Monster Scholar

Greetings fellow monster maniacs, Jeanette here with the latest on what’s happening in Monster Land. School has just gotten under way here at the university which means more work for me as a teaching fellow/grad student. It also means the entire campus has been taken over zombie style by throngs of freshmen (I feel a bit like Barbara in Night of the Living Dead , are they coming to get me?). As a result, it’ll be some days until I can regain the same fast and furious posting pace I adopted over the final weeks of summer. But once I do watch out, because headed your way will be a review of Thirst (which could be the best vampire film I’ve ever seen), a piece on The Eye and it’s remake, an expository article exploring the current popularity of vampires, vampire plants, a review of the menstrual monsters in Ginger Snaps and more from the SAW series. Until then I leave you with the lovely Lorna Raver from Drag Me to Hell who appears on season 4, episode 23 of Bones as Professor Marle

Previously: Saw II: Finding a Formula Saw III has been widely acknowledged by fans as the one film in the Saw series that jumped the shark and went against the formula established Leigh Whanell and Darren Lynn Bousman in Saw II . But the success of Saw III can also be attributed to moves by Whannell and Bousman to fully inhabit their individual creative roles. Leigh Whannell did not attempt to partner with Bousman on the script, while Bousman grew in his capacity as a director. By respecting each other’s each other’s creative spaces, Whannell and Bousman were able to create a truly unique horror film. After cutting his teeth on Saw II , Bousman had become comfortable enough with the franchise to find his own style which is reflected in his use of cinematic transitions. While the transitions in Saw II were awkward and choppy, Bousman puts his own spin on the transitions of Saw III. The result is an elegant rendition of the smooth cuts Wan created in Saw I , as Bousman pans away

At long last a trailer has been released for the much anticipated Wolfman (2010) starring Benicio del Toro set to hit theaters in February of next year. I’ve already given my two cents on the Comic Con trailer that was leaked on the internet in 2008, but this brand spanking new trailer gives a sneak peek at previously unseen scenes from the film. First off, let me just say that my heart thrilled to the look of the practical effects of the wolfman. I was like a kid in a candy store as I flipped through screen captures of the creature in heavily shadowed woods, and caught a glimpse of a gnarled claw complete with razor sharp nails ready to disembowel its unsuspecting prey. As a fan of films like Val Lewton’s Cat People , I am a sucker for the subtle use of light and shadow to inspire fear of a largely unseen monster. At the end of the night, it’s what you don’t see that has you trembling under the covers long after you’ve left the dimly lit theater and its on screen nightmares. So, you

There is a new “trailer” for New Moon floating around on MTV.com . I use the term “trailer” loosely because the minute and a half vignette is more like a behind the scenes special, with a Taylor Lautner interview spliced with new scenes from the movie. Taylor claims that New Moon “is a lot more complicated than Twilight was,” but from where I’m sitting it looks like the same old emo rag we’ve been bombarded with in the first film. Bella spirals into a depression after Edward leaves her in order to keep her safe (as if that makes any sense). Jacob steps in as the friend who comforts Bella in all his shirtless and tanned glory. On that note, Jacob’s hair is having some serious continuity issues in this trailer with shots of him in long locks intermixed with his shorter do. Jacob also doesn’t miss an opportunity to go shirtless, as he offers Bella his clothing when she’s injured and does some impressive Cirque du Soleil acrobatics to catapult himself into Bella’s window. I am also ama

I will admit that while flipping through channels, I briefly stopped to watch some of the prizes given out at the Teen Choice Awards. One of them was for Best Twit (a word with connotations far surpassing the purpose of the award) to Ellen Degeneres for her entertaining twitter updates. But, I also got a glimpse of the thousands of teens and tweens the CW will be targeting with its new show The Vampire Diaries . Based on the teen novels by L.J. Smith of the same name, the network seems primed to take advantage of the success of Twilight and the teenage vampire craze. At the center of the Vampire Diaries is Elena, a popular and beautiful 17 year old Mystic Falls high school student who struggles to deal with her grief after both her parents are killed in a car wreck. The rest of cast is like a carbon copy of Gossip Girl as Elena’s brother Jeremy turns to drugs to deal with his emotions and their circle of friends quibble over everyday adolescent concerns. But everything changes when

Mountain Dew just released a commercial for their new drink, Diet Mountain Dew, featuring a psycho ferret that stalks his victims in a mask while wielding a chainsaw. This ferret obviously had two of the great horror icons, Jason and Leatherface, in mind when he put together this get up. The commercial also makes use of the kind of subjective camera work that would make slasher films like John Carpenter's Halloween so unique, as we see the ferret pursuing the frightened teen victims in the woods from his point of view. Enjoy.