vintage

Special effects may be lacking, but vintage horror films still manage to keep our palms sweating and blood pumping; a look back at retro horror films, stories, books and characters that prove everything is scarier in black and white.

The History Behind Haunted Mirrors and Other Superstitions
So why, exactly, do mirrors—and especially antique ones—have such a twisted reputation? Well, there are a few reasons. Curious, I went digging to learn more about the cultural, mythological, and historical customs around mirrors. Plus, obviously, I needed to know if this had any bearing on decorating with antique mirrors—is that basically inviting evil spirits into my house? Maybe you're just superstitious. Or curious, like me, about all things haunted. Or perhaps it's that you have a burning need to know what the folkloric origins of cursed mirrors tells us about our values and fears as a society. Either way, you'll want to read this before picking up that charmingly lived-in-looking mirror innocently propped up on the sidewalk or peeking out of a dumpster just in case it turns your lovely home into a haunted one.
By sunil kumar5 years ago in Horror
Madame, Please
"Yes, I realize the Marquis de Sade is the fetus aborted by God."--Yukio Mishima, Madame de Sade (1965) Madame de Sade is a play by Yukio Mishima, a Japanese playwright of no small repute. Mishima is a legendary character, a man who, before committing ritual suicide during an armed assault on a Japanese military installation, in which he took the commandant hostage, forged a brilliant and shining pathway (what we in the West call a "career") as an author and poet, an actor, model, political philosopher, filmmaker, mystic and universally hailed genius. His shining brilliance is offset by his radical politics, which were fanatically nationalistic, opposed to Western decadence, bourgeois capitalism as well as communism, and the erosion of what he considered traditionally and purely Japanese, fearing that his nation would devolve into a "rootless people."
By Tom Baker5 years ago in Horror
The Children Who Played at Being Butchers
Once upon a time, there were two children, Hans and Grans, who watched their big strong Papa go to his chores in the field.
By Tom Baker5 years ago in Horror
The Donkey Lane Incident
The year is 1968 and although Kate and her friend were knee high to grasshoppers .. They had the freedom that today’s kids could only dream about.. todays kids would never ever be able grasp that Kate and her friend Marianne were walking down a very remote track on their own. Their parents did not know precisely where they were. No one thought anything of it back then. Kids knew how to safely cross a road, people were assumed to be trustworthy... so long as they were back by teatime and before it got dark.....what harm could possibly befall them?
By Gillian Lesley Scott5 years ago in Horror
To the Monster a Mate!
I first saw the Bride of Frankenstein as a child, on a black-and-white tube television set while living on a military base in a foreign country. I don't know if it was Halloween time or not (I don't now remember), but the Armed Forces Radio and Television Station (A.F.R.A.T.S. is the acronym. Of course, those letters can be rearranged to make a much more humorous acronym) sure as hell wasn't going to spring for the rights to play any horror flick that wasn't fifty years old; or one that might, just might I say, contain some sort of subversive content. Of course, Bride of Frankenstein does contain subversive content, but the Army broadcasters, as well as the audiences of the period, never even realized it.
By Tom Baker5 years ago in Horror
The Alphabet
"Language is a virus from outer space."--William S. Burroughs Fear of communication is endemic; do we chiefly fear that, somehow, if we define a thing, we take power away from ourselves? Until we label something, flesh it out with the constraints of our intellectual rigor, does it exist, really, as anything more than an inscrutable abstraction, a dream-like possibility perched forever on the edge of our awareness? The term "alphabet," which comes from the Greek "alphabetos" merely suggests a series of symbols that can be put together to formulate words; words become sentences, obviously.
By Tom Baker5 years ago in Horror
The Mole
My father was a plain man. His wardrobe only contained the same sets of starched shirts and stiff suits he wore to “work”; his only distinguishing physical features were his dull storm-blue eyes, a rare trait that he did not pass to me, and a small, star-shaped birthmark just below his left eye.
By Baapooh Chung5 years ago in Horror
The Summer My Cousin Died. Top Story - March 2021.
The following contains graphic depictions of a violent crime, and may trigger some readers. He was missing for three days and the police never looked for him. It’s hard to know, so many years later, if the police in Philadelphia routinely didn’t look too hard for missing children living in a homeless shelter. Christopher’s fault was that he liked to trade baseball cards, and at the age of 12 still had a friendly, trusting nature. Baseball had a dark underbelly in its trading cards.
By joy ellen sauter5 years ago in Horror
Fire Exit
He didn’t remember paying the cabbie, or getting into the cab, and he certainly didn’t remember giving any instruction to take him to an ornate private members’ club in the heart of Chelsea. It was raining when he alighted, however, and he had no choice but to walk hastily and neatly inside, stepping through swinging gold doors and nodding in greeting at the austere doorman stood serene and sentinel, his epaulettes gleaming and his moustache shining almost as much. Barclay touched a hand almost self-consciously to his own – it had taken him months to achieve a satisfactory waxed effect, and he was sure his valet had been sniggering behind his back about the supreme efforts it had necessitated.
By Chloe de Lullington5 years ago in Horror
A Filmmaker's Review: "The Invisible Man" (1933)
I think we can all agree that Claude Rains is an incredible actor with buckets full of talent. For a man of his era, he was extremely forward in the world of acting - it was no longer that Vaudevillian stuff but instead, Rains went for a more realistic approach based in the novel's actual character rather than someone who was made more for theatre than film. A film made in the era of the Hayes' Code meant that the punishment of the 'bad guy' was necessary to its release and was done pretty well to be honest. A clever and subtle ending done through atmosphere made for perfect tension. The story stayed in sufficiency, close to the story put forward by HG Wells.
By Annie Kapur5 years ago in Horror
MANOS
In 1966 an El Paso fertilizer salesman by the name of Hal Warren decided to make a feature film. after raising $19,000 (approximately $125,000 in 2020 money) Hal wrote a script, got a cast, acquired props, found filming locations, and a soundless, wind-up camera & film! Hollywood was within his grasp.
By Tony Trombo5 years ago in Horror
Haunted doll that is creepier than Annabelle
A Haunted doll? In 2014, I found a cloth rag doll at a thrift store one evening and decided to give it to my 3-year-old granddaughter, Jayla. The doll was in fair condition and had a few faded spots. She was wearing a long dress that looked like something out of the Antebellum era, and I visualized a little girl running through the yard playing with her.
By Cheryl E Preston5 years ago in Horror