Horror Blog Of The Month: PORKHEAD'S HORROR REVIEW HOLE

Another great horror month, another great horror blog!

Allow me to introduce:

 

PORKHEAD'S HORROR REVIEW HOLE (a.k.a. The Horror Review Hole), 

one of the few really, really entertaining british horror blogs, created by a nice brummie called Joel Elvis (what a name!).

Stumbled upon it sometime in 2010 and love it since, mainly because of Joel's amusing style of writing,

and, of course, the eye-catching layout that consists of scream queens, cabinets and neon signs. :-)

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Maynard:

Hi Joel! Who are you and why do you blog?

Joel:

I'm Joel Harley, creator and author of The Horror Review Hole.  I'm an English Language/Literature graduate who hails from Birmingham, England.  I blog mostly because I love to write.  It's all that I've ever really wanted to to and the only 'job' I could ever see myself doing without coercion from my mother.  I also love horror movies with a passion, so I think writing about them is a natural sort of progression.   Well, until I start making crappy movies of my own, which is an ambition too.

Which movie made you a horror fan (and why)?

 The one I can most distinctly remember watching and loving is Freddy's Dead: The Final Nightmare.  I was about 12 at the time, and it was on late at night.  I stayed up after bedtime just to watch it and have been more or less transfixed by horror ever since.  Which is funny, when one considers how terrible Freddy's Dead is.  Just for that, it'll always hold a special place in my heart.  It also caused my mother to cut the plug off the TV to prevent me from watching TV after hours.  But the movie that marked my progression to real horror fan was Sam Raimi's Evil Dead.  It managed a UK cinema re-release when I was about 18 (on a double bill with some shit slasher set in a lighthouse).  It blew my mind, awakened the horror fan within and made me a little bit gay for Bruce Campbell.

Who is your favorite horror director (and why)?

I go through phases, but the most consistent and the guy I would usually go with is, again, Sam Raimi.  I'm a sucker for a bit of humour in my horror, and Raimi always manages to pull it off.  Evil Dead balances horror and humour wonderfully.  If I'm in a belly-laugh kinda mood, I'll go for Evil Dead II, or for something a little more mainstream, Darkman.  Darkman might just be one of my favourite superhero movies of all time.  I even thought disco Peter Parker was pretty funny in Spider-Man 3.  Drag Me To Hell proved that the man's still got it.  Close runners-up would include Takashi Miike, old-school Peter Jackson and Neil Marshall.  

What are your all-time horror movie favorites?

Oof, there's a lot. Omitting any of the below would have been a crime.  Spot the two (very) ironic joys at the end.  Not all of the movies are technically good, I know, but they're the ones that really clicked and I could watch over and over again.  And have.

The Evil Dead

The Texas Chain Saw Massacre 

Re-Animator

Dawn Of The Dead

Braindead

Ichi The Killer

The Descent

Evil Dead II

The Hitcher

The Wicker Man

The Hills Have Eyes (remake)

Bride Of Frankenstein

Shaun Of The Dead

Aliens

Halloween

[Rec]

Battle Royale

Friday The Thirteenth: Part 4

A Nightmare On Elm Street

Leatherface: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre Part III

Maniac Cop

My Bloody Valentine

I Know Who Killed Me/The Wicker Man (remake)

What's the worst horror movie you've seen so far?

I watch a lot of terrible horror.  The worst thing I ever remember seeing is a no-budget feature called Cold Grip 
(http://porkhead.blogspot.com/2009/05/cold-grip.html)

 which is one of the first things I ever reviewed.  It set the bar pretty high (or low?) for awfulness, and I'm not sure I've seen worse since.

Most of my friends don't like horror films. How about your friends?

My friends mostly either tolerate horror or actively hate it.  Although I do have a set of buddies I showed The Taint to, and they thought it was great.  I guess I have some pretty open minded friends.  One of them, however, walked out of a cinema and left me to watch My Bloody Valentine 3D alone because she hated it so much.  So I also have some pretty wussy friends.

Choose: Freddy? Jason? Leatherface? Michael? The Tall Man? Other?

Leatherface all the way, but not remake Leatherface and definitely not the whimpering Next Generation Leatherface.  Hmm, I might have remembered a new contender for Worst Movie Ever.  But yeah, Leatherface is definitely my favourite.  Which other horror icons can boast a chainsaw battle with Dennis Hopper and having murdered Ken Foree? (depending, I suppose, on which version of Leatherface you watch).  Freddy, Jason, Michael & Mr. Tall rock too, but Leatherface has always been the most interesting to me.    

Choose: US horror? European horror? Asian horror? Other?

Asian horror probably, but not the majority of the ghost stuff: I'll take a bit of Ichi The Killer, the Vengeance trilogy, Audition, Battle Royale or The Chaser, please.  I like horror from all around the world, but the Asian horrors are generally the ones I find the most interesting and usually the only ones to ever nearly-scare me. 

Do you prefer watching horror at home or at the theater?

At home; with the lights off, a bottle or five of beer and some snacks.

What kind of music do you like?

Most of my tastes are desperately uncool.  I think Queen are unironically the best band in the world, closely followed by Johnny Cash and David Bowie.  I could listen to those three for days on end.  And I probably do.  I also love Meat Loaf, Electric Light Orchestra, The Smiths, Screamin Jay Hawkins, Muse and Blur.  My tastes vary though.  Just recently I'm getting more into punk and metal type stuff.

What do you read?

Comic books mostly, washed down with a heavy diet of trashy horror novels and film magazines.   Favourite writers and authors: Jack Ketchum, Clive Barker, Garth Ennis, (some) Alan Moore, James Herbert and the journalist/comedian Charlie Brooker. I'll also spend a good few hours every few days catching up on the other horror blogs out there (Full Moon Reviews, The Girl Who Loves Horror and Totally Jinxed are amongst my favourites).  But I'll generally read anything so long as it can hold my attention.

Tell me the first 3 things that come to your mind when you think about Austria.

Cheese, Arnold Schwarzenegger and probably beer.  Those are probably my first three thoughts when I think about anything, actually.  

LOL :-)
Anything else you wanna tell us?

Hmm; well everyone should definitely read and follow The Horror Review Hole, that's for sure.  Also, I'd love to hear a few suggestions; what would you like to see more/less of?  Is there a particular movie you'd like me to check out?  Even if you want to hurl vitriol at my witless opinions, people should go comment on stuff.  Thanks for reading.  And thanks to Maynard Morrissey and his wonderful blog for asking me to do this.  I had a ball.  Cheers!

Thank you, Joel!

http://porkhead.blogspot.com/

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