#beasts 1976

Here is the public copy of my spreadsheet of (at the moment) 70 sci-fi, fantasy, and horror tv shows. More information and details below :)

Time for a few more of my ghoulish opinions! Today’s theme is folk horror. Most days will probably not have a theme. I’m very tired. 

6) The Dunwich Horror

H.P. Lovecraft: can’t live with him, can’t kill him because he’s been dead since 1937. This is yet another story that I was certain I had already talked about on this blog because I hold it in such high regard. Inspired by Arthur Machen’s “The Great God Pan,” Lovecraft produced this tale of a fucked up Massachusetts family and the unholy terror it unleashes upon the countryside. Main character Wilbur Whateley may have plans for the destruction of human life on Earth but he’s still one of Lovecraft’s most sympathetic characters. Read with caution if you live in or near the woods.

7) The Blood on Satan’s Claw (1971)

I’ve mentioned this movie before as being more interesting than it is good, but I do think it’s worth watching, especially if you have an interest in the history of folk horror. In the 1700s in England a farmhand accidentally digs up a hairy, bestial skull in a field. Things get weird. Everyone who comes into contact with the remains grows a repulsive patch of black hair somewhere on their body. What happens with those weird growths? Well, you’ll just have to watch the movie and see. I want to issue a serious warning that this movie does not like women, and it especially doesn’t like teenage girls. There is an appropriately scary but still very harrowing rape scene about halfway through that I wouldn’t want anyone to be surprised by. 

8) The Wicker Man (1973)

This is one of those rare movies that is just as good as everyone says it is. It’s perfect from the first frame to the last frame and is all but guaranteed to creep the absolute shit out of you. The most uptight British policeman in history travels to a remote island village to investigate a missing child. He finds more than he expects, to say the least. Featuring Christopher Lee in one of the all time great performances as the magnetic and charming Lord Summerisle. I recommend this more than anything else on today’s list.

9) Beasts – “Baby” (1976)

Short and bizarre! I watched a couple other episodes of this British anthology series and liked them fine, but wasn’t particularly wowed. Such was not the case with “Baby.” A young couple finds a desiccated animal corpse sealed in a jar inside the wall of the old farmhouse they just moved into. Not only that, it turns out that a previous tenant’s attempt to keep cows in the field ended with a series of “contagious abortions.” The wife in this couple is pregnant and has previously had a miscarriage. Naturally, she’s very uneasy about this whole situation. Naturally, her husband is a complete boor with no sympathy for her at all. I came here for the mysterious animal corpse and stayed for the horrifying portrait of a bad marriage. My girlfriend watched with me and remarked that the husband comes across worse than James Sunderland, and that guy’s a murderer!

10) The Borderlands (2013)

Hysteria and Curses in Nigel Kneale’s Baby (Beasts, 1976).

When watching Nigel Kneale’s infinitely weird TV series, Beasts (1976), there’s a great sense of underlying currents behind what appear to be strange amalgamations of the everyday with something of the Other.  Though the links between the episodes are often animalistic, ranging the ghost of a dolphin in Buddyboy to the hoards of rats in During Barty’s Party, the majority of the episodes all, at…