Hitch-Hike 1977

This here is a movie I've only seen maybe twice, and that was about a decade ago. I bought the Blue Underground dvd back when they were on top of the horror world, but I hardly had an opinion of it back then. In watching it again after all these years, I'm really enjoying it. This is one entertaining Italian exploitaiton movie.

So over in the Spaghetti west, Franco Nero plays a man with a hot wife that he hates. He's a drunken asshole and they bicker all the time. He's even thought of killing her, but the two will go through the motions of holy matrimony even if they're unhappy with their marriage. That is, until David Hess arrives, and anybody who knows the Hess knows that he's up to no good!

Hess is great to watch. He may have been typecast, but it wasn't for no reason. He's even rather likeable, trying to weasel out a book deal with our disgruntled protagonist, and for a good story, he needs to make it with the wife, which puts a damper on everything for the trio of fugitive and accomplices.

One thing I like about this movie is the score. It's a stand out, almost Carpenter-esque in how simple and charming it can be. Coupled with a good story arc, plenty of changes, charismatic performances, and a good immoral ending, Hitch-Hike is some damn fine Italian cinema.

TV Challenge Results 

Congratulations @zombiecpa! You are the winner of the TV Challenge. Thanks to everyone who participated. It was a fun challenge.

Zombie-509
Ballz-334
Snowy-304
Triggerhappy-154
Box-140
Markus-43

TV Challenge 2020

Okay TrashEpians! February we are trying something new. This month we are focusing entirely on TV, any genre, any show counts! Mark your spots below! Here are the rules:


1.) 1 point for an episode with a running time of up to 30 minutes.

2.) 2 points for an episode with a running time of MORE than 30 minutes.

3.) 3 points for an episode with a running time of MORE than 60 minutes.

4.) If you finish a season in its entirety, you get bonus points. Take the total number of episodes for the season and add that to your total for the final episode of the season.

5.) If you finish a show in its entirety, you also get bonus points. Take the total numbers of seasons for the show and add that to your total for the final episode of the show.

6.) One-Time Bonus Points: If any of the following happen during the show, add 5 extra points to the episode it occurred in. You can only claim each bonus once per show though.

Title Bonus: A character says the title of the show. Includes if the name of a character is the title of the show. Seinfeld, Dexter, etc.

Crossover Bonus: Characters from another show make an appearance


Musical: If the show has a musical episode


Character dies: If a main character dies


Dead character returns: If a character returns from the dead


Theme song: If the theme song plays in the episode


Spin off movie: if you watch the spin off movie Ex.Serenity.


Holiday: if the show has a holiday episode.
Christmas, thanksgiving, Halloween. Etc



Arrested: If a main character is arrested

Maniac 2012

Can you believe this movie is almost 10 years old and I finally saw it? I've been reluctant because I like the original well enough, so when it comes to remakes, I'm always skeptical.

Director Franck Khalfoun's other somewhat popular movie P2 was a piece of shit, and Amityville Awakening was alright, but he got Elijah Wood in this movie? I suppose he looks somewhat evil at times, and this movie lets him shine. It's a pretty faithful remake, what with the mannequins and scalps and a similar ending.

Did I say scalps? That shit is pretty gross. That's one thing this movie's got going for it is some good gore and a good score.

I thought that POV style would annoy me, but it really didn't. It was more of a loose guideline than something strictly adhered to. This movie had a few good things going for it. Maybe Franck Khalfoun doesn't suck so hard after all.

Chuck & Buck Suck & Fuck



You ever have a friend, when you were younger, who stayed "that way" for far too long? Maybe someone you knew in high school and well into your 20's, who hadn't quite got it yet? A situation that could lead to two friends having very different interests and priorities to the point that it could get annoying. This might be especially true if one is trying their best to be the opposite. Even if one still cares, one could find themselves drifting away. Or maybe you're on the other side of the fence. Don't feel bad, it happens. Not usually as extreme of a case as in this 2000 indie flick I'm about to brighten your day with. Yeah, maybe hearing about this will make you feel better. Or if you are, in fact, the mature one, just consider yourself lucky you're not dealing with what Chuck is dealing with.

He goes by Charlie, nowadays, but as a kid, he was Chuck. Chuck once had a friend named Buck. At 11, Chuck and Buck were not only best friends, they were also very much attached at the hip. I suppose neither one had other friends, which is probably unhealthy for kids of any age. However, like most friendships at that age, it only lasted a year or two. Eventually, Chuck's family moved away and he went on to make new friends and meet girls, and all the normal things that come with Junior High/High School, eventually leading to college. And yeah. You get the idea. Chuck is normal.

Buck, on the other hand, never made any more friends. He went through the motions of school, but for some reason, this friendship with Chuck was very much the peak of Buck's entire existence. A time in his life that he not only never forgot, but hung on to tightly. So tightly, Buck never really bothered growing up. Mentally, Buck is still 11. At the age of 27, all this guy wants to do is play, daydream and suck on blow pops all day. One day, Buck's mother, a long-time smoker, literally coughs herself to death. And just like that, Buck is now alone in the world. I'm sure Buck is saddened by this, but seemingly, the first conclusion he comes to is that this might be a good opportunity to reconnect with Chuck.

After 15 plus years apart, Buck gets in touch with Chuck and convinces him to come to the funeral. Though shocked to hear this voice from the past, Chuck has no problem being polite, so, he and his girlfriend attend the funeral because, what is he going to say, "no"? Of course the couple attend, and as you could guess, it's a very awkward reunion. Buck probably didn't think his old friend would be bringing a girl, but he manages to hold it together. Buck doesn't quite know what to say to her, or what to make of her, for that matter, but he sure is happy to see his "best friend" again. There is some vague talk of Buck coming out to L.A. for a visit some time but Chuck is probably just being polite. After Buck tries to play some "grab ass", Chuck takes his girlfriend and gets the hell out of there and away from the awkwardness that you could honestly cut with a knife. But hey! Chuck may have gotten cross with Buck, but he never said "and you can forget about ever visiting, now". No, in Buck's mind, this little visit is still a thing.

Maybe one thing I should have already pointed out: Chuck used to fuck Buck in the mouth from time to time, and as you can guess, Buck really dug it and yearns for more. Yeah, ok. I guess some kids experiment at weird ages, but these mouth fuckings seem to have way too much to do with how Buck has ended up. It's not all this is, mind you. Buck really misses his friend, yet, at the same time, he also misses the taste of Chuck's cum, and aims to choke down more of it once he gets to L.A. And once he reaches his destination, Buck is in for a surprise. Charlie (FKA Chuck) is a successful record executive, and spends most of his time at the office doing boring grown up stuff. Buck doesn't know how to approach him at first, so, he stalks the office building all day, every day, waiting for Chuck to come out so he can get a glimpse. One night, Buck is feeling ballsy and approaches Chuck and the girlfriend after following them somewhere. Buck gets himself invited over to the house for ice cream, but of course, has other things in mind.

After the girlfriend goes to bed, and after a little awkward conversation, Buck quickly gets himself thrown out for suggesting a little oral fun. Chuck is not interested. Chuck is weirded out enough by the fact that this guy is such a man child. Not to mention how fixated he is on this dead friendship, and how bad he is at hiding it. You can imagine Chuck's outrage. So, what does Buck do, you ask? Well, soon thereafter, Buck spends all his inheritance on producing a play. Not just any play. A fantasy-inspired story about a couple of kids who eventually grew apart due to some spell put on one of them by a witch. It doesn't make a lot of sense, but Chuck's girlfriend is supposed to be the witch, I guess. And with just a pinch of gay shit thrown in, Buck believes all will be well as long as he can talk Chuck into coming down and checking out his play. Easier said than done, but this is all Buck has. This one, final attempt at getting Chuck to snap out of whatever he is going through and get him back to normal. In Buck's mind, this is the answer. Meanwhile, Chuck has to change his number due to Buck calling every few minutes and hanging up. You don't have to be one who gets fucked in the mouth to realize that this is no way to get fucked in the mouth.

Lead actors, Mike White and Chris Weitz play their roles exceptionally well, however I'm not convinced this story was told as clearly as it should have been. We're never let in on exactly how Buck ended up like he did. To be stuck in your late teens for too long happens, but everything stops for this dude at 11 because his friend fucked him in the mouth and then moved away? He actually went through high school and remained that way? One could say that's a little "hard to swallow"... Sorry, couldn't resist. But seriously. If Buck's mom kept him inside for all those years and home schooled him, OK, but you don't go through high school without dealing with some shit that changes you a little. Plus, there's that whole puberty thing that should have probably made more of an impact. Oh, well. Don't let common sense get in the way of a fucked up story.

This is one cringy, and might I add, random little story that most people probably wouldn't know what to make of. Cringy because, like I said above, you could cut the awkwardness with a knife, at times. To be that age and to also be THAT age in the head. Having to avoid interactions with adults best you can because you know your empty little head offers you nothing of worth to say back to them. All the while, trying desperately to get close to the only person you know because it's the only way you can feel normal and happy. All of this as well as a whole lot of sexual confusion clouding your judgment. And on top of all that, this person looks at you like you're a fucking Alien when you offer to blow them.

While Buck is the one who gets stalky, it still might be a bit unfair to call Chuck "the normal one", while dismissing his admirer as "abnormal". On the surface, sure, Chuck is normal. However, not without his own dysfunctional ways. As vaguely mentioned by the girlfriend, Chuck does have closeness issues and isn't great at communicating. Chuck keeps things bottled in and buried, never to be dealt with. To be so fixated on someone like that is extra unhealthy for someone like Buck, who is in desperate need of some counciling. This thing, whatever it is, was obviously never going to go in Buck's favor, but Chuck being who he is, it was all the more hurtful. Perhaps there's a lesson in all this. Don't live in the past? No means no? Plays are for fags? Yeah, I think that's the one! 7/10



#Review

A potential challenge for the future: female directors?

On MovieMeter (that's a Dutch movie board which I frequent daily and organise horror projects regularly) there is a buddy of mine organising a female directors movie challenge for the month March. I said I'll participate but won't go for a high number of views. Now that I realized there is a trash challenge in the same month which interests me more I'll try to combine both.

There is a lot more female directors than I realized given how my buddy has been providing movie lists directed by women. Me being a horror fan and not so much interest in genres as romantic comedy or pure drama often relationship trouble themed (which seem to be genres these directors tackle often) I took this list as a base:

https://www.icheckmovies.com/lists/tszdt+the+50+greatest+horror+films+directed+by+women/mightysparks/

I was actually surprised I often didn't knew they were directed (some co-directed) by women. And some really high rated like The Babadook as much as I dislike that one. Biggest surprise is Pet Sematary didn't know who Mary Lambert was. But again there is lots of movies I can't remember who the director was. Even some of my favorites I don't know by heart who directed it. I already joked to my buddy how can Humanoids from the Deep (director Barbara Peeters) not be in that list while Doris Wishman's A Night to dismember' is there. Wishman made real trash but I love her oeuvre anyway applauding how she did pretty much everything herself. I did hear the nude scenes in Humanoids where from a male director wich wouldn't surprise me.


Near Dark (directed by Kathryn Bigelow) is for example one I really liked but it seems to be her only horror movie. And she ain't the only one who directed a bunch of flicks with only 1 happening to be labeled horror. Mary Lambert seems one to do horror flicks more frequently.


So my question is would there be people interested in participating in this kind of challenge? Would I be hosting it myself I would extend it to female driven movies as 1 or more women in the biggest role movies with mainly a female cast.

Jokes

Man 1: Why do you have so many dirty dishes in your sink?

Man 2: I don't have a dishwasher anymore.

Man 1: Did it break?

Man 2: No she died.

Notice of Updates

I've been working on a lot of changes to the internal mechanics of the site, so as you've probably noticed, a lot of features don't work. I try to prioritize them by which ones users will notice are gone and which they wont, so I'll be keeping the forum and shoutbox open as long as I can, but I'll need to shut them down soon so I can rework them.

Fortunately, I believe that the TEDb skin will still work in the meantime, so if you come to TE one day and see everything is broken, try the TEDb skin. Things shouldn't take too long to fix once they're down, but I'm trying to go through enough code to make sure I cover enough ground to keep that time at the bare minimum.


The update wont be particularly noticable for most of you, but the site will act more as a single page application, which should cut back on load times and make fewer redundant calls to the server. The visual design will mostly stay the same, with minor tweaks here and there.

Expect these changes within the next few weeks.

For American Horror Story: 1984 fans

Just a heads up, I have found a few parody accounts on Twitter, purporting to be various characters from AHS1984. I have mentioned this type of thing before, possibly in the shout box. I like this type of twitter account, sometimes they can be hilarious. There are also tons of them that claim to be characters from John Carpenter movies. Sometimes they interact with each other, have relationships, visit the settings of other movies, etc.

But, sorry, I just wanted to talk about the AHS1984 parody accounts. Here are a few, there are probably some more that I haven't found, or possibly haven't found yet. If I fail to make them clickable, Box, please go ahead and work your magic.
https://twitter.com/MontanaaDuke
https://twitter.com/XavierPlymptonn
https://twitter.com/MargaretBooth84
https://twitter.com/ThompsonnBrooke

Children of the Night, by Dan Simmons

Anybody ever read this? He wrote it in the early 90s. It takes place shortly after the Romanian president Ceaucescu was killed, in late 1989. Well, that's when it begins, and most of the action is in about 1991. It's sort of a Dracula story, ultimately, although various other vampires are even more important to the plot, in many ways. At least, as far as the protagonists ever even understand the actual plot, which is to say, not much...

Anyway, it's pretty interesting. I am going to have to spend some time thinking it over, and thinking about what the author was shooting for in certain sections. I mostly like it. He makes Romania sound like such a nightmare at that time, especially the "orphanages" where unwanted babies and children were stashed. Google Romanian orphanages AIDS babies needles, not necessarily in that order, for more details about that.

There are a couple things I would like to talk about, if anyone here has read and enjoyed the book. For one thing, was Radu Fortuna supposed to be Vlad Tepes brother Radu, from the 1400s? I read some parts too quickly, I think I missed some important things. Also, did anyone else have any theories about why Father O'Rourke moved the plot forward so much, in the beginning? I think he was basically a good guy, but it was a bit mysterious. I'll have to see if there are sequels to the book, maybe Simmons went into more detail about that. Also, did you end up thinking Lucian was basically a good guy, or basically a bad guy, or basically just a survivor until he decided he had had enough? I can't decide.

Anyway... I didn't give any massive spoilers in what I just asked, so if you haven't read this, I do recommend it. If you have read it, I'd like to hear your thoughts!