Hometown Haunts, Prime Time Exorcism, Robot Mom

Does your town have a haunted house/hotel/7-Eleven™? If it did, would you know how to find it? Now you can with Fright Find, a website with a comprehensive database of every real haunted house/hotel/7-Eleven™ in every state. It’s like one-stop shopping for ghost groupies. 

From Fright Find’s website: “Every state has its own eerie haunted history. From the Salem Witch Hunts to the Ghosts of the Alamo, each state’s history goes back hundreds, if not thousands, of years. However, there are no boundaries on the afterlife. To help you find haunts in your state, we’ve organized these real haunted houses, places, and haunted attractions so that you can start your phantom hunt. Curious to know your state’s haunted history? Want to find the most haunted place in your state? Start your Fright Find right here…”

According to their stats, Florida is the most haunted state with 127 listings. The District of Columbia clocks in with a non-tourist generating seven haunts. I drink in Washington State and Fright Find says we have a respectable 73 haunted listings. In your face, every state with 72 or less.

While you go through Fright Find’s documentation of all the scary stuff in your state, here are a few out now/upcoming horror/sci-fi movies that may or may not put you in a scary state…

CRAZY CROCODILE / Out now (YouTube™)

“Food host Xiaoyu is tricked into participating in a survival reality show, along with a group of other people who all have their own reasons to participate. Everyone strays into the forbidden area in the wild and they are attacked by mutant crocodiles.”

The irony of a food host becoming food for the mutant crocodiles is…delicious.

KKN DI DESA PENARI: LUWIH DOWO, LUWIH MEDINI / December 29, 2022 (VOD)

“A Javanese proverb expressed by Widya’s mother just before she left for KKN. A sign that there was something in the village at the far east. Widya, Nur, Ayu, Bima, Anton and Wahyu never thought that their KKN activities would lead to disaster.”

The movie’s weird and unpronounceable title translates to KKN in Dancer Village: Longer, Scarier. Yeah, no — didn’t help. I think there’s a dancing snake in this movie.

TRUE HAUNTING / January 6, 2023 (VOD)

“The terrifying true story of the first televised exorcism on NBC in 1971. Millions around the country watched the program that was recorded in Chicago. The NBC news segment was a success, the exorcism was not. Instead, it made things worse for the Becker family who lived there. Much worse.”

All exorcisms should be televised. Can’t be any ickier than watching Dr. Pimple Popper.

JUNG_E / January 20, 2023 (Netflix™)

“In the 22nd century, with Earth no longer habitable due to climate change, war breaks out in the last shelter built for human survival. The only way to end the war hinges on cloning a legendary mercenary into a scalable robot. In a post-apocalyptic near-future, a researcher at an Artificial Intelligence lab leads the effort to end a civil war by cloning the brain of a heroic soldier — her mother.”

It’d be cool to have a robot mom. I don’t know why. Just seems like she’d be better than non-robotic moms.

Independent Aliens

If you’re an older sci-fi fan, you no doubt watched the patriotic UFO invasion mega blockbuster, Independence Day (1996). If you’re younger and/or have not seen it, read as though your life depended on it. Or not.

An alien spacecraft 1/4 the size of the moon is headed our way. Hard to miss. The mothership spits out a few dozen “smaller” ships 15 miles across. The ships strategically position themselves over high value targets like Washington, D.C. and Hollywood, with the intent to dead kill us all with devastating beams of doom.

Before the military can respond in kind, the aliens have turned major cities all over the world into urban fire pits. Our weapons are as useless as non-alcoholic beer, with the aliens launching even smaller UFOs to further rub our faces in it.

A highly-believable plan is devised: fly the recovered UFO that double-parked in Roswell, NM in 1947 (kept in storage), into space, dock with the mothership, upload a computer virus that renders the alien’s deflecto shields inoperable, (all the while hoping an Apple™ computer can seamlessly interface with alien technology), deliver a nuclear device as a last “f*ck you,” then undock and fly home in 30 seconds without getting blown up. This all sounds like a booze dream I once had.

The alien’s arrival is stunning, as is the air combat scenes and the blowing up of entire cities. Where it slows down is with three love stories interwoven into the plot. But hey, if we didn’t have the love angle, all we’d be left with is exciting extraterrestrial action, flying saucers, bombs, and the blowing up of cities.

Still, Independence Day is one of the better alien invasion/love story movies out there.

More Slashers, More Serial Killers, More Maniacs

Some advance key art for Pacific Rim: Uprising, the sequel to Pacific Rim (2013), which pay-per-viewed skyscraper-sized, human-controlled robots against skyscraper-sized, non-human monsters from another dimension that had a revolving door at the bottom of the ocean. PR: Uprising stomps through theaters March 23, 2018.

As for what we can expect, more and bigger skyscraper-sized, human-controlled robots against skyscraper-sized, non-human monsters from another dimension. Not a bad thing, I should think. While we impatiently await the weapons of mass entertainment, here are a few horror movies that may or may not be from this alternate universe…

CRAZY LAKE (available now)
“A group of coeds looking for fun on spring break have their beach plans canceled and opt for Plan B – fun at a cabin on the lake. Sometimes Plan B can be a real killer!”

This couldn’t be more limp as undercooked bacon. Ironically, it sounds like the coeds will be sliced like bacon. We can only hope.

LAKE ALICE (available now)
“The Thomas’ travel to their lakeside cabin in the woods for a joyous Christmas celebration with their daughter and her new boyfriend, but the joy is short-lived and the body count is high.”

There’s a real Lake Alice here in Washington, about a machete throw off the Interstate. Fishing opportunities include catchable-size Rainbow Trout stocked in the spring, with Largemouth Bass and Sunfish also present. The public access has parking, a boat ramp and vault toilets. No slashers, though. Sorry.

CABIN 28 (available now)
“The shocking true story based on the most infamous unsolved murder case in American history. On April 11th 1981, Sue Sharp and her family are enjoying their stay at Cabin 28 in the peaceful holiday resort of Keddie. But a day of fun at the remote getaway turns into a heart stopping nightmare as nightfall brings masked strangers to the cabin. A brutal battle for survival leaves several members of the family dead and one missing. An extensive police investigation follows but no one is convicted of the crime. Now, over thirty years later, Cabin 28 finally gives up its deadly secret.”

Geez, they give away the entire plot in the press release. So we get to see a family slaughtered by slaughterers wearing clown masks. Not seeing a deadly secret here. That, and I’m really burnt out on clowns — circus, rodeo or bar drunks.

TARNATION (November 24, 2017/MonsterFest screening)
“When Oscar’s dreams of becoming a rock star are brutally crushed and her boyfriend leaves, Oscar travels to a ghost town called Tarnation where she and a group of friends have rented a cabin in the woods for a weekend away. Unfortunately the cabin is host to a cursed painting and the surrounding woods are literally, Satan’s playground. Oscar soon finds herself battling a demon unicorn, possessed souls and Satan himself in an epic battle for her soul.”

The plot is weak as wet toilet paper, but the demon unicorn is kinda neat. That’s right up there with a wiccan penguin, mad cow and/or a schizophrenic monkey butler. Last thought: If she goes to a ghost town, how is it she and her soon-to-be expired friends able to rent a cabin? Couldn’t you just, like, stay there for free? Sure, no concierge or mini-bar. But hey, the price is right.

Metaphysical Cowpoke

A Union soldier turned ruthless bounty hunter, Jonah Hex had his face turned into a grilled cheese sandwich with a fresh branding iron after helplessly watching Old West terrorist Turnbull roast his wife and son in an indoor campfire.

Tied to a stake and about to be turned into a steak, Hex was left to be this week’s daily lunch special for the pigeons. But something mystical happened and he was caught between the land of the living and the land of the dead. These days we call it a work week. Now Hex can talk to the dead simply by touching them — and not just in the bathing suit area.

Revenge is the word of the day and Hex goes after Turnbull, who has the Nation Killer weapon in his control and plans to blow up Washington on the 4th of July, celebrating its 100th birthday. Pretty much the complete opposite of patriotic. The government needs Hex to stop Turnbull and will pay him to do it. Fight fire with fire. And grilled cheese face sandwiches.

The action in Jonah Hex (2010), pretty much the cowboy version of The Crow (1994), is frustratingly lackluster given the players and Hex getting his saddle warmer beaten more than once. And Hex’s hooker girlfriend who doesn’t undress for work is nothing short of insubordination. Whoever made this cow pie should be sentenced to clean it up.

Map of Monsters

Monsters in America is an illustrated visual map of all those stinky cryptids (mythological creatures with otherworldly properties/hair styles) who inspire many of the craptacular horror movies I’ve leveraged my life on.

First, some factoids by way of a press release: “The Philadelphia-based Hog Island Press print shop has created Monsters in America, a cryptozoological map of the United States that features all sorts of legendary creatures from across the country.”

“[The map] is possibly the first of its kind – a snapshot of American cryptozoology that brings together the Jersey Devil, Bigfoot, Mothman, Chupacabra, Shunka Warakin, Caddy, the Honey Island Swamp Monster and many more cryptids on one hand-drawn, hand-screened map, which is available to purchase. T-shirt designs based on some of the creatures from their map are also available.”

Man, I could go for some new laundry in the form of a stylish T-shirt suitable for any and every bowling occasion.

While the map is indeed an breathtaking representation of where each of these neck-eating monsters reside with obviously bootlegged green cards, I’m seeing a GLARING omission: where are the cryptids in Washington, specifically Seattle, where I hang my bowling laundry out to dry? Sure, we have tons of wild-eyed creatures roaming around downtown (we call them “out-of-towners”), but no regional T-shirt worthy “manimals.”

It vexes me that Washington State doesn’t have its own monster. Heck, we have UFOs flying out of our butts up here, but the only thing close to local cryptids are those icky giant octopuses just waiting off shore for you to wade a little further out on Alki Beach than you normally do. (I claim your beach towel.)

It’s nice that the California-established Bigfoot occasionally stops by on his Pacific Northwest staycation to visit relatives. But it’s clear Washington/Seattle/Me/I need a residential monster. Until I can organize some sort of candlelight vigil keggar to raise awareness/2nd keg funds, maybe one of you other creature-flush states can loan us one. I’m looking in your direction Ohio, you with your fancy pants Loveland Frogmen and associative merchandising rights.

Oh, yeah – the poster is $30. Get it by clicking the heck outta THIS.

 

Giant Bug vs. Enormous Bug

There is only one thing The Deadly Mantis (1957) has over the almost identical Them! (1954), a nuclear monster movie hailed by the American Film Institute as one of the greatest sci-fi movies of all time: The bug looks cooler. Yeah, I said it.

The giant ants in Them! look like someone stuck pipe cleaners into a couple of potatoes and spray-painted ’em with Rust-oleum™. The giant mantis in The Deadly Mantis looks exactly like a mantis, all alien-esque, spindly and icky. (While we’re on the subject, The Outer Limits’ Zanti Misfits (1963) look more like what ants are supposed to look like minus the big bulging eyeballs, though I’ve seen a few of those things crawling around just after last call.)

Taking the page-by-page format of the “giant insects eat civilization” right out of the Them! playbook, the title 200 foot-long Mantidae (biology name) was de-iced after a volcano thawed it from its icy cube in the North Pole. (I didn’t know they had active volcanoes in the North Pole. Snowball fights, yes; but lava?)

The military stationed up there (building a massive early detection network) sustains severe preliminary damage as the mantis feeds itself on mess hall chow (servicemen). Then it flys south, theorized to be heading to South America where I here it’s warmer than the North Pole and more suitable for getting an all-around tan. (Note to self: Use that tanning salon coupon before it expires.)

On its way for a vacation, the mantis buzzes Washington, D.C., and takes a poop rest on the Washington Monument, totally mocking visiting hours. Jets are dispatched, but the launched missiles rarely connect with their exoskeleton target. (Note to the city down below: the air force was just trying to help, man – get over it.)

One heroic pilot accidentally rams his jet into the bug due to London-grade fog that seems to be covering the entire East Coast, ejecting before ka-BOOM! The mantis hits the ground and crawls into the Manhattan Tunnel, mimicking the giants ants that took up homeless camp residence in the vast Los Angeles drainage tunnels and mocking New York Port Authority’s toll charges. The bail-out pilot leads the charge into the tunnel, armed with chemical gas can bombs, and throws it right onto the face of mantis. In your face, deadly mantis!

But for all its plagiarized similarities to Them!, The Deadly Mantis has two very funny scenes. One is with a bunch of military guys jailhouse rockin’ each other in the rec room as there are no dames around at the North Pole, and the other where a scientist and a dame (visiting journalist covering the story) and a military dude are theorizing how big the monster is, guessing that it’s probably over six-feet tall. This while the mantis is right outside their window and rising up over three stories. I just about crapped sno-cones over that one.

In conclusion, while the sci-fi sorta classic The Deadly Mantis looks good, it isn’t as good as Them!

P.S. For more big bug fun, watch 1957’s Beginning of the End – it features REAL giant grasshoppers. Those things goon me out for some reason.

Man of the Moth

The Mothman Prophecies (2002) is about a supernatural entity that plagued a small West Virginia town back in the ’70s and is based on TRUE EVENTS. I believe all of this and more. Why? Because I’M DRUNK, man.

A Washington, D.C. investigative journalist mysteriously ends up in Point Pleasant, VA where the residents have been reporting strange events and sightings of an eight-foot tall winged moth creature with glowing red eyes. One local guy in particular has been singled out by the Mothman and keeps calling him on the phone.

Richard Gere (the journalist), now drawn into the mystery, starts putting the glue to the clues. Seems Mothman is trying to tell him something as well – and that something is something terrible is gonna happen to Point Pleasant. (OK, bumpy sentence – see last sentence of the first paragraph.)

Where this starts to goon out your mind is when Mothman (referring to itself as Indrid Cold) is on the phone with Gere. The quick-thinking reporter records the conversation and sends the tape to a sound specialist who tells him that’s not a human voice, but more like an electro-magnetic pulse. If Mothman called me on the phone I would totally fill my pants with solid electro-magnetic pulses.

Speaking of, lots of cool eerie crap happens, which builds to a horrific climax that actually happened in real life. That event (Silver Bridge – built in 1928, unbuilt in 1967) is amazingly recreated and will make you think twice about visiting Point Pleasant or talking on the phone with Mothman.

Wolf-Man For President

Jack Whittier, the President’s aide, is sent to Hungary for no other reason that it’s there. While making his way back to the airport to get the hell out of that smell-infested country, his car is run off the road and he’s bitten by a wolf, which we later find out was a gosh-darn werewolf.

Once back in Washington, Jack turns into a marauding, suit-wearing lycanthrope and kills a few people that probably deserved it. (One attack has him on top of a woman’s car at a brightly-lit gas station. Fortunately, no one saw him.)

As luck would have it there are five nights of full moons. Jack’s gooning out and trying to tell everyone he’s the werewolf in the news that’s been biting people. No one believes him. I do, though. When he changes into a silver-haired werewolf in his apartment, he crawls around on all fours and bites the lamp. That’s OK – it was probably a stupid lamp.

In a really confusing plot deviation, wolfman Jack (Hey, I just got that!) makes his way into the White House basement where he encounters the dwarf, Dr. Kiss (no relation to the popular musical ensemble) who’s been experimenting on bodies. Jack sniffs the doctor’s butt and licks his face. This causes the doc to laugh, even though it probably wasn’t in the script.

And speaking of, there are so many laughably bad scenes in The Werewolf of Washington (1973), you have to see it to believe it. Great dialogue, too, as Jack, who’s been boinking the President’s daughter, tells her with a straight face, “I think your father is a cross between Abe Lincoln and Jesus Christ.” Man, you can’t even write lines that good anymore.

The President swears numerous times and eventually gets bitten by Jack. Let’s just say the Pentagon is now the Pentagram. Heh.