Classic Weird Tales Cover Art

BLADE RUNNER (1982) Poster Art

Wild, Wild Podcast Season 7: Episode 11 - SATANIK (1968)

Skin trouble? Grey hair getting you down? Walking with a stoop? Why not take a drug that has not been tested on people yet, will probably make you violent, but will definitely make you young and hot? If that sounds good, you too could become Satanik, the anti-hero of our latest episode.

This is one of the few films from this season to have actually been restored, and is currently available on blu ray from Terror Vision and is highly recommended.

We are now coming towards the end of our fumetti season. If you want to do some background reading on the most popular Italian comics of the sixties, there's a great resource here on Comic Vine.

We would love to hear from you if you have any favorite Italian comic or masked hero/ villain-based films, or if you have ever quit your job as a scientist to become a stripper in a casino on Lake Geneva. You can contact us on Twitter and Instagram or by email at wildwildpodcast@gmail.com. You can also find our YouTube channel here.

Please also remember to rate and review us on your podcast platform of choice!

The Bloody Pit #201 - Blake's 7 (1978-1981)

Author John Kenneth Muir returns to the show to discuss another science fiction television show! BLAKE’S 7 aired in Britain from 1978 to 1981 and was a major hit but was not renewed for a fifth season. That the show remains beloved decades later points to the typical short sighted BBC decision making process in such matters. With the recent announcement of Blu-Ray releases we decided that the time was right to talk about the show and our years long love of it. Since Mr. Muir has written a book on the subject, he is the perfect person to speak to about the show which was sold as ‘The Dirty Dozen in Space’. If you’ve never seen the series, we try to avoid most spoilers but a couple of things do leak through as we go along.

 

Our conversation starts with how we each discovered the show and our initial reactions to the ‘anti-Star Trek’ with the adult nature of the storytelling being our main focus. We discuss the dystopian universe presented and give a brief overview of the ‘rebels vs the federation’ structure of the story. The dark and often cruel tone of the characters and the events they have to deal with is a topic we return to throughout the episode. We also fit in an examination of some of the classic science fiction tropes that the show uses and the creative spin the writers employ to include them. We had a great time digging into BLAKE’S 7 and we hope you will enjoy what we have to say even if you’ve not yet seen the series.

 

Mr. Muir mentions his recent web series near the end of the episode and if you are curious this is the FaceBook page for it and here is the production’s website. Check it out!

 

If you have any comments about BLAKE’S 7 or anything else we touch on thebloodypit@gmail.com is the place to send them. Thank you for listening! 

Roger Corman Monster Movie Poster Art

 

What I Watched in August 2024

From a 50,000 foot view there is nothing ground breaking about the story being told in BLINK TWICE (2024). It’s a straightforward female revenge tale in which multiple women exact bloody retribution on scumbag men. The structure of the plot hides the horrors being enacted in a clever way with the audience and the female characters slowly becoming aware that something strange is happening on an isolated billionaire’s island. This kind of film has been made for decades with varying degrees of success and excess. They range from crude and effective like I SPIT ON YOUR GRAVE (1978) to artful and effective like LADY VENGEANCE (2005) and PROMISING YOUNG WOMAN (2020). But it seems to me that director Zoe Kravitz has done real homework studying the rape/revenge cinema of the past beyond just the more famous entries in the genre. I spotted several stylistic choices and certain editing techniques that reminded me of the Japanese film series Female Convict Scorpion. Tilted camera angles and bluntly editing away from dialog before the final obvious words are spoken can be seen both as a nod to those films (and others that used the technique) but also serves to be early indicators about what is being done to the protagonists. Indeed, BLINK TWICE is a very sure-footed film showing a strong sense of craft and vision that is always at the service of the story. The film hides its plot revelations well and allows the mystery to unfold naturally allowing the main character’s sense of curiosity to shift to anxiety and finally horror. This is a well cast movie sporting solid performances across the board with some character’s turns from antagonistic to friendly and (mostly) in the opposite direction seeming to be ordinary outgrowths of what we’ve seen in the proceeding scenes. This is a thriller that delivers not just the expected chills but provides a satisfying violent third act that feels justly deserved. And that final scene is quite nice!

For me, the most fascinating idea in the film is the question of memory and whether it is healthy to remember the traumas you have experienced in your life. One character speaks about not being able to remember anything from before the age of ten and contrasts that with a sister that remembers everything. Without getting into the question of if this offscreen sister has eidetic memory or not, the inability to remember events from childhood can be a sign of trauma. The film seems to be suggesting that those who can remember all the horrors of their life are doomed to never transcend them – until that revenge ending shows the other possible path forward. But the film does ask the broad question of is it better to remember every trauma, embarrassment, insult or slight? Or is it better to have time hide, or at least dull, those sharp moments? And what is the best way to handle real transgressions? Can our memory always be trusted?  These questions are not the focus of BLINK TWICE but having them as part of the story adds a level of awareness I was not expecting. We are a combination of our life experiences and our reactions to them. Sometimes the most transgressed against are the ones who end up overcoming and succeeding because of those terrible experiences.

Plus, billionaires are generally awful people.

The List

THE ABSENT-MINDED PROFESSOR (1961) – 7 (fun Disney silliness) 

KNOX GOES AWAY (2024) – 8 

HELLRAISER (1987) – 8 (rewatch on Blu) 

DEADPOOL & WOLVERINE (2024) – 8 

5 WOMEN FOR THE KILLER (1974) – 7 (giallo with interesting cast) 

BARBARIAN QUEEN (1985) – 6 (rewatch)

MAN WITH A CLOAK (1951) – 8 (rewatch) 

AVENGER X (1967) – 6 

FATAL WITNESS (1945) – 6 (slight mystery from Republic Studio with Evelyn Ankers)

THE STRANGE LOVE OF THE VAMPIRE (1975) – 6 (rewatch on Blu)

LOVE LIES BLEEDING (2024) – 7 

HELLRAISER II: HELLBOUND (1988) – 8 (rewatch on Blu)

HELLRAISER III: HELL ON EARTH (1993) – 5 (rewatch on Blu) 

HELLRAISER IV: BLOODLINE (1996) – 4 (a composite workprint found on YouTube – good ideas but a mess) 

TAROT (2024) – 6 (well directed, good characters and it looks great but its only pretty good)

SHARKSPLOITATION (2023) – 8 (excellent documentary on the beloved genre) 

SUDDEN FURY (1975) – 8 (excellent Canadian thriller)

JUNGLE MOON MEN (1955) – 5 (not bad but overlong Jungle Jim tale) 

FATAL GAMES (1984) – 6 (ridiculous low budget slasher with a lot of nudity) 

BOOKS OF BLOOD (2020) – 7 (adaptations of three Barker tales) 

BANDH DWWAZA (1990) – 5 (pretty silly, overlong Bollywood vampire film) 

THE RED DRAGON (1945) – 6 (Charlie Chan mystery)

ALIEN: ROMULUS (2024) - 7

HIDDEN GOLD (1940) – 5 (solid Hopalong Cassidy adventure) 

THE FEATHERED SERPENT (1948) – 6 (Charlie Chan mystery)

THE SKY DRAGON (1949) – 7 (very good Charlie Chan mystery)

BLINK TWICE (2024) – 8 

HOPALONG CASSIDY (1935) – 6 (first of the series) 

THE MUMMY AND THE CURSE OF THE JACKALS (1969) – 3 (gloriously terrible!)

THE CASE OF THE BLACK PARROT (1941) – 6 (pretty sharp stage adaptation) 

SATANIK (1968) – 6 (fumetti adaptation with a wicked female anti-hero) 

My Patreon Post About the Latest ALIEN film

I talk about my love of the Alien series and my reaction to the new film.