Interviews

Here are some interviews I've conducted over the years with various people involved in the world of horror: from film directors, actors and musicians, to authors, academics and critics...











Popular posts from this blog

A Brief History of the Necronomicon

Image
After my recent viewing of Evil Dead (2013), I found myself thinking about the subtle (and not so subtle) Lovecraftian elements, particularly the creepy arcane tome found in the cellar of the cabin. A prominent feature of the earlier Evil Dead films too, the Necronomicon is an ancient (fictional) grimoire containing summoning spells, incantations, the laws of the dead and various accounts of an unknowable pantheon of cosmic deities known as the Great Old Ones. The Necronomicon was created by HP Lovecraft and appeared in many of his stories. According to Lovecraft scholar ST Joshi, the author was likely inspired to create a fictional grimoire that could drive its reader insane and unleash incomprehensible cosmic horrors from the beyond, by a collection of short stories by Robert Chambers, The King in Yellow (1895). In his essay Supernatural Horror in Literature (1927), Lovecraft describes this collection as: “a series of vaguely connected short stories having as a background a m...
Read more

Valentine (2001)

Image
After reading the sad news about filmmaker Jamie Blanks , I felt compelled to revisit some of his work. I’ve already written about Urban Legend (one of my all-time favourite slasher films), with its irresistible premise, top-notch cast and slick execution, and his eerie eco-horror Long Weekend , so thought I’d turn my attention to his early 2000s slasher, Valentine . It tells of a group of girlfriends - Paige (Denise Richards), Kate (Marley Shelton), Dorothy (Jessica Capshaw), Shelley (Katherine Heigl) and Lily (Jessica Cauffiel) – who, in the days leading up to Valentine’s Day, are targeted by a mysterious killer wearing a cherub mask. A solid slasher with a strong cast, creepy masked killer and several frenzied set pieces to get the adrenaline flowing, Valentine is a real throwback to classic, holiday-themed 80s slashers, such as My Bloody Valentine , Terror Train and Prom Night . Despite coming in the wake of a slew of post-modern, self-referential slashers in the late 90s, b...
Read more

7 Days

Image
2010 Dir. Daniel Grou aka Podz Middle-aged surgeon Bruno Hamel (Claude Legault), his wife Sylvie (Fanny Mallette) and their eight-year-old daughter Jasmine (Rose-Marie Coallier) live a happy, uneventful life in the suburbs of a quiet town. When Jasmine is brutally raped and murdered by a local man, Anthony Lemaire (Martin Dubreuil), Bruno hatches a meticulous plan to make him pay for his crimes. He will kidnap and torture Lemaire for seven days before executing him and then turning himself in… Directed by Daniel Grou ( Vampire High, Big Wolf On Campus, The Hunger ), aka Podz, and adapted for the screen by author Patrick Senécal ('5150 Elm’s Way,' 'Evil Words') from his best-selling novel, ‘Les sept jours du talion,’ 7 Days is an intense and disturbing French-Canadian thriller that has been described as ' Saw directed by Michael Haneke ( Funny Games ) or Lars von Trier ( Antichrist ).’ Coldly filmed in a stylish, yet detached manner, 7 Days is a harrowi...
Read more