everyday is halloween

i have a soft spot for rob zombie's inaugural feature, house of a 1000 corpses [2003], a baroque grab bag of horror movie cliches married to the day-glo, but gritty, imagination of the musician cum first time filmmaker.  zombie is a horror genre fan boy par excellence.  he populates his first movie with everything horror & halloween, including the bloody kitchen sink.  the film is a mess.  what plot?!  acting, forget about it.  however, zombie is in the possession of a great eye and ear.  he can film a damn pretty horror scene, & cut it for maximum boos.  indeed, back in the mid-'90s, rob zombie guest hosted a week-long horror movie marathon on, if i remember right, the cable channel TNT.  that movie marathon was my introduction to rob zombie, his band at the time, white zombie, his sound, & his eye for the creepy details of the horror genre, & of the great high holiday of halloween.

so when house of a 1000 corpses hit the DVD market i was first in line for my copy.  i watched & rewatched this flick during those late night feedings when nick was brand new.  we had a surround sound DVD entertainment system at the time, & i loved the audio of this pic as it enveloped the whole room.  it was marvelous.

i still have my copy of the DVD.  but like most of us i have moved on to watching movies via streaming platforms.  just like life when you gain something new, albeit a new technology, or personal knowledge, you lose something too.  digital streaming platforms are wonderful things for all movie lovers, but there was a magic in those old DVD.  production companies would hide easter eggs in the menu, add extras, like a documentary on the making of the feature film, audio tracks & so on.

rob zombie upped the ante with the DVD release of this movie.  not only do we get the extras & easter eggs but the great actor of veteran exploitation flicks, sid haig, reprises his role as capt. spaulding to get the viewer to choose an option on the DVD menu.  it is a tour de force.  scary & hilarious.  & please look at the background of the set, there are tons of little toys & articles that empowers the lovers of the great high holiday of halloween.



boo