Curt McGirt

It ain't Halloween without the Chairman

I eschewed mixing and went with doubles chased with juice for that little viewing experience. Did I mention Santaberg starts throwing presents that explode like he was the Green Goblin? Yeah, that happens too.

SO IT'S YOU! Nah, don't worry, I actually had a good laugh. Review will probably be posted tomorrow.

It wasn't his knife, it was a wood splinter! I'll come back to this thread when I get to watch the whole thing cause I only caught the last 15 minutes last night. Looks to be a bang-up episode.

The Master is on TV right now. What the fuck am I watching? Two psychopaths in a latent homosexual relationship? Joaquin Phoenix Method-acting his true insanity? Holy shit.

There is such a thing as the '80s Project and that negates pretty much anything WWE can provide aside from interviews and VQ. DIY, motherfuckers.

Death From Above already posted my favorite. Pretty dark times back when I played that a lot.

DISC 5 RANKINGS 1. Espanto Jr. vs El Hijo Del Santo (Mask vs. Mask) (8/31/86) 2. La Fiera vs. Babyface (8/15/86) 3. Sangre Chicana vs. Perro Aguayo (Hair vs. Hair) (2/28/86) 4. Ringo Mendoza, Atlantis y Ultraman vs. Satanico, Masakre y MS-1, (September 1986) 5. Pirata Morgan, BabyFace y Cien Caras vs. La Fiera, Lizmark y Rayo De Jalisco Jr. (September 1986) 6. Americo Rocca, Cacharro Mendoza y Kung Fu vs. El Talisman, El Dandy y Guerrero Negro (September 1986)7,El Solitario vs. Dr. Wagner (Mask vs. Mask) (12/1/85) 8,Rayo De Jalisco Jr. vs. Mascara Ano 2000 (8/15/86) 9. Lizmark, Alfonso Dantes y Tony Salazar vs. El Signo, El Texano y Negro Navarro (8/15/86) Super, super disc all around. Top 3 are in the top ten, 4 and 5 are in the top twenty easily. So fucking good, if you don't have this set you need it.

Because I just saw this on TV: 5:53, Octagon beats up some drunks.

This is nice after the last couple of bloodfeasts, a trios comedy match to open the window and get some fresh air, so to speak. We open with Kung Fu exhibiting his nunchaku skills to scare the rudos and the rudo ref as well. There's a funny cultural disconnect in having a guy named Kung Fu dressed like a ninja wielding nunchucks. Dr. Morales mentions Tito Santana and other "lucha Norteamericano" and I wonder what they're talking about. Talisman and Cachorro have a nice little matchup then El Dandy and Rocca come in and the pace picks up, ending in all the rudos getting thrown out of the ring with the final toss due to endless rollup being hilarious. After the first fall Rocca comes in and just smokes Negro with among other things a reverse armdrag and what I can only describe as an "armscissors". We get a rudo beatdown and an unseen foule to keep this from going full-on comedy, then finish up with stereo dives and a revancha foule to cap things off. This doesn't quite reach the heights of, say, the exoticos match on the New Japan set but it's great physical comedy and in small doses I love the hell out of it.

To continue my earlier bragging, I got to see The Wicker Man on the big screen last night. Let that settle in for a minute. Having not watched it in over a decade plus, I was shocked at how much of this I remembered. It didn't look like there were many additions really. There's a guy on rogerebert.com who wrote a bitchfest about how the original 112 or whatever minute version he has on VHS is still unreleased, so apparently there's lots more footage out there despite the director saying this cut was his "original vision". Getting to see it in a theater really felt special. Hell, any film that Christopher Lee was so proud of that he offered to pay critics' tickets to go see it should feel that way. The very blasphemous humor got over well with the crowd too, which was nice. "OH GOD, NO... OH JESUS CHRIST, NO!!!"

In the words of AC/DC, "if you want blood, you've got it." Baby Face is hellbent to take out La Fiera and Fiera ends up juicing like a trooper. We even get a closeup of his blood on Baby Face's leg in the second fall. The tecnico rally is fun, and Fiera managing to sell being so beat up he's almost out on his feet yet still fighting fire with fire (pardon the pun) is really good. Him leaping out of the ring to spin-kick Baby right in his Face is the shit. Pirata saves Baby from his bloodening and gets pitched flat out of the ring by Rayo for his troubles, followed up by a big plancha. Then it just kind of ends. Flat finale to a pretty good match. This has to be a glitch in the timeline; Fiera has to get his revenge on Baby Face afterwards.

Oh man this starts with a Dr. Morales interview segment with Satanico talking shit (complete with evil laughter) and Mendoza wearing a blue headband that has "RINGO" on it in sparkly silver. We get a kind of slow open, though Ringo puts Satanico in a toehold that has him doing a head stand. MS-1 shoos off Ringo in favor of Atlantis and it's so arrogant. Atlantis finally looks like he's getting ahold of himself in the ring. No shitty playing to the crowd, just high flying, hard and dirty matwork and punking the rudos. He even does the dick move of stomping on MS-1's hand while he's sitting on the mat! No love lost here, obviously. Rudo victory in segunda caida is great, with MS-1 throwing Atlantis onto his face from a powerbomb position (something I've never seen before), a Masakre powerslam and Satanico busting out the Scorpion Deathlock. Tercera caida, Ringo and Satanico just start pasting each other. Ultraman has a nice rally but eventually the rudos decide they're gonna take Atlantis' mask no matter what and triple-team him in true bully fashion. After they take the final fall Pirata Morgan hits the ring to beat the shit out of Satanico! Cien Caras and Baby Face try to keep the peace but Morgan isn't having it. By the time this is over we have the setup for both a trios and a hair match. Los Infernales are so damn good. Lucha might have a rep for not being stiff but this is not a match that shows it.

This opens with Santito just getting ragdolled by Espanto Jr., who does the very Japanese thing of throwing his opponent back into the ring so he can beat on him more. The little kids coming up and comforting Santito after the first fall was just adorable. Espanto beats on him some more and rips his mask, but then he comes back and despite the truly horrendous audio you can hear the crowd erupt. Man I love the camerawork on this, right up in your face. Espanto does the through-the-ropes Psicosis bump skidding to a stop on his knees. That hurts to watch. Then Santito hits a tope and senton for the second pinfall. We get a great posting shot with Santo flying straight at the camera which Espanto turns to his advantage, chairing him and biting the cut. Awesome Lucha Thing #184: Spitting your opponent's blood in the air after you bite him. Then it's Espanto's turn. He busts out a tope that sees him vanish below the apron from the camera angle, they cut to the two and Espanto is just covered in gore. Both guys are just wore out at this point but Santo still busts out a plancha that the VQ buries. Of course Santito wins with the camel clutch and we get the unmasking of Espanto Jr., noble in defeat. I don't care about the VQ, the clipping, the pauses. This is in the top five of the set easily. Maybe #2 or #3 actually. EDIT: I scroll up and Graham said basically the same thing, wow.

The fanaticism and/or boredom of the wrestling fan knows no limits. Those are some cool videos ohtani. Gran Hamada invents the Finlay roll and Black Man attempts crowd homicide via tope con hilo (through the ropes I might add). Thanx!

Yeah, that movie is really, really, really good.

I am renting that tomorrow. If someone else already did they will feel MY curse upon them.

Yeah that's crazy, I still remember his retirement matches.

Yeah that's crazy, I still remember his retirement matches.

http://wireposterproject.com/ I think they'd work better as t-shirts.

Yeah, that too. I guess Barker's begging payed off and someone finally dug around in the stacks for the footage. It's about goddamned time!

I would watch so much of that but I just finished off my Halloween Havoc pick and it required a huge amount of liquor. Actually, it didn't, but I made myself require it anyway, so no way can I get to Vinny with the Muppets or Kiss with Paul Lynde right now. Get back to you on that. Look at that TCM lineup for Halloween though! If you are a shut-in (no disrespect, I usually am) or just don't give a fuck and aren't doing anything on Halloween unlike myself who is singing for a Misfits cover band, WATCH THOSE FUCKING MOVIES. Masque of the Red Death and The Abominable Dr. Phibes is a dream double-bill to me. I will pay someone to DVR this and burn a copy of it for me to DVDR if possible. Actually, just Dr. Phibes, I have the other one on DVD.

I'm scrolling down the list for what's on TCM the next couple days after this Price-a-thon and they're playing, among others: Spider Baby Sisters Psychomania (!!!) The Bad Seed OG Village of the Damned The Curse of Frankenstein The Mummy (Hammer) Dracula, Prince of Darkness The Devil's Bride Dracula Has Risen From The Grave Horror Express aaaaaand my list cuts out at 6 PM on the 31st. They're also showing Badlands, Mean Streets, Chinatown, MASH, Cabaret, The Conversation, Blow-Up (OG)... DAMN! EDIT: Oh yeah you can watch The Bride of Frankenstein and continue the argument too.

Anyone catch Muhammad Ali's Greatest Fight on HBO? I know we were talking about it on the old board, or maybe this one. Pretty good for an HBO film, not up there with You Don't Know Jack or Beyond the Candelabra but solid. The cast of course is spot-on (cool seeing Judge Faylen from The Wire playing another judge haha) with a bravura performance from Frank Langella especially. It will piss you off, but sometimes that is necessary.

It's Vincent Price Night on TCM! Fall of the House of Usher is on now, followed by: Diary of a Madman The Tingler House on Haunted Hill The Bat Tower of London The Raven The great scene where Vince says he can't stand to eat anything but "patted mash" just played. Me and my folks used to crack up at that line every time.