How I Became A Fan
I was super into dinosaurs as a kid. I might have the year wrong but there was some sort of TV Special about dinosaurs with Christopher Reeve around 1986. The special was mostly about the t-rex but it showed a lot of clips of dinosaurs from various sci-fi and horror movies. Honestly, it was pretty awesome. There was one clip though, that really stood out and I had to see this movie:
The fight scene between King Kong and the T-Rex. I was captivated, the fight was awesome and as a kid into dinosaurs, beating a T-Rex was no small feat.Unfortunately, this was the 1980s and VHS was still relatively a new medium. So my parents checked the various video rental places around us but sadly there was no King Kong to be had. We did eventually find that film and it was as awesome as I had imagined it would be. But before finding it I came across this VHS at a store one day and I was intrigued by it.
King Kong vs. Godzilla was the first time I had seen a kaiju film. My parents agreed to purchase this for me. I actually kind of shudder to think what this cost at the time, VHS were not cheap at all. This was the craziest thing I had seen to that point in my life. These giant monsters were trashing cities and duking it out. It was awesome and I was instantly a Godzilla fan. Over the next few years, I probably rented every single one of the Godzilla movies or saw them on TBS Super Scary Saturday Show. Kaiju were definately my gateway drug into the sci-fi and horror genre.
Then I discovered Mystery Science Theater 3000 probably around 1994. For those that haven't seen the show. Mad scientists would shot poor janitorial staff into space and then force them to watch old B movies. Joel and Mike along with their robot friends would watch the movies and make fun of them while watching. This introduced me to an entire world of weird and bad movies. Attack of the Giant Leeches, The Brain That Wouldn't Die, Gamera, etc. I was hooked. I thought the show was hilarious and I enjoyed the weird and low budget movies they spent the entire episode mocking.
Since MST3K has gone off the air, I still enjoy Rifftrax but I also enjoy finding old bad movies. There is nothing more glorious to me than wandering through the Amazon, Hulu or Netflix catalog and finding some gem from the 50s or 60s that I have never seen before. I honestly prefer watching these movies to the modern Hollywood blockbuster.
My main purpose for this blog is to share my love and passion for these films. I talked about in my first post about what time frame I am thinking about covering. I think Scream is going to be my unofficial cut off for this. I am guessing the vast majority of the films I talk about will be from the 50s and 60s but there are a lot of films in the 80s I want to eventually get to. To me, Scream is where a lot of horror films became self aware. There are a lot of modern day B films trying to recreate the old stuff but I tend to find they fall flat. They come off like they are trying a little too hard for my taste. But I might eventually review some of those films and try to give them a fair shake.
The fight scene between King Kong and the T-Rex. I was captivated, the fight was awesome and as a kid into dinosaurs, beating a T-Rex was no small feat.Unfortunately, this was the 1980s and VHS was still relatively a new medium. So my parents checked the various video rental places around us but sadly there was no King Kong to be had. We did eventually find that film and it was as awesome as I had imagined it would be. But before finding it I came across this VHS at a store one day and I was intrigued by it.King Kong vs. Godzilla was the first time I had seen a kaiju film. My parents agreed to purchase this for me. I actually kind of shudder to think what this cost at the time, VHS were not cheap at all. This was the craziest thing I had seen to that point in my life. These giant monsters were trashing cities and duking it out. It was awesome and I was instantly a Godzilla fan. Over the next few years, I probably rented every single one of the Godzilla movies or saw them on TBS Super Scary Saturday Show. Kaiju were definately my gateway drug into the sci-fi and horror genre.
Then I discovered Mystery Science Theater 3000 probably around 1994. For those that haven't seen the show. Mad scientists would shot poor janitorial staff into space and then force them to watch old B movies. Joel and Mike along with their robot friends would watch the movies and make fun of them while watching. This introduced me to an entire world of weird and bad movies. Attack of the Giant Leeches, The Brain That Wouldn't Die, Gamera, etc. I was hooked. I thought the show was hilarious and I enjoyed the weird and low budget movies they spent the entire episode mocking.
Since MST3K has gone off the air, I still enjoy Rifftrax but I also enjoy finding old bad movies. There is nothing more glorious to me than wandering through the Amazon, Hulu or Netflix catalog and finding some gem from the 50s or 60s that I have never seen before. I honestly prefer watching these movies to the modern Hollywood blockbuster.
My main purpose for this blog is to share my love and passion for these films. I talked about in my first post about what time frame I am thinking about covering. I think Scream is going to be my unofficial cut off for this. I am guessing the vast majority of the films I talk about will be from the 50s and 60s but there are a lot of films in the 80s I want to eventually get to. To me, Scream is where a lot of horror films became self aware. There are a lot of modern day B films trying to recreate the old stuff but I tend to find they fall flat. They come off like they are trying a little too hard for my taste. But I might eventually review some of those films and try to give them a fair shake.
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