity.

Also the choice of the song from Willy Wonka “Pure Imagination” was genius for the trailer. It was beyond perfect!

Side Note:

Also, if you would like to watch part 2 of this book... it’s called WALL-E. There are different characters but it is definitely what Wade’s planet earth is going to look like very soon. They were all absorbed in the internet and forgot about real life and how to make connections, just like this book. I mean Wade even notices his weight gain from being overly absorbed into the game. (pg 196)

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mfmagazine · 6 years ago

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Patrick Fabian

Article by Michelle Nelson

Photo by Mackel Vaughn

Patrick Fabian is a name that you may or may not initially recognize, but once you see his photos and see some of the clips of his previous work, you immediately have that, “Oh, yeah. I totally know that guy,” moment. Fabian’s body of work includes theatre, films, commercials and television shows. He has acted in roles on several TV shows that have been staples in many American households such as Friends, Will and Grace, Big Love, Boston Legal, CSI, and 24 - just to name a few. Fabian plays Reverend Cotton Marcus in the soon to be released film The Last Exorcism. If the movie ends up being even half as terrifying as its trailer, it is sure to send chills up and down your spine and leave you not wanting to be alone in the dark. I spoke to the very down-to-earth, charismatic Patrick Fabian about his career in acting, his upcoming movie The Last Exorcism, and the types of things that give him the creeps. Can you tell our readers a little bit about how you became interested in acting? I got the bug early. In grade school plays, high school plays…that sort of thing. I was in all the arts in high school. I was in the marching band and I was in the chorus and all that sort of stuff and when I went to college I decided I wanted to give it a shot to be an actor. Any parent who is worth their salt doesn’t want to hear those words fall out of their child’s mouth, but they were very encouraging. My parents were always very supportive. So I ended up going to college and getting a degree [in acting] and then I went to Los Angeles and got another degree [in acting]. Then after being armed with a master’s degree in acting, I was qualified to immediately start waiting tables in LA, which is what I did. You have a pretty large body of work that spans from television shows, film, commercials and theater. What’s your favorite type of work that you’ve done and what type of work do you hope to do more of in the future? I used to always joke that the kind of acting work that I want to do is the kind that pays. It’s hard out there to do work and struggle to make a living, but I’ve managed to cobble together stage work, commercial work, some film and mostly TV. I have to say, the stage is really, really satisfying because that’s what I was trained in. That’s what I did in college and that’s what I did when I first came out of college. I got involved with a theatre group. There’s something about the immediacy of doing a piece live on stage and the audience is either getting it or not getting it, or liking it or not liking it, and you can really feel that. It gets your craft in practice with immediate response to it, so nothing really beats that; however, that being said, I still don’t lose any of the thrills of driving on the lot of Paramount or Sony and going to work on a sound stage, where all of those people go into making a television show or making a movie. It’s just fun. You get on set and there’s cameras and there’s hair and make-up and there’s other actors and there’s all of these grips and lights and sound. There’s a real dance and liveliness to that, too, that I also like without a doubt. The day that I don’t get excited driving onto the lot is the day you should tell me to get off the lot and never work again. I’m so lucky and so fortunate to be able to be in this business and I try to make sure that I don’t ever lose sight of that. You’ve acted in several really great; high-quality television shows throughout your career. Obviously there are a lot of shows out there that aren’t so great. What do you look for when deciding to take on a role in a television show? With TV, it’s funny. Sometimes you kind of know that it’s not exactly what you’d like to be doing…but you’d rather be doing something than nothing, you know what I mean? Work can be hard to come by and you find yourself going to the next audition and then booking it and going, “Oh what is this thing I’m a part of now?” In terms of picking and choosing, stuff like Big Love, for instance…that’s the type of script that comes across your desk and you go, “I want to be a part of this,” because it’s so well-written. All the things that people tend to like and are critically acclaimed and run for a long time, stuff like Frazier, Friends, Will and Grace, Mad Men, The Sopranos, Big Love are so well-written. HBO’s been a mine of really quality television - stuff that you really like to watch. That sort of stuff comes through on the page. What do you think are the qualities of a successful television show or series? Obviously you have to connect with the audience on some level. It can’t talk down to them. It can’t be holier than thou. It’s gotta have something that the audience can relate to in terms of the drama or the comedy. You know, real life situations that we’ve all found ourselves in. I think the best TV is the kind of TV where we can relate to one of the characters and sort of go through the show and go on that journey with them and their point of view. That sort of idea that, “I’ve been in that situation and how is he or she going to handle it?” I think even in dramas, it’s all about our ability to look at ourselves and laugh at ourselves…you know, not take ourselves too seriously. Are there any shows from the past or the present that you wish you could be a part of? I always wanted to be on Frazier. I thought Frazier looked like a lot of fun. A lot of pro’s sort of playing hot potato with the lines. They were so good and they flew so well and I’ve always wished I could be a part of that kind of comedy. Currently, I’m salivating to get on Mad Men, as is every other actor in Los Angeles and New York, I’m sure. Every boy or girl fancies themselves wearing a suit and smoking and drinking martinis on set…I’m sure of it, so I’m not alone when it comes to that. A couple of years ago there was this series on HBO called Rome that was a wonderful, over-the-top telling of the Roman Empire, and I just looked at that and thought, “This must be boy heaven.” There are Roman centurions, there’s pretty girls, its blood, its lust…I loved that show. You’ve worked with several very famous actors. Can you name a few people who have been your favorites to work with and are there any who you hope to work with again? Bill Paxton is one of the nicest guys I have ever met in the business. I think that Big Love functions because of his professionalism and his attitude. Also, I got a chance to work with Richard Dreyfuss and he was really, really kind and really good. He taught me a lot of lessons about work and he did it without being a teacher. He showed me by example. I remember one time when I was working on a scene and I just couldn’t get the take. I couldn’t get the emotion and Richard said, “Hey, can we have five minutes because I have to make a phone call.” The set stopped for like five minutes and he came over to me and he goes, “Try this or try that.” The five minute break was over and all of the sudden on the next take, the suggestion that he made dropped into my head and the director was like, “That’s good! We’re moving on,” and he [Dreyfuss] looked over at me and gave me a smile. It was the kind of note that he could have given me in front of everyone and been like, “Look at me. Richard Dreyfuss helping this kid out.” Instead he took me on the side and did it on the sly and I will always thank him for that because I thought it was a great, professional way to handle yourself. You have a movie coming out this summer called The Last Exorcism. What drew you to this role? First of all, it’s a horror film, and I love horror films. I used to love staying up late watching horror films; I loved being creeped out as a kid. I still love being creeped out. I’m still looking for that jolt in the theater that I got when I saw the movies before that would make me scared, make me look over my shoulder, get my flesh crawling. So, if I can be a part of something that can make some young man or woman go to the theatre and just lose their cool a little bit, I love that. Also, the role of the preacher is a great role. It never fails to interest an actor, I don’t think, because there’s so many facets involved in it. A preacher is already sort of theatrical by nature and I think anybody that stands up in front of a group of people and says, “I know the way. Follow me,” is always interesting because human nature dictates people to go, “No, you don’t know the way. You’re only human and there’s gotta be some flaws” and as an actor that is interesting to be able to portray. Can you briefly describe the plot of The Last Exorcism? Well, the film is called The Last Exorcism, and that refers to my character, Reverend Cotton Marcus, is hanging up his cross and he is going to be done with doing exorcisms and he’s decided to bring a documentary film crew along with him to record this. He wants to sort of blow the lid off of the charlatanism that is exorcism and he’s going to show you how fake it is, basically. Along the way we meet a young girl who is claiming to be possessed and we run up against something and we are just unsure what it is. What do you think makes The Last Exorcism different from other exorcism movies? There are a couple of things. I think the director, Daniel Stamm, has built a good old-fashioned scary film. It’s rated PG-13. It goes right up to the edge of PG-13 and it’s not in the range of horror films that are all about body counts, so it’s certainly not that, but it’s got the creepy, scary factor way up. Also, he’s telling the story of this reverend and we spend some time with the reverend to find out who he is and what he’s about. We don’t just go right out of the gates and have the Devil start possessing people. We take our time getting there. It’s also handheld. There have been handheld films before, but this one doesn’t make you sick. I’ve seen the trailer for the movie and it is really scary. Did you ever find yourself getting scared while you were on the set filming the movie? Did you have any nightmares while filming the movie? We were shooting down in New Orleans and we were shooting at night at a farm house that was out in the Lower 9th Ward, which is still devastated by Hurricane Katrina. There’s alligators and there’s swamp rats and mosquitoes and more crickets than you could ever imagine. We were in this old, old farmhouse from the Civil War era and there are ghosts. You know, you can just feel that sort of swampy, ghostlike feeling in there, and I’m easily creeped out. Cats running in front of me would freak me out. As soon as you get away from the light of the set or even if you wander off set into another room to cool down for a second, there’s always that cloak of, “Who else has sat in this room? What’s gone on in this room?” and you can just really mentally creep yourself out. And also, we are shooting a horror film and there’s points where I’m walking on set and the girl that’s playing the possessed girl, Ashley Bell…she’s really talented and really freaky. I was getting really freaked out just looking at her. What is your favorite horror film of all time and why? There are so many. I’m going to discount The Shining and The Exorcist because I think they live in a class on their own. They have such original story telling and it’s so, so good. I loved Rosemary’s Baby because I was at that age where I kind of understood what was going on. So, I was in on the dialogue and the jokes and I was totally creeped out by everything in the apartment building and by the end, I was really freaked out. Alien really blew my little mind when I saw that in the theatres. I had no idea what to expect. I also loved the Hammer Films from the early 60’s. John Carpenter’s re-imagination of The Thing - that also freaked me out badly. There’s a point where there are some dogs involved with The Thing and that image kept me up. I had nightmares about that for a long time. What kind of research did you do when researching your role for The Last Exorcism? Daniel Stamm, the director, gave me a bunch of books to read that involved real life documentations of exorcisms, so I started reading some of those and that was fascinating. Gripping stuff written by priests and written by bishops and whatnot and that was really, really cool. I also visited some churches here in LA - Pentecostal churches and Baptist churches - and sort of watched preachers and whatnot. The Internet was also a great resource when researching this stuff. I saw some great sermons from Jimmy Swaggart and I wanted to get a feel for what that power was. There’s some exorcists recorded that are supposed to be on YouTube, and it was interesting to see what that may or may not have been. When I was in New Orleans, I also went to some churches there. What’s your opinion about exorcisms? Do you believe people really get possessed and that exorcisms actually occur? I, myself, have never been around someone who has claimed to be possessed, so I don’t have any firsthand knowledge. Reading these books, though, definitely convinced me that there is evil in the world and that people are disturbed, so whether that’s an infestation of the Devil or Satan himself, I don’t know. The argument can go to, as long as the person who is possessed feels that that is what’s possessing them and that a man of the cloth can relieve them of that possession, then that sounds pretty real to me. And I don’t know about you, but I’ve been in the presence of something where I swore I saw a ghost. I think all of us have a story about feeling not alone in an apartment when supposedly you’re alone, or funny lights, or stuff like that. I think there’s a whole host of stuff that’s unexplained out there that we as people are very poor at figuring out or coming up with reasons for.

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theoddcatlady · 8 years ago

Text

Indie Film

The town I grew up in had a total of three attractions: the bar, church, and the movie theater.

When you’re twelve years old, you’re too young to drink and the last place you want to be is church on those wooden pews that make your butt ache. So every dime I found inbetween the couch cushions, every dollar I got for allowance, they went into the ‘movie theater fund’. The ‘fund’ was just a giant glass jar on my desk, but it was the best I had.

Unfortunately I had something my friends didn’t.

Strict parents.

I don’t think my mom had a big issue with the theater. She told me a few times that was where she went on all her dates as a teen, a secret between mother and her son. However my dad was another story.

My dad was a big man with a scary voice who believed everything I did had to be justified and observed. So when I went to go to a movie?

He had to see it first. And he would too, and if there was one thing he didn’t like, whether it be an off color joke or a curse word, I was not allowed to go see it. I did try to sneak past him of course. During October our theater liked to show the best of the best horror movies. I told my dad I was spending the night at a friend’s house when in reality I was going with that friend and his dad to see a viewing of The Shining.

When I walked out of the theater my dad was waiting out there, stone faced. He knew. I don’t know how he figured it out but he knew.

He ended up taking all of my saved up theater money and I was grounded from TV for a month. Not like I was allowed to watch much anyway. Dad only approved of a few nature shows and maybe one or two cartoons.

I was left out of the loop a lot when it came to pop culture, having to rely on my friends to give me play by plays of some things and praying my dad would be out of town on business when the good movies came in. My mom would turn a blind eye to me sneaking out to see them.

Then Cassie Kralie came back from college with big news.

Cassie was one of the several kids that aged out of highschool and chose to go on to college. I didn’t really know Cassie, I just knew her sister, who babysat me when my parents went out on dates. Her sister was pretty cool at least, ordered pizza and let me eat all I wanted of it and turned on whatever movies I wanted to watch.

From what I knew, Cassie was a film major with a sight on the weird and the obscure. When she came back for her summer break, she came with exciting news. She’d made her own small movie while at school and was desperate to share it.

Of course everyone was excited about that. Thrilled, really. It was the most exciting thing to happen since Pastor Sweet confessed on his deathbed that he slept with the wives of all the deacons. The law office in the town over had fun handling those divorce papers.

Cassie worked with the movie theater and it was settled over the course of Friday through Sunday her movie would air at ten, three, and nine PM.

The movie was entitled ‘Inspiration’. And of course I wanted to go see it.

I begged my dad on bent knee to let me go see it Friday night, because of course that was when everyone was going. Including my friends.

My father didn’t budge an inch, of course.

“The rule in this house is that I approve every movie you see. I don’t want you coming home with a fowl mouth or foolish ideas. I’ll see it Friday, you can go see it Saturday night… if I allow it.”

I went to my room and yelled every cuss word I knew into my pillow so my dad wouldn’t hear.

My dad wasn’t being fair. Cassie had told everyone that really anyone could enjoy her movie, it was age appropriate and there wasn’t anything bad in it. Then again, my dad thought a single use of ‘damn it’ made a movie unwholesome for me to see.

I could only pray that when he returned from the theater Friday night he’d have a change of heart.

Saturday morning, I woke up and started calling my friends to ask them about the movie.

I basically got the same response all around.

‘Boring!’

‘It was so stupid.’

‘I walked out halfway through. Got ice cream instead. Wish we could get our money back.’

Really it shouldn’t have surprised me. It was made by a film student, someone who barely knew what they were doing still. I imagine that most people did walk out. Talk about dodging a bullet.

I went to go find my dad. Tell him that I had changed my mind, that going to see Cassie’s movie wasn’t that big of a deal.

I found him in his study, furiously typing at his computer.

Figuring I had barged in on him doing work, I headed back to the door.

“Curtis! You’re up!”

My dad spun around in his office chair and I balked at his expression. My father had a serious condition of resting bitch face. He didn’t so much as crack a grin whenever the pastor made a droll joke up at the pulpit.

Right now his face was almost split in two with how big he was smiling. I could see almost all of his teeth. For a second I thought he was high.

When he got up and gave me a big hug, I knew he had to be high.

“I should have brought you to the movie last night! You were right, it was astonishing!” He let go and went into his wallet. He pulled out five bills from his wallet and pressed them into my hand. “Here, you said your friends went last night? Take them tonight too. My treat. They have to see it again!”

I opened my hand to see each bill was a ten. My father, you understand, was a strict man. It was a hassle to get the five dollars every other week for keeping up with my chores and not letting my grades slip. So the fact he just handed me fifty dollars as a ‘treat’ was unheard of.

He gave me another hug before he went back to his computer. “You know, Curtis, I wanted to write a book when I was younger?” He didn’t wait for me to answer. “I gave it up, of course. My dad said being an author just wasn’t worth it. So I became an engineer instead. But after I saw Inspiration I just… It really hit a chord with me.” My father reached up and I swear he wiped a tear from his eye. This man was ice cold during his own father’s funeral, it was terrifying to see him cry. Then he turned back to me and grinned again. “So never let me get in the way of your dreams son! You want to be a cartoonist right? Go! Go buy some books to help you pursue that goal. I’ll help you, just… be what you want.”

After I fled the study, I went out to have lunch with my friends.

It was probably a dick move to use the money my dad gave me for lunch, but his creepy ass reaction was nightmare inducing.

I was out with my friends Eugene and Amos at the only diner in town, the Silver Swan. Amos was the illegitimate grandson of the previously mentioned Pastor Sweets while Eugene was the only Hispanic kid in this very white, lowkey racist town. They were my best friends.

Eugene nonstop snickered when I brought up how the movie got to my dad. “Your dad must be trying to pull one over you! Be glad you missed it. It was so boring. Not to mention the acting was just, eck!” Eugene stuck out his tongue before he bit back into his burger.

Amos nodded. “You know I can appreciate more ‘mature’ movies, the ones with a deeper meaning and stuff but seriously there wasn’t anything to this. It was as satisfying as cotton candy. On your tongue and,” He popped out his fingers, “Gone!” Amos wanted to be a movie critic some day and was almost two years older than both me and Eugene. So I definitely took what he said seriously.

I spun my straw around the glass of soda I’d splurged on, I only was allowed to get water when my dad was around. “Maybe something happens at the end of the movie? Something that hits a chord?”

“Nothing happens at the end of the movie,” Amos said, rolling his eyes. “I stuck around until the end, I wanted to give my money’s worth. Unless there was a scene after the credits, and I didn’t want to subject my brain to any more of that garbage.”

Maybe it was something that only an adult would get. We blew the rest of the money I got from my dad at the grocery store on candy and chips. Amos would keep it safe for me since my dad never liked me to be stuffed full of sugar.

When I got home, my mom had set out dinner. One plate was on the counter, on a tray. I frowned and looked at her. “Mom?”

“Your father wants to eat in the study today. He’s… really into working on this book.” My mom pressed her lips together in a firm line, a sure sign that she was not happy.

I frowned and looked down the hall where the study was. “Dad hates missing dinner though.” At least he always got on my case for it.

Mom shrugged. “He’s taken his vacation days to work on his book nonstop for the next two weeks. During that time he said he should not be interrupted. We could go visit your cousin in New York? Get a change of scenery?”

I had a feeling it was more than just dad ‘taking vacation days’ that had mom this upset. I shrugged. “I mean, sure? When can we go?”

“In a few days, if at all.” My mom looked down the hall now too. “Maybe your father will want to do something with us.”

I glanced at the calendar to see a date circled in red pen.

My parents’ anniversary. In three days.

And wouldn’t you like to know, in three days, we did head out. I’m not even sure if my dad went to bed, when I would wake up I’d hear the furious clacking of the keyboard in his study, and he’d only come out for bathroom breaks.

My mom, bless her heart, set aside several meals for him to eat while we were gone. Things to throw in the microwave or on the stove to heat up. When she left the study before we headed out, I saw that her eyes were red with held back tears.

But she just smiled and said, “Let’s be on our way! Be sure to call your father while we’re gone… don’t want him to think we’re not thinking of him.”

New York was a blast. My mom took me every place I wanted, we even went to go see some real movies. Even the PG-13 ones. I was allowed to stay up past ten. I was allowed to drink all the soda I wanted. I think it was my mom’s way of just letting me cut loose. She cut loose too, she laughed at raunchy jokes and flirted with the twenty some year old waiter that served us dinner. I hadn’t seen my mom ever that happy.

Of course I called my dad, every day, like she said. Told him we were having fun. Lied and said I wished he was here. All that stuff.

After the two weeks were up, we drove home.

When mom opened the front door, I could smell it.

The dishes were piled up on the counters, dishwasher, and sink. Food was starting to rot on the plates. There probably wasn’t a clean fork in the place. There were pizza boxes stacked up as tall as me next to the overflowing trashcan.

But the worst smell came from my dad. Who I found of course, in the study.

The remainder of the dishes next to him, flies buzzing around what was probably a casserole. But the smell of unwashed human? Disgusting. The overpowering stench of body odor made me gag and run back out of the study for a bit to get some clean gasps of air.

My mom looked from the trash, to the dishes, and then down to the hall. I swear she was about to cry… before she got angry.

“Curtis, go unpack in your room.”

My mom went into the study to have a ‘talk’ with my dad… which turned into an argument… which turned into a full blown yelling match. I sat in my room, legs pulled to my chest and hands clamped over my ears. It didn’t stop me from catching every third word. Mom was furious with dad. Furious that he quit his job with no warning, that he turned our house to a pigsty, and that he’d grown obsessed with his book.

My dad insisted that mom was out to crush his dream. That she didn’t care what he felt, that this is what he desired since he was a boy. I imagine having that beast yelling in your face was the most abhorrent thing you could experience, since I doubt he’d brushed his teeth since he’d started writing.

I tried, tried, to ignore the fight… then I heard the sound of a fist meeting another person’s flesh.

My mother cried out in pain and I heard a crash of someone falling on the floor. I’d only heard it in movies a few times, but I knew the sound of someone getting the hell beat out of them.

I ran screaming bloody murder from the house, right to Eugene’s place. I practically broke down the door before he answered it where I begged he called 911.

I heard by the time they got there, my mom’s head was stamped into paste on the floor. And my dad was back to writing like nothing had happened.

My dad plead guilty to murder. A murder which he felt no remorse about.

Eugene’s family took me in, adopted me. Helped me through the funeral. Drove me an hour to the best grief counselor and back once every two weeks to help me cope. I didn’t even have to go back to the house, Eugene and his dad packed up all my things to bring them over. Eugene and I shared a room, and we played video games until one AM and had each other’s backs.

Over the years, I began to recover from hearing my father beat my mother to death. I created my own comic series about a boy who lived with a family of monsters that weren’t so awful after all. I kept up my mom’s grave and never once went to go visit my father.

Well. That isn’t true.

I went to go see him last week. The first time since he’d murdered my mother.

He’d changed. Lost weight. His eyes were sunken and wide as half dollar coins. But he was still smiling.

“Curtis! You’ve grown up so much!”

I sat down in front of him, my fists balled up and I swear to god I was tempted to beat the shit out of him right then and there. “… You wanted to see me?” I asked.

My father dropped a stack of papers in front of me. “They started letting me work on my book again, last year! It’s all done!” He proclaimed proudly.

Hands shaking, I picked up the manuscript. The words ‘Ecstasy of the Eternally Asleep’ stood out starkly against the white paper. “… What’s it about.” I couldn’t work up any enthusiasm in my response.

“Oh, you’ll have to read it to find oouuut…” My father looked so pleased. “I’m going to work to have it published, you’ll get to see the dedication then. It’s to you and your mother.”

I slammed my fists on the table and stood up. “You don’t. Get to dedicate this book. To mom. You hear me?” I made my way to the door.

“Please! Please take my book with you!”

My father sounded frantic, desperate.

I looked back at the manuscript. Walked back over. Picked it up.

With cold eyes, I looked my father in the face and ripped it in half. “We’re done here. Go fuck yourself,” I said, not dropping my gaze as I dropped the shreds of paper on the floor and walked out.

My father committed suicide that night. Apparently they will go through with publishing his book though. Like hell I’m going to read it.

The final question though: whatever happened to Cassie Kralie and her movie?

I did some digging. And came up with far more questions than answers.

See, Cassie never actually went to college, at least not for a film major. She started out as a general before she dropped out, she and a couple other students. The couple other students were the stars of ‘Inspiration’. Today being the era of the internet, I figured it wouldn’t be hard to find them.

I found two of them. Autumn Hodge, the star, and Barry Becker, her friend in the movie. Both of them were found dead, a double suicide as both leaped from a bridge.

The others? It’s like they never existed.

Cassie?

Has been missing since the weekend ‘Inspiration’ aired in our little town.

#scary stories #horror stories #sixpenceee stories #sixpenceee #writers on tumblr #my stories

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