Mystery Photo 2-15

Since I had to work yesterday, when I got up this morning, I had no concept of what day it was, which is why this wasn’t posted first thing this morning. Or at least, that is the excuse I’m using. But none the less, it is still Monday, so we have new pic. But of course, before we get to it, let’s go over last week’s photo. It was from the 1971 film The Nightcomers, which was a disurbing prequel to the famous Henry James’ novel, Turn of the Screw. We only got one correct answer sent in, and that was from Hoby Abernathy. Well done, sir!

Okay, let’s get to this week’s photo. Might be a little easier…might be.

Please remember not to post your answers here, but send us an email to jon@kitleyskrypt.com. Good Luck!

mp021516

Horror History – Edwige Fenech

edwigefenech.jpgEdwige Fenech
Born Dec. 24th, 1948

If you have watched more than a handful of Italian giallos, then chances are you’ve seen Edwige Fenech in action. And she is one that is hard to forget. Born in France, she started her career in beauty contests, eventually moving into modeling. In 1967, she made her film debut in the comedy All Mad About Him. She continued to work making films, mostly comedies, in France, Germany, and Italy. Her first real thriller was Top Sensation (1969), that co-starred another Italian sex symbol Rosalba Neri. She appeared in Mario Bava’s 5 Dolls for an August Moon (1970), then the following year starred in her first film with director Sergio Martino, the 1971 film The Strange Vice of Mr.s Wardh (aka Blade of the Ripper). She would go on to star in quite a few giallos in the next few years, many of them for Martino, titles such as All the Colors of the Dark (1972), The Case of the Bloody Iris (1972), Your Vice is Locked Room and Only I Have the Key (1972), and even with director Ruggero Deodato in Phantom of Death (1988).

In the ’80s, she became a television personality, hosting a talk show for a while. After a while, she moved into movie producing, which she  has been doing since. She even co-produced the 2004 version of The Merchant of Venice starring Al Pacino.

Seeing Fenech’s name in any movie was always an extra bonus. Such a great talent and just beautiful to watch, she is one of the reasons that Italian giallos are still as popular these days as they were back then. Of course, it might have also helped since she was usually in some form of undress during the movie….a lot.

Interview: David Schmoeller

schmoellerinterviewbanner

If you are a fan of Full Moon’s Pupptet Master series, then you hopefully should know that director David Schmoeller was the guy that started it all. But he also made a few other great genre pic, including getting to work with the infamous Klaus Kinski. This interview was conducted at the Cinema Wasteland show on March 31st, 2012.

Kitley’s Krypt: What made you decide to get into filmmaking?

Continue reading

Horror History – Jack Asher

asherJack Asher
Born Mar. 29th, 1916 – Died Apr. 1991

One of thing that Hammer films are most known for are the way they look, especially their early Gothic horror titles that really catapulted them into popularity.  While the talents on the screen of Peter Cushing, Christopher Lee, and the rest of the stellar actors used, and even the talented directors and writers, one of the reasons these pictures looked like they did was because of the cameraman, Jack Asher.

He started in the film business as something as simple as the guy who was to open and close the door while filming was being done.  Eventually, he was asked to join the camera crew by Roy Kallino, at the bottom, learning the basics like loading the film into the magazines and working his way up, to eventually becoming a camera operator himself.  He worked on some of Hammer’s early color films and is definitely party of the reasons those films look like they did.  He worked on CURSE OF FRANKENSTEIN, HORROR OF Dracula, Revenge of Frankenstein, The Man Who Could Cheat Death, Brides of Dracula, The Mummy, as well as a few of their non-horror titles.

He worked for Hammer for less than 10 years before basically being let go because Hammer deemed him too slow for their fast-paced shooting schedules.  Damn shame if you ask me.

Do You Have Jose Larraz’s Symptoms?

symptoms posterWhile José Ramón Larraz is most known for his 1974 blood thirsty picture Vampyres, he also made another film that same year (actually a few in 1974) that starred the daughter of the immortal Donald Pleasence, Angela, who gives us a very creepy performance here. I don’t believe this film has never gotten an actual video release here in the states other than in the bootleg market, but it is one that should be seen, if only because of Pleasence’s performance. The film has such a strange and eerie look and quality to it, with a good and slow burn, but worth seeing.

And now, thanks to Mondo Macabro, you will have that chance. They will be releasing this film this spring that will have plenty of extras, besides the film being fully restored from the original negative. The extras include a documentary on Larraz by Celia Novis called On Vampyres and Other Symptoms, the 1999 entry from the show Eurotika series that was on Larraz, a new interview with actresses Angela Pleasence and Lorna Heilbron, and editor Brian Smedley-Aston. Continue reading

Horror History – John Ashley

johnashleyJohn Ashley
Born Dec. 25th, 1934 – Died Oct. 3rd, 1997

John Ashley was one of the up and coming teenage stars of those popular beach movies in the ’50s and ’60s, which he made quite a few of.  But once he moved to the Philippines, he was responsible for giving us cult horror fans a lot of hours of enjoyment with the films that he was involved with, such as the Blood Island trilogy: Brides of Blood (1968), Mad Doctor of Blood Island (1968), Beast of Blood (1971).

He later would become a successful TV producer for series like The A-Team and Walker, Texas Ranger.

But besides all the entertaining films that he made, this quote is one of the reasons why we admire him so much:

“This is a terrible thing to admit, but maybe the key to my success with exploitation films is that I always like those movies, and I never had any real reason to turn them down.  I just enjoyed doing them.”

Creature Designers to Get Their Due!

Creature-Designers-The-Frankenstein-Complex

Fans of monster movies have been enjoying the work of these hard working artists pretty much since the beginning of cinema. They are the ones that are creating all the different creatures, monsters, and beasties throughout our cinematic history. They made us believe that King Kong really was the 8th Wonder of the World; that Frankenstein really did bring a creature that he made to life; they made us believe that Jason was sword fighting with skeleton warriors, and bringing thousands of other monsters to life, from werewolves, martians, zombies, dinosaurs, and everything else in between. No matter what the genre, this talented brood continuing to astound our eyes as we see their mad creations come to life on the screen for our entertainment. The sad part is that most of them never get the credit they so richly deserve. But now, thanks to the makers of this new documentary, maybe a few of them will get a little bit of that attention.

Continue reading

By Sword, By Pick, By Axe, Buy Now!

mutilator_poster_01The ’80s were a wonderful time for horror fans. Roaming through the video stores looking for an interesting box that looked like it could be fun, it was always an exciting challenge to find some new gem. But when you come across a box that has several bodies hanging on the wall, with large hook in the foreground, with the title The Mutilator across teh bottom, with blood dripping from it! And best of all, the tagline on the box says “By Sword, By Pick, By Axe, Bye Bye!” How could you not want to rent that immediately! And once you got it home, it really did blow you away, especially the over-the-top gore! Okay, sure the movie itself wasn’t the best as far as quality, but back then, we weren’t looking for Citizen Kane.

Now, thanks to the wonderfully people at Arrow Films, a newly restored unrated version of the film, from original vault material, will be coming your way to blu-ray and DVD in a special 2-disc release. And even better, a region free release! But if the movie along isn’t going to make you want to add this to your collection, wait until you see the extras it comes with!

Continue reading

Operation Track of the Blood Bath Vampire!

Blood-Bath-PosterSometimes I am just amazed at not only some of the titles that get released on blu-ray, but in the huge special editions that they come out with. Case in point, a title that Arrow Video just announced. At the end of May, they will be releasing a special edition of the 1966 film Blood Bath. But this isn’t just any ordinary film that was made under the Roger Corman umbrella. In fact, it started as a film being made in Yugoslavia by someone named Rados Novakovic and called Operation Titan. But it didn’t really fit Corman’s approval, so he hired Jack Hill to take the film and see if he could make something out of it, which he did, and would be later called Blood Bath. But for various reasons, such as the film stock from the original footage and what Hill shot didn’t match up that too well. So because Hill went on to make Spider Baby, the film was set aside. Then Corman came back to the picture and hired Stephanie Rothman to see what she could do with it. She changed the title to Track of the Vampire and made it more of a vampire film! According to Hill, about 80 % of the film is what he shot, but I have to say that it is kind of a mess of a picture, even though it has one of the best posters from that era!

Continue reading