If you click this linky right here and scroll down to the little listening doohickey, you will be treated to the dulcet tones of the God and Goddess of Hellfire expounding upon the Mammoth Mountain Poltergeist case. Have you read that book yet? No? Well, get your sweet ass over to Amazon and remedy that tragic situation, dig? Thank you, and Goddess out.
Welcome back to the Hulu Horror Double Feature series, and hey, I’m actually getting to do another one of these way before I thought I’d be able to, so go me! If you want to read the first installment and get your bearings, it’s right here, don’t fret.
First up, The Butterfly Room from 2014. I actually picked this one at random because the cover and blurb looked promising, but only after I started watching it did I realize that it starred Barbara Steele! BARBARA STEELE! Have I mentioned on this blog how much I love Barbara Steele? Because I fucking love Barbara Steele. And besides that, this movie is a veritable overflowing cauldron of well-known horror-type ladies, seeing as how it also features Heather Langenkamp (from A Nightmare on Elm Street, obviously), Erica Leerhsen (Blair Witch 2, the Texas Chainsaw Massacre remake), and Camille Keaton (I Spit On Your Grave, What Have You Done To Solange). There is also a cameo from PJ Soles (Halloween), and who is that turning up in a brief walk-on as a cab driver? Why, it’s Joe Dante! Even if the movie wasn’t any good, you could still turn it into a pretty rad spot-the-horror-legend drinking game, if you were so inclined.
So, IS the movie any good? That depends. It’s a weird one, that’s for sure, and mamma mia, is it Italian. This is actually not surprising, since it was directed by Jonathan Zarantonello from his own novel, Alice dalle 4 alle 5 (Alice from 4 to 5). If you approach The Butterfly Room with this in mind, and get into a sort of early-Dario-Argento-slash-Mommie-Dearest kinda headspace, then I think you’ll probably love it. It’s gorgeously shot, Barbara Steele is CREEPY AS HELL as the butterfly-collectin’ Ann, and there are some pretty fucked-up family dynamics going on all around. On the downside, the acting is a bit stilted and over-the-top, so much so that it seems like a deliberate directorial choice (again: Italian). And while the plot is mysterious enough to keep you watching, it’s pretty easy to guess where we’re going to end up. The timeline jumps back and forth a lot, which sometimes makes it hard to follow, but I don’t think the non-linear narrative was really necessary to what the movie was trying to say. I also wish they had gone with a different soundtrack, maybe classical, since the vaguely heavy-metalish score is pretty jarring and doesn’t seem to match up with the film’s aesthetic. All that said, though, I enjoyed the hell out of Barbara Steele evilling all over the screen like the witch in Snow White, and I kinda loved the “like mother, like daughter” theme that pervaded the entire enterprise. I would recommend the film to fans of Barbara Steele (BARBARA STEELE!!!) and anyone who’s into the early films of Argento and Bava, or giallos in general (although this isn’t a giallo, I hasten to add).
Next on Hulu’s movie-pickin’ agenda was House of Good and Evil (2013). This was another film on the slow-burn psychological horror tip, and as such I found myself digging it a great deal. It’s marginally a haunted house story, but it’s ambiguous enough to keep you guessing right up until the end. Briefly, it deals with a married couple who are trying to start over out in the sticks after abusive hubby Chris beats his wife Maggie into an eighth-month miscarriage. He seems contrite, and she’s willing to give him another chance, though obviously tempers are short between them. They buy a duplex with no phone service and no electricity, thinking that being forced to live with just one another will solve their problems, but it isn’t long before shit starts to go south, both in their marriage and with the house they’ve purchased.
As with the previously-discussed Soulmate, this one might be a drag for fans of more action-packed horror, but I thought its restraint and subtlety gave it great, creepy power. The manifestations of the “haunting” were so simple and understated — the frequent ringing of an old-fashioned telephone, the mysterious nature of the mostly-unseen elderly neighbors — that I was compelled to pay close attention as the eerieness ramped up. The fact that there was palpable tension between the husband and wife at the center of the story just added to the atmosphere, and I liked that the movie played with elements of paranoia (as it seems like people are conspiring against main character Maggie), á la Rosemary’s Baby. Plus the way the Andersons next door were folded into the tale reminded me pleasingly of the Allardyces in Burnt Offerings. It had touches of The Amityville Horror too, now that I think of it. I would definitely recommend this to fans of any of the three films I just mentioned, as well as to anyone who would enjoy a low-key haunted house movie with a psychological bent. Keep in mind, though, that it does have a sort of “twist” ending, and though I thought it worked, I can see how some viewers might be pissed off by it, so your mileage may vary.
Until next time, keep it creepy, my friends. Goddess out.
Here is parapsychologist Steve Mera on the UK’s Moore Show, talking about the Rochdale Poltergeist case and the book we wrote about it. Give it a listen, won’t you?
In case you missed the live feed last night, here I am on the Dark Thirty Radio show from January 29th! The GoH jumped on there too and talked about his poltergeist experiences, and it turned out a great show. Listen well, minions!
Ahhh, the Seventies. What a time to be a kid! I realize this is ever-so-slightly off the subjects I usually discuss on here, but this Pictorial post about rad toys from bygone days got me feeling all nostalgic, and since I’ve already written a post about scary books I loved as a child, I thought, why not expand on that a little? Because as much as I adored my ghost stories and Alfred Hitchcock anthologies, the creepy-ass toys I played with as a little goth nugget were probably just as pivotal in turning me into the horror behemoth you behold before you today. So here we are: the Goddess’s list of her favorite horror-related toys from her formative years!
Weeble Haunted House
This was probably my very favorite toy growing up. I still have a picture of four-year-old me playing with it, along with my toddler brother, in our painfully 70’s-looking living room (complete with mustard-hued beanbag chair). The haunted house opened up like a dollhouse! The front door creaked when you opened it! There were secret passages! There was a little Weeble ghost that glowed in the dark and a Weeble witch with a teeny plastic witch hat! There were two frightened little Weeble people who JUST COULDN’T EVEN. If loving this toy is wrong, I don’t want to be right.
Mystery Mansion Game
I don’t remember the exact rules of this game, but basically, it came with all these little boxlike “rooms,” and you assembled the mansion as you played. There were rules to the mansion assembly, of course, like the rooms had to line up by their doorways, and you couldn’t have a room with a window facing into another room (so the above picture, with the rooms all willy-nilly and the music room’s window facing the boiler room’s wall, WOULD NOT BE ALLOWED, YOU GUYS, GET IT RIGHT).* I think you had to be the first to capture three of the little treasure chests and get back out of the house. The artwork of the rooms was really nice and very realistic, perspective-wise, and I seem to recall that most of the time we didn’t even bother playing the game, because obviously the funnest part was assembling the mansion in lots of different configurations. I totally wanted this to be my real house when I was a kid. Look how spacious and tastefully decorated it is!
Play Doh Haunted House
I would occasionally get all fancy with this and attempt to make multi-colored witches and mummies with the Play-Doh, though I can’t remember how well all of that worked out. And while I did have this exact Play-Doh set with this particular haunted house plastic mat, it’s really bugging me because I’m sure I also had a plastic mat that looked like a mad scientist’s lab that either came with this set or that I used with these particular Play-Doh molds. But I can’t find a picture of it on Google and it’s kinda driving me crazy.
Stretch Monster
A monstery variation on Stretch Armstrong, with a healthy helping of the Creature from the Black Lagoon. I actually recall the monster being a darker green than this and having a smoother head, but that must be just my faulty memory. One thing I do remember, though, is that if you and your little brother played with it enough, eventually it would get a hole in it and the stretchy stuff inside would begin to seep out, and that stuff had the same consistency and smell as maple syrup. Hmm.
Creepy Crawlers
Goes without saying, really. Who didn’t love this thing? You could make creepy bugs and worms with it, and there was always the alluring possibility that you might burn yourself (which is the same reason I also loved the Flower Thingmaker, and that smelting plant-type thing where you could melt down your crayons and make swirly, multicolored Hot Wheels cars).
Shogun Warriors Godzilla
Clunky and not that exciting by today’s standards, but nevertheless, kid-me was entranced that you could roll your ‘zilla around on the floor and flick out his fire-tongue while shooting at your siblings with the monster’s detachable action fist!
Mad Scientist Dissect-An-Alien (1980’s)
A bit of a cheat, as I was slightly older when this came out, but you can bet your ass I played with it when my little brother got one. You filled the alien’s body cavity up with glowing slime and tried to cram all his little innards in there before “stitching” him back up. I don’t recall that we EVER got all of his plastic guts to fit in there with the slime inside. Maybe we just got overzealous with the goop, which totally sounds like something we would do.
Mighty Men & Monster Maker
A more “boy-centric” version of Fashion Plates (which I also had and enjoyed), this one used plastic grave-rubbing technology to let you make cool hybrid superheroes and creatures, even if you couldn’t draw a lick. Then you could color them with the included colored pencils! Fuck yeah, I’m drawing a green, muscle-bound superhero with werewolf legs, AND YOU CAN’T STOP ME, GODDAMMIT.
Crossbows and Catapults
More fantasy-based than horror-based, but I’m including it because it was kinda medieval, and also fun as fuck. Me and my younger brother usually set up our citadels a few feet apart on our grandmother’s kitchen floor, and then went to town trying to take down each other’s settlements. The only downside was having to track down all the tiny projectiles after the carnage was complete. Most of them are probably STILL under a refrigerator somewhere.
Which Witch?
I had totally forgotten about this game until I was researching this post and came across a photo of it. Holy CRAP, all the nostalgia feels came flooding back. I LOVED THIS THING. I can’t remember how you played exactly, but I think you just had to get through the haunted mansion on the little footsteps, and bad shit happened to you if you got stuck on one of the red DANGER spots. Some of the cardboard pieces were movable, I remember that, and there was something about a clock? I also love that the game pieces were wee little different-colored mice. I specifically had the version of the game pictured, which came out in 1970 (I was born in 1972, so maybe my parents got this second-hand), but in 1971, basically the same game was released in a different box under the name Haunted House.
And that’s all the fun for today, minions. Go play with your Aurora model kits and your Monster Machines, and remember to keep it creepy, my friends. Goddess out.
*ETA: Okay, I see now that I was a little too hasty in my OCD condemnation of the Mystery Mansion layout. The music room is a two-story room, and there is indeed a plastic set of stairs leading from its door down to the door of the room beside it, making this room placement totally legit. My apologies, mysterious Mystery Mansion layer-outer.
In case you missed it, here we are discussing The Rochdale Poltergeist on the Restricted Airspace radio show last Friday night! Enjoy!
Tune your earholes to the Restricted Airspace radio show this Friday, November 6th (10pm Eastern Time), because your intrepid Goddess will be on there flapping her jaws about The Rochdale Poltergeist, along with co-author and parapsychologist Steve Mera. Listen and heed, paranormal pals. And then buy the book; it’s rad.
Here is me and the God of Hellfire discussing The Mammoth Mountain Poltergeist on the KTPF Community Talk Show yesterday, Sunday, August 9th. Our bit starts about half an hour in. Enjoy, then buy a copy of the book here to get the rest of the chilling story! Thank you, and keep it creepy!
Greetings, minions! Sorry I’ve been neglecting you, but I’ve really been inundated with work and haven’t had much chance to write any new stuff for this here blog. I will get back to it as soon as I can, but in the meantime, I took the GoH and I’s appearance on Jim Harold’s Paranormal Podcast and edited it down to the half hour that was just us, plus made a little video with photos from the book. So if you’d like to watch and listen, here you go:
We were the guests on the radio show Behind the Paranormal this past Monday, talking about The Mammoth Mountain Poltergeist! If you want to listen, and I know you do, you can download the MP3 right here. Danke!
Goddess of Hellfire 