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where 50 different spooky stories await…
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to perform your own,
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TALES FROM BEYOND THE PALE on BANDCAMP

Happy Spooktober from The Pale Men
Glenn McQuaid & Larry Fessenden

TBT: 2019, Fessenden is one with the undead in Jim Jarmusch’s zombie flick
THE DEAD DON’T DIE.
Now streaming on HBO MAX.

Stay tuned as we announce festivities and treats for the spooky season

From TheGamer by Dennis Moiseyev

It’s fair to say Supermassive horror games are like movies themselves. The gameplay is not your standard survival horror. You have choice-based decisions that result in devastating life-and-death consequences, phenomenal camera work that gives a cinematic quality, and an original character-driven story that’s unlike any other. That’s what makes these games super enjoyable and engaging.

But have you ever wondered if there’s something similar out there in the film realm to those stories that Supermassive creates? The developer is often inspired by other horror films and games in the genre when it comes to crafting its own projects, and the following movies might seem like a good match.

Wrong Turn 4: Bloody Beginnings, Antlers, And Wendigo (2001) 

Until Dawn features themes of cannibalism, takes you to a dilapidated sanatorium in the snowy mountains, and bases its lore on the folkloric entity known as the Wendigo from the Indigenous culture of the Algonquin people.

Wrong Turn 4 is a good starting point. It follows a group of college students on their way to a friend’s cabin during winter break, who then get lost on their snowmobiles and have to take refuge from a snowstorm inside the old Glenville Sanatorium, where they’re brutally hunted by a team of three cannibal brothers – Three Finger, Saw Tooth, and One Eye.

Starring Keri Russell and Jesse Plemons, the 2021 film Antlers features the Wendigo creature in all its glory. The setting revolves around a mine in the fictional Oregon town of Cispus Falls and weaves a supernatural story of trauma.

2001’s Wendigo is actually written and directed by Larry Fessenden, one of the writers of Until Dawn, so you can say the spirit of the Wendigo follows him.

For the Record: Fessenden and Graham Reznick were writers on several other projects sighted:
DARK PICTURES: MAN OF MEDAN
THE INPATIENT
and Reznick went on to scribe THE QUARRY

Read article at TheGamer
for great Shocktober viewing ideas!

From PASTE by Jim Vorel
… there are a lot fewer werewolf movies out there than there are for the other classic monsters. They continue to be made, but they’re utterly dwarfed by zombie movies, vampire movies, etc. But despite all that, we still love a good werewolf yarn, and there have been some cinematic classics in the genre along the way. Below we present the 25 best werewolf movies of all time, which constitute an 80-plus year journey through everything hairy and lupine.

19. Blackout (2024)
Director: Larry Fessenden

Being a werewolf sounds fun, until it happens to you: The late nights, the insatiable hunger, the undying rage, the ballooning of your clothing budget as every outfit you own inexorably falls apart with each moonlit transformation. The cuisine isn’t great, either, unless you’re the over-adventurous type to whom eating animals alive sounds like a test of intestinal and gustatory mettle. It’s enough to make an afflicted person lose their zest for life, which might in turn be enough to make shuffling oneself off one’s own mortal coil an appealing alternative. That’s the space Larry Fessenden occupies in his new movie, Blackout, an existential and depressive character study of Charley (Alex Hurt). A suicidal werewolf is a welcome novelty, especially since more often than not it’s vampires who have all the fun feeling conflicted about their predatory nature. As is, the film balances its talkative side with its gory side nicely. Wanting more isn’t the worst feeling a film can leave you with. —Andy Crump

6. Late Phases (2014)
Director: Adrian Garcia Bogliano

Late Phases is a limited but kind of brilliant take on the werewolf movie, featuring a truly outstanding performance by screenwriter-turned-actor Nick Damici (from Stake Land) as an elderly, blind Vietnam veteran who moves to a retiree community currently being menaced by a lycanthrope. After beginning with a bang, it unfolds slowly, developing the strained relationship between the protagonist and his son, the difficulties presented by his blindness and the search for the werewolf’s identity. The characterization of the embittered protagonist is very well developed, and the film shines with lots of the little things: Great sound design, great dialogue, well-cast minor roles. It even features a pretty awesome werewolf transformation scene that, if not quite in American Werewolf in London territory, is one of the best I’ve seen in quite a while. The actual werewolf costumes, it must be noted, look just a little bit ridiculous—like a man in a wolf-bat hybrid suit, and nowhere near as good as say, Dog Soldiers—but the blood effects are top-notch. It’s far above most indie horror films in terms of performances, though, and even tugs at the heartstrings a bit with some effective drama. If werewolves are your movie monster of choice, it has to vault up your must-see list.—Jim Vorel

Read Whole list at PASTE

Face your fears and determine who survives in this enhanced version of the horror classic.

Rebuilt from the ground up for PS5® consoles and PC, Until Dawn™ invites you to immerse yourself in a gripping slasher horror where every decision can make the difference between life and death.

When eight friends return to the isolated mountain lodge where two of their group vanished a year prior, things quickly take a sinister turn. As fear tightens its icy grip on the group, their remote retreat becomes an inescapable nightmare.

Your actions and choices will determine who survives Until Dawn in this definitive version of the seminal horror classic.

From The SONY Website

written by Graham Reznick and Larry Fessenden and featuring Fessenden as “Flame Thrower Guy”

Fessenden’s Werewolf Drama unspools
at the Film Noir Cinema
October 18 at 8PM followed by a Q&A with Fessenden

Part of the Shock A Go-Go Film Festival

by Kevin Lovell

Capsule review: ‘Blackout’ is an entertaining and often fairly bloody werewolf tale that’s quite different than many of your average werewolf films, exploring the psychological struggle of our lead as he tries to piece together the reality of his situation while trying to find a way to stop it before things grow further out of hand and those he cares about suffer the consequences. It’s a generally solid, entertaining and at times quite emotional werewolf film that changes things up from the standard formula in some intriguing ways.

DISC REVIEW

The Blu-ray release of ‘Blackout’ features a full 1080p High Definition presentation with the film’s original 1.85:1 Aspect Ratio. The video presentation looks wonderful as a whole and delivers a clean, sharp and richly detailed presentation from start to finish that never suffers from any notable troubles or faults along the way. Detail is impressive throughout with everything from character specifics and vehicles, city streets and trees, along with the forest and werewolf details looking spectacular, while colors are bright and clean and nicely balanced by capable black levels and shadowing that hold up splendidly throughout. Overall, this is a great high definition presentation that looks quite gorgeous at every turn and it should easily please fans of the film as well as first time viewers.

AUDIO:

The Blu-ray release features a 5.1 channel DTS-HD Master Audio soundtrack. This multichannel soundtrack offers a clean, crisp and at times nicely immersive audio presentation throughout. It takes advantage of all five available channels in order to send music, nature, action and vehicle effects, along with more whipping throughout the various speakers when appropriate, all while making certain that all dialogue and other audio elements that might be occurring simultaneously with one another remain clean and fully audible. Overall, this is a solid 5.1 DTS-HD MA soundtrack that makes a great complement to the film and shouldn’t disappoint in the slightest.

SPECIAL FEATURES:

The Darky Sky Selects Limited Edition Blu-ray release of ‘Blackout’ features a nice collection of bonus content that fans of the film should enjoy. Included on the release is an ‘Audio Commentary with Writer/Director/Editor/Producer Larry Fessenden’, in addition to an in depth look at the making of the film in ‘Blackout: Behind the Scenes’ (running approximately 77 minutes in length), plus a look at clips from Fessenden’s monster-like outings in ‘Larry Fessenden’s Monsterverse’ (running approximately 6 minutes), a ‘Monster Mash Photoshoot Timelapse by Beck Underwood’ (4 minutes) and the ‘Blackout Audio Drama’ (26 minutes). Also included is the film’s ‘Teaser Trailer’ (2 minutes), ‘Theatrical Trailer’ (2 minutes) and a physical 12-page booklet with an introduction by Fangoria’s Phil Nobile Jr.

Film Rating: 7/10
Disc Rating: 9/10

Read at Screen Connections

SIZE UP
(2020, Dir. Rigo Garay, 15 mins, SONY A7S)

cinematography by James Siewert.
featuring Jesse Schratz, Rigo Garay, Jose Useche,
Sean Mana, Matt Liqouri, Tatiana Montes.

After the senseless murder of this older brother,
an 11-year-old boy will discover what kind of a person he will grow to be.

watch the teaser below
and join us in the CineZone to see the film

SIZE UP is the directorial debut from Rigo Garay, Glass Eye Pix Filmworker
and actor in GEP’s CRUMB CATCHER, BLACKOUT and MISS MILLIE.

NOTES

I was rejected from all film schools. I didn’t even know what a C-stand was until finally stepping foot on a film set for a Glass Eye Pix flick (10 years ago this April). It finally came time to make my own short, and SIZE UP was my first rodeo in many regards. By this time, I had been at GEP for 4 years as Office Coordinator and on set as a PA, boom operator, swing, assistant editor, etc (GEP was my film school) and I made many friends along the way who rallied up and helped good ‘ol Rigo make his short. Chris Skotchdopole producing and editing, James Felix McKenney producing & ADing, Jesse LoCascio as AC, Ben Duff lit it, James Siewert shot the thing and a slew of interns including 2 new hires Matt Yturralde & Santiago Saba Salem as PAs and a fresh faced Luke LeCount who was hired during post. And of course, Fessenden producing and watching over everything.

The inspo for this movie came from stories about people mugged and killed for their Galaxy Foamposites. It’s terrifying to think that you could never see your loved one ever again because of a pair of ostentatious sneakers (ugly sneakers, if I’m being honest). I had pals trading war-stories about violence befalling them from the sneaker game. Stories like surviving a knife to the gut and robbed $400 cash from a Craigslist seller, or mugged out of your True Religion jeans, Burberry Tee and Jordans at gunpoint, walk home in your undies. It was all so surreal, I had to make it a movie.

Skotchdopole and I would talk through the script a lot. He suggested that I should play the villain “Lito”, who’s such a specific character, an amalgamation of riff-raffs & yahoos I’ve encountered growing up in Long Island. L.I. is a weird place, you can commit a B&E with a Juggalo and a Central American war criminal, then go to Sunday mass with your mother the next morning. I know this type of guy too well, I had no choice but to play him. A suburban, sociopathic, bully: The Long Island Kingpin.

The flick is littered with directorial mistakes, and I wear that as a badge of honor. This was my first assignment, my tryout. And like everyone’s first, there are hiccups that I take ownership of and I’m grateful that my collaborators (who are some of the most talented folks I know) allowed me to be stubborn, allowed me to LEARN. With all that being said, the one thing I knew I got right was the HEART of SIZE UP, hopefully it touches yours.

Watch in the Cinezone

Shooting BLACKOUT September 2022 with Kevin Corrigan