HORROR BUSINESS Episode 118: TOURIST TRAP & CRAWLSPACE

Greetings, and welcome back to Horror Business. We have one awesome episode in store for you guys because we’re talking 1979’s Tourist Trap and 1986’s Crawlspace. First off thank you to the fine folks over at Lehigh Valley Apparel Creations, the premiere screen-printing company of the Lehigh Valley. Chris Reject and his merry band of miscreants are ready to work with you to bring to life your vision of a t-shirt for your business, band, project, or whatever else it is you need represented by a shirt, sweater, pin, or coozy. Head on over to www.xlvacx.com to check them out. Thank you also to Essex Coffee Roasters, our newest sponsor. Head to www.essexcoffeeroasters.com to check out their fine assortment of coffee and enter CINEPUNX in the promo code for ten percent off your order! And as always thank you to our Patreon subscribers. Your support means the world to us and we are eternally thankful. If you would like to become a Patron, head to patreon.com/cinepunx. Thanks in advance! We start by talking about some of the stuff involving horror recently. Liam talks about seeing the new David Cronenberg film Crimes Of The Future, and we discuss the career trajectory of Kristen Stewart. We talk about the most recent season of Stranger Things, and Justin talks about starting the television series Evil. We start with Tourist Trap. Justin starts off by talking about how underrated he thinks the film is and that it deserves to be held in the same regard as Halloween, A Nightmare On Elm St, and other classic slashers. He also talks about how genuinely scary the film was for him. Liam talks about how much of a soft spot he has for this film, in that it’s a “fucked up” movie that doesn’t get credit for how upsetting it is. We discuss how the film is largely fun until the kills occur, at which point it becomes almost cruel. We talk about how the performance by Chuck Connors in the lead drives the unhinged feeling of the film. We talk about how the film is largely realistic and at time it feels like the protagonists might actually get away. Justin discusses how the film really just needed to have a guy in a mask to be a successful slasher, but the addition of the mannequins and wax figures puts it above and beyond it’s contemporaries. We discuss how the movie successfully pulls off a red herring in the form of a fictional brother. Justin briefly talks about the impact the film had on the work of performance of artist Eric Fornier and his character Shaye St. John. Up next is Crawlspace. We give a summary of the film and talk about the legacy of actor Klaus Kinski. We talk about how Kinski differs from other legendary “hard to work with” actors in that Kinski was a legitimately dangerous and evil human being who inflicted real harm on people around him. We talk about how the movie largely hinges on Kinski’s performance and wouldn’t be nearly as memorable as it was. Liam talks about how some of the more upsetting scenes are when he’s attempting to be a “normal” person. We talk about the set design of the film and how it successfully made a relatively small apartment building into something approaching a surreal labyrinth. We talk about how the subject matter of the film (Nazi atrocities) weren’t that far removed chronologically when the film came out. We conclude by talking about the concept of inherited trauma. First and foremost, thank you for listening and to everyone and anyone who donated on Patreon, checked this episode out, or shared a tweet/shared a post on FB/gave us love by recommending us to someone. We love you forever for listening and donating. Any questions, comments, suggestions for movies and guests, or if you yourself want to join us for a movie viewing or even an episode, can be sent to [email protected]. We would love to hear from you! Thanks always to Justin Miller, Jacob Roberts, Paul Sharkey, and Doug Tilley for their technical contributions and fliers, Mike Smaczylo for the shirts and fliers (you can check more of his work out at here), and also thanks to Josh Alvarez for the theme song, Chris, Brad, and LVAC for the support and buttons (check them out at www.xlvacx.com and on Twitter), Essex Coffee Roasters (www.essexcoffeeroasters.com) and a HUGE thank you to anyone who retweeted us or shared something on Facebook that we posted. Follow us on Twitter and Instagram at @thehorrorbiz666, like us on Facebook at facebook.com/thehorrorbiz66, check out our Spotify account at Cinepunx, and remember to rate, review, and subscribe to us on ITunes. In fact, if you write us a review, email us with your mailing address and we’ll send you some free pins and stickers!  Check out www.cinepunx.com for more info on some of our other podcasts, some ultra stylish Cinepunx related merchandise, and how you can donate to our Patreon! Until next time…thanks!