Deep Red: Bizarro Movie Night Salutes Italian Horror Cinema this Saturday!

This week's Bizarro Movie Night presentation at the Aster Coffee is boldly breaking Bizarro Movie Night tradition, with a screening of...

A good movie.

Yes, you read right; a good movie. Rest assured, though, it'll still be certifiably Bizarro.

Some of the finest, strangest, most vividly colorful, and most feverishly imaginative horror films ever made sprang forth from Italy in the last half of the twentieth century. And the most important creative figure in that country's genre output was Mario Bava.

Bava paid his dues as a special effects man and assistant director on several Italian action films and dramas throughout the 1950's. Then in 1960 he made his directorial debut with Black Sunday, an atmospheric black-and-white chiller that marked the first leading role for Barbara Steele, a raven-haired British actress whose large, expressive eyes and alien beauty made her a horror movie icon for the ages.

Three years later, Bava made Black Sabbath, a horror movie anthology in which his penchant for eye-popping primary colors and heady atmosphere came into full flower. Without really trying, Black Sabbath established several templates for the horror genre over the next two decades. It gave birth to a distinctive sub-genre known as the giallo, and bridged the gap between the elegant subtlety of the old-school Universal monster movies and the more violent and psycho-sexual content of modern horror cinema.

Throughout the 1960's, '70's, and '80's, Italian directors such as Dario Argento, Antonio Margheriti, and Lucio Fulci further pushed the boundaries of the horror film. And the ripple effects of Mario Bava's influence echo today through more extreme thrillers like Jonathan Demme's Silence of the Lambs, and within the untethered color palate of director Tim Burton (himself such an enormous Bava fan that he toyed for years with remaking Bava's Black Sunday).

We're planning on screening Black Sabbath at the Aster on Saturday. In addition to being a terrific, gloriously creepy film on its own, it's also an important milestone in the cinema of the fantastic. And with Your Schlockologist Truly on hand to introduce this masterwork, you're nuts to miss it!

The Fat Man Lands at the Aster TONIGHT!!

Hola, Fiends and Neighbors!

Yep, you read right: The Fat Man himself--Santa Claus--lands at the Aster tonight! And he's bringing a few pals...

Merlin the Magician!

The Sweaty Red-Bearded Keymaker Ogre!

Lupita the Guilt-Ridden Doll Thief!!

And everyone's favorite mewling neurotic windbag, Old Pitch the Devil!

Just when I think Rene Cardona's Santa Claus can't mess with my mind anymore, it sticks a (pitch)fork in and twists it again. Come join Ye Olde Schlockologist for the Most Astonishing Christmas Film Ever Made, tonight at 7:30!! 

Bikes! Babes! Brawls! Rock! Bizarro Bikesploitation Night, Tomorrow!

Yes, Fiends and Neighbors, another Bizarro Movie Night awaits tomorrow at the ever-lovin' Aster Coffee Lounge. And Ye Olde Schlockologist will turn his nerd-laser focus on that beloved sub-genre known as The Biker Flick!

In the 1954 drama The Wild One, a girl asks motorcycle rebel Johnny (Marlon Brando), "What're you rebelling against?" His reply: "Whadda ya got?"

It was a pop-culture shot heard 'round the world, and youth-in-rebellion movies gradually built momentum throughout the 1950s with Juvenile Delinquency flicks like Hot-Rod Gang and High School Confidential. But it took B-movie Godfather Roger Corman to hurtle motorcycle gangs solidly into the mix with his 1966 exploitation classic, The Wild Angels. For years after, cinemas and drive-ins were filled with the din of roaring Harleys, and the Bacchanalian exploits of the Hell's Angels and myriad other cycle gangs (real and fictional).

For tomorrow's Bizarro festivities, we hope to unspool some great JD/bikesploitation trailers and one hell of a rip-roaring feature. The latter's still being determined, but we're 99% sure it'll involve souped-up hogs, Big Bill Smith, rocket launchers, machine guns, Paul Koslo, and lots of things blowing up. And it may or may not've been covered in this electronic Den of Iniquity before...

Be there at 8pm, Daddy-O! 

At long last, Bizarro Movie Night RETURNS!!

Yes, Fiends and Neighbors, Bizarro Movie Night is back at the lovely Aster Coffee Lounge in Ballard! Tonight, we'll explore the demented, rattletrap wonder that is Turkish pop cinema.

The film industry in Turkey exploded in the 1960's, and for twenty years it delivered action, scares, thrills, titillation, and flat-out dementia to the thrill-seeking masses in its native land. Before that hideous jabbering box known as television homogenized and squashed the collective consciousness, Turkey's film industry burst at the seams with science fiction, horror, leering sex comedies, and double-barrelled action; all delivered with rattletrap energy and a distinctive flair that filtered Western pop culture through its own skewed and gloriously exotic lens.

Oftentimes, that filter outright caught undigested clumps of influences. The country's filmmakers pumped up plots straight out of old action serials with vivid color and eye-popping sex and violence; lifted plots wholesale from US sources (you haven't lived until you've seen the Turkish riffs on E.T, Superman, and The Exorcist); and in some cases even pilfered scenes wholesale (The Men Who Saved the World, Turkey's incarnation of Star Wars, is plastered with actual clips from George Lucas's film--copyright laws be DAMNED!).

Ye Olde Schlockologist will be on hand to give you the straight skinny on the Turkish film industry, and to present one of the wildest and wooliest examples of Turkish cinema taffy to your unsuspecting eyes!

Rest assured, you'll not want to miss it! And be ready for more to come in the coming months!

Goodbye to Michael Gough, Bizarro-Worthy Character-Acting God

The Bizarro Freak flag flies at half-mast in honor of actor Michael Gough, who passed away at age 94 on St. Patrick's Day.

Gough's most high-profile role was that of Alfred the butler, Bruce Wayne's avuncular and paternal Man Friday, in the 1990's Batman movies. And with all due respect to Michael Caine, Gough captured that character's combination of old-school English elegance and mischief more artfully than anyone. Even when Joel Schumacher reduced the franchise to a jackhammer-paced, stunt-casted, empty-headed series of eyesores, the venerable actor always classed up the joint (or, more appropriately, the Batcave). Gough also lent solid supporting work in some truly great films over the years, including Out of Africa and the affecting British drama, The Dresser.

But for Ye Olde's money, Gough's finest moments onscreen were in the many horror films he graced from the 1950's through the 1970's. For a good couple of decades, he rivalled the great Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee as a presence in British thrillers, playing villains with welcome versatility. He could chew the scenery with over-the-top Vincent-Price-ian relish one minute; then deliver characters of icy-cold, quietly terrifying malevolence the next. Farewell, dear Mr. Gough: You knew how to chill the world to the bone.

Officially-Bizarro-Worthy Michael Gough:

Horror of Dracula (1958): Gough's solid work in this classic Hammer chiller makes the throwaway character of Arthur Holmwood, skeptical sibling of vampire-bait Mina Holmwood, believeable and sympathetic.

Horrors of the Black Museum (1959): Gough, in sublime form, plays a mystery writer prone to re-enacting some of his most gruesome written murders for reals in this deliciously nasty British shocker.

Konga (1961): Sleazy villains don't come any more heartless and cut-throat than Gough's mutant-gorilla-wrangling Dr. Decker in this ridiculous (and extremely entertaining) Herman Cohen B-flick.

Phantom of the Opera (1962): I've always been fond of Hammer's unfairly-ignored redux of the old Gaston LeRoux chestnut (go here for a more detailed assessment of the movie), in no small part due to Michael Gough's perfectly-realized and thoroughly chilling Ambrose D'Arcy, an impressario who robs artists, crushes careers, and attempts murder with disdainful and disarming ease.

Dr. Terror's House of Horrors (1965): In one of the greatest anthology horror movies ever, Gough plays a tortured artist driven to suicide by the cutting derision of (and accidental mutilation by) art critic Christopher Lee. It's an affecting performance perfectly in keeping with the film's pulp-horror nightmare archetypes.

Horror Hospital (1973): In one of the most absurd and trashy exploitation movies of the Bell-Bottom Era, Gough sinks his teeth--ravenously--into the role of Dr. Christian Storm, a thoroughly nutty medico fond of hacking up victims, in the name of crazed mind-control experiments. Bonus points for the sedan with the attached head-lopping blade.

Sleepy Hollow (1999): Tim Burton earned major Bizarro props for reviving Michael Gough's career when he hired the actor to play Alfred in the 1989 Batman. Burton also utilized Gough's distinctive voice as the Dodo in Alice in Wonderland, and as Elder Gutknecht in Corpse Bride. Sleepy Hollow marks one of Gough's last onscreen appearances, and in his brief moment on camera he plays grizzled Notary Hardenbrook with pitch-perfect geezerly crustiness.

Schlockologist's Factoid-Crammed Skull Profiled in Seattle Weekly!

Hola, Fiends and Neighbors! Ye Olde Schlockologist has been pummelled upside the melon in recent weeks by that beloved but pesky day job and various irons in the fire. But if you're jonesing for a Bizarro Binge, Ye Olde is in negotiations with the awesome folks at the lovely Aster Coffee Lounge for another Bizarro Movie Night; or more appropriately, a Bizarro Movie Festival! Stay Tuned...

Meantime, in other news, one of the many irons brandished in Chez Bizarro's furnace has been Tuesday Night Trivia at the Bourbon Bar in Columbia City Theater. It's been a blast; fun-loving crowds of regulars, masterfully-mixed cheap drinks, bar food par excellance prepared by a phenomenal chef, and a definitive excuse to empty out some of the useless trivia crammed in my head for fun and profit (or at least a couple of extra bucks).

And the word's been getting around to all sorts of places; most recently the Seattle Weekly, which highlighted Bourbon Bar's Tuesday Night Trivia on its blog. Go here for all the details. And while you're at it, you can check us out on Facebook, right about here.

'Til again, Fiends and Neighbors!

Beat the Bizarro Movie Night Hiatus Blues with...Tuesday Trivia Night with Tony Kay!

Buenos Whatever, Fiends and Neighbors!

While we're still in Bizarro Hiatus, Ye Olde Schlockologist has been spending Tuesday nights regaling the throngs in Columbia City with Trivia Nights, Tuesdays at the Bourbon Bar in Columbia City!

If you've been hankering for those obscuro factoids and that witty banter you've grown to know and love from Bizarro Movie Night, head down to the Bourbon Bar at Columbia City Theater every Tuesday at 8pm for a hearty helping of both! We've done four of these already, to an enthusiastic audience. This ain't your mama's lame canned-from-the-web trivia monotony, Fiends and Neighbors: This is (mostly) yours truly pulling as much stuff from the dank recesses of his own trivia-saturated mind as possible, giving local crowds a chance to flex their smarts (or at least learn a little somethin' about darn near everythin'!).

So far we've covered Rock and Roll, Horror Movies (for Halloween), and two weeks of The Big 1980's. Next up, two weeks' worth of Movie Trivia!

Admission's free, and it's all-night Happy Hour with many tasty beverages, so get your tushes down to Columbia City next week, for Pete's Sake!