As SPECTOBER IV draws to a close, we invite you to once again bunker down in the Goth Bodega for the 4th Annual Spectacle Shriek Show horror marathon! Starting at noon on Saturday, October 25th we’ll be presenting 7 features (not to mention spooky tunes, trailers, shorts, and more!) over the course of the next 12 or 14 or so hours to chill you to your very marrow! This years line-up is the craziest yet and features films from the 60’s to 2014! As always it’s $25 for the entire day or $5 each film if you are too much of a scared little baby to hang out the whole time.
Noon – NIGHTMARE CASTLE (1965)
2:00 PM – SLASH DANCE (1989)
3:30 PM – MONDO MAGIC presented by Massacre Video (1975)
5:30 PM – KOLOBOS (1999)
7:30 PM – MARLEY’S REVENGE: THE MONSTER MOVIE presented by Horror Boobs (1989)
10:00 PM – THE STRANGE COLOR OF YOUR BODY’S TEARS (2014)
Midnight – BURIAL GROUND: THE NIGHTS OF TERROR (1981)
$5 for individual films! $25 for the whole day!
*****BUY TICKETS HERE*****
NIGHTMARE CASTLE
(aka: GLI AMANTI D’OLTRETOMBA, THE FACELESS MONSTER)
Dir. Mario Caiano, 1965
Italy, 104 min.
Dubbed in English
SATURDAY, OCTOBER 25 – NOON
“You don’t know the hate I have inside, if you could see it you’d be terrified.”
When a vicious count catches his wife Muriel (played the lovely Barbara Steele) being unfaithful, he tortures her and her lover and eventually cuts out their hearts. Things get even dicier (if you can believe it) when the count discovers that he can’t even get any of that sweet murder money as his wife has left everything to her sister Jenny (*also* played by the lovely Barbara Steele) who is currently in a mental institution. Not one to be out-crazied even from the beyond the grave, the count marries the sister and settles in for a nice quiet life. Naturally, the sister begins seeing visions and experiences terrible night hauntings. The ghosts of the murdered Muriel and her lover have returned and the only way to end the terror is to DESTROY THEIR HEARTS!
First released in Italy and then subsequently released in butchered versions all over the world under various titles and runtimes NIGHTMARE CASTLE gained steam as a late night cult favorite due in no small part to the presence of Barbara Steele (last seen in our humble theater as part of SPECTOB3R in THE LONG HAIR OF DEATH) and the atmospheric cinematography of Enzo Barboni. Spectacle kicks off our 4th year with this gothic classic!
SLASH DANCE
Dir. James Shyman, 1989
USA, 83 min.
SATURDAY, OCTOBER 25 – 2:00 PM
“SLASHDANCE has the sad atmospherics of a McDonald’s employee training tape.” – Joseph A. Ziemba, Bleeding Skull
An undercover lady cop (played by G.L.O.W. star “Americana”) gets *in too deep* as she tracks a hooded murderer with a saw in a theater who is picking off members of the troupe. That’s pretty much it, you get the idea.
While doing it’s best to ape the likes of DEATH SPA, KILLER WORKOUT, and even STAGE FRIGHT: AQUARIUS (a Spectacle favorite) this late 80’s slasher is at it’s heart a spandex clad PHANTOM OF THE OPERA ripoff and perfect for a mid-afternoon chuckle. Though it packs about 1/10th of the punch of the films it desperately tries to emulate, it does feature some strange cameos and a death by high heeled shoe. If you bring the nachos, this film brings the cheese.
Massacre Video presents: MONDO MAGIC
(aka: MAGIA NUDA)
Dir. Alfredo Castiglioni, 1975
Italy, 99 min.
In Italian w/ English subtitles
SATURDAY, OCTOBER 25 – 3:30 PM
“One of the bloodiest and most sever pictures of its genre, MONDO MAGIC made even it’s own distributors, Carl Peppercorn and Irving Worsmer, want to vomit.” – Bill Landis, Sleazoid Express
MONDO MAGIC – more daring than MONDO CANE, more shocking than AFRICA BLOOD AND GUTS.
Journey into a world of primitive African tribes, Indian faith healers, and Amazonian hunters. Witness their barbaric rituals and brutal sexual rites. Enter civilizations where gruesome acts of magic are the cornerstones of their cultures. MONDO MAGIC is a horrifying testimonial to the brutality of man, black and white. Not even your bloodiest nightmares can prepare you for MONDO MAGIC, because MONDO MAGIC is real!
Since the very first Spectacle Shriek Show, our pals at Massacre have had a huge presence in every line-up – 555, DEMON QUEEN, THE ABOMINATION – and this year is no different as they bring us what is without a doubt one of the most jaw-dropping and shocking films of all time! Made during the fevered height of the “Mondo” films craze in the 70’s, this shockumentary changed the game and rocked 42nd street audiences to their core. Not to be missed.
KOLOBOS
Dir. Daniel Liatowitsch & David Todd Ocvirk, 1999
USA, 84 min.
SATURDAY, OCTOBER 25 – 5:30 PM
Five strangers agree to live in a lavish house together under constant video surveillance, supposedly for an “experimental film”. The first night unfolds along the lines of any Real World episode, with the attendant personality clashes and flirtations – that is, until blades shoot out of the kitchen appliances, disemboweling Tina, the spastic raver girl, just as the doors and windows slam shut, trapping the survivors. With even more senselessly brutal deaths awaiting them in every booby-trapped room, they turn on each other, eventually uniting their suspicions against their most unstable housemate, artist/mental patient Kyra (who can’t find her pills). But Kyra frantically warns them of a mysterious man she glimpsed on TV slicing his own face off with a razor blade while cackling and chanting “Kolobos…today…I…exist…”
Horror films with a Big Brother-inspired reality TV premise would eventually emerge as a familiar trope in the early aughts with films like MY LITTLE EYE and SERIES 7: THE CONTENDERS but KOLOBOS predated all of them, completed months before Big Brother itself debuted in the US.
Uncommonly for a direct-to-video slasher film, KOLOBOS’S main source of inspiration is Dario Argento, and it is an impassioned tribute indeed, with hyper-gruesome practical effects, set-piece murders, expressionistic lighting, surrealistic logic and an effectively Goblin-esque knock-off score. Loaded also with overt references to Fulci, Bava and early Carpenter, KOLOBOS is one of the earliest explicit odes to 80s horror, even as some of its ghostly phantom effects anticipated films like RINGU and DARK WATER. KOLOBOS is truly an under-appreciated and ahead-of-its-time horror film awaiting rediscovery.
First screened at Spectacle back in May in celebration of it’s 15th Anniversary KOLOBOS fits nicely in what ended up being a very Italian-centric marathon this year while also breaking the mold and making a space all its own.
Horror Boobs presents: MARLEY’S REVENGE: THE MONSTER MOVIE
Dir. Jet Eller, 1989
USA, 83 min.
SATURDAY, OCTOBER 25 – 7:30 PM
“I don’t know about you, man, but I’m still huuuuungry.”
Two bozos get picked up by a gang of vigilantes out to scrub the streets of scum after mistaking the men for drug smugglers. The problem is – they’re actually smuggling in their aunt and uncle. The four are whisked away to the local island where they murder all the other drug smugglers. You know what though? None of this even matters because once they get to the island – things get really out of hand. Zombies rise from the grave, a giant hell monster shows up, and the vigilantes aren’t too pleased either? How will anyone escape this island alive?
Another marathon mainstay and VHS monolith – Horror Boobs has been providing not only marathon fare but midnight fodder at Spectacle for over a decade!* This years entry is…well, something special indeed. With the Spectacle Shriek Show in full swing this will be the proverbial “third bowl of porridge” to your melted brain.
THE STRANGE COLOR OF YOUR BODY’S TEARS
(aka: L’ETRANGE COULEUR DES LARMES DE TON CORPS)
Dir. Hélène Cattet & Bruno Forzani, 2013
Belgium, 102 min.
In French with English subtitles
SATURDAY, OCTOBER 25 – 10:00 PM
“I was amazed with the strange colors of this film!” – mario_c, IMDb user
From directing duo Hélène Cattet & Bruno Forzani (AMER), comes this homage to the masters of classic Italian Giallo horror. Dan returns home to find his wife is missing. With no signs of struggle or break-in and with no help from the police, Dan’s search for answers leads him down a psychosexual rabbit hole. THE STRANGE COLOR OF YOUR BODY’S TEARS is a bloody and taut fantasia of suspense that leaves the viewer entranced in this highly original erotic thriller.
As this years line-up reaches a boiling point, Spectacle is proud to present this visual symphony, this auditory feast, as our penultimate film this year. If you didn’t catch it while it was here a few months ago, now is your chance. A beautiful, unsettling work that begs to be seen.
BURIAL GROUND: THE NIGHTS OF TERROR
(aka: LE NOTTE DEL TERRORE, ZOMBIE III)
Dir. Andrea Bianchi, 1981
Italy, 85 min.
Dubbed in English
SATURDAY, OCTOBER 25 – MIDNIGHT
“The gore is heavy, the violence untamed, and frustrations are augmented
rather than relieved.” – Dan Dendle, The Zombie Movie Encyclopedia
Three groups of couples arrive at a stately villa to visit their friend, a professor, who has (unbeknownst to them) recently been killed by the zombies he elected to raise from the dead. As the reanimated corpses converge on the tasty, mortal flesh of the visitors they manage to hole up in the old mansion and fight off the rampage til the break of dawn. And it don’t stop.
BURIAL GROUND is true to it’s roots – an Italian gut-muncher that even works in a skewered eyeball for good measure. Some edits were even passed off as ZOMBIE III to unsuspecting theater goers. The perfect nightcap to this year’s festivities and just in time for the witching hour. Be on the lookout for a small role by Massacre Video’s own Louis Justin in the background! Blink and you’ll miss him!