Yeah, we’ll take this with a grain of salt, but for what it’s worth, they did actually say this; click on the big red link to all the details. Not trying to be negative, we’ve just seen and heard Bruce Campbell‘s reactions whenever someone brings up revisiting the role of Ash onscreen again (note: this is not his favorite question to be asked). Plus, director Fede Alverez seems extremely confident and enthusiastic, and after seeing the flick, I’d love to see something else he wrote and directed… especially a sequel to this gory roller-coaster (adult) funhouse ride.
This scene takes place BEFORE THE OPENING CREDITS, to give you an idea of how hardcore this awesome flick is.
We saw the movie tonight (well, Thursday night, 10PM) and had a fucking blast, by the way! They even gave out college-ruled notebooks, the kind we both love to jot down notes in, with an Evil Dead logo on the cover. See it with a big crowd – and we advise NOT having a snack unless you can finish it by the time the movie starts. Though, if you haven’t eaten yet and have a medium-to-strong stomach, there’s a good ten minutes+ of calm after the opening credits. The pre-title sequence contains the scene in the trailer of the young lady/Deadite being burned alive–one of the film’s very, very few non-practical shots. When the five lead characters start wondering aloud where that horrible smell inside the cabin is coming from, that’s a good time to save the rest of your snack for after the movie.
We especially recommend avoiding any snack that is warm and was alive at one point. Not to be PC, either… you’ll understand. More on our experience AND the movie later. Oh, and advise any fellow horror fans you happened to strike up a friendly conversation with to stay after the end credits! I, in fact, told everyone leaving when the credits had started they should stay. They all took me up on it except some very pale girl who looked like she was about to throw up or faint.
Yes! We are using way too many exclamation points here! There’s a Part 1 and Part 2 – Part 2 is where it gets spoiler-packed. We had to either hastily cover the screen, pause, fast-forward, especially after one character popped up and killed or mortally injured the other, completely out of the blue. We wish we hadn’t had it spoiled, because chances are high the crowd at the movie is going to go NUTS when it happens. There’s something listed as “The Mia Abomination” in the IMDB with a MAN playing her/it. Mrs. Horror Boom also saw some sort of puppet being set up and looked away.
The B-Roll footage also shows alternate/multiple takes (especially of Evil Mia peeking out of the chained-shut cellar door and doing the weeee’re gonna geeeet yoooou creepy sing-song voice from the trailer multiple times, plus saying other lines). Jane Levy is GOOD. I see now why they needed the acting talent to be young and energetic, especially the females. I sort of made fun of her for complaining about being “buried alive” (this is also shown being set up, then I skipped some spoilers from the actual scene). Now I feel bad. While she doesn’t get put through the wringer on a Bruce Campbell-level, you can tell lots of the shots were not fun and exhausting even for a healthy 23-year old actress. In a behind-the-scenes interview, she mentioned that there was one day she couldn’t stop crying (you won’t blame her after you see it, trust us) and they had to basically shut down for the day.
If you have seen the clips, trailers, and everything else officially released, the first part shouldn’t ruin anything major for you. The second, you have been warned – MAJOR spoilers, and we didn’t even watch the whole thing. Here’s Part 1:
(Screen caps to come on both parts, BTW)
Here’s the SPOILER WARNING SPOILERS WE MENTIONED EARLIER! Part 2:
Just think, there’s STILL more coming in the movie! Like, a LOT. Enjoy!
OK, because 24 hours from now we’ll have seen the gory, fun, roller-coaster ride of a flick, we somehow controlled ourselves and stopped watching half-way through the B-roll footage. You WILL be spoiled! It’s not boring, either. We’re talking chopped-up but still possessed bodies being buried, things on fire, Deadites on fire… you’ve been warned.
We also get to see the beautiful Ms. Lucas getting her missing chunk of face-makeup prosthetics applied. FUCK YEAH, PRACTICAL EFFECTS! Sorry, this is like trying to calm down and try to fall asleep when you’re a kid all hyped up on Christmas Eve.
Actually, all the female cast are beautiful. I didn’t recognize Jane Levy out of make-up at the premiere. I’m not that familiar with her work since according to her bio she was born after I graduated from high school (SIGH, but hey, we got to grow up in the 80s Horror Boom, so who’s REALLY lucky?) and we don’t watch Subpugatory (great title, though). Yeah, she looks fucking horrifying as a Deadite, but in the footage and stills of her being chased, getting more or less raped by a couple of evil trees, and the scenes of shaking with fear and whispering to her brother We… have… to… get… OUT… of… here, I still don’t know how the made the stunning, wholesome redhead look as unhealthy and exhausted as she does in the first part of the movie. See below:
Well, they do have excellent make-up talent on board.
We’ll make another post soon with some screen grabs that aren’t too spoiler-y if you don’t want to ruin anything by watching B-roll footage, etc. You probably already had this idea occur to you, but check theater listings. If you can’t wait till Friday (we sure fucking couldn’t) there seem to be a TON of Thursday showings, some starting at 10:00PM and then again at midnight. A good half-dozen theaters in our area code did!
There’s some shots in here even WE didn’t notice, they flash by so fast. Then again, there’s some you’ll recognize… but if you’re as hungry to see this as we are, you’ll want to check them all out! Click on any of the images to enlarge it.
Oh, and there’s a few from the first teaser last Fall (also a blood-bath) and the “Green Band” trailer. Only a few tasteful ones, though…
Fuck, where do we start? The guy pulling the broken-off hypodermic needle from WAY too close to his bloodshot eye, skin trying to come with it? The possessed chick with the geyser of blood flying out of her mouth and onto Olivia’s face? The chick slicing into her tongue with the box cutter? Angry molesting trees that take things to the next level? The disturbing drawings in the Necronomicon, not to mention notes saying things like “HE IS WATCHING” and what looks like “BURN BITCH“? Hell, we don’t know, all we DO know is the guy with the glasses better have a DAMN good reason for ignoring all very clear warnings (the Book of The Dead was tied closed with barbed wire and clearly bound in what looks like human flesh; two red flags that anyone with common sense would heed). Oh, and we do NOT own the copyrights to any of these screen caps, or claim any right to them. There, covered our asses, I hope. Enjoy!
Hey! Kept trying to find a You Tube version of this nasty, GORY clip (just try not to wince and grab your face/eye during two certain nasty shots) which, strangely, doesn’t require age verification. Also, it isn’t described officially as red band, but oh, IT IS. For one thing, several… events… that are cut from the “green band” trailer, but are definitely on the notoriously gruesome (and COOL-ASS) red band trailer are here in the clip.
Here’s the thing, it’s kind of spoiler-y. OK, we’ve all seen the images of Olivia cutting off a chunk of her face, I assume? Also, the short (creepy) clip of her face in a bathroom mirror (which is a nice twist on the classic–some might call it cliché, but we’re not feeling cynical tonight– horror movie reveal/jump where a character opens a mirrored medicine cabinet, calmly gets something out/puts it back, then closes it to reveal someone or something horrible is now behind her) made the rounds, and it’s also briefly in the trailer. Saw it? Well, now you can see them in context in this whole fucked-up horrifying scene. HOWEVER, you also see a great ‘splat-stick’ Raimi-esque gag, plus the context of another hideous shot from the red band trailer that involves a needle waaaaay too close to an eye socket (if you did a frame-by-frame watch of the trailer like we did*, you’ll know the bit we mean). Also, we see what appears to be the brutal death of one of the five main characters (doubt it works for long, but it is brutal), and who’s responsible. Wonder if someone’s gonna walk in and find them like that?
Cool as it is, we did get that slight feeling of regret and disgust with our own impatience that immediately follows a spoiler. Not as major as when we caved and watched the mind-blowing after-credits scene, but still. So be warned: even though we’re 99% sure it happens in the first half hour of the movie, and is only the start of all hell breaking loose in the cabin, it could be a spoiler and needs an alert. Of the sites we’ve found the scene on, most have a spoiler warning of some sort from the staff before the clip. So we offer this…
you can click on this big red link above (until we can find a way to embed the clip) to see it briefly introduced by the much-more-attractive-than-they-appear-in-the-movie cast and watch the clip and get semi-spoiled, or you can also check out the gallery below of screen grabs of the clip instead… we caught all the shots showing off the blood-curdling, gruesome practical effects in it. We mixed up the order things happen in, too. Up to you! Click to enlarge any of the stills. EEK!
Also, there’s some other neat new official content if you do click on the link (you can skip the trailer, up to you). Besides, we couldn’t miss a chance to support Famous Monsters!
FAMOUS MONSTERS OF FILMLAND (words and distinctive lettering design) is a registered trademark of Philip Kim, 2011.
SPARTACUS IS A HISTORICAL PORTRAYAL OF ANCIENT ROMAN SOCIETY THAT CONTAINS GRAPHIC VIOLENCE and adult content. Viewer Discretion is advised.
The above disclaimer (or attention-magnet) is shown along with the usual MA – LSV rating before each episode of Spartacus on Starz. Fans don’t just watch the show for the blood, sex, guts, and sex, but also for the well-written characters and their story arcs, as well as plot twists and reveals that have stunned even some of the more cynical reviewers.
What’s an article on Starz‘s epic series Spartacus doing up on here? Well, it’s in the new issue of Fangoria, for one (even though they didn’t focus on the gore, sadly), and every episode has been brought to you by (among others) Raimi/Tapert/Donen Productions. Yeah, THAT Raimi. Some gladiators look like actual monsters; some characters are beautiful outside and monsters inside.
Just another day at the office for the House of Batiatus…
I’ve tried to keep these vague as far as characters involved, but several of these could be considered spoilers. If you plan on watching Spartacus: Gods of the Arena (prequel 6-episode miniseries) Spartacus: Blood and Sand (Season One) and Spartacus: Vengeance (Season 2) and want to go in completely 100% clean, maybe you should just skim it.*
If you’re considering watching the show but are unsure if it might be too graphic, violent, and disturbing for you, then this is a great way to find out what you’re in for. Hint: if you’re worried it might be too sick for your personal tastes, there’s a 99% chance you are, in fact, correct.
These aren’t the most fucked-up things, or all the fucked-up things, they’re just some memorable highlights. I’m not kidding, this list almost wrote itself, I sure didn’t need to stretch to think of ten bloodcurdling events. If I included every messed-up thing that happened, the list would easily go into triple-digits (and there’s still one season left as of this writing).
1. An especially disgusting character gets interrupted while raping a screaming female slave. When he stands up and faces away from her to turn and confront the interlopers, the woman grabs his sword and rams it all the way up his ass with such force that the tip pokes through his stomach from before she yanks it back out. So there.
2. Soon after, a male character gets information out of that pig by pulling some of his guts out of the aforementioned wound (with his bare hands) and promising him a fast death if he tells him what he wants to know right away (it works).
3. A gladiator kills his opponent by shoving a spear through his opponent’s mouth, out the side of his face, then twisting it until the man’s jaw is literally hanging by a few threads (shown in slow motion, with shots of even the most jaded spectators looking horrified). Extra points to the make-up/FX team for using prosthetics.
4. In one of the most disturbing scenes of the entire goddamned series (which is saying quite a bit), a noblewoman snaps, attacking her (former) friend, and kills her in an enraged frenzy by savagely smashing her skull down against the marble floor countless times. She literally bashes her head in, we’re talking bits of skull and brain within a radius of at least a yard, her eyeball is popped out of the socket, her face caves in, blood everywhere, before someone can intervene and pull her away.
5 .Two gladiators are brought out to fight a giant fat rival gladiator (who may remind viewers a little of Ancient Rome’s Tor Johnson). They win by working as a team, wrapping a chain around his neck and then using all their combined weight to pull the chain from opposite sides until the fat gladiator’s head pops off like a champagne cork.
6. In an underground fighting area, simple referred to as “The Pit”, unofficial fights to the death take place. Fighting dirty is encouraged, bets are placed, and the crowd mostly consists of criminals, compulsive gamblers, etc. Many dead bodies get dragged up and hung upside-down on meat-hooks. One ‘champion’ celebrates every victory by slicing off the skin of his dead of opponent’s faces and wearing it on his own. He doesn’t bother fashioning it into a mask like Leatherface does, he just slices ‘em off with a hooked blade and then slaps that shit right on his face.The skinned faces look really horrifying, and brought the gore-extravaganza also known as the 2010 Piranha* remake to mind for me. Check it out below (sorry, I couldn’t find one without the editorial comments stuck in the action):
7. A noblewoman decides to “sponsor” a new gladiator-in-training and picks the one whose main character trait is that he’s more well-endowed than Dirk Diggler from Boogie Nights. They must have used a prosthetic, otherwise the actor playing him would have been a porn superstar and made enough to retire by now. Later, after he betrays someone, his endowment in chopped off (we don’t see that part, but we see his bloody junk in the sand) then they crucify him in the training square, we see the wound bleeding down his legs (it’ll look familiar if you’ve seen the Italian cannibal flick Make Them Die Slowly )
8. At a party of the city’s richest and most important men and their wives, a captured fighter in the slave rebellion is unlucky enough to be picked to be hog-tied and hung up from the ceiling like a human piñata . Instead of getting hit with sticks, though, people draw numbers to determine which guest gets to step right up to cut off a piece of him first. If that’s not fucked-up enough…
9. This gets worse as the guest who gets first, er, stab at him cuts out his tongue with a sword. Either the sword is about as sharp as a butter knife or the guy who did it was really, really bad with his weapon, as the poor rebel’s tongue is not so much cut out as slowly sawed off. The host jovially tells the second guest not to cut too deeply, “to not deprive others of their turn”. Again, the wealthy party guests (plenty are politicians, with their wives) are drawing numbers out of a goddamned bowl so everyone gets a turn. At one point, you can see a line of smiling guests forming. People eat snacks, chat happily, etc. while watching and waiting for their turn.
10. A man’s face is suddenly chopped off during a fight with an uppercut of a sword starting under his jaw (possibly the most shockingly gory thing I’ve seen in the history of the series, which is no small feat). One second it’s there, the next second CHOP. Not just his face gets liberated from his head, but the whole front of his skull. As he falls forward, dead, his brain slowly slides out of his brain-pan like a gory loaf of bread . Think I’m exagerrating?
Even two of the toughest, most seen-and done-it-all former gladiators who see it are visibly stunned …as you can see if you have the stomach to watch the actual clip below:
The final season of Spartacus, titled Spartacus: War of The Damned premieres tonight, January 25th, on Starz. Find out more here – including the fact that the premiere is online, streaming, for free …now!
The term “blood bath” on Spartacus is often literal.
*Though I am putting a more spoiler-y version later (don’t worry, you will be warned well in advance if you want to avoid spoilers)
**Mainly brought to you by the genius of Greg Nicotero, in some of the best work I’ve ever seen from him and Nicotero-Berger. I still cannot believe that movie got away with an R-Rating, but that’s a piece for another time.
Dedication: This piece goes out to Pete, Cindy, Norm, and all my other friends at Get Glue who asked me to tell them when I wrote it–thanks, you guys. Seriously.
HORROR BOOM 