Looking For Something Spooky To Watch?

First two episodes available today, with two more added each night through the 28th. 75 on Metacritic, I’m in!

Guillermo del Toro – the master of horror – presents a collection of unprecedented and genre-defining stories that will challenge our traditional notions of horror.

Guillermo Del Toro’s Cabinet of Curiosities is an anthology of sinister stories, told by some of today’s most revered horror creators – including the directors of The Babadook, Splice, Mandy, and many more.

Nice Song Ray

When you’re ignorant, everything is new and exciting.

I had no idea that Mr Davies wrote this tune until I learned it in the episode of Waterloo Sunset, which just dropped. It’s awesome.
As are the Pretenders live in London.

La Cathedrale Engloutie


Claude Debussy’s “The Sunken Cathedral” is based on a myth involving, well, a sunken cathedral off the coast of Brittany. The beautiful princess of a prosperous coastal town named Ys had an affair either with Satan or one of his many lieutenants on earth (as beautiful princesses tend to do). As punishment, the town was destroyed by sinking into the sea along with most inhabitants. Local legend held that on certain days you could hear the bells of the cathedral of Ys ringing from below. On other days, it was believed to rise briefly to the surface. Debussy begins by representing both waves and the ringing of the cathedral bells. As the cathedral rises, chanting monks and priests emerge, culminating with the great organ at 2:25: a brief emergence of a grand, underwater zombie Mass of the damned. Then it all sinks again until we just hear the bells. Near the end, the great organ melody makes a muted reappearance from the murky depths.

Beautifully creepy stuff here, with the obsessively perfect Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli looking like he’s playing this from deep within his castle in Transylvania. (He actually never lived in a castle in Transylvania, but for a while he did live in one near Brescia).

Pear Cider and Cigarettes

2017 Oscar-nominated animated short by Robert Valley. You may have seen his stuff here and there already; I became aware of him on Netflix’s Love Death + Robots. The real mind-blower is that he does all of this in Photoshop, which must take FOREVER.

This Is Weird, For Many Reasons

… but mostly because Welles is an opinionated genius and world-class hater. It’s hard to imagine him being a talk show host who could get guests comfortable.

Throw in Andy Kaufman, and I’m not sure what I was expecting. I was pleasantly surprised. It’s clear that Welles had watched Taxi, and had thought about it in some depth.

“I want to know why it is that you go and wrestle with people, when you can act so well.”