Hiatus!

UPDATE: For all your Silver Emulsion needs, visit us at SilverEmulsion.com

Hey everybody, you’re gonna hafta get your fix elsewhere for the next couple of weeks because Uncle Jasper and I are taking a brief hiatus. We will resume normal conditions on Jan. 10, with some slight modifications to the weekly schedule. Don’t worry, you’ll still see the reviews of trash alongside “quality” films that you’ve come to expect. Uncle Jasper will be posting less frequently, but we haven’t nailed down any specifics, so that’s all the info I can give you.

In the meantime, lest you think we’re just sitting around congratulating ourselves, I’ll be finishing up a redesign and hopefully will be re-launching the website in a bigger and better format in January. Goodbye WordPress hosting, hello self-hosted! This will allow for a lot of good thing to happen, which may or may not be visible to the end-user, but if nothing else, the theme will be easier on the eyes.

If you have any suggestions, throw ’em down here and perhaps I’ll incorporate them.

Looking forward to January, I’ll be starting to go through the Puppet Master series and alongside them I’ll be looking at the slightly more mainstream Toy Story series. I also hope to get out and see some new stuff like Black Swan and True Grit during this time, so hopefully I can bring you reviews of those when we return.

So until then, have a good last couple of weeks of 2010 and we’ll see you on the other side with more reviews. Have a good one!

Weekend of Horrors Day 3

The final day of the Los Angeles Weekend of Horrors was a bit of a non-event for myself and Jasper, but there were a couple of panels we didn’t want to miss. We got in the car and braved the dangerously slick streets of Burbank, CA to see John Carl Buechler (FX artist / Director) and the Heroes and Heroines panel featuring Fred Williamson, John Saxon, Jim Kelly and others. We swooped into the auditorium as an auction of  various memorabilia pieces was going on. All throughout the weekend, each panelist would stride over to these huge banners flanking the stage and scrawl a little something on it. Apparently, people want these things! A Bruce Campbell banner went for around $400, a full hundred more than a Schechter guitar signed by virtually every attendant of the previous Weekend of Horrors event (Dario Argento, Robert Englund, etc.) The auction was exciting and intense, as the event coordinator called out for bids and the prices jumped up.

Weekend of Horrors Day 2

Saturday had a little more going for it than the previous day, both in terms of size and content. It looked more like an actual convention instead of senior’s bingo night at the Elk’s lodge. The halls were a lot more crowded and all of the freaky motherfuckers came out of the woodwork, displaying some pretty impressive amateur makeup FX skillz… Kind of awesome unless you’re in urgent need of some restroom relief while caught behind a guy in a zombie mask hauling fake body parts in a wheelbarrow down the hall at a snail’s pace.

Will and I spent most of the day checking out some very interesting panels. Greg Nicotero kicked off the day’s festivities with a look at his recent work from the upcoming Walking Dead TV series. Having read some of the books, I still had only very limited interest in the series as I’m not much of a TV watcher. After seeing a few screened clips however, I am willing to give it a shot, as Greg’s work looks pretty impressive here. AMC is obviously giving him a little more leeway than would normally be allowed for a television series in terms of gore.

Weekend of Horrors Day 1

Uncle Jasper and I attended the short opening day of the Los Angeles Weekend of Horrors yesterday afternoon. It was a good time with vendors, celebs and quality panels. The interview panel with FX artist Gabe Bartalos (Leprechaun, Frankenhooker, From Beyond, Basket Case 2) was great; revealing insights into his work and career. We were especially interested to hear him cite silicon as his preferred modelling material, saying that it provided a much more realistic flesh. Foam latex is a thing of the past, I guess.

Joe Bob Briggs’ panel was super fun. He didn’t know he was doing it until a couple of hours beforehand, so it was very off-the-cuff. He spoke of his early days as a film reviewer and how when he started reviewing the trashier side of cinema, he was one of the few torch-bearers. He took lots of questions from the audience as well.

The highlight of the day for Jasper and I though was when we both got to shake Fred Williamson’s hand. We were walking around the vendor/signing room when all of a sudden, we look up and Fred Williamson is standing there behind a table. Before we had time to compose ourselves, he reached out his hand in a show of goodwill to Uncle Jasper. A huge smile burst upon my face and before I knew it, I was shaking his hand as well. It was all such a surprise that we both found ourselves speechless. Good times.

Today is going to be more even more exciting with Greg Nicotero, Ken Foree and a Maniac Cop reunion!

Announcing the Horrific Month of October!

We LOVE horror movies here at Silver Emulsion and we’re going absolutely fuckin’ apeshit for them come October! The entire month will feature nothing but horror reviews and I’m so excited about it! I had so many movies I wanted to get in that I’m starting it off early on the final week of September. Why? On the faulty logic that that Friday is October 1st!

I’ll be doing two reviews a week from the Empire International/Full Moon catalog on Tuesdays and Fridays, and a Dario Argento movie every Wednesday.

And Uncle Jasper’s coming in on his regular Mondays and Thursdays with a bunch of horror-inspired lucha libre films!

In addition to that, we will be attending and covering the Weekend of Horrors event featuring all kinds of killer faces from the genre! We haven’t yet worked out exactly what kind of coverage this will be, so stay tuned!

The month long event culminates in the final week of October when we both set our sights on four from the Shaw Brothers horror film library! This will be like a one-week version of the Django festival from a couple of months ago. After the break, check out the schedule for this week and the films we decided on!

A Fistful of Djangos… Final Words!

Will Silver

The first true Silver Emulsion Film Festival is over and I’m experiencing both relief and sadness. It was great fun and a good challenge and we managed to pull it off. We’ll definitely be doing more of these in the future, so check back periodically for updates on that. Now that it’s all over, I wanted Jasper and I to give a brief overview of the eight films we covered, sort of a digest version, encompassing our feelings about the eight films as a whole and against one another.

Far and away and unsurprisingly, Django is the best of the bunch. It is original in its take on Kurosawa’s Yojimbo, which itself has its roots in the literary work of Dashiell Hammett. It fascinates me to think of just how many films can be made off of this relatively simple story. Corbucci sets his film apart by maintaining an artistic vision throughout, painting his canvas with sharp characters, gratuitous violence and threads of social commentary. Unlike a lot of spaghetti westerns, Django innovates and redefines what a western can be. I’m looking forward to proceeding deeper into Corbucci’s catalog and hopefully discovering some more gems.

As for the imitators, I mostly enjoyed them. I was surprised that none of the films used the coffin or a machine gun at all, which makes me think that a lot of these were simply retitled or rewritten to contain the name Django to drum up business. Honestly, I would have liked to see at least one of them dragging a coffin, but because it is such a unique idea I don’t know that any of the films could have pulled it off with any of the same panache that Franco Nero did. If I try to imagine Anthony Steffen or Ivan Rassimov dragging a coffin in their respective movies, it doesn’t even work in my head so it’s probably for the best that they didn’t go that route. Although, for comedic purposes I wouldn’t mind seeing George Eastman from Django Kills Softly, dragging around a hefty coffin, all the while sporting that jovial toothy grin of his.

Hit the break to see my ordered list of the films and Uncle Jasper’s take on it all.

Seven Facts

OK, so Dan the Man tagged me a few days ago in another of these answer some questions about yourself things. I’ve been putting this off for way too long because this isn’t really the kind of thing I enjoy doing, but in an effort to give those reading a bit of background on where I’m coming from, here’s seven wonderful facts about yours truly.

A Fistful of Djangos Schedule is unveiled!

A Fistful of Djangos is on! It’s gonna be a rip-roarin’ good time!

Note: During this Silver Emulsion film festival, my regularly scheduled Tuesday posts in the Empire International/Full Moon continuing series will be moved to Fridays.

WEEK 1:

July 5th, Monday:

DJANGO (1966)

[by Will]

.

Starting July 5th: A Fistful of Djangos!

Hey everyone, grab your cowboy hat and your gatling gun ’cause here at Silver Emulsion we’re rolling out a two-week Django extravaganza! It will run Mon-Thurs starting July 5th and will continue the following Monday July 12th.

The Django series isn’t an actual series when defined by strict definitions, but like all good Italian films from that era, it spawned a gazillion clone movies that sought to capitalize on the first film’s success. Uncle Jasper and I are going to tackle four films each, for an eight film, two-week look at this classic Spaghetti Western series. Check back soon for more details, including a schedule of the films we’re taking a look at! It’s gonna be Django-rific!

If you’re excited about it as we are, feel free to post the banner image on your site!

Movie Q & A Thing

Well, I generally don’t like these sorts of things, but what the hell. Kevin over at The Pork Chop Express linked me in this, so I will do my best.

1.  What was your first movie-going experience?

The earliest movie I can remember seeing was 1985’s Follow That Bird, the Big Bird movie. I loved it. I doubt it holds up.

2.  How many DVDs do you own?

Eh, over 100 but I’ve been trying to slim it down lately. I used to want an archive of all these movies I love, but I realize now that a core set of watchable favorites is more ideal.

3.  What is your guilty pleasure movie?

I don’t really feel guilty about the stuff I like. Not that I don’t like some trash, just that I have aged into not caring so much what others think about my tastes. That being said, I like Weekend at Bernie’s way too much. So awful, but so so good.

4.  You’ve compiled a list of your top 100 movies.  Which films didn’t make the cut?

Weekend at Bernie’s. No really, I don’t make it a habit of making lists, especially one of one-hundred films. I’d have to have a huge, months long Battle Royale tournament to decide something like that. Just off the top of my head I’ll say Lawrence of Arabia. When I see it on the big screen at some point, I’ll probably change my mind though. I feel like I haven’t really seen it until then.

5.  Which movie(s) do you compulsively watch over and over again?

The Big Lebowski, Ghostbusters, Back to the Future. I could probably watch Inglourious Basterds a lot and not get tired of it as well.

6.  Classic(s) you’re ashamed to admit you haven’t seen yet?

Um, this is a hard one as I’ve seen most of the big ones. I’ve never seen Giant. I like James Dean and it looks good, but something about it just makes me not care. One of these days.

7.  What movie posters are hanging in your room?

At the moment none. Rolled up in my storage are:

Vertigo
A Clockwork Orange
Enter the Dragon
Dawn of the Dead (signed by Tom Savini and Ken Foree)
L.A. Confidential
and probably a couple I’m forgetting.

I’ll tag JP @ J.P.’s I’m Outta Here Movie Thoughts in this because I know he hasn’t done it yet.