It’s that time of year again and L.A. RECORD is coming at you with twenty-five more overlooked and obscure horror titles to heighten your Halloween. Most are available through Netflix and others can to be found down at Cinefile or Vidiots. And we’re off with Nolan Knight…

1. Phenomena – An Argento stunner featuring a young Jennifer Connelly, insects, murder and a monkey. Oh, Donald Pleasance’s character adds just the right touch of awkwardness to human-chimp relations too. Several bizarre twists will keep you guessing with a killer ending.

2. Tourist Trap – Don’t be fooled! That roadside museum in the middle of nowhere doesn’t kill time—just hare-brained twenty-somethings. Featuring Tonya Roberts, this one isn’t big on acting but definitely worth a peek.

3. The Burning – Pretty much a guide of what not to do when at summer camp, if you enjoy living. A serial-killer revenge flick that delivers with every slash to teenage flesh. A young George Costanza adds to the cast of unhappy campers. This one is a must.

4. Pieces – With a tagline of “You Don’t Have to Go to Texas for a Chainsaw Massacre,” how can you go wrong? An illogical plot, for starters? Nope. That doesn’t stop the fun of this flick. The impromptu martial-arts scene will make your day.

5. The Sentinel – John Carradine. Ava Gardner. Eli Wallach. Burgess Meredith. Christopher Walken. The Gateway to Hell. Nice.

6. Slumber Party Massacre – A driller killer and a full house of teenage girls. One would think the poor bastard wouldn’t stand a chance, right? Wrong. Loads of nudity and violence to compliment the blood and guts.

7. Eyeball – Pretty good Umberto Lenzi giallo. A caped killer is on the loose, knocking off tourists by plucking out their peepers. Go in without high expectations and you’ll dig it.

8. White Zombie – Lugosi in command of an army of undead slaves. Haunting atmosphere and perfectly macabre. A zombie classic.

9. I Spit on Your Grave – Not as explicit as Thriller: A Cruel Picture (i.e. no detailed sodomy scenes) but you’ll get the idea. Technically a revenge flick set in motion via gang rape. Not as many one liners as you’d expect.

10. Dracula’s Dog (a.k.a. Zoltan, Hound of Dracula) – The Russians excavate the tomb of Dracula, accidently unleashing–ah, fuck, just read the title one more time.

11. House at the Edge of the Park – The poor man’s Last House on the Left starring the always sadistic David Hess. This time, an uppity house party gets a full dose of torture and mayhem. Count how many times Hess uses the word twat.

12. Night of the Demon – One of the most visually horrific openers in silver-screen cinema. Dana Andrews stars.

13. This Night I Will Possess Your Corpse – Often regarded as Jose Mojica Marins’ masterpiece in the Coffin Joe series. The hell scene alone is worth the viewing. Subtitled, in case that ain’t your bag.

14. Dog Soldiers – A welcome twist on the werewolf genre by Neil Marshall (The Descent) that puts Scottish soldiers up against rabid beasts. Funny dialogue, great special effects, and tons of gore.

15. Alone in the Dark – Not the Uwe Boll piece of shit. This one’s from 1982. Four psychopaths, fresh out the bin and gunning for their psychiatrists. Jack Palance, Martin Landau, and Donald Pleasance (sans monkey) star.

16. The Car – Before there was Christine, there was The Car, a possessed four-wheel death machine terrorizing everyone in its path. James Brolin says: “Ten years of traffic tickets and all this in one day!” Your call.

17. Mark of the Devil – Ah, the many splendors of the witch hunt. So many ways to cast out the devil. Contains lots of screaming and grisly torture scenes. Watch it with The Conqueror Worm.

18. Satanico Pandemonium – Nunsploitation in all its grandeur. Nothing like a young hot nun tempted by visions of forbidden sexual fantasies to become one with Satan. Boobs, blood and the Bible. Yes!

19. J.D.’s Revenge – Blaxploitation Horror. A young law student becomes possessed by the soul of a 1940s street hustler, exacting revenge on those who killed him. A favorite of the Grindhouse Film Fest (who just screened it with Blacula). Louis Gossett, Jr., co-stars.

20. Happy Birthday to Me – Somebody’s picking off rich kids faster than they can spend their trust funds. Who gives a shit, right? Well, when there’s a death via shish-kabob and it co-stars Glenn Ford, I do.

21. Chopping Mall – Eight teenagers are trapped in the Beverly Center, stalked by murderous robots who blast lasers. ‘80s mall culture meets its match.

22. Witchboard – Tawny Kitaen, an Ouija board, demonic possession, and enough shit acting to fill 98 minutes. And you thought she was only good for dancing on cars. Nope. She’s good for laughs, too.

23. Popcorn – A bunch of film students throwing the most elaborate film fest this side of Cannes. Campy but cool. Death by giant plastic mosquito.

24. Black Sunday – Barbara Steele as a witch returning from the grave for vengeance. A Bava classic and the film that put him on the map.

25. The Exorcist III – William Peter Blatty takes back the Exorcist franchise with an adaptation of his novel Legion. George C. Scott commands the screen and this one delivers nicely, erasing those shitty memories of the Exorcist II.

*Although visually, David Cross with a beard might be able to pull it off.

—Nolan Knight

—Nolan Knight

For one night only, Stuart Shapiro, the captain behind Night Flight—the late-night rock ‘n’ roll/trash film/and beyond! program that was the beating heart of cable television during the eighties—is taking over Cinefamily. Screening an evening of Night Flight’s rare gems and unfathomable awesomeness, he’ll present selections that could explode any two-bit flat screen. He speaks here with Nolan Knight on how Otis Redding and the Circle Jerks helped launch television into another galaxy.

What was your upbringing like and what were some of the major influences that brought you to the creation of Night Flight?
Mostly as an independent film distributor. My company was International Harmony in New York, which I started in 1976. I had a bunch of cult type of movies—Tunnel Vision was the first movie I distributed. I had a lot of music from these titles too—Rust Never Sleeps, Reggae Sunsplash, The Space Movie, The Blank Generation, D.O.A. with the Sex Pistols—I was very involved with the independent feature film distribution, which I kind of spawned into a lot of midnight screenings.
What was the initial idea for Night Flight?
Basically—at the time in 1980, cable had just started to take its foothold. USA Network hadn’t even become USA yet. At that time there was this sort of evangelistic attitude that cable was really gonna come out and be another world for alternative programming. It was gonna be the birth of a freer reign of programming. It’s hard to think today what it might have been like back then but in the 1970s—in terms of your choice of programming—there was very little. Cable was supposed to be this new bastion of entertainment but it really wasn’t happening. I was so involved in late-night theatrical exhibition—it was always a very social experience. I mean, when a lot of people think about midnights they think of just The Rocky Horror Picture Show but there was a whole culture of concert film midnight movies—The Song Remains the Same, Pink Floyd—so I knew that there was a culture of late-night [moviegoers] that were hungry for programming late at night on the weekends. In the beginning, the cable system was going dark late at night—there was really nothing on, so I felt it was a wonderful opportunity to try to put cool hip programming on television. So we pitched the idea. Jeff Franklin, who became my partner on Night Flight, had a friend who worked at USA Network, which at that time was called Madison Square Garden Network. We basically pitched them on the idea of giving us a two-hour time slot as a test. They agreed to give us two hours on Friday night and two on Saturday night, eleven to one, from June until September. We kind of opened up Night Flight a lot with my movie catalog that I actually had already.
And the USA Network had no control over the content of your programming?
It was the height of freedom. I had this time slot and Jeffrey was my partner but I was a creative force along with a lot of associates I worked with. I had control over the time slot.
The music featured on the show was wide ranging—from Circle Jerks to Otis Redding to Zappa. What kind of an impact did this variety have on the viewership at that time?
We looked at stuff really primitive in those days. We never programmed for ratings because it was really hard to tell a different rating from another, but Night Flight was a very very high rated show. We programmed variety but looking back, I can’t really tell you if Bob Marley in Reggae Sunsplash did better than some other movie.
What made you decide to include New Wave Theatre into Night Flight?
I think David had come to us. David Jove had New Wave Theatre on for, I think, one season on local access television here in L.A. He came to us in New York with the shows and pitched us on becoming a production partner. I felt that he was the outer crust of what Night Flight stood for. It became important for us in terms of Night Flight being able to be so bold.
Can you reflect a bit on its host, Peter Ivers?
When I listen to Peter now, I think that he was a poet. When you listen to him speak, he really was a rapper to a degree—he was very very poetic and quite visionary. Both he and David were committed to a higher worldly order, you could say. Peter was a beacon. I’ve only learned, later on in life, in what way New Wave Theatre made its appeal because I’ve come across so many people over the years who have come to me and said almost the identical thing—they tend to be people from the middle of America more than anywhere and they would say, ‘God, you know I thought I was just a freak on my own until I turned on Night Flight and saw New Wave Theatre and realized that there really was a world out there that was like me.’ I always became more and more aware of the influence of this sort of cultural freedom of expression that New Wave Theatre exemplified. If you came from New York or L.A., you would be exposed to that. But if you had cable for the first time in your entire life and came in contact with New Wave Theatre from some small town in Kansas, it was really a beacon of life.
Are there any future plans to resurrect Night Flight in an online format or for television?
Well, we’re building NightFlight.com right now and it’s a pretty cool concept. It should be live sometime in a month or so. The concept is a video blog—kind of a community of discovery where you embed YouTube links and underneath there would be commentary—both a forum and a blog. We would actually have bloggers going in and writing—a good stable of interesting content providers. The idea is for it to be a Night Flight YouTube with a social network community around it. One of the elements that I think is really important to Night Flight is that there is a discovery element to everything we put on. We’re trying to bring that to an online experience where people would host and share—old stuff, new stuff, whatever—and it would be category centric. There will be animation and comedy and video and music. That’s what I’m pushing for.
So what are some of the things in store for us at Thursday’s Night Flight Night at Cinefamily?
Well, it’s an hour and a half film that I put together—a “Best of” which I called Born Again because I thought it was funny—in the Night Flight vein of sarcasm. The thing that’s the most exciting about it is the interviews. There are interviews with Johnny Rotten, Billy Idol, Ozzy Osbourne, Frank Zappa, Freddie Mercury, Annie Lennox—it’s a really rife spattering of interviews. What you will come away with—which is really amazing—is how beautiful, both visually and intelligent, the interviews are. I don’t know how much you’ve seen of the interviews on Night Flight but when you haven’t seen it for twenty-five years, it’s really amazing.
I caught one online with John Waters and Divine during the filming of Polyester that I thought was really candid and excellent.
That interview with Divine is priceless! It’s in the fuckin’ movie!

L.A. RECORD AND DON’T KNOCK THE ROCK PRESENT NIGHT FLIGHT TRIBUTE NIGHT WITH STUART SHAPIRO ON THUR., AUG. 27, AT CINEFAMILY, 411 N. FAIRFAX AVE., LOS ANGELES. 8 PM / $10 / ALL AGES. CINEFAMILY.ORG. VISIT NIGHT FLIGHT AT NIGHTFLIGHT.COM.

Click here to watch the trailer for Return Of The Rub-A-Dub Style!

Dub Club is an L.A. institution and now (after almost five years of filming) the documentary Return Of The Rub-A-Dub Style—which follows both the organizers of Dub Club and the long line of original reggae and dub stars they’ve brought to perform exclusive shows in L.A.—is about to release. Director Steve Henft (who has made videos for Primal Scream, Stone Roses, the Cure and more) and Dub Club mainstay Tom Chasteen speak before a special screening at tonight’s Dub Club. This interview by Nolan Knight.

What was the first record that hooked you into reggae and dub music?
Tom Chasteen (producer/Dub Club selector): The first thing that got me into reggae music was actually my parents. They went to Jamaica in the early seventies and brought back a bunch of records. They had the Harder They Come soundtrack and the Toots and the Maytals’ Funky Kingston album. Those were the first records to get me into reggae. The thing that got me into dub would probably be the Scientist albums. I bought those when I was a teenager—like Scientist Wins the World Cup, Scientist Versus the Space Invaders, a couple of those albums. That’s what really sold me on dub—listening to those. The word dub has a couple of different meanings. I guess the most frequent meaning of dub is—the Jamaican style—they’d make a 45, and on the A-side you’d have the vocal version of the song and on the B-side you’d have an instrumental of the same song but they would add a lot of effects to it—cutting the vocals in and out, making this psychedelic mix of it and that would be the ‘dub.’ That’s kind of the most concise explanation. Then rub-a-dub doesn’t have the same exact meaning. Rub-a-dub is more of this fixed style of Jamaican music that’s kind of in the era of the late sixties through the seventies into the mid-eighties. A slow and heavy kind of reggae that was really great for playing on these big outdoor sound systems and people toasting over.
The Dub Club has generated a huge response over the years—did it start off big or was it a gradual process?
TC: No, it started off pretty small. We have been doing it since 2000. It took a while to build. I would say the last five or six years it’s been a pretty big crowd—solid each week. It’s been a good crowd consistently for years and years. It took a while because I think there weren’t many other people doing this style of music. But we gradually found more and more people and then built from that following—people who liked the style of music and what we do. I think they appreciate that we bring in artists that are rarely seen or who haven’t been here before.
How did the documentary begin?
Steve Hanft (director): We started documenting the shows and then we realized that the Sound System shows in particular could be made into a film. We got excited about that but for me it was a new thing—even though it’s an old style of music that started in the sixties. For me, it was like, ‘Wow, people are rapping over beats back then?’ Basically, I was just excited about finding out about it. I think the first show we filmed was in 2004. We were shooting the rest of them up to a few months ago.
Were all the artists in the film readily available? Or did you have to go hunt some of them down in Jamaica?
SH: We definitely had to hunt those artists down for sure. Those guys at Dub Club—the selectors who book all the shows—they are digging so deep into the roots of reggae—getting the records, getting the artists. A lot of them came through one artist in particular—Tippa Lee, who’s actually a producer on the movie. He knows a lot of them. Tom would ask for some super old school artists and Tippa would know how to find them.
TC: In my experience, usually the artists were good to work with cause they really want to play and they are excited to come here and perform. A lot of these artists are great artists but they mainly play in Europe and they don’t play here very much. They still sound great. Usually they are just great to work with because they are excited that people still love their music. They’re excited that there is a young crowd here that knows their records.
SH: We really wanted an interview with Brigadier Jerry but he’s a real intense person. He was gonna do it and we went to the Twelve Tribes Church in Mount Washington—the Jamaican church were he is one of the founding members. And then he said, ‘No.’ [Laughs]
Can you tell us a little about the film’s soundtrack and where we can pick up a copy?
TC: It’s gonna come out in August and the DVD with the soundtrack will all be in one package together. A lot of the artists in the movie are on it but then there are others like Prince Jazzbo and Jimmy Riley—plus a lot of other great singers. We tracked the music here in L.A. but a lot of the vocals were recorded in Jamaica. It’s kind of just the tip of the iceberg. We have a lot of tracks that we’ve done over the years and they’re going to be out on Echodelic, which is our label. It’s kind of following the traditional Jamaican style where we have the Sound System—Echodelic Sound System—and Sound System kind of becomes the label, putting out its own records.
SH: [The DVD is] gonna come out right around the time of the screening. We’re in the process of building the DVD. The editing is done but we’re putting a lot of extras into it.
You was saying that the film will also be screened on the 15th—what does the club have in store for that night?
TC: We’re gonna screen the film at nine o’clock at the Echoplex and it will be free to come see the movie—free before nine-thirty. Then later that night we have a performance with Trinity, a classic seventies Jamaican DJ. We’re flying him in from Jamaica for that show. So we booked a performance with Trinity and Tippa Lee—and probably some other special guests will come out too.

RETURN OF THE RUB-A-DUB STYLE SCREENS WED., JULY 15, WITH TRINITY AND TIPPA LEE AT DUB CLUB AT THE ECHOPLEX, 1154 GLENDALE BLVD., ECHO PARK. SCREENING AT 9 PM / FREE BEFORE 9:30 PM / $10 AFTER / 21+. ATTHEECHO.COM. RETURN OF THE RUB-A-DUB STYLE DVD AND SOUNDTRACK WILL RELEASE THIS SUMMER ON ECHODELIC SOUND. MORE INFORMATION AT MYSPACE.COM/DUBCLUBLA.

Download: Dex Romweber Duo “Picture Of You”

(from Ruins of Berlin out now on Bloodshot)

Dexter Romweber was the guitar half of the Flat Duo Jets, a two-man rock ‘n’ roll band from the deep south that had the power of Dr. Ross and Abner Jay combined. They were filmed for—and broke up during—the documentary Two-Headed Cow, screening tonight. Dex and his new duo (with his sister Sara) have a new album and will be performing in L.A. this weekend. This interview by Nolan Knight.

What was the extent of your involvement in the production of Two Headed Cow? Was it your idea for the documentary?
No, it wasn’t my idea at all. What it was was that the producers who made Athens, Ga.—Inside/Out, a documentary on music in Athens, Georgia, they wanted to make a Flat Duo Jets film after that film was completed. So we set out on a short Southern tour in ’87, I think. Then they ran out of funds but they wanted to complete the film and they got the funds together by 2005 or so, but the Duo Jets had already ended and I was still touring. They finished the film in 2005 and it was initially their idea—completely.
Are you satisfied with the outcome? Does it accurately reflect the legacy of the Flat Duo Jets?
Yeah, some of it—not all of it. I think they got a lot of good footage and some of it’s pretty funny, you know? There were a few things I wanted taken out but they wouldn’t take ‘em out. That caused little problems but we’re all pretty much past it now.
Your new record, Ruins in Berlin, just came out and I really enjoyed it. Was there a theme of exploration behind this record?
There wasn’t really a theme. I think me and Sara didn’t want to make it just a neo-rockabilly record and we wanted to get many different moods and flavors. These are songs I had around for awhile, so me and Sara sat down and figured out what would be the best ones to put on the record. There wasn’t really a theme behind it except to get a little more jazz influences and some different genres of music.
How has it been playing with your sister on drums so far? Does the family dynamic help when it comes to extensive touring?
It hasn’t been too bad. We’ve done a lot of work since we started playing together. Chan Marshall—Cat Power—has taken us to Europe and we’ve done many shows around America with her and we’ve been generally taking any work we can get that isn’t too bad—if the money’s decent, you know what I mean?
There are some cameos on the record and one is with Exene Cervenka. How did you two come to be good friends?
Well, I didn’t know her too much. A lot of these artists are in the film and our manager came up with the idea of maybe putting them on our record to sort of spice it up a little bit. I ended up playing on Exene’s solo record after my record was complete, so I ended up flying to Missouri and hanging with her and her husband, Jason, for about three days. I got to know her more then and a little bit when she came to lay down her tracks for Ruins of Berlin.
People like Jack White attribute you to being a major influence on their artistry. Who would you consider to be a major influence on your artistry?
Well, there are different people. Some of them are very obscure. People like Benny Joy out of Tampa, which usually only record collectors really know who he is. Big-band artists like Stan Kenton and a bit of people like Jerry Lewis and stuff.
The Jets toured with the Cramps in the early ‘90s. Can you share a fond memory or funny story involving the great Lux Interior?
Generally, I left them to themselves. I didn’t want to infringe on their privacy too much but we spent many an evening together, talking or drinking wine, and I just remember me and Lux sharing a love of Jackie Gleason [laughs]. Mostly, we talked about music and films but Lux was a real forthright guy and a very nice guy. I think what he admired most in people was a sense of honesty. It was nineteen years ago, so it’s a little hard to remember everything. We mostly just talked about artists and stuff.
Is there another solo piano album in your future?
I wanted there to be and I wanted to make a volume two but it’s taking me a while to sit down and compose all these songs that I’d have to get ready. I can’t do it right now but maybe in the coming year I will sit down and get volume two ready.
What are your thoughts on the current state of rock ‘n’ roll?
I don’t really follow it that well and I haven’t really looked at the top ten in terms of current rock ‘n’ roll or bought any of those records. My tastes generally lean towards people like Nick Cave and Leonard Cohen more than the modern neo-rockabilly sound. I got to tell you, there was actually an article on the Cramps that sort of sent me on a different road. They had been asked what they thought of the neo-rockabilly ‘cat’ bands—the Stray Cats, The Rockats, the Polecats, and all those ‘cat’ bands—and they said, ‘You can look like you’re from the fifties but that doesn’t mean that you get the same style or the same feel as the fifties.’ That kind of set my course into finding out more obscure artists in the fifties, but in a sense, I feel a little about the modern rockabilly scene that way. Where in a sense you can look like it but you’ll rarely ever catch what it was really like back in the day—not to put those bands down because there is always a validity in art and artists, it’s just that my tastes generally go towards a lot of different kinds of music. You asked me about the classical piano and I listen to that kind of music, sort of the romantic classical movement, along with jazz and gypsy music. But in truth, I still have a great fondness for early rock ‘n’ roll records.
Would you say from your early days to now with your latest record, has your vision for music been steadfast? Is the latest record a product of something that your younger self would have aspired to make?
Yeah, I think so. I think overall, I would agree with that. When I was younger it was primarily ‘50’s rockabilly but I was branching out even back in the day and listening to people like Chopin and Bach—and even Jackie Gleason records, you know?

DEX ROMWEBER WITH A SCREENING OF TWO-HEADED COW ON FRI., APR. 3, AT THE ECHO PARK FILM CENTER, 1200 ALVARADO ST., ECHO PARK. 8 PM / $5 / ALL AGES. ECHOPARKFILMCENTER.ORG. AND ON SAT., APR. 4, AT FINGERPRINTS RECORDS, 4612 E. 2ND ST., LONG BEACH. 4 PM / FREE / ALL AGES. AND WITH THE DOGHOUSE LORDS ON SAT., APR. 4, AT THE REDWOOD BAR AND GRILL, 316 W. 2ND ST., DOWNTOWN. 10 PM / CONTACT VENUE FOR COVER / 21+. THEREDWOODBAR.COM. THE DEX ROMWEBER DUO’S RUINS OF BERLIN IS OUT NOW ON BLOODSHOT. VISIT DEXTER ROMWEBER AT MYSPACE.COM/DEXTERROMWEBERDUO.

Noted in one biography for his ability to supply “hulking menace,” Sid Haig is one of cinema’s great heavies. He will be honored at a tribute screening at the Grindhouse Film Festival this month and will be programming some of his own favorite films as well. He will appear in person at the New Beverly tonight. This interview by Nolan Knight.

Thanks to the Captain Spaulding role in House of 1,000 Corpses, what does it feel like to be cast as an action figure?
I was really taken aback when it all first happened. I just didn’t know what to think of it. Now I’m extremely grateful and appreciative. I take care of that confidence that was placed in me, you know—that’s kind of drilled in to make the action figures. At this point I think I have ten different action figures!
After you did THX 1138 with George Lucas, were you asked to audition for any parts in Star Wars?
No. I don’t know why! But we had a good time together and it was a good experience but things just didn’t work out.
What was it like working with Lon Cheney Jr. on Spider Baby?
It was amazing. The first couple of days, I was just awestruck. As a kid, I used to go and see all of his films as soon as they came out. So to be able to actually work with him was great.
I was at the Wonder Women screening a while back at the New Bev and you were sharing stories of your time spent living in the Philippines, making movies. How long were you staying there and what was that time like in your career?
I first went there in ’69, I believe, to do The Big Doll House. That was pretty rustic, to say the least—downtown Manila in a little apartment-hotel kinda set-up—bare bones. There weren’t a lot of amenities around but the work was kind of all-consuming. And all-time-consuming. There wasn’t a lot of time for diversion. I had been back and forth so many times to do so many films over there—at one point I was down for six months straight, living in an intercontinental hotel in Makati, which at that point in time was like Beverly Hills—first class, all the way. When it was finally time for me to leave, I had been there so long that the staff threw me a party. It was pretty wild—not the party but the whole experience. It was good and I came back a couple of times after that—once to do Wonder Women and a second time to do Beyond Atlantis.
The Grindhouse Film Festival is having a tribute screening for you with Spider Baby and The Big Bird Cage—two Jack Hill classics. How did your relationship with Jack begin?
I did Jack’s student film at UCLA called The Host, which is actually on the backend of Switchblade Sisters. It’s a half-hour short. When you look at it, it’s something that actually could have been a Twilight Zone episode. It kind of has that feel to it, you know? They way that I actually got that job was he was having a hard time casting the role and so his instructor at UCLA, Dorothy Arzner, was a friend of one of my instructors at the Pasadena Playhouse. He called and said, ‘Can you send somebody over?’ And they sent me over. That’s part of my association [with Jack] that’s gone on for almost 50 years.
Do you see Jack Hill making another film and you being in it?
I certainly hope so. It’s time he did another film and it’s time we did another together.
You’re going to be programming some upcoming nights in March at the New Beverly Cinema, what are some of the films you’ll be screening?
Well, I don’t know exactly what films they have been able to secure—I gave them a list of like twenty different films. I know that we are doing Lawrence of Arabia, which is my all-time favorite film. The closing night we’re doing Pit Stop, a Jack Hill film, and Little Big Top, which is a film I did about three years ago—something I’ve always felt really passionate about—it’s one of those breakout roles that defies everything that I have done up to that point. It’s a character-driven drama with some light moments in it and I’m really proud of it. I believe the original House of Wax will also screen. I know they’re trying to secure Winchester ’73, which is one of my favorite westerns along with Ride the High Country. But I haven’t gotten the schedule yet, so I can’t really say besides those films what’s really going on.
Is it true that you are a certified hypnotherapist?
Yes, it sure is. A hypnotherapist is basically a behavior-modification specialist. A client will come to you and say that he or she has a problem that they want to correct and through direct access to the subconscious mind you help them get through that situation—whether it’s fear, phobias, anger management, or whatever the situation maybe.
Do you have any aspirations to direct film yourself?
Yes, I do. I’ve been close a couple of times to direct films—people have had no problem getting a party together. It’ll happen. I’m not a quitter.

SID HAIG IN PERSON WITH PAUL PICERNI PLUS HOUSE OF WAX AND THE THING FROM ANOTHER WORLD ON FRI., MAR. 27, AT THE GRINDHOUSE FILM FESTIVAL AT THE NEW BEVERLY CINEMA, 7165 BEVERLY BLVD., LOS ANGELES. 7:30 PM / $8 / ALL AGES. MYSPACE.COM/GRINDHOUSE. VISIT SID HAIG AT SIDHAIG.COM.

How did the concept behind the whole Post Punk Junk festival come together? How long did it take to track down most of these films?
Bret: At the Cinefamily, our Thursday nights are set aside for music-related films, and punk/post-punk was simply a subject that we had yet to cover. Funny enough, it was punk films that first really got me into the music, instead of the other way around. Concert films like “Urgh! A Music War”, and compilation tapes of old TV shows like “New Wave Theater” really set me off on the right path, as far as my music tastes go — they were my ultimate mixtape.To our knowledge, no other revival cinema in L.A. has done the full-on punk film retrospective treatment (at this point, you’d think that MOCA would’ve tackled it, at least.) You’d see it pop up in bits and pieces, but never in a concentrated way, and never with as much enthusiasm. For example, the American Cinematheque did “Urgh! A Music War” about two years ago, and it was truly awesome to see the thing projected twenty feet high, with the PA system cranked — but they showed the 90-minute theatrical version. What we’re doing this time around is showing the same 35mm print they did, but after the film’s over, we’re also screening all the material in the extended home video version that they cut out. We’re bringing an obsessive’s perspective to the material, a record nerd’s mentality — which is what we do anyway with all our other festivals.The films themselves weren’t difficult to find. Most of them were just a single email away. A lot of these filmmakers are still active, and have websites through which you can contact them directly, or have their works placed in underground film libraries through which you can rent them. I got in touch with the Target Video gang initially through their MySpace page! Again, it’s the enthusiasm that rubs off — you tell them how awesome you think their work is, and you tell them what your plans are for the whole fest — and they say “yes”. Simple. You just gotta have the right plans.
Are any of these films premiering at the Cinefamily?
It’s very difficult to tell, but some of them, like the 16mm shorts “Crash ‘N Burn” (on April 16th) and “Debt Begins At Twenty” (on March 26th) are at least having their first L.A. screenings in almost thirty years.
What night would you consider the must see based on rarity or pure enjoyment?
I’m biased, of course, since my favorite band in the world is The Fall — so the night I’m most shitting myself over is the “Two Films About The Fall” program, where we’re showing the recent BBC documentary covering the band, as well as a vintage ’80s doc called “Hail The New Puritan”, which covers ballet dancer Michael Clarke and his wacko collaborations with The Fall and other bands. In terms of rarity and enjoyment colliding, I’d have to go with the Target Video tribute night, where Target founder Joe Rees is gonna dust off footage that he himself hasn’t viewed in ages, some even transferred from ancient reel-to-reel videotape. I specifically asked him to gather stuff of bands on his master list that even I myself hadn’t heard of, so I know it’s gonna be a killer show for the thrill of discovery alone!
Do any of the films or clips expose the Los Angeles punk scene or is it primarily New York and U.K?
In the end, the fest ended up U.K.-centric, but that’s a reflection of the larger number of well-made films on the subject to come out of that part of the world. Also, with this fest, I consciously avoided a few American films which I thought were “usual suspects”, films I know everyone who’s interested in the topic has already seen. Also-also, since we’re getting such a great response to this fest, I can easily see us doing another one next year with a totally different line-up.
Can you give us any hints to what kinds of “rare nuggets” will be screened on Target Video Tribute Night as well as the Post Punk Junk Mix Night?
The Target night, ultimately, is in the hands of Joe Rees, so I can’t say for sure about that night, but Tom Fitzgerald, one of my co-programmers, has lined up a total wet dream session of rarities for the mix night, including clips from the Irish doc “Shellshock Rock” (covering the Belfast scene), films from the Neue Deustche Welle (German New Wave) scene, live footage of the Suburban Lawns (one of our favorite old L.A. bands), and the Japanese post-punk band P-Model playing live on what appears to be the set of a Far East version of The Gong Show!

POST PUNK JUNK WITH THE PUNK ROCK MOVIE MAR. 5, TWO FILMS ABOUT THE FALL MAR. 12, MADE IN SHEFFIELD MAR. 19, URGH! A MUSIC WAR MAR. 26, POST PUNK JUNK MIX NIGHT APR. 2, AND MORE AT CINEFAMILY, 611 N FAIRFAX AVENUE, LOS ANGELES. 8 PM / $10 / ALL AGES. CINEFAMILY.ORG.

For your upcoming Cinefamily event you’re screening István Szabó’s Lovefilm, a lesser-known Czech New Wave masterpiece. When did you see this for the first time and what aspects of it impacted you?
It’s actually Hungarian. Hungarians rock—such a beautiful language. I saw this maybe five or six years ago. I think it’s my favorite film. It has a beautiful structure—I won’t give it away—and it’s such a hard-to-pull of blend of totally personal autobiographical details and slivers of memories that have no apparent meaning—besides being undeniably true—and all set against the history of Hungary during the Second World War as it’s becoming part of the Soviet Union. Such a personal film—emotional and historical, the history of emotions maybe? And so quietly progressive in its filmmaking. The other great Hungarian that I frequent is Milos Foreman. Kind of a similar vibe—Loves Of A Blonde and Fireman’s Ball.
And you’re in Berlin right now—what’s that like?
It’s pretty amazingly grey. And so hard to figure out the history here. You feel it everywhere, but so much has been erased. Bombed. I love all things Weimar Germany, and I’m trying to see it in the older buildings and famous platzes, but it’s kind of hard to get at.
What does a normal Mike Mills day consist of?
Psychotherapy til noon, then a full day of calisthenics.
How did you come across the novel Thumbsucker and what made you want to bring it to the big screen?
My friend Bob Stephenson literally read the back—or a review—and thought it sounded like me. And he was right. Walter Kirn taught me a lot about my family—put things into words in a way I couldn’t and with a humor that made all the discomfort actually appealing. I wanted to make a film for a long time—because I felt so close to the main character, I felt like I had permission to try and direct this. It was something I knew about. And no, I don’t suck my thumb—but yes, maybe I should have.
What was the experience like filming in Japan for Does Your Soul Have A Cold? Is filmmaking abroad more strenuous?
Filming low budget in Tokyo is a little bonkers. I had a great time, but we had many two-hour packed subway rides while carrying all our stuff. I have a lot of friends in Tokyo, so it wasn’t as foreign as it should have been. The biggest thing to swallow was caring for and getting close with all these people struggling with depression. They were quite heroic in what they gave to the film—each one really wanted to help others like themselves—but as a director, that’s a heavy load to carry—all that responsibility. A little self promotion—that film really didn’t get it’s fair shake, but if you want to see it you can download it on iTunes! That’s the only way right now.
Where do you find the most creative freedom—music videos or feature films?
Each video and each film is it’s own beast. That’s part of what makes it so fun and so hard. It’s like living with someone that forgets who you are every morning and you have to start over. But don’t trust anyone who uses the term ‘independent film’—that’s largely a brand name propulgated by people trying to make money via ‘authenticity.’ On one level, a film is really just a bank loan, and the bank wants their money back. On the other hand, you don’t have to sell tickets to see videos or ads even, so weirdly, there can be a lot of freedom there. Ads are selling things, but making films is like trying to start Nike itself.
Your resume transcends many mediums. When an idea or concept strikes you, do you automatically assign it a medium or let it evolve into its own self?
Things are always evolving and overlapping. It’s really all the same concerns and issues coming out in different contexts. When I was a kid, a favorite TV show would also have a lunch box, a song, clothes, stickers, books—the same story and identification with a character spread across a small world of goods. I think I’m just replicating that.
Who are a few artists who currently inspire you and why?
Jeremy Deller—especially his folk archive thing. It’s so accessible and such a relief.
Having done graphic design for Subliminal and Stereo decks—along with Deformer featuring Ed Templeton—are you still active within the skateboard community?
I go to the monthly community meetings and I make sure to vote whenever an important issue comes up. To be honest, all the union rules are a drag, but you do it for the health insurance.
I read that you have a book on wildlife photography in Los Angeles underway—true or false? If true, how did this come about?
Yes—yes, it’s called Together and its about how we in L.A. live with the most wild of animals—mountain lions. It’s really about wildlife corridors. Places like bridges and horse tunnels where animals such as mountain lions can travel across freeways and around developments to re-connect different pieces of their increasingly fragmented habitat. It’s a very key issue right now—there are about ten lions in the Santa Monica mountains, but they are trapped by the 101 and 405. Unless something happens, and they can get access to more habitat to hunt and breed in a more diverse gene pool, they will become extinct in this area. While mountain lions scare us, they actually don’t want anything to do with humans. You’re more likely to die from lightning, bees or dogs than a lion in California. They are amazingly stealth, making their way around very populated areas—Brentwood, Tarzana, or the Getty—in the middle of the day while never being seen. If you want to learn more, the best meeting point for this issue is the South Coast Wildlands Project. I’ve been doing the book for years now with the photographer Takashi Homma. We trudge around in the bushes finding GPS points where collared mountain lions have been and taking pictures.
What is the current state of your graphic line Humans?
I’m super happy to say you can get a lot of it at Family now. I’m working on my fifth year-slash-line of posters and fabrics and stuff now. It’s been a dream come true for me.
What’s in store for you next?
If the gods are willing, I’d really like to make my next film.

FAMILY PRESENTS AN EVENING WITH MIKE MILLS AND LOVEFILM ON SUN., FEB. 8, AT CINEFAMILY AT THE SILENT MOVIE THEATRE, 611 N. FAIRFAX AVE., LOS ANGELES. 8 PM / $12 / ALL AGES. CINEFAMILY.ORG. VISIT MIKE MILLS AT MIKEMILLSWEB.COM.

1. Zombie Holocaust (a.k.a. Doctor Butcher M.D.) – This is a fan favorite over at the Grindhouse Film Festival that screens almost annually. With a tagline like, “He’s a depraved, homicidal killer… and he makes housecalls,” why the fuck not? Fun and gory—think Zombie meets a PETA-friendly Cannibal Ferox.

2. Beyond the Door – One of the better Eurotrash possession films to cash in on The Exorcist hype of the early seventies, this film combines itself thematically with Rosemary’s Baby and delivers a ‘better than you thought’ experience. Highlights go to the satanic doll sequence and the foul-mouthed butt-ugly daughter.

3. Maniac – Quite simply, William Lustig’s slasher opus. Joe Spinell (Nighthawks, The Godfather) redefines creepiness, taking the serial killer with mommy issues to a whole new realm. He makes Norman Bates look like a Jonas brother. The gruesome ending and infamous shotgun scene are a must-see.

4. God Told Me To … Kill – Larry Cohen (It’s Alive, The Stuff) truly outdoes himself with this one when random New Yorkers start killing each other and all blaming it on the man upstairs. Keep your eye out for Andy Kaufman in his first film role and don’t get up to piss—you might miss the man-gina.

5. The Beyond – “Behind this doorway lie the terrifying and unspeakable secrets of hell.” Lucio Fulci really takes you on a ride in this one. From the awesome intro to the WTF ending, if you’re a fan of his and haven’t experienced this yet, you’re in for a real treat.

6. Sisters – Siamese twins are usually twisted enough, but in the brain of Brian De Palma (Scarface, Body Double), that’s only the beginning. Margot Kidder shines in this horrifying tale of weirdness and murder. Smoke a doob and try to keep the shit inside your body.

7. Don’t Look Now – Nicholas Roeg (The Man Who Fell To Earth) really fucks with your instincts as he takes you into the strange underbelly of Venice, Italy, and forces you to experience a couple’s decline after the death of their only child. The shocking ending with Donald Sutherland will leave you happily freaked.

8. Autopsy – Stranger than your standard giallo, the film deals with random suicides, featuring a depressed pathologist who visualizes corpses in coitus and a racecar driver turned priest who’s out for vengeance. Throw in a score by Ennio Morricone (The Good, the Bad, and The Ugly) and you’ve got yourself a stunner.

9. The Sinful Dwarf – Wow. This Danish title really speaks for itself. But wait—it also involves girls lured into white slavery by mechanical toy poodles and various musical numbers by a drunken mother in a Chiquita costume. Only in Denmark.

10. Deathdream (a.k.a. Dead of Night)– Before Bob Clark set out to make A Christmas Story, he was hacking up shitty kids in horror films. When a soldier killed in Vietnam returns home as a zombie, he isn’t exactly met with a ticker-tape parade. An overt statement on the horrors of war and the disintegration of the American family, this one has its rough edges but overall is brutally gratifying.

11. Dolls – Next time your car breaks down in the rain, try not to seek refuge with magical toy makers who turn humans into evil dolls. Great death scenes that make Chucky look like “My Buddy.”

12. Night of the Demons – Teens and séance parties—when will they ever learn? This is a fun one with great special effects and over-the-top eighties fashion. I dug the FEAR sticker on their boombox and Linnea Quigley slutting it up is always a thrill.

13. The Devil’s Rain – A rampant group of small-town Satanists, lead by Ernest Borgnine and Anton LaVey, are using their evil powers to melt people’s faces off and the only one who can stop them is… William Shatner? If you thought Borgnine looked like a goat before, wait till you see this.

14. Abbott & Costello Meet Frankenstein – This one has it all—juggling comedy, horror, and romance in just the right way to make that ultra-rare and perfect cinematic experience. You get Bela Lugosi as Dracula, Lon Cheney Jr. as The Wolf Man, Glenn Strange as Frankenstein and Vincent Price as the Invisible Man. How can this not be loved?

15. Spider Baby – Before Sid Haig went on to immortalize exploitation cinema and land in the hands of Rob Zombie, he was a bug-eating inbred for Jack Hill (Coffy, Switchblade Sisters). A demented look at family and greed with an aged Lon Cheney Jr. standing out as the protective chauffeur-slash-guardian.

16. Last House On The Left – Pure sadism at it’s worst. The girls just wanted to score a little dope for the rock concert; the last thing they expected was to be kidnapped, tortured, raped, and killed at the hands of psychotic convicts. David Hess (Hitch-Hike) cements his status as cinema’s #1 sleazebag in this Wes Craven cult favorite.

17. Werewolf Woman – A mind-fucking Eurotrash featuring a woman who dreams of being a werewolf and goes out to hunt men, only to rip their throats out after using them for cheap sex. Check please!

18. Race with the Devil – Come hop in the brand new R.V. with Peter Fonda and Warren Oates as they journey into the countryside with their trophy wives for a vacation of dirtbike riding that quickly turns into a race for their lives after they witness a human sacrifice and black mass.

19. Daughters of Darkness – The DVD promises, “An erotic nightmare of vampire lust.” This is a very artsy and moody piece that succeeds at putting a new twist on the vampire genre as well as subtly tackling human sexuality. Also included on this Blue Underground disc is The Blood Splattered Bride—double score!

20. Black Candles – A Spanish film involving Satanism that includes virgins being raped by goats before they are sacrificed. ‘Nuff said.

21. The Prowler – Lawrence Tierney (Reservoir Dogs, Dillinger) and Farley Granger (They Live by Night, Rope) star in this underrated eighties slasher featuring a killer in WWII army fatigues out for blood at a college spring dance. Pretty sweet knifing to the face and shower scene.

22. House of Dracula – John Carradine takes a stab at Dracula as he and the Wolf Man set out to find a cure for their vampirism and lycanthropy. Mayhem ensues after the Frankenstein monster awakens, spawning a monster battle royale where only one will survive.

23. Taste of Fear – This is an excellent William Castle-produced Hammer Studios film with Christopher Lee that will keep you guessing all the way to the unpredictable ending. A cut above most Hammer films, this one keeps you at the edge of your seat and includes one of cinemas greatest drop-kicks.

24. The Conqueror Worm (a.k.a. Witchfinder General) – A brutal piece of cinema featuring Vincent Price as a witch hunter out to burn heretics at the stake or drown them into salvation. The violence is way ahead of its time and Price considered this to be his finest performance.

25. They Live – Roddy Piper is a nomad who stumbles across a pair of sunglasses that exposes the world for what it really is—a consumerized slave farm controlled by zombie-looking aliens. Heavy on its economic, political, and social overtones, this one also features one of the funniest bare-knuckle brawl scenes ever to be filmed.

Honorable Mentions (more common titles but always horrific): Demons, Near Dark, The Monster Squad, Freaks, I Spit on Your Grave, Susperia, C.H.U.D., Waxwork, Fright Night, She-Freak, Astro-Zombies, Re-Animator, The Living Dead at Manchester Morgue, The Hills Have Eyes, Deep Red, and Blood Diner.