Editorials
2010 BLACK FRIDAY CHOPPING LIST: TOYS & MERCH
We all know those people who seem to have seen every movie and T.V. show, played every video game, and read every book and comic out there (where do they find the time?), and trying to shop for them can make for a frustrating experience. That being said, there are always those off-the-wall items that even the most well-versed horror fanatics haven’t yet gotten their hands on, and that’s where the “Toys & Merchandise” section of B-D’s Black Friday Chopping List comes in. Along with the latest in toys and decorative figurines, you’ll also find such oddities as specialized license plates, zombie-themed Zippo lighters, and even real embalmed mice made into Christmas tree ornaments. Seriously.
COMICS & BOOKS | FILMS | MUSIC | TOYS | GAMES
List Price: varies
We included the Fright Rags t-shirt store on our Black Friday list last year, and we’re including it again because there are a bunch of awesome new designs to choose from this holiday season. You can check out the full, massive selection of original horror movie-inspired artwork over at their website, but don’t fret if you’re not sure what to buy for that special someone on your list – they also offer gift certificates.
List Price: $59.99
Part of Sideshow Collectibles’ original series known as “The Dead” – featuring limited-edition zombie busts and figures put out exclusively by the company – the “Hatchet Head” statue is, as the website puts it, a “plague-ridden severed head [that] depicts one of the many desperate attempts to combat the multiplying horde of The Dead.” Individually painted and finished by Sideshow-commissioned artists, this 9.5″ high bust is a great gift idea for any zombie-lovin’ collector type on your holiday shopping list.
List Price: Around $600 each
Limited to just 300 each worldwide, these two limited edition sets of Nightmare Before Christmas resin statues (ranging in height from 7-12 inches) are a must-have for any fan of the film. Series 1 features Jack, Sally, the Mayor, and a Vampire, while Series 2 consists of Jack (in Santa outfit), Dr. Finklestein, The Wolfman, and Harlequin Demon. Each statue is lovingly crafted and features amazing, movie-accurate detail and accessories to satisfy any aficionado. Sure they’re a little pricey, but worth it if you have the money to spend (or are able to split the cost with others).
Order Series 1 by clicking here
List Price: $209.99
This grotesque 16″ polystone statue of Jason Voorhees depicts the merciless killer –
holding a bloodied axe in one hand and a machete in the other – as he stands atop a pile of nubile bodies that have been slashed and torn to pieces. Each limited-edition statue comes gloriously hand-painted and finished, with a removable hockey mask that reveals Jason’s deformed visage underneath. It’s a little pricey, but worth it for hardcore Friday fans if you have the money to spend.
List Price: $71.99
This insanely impressive, studio-approved Freddy glove replica from NECA has blades made out of real steel, genuine copper armature and a movie-accurate design (based on the glove from the 2010 film, but we can just forget about that) that’s a dream come true for any Nightmare on Elm Street fan. The best thing about the convincingly weathered and “bloodstained” glove is it’s actually designed to be worn and comes with a black plastic handform that’ll give it a perfect fit no matter what size fingers you have. Just be careful the kinda person you buy it for – this bad boy has real-live blades on it. Like, don’t give it to anyone who’s ever complained about hearing “voices”.
List Price: $57.99
Release Date: December 1, 2010
This 12.5″ Alien Queen from Kaiyodo (based on the design from the ’86 film) is one of the latest from their “Revoltech” series of figurines, and it’s a doozy. The impressive, super-articulated Queen features 25 movable joints and 32 movable parts – including retractable inner jaws – that will have any lover of the movies peeing themselves with glee. It also comes with a display base that’ll come in handy once you’re done, you know, playing with it. Raaaarr!! NOTE: For those on a budget, the Revoltech series also includes “Alien” and “Alien Warrior” figurines, each about $20 less than the “Alien Queen” version.
Order Alien Queen by clicking here
List Price: $27.99
This 9″ Michael Myers figure from Mezco features the iconic killer clad in his trademark jumpsuit (made of real fabric), ghost-white mask (splattered with the blood of one of his victims), and oversized butcher knife (also bloody). The figure, which features 10 points of articulation, is an impressive one for the low price; Myers even boasts a pink princess comb to go along with his “real” hair! Ok fine, that’s actually not part of the package – though if you really wanted you could just borrow one from your younger sister’s Barbie collection.
List Price: $12.99 each
Have you ever found yourself sitting in traffic thinking, “You know what, I really love horror movies, but it’d be great if that complete stranger in the car behind me actually knew about it”? If you have, then allow me to introduce two new limited-edition, embossed aluminum license plates from Tin 10 Collectibles featuring horror movie themes to pimp out your vehicle with. The first is “Zombie `More Brains'” (limited to 500 pieces worldwide), drawn by popular artist Rob Sacchetto and featuring a decayed, yellow-toothed zombie with glowing green eyes and an exposed brain. The second one features a painting of original movie vampire Count Orlok (played by Max Schreck in the 1922 classic Nosferatu), which features a close-up portrait of Schreck as the ancient vampire alongside a recreation of that famous “shadow creeping up the stairs” profile shot. Both plates measure six by 12 inches and will fit any standard sized car plate holder.
Order “Zombie `More Brains'” by clicking here
List Price: $80/portrait
Though he’s received attention in the press for “zombifying” celebrities (painting their undead portraits off of photographs), you too can now have “zombie artist” Rob Sacchetto do the same for your non-celeb friends and family members. All you do is a) go to Rob’s website http://www.zombieportraits.com/index.html; b) click on the upper left-hand corner where it says “$80 per zombie”; c) make your order through PayPal; d) email Rob a photo of the person (or animal!) you’d like for him to transform into a decaying flesh-eater; and e) wait approximately 3-4 weeks (possibly sooner if you pay an extra fee) and you or your loved one will receive a 9″x11″ original watercolor portrait of themselves as a ghoulish member of the undead. Couples and group portraits are also available by special order.
List Price: $39.99
Now available from NECA, this fully-licensed latex mask of Iron Maiden mascot “Eddie the Head” (based on the cover art from their classic 1983 “Piece of Mind” album) shows the hairless, lobotomized version of the famed zombie character in all its gory detail. Needless to say, this would be a great buy for any Iron Maiden fanatic on your list.
List Price: varies
Also included in our Black Friday guide last year was the Necromance online store, a collection of macabre jewelry, home décor and other curiosities that should please any horror fan on your list who enjoys receiving oddball gifts. And when I say “bizarre” I’m not kidding – there is some seriously whacked-out shit here. Products range from “Angel Mouse” tree ornaments (real mice, embalmed and adorned with feather wings), creepy lenticular paintings, antique medical tools, and bat skeletons encased in Lucite blocks. For those who are somewhat less adventurous, they also have some pretty awesome t-shirts in stock.
List Price: $19.99 each/$79.99 (set of 4)
Scheduled to arrive just in time for the holiday season, Taverncraft will soon be releasing a set of 4 lighters based on the Walking Dead comic book series by Robert Kirkman. Each black-and-white metal lighter – “Dead Head”, “Dead Rules”, “Fresh Meat”, and “Rise & Feed” – has been deep-etched with zombie imagery ripped straight from the pages of the comics. Buyers can order either individual lighters or the entire set, in which case you’ll also receive a special Kirkman-signed Litho Card. Great for any fan of either the comics or the hit AMC series.
List Price: $39.99
Released just last month in tandem with The Exorcist Blu-ray, this electronic figure boxed set – modeled after the famous “head-spinning” scene in the movie – features actual sounds and dialogue from the film (including the creepy “Tubular Bells” musical theme) and a hand-painted “possessed Regan” figure whose head spins 360 degrees at the push of a button.
List Price: $59.95 each
After last year’s release of the “House of Monsters” skate deck (featured on our 2009 Black Friday list), Monsterman Graphic has now come out with five new ones: “Lurking Zombies”, “Heavy Metal Monster”, “Medusa”, “Punk Rock Space Monster”, and “Halloween Lord o’Lanterns”. Each one comes with specially-designed artwork by Scott Jackson and can be ordered in a variety of different sizes.
List Price: varies
At Gelaskins.com you can shop for removable covers (“skins”) for iPhones, MP3 players, e-Readers, laptops, etc. that feature photo-quality graphics of artworks from both lesser-known artists as well as luminaries like H.R. Giger and Frank Miller. Indeed, the recreations are absolutely stunning and would be a great gift for horror fans whose idea of a good time is trawling around local art shows and museums. Buyers also have the option of customizing skins with their own photos and images. According to the website, the skins are easy to apply and don’t leave any sticky residue behind when you decide to remove them
Twice a month Joe Lipsett will dissect a new Amityville Horror film to explore how the “franchise” has evolved in increasingly ludicrous directions. This is “The Amityville IP.”
A bizarre recurring issue with the Amityville “franchise” is that the films tend to be needlessly complicated. Back in the day, the first sequels moved away from the original film’s religious-themed haunted house storyline in favor of streamlined, easily digestible concepts such as “haunted lamp” or “haunted mirror.”
As the budgets plummeted and indie filmmakers capitalized on the brand’s notoriety, it seems the wrong lessons were learned. Runtimes have ballooned past the 90-minute mark and the narratives are often saggy and unfocused.
Both issues are clearly on display in Amityville Karen (2022), a film that starts off rough, but promising, and ends with a confused whimper.
The promise is embodied by the tinge of self-awareness in Julie Anne Prescott (The Amityville Harvest)’s screenplay, namely the nods to John Waters’ classic 1994 satire, Serial Mom. In that film, Beverly Sutphin (an iconic Kathleen Turner) is a bored, white suburban woman who punished individuals who didn’t adhere to her rigid definition of social norms. What is “Karen” but a contemporary equivalent?
In director/actor Shawn C. Phillips’ film, Karen (Lauren Francesca) is perpetually outraged. In her introductory scenes, she makes derogatory comments about immigrants, calls a female neighbor a whore, and nearly runs over a family blocking her driveway. She’s a broad, albeit familiar persona; in many ways, she’s less of a character than a caricature (the living embodiment of the name/meme).
These early scenes also establish a fairly straightforward plot. Karen is a code enforcement officer with plans to shut down a local winery she has deemed disgusting. They’re preparing for a big wine tasting event, which Karen plans to ruin, but when she steals a bottle of cursed Amityville wine, it activates her murderous rage and goes on a killing spree.
Simple enough, right?
Unfortunately, Amityville Karen spins out of control almost immediately. At nearly every opportunity, Prescott’s screenplay eschews narrative cohesion and simplicity in favour of overly complicated developments and extraneous characters.
Take, for example, the wine tasting event. The film spends an entire day at the winery: first during the day as a band plays, then at a beer tasting (???) that night. Neither of these events are the much touted wine-tasting, however; that is actually a private party happening later at server Troy (James Duval)’s house.
Weirdly though, following Troy’s death, the party’s location is inexplicably moved to Karen’s house for the climax of the film, but the whole event plays like an afterthought and features a litany of characters we have never met before.
This is a recurring issue throughout Amityville Karen, which frequently introduces random characters for a scene or two. Karen is typically absent from these scenes, which makes them feel superfluous and unimportant. When the actress is on screen, the film has an anchor and a narrative drive. The scenes without her, on the other hand, feel bloated and directionless (blame editor Will Collazo Jr., who allows these moments to play out interminably).
Compounding the issue is that the majority of the actors are non-professionals and these scenes play like poorly performed improv. The result is long, dull stretches that features bad actors talking over each other, repeating the same dialogue, and generally doing nothing to advance the narrative or develop the characters.
While Karen is one-note and histrionic throughout the film, at least there’s a game willingness to Francesca’s performance. It feels appropriately campy, though as the film progresses, it becomes less and less clear if Amityville Karen is actually in on the joke.
Like Amityville Cop before it, there are legit moments of self-awareness (the Serial Mom references), but it’s never certain how much of this is intentional. Take, for example, Karen’s glaringly obvious wig: it unconvincingly fails to conceal Francesca’s dark hair in the back, but is that on purpose or is it a technical error?
Ultimately there’s very little to recommend about Amityville Karen. Despite the game performance by its lead and the gentle homages to Serial Mom’s prank call and white shoes after Labor Day jokes, the never-ending improv scenes by non-professional actors, the bloated screenplay, and the jittery direction by Phillips doom the production.
Clocking in at an insufferable 100 minutes, Amityville Karen ranks among the worst of the “franchise,” coming in just above Phillips’ other entry, Amityville Hex.
The Amityville IP Awards go to…
- Favorite Subplot: In the afternoon event, there’s a self-proclaimed “hot boy summer” band consisting of burly, bare-chested men who play instruments that don’t make sound (for real, there’s no audio of their music). There’s also a scheming manager who is skimming money off the top, but that’s not as funny.
- Least Favorite Subplot: For reasons that don’t make any sense, the winery is also hosting a beer tasting which means there are multiple scenes of bartender Alex (Phillips) hoping to bring in women, mistakenly conflating a pint of beer with a “flight,” and goading never before seen characters to chug. One of them describes the beer as such: “It looks like a vampire menstruating in a cup” (it’s a gold-colored IPA for the record, so…no).
- Amityville Connection: The rationale for Karen’s killing spree is attributed to Amityville wine, whose crop was planted on cursed land. This is explained by vino groupie Annie (Jennifer Nangle) to band groupie Bianca (Lilith Stabs). It’s a lot of nonsense, but it is kind of fun when Annie claims to “taste the damnation in every sip.”
- Neverending Story: The film ends with an exhaustive FIVE MINUTE montage of Phillips’ friends posing as reporters in front of terrible green screen discussing the “killer Karen” story. My kingdom for Amityville’s regular reporter Peter Sommers (John R. Walker) to return!
- Best Line 1: Winery owner Dallas (Derek K. Long), describing Karen: “She’s like a walking constipation with a hemorrhoid”
- Best Line 2: Karen, when a half-naked, bleeding woman emerges from her closet: “Is this a dream? This dream is offensive! Stop being naked!”
- Best Line 3: Troy, upset that Karen may cancel the wine tasting at his house: “I sanded that deck for days. You don’t just sand a deck for days and then let someone shit on it!”
- Worst Death: Karen kills a Pool Boy (Dustin Clingan) after pushing his head under water for literally 1 second, then screeches “This is for putting leaves on my plants!”
- Least Clear Death(s): The bodies of a phone salesman and a barista are seen in Karen’s closet and bathroom, though how she killed them are completely unclear
- Best Death: Troy is stabbed in the back of the neck with a bottle opener, which Karen proceeds to crank
- Wannabe Lynch: After drinking the wine, Karen is confronted in her home by Barnaby (Carl Solomon) who makes her sign a crude, hand drawn blood contract and informs her that her belly is “pregnant from the juices of his grapes.” Phillips films Barnaby like a cross between the unhoused man in Mulholland Drive and the Mystery Man in Lost Highway. It’s interesting, even if the character makes absolutely no sense.
- Single Image Summary: At one point, a random man emerges from the shower in a towel and excitedly poops himself. This sequence perfectly encapsulates the experience of watching Amityville Karen.
- Pray for Joe: Many of these folks will be back in Amityville Shark House and Amityville Webcam, so we’re not out of the woods yet…
Next time: let’s hope Christmas comes early with 2022’s Amityville Christmas Vacation. It was the winner of Fangoria’s Best Amityville award, after all!
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