In this illustrated lecture, Japanese cinema expert Jasper Sharp leads us into the feverish world of ero guro nansensu, a term abbreviated from the English “erotic grotesque nonsense” that first entered common parlance in Japan in the 1920s, when it was applied by reactionary cultural critics to a group of writers who traded in detective, horror, and mystery fiction with an emphasis on deviant sexuality, the irrational, and the bizarre. Most influential of these was Edogawa Rampo (1894-1965), whose very name, conjured from the Japanese syllabary in homage of his literary model, Edgar Allan Poe, highlighted the true threat of this new cultural wave: it’s overseas origins. The alienness of ero guro from Japan’s cultural traditions and its popularity with the masses saw it increasingly viewed as a threat by nationalist and conservative voices during the late 1920s and 1930s, and proponents soon fell victim to the repressive state censorship of the wartime years. However, in the more relaxed climate of the postwar decades, a focus on a decadent and perverse sexuality, and the altered states of the physical body as a metaphor for the national body saw this seductive tension between the outlandish and the homegrown, the horrific and the ludicrous given full vent. Sharp will explore the page, stage and screen manifestations of a term that has come to embody more an ethos than a genre, looking at, among other things, the impact of the avant-garde theatre and the modern Butoh dance movement on the work of Ishii Teruo (Shogun’s Joys of Torture; Horrors of Malformed Men) in the 1960s, the role of voyeurism and the shock of new and foreign cultural forms in Watcher in the Attic (1976), and articulations of the monstrous and the carnivalesque in the underground animation Midori: The Girl in the Freak Show (1992).

A representation of crossing bodily and social boundaries, cannibalism exemplifies transgression. If it provokes revulsion in theory, then its enactment on screen is truly affecting, tapping into a deep horror. Drawing from my long-term project, ‘Man-Eater: Cannibal Women in Contemporary Visual Culture’, introduced in The Atlantic and the peer-reviewed Australasian Journal of Popular Culture, this lecture focuses on women cannibals in films from the past fifty years. These women devour – sexually, metaphorically and, sometimes, literally. Their excessive physical hunger, often tied to unrestrained sexual desire, disturbs the idea that they are objects, empty vessels to be filled. But these women cannot (or will not?) deny or contain their urges. The type of the cannibalistic woman can be found in stories throughout history – Lilith, the Sirens, Snow White. But she is of particular interest right now by capturing ever-present social anxieties about the tense and endlessly complicated relationship between gender, hunger, desire, sex, autonomy and power. The characters in these films negotiate and subvert expectations for how women should look and behave. Drawing in particular from the legacy of the femme fatale, many of them actively deceive the men they intend to eat, using their beauty to seduce and then devour. They reflect the dangers of the female body, taken literally and to the extreme – mouths that swallow, teeth that bite, nails that tear. The presence of this type in cinema provokes an exploration of the idea of boundaries, interrogating distinctions between self and other, inside and outside, touch and penetration. In their pursuit of complete incorporation, these women reduce humans to their physical qualities, treating bodies like meat, provoking an experience of abjection which forces the question of what it means to be human. Examples in this lecture are drawn from a lineage of women cannibals on screen, across a diverse range of roles: Mothers (Flesh Eating Mothers 1988; Parents, 1989; Macabre, 2009); Demons (Jennifer’s Body, 2009); Mermaids (The Lure, 2015); Women with a family curse (Frightmare, 1974; Raw, 2016); Cult members (Cannibal girls, 1973; The Perfume of the Lady in Black, 1974; We are what we are, 2013); Club-members (Femmine Carnivore, 1970; Madam Yankelova’s Fine Literature Club, 2017); Scientific test subject (Trouble Every Day, 2001); Autocannibal (In My Skin, 2002); Youth-seekers (Dumplings, 2004); Fame-seekers (Neon Demon, 2016). Though it is for a variety of reasons, the women in these films actually eat people, narrowing the focus from a much broader range of types, like vampires, werewolves and zombies.

Alan Moore reports that, through researching his latest adaptation of Lovecraft’s life and work, Providence, he “became more fully acquainted with academic literary criticism.” The extensive evidence of research throughout the series supports this claim. In this talk, scholar Matt Green argues that Providence uses the comics form to assert the value of humanities research, and of the arts more broadly. The comics series educates its audience in reading and research practices (some of which are more providential than others). Green’s focus– like Moore’s and, arguably, like Lovecraft’s — is on the relationships between imagination and the historical realities of readers; the discussion maps Moore’s reworking of Lovecraft onto current political turmoil in Britain and the US via Moore’s underlying premise that we can trace the origins of our contemporary moment through the societal anxieties encoded in Lovecraft’s fiction. The analysis combines key concepts from adaptation studies, comics studies and postmodern theory to help us understand the way in which Providence uses the comics medium to put into practice Moore’s hopes concerning the world-altering potential of art and scholarship. Put differently, Green will be discussing some of the less obvious ways in which Lovecraft has been deployed by one of Britain’s most prolific contemporary magicians. Advance Recommended Reading: Providence by Alan Moore and Jacen Burrows

*Note this class is on a Monday, not our usual Thursday, due to our visiting instructor’s travel schedule! Prepare yourself for a snowstorm of malevolent miners, ravenous rats, killer sex-slugs and ZED (not ZEE)-grade zombies: all this and much more can be found in the frosty annals of Canadian horror movie history. Oh, and there’s some Cronenberg in there too, of course. Canada got into the horror game late, and even then started slowly, but by the beloved and despised tax-shelter years of the 70s and 80s the country more than made up for its initial delinquency. Movies by the dozens were being turned out: during the peak years of Canadian moviemaking, more films came out of Toronto than they did Hollywood, and a great percentage of these were horror pictures. Monsters and maniacs, scientists and shamans, Leslie Nielsen disco dancing and John Candy rolling around in his underwear: Canadian horror delivers more of what you want. This lecture will bring the audience through the development of this genre in Canada, including behind-the-scenes peeks into the making of the movies; personal stories of the makers and stars; scandals and controversies associated with them; and the political gamesmanship behind the development of the Canadian commercial film industry. Never a dry recitation of facts, the talk describes a wild tapestry of high drama and crazy incident, with characters from David Cronenberg to Lawrence Zazelenchuk: a sort of Easy Riders, Raging Bulls with a much more specific focus and a lot more plaid flannel shirts. This rollercoaster ride through history will be capped by a snapshot of the state of things today, and we may even take a guess as to where things will go next. A question and answer opportunity at the end ensures that any remaining bafflements will be addressed. Accompanying the lecture will be mind-twisting clips from movies like The Mask (Canada’ first horror feature), The Corpse Eaters (its cheapest), Shivers, Black Christmas, Rituals, and Spasms. Lecturer Caelum Vatnsdal is a filmmaker and writer from Winnipeg, Canada; the author of The Came From Within: A History of Canadian Horror Cinema, he is currently in the process of turning his book into a feature-length documentary film.

This class will explore the German krimi film, or Kriminalfilm, a genre of West German crime thrillers inspired by the novels of British mystery writer and King Kong creator Edgar Wallace. Began in the late ‘50s with Der Frosch mit der Mask (The Fellowship of the Frog, 1959), made in partnership between Danish production company Rialto Films and West German distributor Constantin Film, krimi films somewhat made up for the lack of a robust postwar national horror cinema in Germany. Though the krimi are not strictly horror films, they feature a madcap blend of genres: horror, crime, mystery, and police procedural, with elements of fantasy and science fiction, resulting in an often surreal mashup of genre tropes. The popularity of these films led to dozens being produced throughout the ‘60s, with 32 films in the official Rialto series and more spin offs from other production companies. In general, these films follow a simple format inspired by the crime serial of silent filmmakers like Louis Feuillade: a detective, generally from Scotland Yard, is hot on the trail of a criminal mastermind and must wade through an outlandish sea of potential suspects. Often, the antagonists are masked or costumed members of a criminal conspiracy whose motivations are sex, drugs, blackmail, or cold hard cash; sometimes the krimi plots take on a more gothic cast and feature revenge, dark family secrets, and madness. Red herrings and fake identities abound, and many of these films borrow from literary “locked room” mysteries, where the crime committed seems physically impossible, or follow a similar format as future slasher films, where characters in a fixed location are killed off one by one. With their lurid violence and macabre humor, and shadowy, fog-drenched sets in an imaginary London or in spooky castles replete with secret passageways, the Kriminalfilm is an important but relatively unexplored subgenre. Perhaps this neglect is due to the death of home video releases for English language audiences, but the krimi represent a vital stepping-stone: they are effectively the bridge between German Expressionism and film noir, and later horror subgenres like the Italian giallo film and Eurohorror of the ‘70s. This class will explore the importance of the krimi as a stepping-stone, while also examining the evolution of the series and its relationship to and influence on the horror genre. Though they retained common themes and shared stock characters—often embodied by beloved cult actors like Christopher Lee and Klaus Kinski—krimi plots would become increasingly lurid and pulpy as the series wound to a close in the late ‘60s and early ‘70s, directly influencing the Eurohorror of the ‘70s.

Cinema has long tapped into the fundamental devices of fear in its employment of sound. Even before the advent of the loudspeaker and synchronized motion picture sound, organs and pianos collided tense sonic energy against images in the physical spaces of film exhibition parlors and nickelodeons. As humans, the audible sliver of the frequency spectrum provides a unique window into concepts of how energy and vibration physically manifest and affect the matter of our material world. After all, sound is simply vibrational energy we can hear. How we’ve arrived at organizing frequencies into the form of modern music is a mystery itself, dating back 5,000 years and involving ‘sky god visitors’ who bestowed humanity its system of measurement. Understanding our physiological experience of sound and its relation to our universe can illuminate and unlock a deeper understanding of the design of sound and music for the motion picture. Journeying through concepts of cymatics, standing wave levitation, musical tunings, as well as film examples, demonstrations, and dissections of modern mix sessions, The Frequency of Fear guides its participants through an awakening in understanding the spiritual power of sound both onscreen and beyond. ++++ Dean Hurley’s first installment of the library-style Anthology Resource series showcases his original ambient music contributions featured in Twin Peaks: The Return‘s very distinctive-sounding third season. Listen at the link below. https://deanhurley.bandcamp.com/album/anthology-resource-vol-1 ++++ The Cinema Arts Centre (CAC) is Long Island’s premiere, year-round, independent and international film showcase and its leading 501(c)3 not-for-profit community cinema. Located on Long Island’s North Shore, just an hour from Manhattan, the CAC is unique in scope and programming, with three state-of-the-art theaters, including a main theater holding nearly 300 seats. Founded by Vic Skolnick, Charlotte Sky and Dylan Skolnick in 1973, the CAC has over 10,000 members and serves approximately 150,000 individuals each year.

The Miskatonic Institute is pleased to welcome filmmaker, collage artist, sculptor and performer Penny Slinger to our LA branch for an exclusive, in-depth conversation about her dark surrealist work in multiple mediums, moderated by filmmaker and Miskatonic NYC co-director Jacqueline Castel. In 1969 Slinger created her student thesis on the collage art of Max Ernst, which was a combination of written text, film and original collage work. “Having discovered the magic of surrealism,” she later wrote, “I wanted to employ its tools and methods to create a language for the feminine psyche to express itself. The kind of language that dove into the subconscious for images and wantonly combined them into situations and relationships that were both confrontational and expressive.” It was the beginning of an artistic identity that, while always evolving, frequently addressed themes of interior space, body horror, female sexuality and psychosis. Penny’s work – from with her early student short films and first book of collage art, 50% The Visible Woman to her collaborations with filmmakers Peter Whitehead (Lilford Hall, 1969) and Jane Arden’s Holocaust Theatre troupe (culminating in the feature film The Other Side of the Underneath, 1972), and her masterpiece of psychic trauma, the collage art book An Exorcism (1977) – was the spark for a new mode of surrealism focused on the female experience that would have ripples throughout the film and art worlds, though it would take many years for her pioneering influence to be acknowledged – something that has recently been rectified with Richard Kovitch’s illuminating documentary feature Penny Slinger: Out of the Shadows (2017).

This lecture explores the rich narrative universe of The Thing, using its various iterations to examine the multi-platform and serial nature of contemporary genre storytelling. While John Carpenter’s 1982 film remains the best-known (and most widely celebrated) version, the tale of the eponymous alien ‘thing’ which invades and imitates its host body has its origins in a 1938 novella (John W. Campbell, Jr.), which was adapted in two other films (Christian Nyby, 1951; Matthijs van Heijningen Jr, 2011). The Thing’s world has been further expanded or altered through comic books, video games, fan fiction and fan-made videos, novelisation, theme park attractions, and ancillary merchandising. These numerous story extensions, spin-offs and retellings contribute to a broad narrative which spans decades in terms of production and centuries in its fiction, frequently crossing or confusing boundaries of space, time, and occasionally genre (for example, from science fiction to Carpenter’s film as an example of 1980s’ body horror). Transmedia storytelling allows for the creation and consumption of an entire narrative universe across various formats, with each text contributing to and enriching its universal whole. Simultaneously, individual entries into these wider story worlds are self-contained, allowing for their enjoyment as a singular text (Jenkins 2008: 97-98). However, transmediality can confuse categorisations of cinematic ‘multiplicities’ (sequel, prequel, remake, etc.) and the definition of one text solely by its connection to another. In the case of The Thing 2011, for example, which purports to be a prequel to John Carpenter’s film, it can be seen in many ways to more closely resemble a remake. Despite narrative and visual details which anticipate the events of Carpenter’s film, placing it in a clear position of ‘beforeness’, much of it plays out as a recreation of the 1982 film. Within a wider culture of adapting and recycling in genre cinema, remakes—like sequels, prequels, reboots or spin-offs—are becoming increasingly difficult to exhaustively define, and to clearly distinguish from many other forms of filmic adaptation – including prequels and sequels. In a way reminiscent of the alien subject at its heart, which copies, transforms and mutates as its virus spreads, The Thing illustrates the way in which intricate and complex ‘worldbuilding’ can occur through the introduction of new narrative instalments across multiple media platforms. But it also highlights the impossibility of exhaustively defining categories of adaptation and serialisation. Ultimately, this lecture does not strive to resolve these complexities, but rather to identify the theoretical considerations raised by transmedia genre storytelling within a wider culture of recycling and adaptation.

For decades, Mexican fantasy and horror cinema hid in the shadows; wearing a luchador mask, surviving budgets tainted by economic gloom, holding vampires with a nylon thread, receiving the scorn of near-sighted critics and consumption by audiences sunk into tongue-in-cheek appreciation. But things have changed. Over the past two decades there has been a clear rise in the amount, quality and risk found in Mexican horror and fantasy cinema. It is not by chance that today, in the midst of a horrifying reality, Mexican genre films enjoy popularity, freedom and sometimes, profitability.  As if that were not enough, our beloved national genre warrior – Guillermo del Toro – has recently been knighted by Hollywood. Join us for a scenic tour of Mexican genre cinema guided by Morbido Fest’s head programmer, Abraham Castillo Flores. Delving beyond luchadores and psychotronica, Abraham unearths the monsters that fomented a distinctive but barely acknowledged corner of our cinematic consciousness. We will revisit the origins of Mexican fantasy and horror cinema and examine its development through the 20th Century and the start of the 21st.  Along the way we will meet the filmmakers and performers responsible for these celluloid nightmares. Some of these films can be questioned but rest assured, anything they lack is compensated by their sheer honesty and passion. In parallel we will dissect national legends and traumas that have been continuously reinterpreted by our national filmmakers that stand as a reaction to the tragic reality that Mexico is now experiencing. Who would have thought that stories filled with wailing legends from our pre-Hispanic past, starved female vampires, Aztec mummies, monk ghosts, child practitioners of the dark arts and tropicalized sci-fi Queens, would become part of our cultural heritage? Photo courtesy of the Collection of Fundación Televisa