Scare U

A couple, Ash and Linda, are driving to what they believe will be a romantic getaway at a cabin in the woods that Ash claims is deserted.  The cabin, we discover, once belonged to an archaeologist, Dr. Raymond Knowby and his wife Henrietta, who, while on an archaeological… mission of some kind, discovered the Necronomicon Ex-Mortis, the Book of the Dead.  Upon arrival, Ash finds a reel to reel recording of Dr. Knowby discussing his mission and reciting lines from the Necronomicon.  Harmless stuff, you’d think.  Harmless, that is, until Linda and Ash’s world starts coming alive, with evil spirits pouring out of every crack, crevice, and ditch.  When Dr. Knowby’s daughter Annie arrives, along with her lover, a pair of locals, and new pages from the Necronomicon, all are in for a rude awakening.  Fortunately, Ash is there, and proves mighty handy with a chainsaw and sawed-off shotgun.

Intro, Math Club, and Debate Society (spoiler-free) 00:00-27:00

Honor Roll and Detention (spoiler-heavy) 27:01-58:09

Superlatives (spoiler-heavier) 58:10-1:18:21

Director Sam Raimi

Screenplay Sam Raimi & Scott Spiegel

Featuring Sarah Berry, Denise Bixler, Bruce Campbell, Richard Domeier, Dan Hicks, Theodore Raimi, Kassie Wesley

Doug French is a writer, podcaster, speaker, and conference organizer who is preparing for artificial intelligence to put him completely out of work. And now that his last child has graduated high school, he feels like Chuck Noland at the end of CAST AWAY.  His latest project is "When the Flames Go Up," a podcast community he started with his ex-wife about the unique challenges of late-stage parenting. Whatever we thought we were preparing for, this isn’t it.  His favorite movie used to be “Brazil,” until it came true. Now it's “Adaptation.”

Our theme music is by Sir Cubworth, with embellishments by Edward Elgar.  Music from “Evil Dead 2” by Joseph LoDuca.

To read reviews from Eric & Doug’s first collaboration, Filmington (1999-2003), ⁠click here.

For more information on this film, the pod, essays from your hosts on our blog, and other assorted bric-a-brac, visit our website, ⁠⁠⁠⁠scareupod.com⁠⁠⁠⁠. Please subscribe to this podcast via Apple or Google Podcasts, Stitcher, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. If you like what you hear, please leave us a 5-star rating. Join our ⁠⁠⁠⁠Facebook⁠⁠⁠⁠ group. Follow us on ⁠⁠⁠⁠Instagram⁠⁠⁠⁠.

Newlywed couple Stefan and Valerie are traveling across Europe by train, bound for Belgium, then England, where they are to meet Stefan’s mother.  But when the train makes an unexpected stop, the couple decide to hang out for a while in a seaside hotel in the town of Ostend.  Fortunately, It’s winter, so they have their pick of suites. But why is Stefan so hesitant to call his Mother to tell her he and Valerie are married?  And who is this new visitor, one Countess Elizabeth Bathory and her secretary Ilona?  Whoever they are, they soon begin to fixate on the newlyweds. Meanwhile, a series of grisly murders of young women are taking place in neighboring towns, and during a trip to Bruges, Stefan shows a strange interest in a murder that’s just taken place. What do Elizabeth and Ilona have to do with the murders, and why are they so determined to befriend Stefan and Valerie?  And why do the hotel concierge and a retired policeman think Elizabeth looks exactly like someone they knew 40 years ago?

Intro, Math Club, and Debate Society (spoiler-free) 00:00-33:25

Honor Roll and Detention (spoiler-heavy) 33:26-1:08:17

Superlatives (spoiler-heavier) 1:08:18-1:23:41

Director Harry Kümel

Screenplay Pierre Druout, Jean Ferry & Harry Kümel

Featuring Paul Esser, Georges Jamin, John Karlen, Danielle Ouimet, Fons Rademakers, Andrea Rau, Delphine Seyrig

Carolyn Raship draws pictures and tells stories. She is an illustrator, writer, fine artist, and maker of comics who has written and directed theater and has written a short horror film based on Edgar Allen Poe’s classic tale, The Fall of the House of Usher. And she would like you all to know that she is currently in exile from her beloved Brooklyn. Check out Carolyn’s Patreon channel.

Our theme music is by Sir Cubworth, with embellishments by Edward Elgar.  Music from “Daughters of Darkness” by François de Roubaix.

For more information on this film, the pod, essays from your hosts on our blog, and other assorted bric-a-brac, visit our website, ⁠⁠⁠scareupod.com⁠⁠⁠. Please subscribe to this podcast via Apple or Google Podcasts, Stitcher, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.  If you like what you hear, please leave us a 5-star rating.  Join our ⁠⁠⁠Facebook⁠⁠⁠ group. Follow us on ⁠⁠⁠Instagram⁠⁠⁠.

Marrying into the wealthy Le Domas family, one-time foster child Grace thinks she’s going to have it all: a handsome, loving husband in Alex, all the amenities she desires, and of course, a loving extended family.  But, as one character says, the rich really are different.  The family invites Grace to partake in a ritual designed for all new members of the family.  It’s a formality, part of a bargain struck many years ago with a certain Mr. Le Bail.  If the Le Domas family doesn’t hold up their end of the deal, a horrible fate awaits them.  It all comes down to one card, what’s printed on that card, and whether Grace draws it or not.  Because if she does, terrible events will ensue, and the life she envisioned for herself might just explode before her eyes.

Intro, Math Club, and Debate Society (spoiler-free) 00:00-24:40
Honor Roll and Detention (spoiler-heavy) 24:41-58:12
Superlatives (spoiler-heavier) 58:13-1:19:59

Directors Tyler Gillett & Matt Bettinelli-Olpin
Screenplay Guy Busick & R. Christopher Murphy
Featuring Adam Brody, Henry Czerny, Nicky Guadagni, Elyse Levesque, Andie MacDowell, Mark O’Brien, John Ralston, Melanie Scrofano, Samara Weaving

Kim Burns and Ketryn Porter are best friends who host the podcast Kim and Ket Stay Alive… Maybe. Along with looking for any excuse to make the other one laugh, they are also positive that, if they found themselves in a horror movie, they’d be the ones to make it out alive. Each week they put that theory to the test, and often find themselves sorely mistaken. One of the girls tells the other about a horror movie she hasn’t seen, stopping at different points to ask what she would do to stay alive. Listen to Ket & Kim’s episode on Ready or Not.

Our theme music is by Sir Cubworth, with embellishments by Edward Elgar.  Music from “Ready of Not” by Brian Tyler.

For more information on this film, the pod, essays from your hosts, and other assorted bric-a-brac, visit our website, ⁠⁠⁠scareupod.com⁠⁠⁠. Please subscribe to this podcast via Apple or Google Podcasts, Stitcher, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.  If you like what you hear, please leave us a 5-star rating.  Join our ⁠⁠⁠Facebook⁠⁠⁠ group. Follow us on ⁠⁠⁠Instagram⁠⁠⁠.

A film studio focus puller moonlighting as a DIY pornographer, Mark Lewis has a problem.  And he’s not sure he wants to get rid of it.  You see, Mark has a certain kink, a turn-on:  he loves, gets off even, on the sight of women in fear.  Fear of death, fear of Mark, fear of the unknown.  His weapon is a film camera, and after he stalks and kills a prostitute, he films the police’s response to it, all in the name of creating what Mark calls a “documentary.”  At home, in the house his family once owned but now is filled with tenants, he soon meets 21 year old Helen, who takes a liking to the young man, intrigued by his mysterious ways.  Will this relationship be the thing to help Mark with his issues?  Will Helen, and her blind, intuitive mother, succumb to Mark’s bizarre predilections?  And where the hell did Vivian, the film’s lead stand-in, learn to dance like that?

Intro, Math Club, and Debate Society (spoiler-free) 00:00-22:47
Honor Roll and Detention (spoiler-heavy) 22:48-52:46
Superlatives (spoiler-heavier) 52:47-1:10:51

Director Michael Powell
Screenplay Leo Marks
Featuring Maxine Audley, Keith Baxter, Carl Boehm, Brenda Bruce, Shirley Ann Field, Pamela Green, Esmond Knight, Anna Massey, Martin Miller, Moira Shearer, Jack Watson

Mickey Boardman is a writer, socialite, philanthropist, and media personality. From 1993 to 2023, he served as an editorial director and wrote three columns for Paper magazine:  the “Ask Mr. Mickey” advice column, a body positivity column called “Fat and All That,” and the column “Reserved,” for which he interviewed fashion legends like Marc Jacobs, Michael Kors, and Virgil Abloh. His writing has also appeared in a little paper we like to call the NY Times. Mickey is also an active commentator on the New York social/fashion scene and has appeared as a cultural commentator, lifestyle expert, and fashion guru for networks like VH1, A&E, CNN, and E!.  He has also been recognized as one of New York magazine’s “Most Photographed Faces in New York” and voted by Fashion Week Daily as one of its Most-Invited People.

Our theme music is by Sir Cubworth, with embellishments by Edward Elgar.  Music from “Peeping Tom” by Brian Easdale.

Join our ⁠⁠Facebook⁠⁠ group. Follow us on ⁠⁠Instagram⁠⁠.

We begin in an asylum for the criminally insane.  A man in a straitjacket is hauled into the facility and thrown into a padded cell.  Visited by a psychiatrist, the man begins telling his story, while acknowledging that something awful is happening in the outside world.  We flash back: renowned horror writer Sutter Cane has disappeared.  Seeking to locate Cane, and collect his new novel, In the Mouth of Madness, the head of Arcane publishing, Jackson Harglow, hires crack Insurance investigator John Trent – a man with a nose for frauds and whose skepticism seemingly knows no bounds.  Trent has already run into a spot of trouble – after reading a couple chapters of Cane’s latest, Cane’s agent becomes an axe-wielding maniac, crashing through the window of a local café where Trent is dining.  The why, for now, is left unexplained, but as we learn, Cane’s novels have a strange, disorienting effect on its ‘less stable’ readers.  Trent and Cane’s editor, Linda Styles, head to Hobb’s End, New Hampshire, where they believe Cane is living.  Trent and Styles discover a place that seems almost too quaint to be real, and almost immediately, a terrible secret that upends Trent’s life as he knows it, and has major repercussions for Sutter Cane fans worldwide.

Intro, Math Club, and Debate Society (spoiler-free) 00:00-32:15
Honor Roll and Detention (spoiler-heavy) 32:16-1:07:24
Superlatives (so. many. spoilers.) 1:07:25-1:25:20

Director John Carpenter
Screenplay Michael De Luca
Featuring Frances Bay, Julie Carmen, John Glover, Charlton Heston, Sam Neill, Jürgen Prochnow, Wilhelm von Homburg, David Warner

Mary Wild is a 'Freudian Cinephile’ and pop psychoanalyst, creating content related to cinema, philosophy, and the modern cultural landscape.  She is the founder of the Projections lecture series at Freud Museum London, applying psychoanalysis to film interpretation, which has been running since 2012. She teaches film at City Lit and Picturehouse Cinemas, and has produced events for London Centre for Interdisciplinary Research, Picturehouse Cinemas, White Cube Gallery, and Morbid Anatomy. She also co-hosts Projections Podcast, contributes to The Evolution of Horror Podcast, and posts exclusive content on Patreon.

Our theme music is by Sir Cubworth, with embellishments by Edward Elgar.  Music from “In the Mouth of Madness” by John Carpenter & Jim Lang.

An American couple, Peter and Joan Allison, are traveling by train through Hungary when they’re told their cabin has been double booked.  Dr. Vitus Werdegast, a psychiatrist just released from eighteen years in a prison camp, soon joins them for the short ride to their destination – the same place Werdegast is going, he claims, to visit an old friend, along with his manservant, Thamal.  On their way into town, the bus that the four are in runs off the road, killing the driver and injuring Joan. They hike to the home of Werdegast’s former military comrade, one Hjalmar Poelzig, a renowned architect.  Poelzig’s home may be a modern masterpiece of construction, but it’s also built on the site of a World War I battlefield where thousands of Hungarians lost their lives, and where Werdegast was captured.  Now, having returned, Werdegast is ready to take revenge on the man he claims stole his life, and perhaps, his wife.  But Poelzig has his own surprises in store.  And by the time the Allisons realize what terrors await in Poelzig’s home, it may truly be too late for all of them.

Intro, Math Club, and Debate Society (spoiler-free) 00:00-28:41
Honor Roll and Detention (spoiler-heavy) 28:42-1:04:12
Superlatives (so. many. spoilers.) 1:04:13-1:27:07

Director Edgar G. Ulmer
Screenplay Peter Ruric, based on a screen story by Ruric and Ulmer, suggested by an 1845 story by Edgar Allan Poe
Featuring Egon Brecher, Harry Cording, Boris Karloff, Bela Lugosi, Lucille Lund, David Manners, Jacqueline Wells

Hope Cartelli and Jeff Lewonczyk are creative polymaths who’ve been deeply involved with New York’s independent theater scene for 15 years now, having worked as associate directors of Williamsburg's Brick Theater for nearly a decade, producing hundreds of shows and festivals.  They’ve created dozens of shows through their own theater company, Piper McKenzie, including horror-adjacent outings, especially through their "Bizarre Science Fantasy" series of silent, dance-theater works.  More recently, the two have been acting, directing, presenting, and entrepreneuring.  Hope is appearing in the ongoing stage soap opera It's Getting Tired Mildred (now in its eighth year), currently running monthly at the Kraine Theater in NYC’s East Village. She has also acted (alongside Jeff) in America Unanswered, a special video episode of the hit horror podcast Tell Me a Story: The True Life of Jakob Stanley.  Jeff is a writer and illustrator who’s published two short books: the art zine Better Bones, and the first installment of an ongoing serial, The Congress of the Monsters, with Book 2 coming out later this year.  Jeff also directed (and Hope acted in) a musical comedy written by William Peter Blatty, based on his screenplay for the 1965 film John Goldfarb, Please Come Home.

Our theme music is by Sir Cubworth, with embellishments by Edward Elgar.  Music from “The Black Cat” by Heinz Roemheld. For more information on this film, the pod, essays from your hosts, and other assorted bric-a-brac, visit our website, ⁠scareupod.com⁠. Please subscribe to this podcast via Apple or Google Podcasts, Stitcher, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.  

If you like what you hear, please leave us a 5-star rating.  Join our ⁠Facebook⁠ group. Follow us on ⁠Instagram⁠.

It’s Halloween 1968 in Mill Valley, Pennsylvania, a town best known for its Mill and its Valley.  Friends Stella, Auggie, and Chuck decide to take revenge on some local bullies, led by Tommy, who’s dating Chuck’s sister Ruth.  After removing his feces from the toilet to hand to Tommy, and throwing the requisite eggs at his car, the bullies track the friends to  a drive-in movie theater showing ⁠Night of the Living Dead⁠.  That’s when Stella, Auggie, and Chuck hop in the car of Ramon, a mysterious drifter who has come to their town to escape the draft.  Afterwards, the four make their way to a dilapidated home on the edge of town that once belonged to the wealthy Bellows family, who mysteriously disappeared shortly after the town’s titular mill shut down.  The Bellows’ daughter Sarah was, we learn, a prolific teller of stories who was hidden away in a cellar by a family hellbent on keeping a terrible secret at bay.

Intro, Math Club, and Debate Society (spoiler-free) 00:00-30:00
Honor Roll and Detention (spoiler-heavy) 30:01-1:02:58
Superlatives (so. many. spoilers.) 1:02:59-1:21:11

Director André Øvredal
Screenplay Dan Hageman & Kevin Hageman, screen story by Guillermo del Toro and Patrick Melton & Marcus Dunston, based on the books by Alvin Schwartz
Featuring Austin Abrams, Gil Bellows, Javier Botet, Zoe Margaret Colletti, Natalie Ganzhorn, Michael Garza, Troy James, Dean Norris, Gabriel Rush, Mark Steger, Lorraine Toussaint, Austin Zajur

Clay McLeod Chapman is the author of novels Ghost Eaters, Whisper Down the Lane, The Remaking, and miss corpus, story collections nothing untoward, commencement and rest area, as well as The Tribe middle-grade series: Homeroom Headhunters, Camp Cannibal and Academic Assassins. His new novel, What Kind of Mother, arrives on September 12, 2023. Other projects include Quiet Part Loud, a 12-part horror podcast series from Jordan Peele and Monkeypaw Productions, written by Chapman and Mac Rogers. Chapman’s story late bloomer was adapted into a short film, directed by Craig William Macneill. An official selection at the 2005 Sundance Film Festival, the short won Best Short at the Lake Placid Film Festival and the Brown Jenkins Award at the 12th Annual H.P. Lovecraft Film Festival. Their second short, Henley, based on the chapter “The Henley Road Motel” from Chapman’s novel miss corpus, was an official selection at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival. It won Best Short at the 2011 Gen Art Film Festival and the 2011 Carmel Arts and Film Festival. The Boy (SXSW 2015), a feature-length adaptation of Henley, co-written with director Macneill, was produced by SpectreVision (Elijah Wood, Daniel Noah, and Josh C. Waller) in 2015. In comics, Chapman is the writer of the Marvel series Scream: Curse of Carnage, and has written Absolute Carnage: Separation Anxiety, Iron Fist: Phantom Limb, Typhoid Fever, as well as for Edge of Spider-Verse and Venomverse, The Avengers, Amazing Spider-Man, Ultimate Spider-Man, American Vampire, Scream: King In Black, and ORIGINS among others. Chapman is the creator of the rigorous storytelling session The Pumpkin Pie Show. In the twenty years of its existence, it has performed internationally. He currently teaches writing at The Actors Studio MFA Program at Pace University.

Our theme music is by Sir Cubworth, with embellishments by Edward Elgar.  Music from “Scary Stories” by Marco Beltrami & Anna Drubich.

For more information on this film, the pod, essays from your hosts, and other assorted bric-a-brac, visit our website, scareupod.com. Please subscribe to this podcast via Apple or Google Podcasts, Stitcher, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.  If you like what you hear, please leave us a 5-star rating.  

Join our Facebook group. Follow us on Instagram.

An American research crew at a base in Antarctica finds they are not alone in the desolate, freezing landscape when a nearby Norwegian team accidentally awakens an alien presence that’s been frozen in the ice for a hundred thousand years. As the American crew determines just what the alien’s M.O. is, they are overcome by a creeping distrust, and the paranoid group slowly unravels as an unseen, deadly force runs rampant on the base.

After surviving a torrential Nor’easter that rips parts of his home and adjoining properties to shreds, Bridgton, Maine resident and graphic artist David Drayton, his son Billy and wife Steff notice a strange fog rolling in on the lake behind their house. After confirming that his boathouse was crushed by neighbor Brent Norton’s old tree, a source of old resentments, David gathers Billy and Brent into his jeep and heads into town for supplies.  Upon arrival at the  local supermarket, The Food House, into which half the town seems to have crammed, it becomes apparent that the mist is no longer on the lake:  in fact, it’s now is at the doorstep of the supermarket.  Inside the store, we meet a gaggle of characters:  Ollie Weeks and Bud Brown, the store’s co-managers; Mrs. Carmody, a god-fearing woman who’s convinced that Man has brought shame and disgrace upon the world; feisty old Mrs. Reppler, who’s not a fan of Mrs. Carmody; locals Jim, Myron, Hattie, and Ambrose; and Dan Miller, whose frantic first appearance in the store heralds the danger to come.  For there are terrors lurking in The Mist, the stuff of Hieronymous Bosch nightmares, monstrous beings that make even the act of venturing outside dangerous and deadly, and perhaps portend the coming of the apocalypse.

When Christine Brown, a young bank loan officer, must decide whether to grant a third extension on the loan of one Sylvia Ganush, who’s already defaulted on two – she’s in a real quandary.  She really wants that Assistant Manager position, and Stu Rubin seems to have the inside track with her boss, Mr. Jacks.  But Christine’s determined, and so, with all the heartlessness she can muster, she denies Mrs. Ganush the extension.  It’s a decision that will come to haunt her – for Mrs. Ganush curses Christine with the Lamia, an ancient goat spirit that makes Christine’s life a living hell.  The only solution:  the sacrifice of an animal, and giving away the cursed object. Will a kindly medium, Rham Jas, be able to help Christine?  Will the woman who met the Lamia years before, Shaun Sen Dena, be able to lend her expertise?  Will Christine’s psychology professor boyfriend Clay ever figure out what’s going on?  What will stop the spirit’s relentless assault, and put a button on Christine’s nightmare?
Intro, Math Club, and Debate Society (spoiler-free) 00:00-26:51
Honor Roll and Detention (spoiler-heavy) 26:52-53:53
Superlatives (so. many. spoilers.) 53:54-1:15:43