There’s a compelling idea in anthropology that many ancient werewolf legends are derived from our species’ need to rationalize the more animalistic side of humanity – which is why lycanthropy has historically been used to explain everything from medieval serial killers to cannibalism. While I personally think there’s a lot more to unpack when it comes to tales of wolfmen and women, this is still a great example of why so many of our most enduring fairy tales involve big bad wolves.
And in the world of film, I think there’s only one feature that really nails the folkloric origins of werewolf stories, namely Neil Jordan’s 1984 fairy-tale horror classic, The Company of Wolves. Even four decades later, there’s no other genre flick that comes close to capturing the dreamlike ambience behind this strange anthology, and that’s why I’d like to take this opportunity to...
And in the world of film, I think there’s only one feature that really nails the folkloric origins of werewolf stories, namely Neil Jordan’s 1984 fairy-tale horror classic, The Company of Wolves. Even four decades later, there’s no other genre flick that comes close to capturing the dreamlike ambience behind this strange anthology, and that’s why I’d like to take this opportunity to...
- 3/25/2024
- by Luiz H. C.
- bloody-disgusting.com
Franz Rogowski plays a Nazi ringmaster in a deluded blend of magical realism, gratuitous violence and sentimentality
What better way to start the new year with what will surely be remembered as one of its worst films. This mashup of magical realism, gratuitous violence and sentimentality is an atrocity in filmic form. It’s only a bit offensive for its appropriation of the Holocaust as a dramatic engine. What really stirs revulsion is the film’s smug delusions of quality, a self-belief so strong that it has the gall to take two hours and 21 minutes to unfurl itself to the end. Everyone who whined about Martin Scorsese’s Killers of the Flower Moon being too long should be strapped to a chair, like Malcolm McDowell in A Clockwork Orange, and forced to watch this in order to understand the difference between a film that’s long because it has a...
What better way to start the new year with what will surely be remembered as one of its worst films. This mashup of magical realism, gratuitous violence and sentimentality is an atrocity in filmic form. It’s only a bit offensive for its appropriation of the Holocaust as a dramatic engine. What really stirs revulsion is the film’s smug delusions of quality, a self-belief so strong that it has the gall to take two hours and 21 minutes to unfurl itself to the end. Everyone who whined about Martin Scorsese’s Killers of the Flower Moon being too long should be strapped to a chair, like Malcolm McDowell in A Clockwork Orange, and forced to watch this in order to understand the difference between a film that’s long because it has a...
- 1/8/2024
- by Leslie Felperin
- The Guardian - Film News
There was a movie you may have heard of called "Damsel" that came out in 2018. Directed by the Zellner brothers (where did they go?), the film was a chopped-and-screwed riff on the Western, what was called by some a neo-Western, that followed its titular damsel, played by Mia Wasikowska, and her would-be white knight, a blubbering fool played by Robert Pattinson, across the American Southwest. The title was a knowing wink to the subversion of its story -- the damsel in question was in fact much more capable than her rescuer, their shared adversary, and basically everyone else they encountered.
The new trailer for Millie Bobby Brown's latest venture with Netflix, also called "Damsel," seems to be doing the same thing. It's 2023! Women don't need to wait for white knights to save them. Like Brown in the first trailer for "Damsel," released today as part of Netflix's Geeked Week,...
The new trailer for Millie Bobby Brown's latest venture with Netflix, also called "Damsel," seems to be doing the same thing. It's 2023! Women don't need to wait for white knights to save them. Like Brown in the first trailer for "Damsel," released today as part of Netflix's Geeked Week,...
- 11/11/2023
- by Ryan Coleman
- Slash Film
If you were a fan of Sinister Beard Games’ Quietus (which Aaron selected as one of several tabletop RPGs to play on Halloween), then you’ll probably want to keep an eye on their Kickstarter launching today for their folk horror RPG, The Woods at Blight’s Hollow. Inspired by the likes of Guillermo Del Toro, Angela Carter, The Brothers Grimm, Kirsty Logan and Mary Shelley, The Woods at Blight’s Hollow campaign will run until November 30. And from the looks of things, it’s already well on its way to reaching its initial £8,000 goal.
Illustrated by Corey Brickley and written by Oli Jeffery, the story centres on the children of Blight’s Hollow, an isolated village surrounded by a trackless forest in a time before modern amenities, in a world of hearthside tales and nights to be feared. The mysteries in The Woods at Blight’s Hollow have no set outcome.
Illustrated by Corey Brickley and written by Oli Jeffery, the story centres on the children of Blight’s Hollow, an isolated village surrounded by a trackless forest in a time before modern amenities, in a world of hearthside tales and nights to be feared. The mysteries in The Woods at Blight’s Hollow have no set outcome.
- 10/31/2023
- by Mike Wilson
- bloody-disgusting.com
On Thursday, October 19, 2023, at 8:00 Pm, A&e will air the 20th episode of Season 24 of “The First 48,” titled “Little Girl Lost.”
In this episode, Detective Angela Carter takes on a challenging case involving a missing teenage girl. She faces the daunting task of unraveling the mystery behind the girl’s disappearance. As Detective Carter delves into the investigation, she begins to wonder if the key to solving the case might be much closer to home than anyone would have anticipated.
“The First 48” is a documentary-style TV series that follows real-life homicide detectives as they work against the clock to solve murder cases within the critical first 48 hours. The show provides viewers with a gripping and unfiltered look into the world of criminal investigations.
In “Little Girl Lost,” Detective Carter’s dedication and skills will be put to the test as she seeks answers and works to bring closure to a distressed family.
In this episode, Detective Angela Carter takes on a challenging case involving a missing teenage girl. She faces the daunting task of unraveling the mystery behind the girl’s disappearance. As Detective Carter delves into the investigation, she begins to wonder if the key to solving the case might be much closer to home than anyone would have anticipated.
“The First 48” is a documentary-style TV series that follows real-life homicide detectives as they work against the clock to solve murder cases within the critical first 48 hours. The show provides viewers with a gripping and unfiltered look into the world of criminal investigations.
In “Little Girl Lost,” Detective Carter’s dedication and skills will be put to the test as she seeks answers and works to bring closure to a distressed family.
- 10/13/2023
- by Jules Byrd
- TV Everyday
Grimmfest, Manchester’s International Festival of Fantastic Film, are delighted to announce their full feature film lineup for 2023. The festival will be returning to regular venue the Odeon Great Northern in Manchester on 6th – 8th October to showcase the best in genre cinema.
Never screened outside of Japan, and believed lost for nearly 30 years, Banmei Takahashi’s 1988 classic, Door, combines deadpan domestic comedy, chilling stalker thriller and baroquely bloody home invasion horror. It finally had its international premiere at Bifan in South Korea in July, and Grimmfest are delighted to be hosting the first UK screening.
Kenichi Ugana’s Love Will Tear US Apart encompasses dark and deadly romance, satiric slasher movie, psychological thriller and even some martial arts mayhem. Grimmfest is delighted to be hosting the UK premiere in Manchester, birthplace of Joy Division, whose music inspired the film’s title.
Mikhail Red’s Filipino psychological thriller Deleter (UK premiere) follows an overworked,...
Never screened outside of Japan, and believed lost for nearly 30 years, Banmei Takahashi’s 1988 classic, Door, combines deadpan domestic comedy, chilling stalker thriller and baroquely bloody home invasion horror. It finally had its international premiere at Bifan in South Korea in July, and Grimmfest are delighted to be hosting the first UK screening.
Kenichi Ugana’s Love Will Tear US Apart encompasses dark and deadly romance, satiric slasher movie, psychological thriller and even some martial arts mayhem. Grimmfest is delighted to be hosting the UK premiere in Manchester, birthplace of Joy Division, whose music inspired the film’s title.
Mikhail Red’s Filipino psychological thriller Deleter (UK premiere) follows an overworked,...
- 9/2/2023
- by Peter 'Witchfinder' Hopkins
- Horror Asylum
‘Our budget was tiny. The forest was 12 trees on rollers – and for long shots we used bonsai. The crew had worked on Star Wars and thought we were absurd’
I met Angela Carter in 1982, while we were in Dublin attending a week celebrating the centenary of James Joyce’s birth. She’d written a script based on a short story of hers called The Company of Wolves, itself an adaptation of Little Red Riding Hood. It wasn’t long enough for a feature film but I proposed a kind of portmanteau structure, with a girl dreaming herself as a fairytale character and her dream grandmother telling cautionary tales. In that way, we could incorporate elements from other traditional tales in Angela’s collection The Bloody Chamber.
I met Angela Carter in 1982, while we were in Dublin attending a week celebrating the centenary of James Joyce’s birth. She’d written a script based on a short story of hers called The Company of Wolves, itself an adaptation of Little Red Riding Hood. It wasn’t long enough for a feature film but I proposed a kind of portmanteau structure, with a girl dreaming herself as a fairytale character and her dream grandmother telling cautionary tales. In that way, we could incorporate elements from other traditional tales in Angela’s collection The Bloody Chamber.
- 3/13/2023
- by Chris Broughton
- The Guardian - Film News
The film-maker cast Lansbury in his exotic horror folk-tale The Company of Wolves, released in 1984. Here he remembers an actor who ‘always understood’
• Angela Lansbury dies aged 96 – news
• Angela Lansbury: the scene-stealing grande dame of stage and screen – appreciation
I had two Angelas in my life at one stage. Angela Carter (long gone and greatly missed) and Angela Lansbury. There should be a ghost at your elbow, whose only purpose is to remind you how lucky you are.
I would travel over to Clapham Common in south London to work with the first Angela, dissecting her short story collection The Bloody Chamber into interlocking bites and fragments of upended fairy tales that would become The Company of Wolves. I ended up with the second Angela on a sound stage in Shepperton in a forest made of movable trees designed by Anton Furst, financed, somehow, by the producer Stephen Woolley.
Continue reading.
• Angela Lansbury dies aged 96 – news
• Angela Lansbury: the scene-stealing grande dame of stage and screen – appreciation
I had two Angelas in my life at one stage. Angela Carter (long gone and greatly missed) and Angela Lansbury. There should be a ghost at your elbow, whose only purpose is to remind you how lucky you are.
I would travel over to Clapham Common in south London to work with the first Angela, dissecting her short story collection The Bloody Chamber into interlocking bites and fragments of upended fairy tales that would become The Company of Wolves. I ended up with the second Angela on a sound stage in Shepperton in a forest made of movable trees designed by Anton Furst, financed, somehow, by the producer Stephen Woolley.
Continue reading.
- 10/12/2022
- by Neil Jordan
- The Guardian - Film News
Musician and actor David Bowie has topped a Sky Arts list celebrating the 50 most influential British artists of the last 50 years.
Bowie was named most influential by judges as they commended his influence across the industry and ability to transcend a variety of mediums including music, film and fashion.
A team of judges across music, film and TV, performing arts, literature and visual art were asked to create the list by TV channel Sky Arts in a celebration of British artists past and present and their influence on global culture. The 15-person judging panel, led by DJ, presenter and author Lauren Laverne, included Mobo Awards founder Kanya King, writer Bonnie Greer, film critic Ali Plumb and theater critic Lyn Gardner.
The top 10 also includes artist and filmmaker Steve McQueen (“Small Axe”) in second place; Russell T. Davies in third; fashion designer Vivienne Westwood fourth; playwright Caryl Churchill fifth; dancer-choreographer Michael Clark...
Bowie was named most influential by judges as they commended his influence across the industry and ability to transcend a variety of mediums including music, film and fashion.
A team of judges across music, film and TV, performing arts, literature and visual art were asked to create the list by TV channel Sky Arts in a celebration of British artists past and present and their influence on global culture. The 15-person judging panel, led by DJ, presenter and author Lauren Laverne, included Mobo Awards founder Kanya King, writer Bonnie Greer, film critic Ali Plumb and theater critic Lyn Gardner.
The top 10 also includes artist and filmmaker Steve McQueen (“Small Axe”) in second place; Russell T. Davies in third; fashion designer Vivienne Westwood fourth; playwright Caryl Churchill fifth; dancer-choreographer Michael Clark...
- 8/11/2022
- by Naman Ramachandran
- Variety Film + TV
The Heroine With 1,001 Faces author Maria Tatar with Anne-Katrin Titze: “1,001 captures not just an infinite number of possibilities but also the singularity, the magnificence of the heroine.”
In the first instalment of my conversation with Maria Tatar on her latest book, The Heroine With 1,001 Faces, we discuss Joseph Campbell’s Hero with A Thousand Faces; the Arabian Nights and volunteering heroines such as Scheherazade, Beauty, and The Hunger Games’s Katniss Everdeen; the Bluebeard tales; Neil Gaiman; Henry Louis Gates, Jr.'s Finding Your Roots and the Talking Book; Toni Morrison and listening to the voice of the ancestor; Christopher Vogler’s The Writer's Journey and Michael Schulz’s screenplay for Karin Brandauer’s Aschenputtel; Sergei Loznitsa’s documentary Babi Yar. Context and the number 33,771; Astrid Lindgren and Angela Carter and what should not be dismissed; Karl Ove Knausgaard’s The Morningstar; Stephen King’s upcoming novel Fairy Tale; a...
In the first instalment of my conversation with Maria Tatar on her latest book, The Heroine With 1,001 Faces, we discuss Joseph Campbell’s Hero with A Thousand Faces; the Arabian Nights and volunteering heroines such as Scheherazade, Beauty, and The Hunger Games’s Katniss Everdeen; the Bluebeard tales; Neil Gaiman; Henry Louis Gates, Jr.'s Finding Your Roots and the Talking Book; Toni Morrison and listening to the voice of the ancestor; Christopher Vogler’s The Writer's Journey and Michael Schulz’s screenplay for Karin Brandauer’s Aschenputtel; Sergei Loznitsa’s documentary Babi Yar. Context and the number 33,771; Astrid Lindgren and Angela Carter and what should not be dismissed; Karl Ove Knausgaard’s The Morningstar; Stephen King’s upcoming novel Fairy Tale; a...
- 1/27/2022
- by Anne-Katrin Titze
- eyeforfilm.co.uk
It was Shawn’s first time tripping on psilocybin mushrooms. He took them with friends, but hours later, they’d all gone home or fallen asleep. Overwhelmed by the energy of two quarreling dogs, he took refuge in the basement, where his brain found patterns in everything he saw. He couldn’t stop thinking in maddening loops. It was past midnight, the trip wouldn’t end, and nobody was around to help. He was terrified of being trapped alone with his hyperactive mind.
Where could Shawn turn?
Prior to this April,...
Where could Shawn turn?
Prior to this April,...
- 7/7/2021
- by Delilah Friedler
- Rollingstone.com
The star and the writer/director of Sea Fever talk about a diverse array of influential films in a double episode.
Show Notes: Movies Referenced In This Episode
Sea Fever (2020)
Soldier (1998)
Unforgiven (1992)
Blade Runner (1982)
Gladiator (2000)
The Ice Harvest (2005)
Wonder Woman (2017)
Ordet (1955)
Ditte, Child of Man (1946)
Frances (1982)
The Accused (1988)
The Deer Hunter (1978)
My American Uncle (1980)
8 ½ (1963)
Ikiru (1952)
Heaven’s Gate (1980)
Thunderbolt and Lightfoot (1974)
Europa (1991)
Diva (1981)
The Sacrifice (1986)
Saturday Night Fever (1977)
The Party (1968)
Westworld (1973)
The Searchers (1956)
Alien (1979)
Cool Hand Luke (1967)
The Exterminating Angel (1962)
Contagion (2011)
Idiocracy (2006)
The Company of Wolves (1984)
Mona Lisa (1986)
King Kong (1933)
Arrival (2016)
In The Cut (2003)
Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000)
Zero Dark Thirty (2012)
Mandy (2018)
Blade Runner 2049 (2017)
Dune (1984)
Dune (2020… maybe)
Bright Star (2009)
Basic Instinct (1992)
Innerspace (1987)
American Gigolo (1980)
Thelma and Louise (1991)
Wild Things (1998)
Ginger Snaps (2000)
Life of Pi (2012)
Hulk (2003)
Die Hard (1988)
The Hurt Locker (2009)
Psycho (1960)
1917 (2019)
Shane (1953)
Other Notable Items
Brendan McCarthy
David Peoples
Kurt Russell
Lars Von Trier
Carl Theodor Dreyer
Bjarne Henning-Jensen...
Show Notes: Movies Referenced In This Episode
Sea Fever (2020)
Soldier (1998)
Unforgiven (1992)
Blade Runner (1982)
Gladiator (2000)
The Ice Harvest (2005)
Wonder Woman (2017)
Ordet (1955)
Ditte, Child of Man (1946)
Frances (1982)
The Accused (1988)
The Deer Hunter (1978)
My American Uncle (1980)
8 ½ (1963)
Ikiru (1952)
Heaven’s Gate (1980)
Thunderbolt and Lightfoot (1974)
Europa (1991)
Diva (1981)
The Sacrifice (1986)
Saturday Night Fever (1977)
The Party (1968)
Westworld (1973)
The Searchers (1956)
Alien (1979)
Cool Hand Luke (1967)
The Exterminating Angel (1962)
Contagion (2011)
Idiocracy (2006)
The Company of Wolves (1984)
Mona Lisa (1986)
King Kong (1933)
Arrival (2016)
In The Cut (2003)
Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000)
Zero Dark Thirty (2012)
Mandy (2018)
Blade Runner 2049 (2017)
Dune (1984)
Dune (2020… maybe)
Bright Star (2009)
Basic Instinct (1992)
Innerspace (1987)
American Gigolo (1980)
Thelma and Louise (1991)
Wild Things (1998)
Ginger Snaps (2000)
Life of Pi (2012)
Hulk (2003)
Die Hard (1988)
The Hurt Locker (2009)
Psycho (1960)
1917 (2019)
Shane (1953)
Other Notable Items
Brendan McCarthy
David Peoples
Kurt Russell
Lars Von Trier
Carl Theodor Dreyer
Bjarne Henning-Jensen...
- 4/28/2020
- by Kris Millsap
- Trailers from Hell
Corpo Celeste (Heavenly Body), Le Meravigile (The Wonders) and Lazzaro Felice (Happy As Lazzaro) director/screenwriter Alice Rohrwacher with Alba Rohrwacher Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze
Cannes Best Screenplay winner Happy As Lazzaro (Lazzaro Felice), shot by Hélène Louvart, executive produced by Martin Scorsese, and starring Adriano Tardiolo with Alba Rohrwacher, Luca Chikovani, Agnese Graziani, David Bennent, Nicoletta Braschi, Sergi López, and Tommaso Ragno, was the opening night film in The Wonders: Alice and Alba Rohrwacher, organised by Museum of Modern Art Department of Film Curator Josh Siegel with Camilla Cormanni and Paola Ruggiero of Luce Cinecittà.
Alice Rohrwacher with Alba Rohrwacher: “I think fairy tales were very important for us. Especially the collection of Italian folktales done by Italo Calvino.” Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze
The casting of David Bennent (Volker Schlöndorff’s adaptation of Günter Grass’s The Tin Drum), the magic of Italo Calvino (Italian Folktales), Astrid Lindgren, Angela Carter (The...
Cannes Best Screenplay winner Happy As Lazzaro (Lazzaro Felice), shot by Hélène Louvart, executive produced by Martin Scorsese, and starring Adriano Tardiolo with Alba Rohrwacher, Luca Chikovani, Agnese Graziani, David Bennent, Nicoletta Braschi, Sergi López, and Tommaso Ragno, was the opening night film in The Wonders: Alice and Alba Rohrwacher, organised by Museum of Modern Art Department of Film Curator Josh Siegel with Camilla Cormanni and Paola Ruggiero of Luce Cinecittà.
Alice Rohrwacher with Alba Rohrwacher: “I think fairy tales were very important for us. Especially the collection of Italian folktales done by Italo Calvino.” Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze
The casting of David Bennent (Volker Schlöndorff’s adaptation of Günter Grass’s The Tin Drum), the magic of Italo Calvino (Italian Folktales), Astrid Lindgren, Angela Carter (The...
- 12/22/2019
- by Anne-Katrin Titze
- eyeforfilm.co.uk
Rereleased after 25 years, this literary work about a mute woman in 19th-century New Zealand remains full of extraordinary images and enigmas
The re-release of Jane Campion’s mysterious film The Piano after 25 years is a chance to taste again its fetishism and voyeurism, its strange story of sexuality denied and displaced. It is also about the gravitational pull of death; Campion quotes Thomas Hood’s 1827 poem Silence at the very end of the credits: “There is a silence where hath been no sound, / There is a silence where no sound may be, / In the cold grave – under the deep deep sea.” (Perhaps she was savouring the fact that these words would be shown to near-emptied cinemas.)
I once found something over-literary in this film. I felt it played like an adaptation of some forgotten 800-page Booker-shortlisted novel (it is actually from an original screenplay by Campion). And for what it is worth,...
The re-release of Jane Campion’s mysterious film The Piano after 25 years is a chance to taste again its fetishism and voyeurism, its strange story of sexuality denied and displaced. It is also about the gravitational pull of death; Campion quotes Thomas Hood’s 1827 poem Silence at the very end of the credits: “There is a silence where hath been no sound, / There is a silence where no sound may be, / In the cold grave – under the deep deep sea.” (Perhaps she was savouring the fact that these words would be shown to near-emptied cinemas.)
I once found something over-literary in this film. I felt it played like an adaptation of some forgotten 800-page Booker-shortlisted novel (it is actually from an original screenplay by Campion). And for what it is worth,...
- 6/15/2018
- by Peter Bradshaw
- The Guardian - Film News
Stars: Katie Goldfinch, Florence Cady, Neil Morrissey, Charles O’Neill, Brian Croucher, Aaron Jeffcoate, Larry Rew, Babette Barat, Lisa Martin, John Stirling, Angela Carter, Phil Hemming | Written by Darren Lake, Iain Ross-McNamee, John Wolskel | Directed by Iain Ross-McNamee
“British horror”, as a genre, has never really gone away but in recent years it seems that this small corner of our cinematic shores has found itself once again. Shying away from the Carry On-esque mixture of dick and fart gags and horror that once marked out British-made fare, filmmakers have instead returned to the genres more gothic roots, taking inspiration from the likes of Hammer and Tigon – yet stil bringing modern sensibilites and concerns to the fore. It’s that mixture that has borne out some great films over the past few years: The Sleeping Room, The Forgotten, Darkness Wakes, Ghost Ship, Ghosts of Darkness… And you can now add Crucible...
“British horror”, as a genre, has never really gone away but in recent years it seems that this small corner of our cinematic shores has found itself once again. Shying away from the Carry On-esque mixture of dick and fart gags and horror that once marked out British-made fare, filmmakers have instead returned to the genres more gothic roots, taking inspiration from the likes of Hammer and Tigon – yet stil bringing modern sensibilites and concerns to the fore. It’s that mixture that has borne out some great films over the past few years: The Sleeping Room, The Forgotten, Darkness Wakes, Ghost Ship, Ghosts of Darkness… And you can now add Crucible...
- 2/19/2018
- by Phil Wheat
- Nerdly
A version of this article originally appeared on ew.com.
Emma Watson loves to read.
The actress has that in common with her brainy Harry Potter character Hermione as well as bookish Belle, who she plays in the much-anticipated film Beauty and the Beast, out March 17. In addition to being a bookworm, Watson is also an outspoken feminist and as well as a Un Women Goodwill Ambassador and promoter of the organization’s HeForShe movement, which is dedicated to recruiting men into the movement for gender equality. As a response to her work with the Un, she launched the feminist...
Emma Watson loves to read.
The actress has that in common with her brainy Harry Potter character Hermione as well as bookish Belle, who she plays in the much-anticipated film Beauty and the Beast, out March 17. In addition to being a bookworm, Watson is also an outspoken feminist and as well as a Un Women Goodwill Ambassador and promoter of the organization’s HeForShe movement, which is dedicated to recruiting men into the movement for gender equality. As a response to her work with the Un, she launched the feminist...
- 2/21/2017
- by Madeline Raynor
- PEOPLE.com
The greatest of all Hallmark holidays, the day of St. Valentine is constructed to make couples feel obligated to go out on expensive and over-anticipated dates, while unnecessarily reminding single people of their status. Candy hearts and roses are meant to celebrate monogamy and “normal” love; but the origins of the holiday go back to Roman culture and involved whips, wolf skins and fertility orgies. Sound more your speed? Then these decidedly non-romantic books may be the right tonic for this holiday:
Frankenstein by Mary Shelley: Mary Shelley’s still shocking novel is an affront to many things: religion, ego, scientific progress, but also love. The titular doctor creates a creature that he abandons out of disgust, only to have his creation haunt his every step and destroy all the people he loves. Talk about a bad ex. The book is a tragic exploration of freakishness and abandonment, an...
Frankenstein by Mary Shelley: Mary Shelley’s still shocking novel is an affront to many things: religion, ego, scientific progress, but also love. The titular doctor creates a creature that he abandons out of disgust, only to have his creation haunt his every step and destroy all the people he loves. Talk about a bad ex. The book is a tragic exploration of freakishness and abandonment, an...
- 2/14/2017
- by Ben Larned
- DailyDead
December 25th is internationally marketed as a day of cheer, togetherness, and bright lights during one of the darkest nights of the year. But, there are those of us who want to indulge in that darkness. There is a wealth of terror to be found in winter nights, and the following stories are perfect fodder for that breed of dread. Curl up by the fire, turn the lights off, and read... if you dare.
"The Wendigo" by Algernon Blackwood: A group of hunters in snowbound Montana encounter a windy, wintry forest spirit in one of Algernon Blackwood’s scariest tales. By taking an ancient, metaphorical legend and bringing it face-to-face with research and authentic characters, Blackwood forms an account of elemental terror that freezes the soul. Nothing is creepier—or more fun—on a windy December night.
"The Yattering and Jack" by Clive Barker: A family, tormented by...
"The Wendigo" by Algernon Blackwood: A group of hunters in snowbound Montana encounter a windy, wintry forest spirit in one of Algernon Blackwood’s scariest tales. By taking an ancient, metaphorical legend and bringing it face-to-face with research and authentic characters, Blackwood forms an account of elemental terror that freezes the soul. Nothing is creepier—or more fun—on a windy December night.
"The Yattering and Jack" by Clive Barker: A family, tormented by...
- 12/23/2016
- by Ben Larned
- DailyDead
Towering castles where secrets lurk; fragile souls ripe for corruption; beasts made men, and men made beasts. These elements have populated our collective imaginations for centuries, across continents and generations. And for so many of these years, the stories remained the same. They served as warnings, cautionary tales against losing innocence and purity—morally-centered escapism. Only in the last fifty years, it seems, have we begun to deconstruct these stories. Some have watered them down for happier digestion; others amplify their sexuality and luridness. Few have been able to accomplish what Angela Carter did with her collection, The Bloody Chamber.
Focusing mainly on the tales of Charles Perrault, Carter began a trend that we have seen many times since—she brought classic stories into a modern context. A surface read shows obvious themes of feminism and sexuality. Traditional tales were meant to warn against sex (and sin, going hand in hand) and encourage wholesome unions,...
Focusing mainly on the tales of Charles Perrault, Carter began a trend that we have seen many times since—she brought classic stories into a modern context. A surface read shows obvious themes of feminism and sexuality. Traditional tales were meant to warn against sex (and sin, going hand in hand) and encourage wholesome unions,...
- 11/1/2016
- by Ben Larned
- DailyDead
The director adds a romantic relationship story to his documentary about alt-rockers Wolf Alice to create a difficult cinematic hybrid that’s his best film in years
Michael Winterbottom’s On the Road is his best film in years: romantic, erotic and musically euphoric. This is a sensuously laidback docu-social-realist gem which takes something very difficult and makes it look easy. Winterbottom and his camera crew went out on the road last year with the indie rock band Wolf Alice as they toured the UK and Ireland: a group whose name is taken from an Angela Carter short story. They are Ellie Rowsell (guitar, vocals), Joff Oddie (guitar), Joel Amey (drums) and Theo Ellis (bass). The various tour dates provide a convenient chapter-break structure, and are announced in block capitals on screen: Glasgow, Liverpool, etc.
Related: Wolf Alice: ‘We’ve got to a nice, boring middle ground’
Continue reading.
Michael Winterbottom’s On the Road is his best film in years: romantic, erotic and musically euphoric. This is a sensuously laidback docu-social-realist gem which takes something very difficult and makes it look easy. Winterbottom and his camera crew went out on the road last year with the indie rock band Wolf Alice as they toured the UK and Ireland: a group whose name is taken from an Angela Carter short story. They are Ellie Rowsell (guitar, vocals), Joff Oddie (guitar), Joel Amey (drums) and Theo Ellis (bass). The various tour dates provide a convenient chapter-break structure, and are announced in block capitals on screen: Glasgow, Liverpool, etc.
Related: Wolf Alice: ‘We’ve got to a nice, boring middle ground’
Continue reading.
- 10/10/2016
- by Peter Bradshaw
- The Guardian - Film News
The year that gave us Gremlins, Ghostbusters and The Temple Of Doom also gave us these 20 underappreciated movies...
It's been said that 1984 was a vintage year for movies, and looking back, it's easy to see why. The likes of Ghostbusters and Gremlins served up comedy, action and the macabre in equal measure. James Cameron's The Terminator cemented Arnold Schwarzenegger's star status and gave us one of the greatest sci-fi action movies of the decade.
This was also the year where the Coen brothers made their screen debut with the stunning thriller Blood Simple, and when the Zucker brothers followed up Airplane! with the equally hilarious Top Secret! And we still haven't even mentioned Beverly Hills Cop, This Is Spinal Tap, The Karate Kid, Indiana Jones And The Temple Of Doom and the unexpectedly successful romantic comedy, Splash. Then there was Milos Forman's sumptuous period drama Amadeus, which...
It's been said that 1984 was a vintage year for movies, and looking back, it's easy to see why. The likes of Ghostbusters and Gremlins served up comedy, action and the macabre in equal measure. James Cameron's The Terminator cemented Arnold Schwarzenegger's star status and gave us one of the greatest sci-fi action movies of the decade.
This was also the year where the Coen brothers made their screen debut with the stunning thriller Blood Simple, and when the Zucker brothers followed up Airplane! with the equally hilarious Top Secret! And we still haven't even mentioned Beverly Hills Cop, This Is Spinal Tap, The Karate Kid, Indiana Jones And The Temple Of Doom and the unexpectedly successful romantic comedy, Splash. Then there was Milos Forman's sumptuous period drama Amadeus, which...
- 9/8/2015
- by ryanlambie
- Den of Geek
Looking for a good book recommendation? Our writers have a few unsung sci-fi, fantasy and horror gems up their sleeves...
Other people. What’s the point of them? They’re noisy and everywhere.
There is one thing they’re especially good at, however, and that’s recommending new stuff. In the spirit of that, we asked our writers to recommend great books that, for whatever reason, haven’t been surrounded by as much fuss and recognition as they deserve.
Nominations came in for personal favourites in fiction, non-fiction, children’s books and graphic novels, so we’ve divided them up into a series of features, the first of which is below, on great unsung sci-fi, fantasy, horror and thriller adult fiction.
Our hope is that you’ll demonstrate your worth as other people by carrying on the recommendations in the comments section below. Thanks in advance.
The Ladies Of Grace...
Other people. What’s the point of them? They’re noisy and everywhere.
There is one thing they’re especially good at, however, and that’s recommending new stuff. In the spirit of that, we asked our writers to recommend great books that, for whatever reason, haven’t been surrounded by as much fuss and recognition as they deserve.
Nominations came in for personal favourites in fiction, non-fiction, children’s books and graphic novels, so we’ve divided them up into a series of features, the first of which is below, on great unsung sci-fi, fantasy, horror and thriller adult fiction.
Our hope is that you’ll demonstrate your worth as other people by carrying on the recommendations in the comments section below. Thanks in advance.
The Ladies Of Grace...
- 7/2/2015
- by louisamellor
- Den of Geek
The best horror writer of the 20th century you've probably never heard of was a British woman who looked like a benign but mildly dotty Hogwarts teacher. But do not miss the occult mischief behind those 1980s mom-glasses; in a fairly standard Angela Carter story, Harry Potter would be mauled to death by a werewolf before a pan-species initiation of Hermione’s pubescent sexual power. She made things weird like that, which is why she was great. Carter, however, was not a horror writer in the same sense as Anne Rice or Stephen King; the bulk of her work is classified as magical realism (a made-up, jerk-off genre that permits English departments to acknowledge the existence of the human imagination), but her most celebrated book is a high gothic collection of short stories called The Bloody Chamber that you should read immediately if the genre holds any appeal for you.
- 7/23/2014
- by Brian McGreevy
- Vulture
Interview James Peaty 30 May 2013 - 06:44
With his new film Byzantium out this week, Neil Jordan chats to us about vampire movies, and his career to date...
In a career spanning more than three decades, Irish writer and director Neil Jordan has created some unforgettable movies. Some, such as his adaptation of Angela Carter's The Company Of Wolves, or Mona Lisa, or The Crying Game, are cult classics.
His glossy 1994 vampire movie Interview With The Vampire was his biggest box-office hit to date, with its starry cast - including Tom Cruise and Brad Pitt - and the popularity of Anne Rice's source novels behind it.
Since then, Jordan's brought a varied range of movies to the screen, from thrillers (In Dreams, The Brave One, The Good Thief) to dramas (The End Of The Affair, Breakfast On Pluto).
Just under 20 years after Interview With The Vampire, Jordan's returned to...
With his new film Byzantium out this week, Neil Jordan chats to us about vampire movies, and his career to date...
In a career spanning more than three decades, Irish writer and director Neil Jordan has created some unforgettable movies. Some, such as his adaptation of Angela Carter's The Company Of Wolves, or Mona Lisa, or The Crying Game, are cult classics.
His glossy 1994 vampire movie Interview With The Vampire was his biggest box-office hit to date, with its starry cast - including Tom Cruise and Brad Pitt - and the popularity of Anne Rice's source novels behind it.
Since then, Jordan's brought a varied range of movies to the screen, from thrillers (In Dreams, The Brave One, The Good Thief) to dramas (The End Of The Affair, Breakfast On Pluto).
Just under 20 years after Interview With The Vampire, Jordan's returned to...
- 5/29/2013
- by ryanlambie
- Den of Geek
One of the great pleasures in life is finding a book that is so well-written that you can actually feel it on your skin, a book that stays with you long after you have finished reading it. It is a very rare experience and therefore one that must be savored. While looking through my shelves last week, I happened across a very thin volume titled The Bloody Chamber by Angela Carter, something I had randomly picked up when Borders was closing and had never gotten around to reading. I had no idea what to expect, and I was more than pleasantly surprised.
The Bloody Chamber is a book of short stories, all of which are based on a well-known fairy tale. What makes these stories stand out from the normal retelling of fairy tales is Carter's extraordinary grasp of language. Her words flow together effortlessly and create incredibly beautiful pictures...
The Bloody Chamber is a book of short stories, all of which are based on a well-known fairy tale. What makes these stories stand out from the normal retelling of fairy tales is Carter's extraordinary grasp of language. Her words flow together effortlessly and create incredibly beautiful pictures...
- 1/29/2013
- by Lauren Jankowski
- Planet Fury
Next year's flurry of fairytale film adaptations promises some sinister thrills – but fairy stories have always been dark at heart
Harry's long gone, but wands are still selling. 2013, comme 2012, promises a score of classic fairytale film adaptations – a legion of Pinocchios, Peter Pans, Cinderellas and Wizards of Oz. A cursory squint into the crystal ball that is the Imdb website confirms that most of the upcoming fairytale films will be tormented, adult-oriented affairs; expect the adjective "twisted' to appear with some frequency. The sort of films in which for every lie, Pinocchio has to wash blood off his hands. With sandpaper mittens. That sort of thing.
The Dark Heart of Fairy Tales, a season of older films currently playing at the Barbican, proves Hollywood isn't doing anything new. The screenings mark the bicentenary of the first publication of the Brothers Grimm stories, while acknowledging that popular fairy stories mainly derive...
Harry's long gone, but wands are still selling. 2013, comme 2012, promises a score of classic fairytale film adaptations – a legion of Pinocchios, Peter Pans, Cinderellas and Wizards of Oz. A cursory squint into the crystal ball that is the Imdb website confirms that most of the upcoming fairytale films will be tormented, adult-oriented affairs; expect the adjective "twisted' to appear with some frequency. The sort of films in which for every lie, Pinocchio has to wash blood off his hands. With sandpaper mittens. That sort of thing.
The Dark Heart of Fairy Tales, a season of older films currently playing at the Barbican, proves Hollywood isn't doing anything new. The screenings mark the bicentenary of the first publication of the Brothers Grimm stories, while acknowledging that popular fairy stories mainly derive...
- 11/9/2012
- by Rhik Samadder
- The Guardian - Film News
Neil Jordan is best known recently for his worthy dramas along the lines of Breakfast on Pluto or Michael Collins but the man is quite hard to pin down in terms of a specific favoured genre because looking at his filmography he has made some strange choices.
After the low-budget and gritty Angel in 1982, Jordan went for a bizarre horror cum fairy tale story which was financed by the soon to be defunct Palace Pictures. Based on the short story writing of Angela Carter and co-written by her and Jordan, The Company of Wolves is a strange Chinese box of a movie which just about holds up in these modern times.
Starting in present day (well 1984) we meet a girl (Sara Patterson) who is very much trapped in her own world and spends all day in bed much to her parents and sister’s chagrin. The girl dreams back to...
After the low-budget and gritty Angel in 1982, Jordan went for a bizarre horror cum fairy tale story which was financed by the soon to be defunct Palace Pictures. Based on the short story writing of Angela Carter and co-written by her and Jordan, The Company of Wolves is a strange Chinese box of a movie which just about holds up in these modern times.
Starting in present day (well 1984) we meet a girl (Sara Patterson) who is very much trapped in her own world and spends all day in bed much to her parents and sister’s chagrin. The girl dreams back to...
- 10/9/2012
- by Chris Holt
- HeyUGuys.co.uk
For a director who made his name with the excellent adaptation of Angela Carter's gothic deconstructed fairy tales with "The Company of Wolves" and his big studio breakthrough with "Interview with the Vampire," it's been a while since Neil Jordan traveled into more horrific territory. There were genre elements to his last film, "Ondine," but that was more of a warm, romantic fable (and a very underrated film). It's really been thirteen years since 1999's "In Dreams," when Jordan tackled the darker side of the supernatural world. But "Byzantium," the director's latest project, certainly marks a return to that kind of territory with a vampire tale from writer Moira Buffini ("Jane Eyre") that stars Gemma Arterton and Saoirse Ronan as a pair of vampires causing havoc in a British seaside town. And when we spoke to him in Toronto, where the film premiered this week at Tiff, Jordan says that the film was.
- 9/12/2012
- by Oliver Lyttelton
- The Playlist
Once upon a time there existed a cinematic landscape where not every feature-length fairy tale movie was drawn from a classic story, and the descriptor “fractured fairy tale” didn’t just mean gross-out humor and a Scottish-accented Mike Myers playing a big green ogre. While some of those films have certainly succeeded (this writer has a soft spot for the first “Shrek”), the kind of tale that the likes of the Brothers Grimm would collect in their oeuvre of beloved folklore was often of the darker-hued variety – pitting characters in bleak struggles that would see them rise from the ashes as better individuals for it in the end. Yes, the stories were simple, but they also served as a basis for many of the storytelling tropes that are used today – and may have influenced a few of our own moral compasses, with the fables acting as parables for life's lessons.
- 5/31/2012
- by Benjamin Wright
- The Playlist
There have been many portrayals of werewolves and other shapeshifting man/woman-beasts, in the media of film, but I can’t say there has been many memorable ones. With The Wolf Man (1941) Lon Chaney Jr. transformed into a werewolf at the full moon, and created one of the three most famous horror icons of the modern day. Werewolf fiction as since been an exceptionally diverse genre with ancient folkloric roots and manifold modern re-interpretations – from high shcool basketball players to American tourists hiking through the UK. Here is the list of my personal favourites.
#13- El aullido del diablo/ Howl of the Devil (1987)
Directed by: Paul Naschy
Paul Naschy, also known as Jacinto Molina Alvarez, was a Spanish movie actor, screenwriter, and director working primarily in horror films. His portrayals of numerous classic horror figures—the wolfman, the hunchback, Count Dracula, the mummy—have earned him recognition as the Spanish Lon Chaney.
#13- El aullido del diablo/ Howl of the Devil (1987)
Directed by: Paul Naschy
Paul Naschy, also known as Jacinto Molina Alvarez, was a Spanish movie actor, screenwriter, and director working primarily in horror films. His portrayals of numerous classic horror figures—the wolfman, the hunchback, Count Dracula, the mummy—have earned him recognition as the Spanish Lon Chaney.
- 10/13/2011
- by Ricky
- SoundOnSight
Neil Jordan's Byzantium is a female vampire movie with Saoirse Ronan and Gemma Arterton cast in the leads, and today the male star has been announced.
According to Variety, Caleb Landry Jones (X-Men: First Class) is in this sinister mix. The £8 million ($11 million) budgeted movie is set to shoot in October.
The story, penned by Moira Buffini, revolves around a mother and daughter who are vampires and arrive in a small British town, revealing their secret to the locals. Jones plays a teenager dying of leukemia, which in turns forces him to struggle with his mortality, causing Saoirse Ronan's character to struggle with her own immortality.
Byzantium finds Jordan reuniting with producer Stephen Woolley, with whom he has made several movies dating back to 1984’s The Company of Wolves, based on Angela Carter’s novel. Woolley also produced Jordan’s The Crying Game, and they last worked together...
According to Variety, Caleb Landry Jones (X-Men: First Class) is in this sinister mix. The £8 million ($11 million) budgeted movie is set to shoot in October.
The story, penned by Moira Buffini, revolves around a mother and daughter who are vampires and arrive in a small British town, revealing their secret to the locals. Jones plays a teenager dying of leukemia, which in turns forces him to struggle with his mortality, causing Saoirse Ronan's character to struggle with her own immortality.
Byzantium finds Jordan reuniting with producer Stephen Woolley, with whom he has made several movies dating back to 1984’s The Company of Wolves, based on Angela Carter’s novel. Woolley also produced Jordan’s The Crying Game, and they last worked together...
- 8/23/2011
- by Masked Slasher
- DreadCentral.com
Irish filmmaker Neil Jordan first caught the attention of horror fans back in 1984 with his adaptation of Angela Carter's The Company of Wolves. And though he's since won widespread acclaim for films like Mona Lisa and The Crying Game, Jordan's returned to our favorite genre from time to time with movies like High Spirits, Interview with the Vampire, and -- tangentially -- the terrific, disturbing The Butcher Boy. So many of us were pretty stoked to hear that Jordan would be getting creepy once again by adapting Neil Gaiman's Newbery Award-winning The Graveyard Book. But it looks like there's another horror project that Jordan will tackle first -- the mother-daughter vampire tale Byzantium....
- 5/17/2011
- FEARnet
Here's a new story about vampires that has our veins throbbing with excitement.
Straight outta Cannes is news that Saoirse Ronan and Gemma Arterton will be teaming up with Oscar-winning director Neil Jordan for "Byzantium," a spooky flick about the eternal bond between a mother and a daughter… who are also vampires. In fact, the mom turns her kid into a vampire herself. And because they're so young and fresh, sometimes they pretend they're sisters while they get up to their dastardly deeds. What would Freud say?
We all know that Ronan is supremely awesome after seeing "Hanna," but let's give Arterton her due, too. Although she's most famous for her that swords and sandals films like "Clash of the Titans" and "Prince of Persia," she's fantastic in the thriller "The Disappearance of Alice Creed" and the graphic novel adaptation "Tamara Drewe." Coincidentally, "Byzantium" scribe Moira Buffini penned the screenplay for "Tamara Drewe,...
Straight outta Cannes is news that Saoirse Ronan and Gemma Arterton will be teaming up with Oscar-winning director Neil Jordan for "Byzantium," a spooky flick about the eternal bond between a mother and a daughter… who are also vampires. In fact, the mom turns her kid into a vampire herself. And because they're so young and fresh, sometimes they pretend they're sisters while they get up to their dastardly deeds. What would Freud say?
We all know that Ronan is supremely awesome after seeing "Hanna," but let's give Arterton her due, too. Although she's most famous for her that swords and sandals films like "Clash of the Titans" and "Prince of Persia," she's fantastic in the thriller "The Disappearance of Alice Creed" and the graphic novel adaptation "Tamara Drewe." Coincidentally, "Byzantium" scribe Moira Buffini penned the screenplay for "Tamara Drewe,...
- 5/16/2011
- by Jenni Miller
- NextMovie
Young actress Saoirse Ronan will star alongside Gemma Arterton in a ‘mother-daughter’ vampire film called Byzantium, to be directed by Neil Jordan.
Ronan, who most recently appeared in Joe Wright’s Hanna, is set to have a very busy schedule as she has several films in the works already.
Byzantium's original script is by Moira Buffini, who penned the recent Jane Eyre adaptation, and Tamara Drewe, which also starred Gemma Arterton.
Based on Buffini's play A Vampire Story, the plot revolves around “a mother vampire who turns her own daughter into a vampire and the pair form a lethal partnership, sometimes posing as sisters.”
Neil Jordan is no stranger to vampire or fantasy films, having directed Anne Rice’s Interview with the Vampire and The Company of Wolves, an adaptation of a short story by Angela Carter from her book The Bloody Chamber.
Stephen Woolley, who worked with Jordan on The Company of Wolves,...
Ronan, who most recently appeared in Joe Wright’s Hanna, is set to have a very busy schedule as she has several films in the works already.
Byzantium's original script is by Moira Buffini, who penned the recent Jane Eyre adaptation, and Tamara Drewe, which also starred Gemma Arterton.
Based on Buffini's play A Vampire Story, the plot revolves around “a mother vampire who turns her own daughter into a vampire and the pair form a lethal partnership, sometimes posing as sisters.”
Neil Jordan is no stranger to vampire or fantasy films, having directed Anne Rice’s Interview with the Vampire and The Company of Wolves, an adaptation of a short story by Angela Carter from her book The Bloody Chamber.
Stephen Woolley, who worked with Jordan on The Company of Wolves,...
- 5/16/2011
- by charlotte.newman@lovefilm.com (Charlotte Newman)
- LOVEFiLM
Johnny Depp and Jerry Bruckheimer reassure fans by insisting possibilities for Pirates of the Caribbean are 'endless'
• Pirates of the Caribbean fervour briefly – and bafflingly, given the poor reviews for the fourth instalment – swept through Cannes at the weekend, with security guards in the Palais des Festivals flinging themselves at crowds rendered hysterical at the presence of Johnny Depp (below) – "Johnny! Johnny!" they screamed, with the desperation of drowning men.
If some had wished this fine actor to announce his and fellow seadogs' retirement from the high seas, they were disappointed. The possibilities, he said, for Pirates were "endless", while the producer, Jerry Bruckheimer, claimed that there "is much more fun to be to be had. As long as the scripts are good and we're working with film-makers such as Rob Marshall, we're all good".
• Gemma Arterton is certainly having her hour: aside from her forthcoming role in Neil Labute...
• Pirates of the Caribbean fervour briefly – and bafflingly, given the poor reviews for the fourth instalment – swept through Cannes at the weekend, with security guards in the Palais des Festivals flinging themselves at crowds rendered hysterical at the presence of Johnny Depp (below) – "Johnny! Johnny!" they screamed, with the desperation of drowning men.
If some had wished this fine actor to announce his and fellow seadogs' retirement from the high seas, they were disappointed. The possibilities, he said, for Pirates were "endless", while the producer, Jerry Bruckheimer, claimed that there "is much more fun to be to be had. As long as the scripts are good and we're working with film-makers such as Rob Marshall, we're all good".
• Gemma Arterton is certainly having her hour: aside from her forthcoming role in Neil Labute...
- 5/15/2011
- by Charlotte Higgins
- The Guardian - Film News
Is Saoirse Ronan the latest young talent to be cloned so that she can be attached to many projects at once? That appears to be the case. She's already scheduled for The Host [1], may be in Joe Wright's Anna Karenina [2] and Emma Thompson's Effie [3], and the latest is a film called Byzantium, a 'mother-daughter' vampire tale co-starring Gemma Arterton that Neil Jordan will direct. The news (out of Cannes, natch -- this weekend is going to be flooded with reports like this, just as the last few days have been) is that the film is based on an original script by Moira Buffini, who scripted [4] the recent version of Jane Eyre, and is about "a mother vampire who turns her own daughter into a vampire and the pair form a lethal partnership, sometimes posing as sisters." The script is based on her own play A Vampire Story, and...
- 5/14/2011
- by Russ Fischer
- Slash Film
No rest for the wicked as more news is coming out of Cannes today, this time involving Oscar-winning filmmaker Neil Jordan's Byzantium, a female vampire movie with Saoirse Ronan and Gemma Arterton cast in the leads.
Per THR, the original script was penned by Moira Buffini and details the story of a mother vampire (Arterton, pictured) who turns her own daughter (Ronan) into a vampire, and the pair form a lethal partnership, sometimes posing as sisters.
The £8 million ($11 million) budgeted movie is set to shoot in October.
Byzantium finds Jordan reuniting with producer Stephen Woolley, with whom he has made several movies dating back to 1984’s The Company of Wolves, based on Angela Carter’s novel. Woolley also produced Jordan’s The Crying Game, and they last worked together on Breakfast on Pluto in 2005.
“I love the horror genre, and we’ve been working on this for three or four years.
Per THR, the original script was penned by Moira Buffini and details the story of a mother vampire (Arterton, pictured) who turns her own daughter (Ronan) into a vampire, and the pair form a lethal partnership, sometimes posing as sisters.
The £8 million ($11 million) budgeted movie is set to shoot in October.
Byzantium finds Jordan reuniting with producer Stephen Woolley, with whom he has made several movies dating back to 1984’s The Company of Wolves, based on Angela Carter’s novel. Woolley also produced Jordan’s The Crying Game, and they last worked together on Breakfast on Pluto in 2005.
“I love the horror genre, and we’ve been working on this for three or four years.
- 5/14/2011
- by Uncle Creepy
- DreadCentral.com
Film-makers are more fearful of young women's carnal desire than were the fairy-tale tellers of old
The story of Red Riding Hood has its roots in ancient Asian myth, but the version that's come down to us was pretty much shaped by the first known printed rendering. This was published in 1697 by Charles Perrault, a civil servant at the court of Louis Xiv. His pretty heroine's red headgear would then have been unusually provocative attire. She stops to talk to the wolf though she shouldn't have done, takes her clothes off, gets into bed with him and marvels at the size of his body parts. Then he eats her up.
Lest there be any doubt about the moral of this tale, Perrault added an admonitory coda. Attractive young women should never talk to strange men; the apparently gentlest of these smooth-pelted wolves were the most dangerous. In his day, marriages were arranged by parents,...
The story of Red Riding Hood has its roots in ancient Asian myth, but the version that's come down to us was pretty much shaped by the first known printed rendering. This was published in 1697 by Charles Perrault, a civil servant at the court of Louis Xiv. His pretty heroine's red headgear would then have been unusually provocative attire. She stops to talk to the wolf though she shouldn't have done, takes her clothes off, gets into bed with him and marvels at the size of his body parts. Then he eats her up.
Lest there be any doubt about the moral of this tale, Perrault added an admonitory coda. Attractive young women should never talk to strange men; the apparently gentlest of these smooth-pelted wolves were the most dangerous. In his day, marriages were arranged by parents,...
- 4/18/2011
- by David Cox
- The Guardian - Film News
If you go down to the multiplex today, you're sure to find a watered-down take on a fairytale, says John Patterson
After seeing Catherine Hardwicke's toothless and clawless Red Riding Hood, I confess I'm not cheered to learn that her next movie will be a supernatural version of Hamlet. If she can't be trusted with kids' stuff, why should we let her go after the really big targets?
Red Riding Hood is being called Hardwicke's "revenge on the Twilight franchise", from which she was fired having directed the first instalment. I prefer to think of it simply as the waste by-product of the Twilight phenomenon: an even thinner, paler, more anaemic watering down of whatever Twilight was watering down in the first place. And what might that have been? Harry Potter? The Narnia franchise? The Lord Of The Rings? Anne Rice? We suddenly seem an awfully long way from...
After seeing Catherine Hardwicke's toothless and clawless Red Riding Hood, I confess I'm not cheered to learn that her next movie will be a supernatural version of Hamlet. If she can't be trusted with kids' stuff, why should we let her go after the really big targets?
Red Riding Hood is being called Hardwicke's "revenge on the Twilight franchise", from which she was fired having directed the first instalment. I prefer to think of it simply as the waste by-product of the Twilight phenomenon: an even thinner, paler, more anaemic watering down of whatever Twilight was watering down in the first place. And what might that have been? Harry Potter? The Narnia franchise? The Lord Of The Rings? Anne Rice? We suddenly seem an awfully long way from...
- 4/8/2011
- by John Patterson
- The Guardian - Film News
The horror movie, in all its multitude of cinematic guises, has offered up many a piece of friendly advice throughout the years. Whether it’s a deranged old man warning a bunch of witless teenagers to skip this year’s camping vacation, an urban legend warning the curious amongst us all to avoid speaking a certain name out loud five times whilst staring into a mirror or a pub full of especially suspicious punters suggesting we all just “stick to the roads” and “keep clear of the moors” as many an important life lesson has been learnt from the silver screen as from our dear and loving parents.
And so, for an overly imaginative teenager of the Nineteen Eighties, it’s understandable that a great deal of curiosity was to be aroused when Angela Lansbury kindly warned us all to “never stray from the path, never eat a windfall apple...
And so, for an overly imaginative teenager of the Nineteen Eighties, it’s understandable that a great deal of curiosity was to be aroused when Angela Lansbury kindly warned us all to “never stray from the path, never eat a windfall apple...
- 12/6/2010
- by Nick Turk
- HeyUGuys.co.uk
Robin Hood: Ridley Scott's pseudo historical take on the story of the man who robs from the rich and gives to the poor. In the film, Robin Hood (Russell Crowe) is a disillusioned Crusader who decides to go the outlaw route after seeing what's become of his country in his decade-long absence. All the classic character's are there but everything's off. Hood middle aged and surprisingly money hungry, Marian (Cate Blanchett) is now a Lady and the widow of the dead man Robin impersonates. The film lacks the sense of swashbuckling fun that has made the legend of Robin Hood an enduring part of Western culture. As with Antoine Fuqua's King Arthur, a few brava action sequences doesn't make the deconstruction of beloved myths any fun to watch. Also starring Mark Strong, Oscar Isaac, and Eileen Atkins.
Alternate Suggestions: The director's cut of Scott's Kingdom of Heaven has...
Alternate Suggestions: The director's cut of Scott's Kingdom of Heaven has...
- 9/21/2010
- by mmckellop
- Examiner Movies Channel
Catherine Breillat sets aside her characteristic dans ton visage eroticism, but clings to her usual feminism to retell with crisp dispatch Perrault's blood-curdling, much-analysed fairy tale of how a medieval virgin did for the serial uxoricide, Barbe Bleue. Breillat's tactic is to have the story read in a cosy attic in a modern French chateau by an eight-year-old girl (by implication Breillat herself) to her slightly older sister as a way of terrifying her. An interesting conceit, a clever film but somewhat perfunctory and altogether less interesting than, for instance, Neil Jordan and Angela Carter's The Company of Wolves.
DramaPhilip French
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DramaPhilip French
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds...
- 7/17/2010
- by Philip French
- The Guardian - Film News
Roll up, roll up: there's a special offer on today's Clip joint – buy one, get one free. Georgie Hobbs goes four-eyed looking at movies within movies, little cinematic treats buried Kinder Surprise-style within the main feature
Some days it seems all new releases come with a two-for-one offer. You expected a single movie. But thrown in – totally free, probably somewhere round the middle – you got another. The film within a film looks like a device on the rise, from the not-yet-made The Spirit 3 that plays in a cinema in Kick-Ass, to the phoney trailers that kick off Tropic Thunder or Death Proof.
But it's not new, of course. As long as film-makers have been making films, they've been interested in getting metaphysical. So who's done it best? This month the BFI celebrates the work of the sole female director to emerge from the French new wave: Agnes Varda. Eighty-two last birthday and still going strong.
Some days it seems all new releases come with a two-for-one offer. You expected a single movie. But thrown in – totally free, probably somewhere round the middle – you got another. The film within a film looks like a device on the rise, from the not-yet-made The Spirit 3 that plays in a cinema in Kick-Ass, to the phoney trailers that kick off Tropic Thunder or Death Proof.
But it's not new, of course. As long as film-makers have been making films, they've been interested in getting metaphysical. So who's done it best? This month the BFI celebrates the work of the sole female director to emerge from the French new wave: Agnes Varda. Eighty-two last birthday and still going strong.
- 5/5/2010
- by Georgie Hobbs
- The Guardian - Film News
As we reported a few weeks ago, David Johnson, a Frank Darabont alumnus and screenwriter of Orphan, is writing a 'gothic' retelling of Red Riding Hood for Leonardo DiCaprio's Appian Way production company. The project now has a director, in Twilight's Catherine Hardwicke.The film seems now to be officially titled The Girl in the Red Riding Hood, and Variety describes it as a "werewolf movie with a teenage love triangle at its centre". No stranger to teen drama, Hardwicke's CV as a director includes Thirteen and the sk8er boi epic Lords of Dogtown, as well as the Stephanie Meyer juggernaut. She's also prepping a modernised version of Hamlet, with a supernatural angle.No indication yet of whether this will have a period, fairytale setting or whether the story will be transplanted to right here, right now. We've seen a 'dark' version of Red Riding Hood before, in...
- 8/21/2009
- EmpireOnline
It is by complete surprise that I ended up with a copy of this movie. There I was, walking the aisles of my virtual movie store, looking for 'The Empire of the Wolves' when my clumsy fingers stumbled and clicked on Neil Jordan's (The Crying Game, In Dreams, Breakfast on Pluto) film instead. The result? Pure delight. I normally stay away from the 3 W's: witches, wizards and werewolves, but I'm glad I took a chance on this. Based on the werewolf stories in Angela Carter's short story collection 'The Bloody Chamber'[1] [1], this collection of gothic-themed tales was much scarier and darker than I expected it to be. Furthermore its release year (1984) and lead characters (Sarah Patterson and Angela Lansbury) lead me to believe that it was just another fantasy classic from the 80s, in the same vein as Time Bandits, Labyrinth and The Dark Crystal. In short, I...
- 6/9/2009
- by Myles Dolphin
- SoundOnSight
Nominated for Best Film at the 2008 Sitges International Fantasy Film Festival Hansel and Gretel is a visually stunning and truly affecting fable about the destruction of childhood dreams, the loss of innocence and the power of the imagination to overcome life's horrors.
Thematically and tonally comparable to Guillermo del Toro's ‘Pan's Labyrinth', Juan Antonio Bayona's ‘The Orphanage' and the works of author Angela Carter (The Company Of Wolves), Hansel and Gretel, the latest feature from South Korean writer-director Yim Phil-Sung (Antarctic Journal), takes its initial inspiration from the classic Brothers Grimm story and effectively employs it as the basis to reinvent the fairy tale as a dark and chimerical adult mystery for the modern age.
A dark and gripping fairy tale for adults, Hansel and Gretel is also a feast for the eyes, boasting sumptuous production design by Ryu Seong-hee (The Host; Oldboy) and outstanding cinematography by Kim...
Thematically and tonally comparable to Guillermo del Toro's ‘Pan's Labyrinth', Juan Antonio Bayona's ‘The Orphanage' and the works of author Angela Carter (The Company Of Wolves), Hansel and Gretel, the latest feature from South Korean writer-director Yim Phil-Sung (Antarctic Journal), takes its initial inspiration from the classic Brothers Grimm story and effectively employs it as the basis to reinvent the fairy tale as a dark and chimerical adult mystery for the modern age.
A dark and gripping fairy tale for adults, Hansel and Gretel is also a feast for the eyes, boasting sumptuous production design by Ryu Seong-hee (The Host; Oldboy) and outstanding cinematography by Kim...
- 3/10/2009
- by Leigh
- Latemag.com/film
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