protean depravity

Again, it's time to draw a new overview of what's expecting us in terms of horror movies in cinemas and film festivals and stream services in the next couple of months. And it looks good! Let's start with the upcoming Fantasy Filmfest Nights , which takes place between 8. - 11. May at the Zoo Palast cinema in Charlottenburg. I'm loving the entire selection this season, I often feel like the spring movies are even better than the original film festival which takes place in September. Short explanation for those unfamiliar with the FFF; the main festival takes place some time beginning of September, complemented by two mini-festivals, one end of January (or, like this year, beginning of February) and a second one in April or May. And I can safely say I was never disappointed by the spring screenings although I can't claim the same for the other two festivals. Maybe a coincidence. But anyway, let's take a look at the screenings I'm not missing. I always leave s...

It would be good  to read along the stories I'm discussing in this column, because I'll spoil everything! Americans are obsessed with many things: college sports, high school life, peanut butter, haunted houses, ice in their drinks, UFO's... Out of their many strange obsessions, though, the strangest of them all surely must be the love for their lawns. I can't claim to understand how and why the small piece of green grass around their houses became some sort of status symbol, but I can accept it, as it seems relatively harmless compared to other stuff.

Heyo! Finally some short reviews before the spring, the academic semester and Easter holidays begin - hope you enjoy!

As football legend Sepp Herberger said, "nach dem Spiel ist vor dem Spiel" (after the game is before the game), only it's "after the festival is before the festival" for me, because the next mini film festival, Fantasy Filmfest Nights, is already on the horizon - this year from May 8th until 11th. The tickets can be purchased from April 16th on, and the program has been out for a couple of weeks now! Don't forget that some of these movies will have a theatrical release at a later date, like Clown in the Cornfield, so it might be more economical to differentiate between movies you want to see at the festival and those that can be watched elsewhere - although I've really grown to enjoy the festival-atmosphere at the FFF, so I might as well prefer seeing all movies here. Let's take a look which movies I'm talking about... Full list of festival films can be found here !

Quick reminder that Dutch horror author Thomas Olde Heuvelt will be at the Otherland Bookshop tomorrow (March 31) evening at 19:30 for a reading/signing event!

In line with my previous statement that it is inherent to Stephen King's short work that the endings be utterly unhappy, with lingering pessimism, dreadful twists and erasure of all hope for better days, I've assembled his stories from Night Shift that end on a particularly negatively striking, evil, or pessimist note, giving you the chills even long after you close the book. Everything will not be OK in the end, and the worst is yet to come. And film adaptations should stop changing that to make King's horror more palatable for the mainstream audience.   It would be generally good if you read along the stories I'm discussing in this column, even more so for this particular blog post since I'm talking about some of the best endings in all of King's work and spoilers are inevitable.

The first batch of 2025 movies behind us, now comes the fun part of raising hopes for upcoming horror movies that are in line for this year. There's even a concrete reason I'm posting this right now, because this Saturday is Sneak Preview time at the Creepy Crypt and since I have to stick around in Kreuzberg for hours after work until the Creepy Crypt showings begin, I choose my movies carefully. Well, Sneak Preview means that I have no idea what will be shown, only that it's an upcoming movie, so I took a look at movies that I think might be on this Saturday and I'm going to pitch their trailers here (the titles are linked to the teasers or trailers). So this post will be something like an exciting guesswork for the next Sneak Preview. Edit throughout time: They ended up showing the horror comedy Y2K , which really wasn't mine, so I left after the first 15 minutes. But it wasn't all lost, in order to pass the time between Hammett and Creepy Crypt I watched an...

Ugh, I really didn't read a lot this past month, too often was I at the cinema watching movies, so unfortunately the short reviews are a little meager. In fact, I hope that will change since I received a TON of new reads which look amazing, so much that it will need some organizing and planing, but I'll get through, I guess. There are quite some amazing events coming up too, like the upcoming Thomas Olde Heuvelt reading at the Otherland on March 31st, and there's rumors (it's a little more than rumors, but there's no date yet) that Brian Evenson is here in Berlin and might join some discussions, and Caro wants to revive the Otherland Horror Book Club, and I have an interview in progress... Lots of things to anticipate there. Before, though, enjoy the short reviews, I did not love every book I've read recently, but they were mostly okay.