2018 Year End Review – Part 1: Never to Forget….

cemetary old

This time of year, we always see those list of names that we’ve lost over the last year, that were responsible for some of the great entertainment that we’ve enjoyed over our own lifetime. It is no different here at the Krypt.

Seeing these lists are always such a double-edge sword. On one hand, we feel the loss of this great talent. But on the flipside, we’re reminded that we have bits and pieces of their genius forever on film, that we can revisit time and time again. They make us cry, laugh, think, shrink back in terror, or just sit back and be in awe of this talent that has been captured on screen. The beauty of this is that these people listed below may have gone on to whatever the next journey is, but because of their work in movies, we can still enjoy them, over and over again. Because we are all true movie lovers, we’ll get that warm and fuzzy feeling whether we’re watching Scott Wilson’s smooth talking killer in Richard Brooks’ In Cold Blood (1967), Celeste Yarnell trying to escape the crazy Dr. Lorca in Beast of Blood (1970), or even laughing out loud when we see the quiet and patient Donald Moffat trying to get untied from a couch in John Carpenter’s The Thing (1982).

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Movie Review: Clark Ashton Smith – Emperor of Dreams

emperor of dreamsClark Ashton Smith: The Emperor of Dreams (2018)
Directed by Darin Coelho Spring
Featuring Donald Sidney-Fryer, Harlan Ellison, S.T. Joshi, Cody Goodfellow, Skinner

Clark Ashton Smith, one of the “Three Musketeers” of the legendary pulp magazine Weird Tales (with H.P. Lovecraft and Robert E. Howard) has sadly not received the popular attention that the creators of Cthulhu and Conan have benefited from. This new documentary hopefully will remedy that situation.

Smith lived from 1893 to 1961, primarily in the Gold Rush town of Auburn, CA. For about 50 years, he resided in a cabin there without electricity or running water. He never attended high school, but educated himself by devouring all of the books in the local library. He developed an incredible vocabulary and style that soon established him as a promising poet and the protégé of the “Keats of the West Coast,” George Sterling.

Lovecraft encountered Smith’s poetry and began a correspondence to state his admiration that blossomed into a lifelong friendship, all expressed through the mail, as the men unfortunately never met in person. The title of the documentary comes from the first line of Smith’s poem “The Hashish-Eater”, which Lovecraft praised in his Supernatural Horror in Literature. Continue reading