HORROR BUSINESS Episode 16: Vampires, Seed People, And Sponsors, Oh My!

Greetings creepazoids, and welcome back to Horror Business, the podcast that doesn’t feel pity, it doesn’t feel remorse, it can’t be reasoned with, and it will not stop until you are as just as much an elitist asshole about horror movie as we are. Thank you as always for checking us out and we have got one heck of an episode for you guys. First and foremost we want to give a shoutout to our sponsors over at Lehigh Valley Apparel Creations, the premiere screenprinting 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 tshirt for your business, band, project, or whatever else it is you need represented by a shirt, sweater, pin, or coozy. Or…whatever else you need printed. So head on over to www.xlvacx.com to check them out. Also a huge thanks to friend of the podcast Albert Martin of the Lehigh Valley Horror Facebook group for his unflagging support of this podcast. Without you guys, we are nothing. Thanks! This episode we take a look at two films from Charles Band’s Full Moon Pictures, world renowned for their ability to take a B movie approach and make quality films sometimes. The two films we discuss are 1991’s Subspecies and 1994’s Seed People. We begin by giving a shout out to Chris and LVAC, and then talking about what we’ve seen recently. We talk about the recent Exhumed Films event in Philadelphia we attended, a screening of Killer Klowns From Outer Space and The Deadly Spawn to benefit noted NJ horror aficionado James Harris. We discuss both films and our familiarity with them and James’ recent struggles with cancer. We then briefly talk about Liam’s upcoming fatherhood (he’ll be a dad by the time you hear this) and Liam’s accomplishments (or failures) with the Letterboxd 2017 Cult Movie Challenge. There’s miscellaneous small talk that isn’t reeeally worth detailing, Liam talks about the series ‘Crazy Head’, and Justin makes several weird accusations about D.B. Sweeney and Travis Walton. We discuss how originally this episode was supposed to be an “evil alien” episode on Without Warning and Xtro but because those movies are apparently rare as fuck we skipped on it, and then move on to the actual films of this episode. We give a brief background on Full Moon Productions and Charles Band in general (the varied lineup of the roster, the transition from Empire Pictures, the lack of Barbara Crampton on the Full Moon roster, etc) with a declaration that Empire Pictures is better than Full Moon because no Full Moon film can top From Beyond (note: this is a fact). A brief plot outline of Subspecies is given, and from there we generally rip the movie apart for it’s horrible acting, somehow even more horrible special effects, Angus Scrimm’s puzzling role in this film. Justin mistakenly claims Brad Dourif was in The Gate (it was Stephen Dorff) and then argues with Liam that the ‘Subspecies’ in the title are actually the terrible little monsters that serve no purpose in the movie (I, Justin, am later proven right). There’s more criticism of everything about this movie, ranging from a cloudy plot, excessive vampire drooling, a McGuffin that looks like a butt plug but instead some kind of vampire heirloom, the inability of this movie to properly capture what time period it’s supposed to take place, the uneven tone of the film, and more complaining about the special effects. Extra sharp venom is hurled at the demons in the movie, which Liam rightfully compares to a shitty video game. The films being shot on location in Romania is briefly praised, but before we get too comfortable giving it credit we go back to trashing the way the characters dress. More halfhearted praise is given to the lead actress but the character of Stefan is trashed for being lackadaisical and boring, and then the character of Radu is ripped apart for being horribly non-intimidating and goofy. A brief retelling of the near screaming match we got into over vampire lore occurs (Liam was wrong again), and then Liam makes a very valid point on the lack of charm that Subspecies suffers from. The inconsistency when it comes to which aspects of vampire lore the film is sticking to is discussed, as is the inconsistency with which time of the day the film is taking place. The film trying and spectacularly failing at setting a classically gothic mood is discussed, we yell a lot more about how we hate this movie, and then mercifully move on to talk about Seed People. We open our discussion with a plot outline of Seed People, which is at its heart a copy of Invasion Of The Body Snatchers. Justin talks about seeing the film as a kid and how it was one of the movies that cemented his love of horror movies as a kid. There is a discussion the extremely well done practical effects in the movie and how it is an archetype of the ‘practical effects are better than CGI’ argument. Liam goes off on a brief tangent on how the one actress in the film was also in the series Blue Bloods, Rescue Me, and Ascension. There is a discussion about how despite the movie not being a technically proficient film, there is a definite charm and is a vastly more enjoyable film than Subspecies. Justin explains that is it due to following a very archetypical path for a horror movie and yet manages to not be boring or stereotypical. The adherence to classic B movie tropes is discussed. The shortcoming of the movie when it comes to special effects is discussed (a lazy classic 90s ‘morphing’ sequence when a Seed Person reveals their true Seed Person form). Some of the other drawbacks of the film are discussed but ultimately it is decided that this film has a lot of ‘heart’ whereas Subspecies does not. The filmmakers knowing their limits and this being strength is discussed, and there is a brief examination of the subtle racism of the film due to the lack of diversity of the cast aside from one Hispanic character who happens to be an alien. We end the discussion by highly recommending Seed People.   As always thanks to everyone and anyone who 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. 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]. Thanks always to Justin Miller and Doug Tilley for their technical contributions and fliers, Mike Smaczylo for the awesome fliers, and also thanks to Josh “Dr. Zhivago” Alvarez for the theme song, Chris and LVAC for the support (check them out at www.xlvacx.com), and a HUGE thank you to anyone who retweeted us or shared something on Facebook that we posted. Follow us on Twitter at @thehorrorbiz666, like us on Facebook at facebook.com/thehorrorbiz66, and remember to rate, review, and subscribe to us on ITunes! Until next time…thanks!