Episodes
Wednesday Sep 23, 2020
IDMB Episode 206 - The Prophecy
Wednesday Sep 23, 2020
Wednesday Sep 23, 2020
The Prophecy has a really cool premise - angels seeking an edge over other angels to win the second war in Heaven! - and some enjoyable campy performances, but is a badly disjointed film (whether that's because of its first-time director or meddling from the Weinsteins is something maybe only God knows).
Tuesday Sep 15, 2020
IDMB Episode 205 - Frailty
Tuesday Sep 15, 2020
Tuesday Sep 15, 2020
Unlike some films (here's looking at you, The Usual Suspects), Frailty holds up very well on a second viewing, probably because there's more to it than just the twist, like the honest depiction of emotional abuse and the culmination of the film's cynical journey towards its gut punch reveal.
Wednesday Sep 09, 2020
IDMB Episode 204 - The Exorcist
Wednesday Sep 09, 2020
Wednesday Sep 09, 2020
Almost 50 years after its release, why is The Exorcist such an enduring, powerful horror film? I am obviously the first to ever ask this question about this cinematic classic, so allow me to answer: the time it takes to layout what's at stake and Owen Roizman's objective, documentary approach to the cinematography.
Wednesday Sep 02, 2020
IDMB Episode 203 - Introduction to Religious Horror Films (featuring Spooky Doings)
Wednesday Sep 02, 2020
Wednesday Sep 02, 2020
Chelsea Bennington and Rick Guzman, who started the Spooky Doings improv group that in turn inspired the titular podcast, join I Do Movies Badly to talk about the advent of their horror-themed improv comedy, how their religious upbringings have influenced their moviegoing, and share some religious horror films to watch.
Full disclosure: the recommendations are based around Judeo-Christian themes and iconography. This approach was not taken to be dismissive of or discriminatory against other religions, but because it happens to be the formative religion for all of them: Rick (a devout atheist raised Catholic), Chelsea (spiritual, but not religious), and Jim (devout Christian).
Recommendations: William Friedkin's The Exorcist (1973), Frailty (2001), and The Prophecy (1995).
Keep up with Spooky Doings on Facebook
Listen to the Spooky Doings Podcast (specifically, if so interested, Jim's guest episode talking about Bram Stoker's Dracula)
Thursday Aug 27, 2020
IDMB Episode 202 - Near Dark
Thursday Aug 27, 2020
Thursday Aug 27, 2020
The journey for the perfect metaphor ends with Near Dark, a wonderfully directed film that subverts the expectations of the Western genre, but that also signals that the "Others" are vile, bloodthirsty creatures whose influence can only be overcome by blood transfusion.
Read the summary of the essay, "Vampires, Indians, and the Queer Fantastic: Kathryn Bigelow's Near Dark" from The Glorious and the Grotesque
Tuesday Aug 18, 2020
IDMB Episode 201 - The Lost Boys
Tuesday Aug 18, 2020
Tuesday Aug 18, 2020
When Joel Schumacher took over directing The Lost Boys, he made some big changes to the initial idea including making the vampires older, making them sexier, and, by extension, making our heteronormative, boring suburban family protagonists the "others."
Read Alcy Leyva's "30 Years Ago, The Lost Boys Introduced Me to Queer Cinema."
Wednesday Aug 12, 2020
IDMB Episode 200 - Fright Night (1985)
Wednesday Aug 12, 2020
Wednesday Aug 12, 2020
Happy 200th Episode to and from I Do Movies Badly! But enough mushy stuff - let's talk about the original Fright Night, a film that seems to be find its queer coded vampire character infinitely more fascinating than the other characters, but one that also casts him as a corrupter of youth and a sexual deviant. Or maybe that's just the POV of its main character, who hates the feelings that his next door neighbor has awoken in him...
Tuesday Aug 04, 2020
Tuesday Aug 04, 2020
Terry Mesnard of Gayly Dreadful brings some new blood (pardon the pun) to I Do Movies Badly to discuss films of the Queer Vampire Cycle. Terry talks about how his love for horror started with A Nightmare on Elm Street and its drag villain, explores how queer coded characters emerged out of a film industry and American society that didn't want to acknowledge homosexuality, and wades in on whether a director's intent matters as much as audience interpretation (SPOILERS: it does not). No matter what the directors may or may not have intended, Terry explores the queer subtext of the following three films: Tom Holland's Fright Night (1985), Joel Schumacher's The Lost Boys (1987), and Kathryn Bigelow's Near Dark (1987).
Follow Terry on Twitter @gaylydreadful
Check out his podcast, Scarred for Life
And follow it on Twitter as well @ScarredPodcast
Tuesday Jul 28, 2020
IDMB Episode 198 - Class of 1984
Tuesday Jul 28, 2020
Tuesday Jul 28, 2020
Did Mark L. Lester, the man behind Commando, intend us to take Class of 1984 to be a satire of the overblown panic about violence in schools or a gravely serious warning about what he deemed an apathetic, dangerous next generation? Either way, it's an abject failure even if it does typify Canuxploitation. (Also, he definitely intended us to take it seriously)
Tuesday Jul 21, 2020
IDMB Episode 197 - My Bloody Valentine (1981)
Tuesday Jul 21, 2020
Tuesday Jul 21, 2020
There does seem at first to be something clever and subversive about setting a slasher film on Valentine's Day...until you remember that Valentine's Day is a Hallmark holiday and My Bloody Valentine bungles the execution of what could have been an interesting mystery.