Mocata's Den of Horror

My two most recent Blu Ray purchases just arrived in the mail a couple days ago:  from Vinegar Syndrome, there is Count Dracula's Great Love, directed by Javier Aguirre and starring the late-great Paul Naschy.  And then, from Severin, the Italian madness known as Burial Ground , from director Andrea Bianchi. Paul Naschy is most remembered for his Hombre Lobo movies, playing the ever-doomed Waldemar Daninsky, but he made so many movies in his life that it is doing the man a disservice to overlook his other roles, such as Alaric de Marnac in one of my personal favorite Naschy movies, Horror Rises from the Tomb, Gotho (aka the Hunchback) of Hunchback of the Morgue (which deserves a good Blu Ray release as well), and, of course, Count Dracula himself from Count Dracula's Great Love . Naschy was heavily influenced by the classics of the golden age of horror and it shows in this movie, from the moody sets and locations to the look of Dracula.  Naschy took thes...

Back in the 20th century, primarily the first half, there were various magazines known as pulp magazines.  They were predominately short fiction-based (although there were also some longer stories that would be serialized over multiple issues) and got the pulp name from the cheap, pulpy (and highly acidic) paper they were printed on and more or less replaced the penny dreadful of the 19th century.  These magazines featured fiction in genres that are often snubbed by many: crime, science fiction, fantasy, and, of course, horror. One of the most important and well-known of the pulp magazines is Weird Tales .  This magazine featured the first publications of numerous now-classic stories by the likes of Robert E. Howard, Clark Ashton Smith, Robert Bloch, and H. P. Lovecraft in addition to some quality material from now-lesser-known writers such as Seabury Quinn, Nictzin Dyalhis, and many others. Weird Tales originally ran from 1923 until 1954, but has since been revived ...

Back in the 1950s, horror comics were quite popular, with numerous titles from various publishers, all ranging in quality, of course, popping up at newsstands.  However, after some concern from some adults (parents always seem to need something to point to as the thing corrupting their children's minds-- in my day it was Garbage Pail Kids ), along came something called the Comic Books Code which basically killed the horror comic.  Sort of. EC, publisher of the top titles of horror and crime comics in those days, attempted to continue publishing its horror and crime titles, just without the seal of approval.  Apparently, sellers would return the comics to the publisher unsold.  EC soon got out of the horror comic game. There was, however, a loophole it seems.  The code only applied to regular-sized comic books.  If you had a larger format comic book, one the size of a regular magazine, then the code no longer applied, as it was now considered a magazine ...

The Halloween season is starting to kick in again and one of the things I generally like to do during the Halloween season is read plenty of horror, specifically novelizations of horror movies.  Novelizations are pretty much the whipping boys of books.  Granted, they are geared towards cashing in on a movie for the most part, but the people who write these books are still actual writers (obviously, some are better writers than others), who will take on the thankless task of penning a novelization because it is a paying gig, when writing is frequently not a very high-paying endeavor.  Sure, you have Stephen King, Tom Clancy, and plenty of other writers who make a good living from the books they write, but many other authors still have to work regular jobs in addition to writing.  Even King himself had to do this in the earlier days of his career, until he started getting the checks for paperback royalties, then he was free to churn out numerous classic works at a dizz...

Many companies have come and gone, leaving a mark on the home video market for horror, exploitation, and general-all-around grindhouse cinema over the years, all the way back to the days of VHS, with companies like Vestron, Paragon, and Wizard through to more recent years with DVD and Blu Ray releases by companies such as Dark Sky, Shriek Show, and Severin.  One of the most revered, if least productive, to ever rear its ugly head would have to be Grindhouse Releasing.  The name says it all-- the company is focused on the glorious years of the grindhouse era, namely the '70s and '80s part. Since the company's beginning in the '90s, it has obviously worked with a "quality, not quantity" method, usually having years between releases.  In more recent years, however, the output has picked up a good bit.  This has been mainly since Grindhouse Releasing got into the Blu Ray movement.  The main reason for the increased output is likely the fact that most of these mo...

If you are a fan of old exploitation/grindhouse cinema, then you know that many of these movies were retitled, re-edited, and sometimes rescored when released in different territories.   Some were trimmed to eliminate some of the gorier or more disturbing moments and some were re-edited to change the pacing of the story or to incorporate new elements in an attempt to make the films more marketable in a given territory. Zombi Holocaust was one that received some fairly noticeable changes when picked up by Aquarius Releasing in the U.S.A. in the early ‘80s.   The distributor put together a new opening, including the new title, Doctor Butcher M.D. – Medical Deviate, with footage from an uncompleted anthology movie, a new score, and even a new scene.   Zombi Holocaust (as Zombie Holocaust ) has been available on both DVD and Blu-Ray for some time now, but the Doctor Butcher M.D. cut was only available on old VHS copies or film prints. Something Old  ...

Earlier this year, Eibon Comics announced that it was redoing the old graphic novel of Lucio Fulci’s Zombie ( Zombie Flesheaters to those in the UK and Zombi 2 in its native Italy) originally released through Blackest Heart Media, this time in color and expanded into an ongoing series, from what I have read.   The first issue of this new version went on sale more than a month before it was due to ship and sold out rapidly.   Happily, I was able to order a copy before it sold out.   Eibon and since stated there will be a second printing of the issue and that future issues will be printed in higher quantities. My copy of Zombie Issue #1 arrived recently and I am quite pleased with it.   It is just as Eibon advertised it.   The presentation alone is remarkable, including the outer sleeve each copy comes in.   My copy also came with a liner note booklet about Eibon and the development of the comic sleeves Eibon is putting all of its comics in, as...

Welcome to Mocata’s Den of Horror.   As the name would imply, I will be posting about horror and horror-related topics, however I will also discuss metal music, mostly death metal and black metal, just because, along with horror, that is one of my favorite topics. To start off, I would like to discuss a new release from a long-time favorite band of mine, Embalmer. If you are not familiar with Embalmer, you should be able to look the band up and learn its history.   Right now, I want to focus on the band’s newest release, and already one of my favorite releases of the year, Emanations From the Crypt . Like the band’s classic material from the 1990s, this album is aggressive yet memorable.   Unlike a majority of modern death metal, which is often focused on being “brutal, technical” death metal, the songs on Emanations do not blur together in one big long stream of thrown together notes, which may be difficult to play, but are generally tedious to listen to...