Rue Morgue reviews THE LARRY FESSENDEN COLLECTION, out now on Blu-ray
Monday, December 7, 2015

by JEFF SZPIRGLAS

Over the last quarter century, New York-based filmmaker Larry Fessenden has been taking horror tropes and turning them on their ear, crafting a series of personal ruminations on our relationships with the environment, and each other. Fessenden imbues his movies with a unique sensibility, deconstructing the horror genre as much as he adds to it. Four of his features have been upgraded to high-def and are now neatly packaged in a set from Scream Factory.
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These four discs comprise an impressively comprehensive collection. While Fessenden’s big ideas and inventive filmmaking approach are sometimes heavy-handed, he’s a man with a message and passion to spare, as evident on the supplementary material and commentary tracks, in which he dwells on all aspects of production, down to the minutiae of the action figures used for the opening credits of WENDIGO.

Indiewire presents a guided meditation unlike any you’ve tried before! Graham Reznick’s THE CHAMBERS TAPE is streaming now.

Read on for more info and an interview with Reznick.

Indiewire presents James Felix McKenny’s Season 3 TALES FROM BEYOND THE PALE episode, THE TRIBUNAL OF MINOS.

Read on for more info and an interview with McKenny.

Graham Reznick’s TALES FROM BEYOND THE PALE season 3 episode THE CHAMBERS TAPE just hit #1 on iTunes Fiction Audiobooks. Check it out!

Ken W. Hanley, writing for Fangoria, just reviewed the third season of TALES FROM BEYOND THE PALE.

TALES strongest season to date, providing bold, wickedly entertaining stories that stir up one’s imagination with mischievous glee. And furthermore, with an assembly of terrific performers and storytellers by their side, there’s an inherently unique air about this season of TALES that certainly separates it from season’s past, offering a structural and tonal continuity that impressively feels much more carefully curated than previous iterations.
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Overall, with a murderer’s row of horror voices and actors involved, not only is TALES FROM BEYOND THE PALE’s third season incredibly worthwhile but a masterful example at how audio production can be used effectively within the genre. With impressive sound design, mixing, foley work and editing, this anthology radio play series plunges the listener into its many nightmarish worlds effectively and with unflinching resolve. So if you’re looking to creep out your fellow carpoolers or if you just need a scary story for a dark and stormy night, look no further than this latest batch of TALES FROM BEYOND THE PALE.

Read on for the full review!

Patrick Bromley over at Daily Dead just wrote a review of THE LARRY FESSENDEN COLLECTION.

“If ever there was to be a Mt. Rushmore of modern horror, there’s no question that the face of Larry Fessenden would get prominent placement. One of the patron saints of indie horror, Fessenden is a true auteur and a true original whose incredible career is now being celebrated with the Scream Factory release of The Larry Fessenden Collection, containing four of his films and hours of bonus features that help illuminate just what a vital voice Fessenden has been in the genre for more than three decades. This is one of the best horror releases of the year … Scream Factory has done such great work with The Larry Fessenden Collection that it’s one of those rare cases where the supplemental content is every bit as good as the film(s) it’s supporting.”

Read on for the full review. 

The suspiciously named new feature from Fango (The Cutting Room?????!) presents an archived interview with McQuaid and Fessenden.

Have you ordered your new box set yet? Ships end of week!!

“For Season 3, the collaborators who joined us have been very big and as much as I love the challenge of writing these stories under the gun, it’s been equally refreshing to seduce others into TALES. So we have some old collaborators, some new collaborators as well…”

Fessenden cited as an artist engaged in the Global Warming discussion (yes, ahem, since back in 1990 with LOW IMPACT FILMMAKING and later in 2005 with THE LAST WINTER). Also cited, GEP pal Heather Woodbury (HOLLOW VENUS) whose ferocious epic multi-character performance piece / podcast AS THE GLOBE WARMS is not to be missed.

From the article in CAPITAL & MAIN by Judith Lewis Mernit:

Bad enough that the climate is changing and humans are causing it; worse, most of us don’t even want to talk about it.

“Where are the books? The poems? The plays? The goddamn operas?” asked author and climate activist Bill McKibben a decade ago on Grist, comparing the climate crisis to the AIDS epidemic, which, McKibben noted, produced “a staggering outpouring of art that, in turn, has had real political effect.”

To be fair, that has started to change: Authors such as Paolo Bacigalupi (The Water Knife) and filmmaker Larry Fessenden (The Last Winter) have begun to address environmental catastrophe in their works. 

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There are even occasional podcasts by story performer Heather Woodbury that will conclude during the festival’s two weeks.

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Today is the day! Escape the stores and spend Black Friday with TALES FROM BEYOND THE PALE, SEASON 3, now available on iTunes, Amazon, Audible, and the TALES online store.  Plus get your hands on the TALES SEASON 3 complete set (book & flash drive), shipping next week.

And keep it tuned to Indiewire all month long for interviews with the writer-directors and free-streaming sessions of the episodes.

Happy Black Friday!

Indiewire again presents an amazing season 3 episode of TALES FROM BEYOND THE PALE. April Snellings makes her TALES debut with FOOD CHAIN, a freaky southern gothic Bigfoot tale.

Read on for more info and an interview with April.