Since the advent of motion pictures, horror has been linked closely – inexorably, even – to the medium. Cemetery Dance’s anthology MIDNIGHT PREMIERE, edited by Tom Piccirilli, celebrates that mutually beneficial marriage of the terrifying and the visual. Offering an angle unique from previous horror fiction collections delving into film, PREMIERE includes contributions from actual B-movie personalities.
But it’s the big boys that make this book such a treat, starting with Gary A. Braunbeck’s “Onlookers,” which works wonders with a “lost film” conceit, right up to its unsettling final page. But Jack Ketchum immediately shows him up in the disturbing department with “Elusive,” about a man’s ill-fated attempt to try to catch a horror flick everyone raves about. Whether in theaters or on video, his protagonist is unable to see it, as if it were cursed. The true reason is chilling.
Ray Garton’s “Evrything Must Go,” in which a couple unwisely ventures far out of their realm of comfort for a yard sale, is intense in just a handful of pages. The strangers they encounter will have you thinking TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE even before they do; this story is ready-made for an episode of MASTERS OF HORROR. Meanwhile, “Forces of Evil, Starring Robert Fields” follows dual narrative threads of a supporting actor on an ARMY OF DARKNESS-like movie who goes nuts on set and the unpopular high school kid who worships the finished product. Lisa Morton and Richard Grove are to be commended for this collaboration – one that doesn’t end the way you think it will.
Al Sarrantonio provides surreal yuks with the bent “Baby Boss and the Underground Hamsters: A Feature-Length Cartoon.” As one-note as it is, the piece makes for a nice comic-relief intermission. Brian Dodge ventures into dark satire with “The Passion of the Beast,” about the furor surrounding a film on Satan, a flipside to Mel Gibson’s THE PASSION OF THE CHRIST. Closing out the 18-tale collection is “Scream Queen,” Ed Gorman’s look at a lowly video-store worker and his two friends who believe a female customer is a former scream queen they’ve been obsessed with after years of watching her have her top torn off. The actress had disappeared from the Hollywood scene years earlier, with no explanation; Gorman’s reveal is absolutely oddball – and I mean that in a good way – and one you won’t soon forget.
As for PREMIERE’s selling point – the stories by the “stars” – included are DRACULA 2000 director Patrick Lussier; THE RETURN OF THE LIVING DEAD‘s nude grave dancer Linnea Quigley, INVASION OF THE BEE GIRLS‘ William Smith (with Dark Delicacies store owner Del Howison) and Kyra Schon, the little girl who so memorably became a zombie in George Romero’s NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD. Unfortunately, they mostly seem amateurish, predictable and a little too self-centered. The lone exception? Mick Garris, whose “Ocular” is a note-perfect exploration of a ’50s for-hire director making a B movie. An accident occurs on set that is one of the sickest things imaginable, and made even more horrifying by the ante-uppping closing paragraph.
It’s good enough to not only make me think that Garris should stop directing crappy Stephen King movies and put pen to paper full-time; he even redeems the less-worthy selections from his Tinseltown peers. It’s a nifty idea to include these fringe celebs, but they’re not up to the standards of PREMIERE’s pros, who make this anthology so worthwhile. –Rod Lott
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OTHER BOOKGASM REVIEWS OF THESE AUTHORS:
• THE ADVENTURE OF THE MISSING DETECTIVE AND 19 OF THE YEAR’S FINEST CRIME AND MYSTERY STORIES edited by by Ed Gorman and Martin H. Greenberg
• BLACK RIVER FALLS by Ed Gorman
• DARK DELICACIES edited by Del Howison and Jeff Gelb
• DEAN KOONTZ’S FRANKENSTEIN: BOOK TWO – CITY OF NIGHT by Dean Koontz and Ed Gorman
• DIFFERENT KINDS OF DEAD AND OTHER TALES by Ed Gorman
• FLIGHTS: EXTREME VISIONS OF FANTASY edited by Al Sarrantonio
• FOUR DARK NIGHTS by Bentley Little, Douglas Clegg, Christopher Golden and Tom Piccirilli
• GHOST TOWN by Ed Gorman
• GRAVES’ RETREAT by Ed Gorman
• GUNSLINGER AND NINE OTHER ACTION-PACKED STORIES OF THE WILD WEST by Ed Gorman
• HALLOWS EVE by Al Sarrantonio
• HORRORWEEN by Al Sarrantonio
• INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS: A TRIBUTE edited by Kevin McCarthy and Ed Gorman
• THE GIRL NEXT DOOR by Jack Ketchum
• KEEPERS by Gary A. Braunbeck
• LADIES’ NIGHT by Jack Ketchum
• LIVE GIRLS by Ray Garton
• THE LOVELIEST DEAD by Ray Garton
• 999: TWENTY-NINE ORIGINAL TALES OF HORROR AND SUPSENSE edited by Al Sarrantonio
• OFF SEASON by Jack Ketchum
• THE WIDOW OF SLANE AND SIX MORE OF THE BEST CRIME AND MYSTERY NOVELLAS OF THE YEAR edited by Ed Gorman and Martin H. Greenberg
• WOLF MOON by Ed Gorman
Related posts:
- 999: Twenty-Nine Original Tales of Horror and Suspense
- Ladies’ Night
- Different Kinds of Dead and Other Tales
- Horrorween
- Leisure reveals rest of 2006 horror slate
