WISE WORDS:

 

SALLY THE ZOMBIE CHEERLEADER'S A GHOUL'S GUIDE TO HORROR: THE VIDEO DEAD

Sally the Zombie Cheerleader's A Ghoul's Guide to Horror takes on an amusing entry from the 1980s: The Video Dead. 

The 1987, MGM/Embassy release, written, produced and directed by Robert Scott, was, in fact, dispatched straight to VHS, which suits its premise just fine. Its Twilight Zone/Poltergeist/Friday the 13th: The Series-ish slant features a cursed television that pushes a Night of the Living Dead knockoff into our reality, with all the gnarly, flesh-eating mayhem one might expect.

As with any zombie flick worth its salt, the tale's thrust is a survivalist one, and like the best of 'em, this submission makes excellent use of its undead designs. (My favorite zombie is the David Bowie-ish one, though I also dig the stumbling fellow with a clothing-iron in his head, the shriveled bride, the scarecrow gent and the one-armed chap with an exposed, grinning skull. Yep, cuties one and all!) 

Sally, an authentic zombie if ever there was, knows her subject well and covers the creative ins and outs of Scott's production, enough to make her fleshie followers appreciate this macabre, low-budget labor of love all the more. 

It's been years since I've viewed The Video Dead, but Sally's rundown inspired me to revisit it. The movie meant a lot to me back in the day, and I'm happy to report that my fondness has been restored. Thank you, Sally, for the scholarly nudge!

One may study Sally's prolific, Video Dead "guide" at 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_uaouCSVoa0&t=442s

COLLECTIBLE TIME: ROLLING STONE'S DAVID BOWIE SPECIAL EDITION

I found a neato item on a sojourn for my wife's prescriptions: a Rolling Stone commemorative, David Bowie issue. 

The collector's edition contains articles by Kurt Loder, Cameron Crowe, Rob Sheffield, Brian Hiatt, Mikal Gilmore, David Browne and Timothy Ferris. The contents and analyses span Bowie's glittery career, covering his Space Oddity/Major Tom phase, Ziggy Stardust, the Thin White Duke, the ubiquitous, MTV '80s and beyond. 

Bowie's masterful music is explored throughout the majority of the edition, with emphasis on such praised and popular albums as The Man Who Sold the World, Hunky Dory, Aladdin Sane, Diamond Dogs, Low, Heroes, Pin Ups, Young Americans, Station to Station, Lodger, Scary Monsters, Let's Dance, Tin Machine I & II ... and Blackstar. 

Along with these classic albums, several of Bowie's movies are featured (Just a Gigolo, The Man Who Fell to Earth, The Hunger and Labyrinth), teamed with his imaginative videos, television, guest appearances and superstar collaborations, including his famous, Christmas pairing with Bing Crosby. 

Bowie's knack for style (often outlandish and sometimes just downright classy) is documented, accompanied by aspects of his personal life, which encompasses his marriages, general struggles and the woeful period that led to his untimely passing. 

The David Bowie: Special Rolling Stone Edition may not be the most comprehensive offering on the man and his legend, but it works as a satisfying sampling of his iconic stature and rousing, creative contributions. Any true, Bowie fan must purchase it, and all serious, music lovers must add it to their libraries. 

Rolling Stone's Bowie tribute is available at bookstores, drugstores and supermarkets nationwide. 

PINUP TIME: DOROTHY PROVINE AT 30 FEET

MR. LOBO'S CINEMA INSOMNIA: BELA LUGOSI MEETS A BROOKLYN GORILLA PREORDER

 

Mr. Lobo's Cinema Insomnia 25th Anniversary is upon us, and to mark it, our gracious host is presenting one of the greatest, "misunderstood" movies of all time: Bela Lugosi Meets a Brooklyn Gorilla. It premiers on March 28, on Twitch, OSI74/Roku and Amazon Fire at 10pm. However, the historic contents are captured on an illustrious Blu-ray, which one can preorder right here and now at https://www.osi74.com/. 

When I was a wee lad and discovered Bela Lugosi Meets a Brooklyn Gorilla, I mistook Sammy Petrillo for Jerry Lewis and thought that Duke Mitchell was maybe an alternate costar before Dean Martin came along. Of course, I was wrong, but being that I couldn't read the credits at that naïve age, let alone research the matter, I just went with the flow, nurturing my misconception. 

Years later, I discovered the truth behind the 1952 production and came to appreciate its inadvertent quirkiness, which only made the movie more endearingly bizarre. 

Directed by William (Ghost Chasers) Beaudine and written by Tim (Dead Men Tell) Ryan, the plot pits Petrillo and Mitchell, who portray "themselves," against Lugosi's mad scientist, Dr. Zabor, who wants to implant Mitchell's brain into a gorilla on Kola Kola Island. The headlining duo is chased by lusty, native women (Muriel Landers and Charlita), with Ramona the Chimp layering on much of the mush, as she falls for Petrillo who's happy to ape Lewis throughout every speck of the calamity. Honey-voiced Mitchell cuts in to share his breezy tunes, and Lugosi remains in supreme form, doing his ever iconic, sinister thing. 

Despite the fact that Lewis wished to seize the flick (i.e. stomp it into oblivion), Brooklyn Gorilla managed to make the UHF rounds, and because of its surreal nature, it now inspires further, misunderstood fun, in particular that of Mr. Lobo, who surrounds it with linking skits, trailers, the Horsen Milken (Reel 7) Girl and her nifty puppet, Professor Shrimply, good ol' Kogarilla and the hilarious, Petrillo impersonator, Gary Blemish (who, if one can believe it, pitches a Birth of a Nation rock opera). To embellish this prolific succession, there are time-warping, nostalgic segments that cover Mr. Lobo's vast, informative career. That's right. This one leaps all over the place to ensure one's uttermost, wraparound pleasure.  

It should go without saying that Mr. Lobo's Cinema Insomnia Presents Bela Lugosi Meets a Brooklyn Gorilla will go down as a wild winner; so make it a point to embrace (and own!) its commemorative hijinks.

FOR THE FUN OF IT:

 

I SAW DRACULA 2025

Writer/director Luc (Leon: The Professional/The Fifth Element) Besson's Dracula: A Love Tale is the latest, cinematic take on Bram Stoker's perennial novel. It's a remake, therefore, but more so, a remake of a remake: a specialized turn, indeed, but this wouldn't be the first time such an uncanny revival was achieved. 

Victor Fleming's 1941 adaptation of Robert Louis Steven's Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde is, in fact, a redux of Rouben Mamoulian's 1931 adaptation. The productions are reflections of each other, with precise, comparative components shared from one to the other, including the character of Ivy, played first by Mariam Hopkins and later by Ingrid Bergman. (For the record, Ivy is an evident retooling of Nita Naldi's Gina from John S. Robertson's 1920, silent classic.) 

For Besson's 2025 Dracula, which shifts its chief location from England to France, we're dealt an imprint of Francis Ford Coppola's 1992 Bram Stoker's Dracula. (Some have argued that Dario Argento's controversial, 2012 edition is as much a remake of Coppola's, though others maintain that it only reframes several key scenes from the earlier picture.) The parallel between the 1992 and 2025 retellings makes Mina Murray not just a fetching lass who catches the Count's eye, but rather his reincarnated love. (This idea was used in Karl Freund/John L. Balderston's The Mummy, which many consider an unofficial reimagining of Dracula.) 

Also, as in the Coppola retelling, the Turk-battling Dracula rejects Christianity when his love is struck dead. Dracula's mate, in this respect, is named Elisabeta in both the 1992 and 2025 versions, fitting the carryover tradition set by the Jekyll/Hyde set. (Please note: Elisabeta doesn't exist in Stoker's novel or in any other Dracula play, series or movie.)

Caleb Landry (The Last Exorcism) Jones is quite effective as the suave, parasitic lead, tapping the Gothic, Old World command of Bela Lugosi, John Carradine, Francis Lederer, Christopher Lee, Zandor Vorkov, Louis Jordan, Frank Langella, Michael Nouri, Duncan Regehr, Geordie Johnson, Gerard Butler, Thomas Kretschmann, Jonathan Rhys Meyers ... and Claes Bang, underscored by Gary Oldman's anxious, grief-ridden hostility and the fever-eyed avidity of Udo Kier, Howard Vernon, Klaus Kinski and Lon Chaney Sr.'s Man in the Beaver Hat, as captured in so many London After Midnight stills. 

Zoe Bleu plays the Elisabeta/Mina counterparts, with Matilda De Angelis as the enslaved Maria (i.e. Lucy Westenra) and Christoph Waltz (who struck a jolting chord in Guillermo del Toro's Frankenstein) as the Priest, an Abraham Van Helsing surrogate (and implied exorcist), who imbues his character with an endurance that recalls Anthony Hopkins' 1992 incarnation, supplemented by a decent strand of Peter Cushing's from his Hammer chapters, Andrew Keir's Father Sandor from Terence Fisher's Dracula: Prince of Darkness, Herbert Lom's from Jess Franco's Count Dracula and Hugh Jackman's from Stephen Sommers' monster rally, Van Helsing.

Comprising the biding, supporting cast is Ewens Abid as Jonathan Harker, Guillaume de Tonquedec as Dr. Dumont (i.e. John/Jack Seward) and David Shields as Henry Spencer (i.e. a blending of Arthur Homewood and Quincy Morris). It should be noted that the alteration of names is an explored (if not copyright-deceiving) horror-movie practice used in F.W. Murnau's Nosferatu, as well as Stephen Weeks' I, Monster, an Amicus reimagining of Jekyll/Hyde, though the entirety of Dark Shadows did much the same without an ounce of shame. (Is Jonathan Frid's Barnabas Collins not Dracula in disguise?)  

Jones' indefatigable "Vlad of Wallachia" pursues Mina much like Oldman's version pursues his own (though in Jones' case, with a few Highlander-styled flashbacks along the way). These Draculas are prompted not by superficial lust, but to reinstate their plundered existences, all within stretches that grow insufferable without Elisabeta. Whether with the 1992 or 2025 entry, Dracula believes (if only per implication) that regaining his love will spur his redemption: that the power of love eradicates sin. Of course, this notion is naive, and with a committed vampire hunter on his tail, any second chance for the Count is marked by inevitable comeuppance. Dracula, after all, must pay for his deeds, which pushes the movie to its despairing conclusion. (Danny Elfman's mercurial/music-box-ish score billows through this emotional motif, referencing a popular, Dark Shadows passage, though Colin Wandersman's cinematography counters the idyllic sweeps with militaristic heft and unearthly foreboding.) 

Make no mistake, though Dracula: A Love Tale probes affairs of the heart (and is devoid of wolf and bat transformations, castle brides and alas, an insect-nibbling R.M. Renfield), it does get monstrous when need be, offering a dozen gargoyle servants in its Carpathian phases and down the morbid line, one snappy decapitation. Even so, the production's amorous aura devours most of its menace, placing it alongside other such tender takes as the obvious, Coppola edition, Javier Aguirre/Paul Naschy's Dracula's Great Love, Bram Stoker's Dracula 1974 (directed by Dark Shadows' Dan Curtis and starring Jack Palance), the Cliffhangers serial, The Curse of Dracula (with the aforementioned, pre-Flashdance Nouri), Dracula Untold (a passionate prequel with Luke Evans), Love at First Bite (a jaunty escapade with George Hamilton) and William Crain's Blacula (a modern, Dracula spinoff, starring William Marshall, which holds a lost-love, reincarnation angle of its own.) 

Stoker's novel was always considered romantic, if only in the way it could quicken a reader's pulse. Dracula: A Love Tale plucks that string, and for those who appreciate the warmth behind a vampire's clamminess, this one should fit like a custom-made glove. Take a bite. You might just find that this weird, love tale stakes the right, reiterated spot.