kindertrauma

Month: October 2009

Where The Wild Things Are :: Soundtrack

Posted on By unkle lancifer

I wanted to write a review for the WHERE THE WILD THINGS ARE soundtrack, but what the hell do I know about writing about music besides, "It's got a good beat and I can drink to it." Still, I feel compelled to tell y'all about just how enjoyable this soundtrack is. I was a borderline fan of THE YEAH YEAH YEAHS and then became a die-harder with the release of their dipped in chocolaty new wave IT'S BLITZ!

My opinion of KAREN O, the YEAHS front woman has expanded even further still now that my ears have gotten a taste of her work with the WILD THINGS soundtrack; it's joyous, vaguely creepy and filled with junkyard beats that stay bouncing around your cranium for days. Also performing on this album is a bunch of folks from other bands too hip to be known by me, and a chorus of kids. (Whether it's PINK FLOYD's THE WALL or PAT BENATAR'S WE BELONG, who doesn't love a chorus of kooky kids?) You can listen to the whole album HERE and if ya' dig it, buy it on the Amazon HERE.

Hey, Aunt John even likes it and that guy only listens to DOLLY PARTON Christmas music!

Halloween III: Season of the Witch (A Holiday Classic!)

Posted on By unkle lancifer

In 1982 audiences across the globe cried like big babies because they didn't get their Michael Myers rattle in HALLOWEEN 3: SEASON OF THE WITCH. Talk about pearls before swine, a critical and commercial failure, H3, or as I like to call it "The non-stop genius show" was considered the redheaded step child, black sheep, blighted pimple of the HALLOWEEN franchise for years. When H3 walked down the streets of town, spinsters called it a floozy and spit on its shoes. Thankfully one day everyone everywhere decided to stop smoking crack and woke up to the obvious slice of perfection before them and declared HALLOWEEN 3: SEASON OF THE WITCH the greatest robot-infested, killer mask thriller that involves a stolen rock from Stonehenge that TOM ATKINS has ever starred in and an unmitigated holiday classic for all eternity. Nice job catching up dum-dums!

HALLOWEEN 3 knows how great it is, but it's not stuck up like some other sequels (get over yourselves TROLL 2 and LEPRECHAUN 4: IN SPACE!) The reason it works as well as it does may be because it is respectful enough to honor many of the holiday classics that came before it, particularly the untouchable RANKIN AND BASS cannon. Hear me now and believe me never, I've compiled the evidence and I almost know what I'm talking about. Below are some instances of suspicious overlapping that will make even the most credulous among you go hmmm, like you're at a C+C MUSIC FACTORY concert…

EVIL OLD BASTARDS!
Be it Conal Cochran or Burgermeister Meisterburger, one thing's for sure, old rich white dudes with nothing but time on their hands want to rain on your parade. These guys hate holidays of all kinds because they promote joy and laziness amongst the masses.

SUFFER THE CHILDREN!
Our world's innocent children are always the targets in these nefarious schemes! I'm not sure what is worse, taking a child's toy away from them or making their head explode into a seething mass of snakes and vermin by way of vague witchery that incorporates Halloween masks, television signals and stone shavings from Stonehenge, but both sound like they would be about as appealing to a kid as a McDonald's Salad Shaker.

CAPITALSM: A LOVE STORY
Putting aside children's general unhappiness and/or mass annihilation, just think of what the absence of holidays would do to our struggling economy! Granted if Cochran's plan were to come to pass, insecticides and snake trap sales would go through the roof, but only at the expense of the bankruptcy of Ferra Pan.

TOWNSPEOPLE ARE PARANOID AND NOSY!
In some cases they are fearful of strangers wearing bright red outfits and in other cases they are rightfully curious about what's going on in that motel room between that old guy and that young chippy that could be his daughter.

NEVER TOO BUSY FOR HITTIN' BOOTS
Everyone with awe inspiring facial hair knows that when the going gets tough, the tough get busy and by busy I mean, (insert gross sexual euphemism of your choice here) wink-wink, nudge-nudge or as the audience on FAMILY MATTERS says "Woooooooooo!"

CLOCKWORK MINIONS!
With the possible exceptions of Hitler and RACHAEL RAY, most obvious embodiments of evil have a hard time finding gullible yes men to do their bidding. Enter robots; robots do what you tell them to do and you never have to thank them or worry about unionization.

THE HERO IS CAPTURED!
Well, at least one of these guys gets to watch the original HALLOWEEN during entrapment.

EVIL HEADGEAR
A talking Easter bonnet or a booby-trapped Halloween mask; who's to say which is more foul and diabolical?

BRAIN NUMBING TUNES!
What better way to get an audience to remember you than cramming a torturously repetitive song into their heads?

STILL NOT CONVINCED?
Neither am I, so here's a shot of Mrs. Claus with her face blasted by a laser beam and a bug crawling out of her mouth!

Traumafessions :: Reader KtBear on Disney World's The Haunted Mansion

Posted on By aunt john

First of all, love your site! I've showed it to all my friends, and most of them couldn't get past the first page, they were so scared! I've scoured almost 30 pages of this here web site, and haven't seen one mention of Disney World's The Haunted Mansion!

I remember when I just a wee child of probably about six my parents took me to Walt's Florida escape, and they thought I was finally old enough to enjoy The Haunted Mansion. I was a little freaked out even going through the queue, but I managed to make it to the little room, which gave you the prologue to the actual ride. I was O.K. until the pictures in the room started moving and stretching to reveal some very horrifying images to a 6 year old!

I flipped out, and demanded my parents take me OUT of this ride immediately! Thankfully, there IS an emergency exit in this room, and I was escorted to safety.

Also, I never learned, until years later, what happens at the end of the picture stretching…the awful (and traumatizing) image of a man hanging himself right above you! Twenty-two years later, I'm not terrified anymore, but I still do feel a little uneasy in that little room. I hope I'm not the only one who spent years having nightmares because of WALT freakin' DISNEY!

AUNT JOHN SEZ: Thanks for writing in KtBear! Although I have yet to physically step foot in any of the fine family theme parks owned by the Disney Corporation (I am more of a low-rent, Wildwood, NJ boardwalk kind of boy who's going to take this opportunity to give a shout out to the now defunct Whacky Shack!), I have always been intrigued by The Haunted Mansion attraction.

I have spent countless hours lurking on DoomBuggies, drooled over the LP posted by Brother Bill at THE HAUNTED CLOSET, and most recently discovered the awesome design work of KEVIN KIDNEY. I reckon this all to say that if I were to have a bucket list of places I need to see before going to that malt shop in the sky, visiting The Haunted Mansion would be on there somewhere right above Dollywood, and maybe slightly below the Moscow Cat Museum.

Regarding trauma delivered at the hands of WALT DISNEY, you are definitely not alone! Just ask Lene, Carol, Jillcs, Vicar of VHS, me, and anyone else I might have overlooked (my apologies, in advance, to anyone who might fall into this neglected category).

Kinder-link: The Haunted Closet

Posted on By unkle lancifer

It's a well documented fact that yours ghouly worships the goings on at THE HAUNTED CLOSET. In case you need a new reason for me to be so smitten, check out the a recent post that has vintage Halloween costumes pouring out of that very closet. As per usual, my big dilemma is choosing between sirs Grizzly Adams and Chewwy. Check out lots more groovy threads HERE.

Name That Trauma :: Reader Errico on a Vacuum-Mouthed Monster

Posted on By aunt john

Hello, first of all let me say that your website is a cracker! I love it! Made me remember so many good ol' scares.

I have one myself but I cannot, for the life of me, remember the title, nor I can find it with generic searches on Google. It was a sci-fi B-movie, early ‘90s with an alien or some sort of bio-mechanic monster that looked like a vacuum cleaner with a trunk which could suck a bird out of its cage (a scene which was in the film) or a person's internal organs via his mouth. I know it sounds like a mad plot, but it was one of those crappy titles that can only scare you as a very young child.

If you could help remind me of which film it could have been, I'll be extremely glad, and I'll be able to write a new entry for your website. All I remember is that this monster was going around a house, while a geeky kid and his family were hiding from it in a closet. The monster in the meantime ate (or "sucked") stuff out of the fridge, the bird from its cage and I believe someone who entered the house at the wrong moment.

Thanks again,

Errico

AUNT JOHN SEZ: NAME THAT TRAUMA SOLVED! After initially writing in, Errico followed up with the answer:

OH MY GOD I FOUND IT!!!

It's actually not a film, but from a T.V. series.

TALES OF THE DARK SIDE, the episode is called "Hush!" It would be great to be able to watch it again. No idea how I could find it.

This is the description (I wonder if it would be still scary to watch nowadays):

Season 4, Ep 18: "Hush"

A babysitter is called in to take care of a sick boy. As a game, the two make up a pretend creature out of household parts, one that eats sounds. The creature comes to life, sucking the sound and the life out of everything in the house. The two try to evade it, but the boy's uncontrollable coughing gives him away. The creature then becomes sensitive enough to the girl's heartbeat to find and kill her too, then goes out into the world for more "food."

Zombieland

Posted on By unkle lancifer

Put on your shoes now and go see ZOMBIELAND. I'm not kidding, just stop reading this and go… leave! I'm not kidding Elizabeth…Shoo! ZOMBIELAND is ten tons of awesome, laugh out loud funny and the best road movie of the ….well since GEENA DAVIS humped BRAD PITT! You can probably tell from the film's trailer that there is plenty of splatterific yumminess to be enjoyed, but even though it delivers on that level ZOMBIELAND delivers so much more. In fact, if you must know the whole zombie thing, as well done and gratifying as it is, has little to do with why my heart is all a tingle for this movie; the characters and their interactions are gold. Even if the world had not gone to hell in an undead hand basket, I would love to watch a movie about these folks just hanging out and shooting the breeze.

WOODY HARRELSON has finally justified my love. I always dug his, "Do I have a harelip?" mug but this is easily his best performance since (another great road movie) NATURAL BORN KILLERS. JESSE EISENBERG, who just finished getting on my nerves in ADVENTURELAND, has now actually found a role that suits his persnickety jitter-boy persona to a tea and makes ya' seriously route for the guy. EMMA STONE, the smokey voiced hottie from SUPERBAD, makes me wish I was young and straight again and ABIGAIL BRESLIN, who I'm still a bit dubious of, at least cracked me the hell up with a throw away line where she tries to explain what the deal is with HANNAH MONTANA.

Go for the action, the gore and the laughs, but stay to bask in the love. This movie has such a Zen handle on what's important in life, our relationships to one another and the smaller things like Twinkies, rollercoasters and all things GHOSTBUSTERS (Oh man, I wanna tell ya about something SO GREAT in this movie, but I'd rather die then ruin the surprise) that to see it in a crowded theater may just renew your faith in humanity. My experience was so damn rejuvenating that I wanted to just hand out my email to everyone else in the theater that saw it with me and promise to keep in touch.

Ya know what? We already live in ZOMBIELAND folks and hopefully we all know two or three people that we can count on in a crisis and share some good times with. This movie is so much more than splat-falls; it understands the joyride aspect of the zombie film, the fact that part of the appeal is dancing on our culture's grave. Call me a romantic, but if every other guy on the planet has to drop dead for the nerd to get the cool chick, I can only say "Awwww!"

Most of all though, ZOMBIELAND is fun with a capital "Z", so why are you still reading this? Go'on and get!

Kindertrauma Funhouse with Halloween & Trick 'R Treat!

Posted on By unkle lancifer

Below are ten images, one from each of the ten HALLOWEEN films. Can you figure out which image is from which film? Leave your guesses in the comments section. If you don't know guess because today ANYBODY can win! To help out our readers in different time zones, we're going to wait until 6pm tonight (E.S.T.) to award a prize to a randomly chosen commenter! So guess, don't guess, leave your name, whatever… just make sure you leave a comment! The prize today is a doozey. One of you shall be the proud owner of the comic adaption of my favorite new flick TRICK 'R TREAT! Good luck to all!!

Traumafessions :: Reader Propagatrix on a Thief in the Night

Posted on By aunt john

Has anyone mentioned the horror that is the A THIEF IN THE NIGHT series of ‘70s fundamentalist Rapture movies? I don't know if these no-budget masterpieces actually converted anybody to Christianity, but they undoubtedly caused a lot of damp sheets in households with traumatized youth group members.

The LEFT BEHIND movies WISH they could be this scary.

This clip is from the third movie, IMAGE OF THE BEAST