Tag Archives: monster

Escape Presents: The Abominable Snowman – Fun, Old Radio Adventure

I used to listen to the CBS Mystery Theater radio program late at night as a kid and, then, in later years tried to relive those happy moments by  collecting old cassette recorded copies of similar radio drama programs.  I stumbled upon this gem, the 1950’s era Escape show and its feature, “The Abominable Snowman”.

The story is presented in an economic style with a handful of characters, emotive music and gobs of sound effects.  All the better that there are no visuals involved so that your mind’s eye can more effectively play tricks on you.  The imagination can be a powerfully suggestive thing.

A search ensues in the Himalayan mountains to find evidence of an Abominable Snowman or Wildman.  Some things are just better left alone.  Tragedy ensues.  Drama.

This is definitely a nice road trip companion to play as the miles melt away.  Just be sure not to pull the car off into some darkly lit, remote location.  Who knows what lurks in the shadows?

 

Another Five Choices For A Halloween Marathon Movie Day/Night

When you get right down to it, there are a ton of potential choices for Halloween movie viewing marathons.  For the sake of brevity, I am choosing just five selections which will still take you a good day to get through so plan ahead to take the day off from your work or school grind!

  1.  Wolfen (1981) – a cop is assigned to investigate a series of animal attacks.  Is there a pack of werewolves on the loose in modern day New York?  Some creepy situations and a suspenseful story should keep you entertained throughout.  Albert Finney and Gregory Hines are the stars of this one.
  2. Attack Of The Mushroom People (1963) – OK.  This one is really freaky.  A group of young folk out on a boat trip have an accident and are stranded on a mysterious island.  They take refuge in another landlocked but larger ship.  The ship’s journal is examined and a warning is discovered:  don’t eat the island’s ample mushroom supply.  In order to survive, they’ve got to eat and it’s just easier to grab some of the island’s main staple.  That, as you will find out, is a big mistake.  Dripping with atmosphere and garish color, this is a must see shocker.
  3. The Thing (1951) – Science fiction film cornerstone that still maintains its freshness to this day.  An alien spaceship is discovered buried in the ice by an American military team stationed in a remote arctic outpost.  Although the ship is destroyed, the craft’s only surviving occupant is accidentally reawakened and is in a thoroughly pissed off frame of mind.  A last stand ensues as humans battle a formidable alien foe to the death.  Essential viewing!
  4. The Lost Continent (1968) – More whacked out material as a group aboard a doomed ocean freighter become stranded in the Sargasso Sea, a place of strange clogging and rampant seaweed and some cool matte painting shots of a ship graveyard.  Yes.  There have been others who have also unfortunately succumbed to the deadly area.  Attempting to find a way out of the morass, the ship’s inhabitants have a run in with a population of lost in time Spanish conquistadors who rule the region by force.  Also thrown into the mix are some oversized creepy crawlies who see anything on two legs as there next meal.  This is all great fun.
  5. Lifeforce (1985) – A huge alien ship is investigated by a team of astronauts from Earth and three seemingly human survivors from the other worldly ship are brought onboard the astronaut’s space shuttle.  One by one the human crew succumb to some bizarre malady with only a sole survivor who incinerates the shuttle and takes an escape pod back to Earth.  A rescue mission recovers the three aliens from the wrecked shuttle to the detriment of the human population as they come out of a dormant state and seek out our life sustaining energy or lifeforce.  A plague ensues on Earth as these energy vampires plunder our planet.  Epic destruction and carnage result.  Pretty entertaining!

So there are another five fine films that I would personally take a day/night to sit through consecutively for a perfect Halloween viewing experience!

EXISTS – 2014 – TRAILER

I started watching this from about the half way point and got hooked.  This is your basic kids stranded in a lonely cabin with no way to get past or rid of the nasty, howling bigfoot creature which wants to avenge itself on them.  Fairly effective “found footage” approach is used throughout.  One of the humans in peril is video recording the whole adventure.  The scene with the guy on the mountain bike and the GoPro trying to find a cell phone signal and, then, trying to outpace a hotly pursuing sasquatch is pretty nerve wracking.  Exists brings to mind a similar tale from the ’70’s, “The Creature from Black Lake”.  Don’t mess with Mother Nature’s babies may be the lesson here.

LAKE MONSTER PHOTOGRAPHED?

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A camera set to take photographs at select time intervals catches a strange shape rising out of a lake near Loch Ness.  Is it a log, a large fish, a camera aberration?  You be the judge.  The Internet is just full of such mysterious photos/videos that allegedly show proof of mythic beasts.  One day solid proof of such unusual phenomenon may materialize.

LASERBLAST (1978) TRAILER

th (15)This picture was made on a small budget and sports some Ray Harryhausen style stop motion animation effects.  Pretty good effects at that.  Sometimes the figures and models look out of scale with their background but the motion achieved is more than adequate.  This is a good flick for a lazy Saturday afternoon:  enough thrills to keep you occupied but nothing spectacular either.  Kid finds blaster in the desert which allows him to blow things to smithereens.  Cool!  The unfortunate side effect of the weapon is that it turns the kid into a hideous green- hued monster.  The alien owners of the weapon show up and reclaim it from the kid but not without a fight.  I suppose it is a cautionary tale: don’t mess with what you don’t understand.  An otherwise innocent youth not even in his prime is corrupted by the awesome force he uncovers and is corrupted absolutely.  Sounds like too much TV, movies, and Internet usage.