Lara Parker and Kathryn Leigh Scott

This pic is from October 18 when both House of Dark Shadows and Night of Dark Shadows played at the Castro Theatre in San Francisco. Rarely has the Castro had such a large turnout of fans on a beautifully, summer-like Saturday night. Left in photo is Lara Parker who played Angelique on "Dark Shadows" and Kathryn Leigh Scott was famous for playing Josette and Maggie Evans.

They told some really great stories about the mishaps and low-budget filming techniques they endured. Like the time that Lara Parker's eyebrows were burned off from the excess lighter fluid when she lit the house of cards, which she built for an incantation. instead of a slow fire, there was a tiny burst of fire and it was gone. They patiently took questions and were kind to spend the best part of the weekend with us.

We were very excited to see rare footage being restored of Night of Dark Shadows.

Fans are waiting for the day that Johnny Depp brings Barnabas Collins "back to life."

Halloween songs highlighted this week on Music Choice's Sounds of the Seasons

I discovered that Halloween music has its own Music Choice channel. I was just listening to artists such as Laverne Baker from one of several Elvira compilations, nearly every song from her comps have appeared in the mix I caught. Now Oingo Boingo's "Dead Man's Party" from the New Wave Halloween album. Definitely material we would hear if listening to Dr. Demento. The other night there was an interpretation of "The Addams Family" theme song by someone I never heard of and then tonight "Addams Groove," by MC Hammer, likely from the first movie soundtrack (it's from Drew's Famous Halloween Party Music 2). Just as I type is the John Carpenter score "Michael's Sister" from Halloween II Soundtrack. It's pretty great. Twilight Zone by John Williams/Boston Pops Orchestra. Nice.

Plus they have trivia statements from news, people born on Halloween, movies, vampire facts, and little to do with the song itself. Halloween cities: Transylvania, NC. Gee, what's it like there!? Yeah, some are downright hoaky.

I heard the worm song the other night. "The worms crawl in, the worms crawl out, The worms play pinochle on your snout." So some of it is great for kids, like from the Chipmunks voice: Andrew Gold's, "Trick or Treat" song. But some might be scary. It's very random. The dates of some of the music can be obvious. Lots of bad crap from the 80s and 90s. Twice I've heard "Feed My Frankenstein" by Alice Cooper (Elvira comp. again with her voice over the song near the end). 'Weird Al' Yankovic's "Nature Trail to Hell" is a cheesy high point. Yankovic is a vegetarian, according to Music Choice.

Cheesy goth music: Song called "Druids" by some musicians that call themselves Midnight Syndicate with a website that makes you click twice before you can find a menu that tells you much of anything.

But the stuff from the 60s and 70s can be remarkably cool. The Ran-Dells doing sugary harmonies on a novelty pop song called "Martian Hop" in 1963. It is much less predictable than incessantly playing "Monster Mash".

I love that they will play the theme from Psycho by Bernard Hermann. I have a Bernard Hermann collection on vinyl but no way to play it.

Dave Edmunds' "The Creature from The Black Lagoon" is a good saloon song, from 1979.

They also have scary sound effects, literally, that's the title of the album, song is "The Phantom Theremin Orchestra," which really is creepier than it sounds. Like you're spinning in a tornado of mosquitos.

And, indeed, it helps me stop the channel surfing for a while. This is what one should do on a Monday night anyways.

The Powerpuff Girls 10th Anniversary Collection and the upcoming TV Special

"The Powerpuff Girls" 10th Anniversary Collection will be released on DVD January 20, 2009
Stay tuned for the Cartoon Network's schedule because sometime in December they will air "The Powerpuff Girls" TV special in which Roger Jackson plays Mojo Jojo singing two songs. One of the songs is "Everybody Wants to Rule the World," originally by Tears for Fears. Roger says that it was a lot of fun making this special and he looks forward to seeing it on TV.

Patti Smith: Dream of Life movie by Steven Sebring

San Francisco's Lumiere theatre was packed with people on October 19 for the special appearance of Patti Smith and Steven Sebring as their documentary Patti Smith: Dream of Life was about to screen. In the film she says when someone asks me, "How does it feel to be a rock icon, it makes me think of Mt. Rushmore." That's the wit we're dealt by this poet-singer-artist as she talks about her life.

She travels to places across the globe including Rome, Jerusalem, the graves of Gregory Corso, Arthur Rimbaud, and William Blake. Some precious moments are of her with her family and of her feeding a cemetery cat.

She's gentle in person and ferocious on stage whether it be footage of her live performances or of her war protests. Every time her live performances were shown, my hair stood on end. This is the effect she has on me live.

Guest appearances in the film include Philip Glass, Thom Yorke, Michael Stipe, and Flea (the latter compare peeing in a bottle stories).

We get to watch her paint as she confesses that she always wants to touch the paintings in museums, especially de Kooning's. She talked about Pollack's inspiration from Picasso's Guernica and that the drip from the tooth of the tiger in that painting is where he found a technique that hadn't been done before.

She had just came in from Australia and was terribly jetlagged, but wanted to answer questions for us. Someone asked her about how she met Robert Mapplethorpe. She said that he was her boyfriend and that they had met at Pratt College in Brooklyn. They found a way to continue to work together and remain friends until he died.

In a request for her to talk about her late brother Todd, whom had died from a rheumatic heart, she proudly exclaimed, "Isn't he handsome?" She recalled the time she came off stage in 1978 and backstage were Robert DeNiro, Harvey Keitel and her brother Todd. They were all the same age and she said that we all knew who was the hottest guy in the room.

Filmmaker Steven Sebring said that there was more music in the film, but those scenes that included music on the radio that was too expensive to obtain the rights to, had to be cut. In no way did they plan the filming around having to obtain rights of books used in the film or music that was naturally playing in the background in cafes or other locations. They let the filming process be as natural as possible and then worried about copyright permissions later.

Afterwards, Smith was signing the book that was released to go along with the film.

Into The Unknown with George Noory schedule

Into the Unknown with George Noory will air for one week on the SciFi Channel
schedule
full week airing dates below

DESCRIPTION:
(from Sci Fi's press release) Into The Unknown with George Noory, a late night television special exploring the realm of the unexplained. George Noory is host of Coast to Coast AM, a radio program nationally syndicated by Premiere Radio Networks. The show is the most listened to overnight radio program in North America, heard by nearly three million listeners each week on approximately 500 stations in the U.S. and Canada.

Check your local cable tv station listings:
11/16/08 (Su.) 11:00 PM SCI FI (#101) REINCARNATION
11/17/08 (Mo.) 11:00 PM " (#102) WITCHCRAFT
11/18/08 (Tu.) 11:00 PM " (#103) MONSTERS
11/19/08 (We.) 11:00 PM " (#104) UFO'S
11/20/08 (Th.) 11:00 PM " (#105) LEGENDS & LORE

Movie Review - From Inside at Dead Channels 2008, San Francisco, CA - Oct. 3 & 5 screenings

Wednesday attended the two screenings of From Inside as part of the Dead Channels Festival at the Roxie Theatre, Friday night and Sunday afternoon. The audience members were a mix of tattooed-hair-dyed goth punks and average looking 30-something fans of animation wanting to see the "new blood." In total about 25-30 people were in attendance. Ironically, San Francisco experienced its first rains of autumn within hours following the first screening, as if in honor of From Inside's torrents of blood raining from the sky. However, the second screening fell on a bright balmy Sunday severely contrasting any dour outlook you have when the movie is over.

The graphic novel From Inside, written, painted and inked by John Bergin, was published in 1992 by Kitchen Sink Press. It has remained timeless in showing how vulnerable humans are to the whims of the people around them as they are the only survivors of a nuclear attack. Its characters are traveling on a train, just barely holding onto life. The main character, Cee, faces bleak prospects, being in her last trimester of pregnancy. She's dealing with some denial about what's to come. In the transformation of page to screen, the drama unravels steadily with a subtle narration by Corryn Cummins, balanced by a dark, ominous score from Jeff Rona and a sound design by Dustin Blegstad that draws us into the post-apocalyptic journey. Bergin's panels become richly animated with flowing rivers of blood and billowing caustic black smoke. Faces of fellow passengers beckon for hope in some of the most vivid images of despair. Bergin chooses to use animation techniques that delay the action and hold onto moments, which honors the quiet doom that permeates throughout the story. Some scenes from the book have more of an impact when animated such as when they come upon the herd of buffalo. Unfortunately, the story reveals all too well that perseverance is futile.

The novel-to-film process began for Bergin in mid-2005 and is well detailed on his blog. In order to stay updated on the movie's festival run, follow John Bergin's blog and Wednesday's Korner using Google Reader to subscribe to the blogs in order to view all the new posts.

Pilot for Cartoon Network

Roger Jackson phoned and informs me that he was recently in the studio working on a pilot called "The Regular Show" for the Cartoon Network. "Guess who was in the studio with me!" says Roger. "Oh, I don't know," I answer. "Mark Hamill." Roger says he's a great guy and really fun to work with. Roger plays the Evil Voice and the Groundskeeper, while Hamill plays the Yeti. This is a show currently in production so there's no word on when it will ever air, but the blog will provide updates if there's any news.

We recalled a show we loved, that also had a Yeti, with superheroes comprised of marionettes. It was a scrappy version of Thunderbirds Are Go. Unfortunately, canceled by MTV before it even had a chance. It was called "Super Adventure Team," created by Robert Cohen and Dana Gould was the executive producer. The only identifiable real name actor is Daran Norris, but all the other actors had to fake their names in the credits. So it's been ten years since the show was on MTV and we both have a bootlegged DVD of all the episodes. Of course, Roger pulls a quote from it right out of thin air.

If anyone ever wondered what it is like to talk to Roger, the Ghost Voice from the Scream movies, on the telephone, well, I'll tell you. If you don't have caller ID, it's even more of a treat as he impersonates all sorts of people when you answer. This time, I saw it was him calling, so when I answer I just say, "Hi!" He was doing his Arnold Schwarzenegger voice which is Dana Carvey's impersonation skills multiplied times 100. He called just before The Sarah Conner Chronicles show (we both admit that we watch to see how great Summer Glau is on screen, though feel she deserves a better show). He tells me the news about his recent work, then goes back to the Arnold voice while the show is on, so I say, "This is just so much better than MST3K, but you should do Arnold a la Beavis and Butthead." The next five minutes is exactly that, Arnold's voice coming out of Roger's mouth with the stoner humor of Beavis and Butthead. "Oh, geez, that's a big haüs, heh-heh. They needz to vater their graz. Vhere'z the Terminator?! I vant to see the Terminator! Oh, yah, there she izz!" But it was funnier because his mind is so quick, I was laughing too hard to keep track of it all.

We're both fans of "Weeds," too. The announcer on the Mucinex commercial (where Roger is the voice actor playing the green guy) just so happens to be Andy Milder who plays Dean Hodes, Celia's husband. "Andy Milder and Elizabeth Perkins," says Roger, "have got great chemistry on screen."

Other shows we both watch are "Dexter," "True Blood," "Entourage," and "Lost."

Another chance to see John Bergin's From Inside

From Inside, the movie is playing at the Dead Channels Film Festival in San Francisco on Oct. 5 at 2:00 PM Sunday at the Roxie!! It screened first on October 2, Friday, which went perfectly with the storm clouds that brought us the first rains since April.

As previously mentioned Bergin's 71 minute film follows a pregnant woman on a train after a terribly destructive world event. It's tragic, sad and inspires haunting contemplation with unforgettable scenes of bleak landscapes and death. Dead Channels' week-long festival ends October 10 and will show films in San Francisco and in Oakland, CA. The film Latchkey's Lament screens with From Inside and fans of intricate animation and gloomy Sci-fi stories should make this a not-to-be-missed excursion into the City.

Read Dennis Harvey's summation of other movies shown during Dead Channels, which are also fantastically full of dread.

From Inside screens during Dead Channel's Festival of Fantastic Film

From Inside, the movie is playing at the Dead Channels Film Festival in San Francisco on Oct. 3 and Oct. 5!! John Bergin spent thousands of hours inking, painting and numbering the limited edition graphic novel and dedicated even more tedious hours animating it into a 71 minute film. The story of From Inside follows a pregnant woman on a train after a terribly destructive world event. Its tragic, sad and inspires haunting contemplation with unforgettable scenes of bleak landscapes and death. Dead Channels week-long festival begins October 2 and ends October 10 and will show films in San Francisco and in Oakland, CA. The film Latchkey's Lament screens with From Inside and is not a light-hearted screen 'toon about inanimate objects, rather a lively dark tale bounding with the struggle to survive and the quest for vengeance. The big screen is well-justified for both films, well-paired for fans of intricate animation and gloomy Sci-fi stories.

Dexter Season 2 on DVD

take the Dexter Test

Dexter's Psycho Therapy

then get the DVD of Dexter Season 2!

Captivating documentary on HBO

HBO Documentary Film series has featured Heidi Fleiss, Roman Polanski, and another must-see is Rory Kennedy's "Thank you Mr. President: Helen Thomas at the White House". I just loved the scenes they had of Nixon and Clinton. Really amazing that the White House Press Corps. tries to keep the President of the U.S.A. honest, yet the president's aides are actually telling the president not just what to say but what he cannot say. Who is really leading the country? What I saw here in the documentary makes a shadow government seem evermore possible.

TNT's Saving Grace is the next foray into television for Christina Ricci. Ricci's Emmy nominated work on Grey's Anatomy and work on Ally McBeal appears to have put her on the drama series track. She's playing a detective whom teams up with the series' lead character played by Holly Hunter. The first episode of the 2nd season has already aired and you can find it online or on your cable system's "On Demand" channel under TNT.

Roger Jackson, working all the time

My latest conversation with voice actor Roger Jackson brings excellent news. Coming from Electronic Arts on June 17 is a free downloadable demo called Spore, which is really something to behold. "It'll be revolutionary," says Roger, who plays lots of creatures in this game that will be known as a "Universe in a box." The demo will also be included in the The SimCity Box, which ships on June 23. The full retail version of Spore for PC and Mac launches on September 5, 2008 in Europe and September 7, 2008 in North America and you can import the creatures and worlds you made with the demo into the retail version. It means some more opportunity to use YouTube because, according to the press release, "Gamers can then share these creations with their friends, including seamless uploads to YouTube." Read more about it. He says that he finished the session for The Powerpuff Girls anniversary episode which is for a one-hour time slot, probably will air in the Fall of 2008 on the Cartoon Network. A song will be sung by Mojo Jojo; there's only one song in the episode. He can finally talk about the American McGee project called Grimm where he plays all of the voices. "It's puppet theatre meets animation," says Roger. Watch new game episodes weekly, released through Game Tap starting July 31. Listen for Roger's voice in a new release of My Sims in Fall 2008 that will be called My Sims Kingdom. In EA's Dead Space Roger plays a lot of different mutants. Hope the fun jobs keep going to him!

No fear, Reaper is back (midseason) 2009 on CW

The CW network did the smart thing by renewing "Reaper" which I hope remains true because it is not coming back until probably early 2009 as a midseason replacement. The writing is done well and I love the characters played by the actors I've loved in other short-lived series, namely Tyler Labine (Invasion), Ray Wise (Twin Peaks), and Christine Willes (Dead Like Me).

new Portishead album Third releases on 4/29

check out the band's You Tube channel.

Sugar, Spice, and Cartoonstitute

Famous for creating the girls known for "saving the world before bedtime" aka The Powerpuff Girls, creator Craig McCracken and Dexter's Laboratory creator Rob Renzetti have formed Cartoonstitute, "a new initiative designed to dramatically increase the animation development slate" for the Cartoon Network. I hope it really means it will create a lot of new jobs for people in the U.S. and not use cheap labor in foreign countries. I do love the shows that use this cheap labor, however there are so many promising animators-in-training in the U.S. eager to work for a television network like The Cartoon Network. I'll be watching for any developments so check back at Wednesday's Korner for word of any new shows.

 

Update: 11/08/2020 the above link is updated to shed light on why it wasn't developed beyond the formation.

EW interviews Speed Racer filmmakers

Check the latest Entertainment Weekly interview with the Wachowski brothers on Speed Racer due in theatres on May 9. Page 2 of the article shows a link to exclusive photos from the film. Christina Ricci plays Trixie and the exclusive photos can be found of her here and here. Several trailers can be viewed from this site.

Whedon's on Track with Dollhouse

Not really intending the track home community pun, but if you think about it, that'd be a sweet way to set up a loft consisting entirely of track home-style dollhouses. "Little boxes on the hillside..." Anyways, there are newsbits all about Joss Whedon's new TV project called "Dollhouse". I'm looking forward to it and it best damn well not be cancelled after ten shows air.

Penelope Review

Penelope has finally found its opening weekend and my review is as simple as this: Go SEE it in the theatre because it is a rare, wonderful, sharply comedic and quick-moving film. Support a movie in a theatre that uses great set designs which includes art by Joe Sorren and includes music by Sigur Rós. Chase scenes are not predictable. Penelope covers, in a few comical moments, what else would a person do who was confined to one house their entire life? I enjoyed the "who's real" and "who's fake" process of elimination and how one copes when you only find the latter. The characters are well-crafted and played by some of my favorite people, obviously Christina Ricci, but also minor characters played by Burn Gorman (Torchwood), Hot Fuzz and Shaun of the Dead's Nick Frost, and the ever-watchable (getting all the laughs when I saw the movie) Peter Dinklage which you've seen in The Station Agent and Death at a Funeral, plus Marianne Faithfull is in it and she really is as great looking as I remember her from the brief appearance she made in BBC's "Absolutely Fabulous". The story's moral is powerful: embrace individuality. It's as simple as that and I would love a poster of this phrase on every street corner to remind those people that forget to do it.

Roger Jackson news

Roger Jackson writes to confirm that I did hear his voice on a Comcast commercial the other day, he says, "I am doing a couple of Comcast spots, one about 'We like math,' and one with something about 'Dreaming one of those big fat library full of HD movies only Comcast has- dreams.'"

"...Just did a program where I did gibberish SIMS-style of real-sounding fake languages as Salah-ah-din, a Tokugawa Shogun, Mahatma Gandhi, Otto von Bismark, Genghis Khan, a Pictish warrior, an African tribal hunter, and an English professor, among others."