News

Stars: Barbara Steele, Ian Ogilvy, John Karlsen, Mel Welles, Joe ‘Flash’ Riley, Richard Watson, Lucretia Love, Peter Grippe | Written and Directed by Michael Reeves

Revenge of the Blood Beast, also known as The She-Beast, is a 1966 horror film directed by Michael Reeves. This movie is a unique blend of Gothic horror and campy humour, which offers a curious mix of eerie atmosphere and unintentional comedy.

The story revolves around a newlywed couple, Philip and Veronica, who are honeymooning in Transylvania. They encounter an eccentric innkeeper and a deranged scientist, Count von Helsing. An ancient witch, executed centuries ago, is resurrected and possesses Veronica, leading to a series of supernatural events. Barbara Steele, known for her roles in Gothic horror films, stars as Veronica. Her performance is captivating and adds a layer of authenticity to the supernatural elements of the film. Ian Ogilvy, as Philip, delivers a solid performance, balancing the...

Jack Nicholson's tearful tribute captured the essence of Roger Corman's impact on his career and life, starting with Little Shop of Horrors. Hollywood legends like John Carpenter and Ron Howard recognize Corman's influence. Corman's financial success in low-budget films and ability to inspire others cemented his status as a Hollywood icon, leaving a powerful legacy.

As the world mourned the loss of Roger Corman, one particular clip from the archives went viral across social media. It was not a clip of Corman, or from one of his many movies, but of an emotional Jack Nicholson breaking down in tears while talking about the impact Corman had on his life and career. Roger Corman passed away on May 11, at the age of 98. As the director of around 50 movies and producer of up to 500, the unique and legendary Hollywood icon was still working right up to the end.

It was...

Roger Corman & Joe Dante are teaming up for a new Little Shop of Horrors remake. Joe Dante returns to working with Corman, who he started his career working for. Expect a fresh take on the original movie, with no details yet on the upcoming Little Shop of Halloween Horrors, but stay tuned for updates.

Little Shop of Horrors looks to be getting a remake after all, with B-movie legend Roger Corman returning to his creation along with Gremlins director Joe Dante. This will be a reimagining of the story of an alien plant that attempts to take over the world, and follows the abandoned Chris Evans-starring remake that was in development but cancelled after pandemic delays.

The Little Shop of Horrors NRComedyFantasy Horror Release DateAugust 5, 1960DirectorRoger Corman, Charles B. Griffith, Mel WellesCastJonathan Haze, Jackie Joseph, Mel Welles, Dick Miller, Myrtle Vail, Karyn KupcinetRuntime70Main GenreComedyWritersCharles B. GriffithTaglineThe funniest picture of the year!

Two-Disc Collection Packed With Special Features, Including Bonus Film The Little Shop of Horrors (1960) and Film Commentary by Star Jonathan Haze

The duality of Roger Corman is on display, showcasing his spooky gothic side with The Terror (1963) — marking the 60th anniversary of its release this year — and his more whimsical side with The Little Shop of Horrors (1960) in this double-feature, special-edition, two-disc, collector’s set, on Blu-ray and DVD 12th December 2023 from Film Masters.

In The Terror—with an all-new HD restoration from 35mm archival elements — an 18th century French Lieutenant in Napoleon’s army encounters the ghostly apparition of a young woman (Sandra Knight). Curiosity leads Lt. Andre Duvalier (Jack Nicholson) to the castle of Baron Von Leppe (Boris Karloff), where he notices a painting of the Baron’s late wife Ilsa, who looks identical to the ghostly woman. Determined to unravel the castle’s mystery, Duvalier learns that...

The gothic mode in Italian horror was effectively launched, and reached its early apotheosis, with the release of Mario Bava’s Black Sunday in 1960. An ensuing tidal wave of likeminded films flooded the market throughout the ’60s, before starting to dry up in the early ’70s, as the more modernist-inclined (and frequently more graphic) giallo came into prominence. Now Severin Films has gathered together four vintage examples of the Italian gothic trend in their new box set Danza Macabra Volume One. When it comes to sex and violence, those two requisite mainstays of the genre, the films run the gamut from almost timidly titillating to unabashedly lurid.

Renato Polselli’s The Monster of the Opera, from 1964, opens with arguably its strongest set piece, which is revealed to have been a dream sequence. This allows Polselli to openly embrace a surrealist aesthetic through oneiric slow motion, tilted cameras, disorienting high- and low-angle shots,...

The Little Shop of Horrors is a 1960 comedy horror movie directed by Roger Corman, starring Jonathan Haze, Jackie Joseph, Mel Welles, and Dick Miller. It was in this movie that Jack Nicholson made one of his earliest appearances on film. He was years later quoted in Corman’s 1998 book recounting how he experienced the reception of the movie saying that the audience

“laughed so hard I could barely hear the dialogue. I didn’t quite register it right. It was as if I had forgotten it was a comedy since the shoot. I got all embarrassed because I’d never really had such a positive response before.”.

from the book ‘How I made a hundred movies in Hollywood and never lost a dime’ by Roger Corman The Little Shop of Horrors (1960) Premise

Seymour works in a skid row florist shop and is in love with his beautiful co-worker, Audrey. He...

They’re after you, and your wives and children! This Corman/VeSota/Ed Nelson shocker with the excellent poster is a Robert Heinlein knockoff that can’t quite sustain the paranoid pitch of other ‘parasitic possession’ sci-fi horror epics. One of the cheapest of the drive-in cheapies, it remains a must-see title just for the audacity of its ad campaign, and a random moment or two of spooky serendipity. Don’t get your hopes up if you’re coming to see Leonard Nimoy’s performance — unless his voice is enough to satisfy.

The Brain Eaters

Blu-ray

1958 / B&w / 1:85 widescreen / 61 min. / Street Date January, 2022

Starring: Ed Nelson, Alan Frost, Jack Hill, Joanna Lee, Jody Fair, David Hughes, Robert Ball, Greigh Phillips, Orville Sherman, Leonard Nemoy (Nimoy),, Doug Banks, Saul Bronson, Hampton Fancher.

Cinematography: Larry Raimond

Art Director: Burt Shonberg

Film Editor: Carlo Lodato

Written by Gordon Urquhart

Uncredited Executive Producer:...

Roger Corman began his boom year of 1957 with a marvelous bit of ‘way-out’ sci-fi — a ‘Tidal Wave of Terror’ no less. This note just arrived from Donald J.’s Seafood Emporium: “You puny, dunderheaded humans, don’t let the campy title fool you! Soon you will be ‘absorbed’ into our crabby super-mentalities, heh heh heh. We atom-age crustaceans are made of electric anti-matter — it’s incredible! Our telepathy is the best telepathy ever — everybody says so! It is what it is!” The new Blu-ray will charm fans seeking prime ‘fifties monster nirvana.

Attack of the Crab Monsters

Blu-ray

1957 / Color / 1:85 widescreen / 62 min. / Street Date August 25 , 2020

Starring: Richard Garland, Pamela Duncan, Russell Johnson, Leslie Bradley, Mel Welles, Richard Cutting, Beach Dickerson, Tony Miller, Ed Nelson, Charles B. Griffith, Maitland Stuart.

Cinematography: Floyd Crosby

Film Editor: Charles Gross Jr.

Assistants of all stripes: Maurice Vaccarino, Charles B. Griffith, Lindsley Parsons Jr., Beach Dickerson,...

Article by Jim Batts, Dana Jung, and Tom Stockman

Happy 94th Birthday to a legend! Roger Corman has directed more than 50 low-budget drive-in classics, produced and/or distributed 450 more, and helped the careers of hundreds of young people breaking into the industry. A partial list: Martin Scorsese, Francis Ford Coppola, Irvin Kershner, Monte Hellman, Peter Bogdanovich, Gail Ann Hurd, James Cameron, Jonathan Kaplan, Joe Dante, Robert Towne. Considering Corman’s own films, Jonathan Demme has stated. “Roger is arguably the greatest independent filmmaker the American film industry has seen and probably ever will see.” We Are Movie Geeks has taken a look at Corman’s career and here are what we think are the ten best films that he has directed:

Honorable Mention. The Premature Burial

The Premature Burial (1962) is the ‘odd man out’ among the series of Corman’s Edgar Allan Poe adaptations because of the absence of Vincent Price...

Two-fisted Hong Kong racketeer Clark Gable goes out on a limb to recover Susan Hayward’s husband, held prisoner in Red China. In a literal pirate vessel armed with a stolen cannon, Gable literally goes to war, risking his smuggling empire by half-kidnapping Michael Rennie’s Hong Kong cop. This lush CinemaScope action-travelogue-romance now comes off as comfort food movie viewing: familiar stars doing what they do best. It’s a German import from a Hollywood Studio whose library titles may no longer be licensed to hard media home video.

Soldier of Fortune

Region-Free Blu-ray

Explosive Media GmbH

1955 / Color / 2:55 widescreen / 96 min. / Street Date September 26, 2019 / Treffpunkt Hongkong / Available at Amazon.de

15.99 Euros Starring: Clark Gable, Susan Hayward, Michael Rennie, Gene Barry, Alexander D’Arcy, Tom Tully, Anna Sten, Russell Collins, Richard Loo, Frank Tang, Jack Kruschen, Leo Gordon, Mel Welles, Robert Quarry.

Cinematography: Leo Tover

Film Editor: Dorothy Spencer

Original Music:...

It’s a spooky, snowy train ride across thousands of miles of Siberian rails — trapped on board with a victim-possessing creature from outer space, with eyes that kill! Actually, ‘Pánico en el transiberiano’ is a fine show for Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee, a Spanish-made chiller with a smart script and some effective shocks.

Horror Express

Blu-ray

Arrow Video

1972 / Color / 1:78 widescreen / 90 min. / Street Date February 12, 2019 / Available from Arrow Video

Starring: Christopher Lee, Peter Cushing, Telly Savalas, Alberto de Mendoza, Silvia Tortosa, Julio Peña, Ángel del Pozo, Helga Liné.

Cinematography: Alejandro Ulloa

Original Music: John Cacavas

Written by Arnaud d’Usseau, Julian Zimet

Produced by Bernard Gordon

Directed by Eugenio Martín

Dedicated horror fans look to the past to uncover forgotten chillers, or just to complete their lists of rare items unseen. For instance, although no release date has been given, we’re told that Kino Lorber will be giving...

By Fred Blosser

As movie censorship relaxed in the early 1970s, Mel Welles’ horror film “Lady Frankenstein” added sex and nudity to the familiar Frankenstein formula of the single-minded and arguably demented scientist who creates a monster and lives to regret it. In the 1971 production, now available in a handsome, fully loaded Blu-ray edition from Nucleus Films encoded for Region B, Dr. Tanya Frankenstein (Rosalba Neri) returns home to the family estate after completing medical school. Having inherited the family obsession, she is determined to help her father (Joseph Cotten) realize his long-frustrated ambition of creating human life in his laboratory. When Baron Frankenstein and his associate Dr. Marshall (Paul Muller) balk at including the refined young woman in their gory experiments, she fiercely overrides their objections: “Stop treating me like a child! I’m a doctor and a surgeon.” Frankenstein and Marshall successfully reanimate a creature that they’ve stitched together from plundered cadavers,...

Article by Jim Batts, Dana Jung, and Tom Stockman

Happy 92nd Birthday to a legend! Roger Corman has directed more than 50 low-budget drive-in classics, produced and/or distributed 450 more, and helped the careers of hundreds of young people breaking into the industry. A partial list: Martin Scorsese, Francis Ford Coppola, Irvin Kershner, Monte Hellman, Peter Bogdanovich, Gail Ann Hurd, James Cameron, Jonathan Kaplan, Joe Dante, Robert Towne. Considering Corman’s own films, Jonathan Demme has stated. “Roger is arguably the greatest independent filmmaker the American film industry has seen and probably ever will see.” We Are Movie Geeks has taken a look at Corman’s career and here are what we think are the ten best films that he has directed:

Honorable Mention. The Premature Burial

The Premature Burial (1962) is the ‘odd man out’ among the series of Corman’s Edgar Allan Poe adaptations because of the absence of Vincent Price...

Horror and sci-fi home entertainment titles are really picking up this week, as we have almost 20 different Blu-rays and DVDs coming home this Tuesday. Universal is keeping themselves busy with several notable releases including Death Race 2050, Ouija: Origin of Evil, 12 Monkeys: Season Two, and a Ouija double feature.

Scream Factory is dusting off two cult classics, Slumber Party Massacre II and III for a special Blu-ray featuring the slasher sequels, and Sony Pictures Home Entertainment is getting you guys pumped for the upcoming release of Resident Evil: The Final Chapter with several new Blu-ray releases for the franchise's first four films.

Other notable releases for January 17th include Revenge of the Blood Beast, 24 Hours to Die, Wolf House, Mountain Devil, and Space Clown.

Ouija: Origin of Evil (Universal Studios Home Entertainment, Blu / DVD / Digital HD & DVD)

It was never just a game. Inviting audiences again into the lore of the spirit board,...

Revenge of the Blood Beast

Blu-ray

Rarovideo

1966 / Color / 2:35 widescreen / 79 min. / Il lago di Satana, La sorella di Satana, The She-Beast / Street Date January 17, 2017 / 29.95

Starring: Barbara Steele, John Karlsen, Ian Ogilvy, Mel Welles, Lucretia Love

Cinematography: Gioacchino Gengarelli

Film Editor: Nira Omri

Original Music: Paul Ferris

Produced by: Paul Maslansky, Michael Reeves

Written and Directed by Michael Reeves

It’s back into the genre argument pits with the interesting director Michael Reeves. Reeves has persisted as a cult figure far longer than most directors with only three credited feature films. The movies are uneven but promising, and certainly the artistic equal (or better) than most of the work being turned out at the time by American-International and the majority of the Euro-horror crowd. The second half of the 1960s saw a general depression in the horror field, with Hammer losing touch with its audience and continental fare turning to sex content to generate interest.

One woman is slamming Samsung because she says the company's phones have a default setting that automatically airbrushes selfies.Author and blogger Mel Wells shared two selfies on Instagram: one of her airbrushed face after a Samsung phone automatically applied the "beauty level 8" filter, and one of her normal face, freckles and all. "Wow Samsung. This means everyone who gets a new Samsung phone and flicks the front camera on is automatically being told 'Hi, we're Samsung and we think you look way better when we automatically airbrush your selfies for you, x 8!!' " Wells captioned the photo. this is Samsung's Default Front Camera Setting.

One woman is slamming Samsung because she says the company's phones have a default setting that automatically airbrushes selfies.Author and blogger Mel Wells shared two selfies on Instagram: one of her airbrushed face after a Samsung phone automatically applied the "beauty level 8" filter, and one of her normal face, freckles and all. "Wow Samsung. This means everyone who gets a new Samsung phone and flicks the front camera on is automatically being told 'Hi, we're Samsung and we think you look way better when we automatically airbrush your selfies for you, x 8!!' " Wells captioned the photo. this is Samsung's Default Front Camera Setting.

Article by Jim Batts, Dana Jung, and Tom Stockman

Happy 9oth Birthday to a legend! Roger Corman has directed more than 50 low-budget drive-in classics, produced and/or distributed 450 more, and helped the careers of hundreds of young people breaking into the industry. A partial list: Martin Scorsese, Francis Ford Coppola, Irvin Kershner, Monte Hellman, Peter Bogdanovich, Gail Ann Hurd, James Cameron, Jonathan Kaplan, Joe Dante, Robert Towne. Considering Corman’s own films, Jonathan Demme has stated. “Roger is arguably the greatest independent filmmaker the American film industry has seen and probably ever will see.” And he’s still going strong, currently producing the upcoming actioner Death Race 2050. We Are Movie Geeks has taken a look at Corman’s career and here are what we think are the ten best films that he has directed:

Honorable Mention. The Premature Burial

The Premature Burial (1962) is the ‘odd man out’ among the...

1958’s "High School Confidential" is an exploitation natural made by two pros who knew the genre inside and out: producer Albert Zugsmith ("Sex Kittens Go To College") and director Jack Arnold ("The Incredible Shrinking Man"). Jerry Lee Lewis kicks it off with some barn-burning rock n’ roll and then surrenders the stage to a cast made in B-movie heaven including Bad Girl Par Excellence, Mamie Van Doren and Russ Tamblyn as an undercover agent investigating a drug ring at the local high school. Roger Corman regular Mel Welles contributed a few lines of satirical poetry presaging the beatnik doggerel he’d compose for Corman’s 1959 horror-comedy "Bucket of Blood."...

1958’s High School Confidential is an exploitation natural made by two pros who knew the genre inside and out: producer Albert Zugsmith (Sex Kittens Go To College) and director Jack Arnold (The Incredible Shrinking Man). Jerry Lee Lewis kicks it off with some barn-burning rock n’ roll and then surrenders the stage to a cast made in B-movie heaven including Bad Girl Par Excellence, Mamie Van Doren and Russ Tamblyn as an undercover agent investigating a drug ring at the local high school. Roger Corman regular Mel Welles contributed a few lines of satirical poetry presaging the beatnik doggerel he’d compose for Corman’s 1959 horror-comedy Bucket of Blood.

Jerry Lee Lewis kicks it off with some barn-burning rock n’ roll and then surrenders the stage to a cast made in B-movie heaven including Bad Girl Par Excellence, Mamie Van Doren and Russ Tamblyn as an undercover agent investigating a drug ring at the local high school. Roger Corman regular Mel Welles contributed a few lines of satirical poetry presaging the beatnik doggerel he’d compose for Corman’s 1959 horror-comedy "Bucket of Blood."...

Reviewed by Kevin Scott, MoreHorror.com

She Beast (1966)

Written and Directed by: Michael Reeves

Cast: Barbara Steele (Veronica), John Karlsen (Count von Helsing), Ian Ogilvy (Philip) Mel Welles (Landislav Groper)Richard Watson (Comrade Police Lieutenant)

This week I’m going really old school with a British Italian horror classic, “The She Beast”. There’s the strong possibility that I have seen this movie in the past maybe on a local channel from back in the day, but I don’t recall it if I did. I should have though, because, it’s definitely an important film in the history of horror. It won’t change your life if you watch it now, but I bet it inspired some horror filmmakers early on, whose work we enjoy today.

“The She Beast” tells the story of the evil witch Vardella, who is terrorizing villagers in 18th century Transylvania. Finally, the townspeople have had enough,...

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By Harvey F. Chartrand

Peter Gunn: The Complete Series is now available for the first time ever as a 12-dvd box set from Timeless Media Group… all 114 episodes, with a running time of over 58 hours.

Peter Gunn – created and produced by Blake Edwards – ran for three seasons – from 1958 to 1961. This classic detective show was a delightful blend of film noir and fifties cool, featuring a modern jazz score by Henry Mancini (a bonus CD of the soundtrack is included in the set), outbreaks of the old ultra-violence, a gallery of eccentric and sleazy characters (usually informants, gangsters and Beat Generation bohemians), and great acting by series leads Craig Stevens (as Gunn), Lola Albright (as his squeeze, sultry nightclub singer Edie Hart) and Herschel Bernardi (as Gunn’s friend and competitor Lieutenant Jacoby, who seems to work all by himself 24 hours a day...

More long hidden horrors are now available as part of Warner's made-to-order Archive Collection. Oh, the classic terrors that await you, dearest reader! Dig it!

Head on over to the Warner Archives and order yours today!

The Awakening

Director: Mike Newell

Cast: Charlton Heston, Susannah York, Jill Townsend, Stephanie Zimbalist

Synopsis

Mention Bram Stoker’s name, and literature and movie buffs will conjure up Count Dracula. But there was more blood in Stoker’s pen. He also wrote The Jewel of the Seven Stars, later filmed with chilling effect as The Awakening, grippingly directed by Mike Newell (Dance with a Stranger, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire) and sensuously shot on Egyptian locations by veteran cinematographer Jack Cardiff. Charlton Heston stars as an Egyptologist with a passion that will trigger several mysterious deaths. He’s obsessed with a sorceress whose return has been prophesied – and whose tomb he opened...

Joseph Gordon-Levitt is eyeing the Warner Bros. remake Little Shop of Horrors. Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa, who is drafting the new Carrie remake for MGM, is in negotiations to write the screenplay.

If he officially signs on, the actor will play Seymour Kilborn, a meek florist who must continue to feed his gigantic plant, which feasts on humans, to secure his newfound fame and fortune. The role was previously played by Jonathan Haze in the 1960 version of The Little Shop of Horrors, directed by Roger Corman, and by Rick Moranis in Frank Oz's 1987 rendition, Little Shop of Horrors.

Marc Platt (Drive) is producing for the studio, although no director has been attached yet.

Little Shop of Horrors was released December 19th, 1986 and stars Rick Moranis, Ellen Greene, Vincent Gardenia, Steve Martin, Tichina Arnold, Michelle Weeks, Tisha Campbell-Martin, Levi Stubbs. The film is directed by Frank Oz.

The Little Shop of Horrors was released August 5th,...

Article by Jim Batts, Dana Jung, and Tom Stockman

Celebrated producer and director Roger Corman will be in St. Louis this weekend to help kick off the Vincentennial Vincent Price Film Festival. We Are Movie Geeks has decided to take a look at the directing career of the man known as .King of the B.s’, a Hollywood legend who.s discovered so much talent and gave so many future directors and actors their starts, that he has to be considered a one-man movie industry. Since we just posted the Top Ten Best of Vincent Price last week and included three of the eight Corman/Price collaborations in that list, we decided to leave off the films he made with Price this week and focus on other films that he directed. Roger Corman will be at the Hi-Pointe Theater at 1005 McCausland Ave. in St. Louis on Saturday May 21 to speak...

Hey Fiends! Happy Monday! Got another list of flicks on the format of your choice.

Roger Corman’s Cult Classics Triple Feature (Attack of the Crab Monsters / War of the Satellites / Not of This Earth)

Format: DVD

———————————–

Three Films Produced And Directed By Honorary Academy Award Recipient And King Of B-Movies, Roger Corman: With All New Film Transfers From The Negative!

In Attack Of The Crab Monsters, a group of scientists become marooned on an island while investigating the disappearance of researchers who were looking into atomic activity in the Pacific. They quickly fall prey to giant, mutant crustaceans that have the ability to absorb the minds of their prey. Starring Russell Johnson (Gilligans Island), Richard Garland and Mel Welles (Little Shop Of Horrors).

An alien comes to Earth, masquerading as a human, to scout our planet for a new blood source in Not Of This Earth. He needs...

Does claustrophobia set in easily for you? Then you may want to steer clear of the video aisles of your favorite stores as last year's intense buried alive flick (starring the future Green Lantern) is coming on home.

Being that this is another light week release wise, you don't have too many other options. That is unless you're in the mood for high speed chases featuring coffin-looking vehicles that could end up causing just as much anxiety.

Or maybe you'd just like to find comfort in another Roger Corman fest from a kinder, gentler era - a triple treat that has nothing to do with coffins. Yay!

Buried (Blu-ray Review)

Directed by Rodrigo Cortés

Starring Ryan Reynolds, and the voices of Samantha Mathis, Erik Palladino, José Luis García Pérez, Robert Paterson, Stephen Tobolowsky

Paul Conroy is not ready to die. But when he wakes up six feet underground with no...

In 2010 Shout! Factory delivered us stellar editions of some truly classic Roger Corman films. The best part? They have no signs of slowing down in 2011! That's right, kids, five more flicks are on the way on January 18th that are bound to bring a smile to your horror-loving face!

From the Press Release

Roger Corman’S Cult Classics: Sci-fi Classics Triple-feature Collector’S Edition 2-dvd Set

In Attack Of The Crab Monsters, a group of scientists become marooned on an island while investigating the disappearance of researchers who were looking into atomic activity in the Pacific. They quickly fall prey to giant, mutant crustaceans that have the ability to absorb the minds of their prey. Starring Russell Johnson (Gilligan’s Island), Richard Garland and Mel Welles (Little Shop Of Horrors). Attack Of The Crab Monsters is a Roger Corman Production. Produced and directed by Roger Corman; screenplay by Charles B. Griffith.

The Shout! Factory, I think, deserves some sort of award for the energy they've thrown at the Roger Corman library. I don't think I anticipated the number of DVDs and Blu-Rays they've put out since announcing they acquired the Corman collection. Terrific stuff. Here's the lowdown on the latest round of titles that will street on January 18. First, the triple feature: In Attack Of The Crab Monsters, a group of scientists become marooned on an island while investigating the disappearance of researchers who were looking into atomic activity in the Pacific. They quickly fall prey to giant, mutant crustaceans that have the ability to absorb the minds of their prey. Starring Russell Johnson (Gilligan.s Island), Richard Garland and Mel Welles (Little Shop Of Horrors). Attack Of The...

Halloween may now be associated with the likes of Michael Myers and other hack-and-slash types, but for those of us of a certain age, at this time of year our thoughts return to the granddaddies of them all: Dr. Frankenstein and his Monster. In honor of that tradition, today Trembles takes a look back at the good doctor's daughter: Lady Frankenstein, directed by Mel Welles and Aureliano Luppi.

Synopsis:

When Dr. Frankenstein (Joseph Cotten) is killed by a monster he created, his daughter (Rosalba Neri) and his lab assistant, Marshall (Paul Muller), continue his experiments. The two fall in love and attempt to transplant Marshall's brain into the muscular body of a retarded servant, Stephen, in order to prolong the aging Marshall's life. Meanwhile, the first monster seeks revenge on the grave robbers who sold the body parts used in its creation to Dr. Frankenstein. Soon it comes...

Michael Reeves. directorial debut must.ve had a budget of around $25, but it still a film that you can.t help but watch. It would lead to much bigger things for the director, but his career would end on a tragic note. Dark Sky brings out another cult classic to DVD as the She Beast prowls again. Honeymooners Veronica (Barbara Steele) and Phillip (Ian Ogilvy) are touring scenic Transylvania (didn.t know that it was a popular honeymoon spot?). They stop at the inn of a perverted innkeeper Ladislav Groper (Mel Welles) and meet the strange Count Von Helsing (John Karlsen). The odd Count tells them the local legend of the witch Vardella (played by a stuntman in a...

The first question that springs to mind is, 'when did they green light a "Little Shop of Horrors" remake?' If anyone out there knows please tell me, because this is the first I've heard of it.

The original 1960 film (not the later musical) has become something of a cult classic due to word of mouth, and a small part played by a young Jack Nicholson - an appearance that is now almost misleadingly marketed on current releases of the film.

The actual stars were Jonathan Haze, Jackie Joseph, Mel Welles and Dick Miller all of whom had worked for director Roger Corman previously, and the film is described on IMDb as:

"A classic black comedy about young schnook who develops a bloodthirsty plant and is forced to kill in order to feed it. The basis for the later hit stage musical."The young director who has optioned the rights...

By Alison Willmore

For the many ill-wishers out there, the most disappointing thing about M. Night Shyamalan's environmental thriller "The Happening" wasn't that it was a failure, but that it wasn't a spectacular failure. Critics went in with their long knives out, only to leave shrugging that they've seen worse. Having made $59 million in theaters, it's not even the box office bomb some expected after "Lady in the Water." All in all, "The Happening" is actually pretty successful, considering it's a serious horror film about trees... that kill! In honor of that dubious designation, here's a look at the spotty history of films about murderous botanic life that have preceded it.

Killer tomatoes

Film: Attack of the Killer Tomatoes! (1978)

Directed by John De Bello

M.O.: Produce that, for no apparent reason, become massive and murderous.

De Bello's broad comedy mocked B-movie conventions while bearing its reported $90,000 budget like a badge of honor.