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by Scott Aaron Stine
Published by McFarland & Company
Publication Date: 2003
Format: Black /White – 398 pages
Price: $35
If you were around to enjoy the 80’s you know it was a great time for horror. Alot of classics were born and alot of strange products came out of that era. What better way to celebrate a productive horror era than with a Gorehound guide! Scott Aaron Stone has been keeping track and has laid out the perfect addition to your growing horror library. Presented in alphabetic order you got a full listing of all the titles that came out. What is even more nostalgic may be the actual video companies that produced some of these products. Vestron, Magnum, Medusa, Marquis, New Star, Odyssey, Midnight…. well you get the gist. Lucky for us, Scott kept pretty thorough in his info sections.
Each film is accompanied with a review. Proceeding that is a bunch of annotated information. Title, date, production company, FX groups, alternate titles, length, stars and a few more tidbits. The title may or may not include a box art pic, which I was hoping that all would. Then as it follows the film is reviewed by Scott. Now I’m sure what the final tally is, but there are alot of title here. Reviews are fair and insightful, though at times you can tell Scott is just tired and wants to get on to the next product. His reviews are good, I just don’t agree with them all. He hits some titles pretty hard that are considered classic in my opinion. I’m not sure I can put my finger on it, but Scott seems to generally have alot of qualms about the 80s horror films, though he still endured a complete volume of these things. Scott, next time try and stay away from the darkside of the force and give the titles a little more credit.
But in any case he did the work for us so we can rent them and figure it out for ourselves. A more complete volume for me would have been at least a box art per title so that we can seek some of these our easier. I’d imagine since many will never DVD a mom and pop video store might be your only bet.
Your biggest thrill here might be in the simple fact that there are just alot of titles. Many I have never seen or heard of. Examples for me are titles like “The Other Hell”, Cannibal Hookers”, “Evil Laugh”, Deadly Manor” and that’s just a taste. It’s also my guess that many of these will never see the light of day past there VHS versions so at least they get a final tribute of sorts.
The book is a nice 6 x9 size, paperback and a decent product. I’d say if you want your 80s then grab one. The price of $35 might be harsh but you can shop around as well. Since you might not totally like the commentaries at least you can benefit from this as a collectors guide with some important details produced.
I own this and his fist book. The thing about the author is he isn’t really a fan of horror or the gore but more of a trash film lover. I don’t mean this as a positive thing. He praises no budget stuff like Ed Wood and Andy Miligan but shits all over real horror films and just seams to not be into 1980’s horror one bit. Most his reviews are just trashing the films for the wrong reason. I like slashers and gooey sci-fi and horror of the 80’s and I kinda blame this guy for dragging me into trash films. I think the guy is into camp and hot actual horror. I just never would of bought stuff like Blackenstien or Andy Millagan if it were not for this guy and his book.