Fred Burdsall
Fred Burdsall is an amusement park junkie living with his better half, Allison, and their 4 cats. You can find him in the Center City Borders looking for Doctor Who and zombie books.
Fred's Posts
Fred Burdsall | Staff Notes
We all have our own personal favorite "moments" or scenes from the movies. Something you see that shocks you or just etches itself inside your head and won't go away no matter how many years pass. For my girlfriend Allison (Picking up brownie points here) it's Richard Gere sweeping Debra Winger off her feet in An Officer and a Gentleman. I've compiled a list of MY personal favorite moments and I welcome your own contributions. There is no right or wrong here, and with that, let's go to...
Number 10: The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms
Get in line like everybody else.
Fred Burdsall | Staff Notes
Wow. Is it that time again already? Seems like it was just yesterday. Oh well, let's check and see what's in the bag for us this month. Ooh, I like this one.
A good low budget zombie film that is certainly not getting the credit it deserves. When it comes to zombie films, I'm all about the blood and guts. The more graphic the better, so the fact that this remains one of my top three favorite zombie movies despite an almost complete lack of blood says something.
Let's take a look back at Children Shouldn't Play With Dead Things!
It's late at night and egotistical stage director Alan (Alan Ormsby) and his band of abused actors have just landed on an island for a little voodoo ceremony. They make their way through the forest, past the cemetery, and finally stop at a deserted cottage. After breaking in, they begin to make themselves at home. Alan (wearing the most hideous looking pants in the history of film) opens the crate they've been lugging and tells them of his plan to summon the dead, who will, of course, then do his bidding. Somehow, I think not.
Fred Burdsall | Staff Notes
Fiend Without a Face first started out as a story that appeared in Weird Tales (possibly the best fantasy/horror fiction magazine ever) back in 1930 as "The Thought Monster" by Amelia Reynolds Long. The film's director, Arthur Crabtree, also gave us Horrors of the Black Museum in 1959.
A lone sentry on patrol hears a crunching, slurping sound in the woods and goes to investigate. A farmer out checking on his cows in the early morning is attacked and the sentry arrives seconds later to find a dead man and no sign of the killer. Official cause of death: Heart Failure. The Air Force wants to do an autopsy but his daughter, Barbara (Kim Parker), won't allow it and hands the body over to the local authorities.
The Adams farm comes under attack and the old couple die as horribly as Farmer Griselle did. The Air Force get control of the bodies and an autopsy shows they had their brains sucked out of their heads and that the spinal cord is also missing. Major Cummings (Marshall Thompson) checks in on Farmer Griselle's daughter and ends up in a fight with Constable Gibbons. Gibbons gets the mayor's OK to search the woods for the "mad G.I." and seconds after leaving his house the mayor meets the same fate.
Fred Burdsall | Staff Notes
Back before the dinosaurs died off (sometime around 1968), a little film called Mad Monster Party made its way to my local theater, and like any kid...I had to see it. So, armed with some cash courtesy of my parents, I marched in and was handed a clip-on button that simply read "The Green Slime Are Coming." I had no idea what that entailed, but if it's slimy and green...I'm there. It took an agonizing four weeks but one day the marquee read "Saturday at noon..The Green Slime." This was it, no turning back: Give me the worst chores you got, mom, cause I'm going to see The Green Slime, and I need money.
That being said, let me tell you all about it.
An asteroid is on a collision course with Earth--cue psychedelic late '60s rock from Richard Delvy and we are on our way. They blast it out of the sky and it falls on Jack Rankin (Robert Horton of Wagon Train fame) to do it. He's rushed off to Gamma 3, run by his former friend Vince Elliott (Richard Jaeckel). Apparently they had a falling out over Dr. Lisa Benson (played by Luciana Paluzzi, who real nerds know as Fiona Volpe from Thunderball) and an active member of Gamma 3. After quick hellos and some macho posturing, Vince asks to join the team and is welcomed aboard. Guess he didn't hear the chances of outrunning the blast are next to nothing.
Fred Burdsall | Staff Notes
What are you all doing out front of my house on a cold night like tonight? You want to hear about another movie from back in the day? Don't you have school or something? OK, I guess I can spare a few minutes to share another forgotten gem with you, but then it's straight to bed...for me, anyway.
I think it's safe to say that Linda Blair and I have pretty much grown up together, albeit on different sides of the camera. While I was toiling in the multi-media club in high school making movies for the classes she was in Hollywood making movies for the masses, but we were on the same ship. From the Exorcist movies, Born Innocent, Sarah T.--Portrait of a Teenage Alcoholic, Roller Boogie, Ruckus, Savage Streets, Night Patrol, all the way up to All is Normal...I've pretty much seen it all. Linda to me is one of those people that you don't know exactly why but for some reason you just like her. She always seemed like a person that has both feet on the ground despite her success and would be fun to hang out with. As you'll see later in the last picture on this article, she also has a heart of gold. But for now, let's look at a my favorite Linda Blair movie, released August of 1981...Hell Night.
Fred Burdsall | Staff Notes
Last time I looked back at Galaxy of Terror and this month I tackle my favorite Corman production: Forbidden World, directed by Allan Holzman and starring Jesse Vint, June Chadwick and the spectacular Dawn Dunlap.
Bounty hunter Mike Colby (Vint) is called to Xarbia to check out Subject 20, which was created in hopes of curing a galaxy wide food crisis. Too bad they didn't explain that to Subject 20. After an opening segment with Colby awakening from cryosleep to fight off raiders, he receives orders to go to Xarbia where he is met by Doctor Hauser (Linden Chiles) and Geneticist Barbara Glaser (Chadwick). They show him to the Biohazard chamber where he sees the remains of various animals killed when Subject 20 got loose. It has now cocooned itself in the incubator and despite Colbys insistance on destroying it, they convince him to sleep on it. While they go to dinner, Jimmy (Mike Bowen) is left to clean up the mess and after opening the incubator for a better look gets a faceful of Subject 20 for his trouble. (They NEVER learn)
Fred Burdsall | Staff Notes
If I were to make a list of my favorite directors it would look like this: 1. Alfred Hitchcock 2. Dario Argento 3. Ridley Scott 4. Lucio Fulci and 5. Roger Corman. Why Roger Corman? If you hand him half a mil and say "I need this pic by the end of the week"... he'll deliver. Let's see the almighty Spielberg do that. Roger Corman (article) is the king of making something for nothing and we are the better for it because his movies are what movies should be...FUN. I would love to see what he could do with a budget and a solid script, but that won't happen, so let's accept him as the low budget God he is.
The list of people who have worked for him is ridiculous. Nicholson, Scorsese, Cameron, Coppola and a boatload of actors who've all made a mark on the industry and they all learned how to do it from Roger. His adaptations of some Poe stories starring Vincent Price for AIP in the 60's are genre classics with The Fall of the House of Usher being a favorite of mine as well as The Tomb of Ligeia.
Fred Burdsall | Staff Notes
I know I said I was going to foam at the mouth about the Cinema God known as Roger Corman this month, but it's my column and I changed my mind. We'll talk Corman next month or two.
August 20-22 saw the 15th Monster-Mania Con take place at the Crowne Hotel in Cherry Hill, NJ. There are several around the NE portion of the US held under this name and in March and August they hit NJ and attract any number of sci-fi and horror fans all looking for that elusive big name autograph or, in my case, the not so big names. I love the chance to talk to the stars one on one, since the HUGE names never afford you that opportunity because they are the main focus and draw the fullest lines. If you want to meet up with unnamed "victim number four" in Friday the 13th Part V: A New Beginning, however, this is usually your chance.
Fred Burdsall | Staff Notes
Being a zombie movie fan, I've sat through some great ones (Fulci's Zombie) and some real junk like Children of the Living Dead, but no matter what I go into all of them with an open mind and hoping for the best. Is this the one that finally tops Fulci's or another one that causes my mind to wander and ponder life's great mysteries—like Freddie Prinze, Jr. having an acting career.
Fred Burdsall | Staff Notes
The town of Perfection, Nevada, is pretty much just that. Not a lot happens, only a dozen or so locals, the ideal life…as long as you don’t mind the graboids. Seems they like the ground under the town and the people above that populate it.
Let’s take a look at a great popcorn movie: Tremors.
Valentine and Earl (Kevin Bacon and Fred Ward) are tired of making small money as handymen in Perfection. Both dream of bigger money and decide to leave town. On the way back, they encounter Seismology major Rhonda (Finn Carter) who tells them about some of the strange readings she’s been getting. After packing, they head out, only to find the dehydrated body of town drunk Edgar sitting atop a power line. As they return to town with the body they discover Farmer Fred’s ranch decimated and a road crew soon meets the same fate.
With phone lines down and the only road out of town blocked by rockfall, the locals gather at Chang’s market where conspiracy theorist and survivalist Burt Gummer (Michael Gross) and his wife Heather (the ALWAYS incredibly hot Reba McEntire) check out a piece of the creature attached to the axle. Meanwhile, the frightening attacks continue and a plan is formed.
Fred Burdsall | FanFare Guests
On January 10Th 1967, ABC introduced us to The Invaders, alien beings from another world who have come to Earth to make it their world. David Vincent has seen them and now has to convince a disbelieving public the threat is real. Let’s see how it all began in the pilot episode, “Beachhead.”
Architect David Vincent (Roy Thinnes) is returning from a business trip. Tired and lost, he pulls over in the parking lot of a deserted diner to get some sleep. He wakes up to the shrill sound and bright red glow of an alien saucer landing in the clearing in front of him.
Fred Burdsall | FanFare Guests
Since his debut in the Bela Lugosi film White Zombie, our friend Zed has always been the idiot bastard son of the horror movie genre. He never receives any credit for being a loyal, quiet servant to the practitioners of voodoo. Willingly performing any task given to him, no job too is menial and no respect is afforded.
George A. Romero came along and gave the zombie a little more “bite” by making him a flesh-eating ghoul, but zombie films were still few and far between. (The fact that Night of the Living Dead is shown virtually uncut on TV after being banned in more countries than we even knew existed still cracks me up.)
Well, the zombie is finally enjoying the fruits of his labors because he has NEVER been more popular. It seems like a new zombie film or five is coming out every year, and while most of them are no-budget bloodfests, I see nothing wrong with that.
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