Soundtracking: "The Omen"

by Chris Feil

Remember that time worshipping the devil got an Oscar nomination? And in Best Original Song no less? No, I’m not talking about The Greatest Showman last year, I’m talking about when The Omen made hell on musical earth with “Ave Satani”. In its Latin lyrics, the song hails the risen body of Satan, the coming Antichrist, and drinking blood. Yeah, this bonkers nomination totally happened.

I mean, how often does a musical composition meet the Venn diagram of approval from Anton LaVey (one assumes) and the Academy? Unsurprisingly, it's kind of rare. Unless the notorious founder of the Church of Satan is secretly super into Diane Warren.

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Showbiz History: Dreamgirls vs Nine, Damien The Omen, and More.

Today is my birthday! Wish me well. Or better yet, donate to the site (see right hand sidebar) to keep it healthy. That's my only birthday request since I have a roof over my head and food in the fridge and friends to  have weekend activities with and really that's the important stuff in the grand scheme of things so I'm hashtag blessed... without the icky religious connotations! My only church is the cinema.

Anyway,  here's what was happening in showbiz history on June 6th throughout the years!

1933 The first ever drive-in movie theater (location: Camden, New Jersey) opened starting a popular but now essentially lost tradition. 

1944 D-Day a World War II and inspiration for many filmmakers since.

1950 Director Chantal Akerman born in Belgium

1954 Multiple Tony winner and queer icon Harvey Fierstein is born in Brooklyn. I love that one of my heroes shares my special day. Credits include Torch Song Trilogy, La Cage Aux Folles, Hairspray, and more...

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Showbiz History: AIDS Movies, Reese & Ryan, and the Orient Express

by Nathaniel R

Murder on the Orient Express (2017)

Happy June 5th, especially if it's your birthday. Is it your birthday? Do speak up this month if you're a Gemini please. Here's what was happening on this day in history as it relates to our favorite topic: showbiz.

1883 The first Orient Express leaves Paris. The train ride becomes mythologized in multiple pop culture works.

1953 Producer Kathleen Kennedy born in Berkeley. Currently rules the Star Wars franchise with a director-firing iron will. 

Lisa Cholodenko with her two time muse Frances McDormand (Olive Kitteridge, Laurel Canyon)

1963 John Profumo resigns his post in the House of Commons due to an affair with an alleged prostitute. There's an underdiscussed movie about this called Scandal (1989). 

← 1964 Happy 54th birthday to undervalued writer/director Lisa Cholodenko born in Los Angeles on this day in history. She goes on to make two bonafide lesbian classics (High Art, The Kids Are All Right)...

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TV @ The Movies: "Damien" Flashes Back

Though I know not why it's so, considering I prefer original material in nearly all mediums to rehashes, I sample nearly every TV series that's based on a movie. Not that the interest tends to last. So it was that I binge watched the first four episodes of A&E's new series Dam♰en.  The Omen (1976) was the first horror film I ever watched that didn't involve vampires (I was really into vampires for some reason as a little boy, even though I was never a horror film aficianado). I snuck watched The Omen one night during one of its television airings in the early 80s.

Though the new series never mentions Damien's birthday, the wee Antichrist's birthdate was June 6th in the original movie (6/6 natch) which is also my birthday. Little me actually ran to the bathroom to make sure there was no mark of the beast on his scalp after the movie. (He had so many nightmares that week, poor little guy.)

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Time Out's "100 Best Horror Films"

I am fascinated by the horror genre. From afar. As in: I am not at all fascinated by the horror genre but am endlessly curious about why it provokes so much feverish fandom in others. So I find myself reading about the horror genre a lot in an intermittent effort to understand it. From afar. Time Out London just came out with a poll of horror biggies and horror enthusiasts to form an eclectic list of the 100 best horror films. Some of them that I love I hadn't really thought of as "horror" (though on second thought they clearly are) like Dead Ringers, The Night of the Hunter and Ken Russell's The Devils. 

I knew my three all time favorites would rank high though my fourth favorite horror film (Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?) did not make the list.

Nathaniel's Horror Trinity: CARRIE, ROSEMARY'S BABY, and PSYCHO

The films on the list that prompted the most nightmares were The Silence of the Lambs (which I weirdly dreamt up constantly before seeing it) and The Omen which I saw on television by myself (after my parents had gone to bed) as a kid. It was probably severely edited but I was so terrified that Damien shared my birthday (June 6th) that I raced to the bathroom mirrors afterwards to check my head for a 666 mark -- no joke! I was so scared I had nightmares for a full week afterwards and vowed to never watch another scary movie.  

As an adult the films I was most terrified of while I was watching them were: Halloween which I didn't see until the early 90s on VHS when a friend would not let me be until I watched it; The Descent which I saw in a completely empty theater... like one big dark cave, The Blair Witch Project's last ten minutes in which I basically thought I would die (though that experience seems unrepeatable); Audition because... holy hell; and The Shining which I saw for the first time in basically .... wait for it... a cabin in the woods.

In the interest of full disclosure and to illustrate my scaredy-cat nature I have seen but 32% of the 100 wide list which I've included in a visual after the jump if you must mock me. How many have you seen? And which 10 do you think should be mandatory viewing? 

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