Re: Rob Zombie's Lords Of Salem (2012)
 

Haha. Yea, I typed it into the seach and both our threads came up.

So... yea...

Re: Rob Zombie's Lords Of Salem (2012)
 

Agreed if Halloween 2 is the bad film you are talking about. El Super...was decent, but didn't get a full release anyways. Don't know why people are shitting on House of 1000 Corpses.

As for this film, was really hoping to get Witches and about Salem. The song for this is great, movie doesn't look good on paper, though.

Re: Rob Zombie's Lords Of Salem (2012)
 

I liked <b>The Devil's Rejects</b>. <b>Halloween</b> started out good, then turned disastrous.

I'll give him one more chance. Not sure if this is the film, though.

Re: Rob Zombie's Lords Of Salem (2012)
 

Apparently, Zombie is going to premiere the trailer for this tomorrow night at one of his shows. Shitty bootlegs should hit the internet immediately; not sure when the actual one will show up.

Not much for news, but, hey, it's something.

Re: Rob Zombie's Lords Of Salem (2012)
 

No Sid Haig? :(

Re: Rob Zombie's Lords Of Salem (2012)
 

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/y6_XMwTwVms" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

best i could find. looks awesome!

Re: Rob Zombie's Lords Of Salem (2012)
 

Quality aside, that does look like it could be all kinds of Satanic fun.

Re: Rob Zombie's Lords Of Salem (2012)
 

very interesting..looks very cool visually speaking.

Re: Rob Zombie's Lords Of Salem (2012)
 

This played at TIFF last night. Here are some collected reactions, courtesy of Shock Till You Drop:

•@DrewatHitFix: Gotta say... Rob Zombie's "Lords Of Salem" is a complete original. Nice rebound after the "Halloween" films, and freaky as hell.

•@MintzPlasse: Lords of Salem. Twisted dark nightmare of a film. Still don't know if I like it or not.

•@TaraMason: Well that was the biggest piece of shit I've ever seen. Take my advice and don't see The Lords of Salem. Seriously SOOOOO ridiculously bad

•@TheInSneider: Lords of Salem felt like a love it or hate it pic. Zombie's hardcore fans'll dig it but I don't think it'll be crossover hit Paranormal was.

•@EthanVes: I dug the hell out of Lords of Salem, brazenly weird and self-aware and oh so gorgeous looking.

•@DustinCohen: Rob Zombie's latest Lords of Salem was a let down. Good moments, but needs a re-cut to speed it up and keep the momentum.

•@KalenArtinian: Lords of Salem was sort of a crazy Kubrick, Argento & Lynch combination

•@KatarinaG: I liked LORDS OF SALEM a lot more than I expected. Damn beautiful to look at. That Brandon Trost is one talented cinematographer.

•@ChadEberle: LORDS OF SALEM. Rob Zombie's most well-made film yet. Unfortunately it's his first boring one.

•@VeryAnal: LORDS OF SALEM is THE SENTINEL meets Kubrick meets ALTERED STATES. And I kinda really loved it.

•Gary Pullen: Turns out Lords of Salem is Zombie's best film to date. Wisely, it replaces Redneck dialogue and toilet humor (though some still of that still lingers) with large doses of Jodorowski and Kubrick-esque visuals. The ending is a plate of scrambled eggs but Meg Foster's brave performance as the town witch steals the show.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Kubrick meets Altered States? Sign me right the fuck up.

Re: Rob Zombie's Lords Of Salem (2012)
 

Very interesting.

Re: Rob Zombie's Lords Of Salem (2012)
 

Having watched Altered States a couple of weeks ago has now peaked my interest for this project. Hated the Halloween remakes, Devil's Rejects was okay, and parts of 1000 were okay.

Re: Rob Zombie's Lords Of Salem (2012)
 

Rob Zombie being mentioned with the likes of Kubrick, Argento, Lynch and Jodorowski?

Based on his track record thus far, I'll take that with a large grain of salt.

Re: Rob Zombie's Lords Of Salem (2012)
 

Will this be out in time for Halloween?

Re: Rob Zombie's Lords Of Salem (2012)
 

I really don't know what they're doing with this film. The only trailer has been shown exclusively at Zombie's shows, nothing has been released outside of a couple posters, and I've heard nothing about a firm release date. I'd say this year is out (?), so maybe early next year. You know, when it's not prime Halloween horror season.

Re: Rob Zombie's Lords Of Salem (2012)
 

If true, that sucks. I want some genuinely creepy supernatural shit for my Halloween movies. Not "Found Footage Part Five.'

Re: Rob Zombie's Lords Of Salem (2012)
 

So House of 100 corpses was just a flick I loved in my late 20's but sadly...if you ever see it on blu...it looks TOO good to the point that I can't even watch it anymore well, that and top off the fact that I now finally took notice to how bad the acting is.....I can only watch it up to the part where they go through Sid Haig's (aka Captain Spaulding) fun house then I have to turn it off..........but what a blast it was to just throw that movie in whenever and enjoy the dumb fun.

Hopefully this is the flick that mocks it a bit but stays around indefinitely.

Re: Rob Zombie's Lords Of Salem (2012)
 

I don't have to see the flick to know this is the very definition of hyperbole. Jodorowsky's name should never be mentioned anywhere near Rob Zombie's filmmaking.

Re: Rob Zombie's Lords Of Salem (2012)
 

The Devil's Rejects takes me to a different place. Where worshipin' Satan and killin' folks is alright.

Jodorowsky is on a different plane of existence and I feel like an asshole when I try to say something about him. But I do like the idea that Zombie was maybe inspired by Jodorowsky.

Re: Rob Zombie's Lords Of Salem (2012)
 

There were three bids on the table before its premiere at TIFF. Anchor Bay is in the lead for the $1.5m budgeted flick (the movie follows the Oren Peli "low budget but the director gets 100% control" setup that they used on the $1.5m Insidious) It does look to be a very nicely shot movie, lot of use of lighting, smoke/fog, and they seem to be focusing on long shots over quick cuts.

Re: Rob Zombie's Lords Of Salem (2012)
 

Wow, had no idea they were going that low. Rob Zombie's been taking lessons from Gene Simmons on how to maximize that all mighty dollar. $$$$$
Insidious was the most profitable film of last year in terms of ROI due to it costing almost nothing to make.

Re: Rob Zombie's Lords Of Salem (2012)
 

All of these reviews have to be taken with a grain of salt.

A lot of people are going to shit on a Rob Zombie movie on general principle no matter how good it is because he's a rock star. Likewise, some people are going to fawn over anything he does because he's a rock star.

Re: Rob Zombie's Lords Of Salem (2012)
 

All reviews of anything should be taken with a grain of salt, but I sense more indifference this time around than the usual fawning praise vs. venomous hatred, and indifference can be just as fatal at the box-office, assuming this picture gets much of a theatrical release.

Turns out that wasn't a very commercial decision, but because Rob Zombie's names on it and the budget was tiny, I'm sure he'll make a profit, even direct to DVD, which seems likely in its present form.

Saw this at the TIFF premiere the other night and left feeling rather indifferent and, for once, I don't think you'll find too many attendees from that screening raving that it was the Best Movie Ever® (as is often the case when the Midnight Madness "experience" outweighs the content of the film being shown), or even Worst Movie Ever®. The most interesting takeaway from the evening was just how many cast members listed at IMDB ended up on the cutting room floor. Once I got home and cross-checked against my memory, I could not recall seeing ANY of these people in the finished product:

Clint Howard
Udo Kier
Lisa Marie
Billy Drago (part not shot, according to Zombie at the Q&A)
Richard Lynch (filmed, but incomplete due to death; I think someone else played his role?)
Daniel Roebuck
Barbara Crampton
Camille Keaton
Christopher Knight.
Sid Haig
Michael Berryman

Those last two ARE in the final credits as screened at TIFF, but I must've blinked. If any of the others were present, I'll happily stand corrected.

By his own admission at the TIFF Q&A (see below), Zombie removed a lot of players in the editing room, possibly to put the focus more squarely on his wife (and her pretty, pretty bum).

I can't help but think any version featuring these MIA performers should by default be more interesting than what he brought to the premiere, which is mostly a series of creepy, often beautiful, tableaux without a propulsive, coherent plot. Some of that imagery is genuinely disturbing, some of it's nonsensical (the dildo-masturbating zombie Pope? Still debating that one in my head, though it got big laughs at the Ryerson whether that was Zombie's intention or not), but most of it looks lush and fluid, a sharp contrast to just about everything else Zombie's ever done.

At the Q&A (see below), Zombie admitted he did this on purpose to counter the "TV" look of much of today's horror movies (something I'm not sure I agree with, but whatever). This may also explain his marked move away from the frenetic rhythms of his previous pictures.

As the film stands, it just doesn't feel complete, or fully thought through. The entire film could be compressed into a strong prologue to a different movie about creepy old Salem witches coming back to life in the present day to deliver a hellspawn through the descendant of their 15th century persecutor, after which we might have experienced some genuine tension and suspense instead of the inertia on display throughout, but if reports of the $1.5 million budget are true, then Zombie must've had to stay within fairly tight boundaries (or hallways, as evidenced in the film). And yet, based on the number of players in the IMDB cast list missing in the festival cut, it seems likely his budget originally went much further than what we saw on the festival screen. I wouldn't be surprised if an alternate cut turns up as part of the DVD package.

More thoughts: Bruce Davison gets the Donald Pleasance role in this (only with cooler hair), investigating some regional witchy legends after being a guest on Sherry's #1 hit radio talk show and hanging around when she spins a satanic vinyl record that was left for her at the front desk in a musty old wooden box, but at no point is he aware that there's an imminent threat to her life and must race the clock to save her, so his role consists largely of reading books, tracking the origins of the music, and interviewing a local expert on witchcraft. When he finally visits Sherry's apartment building to simply impart some of this curious info as a goodwill gesture, her "coven" of protectors (Judy Geeson, Dee Wallace and Pat Quinn playing to the nosebleeds) give him some tea and a pretty good working over, yet when her lovestruck radio co-host (Jeffrey Daniel Phillips, an obvious stand-in for the equally lovestruck Zombie) shows up a couple of scenes later to take her to work—even though she's strung out on crack!—the coven just sorta delays him a bit, then lets her go with him. Then we suddenly cut to Phillips helping her stumble to the station, blocks away, while she's still very much out of it, and warning waiting co-host Ken Foree that "we'll deal with this later, man" (as in, apparently she's still fit to host a radio program even on crack!). Evidently the witches were so protective of their vessel that a friendly author couldn't get anywhere near her with information anyone could find in published books, but not so protective that they wanted her to miss her shift? Not that it mattered, because right then, outside the studio, she whimpers goodbye in a strange close-up, disappears behind a a door that two grown men don't even try to open and stop her, even out of curiosity about why she'd do such a thing. That's when she's/we're magically transported to a big demonic-wicca light show sequence inside an opulent, Broadway-style theatre the witches have apparently rented for the evening. Or maybe it's a dream. Or another dimension, with a fog machine. In fairness, many parts of the film could be interpreted this way, albeit ambiguously since Zombie doesn't entirely specify what's real and what's imagined (which would actually help) as his heroine becomes more and more isolated.

I think Rob Zombie could do an fantastic picture with established screenwriters who aren't Rob Zombie, and probably should considering LORDS OF SALEM in its festival edit feels like a vanity project dedicated to his wife, wherein he'll still make a tidy profit, even if its via DTV and streaming, which is where this picture seems destined in its current form. There are indeed some striking visuals throughout. Zombie's Salem seems to be inhabited by about fifteen people in total. The wet, vacant look is eerily appealing until about the fifteenth shot of Sherry Zombie walking to work (or rehab therapy) through empty streets or taking her dog to the empty park (a snippet of which actually closes the film for no good reason other than that Rob Zombie loves Sherry Zombie). In the last reel or two, when things get really strange and the witches put on their big nekkid Broadway production, the soundtrack is overwhelmingly powerful. The problem is that this sequence, like many others in the film, is just a series of pretty images with no tension, no high stakes. By this point, I was just waiting for the end. You could chalk this up to the low budget, but those missing actors suggests the money went even further than what's on screen.

For those curious about such things, I shot the Intro and Q&A at the Midnight Madness premiere. Be warned that the Q&A features some of the dumbest questions ever. I almost felt bad for Zombie having to deal with it.

Intro:
<iframe width="560" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/tllIOGkfNJk" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Q&A Part 1
<iframe width="560" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/llDHVAQmdj0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
Q&A Part 2
<iframe width="560" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/rU8MgXzzAgI" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Re: Rob Zombie's Lords Of Salem (2012)
 

:rolleyes:

My interest for this is slowly plummeting now.

Re: Rob Zombie's Lords Of Salem (2012)
 

I know Oren Peli is one of the producers for this, but I don't fully understand that comment.

The films aren't similar and from the looks of that teaser, it doesn't look like Rob is going for that 'crossover appeal'.

Re: Rob Zombie's Lords Of Salem (2012)
 

Is it a found footage film?

This has about three weeks to get to theaters, otherwise we'll see it in February (at earliest).