Movie Clerks

Filed under: Horror, Cinematical Seven, Lists

Maybe a filmmaker wants to tip their hat to the slashers and psychos who thrilled and chilled them in their youth; perhaps they want to make a post-modern comment on the nature of watching violent entertainment; maybe they just want to scare us good and proper with a moment of sheer blood-curdling terror. Whatever the reason, there are some pretty good horror movies about watching horror movies; here are seven (admittedly skewed towards the modern and the domestic) for your perusal.
1) Scream (1996)
Kevin Williamson’s sly, self-referential script exploded every slasher-flick cliché … and picked some darkly glimmering moments out of the rubble. Starring Neve Campbell as Sidney Prescott, a girl beset by a masked killer, Scream paved the way for a host of imitators, but the original is a surprisingly fresh and remarkably well-structured mystery — plus, Williamson and director Wes Craven’s commentary on the […]

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Filed under: RumorMonger, Fandom, Movie Marketing
Almost every day I receive an email from another online movie writer pointing me toward a “hot” story they’ve written on a “hot” topic. Some of these I decide are worthy of a post, some are not. This evening Devin from CHUD was the latest name to pop into my inbox, and he’s got some tasty Halloween treats that I personally think you might want to check out. First off, the first full-length Cloverfield (or 1-18-08, or Untitled J.J. Abrams Mind-F*ck) is said to be arriving on November 16, with a confirmed title, but Devin claims to have seen the trailer (or an earlier version of it) and he’s published a full report with all kinds of details. Most notably, he says the trailer ends with the title Cloverfield. Granted, knowing Abrams and his crew, they may not stick a title in until the very […]

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Filed under: Horror, Retro Cinema

I come to John Carpenter’s 1978 classic Halloween from an odd perspective. I’m a horror buff, and I’ve been getting the crap scared out of me at the cinema and on video for several decades now. Whether it be current stuff like the Saw films, classics like the Universal Monsters, or mondo obscuro delights like Paul Naschy werewolf flicks from Spain or Messiah of Evil (which I did a Retro Cinema review on a few weeks ago), I’ve seen it all. Well, not quite all. Despite my status as a hardcore horror junkie I only recently watched Halloween for the first time in its entirety. I’ve seen bits and pieces here and there over the years, but this was my first time taking in the whole thing from start to finish (and if you just said “that’s what she said,” then shame on me for handing […]

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Filed under: Drama, Casting, Deals, Scripts & Screenwriting
After wrapping up The X Files, Gillian Anderson practically went into hiding. She’s had a small handful of roles, some time in Bleak House, and that’s about it. But maybe there’s just something about X Files air that makes her feel like working and making the money. She’s wrapped How to Lose Friends and Alienate People, and along with the X Files sequel, she’s got a few other flicks on the way. There’s No One Gets Off in This Town on her docket, and Variety reports that’s she’s now signed on for Kfir Yefet’s The Smell of Apples.
Set in South Africa during the ’70s, Apples is a coming-of-age drama based on Mark Behr’s novel. Marnus Erasmus is a young kid from an affluent, white, South African family who grows in a house of “terrible hatred and ignorance.” Yet he’s also challenged by the […]

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Filed under: Classics, Horror, Images

Happy Halloween from Cinematical! As a special treat, we’ve put together this gallery of some of the great movie monsters, from Lon Chaney Sr. as the Phantom in the 1925 silent film The Phantom of the Opera, to Lon Chaney Jr. as The Wolfman. We have an array of Dracula’s, from Nosferatu (1922 and 1979 versions) to Dracula (Bela Lugosi, Christoper Lee, Frank Langella, and Gary Oldman — who do you like best?). We have a slew of evil children and evil adults in the mix as well. Tell us who your favorite movie monsters are, and who we missed including in our gallery.
If you missed catching any of our Spooktacular Halloween Coverage, you can catch up with it all right here! And don’t forget to let out your own inner monster by entering our fabulous Halloween Costume Contest.

Gallery: Greatest Movie Monsters

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Filed under: Sci-Fi & Fantasy, Fandom, Distribution, 20th Century Fox, DIY/Filmmaking, Newsstand, Remakes and Sequels
It’s taken a bit of time for the trades to catch up to the long-awaited X-Files sequel, currently being referred to as X-Files 2, but now that they have a flurry of information has hit the net. Variety just announced that 20th Century Fox has set a release date of July 25th, 2008 (that’s this summer people!!) for the first X-Files flick in ten years. Unfortunately, that’s all we know right now, and a plot synopsis was not released, but they did offer up the following: “Studio is keeping the film’s logline under wraps, but stressed the pic is a stand-alone story and supernatural thriller that takes the complicated relationship between Mulder and Scully in new directions.”
Hmm, so they’re taking their complicated relationship in new directions, huh? Perhaps the two will get married and have a […]

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Filed under: Comedy, Drama, Sci-Fi & Fantasy, Box Office, Family Films, Box Office Predictions
As expected, Saw IV continued the franchise’s tradition of tearing it up at the Halloween box office, and Dan in Real Life took second place, placating audiences looking for something milder. The only thing that kept me from a perfect score on my prediction was the fact that The Game Plan had a little more life in it than I thought, beating out Tyler Perry’s Why Did I Get Married for fourth place. Ah well, whatcha gonna do. Congrats to Bubba8193 for hitting one out of the park. And now without further ado, here’s last weekend’s final box office numbers:1. Saw IV: $32.1 million.2. Dan in Real Life: $12.1 million.3. 30 Days of Night: $6.7 million.4. The Game Plan: $6.3 million.5. Tyler Perry’s Why Did I Get Married? $5.7 million
Looking for a new release this weekend? Well, […]

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Filed under: Action & Adventure, Drama, Thrillers, Casting, Deals, Sony, Newsstand
Since his Academy Award-nominated turn as a racist cop in Crash, the ever-reliable Matt Dillon has starred as Charles Bukowski’s alter-ego in the drama Factotum and played a hapless husband in the disappointing You, Me and Dupree. He also appeared recently in supporting roles in Kevin Bacon’s drama Loverboy and opposite Lindsay Lohan in the family comedy Herbie: Fully Loaded. That selection of parts has been typical throughout Dillon’s career, as he’s moved easily between the independent and studio worlds and is equally at home in both comedies and dramas.
Now The Hollywood Reporter says that he’s in final negotiations for two more roles, both crime-related. Dillon will play a detective who intercepts the plans of a group of bank robbers in Bone Deep. The article doesn’t say whether Dillon is working for the police or on his own, only […]

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Filed under: Comedy, Drama, Independent, Romance, New Releases, Scripts & Screenwriting, Interviews, The Write Stuff

The Write Stuff interview series continues this week with Nancy Oliver. Nancy got her big break writing for one of my all-time favorite television shows — Six Feet Under. She also wrote the script for the wonderful new film Lars and the Real Girl. The movie is about a young man named Lars (Ryan Gosling), his relationship with a sex doll, and how it affects those around him. Lars is in theaters now. Cinematical: Take us through how you got your start as a writer.
Nancy Oliver: I have always written, since I was a little girl. I would rather have been a rock star, but that didn’t work out. I got serious about it when I was about 21, which was a while ago. I had seen Saturday Night Live, and at the time I was […]

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Filed under: Drama, Casting, Deals, Scripts & Screenwriting, Distribution
In July, I alerted you to a new coming-of-age drama in the works — I Know You Know. It’s about a kid who thinks his dad might work undercover for the British Secret Intelligence Service, otherwise known as SIS or MI6. It’s the second feature for writer/director Justin Kerrigan, who is the man behind the late ’90s club film Human Traffic. And Robert Carlyle, everyone’s favorite Begbie, had signed on to star. Now Variety has reported that Little Film Company has picked up the worldwide distribution rights, and there’s a better synopsis and added cast for the film, which will begin shooting in Cardiff, Wales this November.
As Variety describes it, the film focuses “on a teenager who is fascinated by his father’s espionage work until the world of spies becomes all too real and he slowly begins to understand that his father […]

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