What are you watching?

[Cody Layne]

The Strange Door: Another movie I'd seen before, this one is similar to The Black Castle in that it's a period piece where Boris Karloff has a supporting role as one of the main villain's servants who is actually trying to help the victims. However, I would say this is the better of the two, as Charles Laughton makes for a much more memorable and entertaining villain.

[Cody Layne]

The Thing That Couldn't Die: This is a pretty ridiculous flick about an executed sorcerer from the 15th Century or so whose severed head is dug up from where it was buried and it gains control of people to do his well, intending to find and be reunited with his body. However, it's not nearly as fun as that ludicrous plot would make you think, and the ending is the definition of anti-climactic.

The Shadow of the Cat: Speaking of ridiculous, this is actually a Hammer film that Universal distributed in the U.S. along with The Curse of the Werewolf (an infinitely better movie). The story is about a house-cat that witnesses the murder of her owner, a wealthy elderly woman, and the rest of the movie centers around the murderers actually trying to hunt down and kill the cat, as if she could actually tell what happened. Funnily enough, the cat herself becomes bent on revenge and starts knocking the murderers off in various ways. It's bonkers, and the editing and overbearing music score often make it feel like a crazy fever dream.

[Cody Layne]

The Black Castle: Getting into Volume 6 of the Universal Horror Collection, this is a movie that I'm sure I'd seen before, but I couldn't remember anything about it whatsoever. Re-watching it, it's a fair enough Gothic horror flick, with Boris Karloff and Lon Chaney Jr. in supporting roles (the latter has no dialogue), some good art direction, and was the directorial debut for Nathan Juran, who went on to do movies like The Deadly Mantis, 20 Million Miles to Earth, The 7th Voyage of Sinbad, Attack of the 50-Foot Woman, and The Brain from Planet Arous, among others.

Cult of the Cobra: Now I did remember seeing this one, which is about a woman who can turn into a cobra coming to the United States to kill a group of Air Force officers who infiltrated a snake-worshiping cult while in Asia. It's okay, but very standard, especially with its actors, and some very archaic special effects, even for the time.

[Cody Layne]

The Climax: I'd seen this before as well. It's a follow-up to the 1943 remake of The Phantom of the Opera (it started out as a sequel), starring Boris Karloff as a physician for an opera house who becomes obsessed with a new singer because her voice reminds him of his old love, whom he murdered out of jealousy. Not one of the best Universal horror flicks from this era, but Karloff, as always, is great, the other characters are well acted, and you can tell that the film was a lavish production, as it was shot in Technicolor, on amazing sets.

House of Horrors: One of the Universal horror movies starring Rondo Hatton as the Creeper, this features that character becoming friends with a struggling artist and murdering all of his enemies. Not a classic by any means, but it's short and sweet, and Hatton definitely had a unique film presence.

[Cody Layne]

Night Key: The first of the four movies in Volume 4 of the Universal Horror Collection. I'd seen this before and, even though it stars Boris Karloff, it's not a horror film; instead, it's a sci-fi/crime flick where Karloff's character is forced by a mob to use a device that can open locks to aid them in their robberies. Nothing amazing, but at just 68 minutes, it's hardly that taxing.

Night Monster: I'd never seen this one before, nor had I even heard of it... and after seeing it, I understand why. This is a very dull, talky affair, with Bela Lugosi and Lionel Atwill only playing supporting characters, despite being top-billed. And the identity and nature of the killer is not earth-shattering in the least.

[Cody Layne]

Land of the Dead Scream Factory Collector's Edition. Again, didn't watch the actual movie or the commentaries, but did check out the other special features, as there are plenty of them. They were quite cool and informative, including interviews with John Leguizamo, Robert Joy, and other actors, including those who played the most notable zombies, Roy Frumkes' Dream of the Dead, as well as a commentary for it and deleted footage, and all of the features that were on the original DVD release. While this isn't among my absolute favorites of George Romero's living dead series, it's fine enough and this edition is definitely worth having.

[Cody Layne]

Night of the Living Dead Criterion Collection Blu-Ray. Avoided getting this for a long time, as I simply didn't want to buy another copy of this, especially one as pricey as the Criterion Collection often is. But, when I found it for $20 at McKay's a couple of months ago, I figured, "Why not?" I didn't listen to either of the commentaries (I listened to the laser disc one with George Romero, Karl Hardman, and some others years ago and didn't find it too interesting, so I wasn't interested in the one with Russ Streiner and John Russo), nor did I watch the Night of Anubis workprint or the silent dailies (they could've at least put music to those) but I did watch all of the other features. Very interesting stuff, especially the interviews with the more obscure actors, although I wish that great documentary from the Dimension Extreme edition was ported over to this.

[Newt Cox]

Joe Bob's airing of Deathstalker from the Corman tribute show.

Love me some early 80s Sword and Sorcery films. Deathstalker is fun.

[Cody Layne]

Spider Baby. Seen this five years ago. Definitely an oddball movie and unique for its time, and while I may not be absolutely in love with it like so many people are, I do think it's interesting, Lon Chaney Jr., in particular, giving a great performance. This Arrow Video Blu-Ray has all of the features from the Dark Sky Entertainment edition, as well as a couple of new ones, like a panel discussion on the movie from 2012 and The Host, a short film that Jack Hill made, which also starred Sid Haig.

[Cody Layne]

The Skull. I'd seen this once before. Definitely an unusual and sometimes surreal film, with long stretches without any dialogue, and Peter Cushing carrying much of it, despite there being other noteworthy actors in it, including Christopher Lee, who only appears in three or four scenes. This Region B Eureka! Video release has two interviews, one with Jonathan Rigby and the other with Kim Newman, both whom of give a lot of insight into the movie, as well as Amicus Films in general.

[Newt Cox]

Turner and Hooch

Tonight's after dinner movie. I haven't seen it since the VHS rental days. And it aint bad. Worth seeing but not worth owning. On Youtube free movies right now.

[Cody Layne]

Godzilla Minus One: Watched this with my dad last night. Saw it in theaters last year and it was really cool to check it out again. Definitely an awesome Godzilla movie in every respect, and it looked really good on the Blu-Ray. However, this specialized release from Godzilla.com, which is an Americanized version of the Japanese 4K/Blu-Ray set, has the special features disc but there are no subtitles. Before you even get to the menu, it comes up and says, "In order to give you an authentic Japanese home media experience, there are no subtitles here." Well, that may make it authentic, but that's downright useless for someone who doesn't speak Japanese.

[f.ramses]

Desecration - Though it wasn't anything great I was pleasantly surprised by this one as it is one I've passed on for years thinking it would be a terrible mess. Instead I found it coherent enough and even found a few of the scenes to be pretty well done in the creepy sense, the story is somewhat blah and convoluted but it's really nothing terrible imo. The worst thing about this movie is the video quality since apparently all that exists of this one is a tape master but I feel like it could have been better seeing as how there seemed to be frame rate/motion issues throughout the whole movie.

Hollywood 90028 - A lot of the comments about this movie go on about it being a sort of time-capsule movie and while I agree I would also suggest that this might just be the best thing about this movie. Aside from the sights and locations it's predictable and somewhat below-average with a really great final shot. Overall I thought it was OK but my doubts about it turned out to be not so unfounded.

[Newt Cox]

The Muppets-Blu ray

Wanted a comedy. Ended up singing along with every song. Plus mom watched it with us. So wondered why we both kept laughing when first the Barber shop quartet did Nirvana then Gonzo's chicken's covered FUCK YOU.

Beethoven-Youtube Free movies

got told that after dinner we were doing a movie. Cool,and it had to be funny. "Not funny in the way you find stuff funny." So saw this was on YT. Holds up fairly well for an early 90s kids movie.

Maggot Ass the Wonder mutt would look at the screen any time a dog barked or howled.

[Cody Layne]

The Comedy of Terrors Kino Lorber Blu-Ray: I really enjoy this flick. It's one of my personal favorite AIP movies from that period, with the actors all giving wonderful and hilarious performances. This Blu-Ray not only has an old interview with Richard Matheson talking about writing the movie but also an audio commentary by Tim Lucas, which was interesting and fun (although, I kept getting distracted while listening to it).