HARDWARE

The reason I’m discussing Netflix and not something like Lovefilm is because of hardware compatibility. Both Netflix and Lovefilm will work on PC’s and consoles, but it seems that only Netflix supports the Android OS. Now, since I have Android on my beloved phone and can watch movies when I’m supposed to be working Netflix wins. One down side of both is that they’re in bed with Micro$haft and use Silverlight rather than Flash. This is a definite problem for Linux geeks like myself who can’t get Silverlight due to Microshaft douchbaggery. Worst comes to the worst and I simply must watch a movie on my Linux PC I’ll fire up a virtual machine with Windows in it.

PICTURE

Picture quality is a big thing now-a-days with all this new fangled HD stuff floating around. Personally I can’t see a bit of difference, but then I’m in the stone-age UK. If you choose a relatively new-ish release then you’ll get HD quality from Netflix (and you can alter the picture quality in the settings should you maybe be stuck for bandwidth) but choose an old movie which isn’t in HD and you’ll soon know about it. It’s like watching a video on a Commodore 64.

SELECTION

The choice of movies is another big factor, and in some ways Netflix shines. The Dark Knight? Nope, not on Netflix. In fact there are, surprisingly, no Batman films at all. Not even the early ones. Nude Nuns With Big Guns? Check! No Nightmare on Elm Street movies, no Friday the 13th movies either (not even the remakes) and no Godzilla. So although they’re definitely missing some big big movies, they do seem to shine with the sorts of lesser-known movies that we’d watch.

One strange thing though (no doubt something to do with licensing) is that you can watch Saw V and Saw VII, but there’s no Saw I to VI or Saw VI. Bizarre. Same with some TV series too. You’ll get early series, but not the new stuff, or vice versa.

Don't lie. You loved old 1960's Spiderman.

There are some gems in there (checking some of our reviews against what’s on Netflix) such as Dead Set (which Alex  reviewed right here), old 60′s animated episodes of Spiderman, House of 1,000 Corpses, My Bloody Valentine (the remake), Hobo With A Shotgun, Humanoids From The Deep, Killer Klowns From Outer Space, Night of the Demons (1988), Machine Girl, Tokyo Gore Police, even through to more *ahem* unusual titles such as Hellraiser Inferno, Deader, and Hellseeker. No, none of the good first couple, only the crappy later ones.

INFO/SITE

One good thing about the site is that you can tailor its suggestions. Having run through a bazillion questions about genres and stories, the site will suggest films to watch again (things you’ve marked as already watched), films to watch based on <insert_film_title>, and films that fit particular genres that you like by combining them. So, if you like gory films and foreign films then the site will suggest gory foreign films. Nice!

No, please, don't make me! :'(

Most of the time the suggestions are pretty good and hovering your pointer over a title will give you a little popup that will give you some basic info, with a link to more info, and a quick play button over the title cover. You’ll see what rating the site thinks you’d give it (like hell I’m giving Hellraiser Inferno four stars!) but you can either override that with your true rating (out of five) or you can dismiss the film by telling the site to forget it.

PRICE

So, with all the down sides is Netflix worth it? I’d say so, yes. For six quid a month (other peoples with funny money can do their own conversion) you’re getting unlimited viewing. I can watch movies/TV on my Android device (phone/tablet), my Xbox, or on a non-Linux PC.

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

If you’ve used both, feel free to leave some comments about LoveFilm as, like I said, the only downside to them was a lack of Android support.

THE SILENCE OF WALTER SHELTIN

Bill Oberst Jr. To Show Chops In THE SILENCE OF WALTER SHELTIN 

Horror genre actor Bill Oberst Jr. (known for leads in Fearmakers’ DISMAL, director Michael Emanuel’s upcoming SCARY OR DIE with Corbin Bleu and The Asylum’s August release A HAUNTING IN SALEM in 3-D) has been attached to detach his wife’s head from her body in a fit of postcoital bliss for writer Jeff Palmer’s THE SILENCE OF WALTER SHELTIN, a fan-driven film scheduled for production in late 2011.

Palmer makes an appeal for fan funding in a video that Oberst calls “the funniest and most original Kickstarter video I’ve ever seen.” In the video, Palmer cradles an axe and talks to fans about the film while his offscreen wife’s nagging drives him closer and closer to the brink of murder until…

httpv://www.kickstarter.com/projects/jbpalmer/the-silence-of-walter-sheltin/widget/video.html

Oberst says “THE SILENCE OF WALTER SHELTIN is a purely fan-driven project. It’s not a money-making project so there’s no way we can do it without small donations. It is really a labor of love. Jeff Palmer’s script is skin-crawlingly creepy and a little funny and whole lot of fun. It’s the kind of little film that Rod Serling and Richard Matheson might have made on a weekend off from THE TWILIGHT ZONE or NIGHT GALLERY…a devoted husband has a romantic dinner and passionate sex with his hot wife, and then chops off her head. But why? The answer is even better than the murder. It is a great classic horror script.” A casting search is currently underway for the role of Walter Sheltin’s gorgeous wife.

Fans can pledge a small contribution toward the film’s production budget at http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/jbpalmer/the-silence-of-walter-sheltin  Kickstarter is an all-or-nothing funding site, so no pledges are collected unless the production makes its funding goal by the August 19th deadline. Several appreciation gifts are offered for pledges, including lunch with Oberst and Palmer at a swanky Hollywood restaurant, signed posters, DVDs and an autographed life-size stand-up of Bill as Walter Sheltin clothed in his wife’s blood and a strategically-placed axe (says Oberst, “I’m lobbying for one of Walter’s smoking hot wife in the same pose!“)

“No one is making a dime on this picture,” says Oberst “it’s just a gift we want to wrap up, smear with a little blood and give to fans. I personally appreciate any help. Some films you do for money, some are just for love of horror. This is one of those. Thanks for helping us get it made and for keeping the fun of indie horror alive!“

Cinema Sewer Vol. 3

Woohoo! Cinema Sewer Vol. 3 is almost upon us  folks. From Mr. Bougie himself:

The Cinema Sewer book 3 preorder HAPPENS NOW! Get in the queue early and get your book with the free 1-hour pervy drawing in it quicker!

Order here: http://cinemasewer.ecrater.com/p/11590544/cinema-sewer-book-3-presale-this

Pembalasan ratu pantai selatan (1989) aka: Lady Terminator

If you haven’t read my review of Lady Terminator, or seen the movie, then you need to get your finger out and do so. Pronto!

But, as a bonus, if you click HERE you’ll be able to read an interview with Barbara Anne Constable (aka: Lady Terminator) which was done by the uber-lucky Lew Ojeda, and her reply to one question with “I appeared in Australian Penthouse as ‘November Pet of the Month’ when I was 19 – four years before I made Lady Terminator” means I have a new Google mission.

Tura Satana - R.I.P. - 1935 - 2011

It has been confirmed, by me, that God sucks donkey balls due to the fact that Tura Satana (real name, Tura Luna Pascual Yamaguchi) is dead. She was 75, once turned down a marriage proposal from Elvis, had an amazing rack, and kicked serious ASS.

From FilmShaft.com: She made her debut in Billy Wilder’s Irma Le Douce in 1963 but it is Meyer’s Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! which made her an exploitation cinema star. Santana starred as Varla the leader of a vicious gang of go-go dancers in what has been described as an “ode to female violence”. It is easily Meyer’s best film.

Seriously, how many more awesome cult actors/actresses is God going to steal from us? This God character is out of control and needs a good kicking…

My Top Ten WATCHES of 2010 from Ronnie on Vimeo.

P.S. I love you guys  & gals.  Give mad props to the author of this on youtube if you dig it.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=61RJGQcG_sM&feature=player_embedded

This new trailer has some new scenes, no full facial shots of Freddy yet, but some iconic scenes from previous films such as Freddy’s hand in the bath (which was in the first trailer) but in trailer 2 we also see the scene where Freddy is pressing through the wall which was also in a previous NoES movie.

Freddy’s voice has also changed, thankfully, in the first trailer it was quite emotionless and robotic, in trailer two is sounds more like Haley did in The Watchmen.

Anyway… go have a looksy!

Alexander "Sawney" Bean at the entrance to his cave.

And now, we take a moment from our ‘normal’ programming schedule to bring you something a little different, yet still related to horror movies. Several movies have been based upon the tale of Sawney Bean and his cannibalistic family, The Hills Have Eyes being one such movie.

Our tale begins in the 16th century, in East Lothian (near Edinburgh), Scotland. Alexander “Sawney” Bean (sometimes called Beane) grew up working hard labour with his father and quickly realised that honest labour wasn’t for him and fled with a woman, a reputed witch, by the name of Agnes.

The couple ended up living in a coastal cave in Bannane Head near Galloway (now South Aryshire) where they lived undetected for over 25 years rearing several children. The cave was several hundred yards deep and when the tide rose the entrance was blocked by water and inaccessible.

After many years grandchildren appeared. The product of an incestuous, lawless, family. The family included eight sons, six daughters, eighteen grandsons and fourteen granddaughters. Since Bean had tried and disliked honest labour, the family would lay careful ambushes at night to rob and murder passers-by. The dead were taken back to the cave, dismembered, and cannibalised. It is said they even took to robbing fresh graves for ‘food’.

As more and more people began to vanish in the area several searches were done of the area, one search passed by their cave since the men refused to believe anyone could live in such conditions.

Bannane Cave where it's alleged Bean and his family lived.

One night, the Bean family attacked a couple riding from a fair on horse back, but the man fought them off with sword and pistol but not before the clan had mauled his wife to death. A large group of fairgoers appeared and the Bean family fled in fear.

It’s said that King James VI of Scotland personally led a manhunt with a team of  over 400 men and several bloodhounds. It was the bloodhounds who lured the men to the coastal cave where the family were finally captured. Taken, in chains, to the Tollbooth in Edinburgh, where they were executed without trial. The men had their hands and feet cut off and left to bleed to death. The women were to watch the men bleed to death then be burned at the stake.

Fact of Fiction?

No one knows for sure whether the tale of Sawney Bean is a myth, several investigators have found no evidence of disappearances in the area at the reputed time of the Bean family, but one theory is that the story was political propaganda from the English to make the Scots seem more barbaric and animalistic.

But the tale of Sawney Bean also closely resembles the story of Christie Cleek which was in the 1400′s, earlier than Sawney Bean.

Christie Cleek

Andrew Christie was a butcher, by trade, in Perth.During a great famine in the mid-1400′s Christie joined a group of scavengers in the Grampian mountains. When one of the party died of starvation, Christie put his butcher skills to work on the corpse and fed himself and the group. They now began to ambush travellers as food. Christie used a hook on a pole to haul his victims from their horse, this device was a ‘cleke’, a hook or crook, hence his nickname, Cleek. Eventually an armed force from Perth defeated the group but not before Christie fled. He was never heard from again.

But the name, and story, of Christie Cleek was used in a bogeyman-like fashion to silence even the most unruly of kids, so maybe Christie Cleek is a myth too.

Of course, no one knows for sure whether Sawney Bean, or Christie Cleek are fact or fiction, but they’ve given rise to some more well known stories such as Wes Craven’s The Hills Have Eyes (1977), which has a family of cannibals in a more modern setting. Several bands have written songs about Sawney Bean but, sadly, no one has yet made a decent movie on the tale of the incestuous Bean family. Maybe one day, when some rich benefactor gives me the budget…

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YouTube has a video which gives a tour of the reputed Sawney Bean cave in South West Scotland: