Top 7 Saw Traps
“If it’s Halloween, it must be SAW” There was a time when these words rang true. Saw, 2004’s “little ‘torture porn’ flick that could,” made over $100 million worldwide on a $1.2 million budget,...
Author: Mr Alarm
Ghastly Gems: Werewolf of London (1935)
Forgive the pun, but Werewolf of London is a strange beast of a film. It preceded the much more well-known The Wolf Man by six years and established a fair amount of mythology that we...
Ghastly Gems: Phantom of the Opera (1943)
After a solid run, the Universal monster series of movies suffered its first notable dud with the 1943 remake of 1925’s The Phantom of the Opera. In case you forgot, I considered the 1925...
Top 7 Universal Monsters
Having written about at least one movie featuring each of the most famous Universal monsters, Ghastly Gems has hit something of a crossroads. Before moving onto sequels, spin-offs, and other monster-related oddities, let’s start...
Ghastly Gems: Creature from the Black Lagoon (1954)
Once again, we skip ahead to a new decade to look at one of the more unique “core” Universal monster movies: 1954’s The Creature from the Black Lagoon. In the mid ‘50s, American moviegoers...
Ghastly Gems: The Wolf Man (1941)
Even a man who is pure in heart, and says his prayers by night; May become a wolf when the wolfbane blooms and the autumn moon is bright. This iconic poem is...
Ghastly Gems: Bride of Frankenstein (1935)
OK, I know I said I’d save sequels for later, but I’ll cheat just this once, because the film is so significant (and technically introduces a new monster). 1935’s Bride of Frankenstein is the...
Ghastly Gems: The Invisible Man (1933)
Just two years after James Whale changed the landscape of horror cinema with Frankenstein, he directed The Invisible Man for Universal in 1933, where he would focus on revolutionary special effects and subtle psychological...
Ghastly Gems: The Mummy (1932)
1932’s The Mummy is a difficult film for me to revisit, as it was the first I distinctly remember being (very) disappointed by. As a child, I was obsessed with movie monsters as well...
Ghastly Gems: Frankenstein (1931)
Released the same year as Dracula, Frankenstein marked a pivotal moment for the then-budding horror genre. In sharp contrast to Dracula’s purely malevolent vampire, the central monster in Frankenstein is almost entirely sympathetic. While...
