The Black Museum: Series Three (part one)

It's back! The Black Museum, Toronto's premiere horror lecture series is back for a third season of erudition. This year, lecturers and audience members will enjoy the comforts of the Royal cinema on College. New again is the lecture schedule, which has switched to a monthly event.

This year's series kicked off on in early Feb with a screening of Carnival of Souls, and will pick up with a lecture by Black Museum alumnus Alexandra West about French New Wave Gore.

March 12, 2014
Quelle Horreur! The Films of the New French Exremity
with Alexandra West

Alex takes apart New French Extremity, a movement in the Gallic cinema that makes torture porn look quaint. Films such as Martyrs, Them, High Tension, and Trouble Every Day stand in opposition to tourist-attracting confections like Amelie, poised instead to explore the troubled identity of a country that knew the Grand Guignol, the Theatre of Cruelty, and a cultural landscape torn by riots over thirty years of political strife and unrest.

April 9, 2014
Where Life is Cheap! Snuff Movies and the Evolution of Genre
with Yours Truly

Since 1976, the notion of filming murder for profit has outraged, disgusted, and fascinated audiences. Aided and abetted by sleazy marketing tricks, "snuff" film provided traction for feminist and anti-pornography movements, also inspiring that most steadfast and contentious of urban legends: the myth transmitted through media. I this lecture, I consider snuff's origins and aspirations, tracing its roots from early theatre to Slaughter, Hardcore, Tesis, 8MM, The Butcher, and beyond.

May 14, 2014
One of Us: The Transcendent Rise of Religious Cults in Horror 
with Alison Lang

From Satanists to Scientologists, Moonies to the Manson Family, a cinematic curiosity for cults endures. Broken Pencil's Alison Lang advises initiates that the cult trope allows reflection or commentary on wider sexual, spiritual and moral politics of an era. See: The Wicker Man and Ticket to Heaven. And sometimes the mirror held to society's scabbed visage stares hard at the truth, as in Helter Skelter and Race with the Devil--the latter purportedly starring actual Satanists as themselves.

The Black Museum: Series 3

The third semester of The Black Museum lecture series is set to begin later this month. Toronto's premier horror lecture series has evolved some over the past year and the current line-up branches out from film to include video games and costumes. Read on to find out what topics will be covered this fall.

September 26
Arcane Arcade: The History of Horror in Video Games

This lecture will examine the history of the horror genre within the videogame industry, from early licensed
film titles to the emergence of survival horror, which came to define the genre with titles such as Resident Evil and Silent Hill creating narratives that influenced the film industry in turn. The aftermath of survival horror will also be discussed, as well as the hybrid action horror titles of recent years, releases working to increase the psychological act of play, and the rise of indie programmers creating compelling horror experiences outside the major studio system.

October 10
Black Glove Ballads: The Art of the Italian Giallo Soundtrack

During the late sixties and early seventies the giallo rapidly evolved into a highly stylized form of storytelling where images and sounds supported elaborately rendered murder sequences. Plots tended to be incomprehensible or downright bizarre, and the various directors often built their scenarios around murders which were heavily driven by music and images. Composers from various venues would bring jazz, lounge, orchestral writing, rock, and experimental techniques, sometimes as slight hybrids, or in the hands of Ennio Morricone, as radical fusions. This lecture will examine a chronology of musical innovation within the giallo using music montages, scene and interview extracts, and a healthy sense of humour for this endearingly insane genre.

October 24
Fashioning Fear: A Cultural History of Halloween Costumes

Horror film costume designer Alex Kavanagh will take the audience through the history of Halloween focusing on the popular symbolism surrounding Halloween costumes and how they have been modified and transformed by the entertainment industry. This lecture will discuss how costumes have become the most revealing snapshot of modern western society via photos, film clips and a costume display.

November 7
King of the Ring: Stephen King Movie Debate

This is a brand new Black Museum event in which teams of horror fans and professionals get a chance to fight, feud and fuss on a particularly contentious area of horror filmmaking. For the Debate Club’s debut meeting, four teams will square off on a question that’s hounded horror buffs for years: Which is the best horror film based on a story or novel by Stephen King? Profiling four of the most well-known King adaptations, each team will get a chance to defend their choices, show off convincing film clips, and engage in a little Stephen King trivia to win over the judge and audience and take home the coveted Golden Tentacle trophy.

November 21
Woeful wombs: Pregnancy and the Horror Film

Many horror films are read as having a reactionary view of women, reducing them to monstrous mothers or abject incubators for terrifying beings. But are these representations of pregnancy always cut and dry? What can be gained from debasing pregnancy? And what does it say about how we view (or cherish or revile) this biological process? Looking at how this “horrific” body has morphed on screen, this lecture will look at the likes of Rosemary’s Baby (1968), The Fly (1986), Aliens 3 (1992), A l’interieur (2007), and yes, Twilight (2011) in the hopes of giving birth to some answers.

As always, lectures will be held at Big Picture Cinema on Gerrard (formerly The Projection Booth East). Big Picture's causal setting creates a inviting, intimate atmosphere perfect for the academic exploration of the horror genre. There will be door prizes. And beer.

Drink in the Horror

On a recent Avod (Ep 84), Count Vardulon and I briefly discussed beer labels.  That conversation got me thinking partly about how I need to buy more beer, and partly about beer label art and design.  Not strictly under the purview of horses and barely, beer labels feature all kinds of images and the devil figures prominently in a number of them.

Canadian brewery Unibroue, famous for its fortified beer, produces Maudite (damned) and Trois Pistoles (three coins), among others.  The names and art for these two labels are inspired by French Canadian folktales, La Chasse-Galerie, and the legend of the church in the town of Trois Pistoles.

 Click the images to hear the tales that inspired the beers.

Avery Brewing, from Boulder, Colorado, has been brewing beer since 1993 and is host to a trifecta of beers called the Demons of Ale: Samael's Oak-Aged Ale, The Beast, and Mephistopheles' Stout.  The Beast and the stout are particularly special because they are brewed once a year, on August 1st and December 1st, respectively.

Samael's is 15% abv and tastes like vanilla spice with little carbonation.  The Beast is a deep, dark red colour with a sweet, dark fruity taste.  Mephistopheles is pitch black and tastes like the 16% abv that it is, with just a hint of chocolate, coffee, and nuts.

Although it has an Irish name, Daibhal, this Belgian ale is brewed in California by the Rabbit's Foot Meadery.  Made with a generous amount of honey, the beer won a gold medal at the 2009 International Mead Festival.

Diabhal is sweet-tasting with low carbonation.  Low on hops.

More award-winning California beers come from the AleSmith Brewing Company.  Their two Belgian beers, Horny Devil and Li'l Devil, have taken home numerous awards between them.  Not limited to just brewing devilish ales, AleSmith also brews Evil Dead Red at Halloween and My Bloody Valentine in February.

Horny Devil is 11% abv, but drinks well though it is highly carbonated.  Li'l Devil is lighter and spicier.

Though not a devil, the hobgoblin of Wychwood Brewery, UK, is famous for being the first label in the country to feature an image as opposed to just the name of the beer.  Initially brewed for a wedding, Hobgoblin became Wychwood's biggest seller, and is the 5th highest-selling beer in the UK.  Wychwood now also brews King Goblin, a beer brewed under the full moon.

 "As the full moon casts its eerie light over the shadowy old Eagle Brewery, a magical brew gurgles forth from the casks."

Returning to Canada, we find perhaps some of the most artistic labels.  The microbrewery, Dieu du ciel! (God in heaven!), produces a number of beers, one of which is Corne du diable (horn of the devil).  The label features a gentleman devil in profile, with a forked beard and a horn, holding his namesake beer.  He is enclosed by an ornate arch supported by two small angels.  The arch appears on all the brewery's labels, and all are equally interesting.  Other brews by Dieu du ciel! that feature uniquely creative designs are Peche mortel (mortal sin) and Rigor Mortis, both award-winners.

There are, of course, many more beer labels that feature the devil or some other horror-inspired art, and some breweries are even named after the devil himself (Duvel and Satan, for example).  Like wine marketing, specific beer marketing techniques--labels that feature curious names and art--are generally aimed at younger consumers, hoping to establish brand loyalty as drinkers mature.  Moreover, unique designs help microbreweries distinguish themselves.  But with the increase in devilish inspiration, one wonders if the market is maybe over-saturated with satanic brews; is the devil you know truly better than the one you don't?  Only taste will tell.