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The Battle of Stalingrad is considered the largest and bloodiest combat in history. One of the most essential battles of World War II, it pitted Hitler's troops against Stalin's resistance soldiers as the Axis powers attempted to expand eastwards. The sheer numbers—millions of soldiers with over a million casualties—and individual and group stories have been a magnet for filmmakers. German Director Joseph Wilsmaier chose to focus his 1993 war film Stalingrad on the Axis soldiers' unraveling of declining morale against the backdrop of the horrors of war. Frank Wisbar made Stalingrad: Dogs, Do You Want to Live Forever? to explore survival, even if it meant disobeying out-of-touch authority. The title references a historical quote attributed to Frederick the Great: "You cursed rascals, do you want to live forever?" Meanwhile, Enemy at the Gates completely misreads the theater, failing miserably by attempting to toy with historical reality and...

“I drifted into Prc and couldn’t get out.” — Edgar G. Ulmer In the early 1930s, a wave of prominent directors fleeing Germany had found success at the major or second-tier studios; only rarely were they forced to make films at the low-budget studios found on the so-called Poverty Row. The next generation was too late—if Fritz Lang thought Rko was squalid, it was because he had little idea of the depredations suffered by, for instance, an István Székely, a Franz Wysbar, or, briefly, […]...

“I drifted into Prc and couldn’t get out.” — Edgar G. Ulmer In the early 1930s, a wave of prominent directors fleeing Germany had found success at the major or second-tier studios; only rarely were they forced to make films at the low-budget studios found on the so-called Poverty Row. The next generation was too late—if Fritz Lang thought Rko was squalid, it was because he had little idea of the depredations suffered by, for instance, an István Székely, a Franz Wysbar, or, briefly, […]...

Douglas Sirk's first American movie came out so well that Prc sold it to MGM, earning Sirk a promotion out of the Poverty Row studios. John Carradine is excellent - and underplays! -- as the Hangman of Prague who moonlights as a depraved sex criminal. But the context in this wartime propaganda movie is serious -- it commemorates the Nazi murder of an entire Czech town. Hitler's Madman DVD-r The Warner Archive Collection 1943 / B&W / 1:37 flat Academy / 84 min. / Street Date December 1, 2015 / available through the WBshop / 18.95 Starring Patricia Morrison, John Carradine, Alan Curtis, Howard Freeman, Ralph Morgan, Ludwig Stössel, Edgar Kennedy, Al Shean, Elizabeth Russell, Jimmy Conlin, Ava Gardner, Natalie Draper, Victor Kilian, Otto Reichow, Peter van Eyck, Hans Heinrich von Twardowski, Blanch Yurka. Cinematography (Eugen Schüfftan, credited as Technical Advisor), Jack Greenhalgh Film Editor Dan Milner Second unit and uncredited production designer Edgar G. Ulmer Original Music...

Strangler of the Swamp

Written by Frank Wisbar and Harold Erickson

Directed by Frank Wisbar

USA, 1946

“Old legends – strange tales – never die in the lonely swampland. Villages and hamlets lie remote and almost forgotten. Small ferryboats glide between the shores, and the ferryman is a very important person. Day and night he is at the command of his passengers. On his little barge ride the good and the evil; the friendly and the hostile; the superstitious and the enlightened; the living and – sometimes – the dead.”

In Frank Wisbar’s Strangler of the Swamp, townspeople mourn the loss of members of the community who have died via strangulation. The deaths have caused a rift in the community. Some believe the rational explanation that people have died as a result of their own foolhardiness in the swamp. Others know better. They suspect that “The Strangler,” a ghost of an innocent man the town hanged,...

Writer/director Drew Daywalt is no stranger to the independent horror world. In fact, a few of his projects have already shown up on other filmmakers’ lists, and during some Indie Horror Month interviews that will be running later this month, his name pops up frequently.

So when it came time to reach out to filmmakers for this week’s series of lists, we knew he needed to be a part of our celebration of the independent horror filmmaking spirit.

Daywalt is currently busy working on a new series for MTV called “Death Valley” but was kind enough to give us a quick list of some of his favorite indie genre gems when he had some downtime recently.

According to Daywalt, “These are my five indie horror films you need to see before you die. They're oldies, but that's my specialty, so I'll hang my hat on that. My five...