Sunday, October 5, 2008

Jeepers Creepers! TV Features!



About three Halloweens ago I did an article for Film Threat which was essentially a look at every made for television horror/thriller/suspense movie released in the month of October from 1970-1980. It became a huge undertaking and remains one of the articles that I am proudest of. They deleted my introduction to the piece (for space I assume because it was already very long), so I thought I’d post it here with a link to the actual article.

Enjoy!



Jeepers Creepers! TV Features

A Retrospective on classic Made for TV Halloween Horror Movies (1970-1980)

By

Amanda Reyes


Picture it – October, 1970. You’re a latch key kid not yet of age for the grindhouse circuit but old enough to appreciate the horrors of the night. The world still had eight years before John Carpenter would unleash his timeless classic, “Halloween”, which featured by the way, two kids totally engrossed in watching scary movies while lovely babysitters were being slaughtered across the street. That scene featuring little Lindsey Wallace (Kyle Richards) totally terrified of yet still absorbed in “The Thing” actually encompassed the same sort of passion I have with the genre. But like I said, it’s 1970 and there was no “Halloween” and horror hadn’t really gone mainstream yet. Still, the three networks understood the plus of exploiting exploitation. Sure they had to meet the confines of the censors, had to deal with smaller budgets and shorter timelines but working under those conditions produced a creativity that has endured over the last three decades. Some of the best small screen genre films came during that tumultuous decade, so this list will run from 1970-1980. READERS BEWARE: Reading this article may cause massive fits of nostalgia.

Click here to read the full article!


1 comment:

Craig Edwards said...

Awesome stuff - congratulations on being published by Film Threat!