​Joe R. Lansdale's The Nightrunners  is a modern classic that still packs a punch almost forty years after its initial release.  It's a nasty cross-genre novel, part crime spree and part horror, in which the author first created his infamous God of the Razor.   It's a full-throttle blast of blood and mayhem.  It's also damn good, fast storytelling.   Not for the faint of heart or the squeamish, but a real treat for hardcore fans.  It amazes me that no one in Hollywood has taken a bite of the apple over the years—but then, maybe they’re scared of the razor inside.
 

Recently in the basement, I’ve been watching movies that show up on people’s most shocking/disturbing lists lately, hoping to find something challenging. 

Here, alas, is another one that just doesn’t cut it.  Gerald Kargl’s Angst  (1983) is not as interesting as he seems to fancy it is.  It would be better if Kargl had been brave enough to jettison the annoying voiceover narration and just let the visual carry the portrait (a la, say, Polanski’s Repulsion).  The narration is dull and intrusive, and the movie quickly becomes overly talky although it has virtually no dialogue.  If you can’t trust your audience to “get it,” then why make the movie?   The silly yapping does little to illuminate the character and fails to give us any “deep” appreciation of his motives. 
​
Even worse, the pacing sucks.  For such a short movie (86 minutes) it has a lot of what feels like filler, and I was left feeling this was a thirty-minute short dressed  in a ridiculous full-movie costume.  Crane shots like bad music videos.  Lots of extended sequences of running and walking.   Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay  too much dragging around of already dead bodies, step by fucking annoying, drawn-out, tiresome step.  In the end, it is saddled with a “shocking climax” that does not shock and is hardly climactic.  There are some legitimately unnerving moments, and  Erwin Leder’s performance is strong, but these are not nearly enough to carry the whole.   

Dude's name is Easton Hawk.  He's from Illinois and if you don't know his work, you should.  Came across his stuff at a convention last year.  Check him out on Instagram.  

Dynamite band from Boston.  Never as big as they deserved to be . . .  

Henry Portrait of a Serial Killer, Part 2 has a lot of issues: poor script, shitty pace, wooden acting, dull plotting.   Then again, is it really all that?   Or is it just casting?  The first installment of the series was so good that it’s hard for me to be objective about what’s wrong here.  The plain truth is that no one on screen here is a fraction as  compelling as Michael Rooker’s demented Henry, or Tracy Arnold’s damaged Becky, or Tom Towles’s disturbed Otis.   It’s hard for me to gauge whether part two is really that bad or if it’s just not that good.  Maybe it’s my disappointment talking, right?  One thing’s for sure—despite this movie’s unflinching willingness to stare into the flat, dead eyes of senseless violence, it doesn’t hold a candle to the original.   It lacks the sense of a world drenched in ancient poverty and penetrated by the stench of hopelessness that made the first movie so believable and painful.  Somehow, amid all the grit and grunge, the first movie made you care about what happened to Becky, and maybe even to Otis and Henry, too.  Quite an accomplishment when you think about it—and something part two doesn’t come close to pulling off.  

James Ellroy  The Hilliker Curse 
 
Ellroy is a good crime novelist.  I especially liked the LA Quartet back in the day.   The bio My Dark Places was ok, too.  But another book about himself?  Most of what is good here was already discussed in the earlier book.  Really, someone needs to tell him that his own life is not all that interesting.  Shaddup already and go write a novel.   

the ​last house on the left (1972)
the Texas chain saw massacre (1974)
i spit on your grave (1978)
cannibal holocaust (1980)
henry: portrait of a serial killer (1986)

Came across this the other day...

Hand-sewn book.  Stained paper, linen thread, leather backstrap and cord.  Don’t recall when I made it.  A long time ago now, several years.  Never been written in.  Maybe some day.  

Here's a favorite from the book shelf... 

​Greg F. Gifune has written some mean shit here.

For horror fans familiar with his work, that’s not a surprise. If you aren’t familiar with his work, you should be.

God Machine is a grim journey through a disturbing world full of darkness and uncertainties. The novel tells the story of Chris Tallo, a former cop turned hotel security guard who becomes obsessed with the suicide of one of the hotel’s guests. Is it the unusual brutality of the young woman’s death that draws him? Or is it that she reminds him of his own daughter, killed five years earlier while serving in Iraq? Or is there some other, more elusive force tying Chris to the girl’s death?

The book does not provide easy answers to these questions, nor does Gifune shrink from examining the heavy toll that grief, loss, pain, and violence take on Tallo’s life. From what I’ve been able to determine over the years, Gifune doesn’t shrink from much of anything. He looks evil in the face, then pulls it close so he can smell its breath. It isn’t pretty, but it makes for a dynamite read, both chilling and thought-provoking.

From the beginning, it’s clear Tallo’s life has been in a downward spiral since his daughter’s death. His career is on the skids, therapy hasn't helped, and his relationship with his wife isn't, understandably, the same. At times, the only thing that seems offer any comfort--other than the bottle--is the unconditional love of the family dog. He discovers the dead woman had been involved with a cult determined to recreate a nineteenth-century ritual to designed bring God--or some other, darker, entity--to earth. Unfortunately, her death did not put an end to their plans.

A lot of the book’s horror comes from Gifune’s knack for tying the known and unknown together in knots. Alone in his home, Tallo knows something is there in the dark watching him but does not know what it is or why it has come. At times, the book feels like a surreal nightmare where levels of (un)reality intertwine and time frames shift unexpectedly. Tallo is an alcoholic who climbs further into the bottle the worse things get; he is, obviously, an unreliable narrator. But it’s more than that: reality itself becomes a contested concept. Drunken dream states are spiked with what may be memories, or hallucinations, or visions. Tallo cannot—and Gifune, thankfully, does not—try to sum up what’s what. In these extreme circumstances, life is mysterious and inexplicable. It’s notable that, in the end, the effort to explain events and shape them into an easily-digested narrative is made by government agents bent on concealing the truth. Beware of easy answers.

That preceding description may make the novel sound like a meandering acid trip. It’s not. Tallo’s subjective experience creates dissonance and layers of uncertainty, but Gifune’s plot keeps rolling full force. I think it’s his ability to dive deep into the unknowable while keeping one foot firmly rooted in his crime-writing experience that makes Gifune such a powerful horror writer: you get the nightmares, but you also get tight plotting and solid action. God Machine certainly does not disappoint in this regard. It all comes to a bang-up climax, complete with a hand-to-hand combat sequence that might make John Skipp himself a bit jealous.

How does it all end? Read it and find out.

I've shared Devin Renshaw's work here before, but it's worth sharing again.  This little horror/sci-fi woodblock print beauty is only a sample of the fun and interesting stuff he does.  I have a good bit of it in the basement and will probably add more in the future.  You can check his stuff out at his online store!