Halloween Hangover 2014

I've been a terrible horror blogger this Halloween, I think I have a couple good reasons though. Between two horror photoshoots, acting in a short film on Denman Island, Thanksgiving, The Rio Grind Film Festival and going to The Show From the Crypt I've been a bit busy. Need proof? Here are some photos:

 We'll start with photos from my ghastly shoots with BD MacDonald Photography, make-up by Erin Geer.

 

 

People Who "Don't Like Horror Movies"

Whenever I tell someone that I love horror movies often they will say something along the lines of "Really? Personally I don't like horror movies." Yet if we end up really discussing it, they usually reveal that the blanket statement they made is not all that true. I only started noticing this trend as recently as this summer when my mother visited and she agreed to come to The Conjuring with me when she realized it wasn't a gory movie, but a ghosty movie. Apparently all this time that I had thought she hated all horror, it was just the blood and guts she wasn't a fan of, ghosts and demonic possession were a-okay for her. Heck she even enjoyed the movie.

Horrifying Birthday Wishes

Everyone gets a heaping pile of facebook messages on their birthday, I decided to make mine a little more interesting by asking people to share with me their favourite horror movie and why it is their favourite, so here are their anonymous responses (I will update it throughout the day as more come in):

-My favorite horror is house of the devil because it is retro styled, well paced, has a cult, is a devil baby movie, and is low budget but high value!

-House on Haunted Hill was a fun one just because it was simple, uncomplicated ghost stuff. Behind the Mask and Dogsoldiers were also awesome, for reasons you know.

-I don't have a favorite horror movie and you know that. You know I have to always cover my eyes, even when watch the B list ones.

-Insidious (the first one) had the ability to make me jump whilst I was watching it on a plane on a tiny screen. Not baaad I'd say! I also thought that The Children was fabulous... although I doubt you'll have seen that as it's British.  (Ariel here, I actually own a copy of The Children)

-Evil Dead. Such a unique and well crafted blend of jump scares, gore, unsettling vibes and humor. Plus it was made on a shoestring budget.

And Hallowe'en Came to an End (Been Blogging for 2 Years)

Jack o lanterns, they just get better with age.

Well it's a few days late, but the most wonderful time of the year has come to an end. And somehow over the past two years I've had over 9000 clicks on this here blog. Wondering why I wasn't posting on Hallowe'en? That's because I was busy watching women strip whilst dousing themselves in blood. Yes, I went to the Bloody Betty Black Mass, of course a few movies were watched prior to the 9pm show (Addams Family and Trick 'r Treat if you were wondering) as well as the completion of my pumpkin carving task and getting my costume prepped and ready. Now you can read on for photos of my pumpkins, an assessment of the Bloody Betty show and my annual list of all the horror movies I've watched.

Dunbar Haunted House and Kitty "Frights" Halloween Show

Well something tragic has happened to Halloween here in Vancouver, it was announced that this year would be the last year of the Dunbar Haunted House. Having conquered six haunted houses already this year I took my friends up on an offer to go to it this past Sunday. The theme for this year was horror throughout the ages (they billed it as "The Terror of History" and it did not disappoint. The rooms were packed full of props, animatronics, mannequins and actors displaying everything from the horrors of Egypt up to Asylums and slashers. While my insider knowledge allowed me to predict where most of the actors were I was still surprised by some of them and had a sense of impending doom & panic the entire time. Here are the few photos we were able to take, they are all outside since of course there's no photography inside the house.

Prior to Topher learning the rites of succession in the kingdom.

But Anubis, you were always my favourite Egyptian deity!

Enough to make any parent proud.

Is that a canon or are you just happy to see me?

Topher is reunited with his mummy.

Now after we went to the haunted house we decided to attend the Kitty Nights Halloween burlesque show at The Biltmore. As you recall the last burlesque show I went to, The Rock Apocalypse, was rather short on burlesque (to be fair it wasn't supposed to be entirely a burlesque show). Well Kitty Nights didn't disappoint, while it wasn't big on the blood the dancing itself was the best burlesque dancing I've seen so far in Vancouver. The routines had a lot of thought put into them and were clearly well rehearsed. There was also a costume contest, but due to lack of preparedness I was not in costume so I could not enter. The winners of the contest were awesome though. The pair were dressed as Edina and Patsy from Absolutely Fabulous, and none of my friends understood their costumes.... The staff at the bar were all dressed as Scooby Doo characters and the host of the show was great in his Eddie costume from Rocky Horror. That show was definitely worth the low price of $7 we each had to pay to get in.

And with that I have to start prepping my costume for this year, which you will see photos of very very soon.

Treacherous Tea Time in Fort Langley

Seriously creepy teapot.

Well one of the seasonal activities I did this year was get a group of girlfriends to go to Treacherous Tea Time at The Little White House & Co. in Fort Langley. For those who don't know where Fort Langley is, it's a picturesque small town within the township of Langley that also has a national historic site where you can learn about the history of the fort and the fur trading industry.

The town even has it's own graveyard.

Now the building that the Treacherous Tea Time was in was apparently the most haunted building in Fort Langley. And I'm sure you're all wondering what exactly a Treacherous Tea Time is, well it's a Victorian tea with Halloween themed desserts and a reading of both tarot cards and tea leaves. Our group's reader used a bird themed deck and two of the cards which I got were a peacock and a vulture. I thought those were very fitting for me. I totally forgot to take pictures of our lovely food until we were almost already done so here is the sole photo I have to commemorate our creepy comestibles.

To fit in with our activities our group did our best to dress completely in shades of black and grey, I was completely inspired for this idea by the first episode of American Horror Story: Coven. We were even asked several times if we were some sort of club.

Seriously want to get a variety of black dresses now.

And here is a look at the Salon.

We also took some time to explore the town which felt like it was a movie set. In fact the last time I was there I was convinced that it was where they had filmed Trick 'r Treat. I was mistaken. But here is a look at some highlights of the town for those who haven't had a chance to be there.

The Frightening Friday: Netherworld Collectibles and Fright Nights

So back on the 11th my friend Christopher Graham (he took all the photos) and I decided to go to the opening night of Fright Nights and since we were going to be in the area we went to Netherworld Collectibles beforehand. As soon as we got into the store we were greeted by an adorable little fellow named Ladder.

I really like snakes.

I mean REALLY like snakes.

Ladder was on loan from http://www.snakeinthegrass.org/ a local snake rescue. After a little quality reptilian time we got to looking around the store which had a great assortment of movie props, posters, books, comics, movies, board games, action figures and more. Things that caught my eye were the Forbidden Planet poster and the wearable Right Hand of Doom (from Hellboy if you're not in the know).

I fell in love at Netherworld Collectibles.

Now I figured since I was in the commercial, I might as well go to Fright Nights. Speaking of Fright Nights here is the 60 second version of the commercial:

Fright Nights Commercial Creepiness

Who says you can't make money doing what you love? Well I certainly don't. Back in September I had an awesome opportunity to be on set doing what I do best, being creepy. I was working on this year's commercial for Fright Nights at the local amusement park called Playland. The commercial is now airing on some Canadian tv channels, so I suppose this is the first time folks will get to see me on their television sets in character.

Here is the 30 second version of the finished product:

It was my second night shoot and resulted in spending over 40 hours being awake with about 1.5 hours sleep, turns out I can function rather well without much sleep. The set was one of the actual haunted houses at the park as well as some outdoor parts that were more on the sinister side.

There was also a blow torch on set to "distress" some of the set dec brought in for the production. I had to keep telling myself "fire bad". Of course I ended up spending quite some time in the make-up chair and loved every minute of it.

They didn't even get my good side.

I was so happy with how I looked I even took a few selfies to show all boys just how pretty I was.

Wanna date?

Of course I wasn't the only one to get all dolled up for the camera.

He's a vegan, because there's no cruelty to animals in cannibalism.

Then it was time to get my tree witch on for my second character in the commercial. Tree Witch twerks ensued, but this was before a certain celebrity made it uncool.

Forget #SplitsOnTrees now it's #SplitsOnMees

Then of course the evening ended with clowns, because no one likes clowns except for their fear inducing qualities. My parents were convinced I was one of the clowns in the commercial. They were wrong.

Ya want a balloon animal?

As more photos from behind the scenes come I'll be adding them to this post, so look forward to more!

My Macabre Mind: Halloween and the Bloggiversary!

It's my Bloggiversary! In honour of that I thought you might like to see how many horror movies I've watched in the past year. So here is the updated list of all the horror movies I know I've seen:

-Zombieland

-Jack Brooks: Monster Slayer

-The Host

-My Bloody Valentine (2009)

-Jeepers Creepers

-Fright Night

-Fido

-Night of the Living Dead (original)

-The Evil Dead

-Evil Dead 2

-Army of Darkness

-My Name is Bruce

-Darkness Falls

-Ghostship

-The Orphanage

-The Ring

-The Grudge

-Pet Semetary

-Carrie

-Thinner

-The Hills Have Eyes

-Cabin Fever

-Dawn of the Dead (2004)

-Land of the Dead

-Shaun of the Dead

-Poltergeist

-The Exorcist

-Zombie Strippers

-Return to Salem's Lot

-Return of the Living Dead

-The Lost Boys

-American Werewolf in London

-Shadow of the Vampire

-Dusk til Dawn

-Planet Terror

-The Quartermass Experiment

-The Omen (remake)

-Misery

-Halloween 2

-Gingersnaps

-Hell Raiser 2

-The Blair Witch Project

-The Blair Witch Project 2

-The Thing (1982)

-The Stepfather (2009)

-Frankenstein

-The Others

-Children of the Corn

-House on Haunted Hill (remake)

-The Haunting (both original and remake)

-The Frighteners

-Little Shop of Horrors (original and musical)

-Graveyard Alive!

-Dark Water

-Cloverfield

-Once Bitten

-The Craft

-Sleepy Hollow

-Thirteen Ghosts

-Interview With a Vampire

-Blood Freak

-Bordello of Blood

-Hide and Seek

-30 Days of Night

-Bram Stoker's Dracula

-Repo! the Genetic Opera

-Near Dark

-Let the Right One In (absolutely amazing)

-Martin

-John Carpenter's Vampires

-Mary Shelley's Frankenstein

-Dead Snow

-Day of the Dead (2008 remake)

-Feast

-Re-Animator

-Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon

-Dog Soldiers

78 MOVIES SO FAR!

-Case 39

-The Serpent and the Rainbow

-House of the Dead

-The Ruins

-Daybreakers

-The Collector

-The Crazies (2010)

-The Crazies (1973)

-Pandorum (most of it)

-REC

-Grace

-Deadgirl

-Cemetary Man (Dellamorte Dellamore)

-Trick'R Treat

-Dance of the Dead

-Antichrist

-The Hamiltons

-Plague Town

-REC 2

-The Final

-Pontypool

-The Children

100 HORROR MOVIES WATCHED!!!!! (holy shit)

-Dead Alive (Braindead)

-C.H.U.D.

-The Strangers

-Friday the 13th ("remake")

- Drag Me to Hell

-Rosemary's Baby

-Halloween (Rob Zombie remake)

-House of 1000 Corpses

-Spider Baby

-Cube

-Creepshow

-Night of the Living Dead 3D (not in 3D and made in 2007)

-A Haunting in Conneticut

-A Nightmare on Elm St (2009 remake)

- Carnival of Souls

-Night of the Demons (2009 remake)

-Troll 2 (it was intended as a horror movie so it counts)

-House on Haunted Hill (original)

-House of Wax (original)

-Fearless Vampire Killers

-The Zombie Diaries

-Black Christmas (original)

-The Terror (or as the back of the DVD case said "The Error)

-Hostel

-Resident Evil

-Resident Evil 2

-Resident Evil 3

-Let Me In

-American Zombie

-Jesus Christ Vampire Hunter

-Session 9

-Last Man on Earth

-The Uninvited (black and white really old movie)

-Plan 9 from Outer Space

-Lost Boys: the Tribe

-Bloody Pit of Horror

136. Can I make it to 200 before the end of the year?

-The People Under The Stairs

-The Wicker Man (1973)

-Tucker and Dale vs. Evil

-Sharktopus

-Seconds Apart

-Insidious

-Jennifer's Body

-Cabin Fever 2

-Fright Night (2011)

-Satanic Rights of Dracula

-The Monster Maker

-I Sell the Dead

-American Psycho

-Poultrygeist: Night of the Chicken Dead

WOOO 150 Horror Movies!!!!

-Transylmania

-Village of the Damned (80's re-make)

-From Dusk Til Dawn 2

-Freddie Vs. Jason

-Suck

-Carriers

-Dawn of the Dead (original)

-Splice

-The Reaping

-The Dead Next Door

-Day of the Dead

-Nightmare City

-Pet Semetary 2

-Monsters

-Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale

-Santa's Slay

-Silent Night, Bloody Night

-Ghidorah, the Three Headed Monster

-Trollhunter

-Chillerama

-Attack the Block

-The Innkeepers

-Black Death

-Dogtooth

-Doghouse

-Devil

-Nightmare on Elm Street (original)

-Hatchet

-The Last Exorcism

-Texas Chainsaw Massacre (2003)

-Resident Evil: Afterlife (4)

-Parasomnia

-Demons (1985)

-White Zombie

-The Loved Ones

-28 Days Later

-The Hidden

-A Little Bit Zombie

-A Bucket of Blood

-House of the Dead (old anthology film, not the terrible zombie movie)

-The Skin I Live In

-Horror Express

-Scream

-The Haunting of Sorority Row (Deadly Pledge)

-Horror of Dracula

-Little Deaths

-Hatchet 2

-Midnight Meat Train

-28 Weeks Later

And drum roll please.....

-The Woman In Black.... NUMBER 200!!!!!!!

-Suspiria

-Night of the Demons 2

-Stakeland

-Nightbreed

-Battle Royale

-Frankenhooker

-Manos: The Hands of Fate

-Blood Shack (The Chooper)

-Cabin in the Woods

-Orphan

-Frozen

-Psycho

-Cujo

-Alien

-Prometheus

-Videodrome

-Darkness

-Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter

-The Gathering

-Night Watch

-Day Watch

-Feardotcom

-Paranormal Activity

-The Woman

-Salem's Lot (2004)

-Day of the Triffids (2011? it had Eddie Izzard)

-Resident Evil: Retribution

-V/H/S

-Famine

-The Relic

-The Thaw

-The Hole

-The Stuff

-Let Sleeping Corpses Lie

-Dead Heat

-Exit Humanity

-Idle Hands

-Halloween 3: Season of the Witch

So that is the list, click read more to find out about the Burnaby Haunted Village and my Halloween costume.