A Blast From The Past: The Night America Trembled (dir by Tom Donovan)

Posted on October 31, 2023 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Filmed in 1957 for a television program called Westinghouse Studio One, The Night America Trembled is a dramatization of the night in 1938 when Orson Welles’s adaptation of H.G. Wells’s The War of the Worlds reportedly caused a panic amongst listeners.

For legal reasons, Orson Welles is not portrayed nor is his name mentioned. Instead, the focus is mostly on the people listening to the broadcast and getting the wrong idea. That may sound like a comedy but The Night America Trembled takes itself fairly seriously, complete with Edward R. Murrow narrating and taking drags off of a cigarette.

Clocking in at a brisk 60 minutes, The Night America Trembled is an interesting recreation of that October 30th. Among the people panicking are a large collection of future stars and character actors. Ed Asner, James Coburn, John Astin, Warren Oates, and Warren Beatty all make early appearances.

It’s an interesting historical document and you can watch it below!

An Auditory Blast From The Past: Orson Welles’s 1938 Broadcast of The War of the Worlds

Posted on October 31, 2023 by Lisa Marie Bowman

On October 30th, 1938, Orson Welles and the Mercury Theater On The Air broadcast an adaptation of H.G. Wells’s War of the Worlds and, legend has it, they scared the ever-loving heck out of America.

Actually, there’s some debate as to just how panicked America got when they heard the Mercury Theater On The Air’s adaptation of War of the Worlds. There was definitely some panic but there are differing reports on just how wide spread it was. For our purposes, let’s assume that the entire country was terrified at the same time and that everyone was loading up a shotgun and planning to go out and look for aliens. One thing is for sure. With his adaptation of War of the Worlds, Orson Welles managed to invent the whole found footage genre that would later come to dominate horror cinema in the late 90s and the aughts. Every found footage horror film owes a debt to what Orson Welles accomplished with War of the Worlds. We won’t hold that against Orson. Instead, it’s just another example of how far ahead of his time Orson Welles was.

H.G. Wells, the original author of War of the Worlds, and Orson Welles only met once, while they were both in San Antonio, Texas in 1940. (Orson Welles and H.G. Wells hanging out in San Antonio? To be honest, that sounds like it would make a good movie.) They were interviewed for a local radio station. H.G. Wells expressed some skepticism about the reports of Americans panicking while Welles compared the radio broadcast to someone dressing up like a ghost and shouting “Boo!” during Halloween. Both Wells and Welles then encouraged Americans to worry less about Martians and more about the growing threat of Hitler and the war in Europe.

I’ve shared this before but this just seems like the time to share it again. Here, for Halloween, is the 1938 Mercury Theater On The Air production of The War of the Worlds!

Horror on the Lens: Night of the Living Dead (dir by George Romero)

Posted on October 31, 2023 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Happy Halloween everyone!

Well, as another horrorthon draws to a close, it’s time for another Shattered Lens tradition! Every Halloween, we share one of the greatest and most iconic horror films ever made. For your Halloween enjoyment, here is George Romero’s Night of the Living Dead!

(Be sure to read Arleigh’s equally famous review!)

Get In The Mood For Halloween With Christopher Lee And The Fall Of The House of Usher

Posted on October 31, 2023 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Happy Halloween everyone!

Here to help you get in the mood for the best day of the year is Christopher Lee reading Edgar Allan Poe’s The Fall Of The House Of Usher. Listening to this will require 40 minutes of your time but it’s totally worth it. Christopher Lee had an amazing voice and was a wonderful reader and one imagines that it was his voice that Poe heard in his head as he first wrote this short story.

Here is the wonderful voice of Christopher Lee….

6 Trailers For October 31st, 2023

Posted on October 31, 2023 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Happy Halloween! For today’s special edition of Lisa Marie’s Favorite Grindhouse and Exploitation Film Trailers, we are paying tribute to the great George Romero! Here are six trailers, all for films directed by the master of American horror! How many of them have you watched this October?

Night of The Living Dead (1968)

2. The Crazies (1973)

3. Martin (1977)

4. Creepshow (1982)

5. Monkey Shines (1988)

6. The Dark Half (1993)

October Positivity: The End of Days: Global Catastrophe (dir by Mike Norris and David Timmes)

Posted on October 30, 2023 by Lisa Marie Bowman

2019’s The End of Days: Global Catastrophe (a.k.a. The Crossroads of Hunter Wilde) opens with a voice-over from Hunter Wilde (played by Chuck’s son, Mike Norris). Hunter explains that the world is in pretty bad shape and it’s for all the usual reasons. Hunter explains that Hollywood destroyed America’s moral fabric. The fake news media promoted a liberal agenda and set Americans against each other. Eventually, disease, war, and pestilence spread across the world.

Hunter and his daughter, Jo (Kat Rowland) are now living in a Christian survivalist compound. Hunter is one of the leaders of the compound but he suffers from frequent wanderlust. Whenever he starts to suffer from doubts or life in the compound starts to become too stressful, Hunter jumps in his jeep and drives off for a few days. Sometimes, he returns with supplies and refugees. As Jo points out, Hunter puts his life in danger every time that he leaves. The world outside the compound is full of terrorists and infected, zombie-like scavengers. Fortunately, Hunter is a good shot with a gun and he also knows some fairly effective karate moves. I mean, would you expect anything less from Chuck Norris’s son?

What Hunter does not fully understand is that there is currently a war raging inside of him. His doubts and his frustrations have left him vulnerable to a demon named Dagon (Jordan DragonKing). Dagon lives in another dimension, one that exists alongside our world but which is still separate. When Dagon drags Hunter into his world, it leads to an otherworldly battle.

Actually, calling it an otherworldly battle is perhaps overselling it. Actually, Hunter and Dagon exchange a few kicks in front of a white fence and eventually, Dagon comes at Hunter with a sword. As far as fight scenes go, it’s not bad but it’s not spectacular either. Mike Norris is a trained martial artist who has starred in various straight-to-video action films. He looks convincing with when he throws a punch or kicks someone in the face. At the same time, Mike Norris was also in his late 50s when this film was made and, as such, it can be forgiven that he doesn’t move quite as quickly as he probably did in the past.

Though the film opens with verses from the Bible and it features a battle between Mike Norris and a literal demon, the film itself feels more like a prepper film than a typical faith-based apocalypse film. Yes, the film seems to be saying, the world is ending and our heroes failed to be raptured so they’re now going to have to deal with the tribulation but thank God they stocked up on canned vegetables and hoarded weapons beforehand. Otherwise, they would really be in trouble! The opening montage feels like it could have been lifted from one of those, “Invest in Gold” infomercials. When the film discusses the end of the world, less emphasis is put on the Book of Revelation and more is instead devoted to the type of news stories that one would expect to see on Breitbart. As such, the film offers a chance to view the world through the eyes of someone who is convinced that society is about to collapse, with the main subtext being, “I was smart enough to prepare but the rest of you all are screwed.”

As you may have guessed, The End of Days has the potential to be an enjoyably bonkers film but, unfortunately, there’s a bit too many slow spots for the film to really hold one’s interest. There’s also a few subplots that don’t really lead anywhere, which occasionally makes the film feel like it’s an episode in a Walking Dead-style television series as opposed to a stand-alone story. That said, Mike Norris may not be as intimidating as his father but he still has a definite screen presence and Jordan DragonKing is enjoyably over-the-top in his performance as Dagon. If the world’s going to end, it might as well go out with jump kicks and swordplay.

Late Night Retro Television Reviews: Nightmare Café 1.5 “Sanctuary For A Child”

Posted on October 30, 2023 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Late Night Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Mondays, I will be reviewing Nightmare Café, which ran on NBC from January to April of 1992. The entire show is currently streaming on YouTube!

This week, the café goes country!

Episode 1.5 “Sanctuary For A Child”

(Dir by Armand Mastroianni, originally aired on March 27th, 1992)

On tonight’s episode of Nightmare Café, we learn a few things about the café. Apparently, the café is not just located in Los Angeles. It can materialize anywhere on the planet but it apparently does so on its own. Though Blackie (played by Robert Englund) claims to be the proprietor of the café, this episode suggests that he actually has no control over it. While Blackie apparently does know why the Nightmare Café does the things that it does, it would appear that the café still has a mind of its own. It decides where it is going and it decides when it is time to leave.

This episode, for instance, begins with the Nightmare Café materializing on a street in a small, country town. Soon after it materializes, both Frank and Fay also materialize inside the café. I’ve often wondered where Frank and Fay go whenever the café is closed for business. Frank and Fay, after all, are essentially ghosts. Do they need to eat or sleep? This episode suggests that they do, as Fay complains about having to get up early because “the café” has decided to open up the crack of dawn.

Soon enough, a young boy named Luke Wall (Brandon Quintin Adams) comes walking into the café. He and Frank immediately bond, with Frank realizing that Luke is trying to run away from home. What Frank discovers upon following Luke out of the café is that Luke’s home is in a hospital. Luke is in a coma and has been for quite some time. Frank also discovers that the café has materialized in his home town, the place that he left when he joined the Navy and to which he thought he would never return. Luke is the son of Frank’s former best friend, Tom (Vondie Curtis-Hall), and his ex-girlfriend, Evelyn (Angela Bassett). Frank explains to Fay that Evelyn was the love of his life but his racist father demanded that they break up. That was one of the main reasons why Frank left town and has never returned.

So, the Nightmare Cafe wants two things to happen. It wants Tom and Evelyn to make peace with Luke’s impending death and also with each other. And it wants Frank to deal with his past and his feelings towards his late father.

And that’s exactly what happens. It’s a sweet episode, even if it’s a bit predictable and heavy-handed enough to end with “The Living Years” playing on the soundtrack. In many ways, this felt more like an episode of Highway to Heaven than an episode of Nightmare Café but, as was so often the case with this show, the strong performances of the cast carried the narrative over any rough spots. In the end, Frank made his peace with the past, Luke moved on to the afterlife, and the Nightmare Café moved on to a new town.

Next week: the final episode of Nightmare Café!

The Eric Roberts Horror Collection: Bleach (dir by Michael Edmonds)

Posted on October 30, 2023 by Lisa Marie Bowman

The 2022 film, Bleach, tells the story of Jonah Paxton (Mark Justice).

Born in Nevada, Jonah never knew his mother. He was raised in a trailer by his abusive father (Lorenzo Lamas), a degenerate gambler who molested Jonah and forced him to wear dresses in an attempt to shame him into “being a man.” When the mob threatened to come after Jonah because of his debts, he sold Jonah to his uncle, a drug dealer named Matthew (Eric Roberts).

In the mid-80s, grown-up Jonah has some issues. That’s not surprising. He’s haunted by his past and has hallucinations in which the devil is raping him from behind. (Yikes!) He also has visions of selling his soul to a mysterious woman (Mindy Robinson) who throws money at him. In what might be the real world, Jonah is hired by El Jefe (Robert LaSardo), who explains that he loves horror films but that the whole trope of the final girl upsets him. He gives Jonah a million dollars to film an actual snuff film. He tells Jonah that he wants high production values. He wants to watch Jonah become a monster. Jonah takes the money and films himself murdering two women who picked up at a bar and one woman who unfortunately entered the room at the wrong time.

While El Jefe waits for Jonah to bring him the tape, Jonah finds himself having even more violent hallucinations. He sees demons. He sees the devil. After he crashes his car in the desert, he has a vision of a woman (Tara Reid) who claims to be his mother and who encourages Jonah to commit suicide. While the police investigate Jonah’s crimes, Jonah is haunted by the ghosts of his victims and his already tenuous grip on reality continues to loosen. Soon, Jonah is drinking bleach and trying to purify himself with fire….

Bleach is a mess of a film, one that is occasionally surreal but which is more often just boring. The film’s tone is all over the place and certain scenes are so drawn out that they go from being disturbing to being dull. The moments of dark comedy fail to land but the glimpses inside Jonah’s mind are appropriately twisted and bizarre. By the end of the movie, Jonah’s scarred and blistered body is an undeniably shocking sight. Physically, he’s come to reflect the monster that he truly is. But, in the end, the film is too unevenly paced to be really effective and it ends with a shoot-out that is so clumsily choreographed that it’ll probably lead to more laughs than pathos.

Eric Roberts is memorably sleazy as the faux friendly Matthew. One gets the feeling that both and Lorenzo Lamas were only on set for a day or two but both of them make the most of their screen time. Both of them offer a glimpse into how to make a monster.

Previous Eric Roberts Films That We Have Reviewed:

Horror on TV: Baywatch Nights 2.11 “Possession” (dir by David W. Hagar)

Posted on October 30, 2023 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Tonight’s bonus episode of televised horror is an episode of Baywatch Nights that deals with something that every lifeguard eventually has to deal with: demonic possession.

Well, actually, it’s not so much demonic possession as its dead serial killer possession but it’s still definitely not a good thing. That’s especially true when it’s a friend and/or co-worker getting possessed. I mean, it’s never fun to end a relationship but having to end it because someone managed to get possessed …. I just don’t see how you live that down.

And, before anyone gets the wrong idea, Hasselhoff is not the one who gets possessed. It would have been fun if he had been but no. Sorry.

This episode originally aired on February 2nd, 1997.

Horror on TV: The Hitchhiker 6.19 “Secrets” (dir by Jacques Richard)

Posted on October 30, 2023 by Lisa Marie Bowman

On tonight’s episode of The Hitchhiker, a woman and her lover attempt to collect her husband’s health insurance after his death. Unfortunately, for them, her husband might have something to say about that.

This episode originally aired on February 15th, 1991.