Goosebumps at 33: Piano Lessons Can Be Murder

Previously on Goosebumps At 33…

Well hello boils and ghouls! I am extremely excited to welcome you to a brand spanking new season of Goosebumps At 33! This is the 5th season of Goosebumps At 33, and oh boy are you in for a treat, as this season is set to deliver all sorts of thrills, chills and dolla dolla bills, ya’ll!

For those of you who aren’t hip to all this Goosebumps jazz, I encourage you to jump in my time machine and take a look back at this introductory post. For the rest of you dear brave souls, why don’t you have a seat, take a deep breath, and listen closely as I tell you the horrid tale of…

PAINO LESSONS CAN BE MURDER!!!

Jerry (Ben Cook) is a young boy with a wild imagination filled with aspects of horror, science-fiction and adventure. While moving into a new home, Jerry’s imagination crosses over into reality when he hears a piano playing Ludwig Van Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata… all by itself! This obviously startles Jerry, but when he tells his parents about what he just witnessed, they chalk it up to his imagination and suggest that he gets a hobby to keep his wandering mind occupied. Oddly, they don’t seem to worry about Jerry wearing a spaghetti strainer on his head. Like, not only is it a strange thing to do, it’s highly unsanitary.

Soon after the piano incident, Jerry meets a neighborhood girl named Kim (Erica Luttrell), who gleefully informs Jerry that his new home was previously owned by a piano teacher, something that intrigues Jerry. Later on that night, Jerry once again hears the same song as before, which leads to him heading down to the basement to investigate. When Jerry sees that the pianist is a ghost, he freaks out and runs away, but not before waking his parents by knocking over a bunch of boxes.

Jerry is as frightened as he is fascinated by what is happening in his new home, so he decides that the best way to figure out why there’s a ghost playing the piano in his basement is to take piano lessons. This goes over well with Jerry’s parents, as they believe this will keep him occupied and prevent so many strange outbursts.

While taking piano lessons seems like a pretty innocuous undertaking, the piano school is located in an abandoned factory with some seriously high-end security. Nothing to be ‘alarmed’ about, right? Well, if an abandoned factory and security system isn’t sketch’ enough for you, the fact that Jerry’s piano teacher (Aron Tager) is a flamboyant Santa Claus looking old man obsessed with little boy’s hands might be of concern. That, or the fact that there is a creepy maintenance man (Geza Kovacs) who’s in charge of various red-eyed robots that roam the halls of the factory. Like really, what could go wrong?! 

Taken from the 13th book in the series, Piano Lessons Can Be Murder was the 8th episode in the 1st season of the Goosebumps television series. Overall a solid episode, Piano Lessons Can Be Murder has a bit of a strange but visually interesting finale, filled with twists and turns and turns and twists. Interestingly enough, however, this is one of those rare occurrences where there is no twist at the very end of the episode. The performances are fairly entertaining, and Terry isn’t too obnoxious as the protagonist, though at one point he claims that he can play Stairway to Heaven On the Kazoo. Jerry is obviously a crack head.

Anyway, Piano Lessons Can Be Murder is a nice way to get this year’s Goosebumps at 33 started, and I only hope that the rest of this season brings about a bevy of equally enjoyable Goosebumps goodies! 

Until next time, kiddies, keep your night light on and your head under the covers...

Salute Your Shorts: Tricker's Treat (2013)

It's Halloween night, and a man credited as The Fatman (Paul Hernandez) wants absolutely nothing to do with any sort of trick-or-treating. In fact, he even goes as far as putting up a sign in his front yard saying “NO TRICK ‘R TREATERS.” Instead of being bothered by greedy little children, The Fatman would much rather spend his Halloween watching horror movies and eating a massive bowl of buffalo wings covered in blue cheese. And honestly, I don't blame him, because buffalo wings are wicked good. Like, they’re one of my favorite foods good.

In any event, a handful of trick-or-treaters come knocking and interrupt The Fatman’s evening of horror movies and eating buffalo wings. As expected, he doesn't take it too well and responds accordingly by telling the children to kick rocks. This isn’t the last time The Fatman will have to deal with visitors, however, as soon his evening of horror films and delicious buffalo wings becomes a night of regret for having shunned so many young trick-or-treaters.

Written and directed by Don Greene, Tricker’s Treat is a 5 minute short that clearly cost very little to make. That’s not to say the short suffers as a result. In fact, it’s just the opposite, as Tricker’s Treat is a solidly made little slice of Halloween horror that features impressive lighting and editing as well as a humorous performance by Paul Hernandez.  

Give it a watch for yourself below, and please feel free to invite me over next time you order wings.

 

The Worst Witch (1986): Prewitched

While attending a prestigious school for witches, a young girl named Mildred Hubble (Fairuza Balk) simply cannot do anything right. Mildred is quite clumsy and constantly making mistakes, which puts her in the crosshairs of a group of bullies led by a girl named Ethel Hallow (Anna Kipling), who would be best described as your typical perfect student who also happens to come from a very respectable family of witches. Mildred has also found herself on the bad side of Miss Constance Hardbroom (Diana Rigg), a potions teacher who has a low tolerance for screw ups and has absolutely no problem with calling Mildred out for every little mistake she makes. The only people who seem to have Mildred’s back are her best friend, Maud (Danielle Batchelor), and the school’s headmistress, Miss Cackle (Charlotte Rae).

While Mildred is busy struggling with everything from flying on her broom to properly executing magic spells, the school is preparing for a special visit from The Grand Wizard (Tim Curry), which is a VERY big deal for everyone involved. This becomes most obvious during a scene where all the girls are passing around a black and white photo of him during class, with each girl oohing and awing and kissing the photo as if The Grand Wizard were a member of One Direction. All the while, Miss Cackle’s evil twin sister, Agatha Cackle (also played by Charlotte Rae), and a group of devious witches are planning to take over the witch academy and turn all the young, budding witches into young, budding evil witches. What role will Mildred play in all of this? Probably a large one, you know, considering the film is about her and all.

Directed by Robert Young, The Worst Witch is a UK made-for-television film that aired every October on HBO and Disney all the way up until the late ‘90s. Based on a series of books written by English writer Jill Murphy, what might be most obvious to anyone who encounters The Worst Witch are the many similarities it shares with Harry Potter. In fact, Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling has, on numerous occasions, been accused of ripping off The Worst Witch series. While the similarities are a plenty as well as being completely undeniable, the world of Harry Potter and Mildred are indeed very different, at least based on my experience.

“Things never go right for Mildred Hubble…” proclaims the film’s tagline, which is made obvious during an opening credit sequence that does a nice job of quickly portraying Mildred in all of her clumsiness as well as setting up her rivalry with miss perfect herself, Ethel Hallow. The Worst Witch is mostly focused on Mildred trying to find herself whilst dealing with a series of self-imposed unfortunate events and the ramifications she faces as a result. The film is essentially a classic underdog tale, where one character will go against all odds to prove themselves worthy of respect.

While enjoyable as a children’s made-for-TV film, The Worst Witch is quite hokey at times, though this element adds a certain level of enjoyment to the viewing experience. The rear projection flying effects are charmingly awful, especially in how each actor actually sells the act of flying on a broom. Most of the performances are solid, but a major standout, for better or for worse, comes from Charlotte Rae, specifically in her role as the evil twin sister Agatha Cackle. As opposed to headmaster Cackle, who is a fairly sweet, laid-back character, Agatha gives Rae the opportunity to ham it up, and she does so with ridiculous glee.

The Worst Witch also features a handful of musical numbers. While musicals aren't necessarily my favorite thing in the world (outside of a few exceptions), the musical moments in The Worst Witch are kept to a minimum. More importantly, however, it is indeed a musical number that stands out as the single best moment in the film. In fact, it may be the single greatest moment in any film. Ever.

Throughout the entirety of The Worst Witch, everyone is extremely excited about the special visit from The Grand Wizard, and knowing The Grand Wizard is played by Tim Curry, it’s nearly impossible to not be equally excited as a viewer. With the benefit of hindsight, the prospect of Tim Curry showing up as a “Grand Wizard” in a kitschy kids film with musical elements is quite promising. And let me tell you, people, when The Grand Wizard shows up and lets loose one of the greatest performances to ever hit celluloid, forever will your mind, body and soul be changed. The Grand Wizard’s performance is the equivalent of a cape-wearing unicorn starring in one of those lip-sync music videos that you could make at the mall back in the 80s and early 90s. Please, feel free to indulge for yourself below:

 

If that doesn't sell you on the film, then nothing will.

If you feel a hankering for watching a kids’ film about girl witches, you can watch The Worst Witch, in its entirety, on YouTube. Which is exactly why YouTube is so awesome.

Chucktober 6: The Curse of Matt-suzaka!

Good gravy, just what on earth could that smell be?! Rotten milk? A dead animal? The sticky side of Nelly’s band aid? Oh, wait, I know what that smell is! It’s…

CHUCKTOBER!!!

Okay, now that you've had a moment to get used to the stench, I should quickly explain what Chucktober is. You know, in case you weren’t here last five years. Simply put, Chucktober is a month-long celebration in which all posts are dedicated to the work of actor, singer-songwriter and mime Nuno Roque!

Oh, wait, that’s in January. Or should I say, Nunoary?

Anyway, Chucktober is, in fact, an entire month exclusively dedicated to all things horror and, of course, Halloween. What does such an event include, you might be asking?! Well, pull up your pants (seriously) and take a look for yourself!

Seriously, if your pants aren’t full, then you must lack the ability to poop, because this line-up is set to rock your bowels with the force of 10,000 Arby’s Jr. Bacon Cheddar Melts.

Regardless of your bowel movements, or lack thereof, I for one am Xtremely excited for this Chucktober, so without any further ado…

LET’S GET THIS CHUCKTOBER STARTED RIGHT!!!

Halloween Happenings: Drunken Pig

As many of you are well aware, the Halloween season is well underway. In fact, it’s impossible not to notice if you’ve stepped foot into any type of store over the past month or so. As is the case with every Halloween season, I am gourds-deep in everything orange and black, and I thought it would be nice to share with all three of you just what I’ve been up to in the days leading to…

CHUCKTOBER!!!

If you’ve been a long-time reader of CNAMB, then you should be familiar with Bolo, the mighty gourd plant that I started growing some years back. This season Bolo came on STRONG and grew so large that things got a little scary for a minute.

Unfortunately, however, Bolo fell ill, and do to his size it was tough/expensive keeping him healthy. As a result, Bolo kicked the bucket pretty early this season, but not before giving us a handful of new gourds to decorate our crack house with.

What’s interesting is that each year Bolo gives us vastly different looking gourds, and this year was no different. This is specific to the five oddly shaped gourds that were best described by a friend as vaginal, something that might come in handy one of these lonely nights.

As is the case every year, I am spending my days of darkness enjoying as many seasonal beers as possible. After coming across this shrine erected by the mighty Kroger, I knew the season had officially begun!

Below are but a few of the many Fall/Pumpkin beers I’ve been enjoying…

And of course, no Halloween season would be complete without me ingesting a ton of Halloween influenced junk food. I am a complete sucker for Halloween packaging, something I am only slightly ashamed of, and I have been doing nothing more than adding to my potential for developing diabetes.

Here’s a sample of my inability to control myself…

Normally by this time of year, I would have most of my Halloween decorating done. However, the days leading up to the month of madness have been overtaken by something other than Halloween. Specifically the fact that my mail-order bride and I have a child on the way, which I think is an acceptable reason to not get a lot of Halloween decorating done. 

What’s sort of fitting about this whole baby thing is the fact that she (as in a girl!) is due on November 4th, which is obviously right around Halloween. What are the chances, right?! Anyway, I have my claws crossed that our daughter will be born on Halloween day, but outside of black magic, I have very little control over that whole thing.

In any event, my mail-order in-laws were awesome enough to throw my mail-order bride a baby shower, and seeing as she is due right around Halloween, Halloween was indeed the theme for the baby shower.

Below are a few photos of the decorating they did, which I think came out pretty darned fantastic!

That about does it for now, kiddies. Hope you enjoyed this in-depth look into all the Halloween Happenings I have been enjoying over the past month or so. Now I have to get my rock-hard ass in gear and start setting up for Chucktober, so soon thou shall see you!

Salute Your Shorts: Mickey (2009)

Mickey opens with a black and white shot boxing match between the film’s titular character, Mickey (Hugh Elliot), and a much larger opponent. Everything seems to be pointing to this being an epic moment for the drastically undersized Mickey; however, within seconds of the bell ringing he is TKO’d. This happens again and again, as Mickey faces off against a handful of opponents, with the result being the same each and every single time.

This opening scene immediately sets the tone for both the film and the character of Mickey, as it is very apparent that, despite having all the odds stacked against him, Mickey never seems as if he’s afraid to step up to a challenge. It's an excellent way to introduce the character, because within a minute’s time the viewer really gets a sense of who the character of Mickey is and what he has likely dealt with his entire life.

Shortly after a run in with a dangerous gangster (Joseph West), Mickey is led to a tattoo shop where he discovers a peep show featuring a woman (Jessica Osbourne) imprisoned by chains. Despite the many dangers that he could be facing, Mickey decides it's his duty to rescue this woman. Will this attempt at heroism lead to the good-hearted Mickey getting one over the bad guys, or will this be yet another failure in the making for a character who has never had anything go right for him?

Written and Directed by Dusty McGowan, Mickey is a 20 minute short film that doesn’t rely on much dialogue to tell its tale of a character who refuses to let his small stature be a roadblock for his principles. To go with the lack of dialogue is a true sense of surrealism. Mickey is, at times, a strange film and somewhat reflective of the works of David Lynch, and this both works for and against the final product. The oddness of the film makes it tonally confusing at first, but once it’s clear that McGowan is going for surrealism, everything begins to gel a little better.

Overall, Mickey is an enjoyable little oddity about a little man with a big heart, so take 20 minutes to give it a watch for yourself below!

Killpoint (1984): The Sound of Violence

The review is in conjunction with the 1984-A-Thon, which is being hosted by Forgotten Films. After you check out this review, I encourage you to keep up with the other contributions throughout the Blogathon over at Forgotten Films.

When a vicious weapons dealer named Nighthawk (Stack Pierce) robs a military weapons cache and begins selling off the high-powered arsenal to various gangs, the police are forced to send in their best man to take care of business: Lt. James Long (Leo Fong). Armed with an unwieldy bowl cut and adorable bangs, Lt. Long must do whatever it takes to get these dangerous weapons off the streets, while also putting a stop to Nighthawk and his boss, a crazed mob leader named Joe Marks (Cameron Mitchell). Oh, and if that wasn’t enough,  Lt. Long also must find the people responsible for raping and murdering his wife only a year before.  

Written and directed by Frank Harris, Killpoint (or Kill Point if you’re a conformist) is far from what one would describe as a “good film.” Killpoint is, however, a film that certainly delivers the goods, and it does so in spades, I might add. Right from the word go, Harris kicks the door open and unloads a barrage of action-packed madness that greatly exceeds the average B-Action picture of the time period, or any period for that matter.

Shortly after Nighthawk (by the way, NIGHTHAWK!) robs the armory, there’s a brilliant scene in which he is instructing a group of armed thugs to go into a restaurant and kill a specific person. However, he also informs the men that they mustn't leave any witnesses, which would seem innocuous in terms of an action film except for the fact that during this set up Harris cuts to various shots from inside the restaurant, where there are numerous innocent people eating. As a result, Harris subjects his audience to an amazing scene where no one person or one thing is safe from the thugs high-powered attack, and this includes, but is not limited to women, children, vases, liquor bottles, wall art, and plants. Nighthawk and his men shoot everything and anything, no questions asked.

“Take THAT, tequila bottle!”

As wildly satisfying as this moment may be, it’s only 5 minutes later when a nearly identical scene occurs, but this time taking place in a grocery store! And please keep in mind that this all happens within the first 15 minutes of the film. We're talking about an incredible amount of people and even more inanimate objects being shot the hell up, and every last minute is an absolute joy to witness.

While there are plenty of bloody and violent action scenes to be had throughout the entire 80 minute runtime, Killpoint has far more to offer than the giggle worthy action it delivers. Throughout Killpoint, one will find Mexican gangbangers, Richard Roundtree, a karate tournament – which may feature the best martial arts in the film, if that should tell you anything – a cheap hillbilly strip club (complete with pool tables and wood paneling), body builders, and Cameron Mitchell.

Oh, and that Cameron Mitchell...

Camera Mitchell is, as one would expect, as bananas as ever. Playing the kind of ridiculous, over-the-top character that only Cameron Mitchell can play, Joe Marks is a mix of flamboyant psychosis rarely witnessed on screen. Often adorned with a scarf tied around his neck and rocking a pair of oversized sunglasses, Marks loves nothing more than flying off the handle without any warning whatsoever. At one point, and during his introduction no less, Marks is watching a news report about the armory heist, when he suddenly pulls out a massive gun and shoots the TV. After that, he simply laughs and starts talking to the little dog sitting on his lap. Oh, did I mention he carries around a little dog? Well, he does, and not only does he have a little dog, he also loves wearing daisies in his hair while getting drunk in a Jacuzzi with said dog. Like I said, bananas.

Cameron Mitchell is far from the only person deserving of a few laughs, as Lt. James Long (Leo Fong) also brings a lot of awful to the table. One of my favorite moments comes during a scene in which Long – who is clearly harboring a lot of issues due to the fact that his wife was raped and murdered – partakes in an epic training montage where he is visibly driven by silent rage. Within this montage, the viewer is privy to a barrage of imagery featuring Lt. Long doing all sorts of weight training, target practice and sparring (which leads to a small cameo by Bill “Superfoot” Wallace) mixed with close-up shots of Lt. Long staring intently into the camera. And when I say close-up shots of Lt. Long staring intently into the camera, I mean the camera is literally right on his face, where all that is seen is his nose and his eyes (which are frighteningly close together) and those adorable bangs.

Despite being narratively inept and poorly made, Killpoint makes it a point to entertain despite its obvious blemishes. In fact, those blemishes only add to the overall value that the film contains as a piece of cinematic history, and while Killpoint will never be remembered as a classic per say, it will be remembered for being one hell of a fun watch. That is, by the five people who’ve actually seen it.