Life's span & blind death; new this week at the buffet…

Whenever we're in the production stages of an issue of c14, I tend to get a bit of tunnel vision and end up immersing myself in assorted things being featured in the issue. With #27, for example, I spent a whole month watching Blaxploitation films and listening to Steve Wilson-era Rancid Vat (the subject of Thee Whiskey Rebel's column) and Turbonegro's Party Animals. (It was reviewed twice, by Falling James & Alex Richmond, who also wrote a great travel piece for that issue centering around her pilgrimage to the '05 Turbojugend Astra Meeting.)

Of course, with the production of a new issue comes new things to immerse myself in so for the past month I've been watching Herschell Gordon Lewis films (in preparation for our upcoming BMB retrospective) and listening to Redd Kross (with the Kommandant, in preparation for his interview with Steve McDonald.)

I bring all this up here because this week's menu offerings are also partially inspired by the next issue - specifically Dante's Six Pack Sinema column about The Blind Dead. I was really trying to wait until the issue was done to delve into this quad-rilogy but after the third read-through, I caved in. Thus this week's review of the OG of Blind Dead flicks, Tombs Of The Blind Dead.

Also new to the BMB this week, the Kommandant explores a mysterious exploration into the mystery of life, Lifespan.

Cursed castles & knife-wielding kooks; new this week at the buffet…

The Kommandant returns to his Corman Corner to catch Rog's take on Edgar Allan Poe's demonic tale of the ungodly, The Fall Of The House Of Usher.

And Bunny is pleased to meet the acquaintance of a macabre story of two motorcycle-riding, knife-wielding, shiv-shaving, arm-twisting, chain-lashing, scalpel-flashing, acid-throwing, gun-shooting, bone-breaking, pathological nuts and their pal the undertaker… The Undertaker And His Pals.

Kung-fu killers & slashed strippers; new this week at the buffet…

Bunny attempts to measure up to the confounding kung-fu of For Your Height Only and meet the Challenge Of The Tiger; while the Kommandant bares all about the terrifying dance of death that is Stripped To Kill II.

If Jason still haunts you, you're not alone...

...but if you are alone, especially if you're alone in the dark, then look out! Cause that's when he'll try to kill you.

Jason Voorhees doesn't really kill anybody in today's installment of 2006: The Year Of The 13ths, Friday The 13th Part V: A New Beginning, but don't worry - plenty of people do live long enough to die horrible deaths at the hand of some dude in a hockey mask and that's what we're all here for.

Murderous madmen, gun-toting gangsters and extra-troubled teens; new this week at the buffet...

We were supposed to host an in-house photo shoot for Thee Minks' upcoming 7" this past Sunday but the lovely Miss Liz Lixx rescheduled us, leaving the Kommandant and I with a rare day off. We considered staying home and working on the next issue of c14, which is due to go to the printer at the end of the month - for about a minute. Instead we decided to go out for brunch and hit a flea market in Lambertville, NJ.

The Country Host tends to be a little pricey for our tastes, featuring a lot of vendors selling expensive "antiques" of questionable age, assorted forms of advertising paraphernalia and hand carved seating made of trees. It's usually fun for browsing purposes though and sometimes there are tables filled with cheap junk - which is much more up our alley than brass clocks in the shape of various animals, giant coca-cola signs and tree benches. (Those are actually kind of cool if you're into that type of thing.)

My browsing resulted in the acquisition of two vintage enamel flower pins and a stack of sleaze paperbacks; plus a pair of sunburned shoulders. It was looking like the Kommandant was going to walk away empty handed - which hardly ever happens, as there are dollar record bins at pretty much every flea market we've ever been to and he hasn't met a dollar record bin that didn't contain a piece of vinyl he thought he might like. But then he came across a cranky old dude overseeing table after table of dusty old VHS tapes.

They seemed to be cast-offs from a defunct Blockbuster so the wobbly tables were laden with comedies, chick flicks and children's stuff but he persevered and unearthed copies of Mighty Peking Man, a movie we've already seen but agreed we would watch again; Stripped To Kill II, a Roger Corman produced sequel to a mid-'80s slasher flick neither of us had ever heard of; and a movie we kept meaning to rent in order to review as part of our Decade That Dripped Blood column but never quite got around to it, Sleepaway Camp. (Oddly enough the three tapes together cost a dollar less than it would have cost us to rent any of them from our local video store.)

I've been wanting to see Sleepaway Camp since I watched a somewhat recent interview with Felissa Rose where she reflects on her role as sullen pre-teen camper Angela. (The interview was part of the extras section on Troma's Slaughter Party DVD, which I reviewed earlier in the year; I totally and unknowingly spoiled the whole plot of SC in the one sentence I wrote about it in said review, so don't read that if you wanna be somewhat surprised by the ending.) I must admit, it definitely lived up to my expectations of being one crazy f'ed up movie. Interested parties can read the Kommandant's thoughts on this most unusual slasher flick here.

Also new to the buffet menu this week is a double dose of darkly lit film noir-esque "krimis", Monster Of London City and Secret Of The Red Orchid.

Hillbilly hellcats and psychic sea sirens; new this week at the buffet…

We have two new additions to the menu this week, served with a side order of self-referential trivia. The side order will be served first:

Do you know which star of Voyage To The Planet Of Prehistoric Women has had her portrait painted by Alberto Vargas, is rumored to have had affairs with Elvis Presley and Howard Hughes (among other famous men), and is one of the most famous people to ever grace the pages of our humble magazine, carbon 14? Why it's none other than fabulous blond bombshell Mamie Van Doren! The interview was done by the equally fabulous and bombshell-y, but not blond, Justice Howard and appeared in issue #20, along with some stunning photos of Mamie taken by Justice.

Please excuse the plug by the way, but I couldn't help myself from mentioning it - it's one of our biggest interview coups ever, right up there with Thee Whiskey Rebel's Merle Haggard interview and Falling James' two part Jayne County interview. Anywhoo, I now return you to our regularly scheduled update.

This week Bunny has her eyeballs singed by a scorching double feature of crazed country carnality, Hip, Hot And 21 and Hot Thrills And Warm Chills; while the Kommandant travels to a world where the women are beautiful and the men are spliced in from another movie, Voyage To The Planet Of Prehistoric Women.