On location: DAWN OF THE DEAD (1978) - picture heavy

I enjoy visiting shooting locations from my favourite films, and I also enjoy shopping more than I should. Here was a chance to do both at the same time - looking around the shopping mall where half of George Romero's Dawn of the Dead was shot thirty years ago.

When I first saw the film in 1980, shopping malls were pretty new - I'd not even seen any in the UK. The concept of having everything under one roof was interesting, but using a mall as a post-apocalyptic hideout really impressed me. It seemed more of a fantasy than a nightmare (once all the zombies had been cleared out, that is).

Today the Monroeville Mall, a few miles east of Pittsburgh, can still be explored following the action in the film. The lack of windows obviously made night shoots easy - all they had to do was avoid shooting the high skylights.

All the stores except J.C. Penney have now changed hands. But luckily, Penney's is the main store featured in the film - the escalators, the inside aisles and the main interior doors were all featured.

Despite the decorating changes to the floors and balconies, the ‘psychological’ layout of the building remains. Physical layout is often cheated in movies, with additional sets and editing that alter the spatial relationships. The story usually inhabits a space that never existed. For example, the Psycho house is a fascinating building that never existed as you see it. The layout is well-known - from Norman Bates' attic room down to the apple cellar - but it could never actually be explored the way the characters do.

The mall is still popular, there's a couple of empty units but it's still very full, and is surrounded by other stores round the perimeter of the car park.

The layout stretches east-west, with three huge department stores accessible from the west (Boscov's), east (Macy's) and south (Penney's). The central north entrance is now at the bottom of a street between two new buildings, collectively known as The District. One side is restaurants, the other is a large Barnes & Noble bookstore.


This north entrance used to lead into the ice rink, instead it now leads to the food court.

The mall has two levels, with three atriums each with two escalators. It's easy to tell the atriums apart because the escalators are laid out differently in each one.

These look like the old lights, but there aren't many left.

Macy's dominates the east end of the mall.

View from the south side.

Ths is the bus stop, at the south side of the mall.

These trucks outside the back of Macy's reminded me of the lockdown scene.


This new lift is in the food court, where the ice rink used to be.


Just inside the remodelled north entrance is the only bank.

Just keep repeating, "It's only a mall, it's only a mall..."

This reminded me of the final shot in the film.

This is looking out of the lower level at the bus stop - the view is crying out for a large zombie, dressed only in his shorts.

The Boscov atrium, where the fountain used to stand. This was also the end where the clock tower was.

The escalators were positioned over to one side to make room for where the fountain was. The trampoline rig was cleared to make space for the special screening of Dawn of the Dead inside the mall.

The passage to the hideout is on the upper level.

Along the passage today is a nursery, rest rooms, and your chance to sign up! You can see the fire exit at the end.


The view out from the passage.

The central atrium (looking south).

Central atrium (looking east), JC Penney is off to the right.

The escalator slide in Penney's.

The only elevator I could find in Penney's - on the second level...

...and on the first level.

The big fountain has gone, but this pond and bridge remain.

Looking west, towards where the clock tower stood.

A security guard who has worked here since the film was shot, told me that this unit, at the west end of the second level, was the gun store in the movie.

The Macy's atrium now has a Mr Roger's Neighbourhood!

Some of the less busy entrances are rather scary.

Even more atmospheric at night... (I was in there for the Dawn of the Dead screening, not looting)

A gallery of old publicity posters in the lower level passage included this blaster from the past...

Yes, this is my idea of a holiday.


Dusk of the Dead

I visited Monroeville Mall while at the Pittsburgh Horrorhound Convention, where I met actors from Day of the Dead, Dawn of the Dead and Zombie Flesh Eaters... my coverage of the convention is here.

At the convention I saw an early cut of Paul Davis' documentary Beware The Moon: Remembering An American Werewolf in London. My review of that event, attended by David Naughton and John Landis can be found here.

EMPIRE OF THE WOLVES (2005) - Jean Reno in action

EMPIRE OF THE WOLVES
(2005, France, L'Empire des Loups)

Partnership with the devil

This recent thriller was directed by Chris Nahon, who’s currently finishing work on the live-action Blood: The Last Vampire. I only recognised Jean Reno in the cast, but isn't that enough? Certainly it's an indication of something interesting, at least in French-language movies.


The movie starts off with two parallel storylines: Anna, a Parisian housewife, is suffering such a massive memory loss that she can't even recognise her husband's face. As her experimental therapy fails to get results, she secretly goes to an analyst, Mathilde, to try and unlock her past.


Meanwhile a young detective is investigating some very, very nasty serial murders of young Turkish 'illegals'. Because these rank as low priority with the homicide division, he resorts to consulting disgraced cop 'Shifty' Le Shiffre (Jean Reno), an expert on the Turkish underworld operating in France. Joining forces, the closer they get to the truth, the more danger they find themselves in. Shootouts, mystery assassins, exploding bath-houses... can they handle the truth, and what does it all have to do with the amnesiac Anna?


Reminiscent of The Bourne Identity, this is a rewarding, twisty thriller which gradually reveals its many mysteries. It's hard-edged too - as Anna tries to regain her memory we see horrific images of disfigured faces, better suited to a horror movie, and the serial killer sub-plot is similarly nasty.

Set in a Paris that's forever in the rain, the lush visuals and locations never overpower the story. The cast are uniformly excellent, and help sell the more ludicrous action. But what's with French films and women trapped on ledges in their underwear? Is it compulsory?


Although fast-moving and stylish, some scenes are undermined by an inappropriate choice of hardcore club tracks used for the score. The effect seems to be aiming just for excitement, even though the action is supposed to be shocking or dramatic.

Empire of the Wolves is recommended, and available in the UK and US on DVD, with English-dubbed dialogue as an option.

ANATOMIE 2 (2003) - thrills but no chills

ANATOMY 2
(2003, Germany, Anatomie 2)

A new way to build muscles...

Anatomy (2000) was a stylish and unusual thriller. Stefan Ruzowitzky returned to direct this sequel, approaching the central premise of the first film from the other direction, rather than repeat himself. Instead of Heidelberg, we’re in a huge hospital in Berlin, here a young doctor is invited to join the inner circle of renegade surgeons.

The members of this secret society are experimenting on themselves with synthetic implants as well as performance-enhancing drugs. But it's not for the sake of life-saving advances in medicine, but to score academic prizes and lucrative drug patents. Also using methods completely against their codes of ethics, the foundations of their professions and the law. None of them can afford to get caught.

We follow the intern, Dr Hauser (Barnaby Metschurat), as he leaves his wheelchair-bound brother, who’s suffering from a muscular wasting disease, to go and work in the capital city. There's a cleverly edited montage as he starts his gruelling shift work in the casualty department.

But when he bends the rules to save the life of a little girl, he attracts the attention of the renegade researchers who think he might want to join their secret clique. The initiation test involves an overly thorough examination from Viktoria, in an echo of the bizarre sex scene in Anatomie.

The surgeons have used implants to enable each member of their inner circle to achieve different feats, while Viktoria excels at cocktails of medication to support the group’s various enhancements. They persuade Hauser to try implants for himself and his legs are tuned up - very useful when he's playing soccer. But while artificial super-powers are very seductive, it’s not a good idea if anyone changes their mind and wants out, and that's not the only catch...


Plotwise, this branch of the secret society was pretty slack in its methods and forever dangerously close to keeping its secrecy. No wonder Franka Potente (in a cameo role) wasn’t on their heels sooner.

It's an inventive story, but too unlike the first, making it a thriller with a little gore, less horror and less sex. Though there’s curiously still plenty of man-flesh on display. It’s fun while it lasts, but runs out of surprises by the end.

Anatomy 2 is on DVD in the US and UK from Columbie Tristar.

THE CAR (1977) - sworn enemy of road safety

THE CAR
(1977, USA)

Steven Spielberg's taut TV movie Duel (1971) may have prompted a few spin-off genre of 'road movies' that were crossbred with horror films. There was TV movie with a killer bulldozer, naturally called Killdozer (1974), the unbeatable Death Race 2000 (1975), and the creepy Race with the Devil (1975). This was when car stunts were cheaper and more convincing than horror special effects. I saw The Car in July 1977 in the UK, on a double bill with William Girdler’s Day of the Animals.

The Car probably looked like a complete gamble on the printed page - hats off to the cast for signing up. But despite the offbeat scenario, it works in a weird way. The Car is thoroughly menacing, working on our fears of evil as well as our experiences as pedestrians and cyclists...

It starts in a dusty Utah town, when a mysterious black car bumps off two innocent victims (bumps them off a high bridge, that is). After further hit-and-run deaths, the local sheriff is shocked to hear that no driver was seen inside, and bullets can't touch it.

A weird wind precedes each deadly appearance. In the distance, a dust trail slowly comes nearer, and there’s the sound of an increasingly ominous car horn... (heavily referenced in the Futurama episode 'The Honking').

What does it want, where is it from, and can it be stopped? As the killer car shows no sign of slowing up, the local police start believing the worst...


With some spectacular stunts, the action is quite low-key but inventive (the Car rarely kills the same way twice), and the cinematography highlights the spectacular desert locations.

The Car rarely gets more than creepy, but works well as a mystery, as long as you’re not expecting a thorough explanation at the end. The premise is more like Jaws on land, than The Exorcist on wheels. It's not at all like John Carpenter's adaption of Christine, which rolled up in a similar vein six years later.

The brave bewildered sheriff is played by James Brolin, (inbetween leading roles in Westworld and Capricorn One). Spunky Kathleen Lloyd (of It Lives Again) plays his wife. As police deputy, Ronny Cox has some great emotional scenes but a low, low billing - this was halfway between his memorable characters in Deliverance and Robocop.

A few years ago, the unique design was celebrated with a beautiful 1:18 die-cast replica from ERTL.

But the star is the car - a cool, fearsome creation from George Barris, who also styled the original Batmobile for the Adam West Batman TV series (1966). From its super-darkened windows to the pedestrian-unfriendly double chrome bumpers, this is one sight you wouldn't want in your rear-view mirror.

Newly remastered by Universal for DVD in the US, The Car has never looked better, the 2.35 image never looked crisper. My only gripe is that the opening titles were originally in a different colour in the cinema release (and in the Anchor Bay DVD released in 2000), where they were a deep electric blue rather than a pale green.

The Anchor Bay DVD artwork for the 2000 release

DVD Beaver has a bunch of framegrabs from the new transfer, with shots of the stars and a great shot of the terrifying tail-gating scene...

BEWARE THE MOON: Remembering AN AMERICAN WEREWOLF IN LONDON - a preview

At the Pittsburgh HorrorHound convention in June, An American Werewolf in London was screened, just before the preview of a new feature-length documentary about the making of the film. I was again reminded how good it was and how well it stands up today, as a horror film, a drama and a black comedy.

First I'll recall the original film, then preview the new documentary, Beware The Moon.

AN AMERICAN WEREWOLF IN LONDON(1981, UK)

When I first saw this in an English cinema back in 1982, its shock-moments were what impressed me. It was bloodier than the slasher movies of the time, but was still recognisably a John Landis comedy. But the humour could cruelly flip into nightmare at any moment – one scene memorably mixed the Muppets with terrifying Nazi demons. This was the first film where I was caught out by someone waking up from a dream within a dream.

It’s an unusual werewolf film, depicting the nightmares that prefigure David’s realisation of what he’s becoming. The creature’s victims also hang around in limbo to haunt him, a new angle to the mythology that enables his dead best friend to keep him company, despite advancing decomposition.

Besides delivering a horror film that avoids horror cliches, I also love the film because it’s a great London film. I grew up here, and to see an accurate and witty depiction of the city from an outside perspective is a treat. Besides using locations especially familiar to tourists, there’s also the backpacker experience out in the countryside, where entering a local pub feels like breaking the law. American Werewolf captures this bizarre experience, that’s also just as intimidating for city folk as it is for tourists. London hospitals, the police, public transport are all amusingly observed and a great introduction to the London behind the brochures.

At the time the publicity concentrated not on the comedy, the romantic heart of the film, the location, or the psychology… but on the special effects for the werewolf transformation. With no A-list stars I guess this was logical, but similar werewolf effects had already just appeared in The Howling, (the embarrassing reason for that is explained in the documentary). The humour of The Howling was more subtle, Joe Dante’s trademark in-jokes were aimed at horror fans. It’s also a great film, but even less widely seen. 1981 was a crowded year for wolves because there was also Wolfen, starring Albert Finney and a young Edward James Olmos. An overly serious eco-thriller about urban wolves, Wolfen had showcased the use of a low-slung steadicam doubling for a wolf’s point-of-view. Coincidentally, it also has a police decapitation, though American Werewolf did it far better.

These three wolf films were heavily cross-compared, but this isn’t important now that we’ve had over a quarter century of perspective. American Werewolf easily stands the test of time and works just as well today. It’s originality and humour certainly makes it certainly worth all the attention it’s getting again.

BEWARE THE MOON: Remembering AN AMERICAN WEREWOLF IN LONDON(2008, UK)

Paul Davis presented this 'director's cut' of the new documentary that he wrote, directed and presented, about the making of An American Werewolf in London. The Pittsburgh screening is the longest it will ever be, in an 105 minute work-in-progress version. He dedicated the screening to monster-maker Stan Winston, who had sadly died just a few days before.

Almost all the main cast and everyone involved behind the scenes is interviewed. It tells the story of the film, of how it came about and how it was received. Besides John Landis and Rick Baker’s extensive involvement, there are the leading actors David Naughton, Griffin Dunne and Jenny Agutter (Logan’s Run, Equus, Walkabout). There’s even most of the British supporting cast, down to the actress from the faked porn film, shot specially for the Piccadilly cinema scenes. Unfortunately for Landis, the soft-core porn scenes were the very first to be filmed, which gave his British film crew a very slanted idea of what kind of story they were going to be working on!

It’s good to hear the traditional British thespian perspective of John Woodvine, who played David’s psychiatrist. Regular Landis collaborator, George Folsey Jr, has a particularly disturbing screenshot looming behind him, and talks extensively about the problems he faced as the producer. The rest of the crew are well-represented, from the cinematographer Robert Paynter, to the stunt driver Vic Armstrong, who’s now a major stunt-co-ordinator and action unit director for the biggest Hollywood thrillers. It’s all the more interesting for being a film made outside of a Hollywood studio.

The idea for American Werewolf began in former Yugoslavia, back when Landis was in the junior production staff working on the war/heist/comedy Kelly’s Heroes (1970), when he was also training as a stuntman. On location he witnessed local gypsies who resembled extras from the old Universal horror The Wolfman (1941), who actually believed in ancient superstitions and were burying a man swathed in garlic, in a ceremony to prevent him from rising from the dead.

The incident inspired a script, which he was still talking about with Rick Baker when they were making Schlock (1973) together. But only after three smash-hit comedies (Kentucky Fried Movie, National Lampoon’s Animal House and The Blues Brothers) could Landis finance the unusual story, mainly because of the edgy mix of humour and horror. In the end, it needed help from a British film financing fund, ending up as a ‘$10 million negative pick-up deal’.


Rick Baker, integral to the success of film, had been mulling over Landis’ ideas over the years as to how he could engineer special effects for the transformation. Landis was very specific about what he wanted to see, which made the direction clear but not the techniques to be used. Baker had started off in horror films and as an assistant to Dick Smith (the modern godfather of make-up effects). In Schlock, a savage satire of Trog, he dressed Landis up as an apeman throwback. Baker also appeared in Kentucky Fried Movie as a gorilla running amuck in a TV station (Landis cameos as a TV director fighting with him). I remember being impressed by Baker’s work on Squirm, It’s Alive, and The Incredible Melting Man in the seventies. His early creations even helped pad out the cantina bar in Star Wars (1977). But Baker also had a specialty for realistic animal make-ups, especially large apes. He played a huge part in the 1976 King Kong, which he famously received no credit for. Although he performed inside the suit built by him and Carlo Rambaldi, and was in 99% of Kong’s scenes, the producer Dino De Laurentiis span the publicity as if a life-sized robot was all that was used!

Baker’s work on American Werewolf was ground-breaking and hugely influential, the central transformation having to withstand the scrutiny of a harshly lit set. Jekyll-and-Hyde scenes had traditionally been done by optically cross-fading between make-ups while the actors were held in position. Baker and his crew instead built mechanical effects that would change shape before the camera, while still looking organic. Baker and the actors describe in detail shot-by-shot how the scene was achieved. At the time, Landis ensured no publicity photographs of the final creature were released.


Baker, still hugely busy in Hollywood today, tells a great story about the scene when the boys are attacked by the wolf on the moors. The interviews with Baker and Griffin Dunne intercut as we hear both sides, when the two of them try to appear to fight to the death without wrecking Baker’s effects. We then hear from members of the crew nearby, hearing the blood-curdling sound in the middle of the night, when Dunne is asked to ‘scream as if he was being murdered’.

There’s also the real story behind how The Howling ended up using similar effects but was released beforehand – a howler originally reported as Baker’s assistant, Rob Bottin, running off with his special effects secrets!

The wolf make-ups aren’t the end of Baker’s contributions, he also had to envisage the many dream effects, the living dead make-ups of all David’s victims and especially Jack’s decomposition. The original actors involved, in particular Griffin Dunne as Jack, have much to say about the physical and psychological effects of looking and acting as a corpse with its throat ripped out.

Landis and Baker continued to team up, first on Michael Jackson’s groundbreaking pop video for Thriller. Jackson’s enthusiasm for American Werewolf lead to them being hired to change Jackson into his very own wolf creature. Baker also had to create the famous zombie make-ups for the dancers, with little preparation, and even appeared as a zombie in the final promo. (For more information, I’d recommend Cinefex magazine, issue 16 was devoted to all Rick Baker’s early work, up to 1984).

Later, Rick Baker made up Eddie Murphy as radically different characters in Landis’ Trading Places and Coming To America – early multiple roles for the actor who still uses the technique as a regular basis for his Hollywood comedies.

I don’t want to spoil the many anecdotes. It’s full of stuff I didn’t know and it’s great to see everyone again. It helped me appreciate more about the agonies of make-up effects, as well as the trials of seemingly easy location shoots. With jokers Landis, Naughton and Dunne providing a lion’s share of the stories, the documentary is as funny as it is engaging. Davis has succeeded in both exploring his obsession, as well as explaining it for anyone who hasn’t seen the film. It’s rare that a feature-length documentary about a movie can be so entertaining.

Behind the behind-the-scenes documentary

Before the premiere, there was a Q&A session with the the documentary director Paul Davis, director John Landis, and the star David Naughton.

Landis said he was initially shocked to hear that someone had started on a movie documentary without sorting out clearances and copyrights first – normally the way it’s done. He said that the whole project could have been doomed from the start, never to see the light of day. (Thankfully, with his help, this has now been sorted out).

He was amused to have been tracked down for his Beware the Moon interview via MySpace, but was sufficiently impressed by the roster of interviewees that and is now a strong supporter of the documentary. He even announced that it would be included in a Blu-Ray release of American Werewolf within the next two years – much to the surprise of the director, Paul Davis. This is the logical place for the documentary, but I hope it gets more public screenings when it’s complete, and even finds a wider audience, possibly on TV.

David Naughton talked about first getting cast werewolf and admitted that the nude scenes looked a lot less intimidating in the script than when he actually had to perform them. Naughton looks very different today, mainly because his hair is now strangely uncurly. Perhaps it was the experience of filming…

The next day I talked to Paul Davis and his producer Romy about this big project that started out small. They had travelled from London for the screening.

Spookily, Davis was born while American Werewolf was being shot (the porn theatre scenes, he reckons). He first saw it on VHS at the age of three! Indelibly impressed with the film, but exasperated by the lack of extras on a DVD release, he decided in 2006 to interview everyone connected with the movie.

Romy Alford-Sancto took a year out from her film production course to produce Beware the Moon, and described the process as a domino effect, that got easier once people heard who’d already been interviewed. The crew ended up visiting New York and Los Angeles to get the biggest names.


Cameraman Anthony Bueno shot it all on HD video and also edited it – arguably the hardest task. They also travelled around so that Paul Davis could present the documentary from the original filming locations as they appear today. Beware The Moon therefore also serves as a great guide to making your own American Werewolf pilgrimage – London Zoo in Regents Park, Tottenham Court Road Underground Station (doubling for Piccadilly Circus) are easy to find, but the original Slaughtered Lamb exterior was shot in darkest Wales, and was almost impossible to locate, as it is now a private residence. Romy described a chain of coincidence that helped them find it eventually f. Apparently John Landis still has the original prop of the legendary pub sign.

Thankfully, most of their wishlist of interviewees agreed to appear. The only notably missing contributors are the late Elmer Bernstein, who composed the original music, and actor Brian Glover who issued the original warning “Beware the moon, lads…”. They both have a good excuse for not being interviewed, as they are unfortunately neither living or undead.

As a fan, and having shot hours of usable footage, Paul Davis would ideally like it to be much longer, while Landis is advising a shorter cut. But Beware the Moon will officially be completed in Los Angeles later this year, hopefully adding more of the rare behind-the-scenes footage. I can’t wait to see it - it’s marvellous when your favourite films get this much attention.

A complete list of participants, and a couple of clips have been unveiled on their ‘KesslerBoy’ (it’s the name of Naughton’s character) MySpace site and the website is also being prepared.

As the original script for The Wolfman (1941), written by the late Curt Siodmak, is being reinterpreted for a new wolfman movie, it’s the ideal moment to spend time with An American Werewolf in London. They’ll have a tough time making a better film.

HorrorHound Weekend: Pittsburgh - convention report

The HorrorHound Movie Convention
20th - 22nd June 2008

Return of the zombies to the shopping mall

It's a long way to Pittsburgh from anywhere, especially from England, but because of the zombie theme and being only a few hundred yards away from the original Dawn of the Dead shopping mall, I simply had to go to this particular horrorcon.




Only a few hundred yards across the parking lot from the Monroeville Mall, the convention took place inside the Expo Mart for a three day event.

The guests included actors, directors and make-up artists from famous horror films, as well as artists like Joel Robinson who provided the awesome poster art for the event (pictured at the top).

Besides the main room which housed the vendors and the guests' signing tables, there were special screenings in a nearby hall. Friday there was a special American Werewolf In London (1981) evening starting with the film itself. This was followed by a Q & A session with the director John Landis and the star David Naughton, together with Paul Davis who's just finishing work on his documentary about the film, called Beware the Moon.

He had first been impressed by American Werewolf when he saw it on VHS at the age of three! Two years ago, exasperated by the lack of extras on the DVD release, he set out to interview everyone connected with the project. John Landis observed that the project was potentially doomed unless he'd first cleared up the rights issues (which has since been sorted out). Other independent documentaries are currently in limbo because of this issue. For example, Landis had seen and enjoyed Spine Tingler, all about the director William Castle, but predicted it will only be seen at conventions unless about $4 million can be found to sort out licensing issues!

Paul Davis then presented what he called a 'director's cut', an extended 105 minute work-in-progress version. Of course, the fan in him wants it to be longer, but Landis is advising a shorter cut. Only one shall win! Beware the Moon will officially be completed in Los Angeles later in the year. It's an enjoyable look at a great film, full of surprising and interesting behind-the-scenes stories told by some great raconteurs. There are clips posted at their MySpace page. I'll review it properly shortly.

John Amplas and me

Pittsburgh is of course where George Romero shoots most of his films, and many of his cast and crew still live in the area. Besides a sprinkling of zombies from Dawn of the Dead (1978), actor John Amplas was there all weekend. I especially liked his character in Day of the Dead (1985) and it was a pleasure to talk to him at this his first convention appearance. Amplas appeared in many other Romero films, notably as the title character of the modern-day vampire film Martin (1977), but nowadays he teaches acting at a Pittsburgh university.

Al Cliver, me, and Ottaviano Dell'Acqua (wormeye!)

It wasn't all about American horror films - I also met a zombie and a zombie-slayer a long way from their homeland of Italy. Al Cliver and Ottaviano Dell'Acqua both appeared in the awesome Zombie Flesh Eaters (1979). Cliver, who sported a beard in his Lucio Fulci films back then, is now clean-shaven and speaks pretty good English, thanks to his American wife. Of course, I'm used to him being dubbed into English!

Far less recognisable was the poster zombie from the film, the fearsome worm-eyed creature who still ranks as the most nightmarish undead ever. In real life, he's a good-looking Italian stuntman who appeared with his five brothers as various zombies in the film (he no longer remembers which others he played). Ottaviano is now a major stunt coordinator in Italy and was working on the new James Bond film Quantum of Solace earlier this year.

The two performers were being looked after by Mike Baronas, who has put together many of the excellent documentaries on the DVD releases of Lucio Fulci's horror films. He has his own DVD out now called Paura - Lucio Fulci Remembered: Volume 1. Again, I'll be reviewing it soon.

Me and ex-zombie Lenny Lies.
Who knew a machete in the head could bring such fame?

Saturday saw Griffin Dunne join David Naughton and John Landis to sign autographs all day. Out of the blue I mentioned to Naughton that I'd met the Ladies of The Evil Dead at a convention and he said he'd just made a movie with them - Brutal Massacre, a horror comedy. I also talked to Paul Davis and discovered that he only lives a few miles away from me in south London.

In the screening room, Doug Bradley, better known for playing the fearsome cenobite Pinhead in the Hellraiser series, presented the first completed episode of Spine Chillers, a successful attempt to bring the words of famous horror literature to life. In the first episode, Bradley reads H.P. Lovecraft's The Outsider, while it's illustrated by layers of impressionistic and evocative artwork. The effect was to bring the story to life without discarding the original text, like most screen adaptions do. A clip from The Outsider is online and Bradley hopes to tackle The Tell-Tale Heart by Edgar Allen Poe next. He's also thinking of getting horror celebrity narrators to work on episodes in this proposed series - but I thought he was already perfect for the job.

Tom Savini (left) and Fluffy

Tom Savini then appeared cracking his bullwhip, VERY LOUDLY. He also brought along the animatronic head of 'Fluffy' (the monster in the crate from George Romero's Creepshow) newly restored by Greg Nicotero. Savini talked about how his gory make-up effects for Friday the 13th and Dawn of the Dead led to a decade of fabricating similar effects for splatter and slasher films. But nowadays he only consults on special effects work, concentrating instead on acting and directing - he talked about his appearances in From Dusk Till Dawn and the forthcoming The Lost Boys 2. I particularly like his remake of Night of the Living Dead (1990), which he didn't enjoy directing at the time, but has recently rewatched and thinks better of it.



Later on was the much-anticipated screening of Dawn of the Dead at the nearby Monroeville Mall where much of the film was shot. Hundreds turned up to the event, some dressed up as zombies. Some of the original zombie cast spoke beforehand, including Mike Christopher (the Hare Krishna zombie), Clayton Hill (the sweater zombie), Sharon Hill (the nurse zombie), and the very tall Jim Krut (no wonder he lost his head to the helicopter blades).

The charity screening was held inside, at one end of the mall where the big circular fountain used to stand. There were complaints about the fuzzy sound system and the projected picture couldn't always compete with the mall lights, which were supposed to have been dimmed. But it was still a first-time event that nearly didn't happen at all, so I was thankful to have been there. It was a treat to hear 'The Gonk' muzak being played inside the mall, and a great opportunity to do a live side-by-side comparison of how the mall has changed in thirty years.

Further photos from the weekend events can be seen on the HorrorHound website and their MySpace page.

I'll soon review the documentary Beware The Moon - Remembering An American Werewolf in London at length, and will also post my own location tour of the mall.

THE CRAZIES, SHIVERS, RABID - nasty seventies virals

Three North American horror movies from the mid 1970's where people turn into mindless, predatory animals, decades before the fast-moving 'zombies' of 28 Days Later and I Am Legend.

THE CRAZIES

(1973, USA)

George Romero had already laid down the rules for the modern zombie genre in Night of the Living Dead (1968). But before he started with the sequels, he made The Crazies, in which society breaks down in a remote town when a military nerve gas turns everyone into psycho-killers.

While the premise had horror potential - with innocent-looking children and grannies turning homicidal – the amateurish acting has always made this a tough one for me to sit through, even when it came out. Besides the budget being too low to do ‘a city in chaos’ properly, the gore effects severely lack Tom Savini, with fake-looking limbs and even unconvincing blood.

But the ideas were ripe for recycling, and the image of the military dressed head-to-foot in white gas masks, suits and hoods proved enduring, soon appearing again in The Cassandra Crossing (1976).

SHIVERS
(1975, Canada)

David Cronenberg was obviously inspired by Romero’s film (he even cast Lynn Lowry from The Crazies), but added more inventive angles, like making people homicidal and sexual maniacs. Shivers was his first feature film, and he ladled out enough controversy to launch his career.

In it, a medical experiment to mutate parasites into missing organs comes to a tragic end when the doctor kills, disembowels and pours acid into the stomach of a naked schoolgirl. Little does he know, she's been sleeping around, fuelled by the parasites' sexual appetite. Now several men in her apartment block are breeding parasitic slugs of their own... internally.

While this is far more interesting than The Crazies, the amateur quality of acting is still pretty distracting, though queen of Italian horror, Barbara Steele (Mask of the Demon) is a welcome exception. Her bathtub scene is still squirmingly effective, and was the basis of many poster campaigns.

By his own admission, Cronenberg was still learning to direct during the production, but the film was still an international hit. He pushes the concept way out, and it's unusual to see sexual horror outside of the realm of vampires for once.

RABID
(1976, Canada)

Cronenberg tweaked and expanded the same concept of infectious psychosis for his next, far more assured film. This is the easiest of the three to recommend, with a more able cast, and a bigger budget.

Another medical experiment misfires, this time using skin-grafts. After a bike accident, Rose (Marilyn Chambers) finds herself with a vampiric spike in her armpit and a lust for human blood, not realising that she's infects her victims with rabies.

The stage is set for random violence, with Cronenberg dreaming up kills more creative than the story or the characters. Not many horror films feature a pneumatic drill as a murder weapon, or Santa Claus gunned down by a hail of machine-gun fire.

This is efficient, unusual, indie horror mayhem, from the heyday of Canadian horror, with buckets of subtext only if you want it. Watching this again, I noticed that there's no original soundtrack music, just a few library tracks repeated to exhaustion! It certainly worked at the time. Shivers and Rabid then made perfect partners on a double-bill re-release in cinemas. Check out any trailers you can find - the voice-over is a classic.

(Cronenberg then continued with a run of interesting horror films - The Brood, Scanners, and the marvellous Videodrome, before hitting the big time with his 1986 remake of The Fly).

These three quasi-zombie films were labelled as 'body horror' in the eighties, and lumped in with the remakes of The Blob and The Thing - today they're the fore-runners of today's 'fast and furious' genre of the undead.

Incidentally, the US DVD of Shivers (from Image Entertainment) looks good in 1.33 aspect ratio, but my UK edition of Rabid (from Metrodome) is severely cropped on all sides of the 16:9 frame, cramping the action and even clipping off parts of the opening titles - a case of 'widescreen edition' meaning less rather than more... but there's an interesting introductory talk from Cronenberg on both discs.

ANATOMIE (2000) - gutsy German thriller

ANATOMY
(2000, Germany, Anatomie)

Go up the lab, and see what's on the slab...

Franka Potente is reason enough to watch this slick slasher from Germany. The actress scored an international success with Run Lola Run (1998), then starred in Antomie before a short run of Hollywood parts - in Blow (2001) opposite Johnny Depp, The Bourne Identity (2002) and The Bourne Supremacy (2004). She also starred in another horror, Creep (2004) in the UK.

Paula and Gretchen are two medical students who get the chance to study anatomy at an old revered college in picturesque Heidelburg. But while they dissect dead bodies during the day, two masked maniacs are using the same high-tech facility at night to carefully cut up victims while they're still alive.


(These scenes reminded me of the unfortunate runner in Scream and Scream Again (1970) who wakes up without a leg, then another leg, then his arms).

As the two roommates start to get popular with the male students, Paula starts to suspect that something nasty is going on in the college...


This is gripping and enjoyable while it lasts, but the climax arrives a little too quickly, leaving enough loose ends for a sequel (in 2003).

The special effects all look exactly like the squishy nastiness, though it's far less bloody than I anticipated. Plasticised bodies that look like those made famous by Dr Gunther Von Hagens, are used as exhibits in the research wing of the college. I felt they were under-used by the director and would have liked a closer look at these extremely creepy replicas. For instance, a huge set of shelves decked out with skulls deserved far more attention.


To ease the tension, and almost dissipate it, there are one too many scenes of upbeat college life, with an intrusive pop soundtrack - indeed Paula’s roommate Gretchen is played my German singer Anna Loos, who gets an unlikely sex scene on a metal dissection table.

Franka Potente ensures the character of Paula is as realistic as the medical mayhem around her. Benno Fürmann is also impressive as the self-obsessed muscle-boy, Hein. Fürmann has a long list of credits in Germany, but recently appeared as Inspector Detector in Speed Racer.


Anatomie avoids most of the cliches of modern horror, using more Hitchcockian suspense and a steadily-unfolding story, which is all the more creepy for remaining in the realm of the very possible.

What makes it different from American horror is the mixture of nudity, sex and death. Most of the corpses are young and good-looking, adding a necrophilic edge to the flesh on display.


The UK DVD from Columbia Tristar is presented in anamorphic 2.35 widescreen, and has plenty of extras (including an Anna Loos pop video and interesting interviews).