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- Jan 25, 2014
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Didn't love it, but it was a fun throwback to conventional tropes that are then purposely flipped on their heads in the chaotic/fun third act. It was enjoyable.
Eh, the remake is forgettable.
Bah humbug was afraid of that. Not a horror film but man how do I love . . . (besides on a music tear - ole industrial/techy snyth)
I have never really listened to them, aside from that song. And even then, I have mainly heard the Rollins cover of it. Kinda weird bc I am into a lot of music inspired by Suicide.
Damn right.And I love Rollins (saw him many times) when he was in Black Flag. I'm into heavy experimental/industrial and a ton of other musick.
Made at the close of the decade that gave him his name, filmmaker/mogul Roger Corman’s 1959 horror comedy A BUCKET OF BLOOD was supposed to be nothing more than another quickie designed to give the kids a thrill. But when Corman (who was fresh off a wave of dopey, quickie pulp flicks like SHE GODS OF THE SHARK REEF) sat down with quirky screenwriter and close pal Charles B. Griffith, they instead crafted something completely different; a picture that was really special and utterly, totally and wonderfully deranged.
Starting as a riff on popular mad sculptor movies like HOUSE OF WAX, A BUCKET OF BLOOD takes square aim at a once underground, by then mainstream and soon to be defunct, arts and culture movement that was ripe for the skewering: the beatniks.
The film stars Corman regular Dick Miller (who later would become the darling of THE HOWLING and GREMLINS director Joe Dante and recently had an entire documentaryproduced about his life) as Walter Paisley, a nebbish busboy at an elite, artesian beat poetry hangout known as The Yellow Door. Though poor Walter yearns to be an artist himself, he’s an earnest hack (and probably a tad slow to boot) and more often than not, finds himself the butt of ridicule by the cafe’s more snooty black clad figures.
One night, after accidentally stabbing his wall dwelling cat (a foreshadowing of Corman’s already healthy interest in the soon to be explored cinematically, Poe) to death with a butcher knife, a nervous Walter opts to coat the kitty with a mound of clay to cover up his feline crime. The next day, he brings the entombed tabby to The Yellow Door, presenting it as a sculpture he calls, bluntly, ‘Dead Cat’. Almost instantly, the inept latte slinger is hailed as a minor genius, a real deal artist, the architect of an unsettling new realism, ruthless in his shocking detailing of death. But when Paisley is called to create more cutting edge works, no cats are to be found. People, however, are plentiful…
This genuinely amusing and demented low budgeter (reportedly brought in for less than $50,000!) is a companion piece to the equally bonkers (and even cheaper) Corman/Griffith horror send-up LITTLE SHOP OF HORRORS (the basis for the same named musical and its 1986 Frank Oz directed film adaptation) but A BUCKET OF BLOOD is a much more sophisticated and polished effort. Miller is absolutely fantastic as the homicidal dweeb Paisley, a textbook of pre-Norman Bates ticks and barely concealed insanity.
Creepy, goofy, tightly paced (only 66 minutes long!), laugh out loud funny and occasionally, for the time, surprisingly gruesome, A Bucket Of Blood is also a razor sharp lampooning of the creative process and those that position themselves as art lovers in order to be part of a social circle. At the very least, it stands as Corman’s greatest pre-Poe achievement and is a testament on turning in a film that’s slick and stylish on a budget that is two shades shy of cappuccino cash.
Here’s an interview I conducted with Corman about the genesis of this classic bit of bleak, baroque and cruel comedy.
Between a new job, a new baby, and rigorous deadlines, it was a miracle I watched anything in 2015. Sadly, I skipped many of the genre’s new releases, gravitating instead toward the heaps of old favorites and forgotten gems that were dusted off for HD genre junkies.
No overarching criteria went into evaluating these titles. Obviously, audio/video quality is the biggest factor, and then I considered a whole range of others while compiling this list.
Is the movie good? How are the supplements? Not every film here is a jam-packed special edition, and no prizes have been awarded for the glossiest slipcover. Still, here are ten genre titles (and a runner-up) that were done right on Blu-ray this year.
I know!!!I was about to reply to your previous post that lesbian vampire movies are my new fetish until I saw the cheerleader vagina missiles.
I know!!!
Amazing stuff... Reinvigorates my love for Japan. We need a GIF.