Category Archives: Halloween Season

October 20, 2015 · 8:26 pm

THE DEAD DANCE BY MOONLIGHT

Another neglected American horror legend from Balladeer’s Blog to help celebrate Halloween Month.  

THE DEAD DANCE BY MOONLIGHT

Dead Dance by MoonlightManetti was the violinist’s last name. His first name has been lost to history. He was making a name for himself throughout New England when twin milestones occurred which prevented him from earning the full musical fame he longed for.

Those twin milestones happened in 1775 and they were:

On the personal level, Manetti was diagnosed with consumption (tuberculosis) and on the national level, the Revolutionary War broke out. Due to his medical condition the thirtyish violinist was not looked down upon for refraining from military service. However, none of the New England towns had funds to spare for the type of symphonies or opera houses Manetti had envisioned for the area.  Continue reading →

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October 19, 2015 · 9:43 pm

THE MARQUETTE MONSTER

Balladeer’s Blog presents another neglected American horror legend for Halloween Month.

THE MARQUETTE MONSTER

Marquette MonsterNear what is now Alton, IL a monstrous man-eating monster was first sighted by Jacques Marquette in the 1670s. Sightings of the creature continued until the 1860s. The celebrated drawing of this monster by Native Americans was dated to around the year 1200 CE.

The monster is also known as the Piasa Bird, named after Native American terms for dragon-like creatures that supposedly inhabited the region in the ancient past. Over the decades the description varied but overall the Marquette Monster was said to have the body of a horse-sized cougar, the wings of a bat and the head of a human but adorned with antlers like a deer.   Continue reading →

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October 17, 2015 · 7:35 pm

THE SHE-MONSTER OF THE FRENCH BROAD RIVER

Balladeer’s Blog presents another neglected American horror legend for Halloween Month.

THE SHE-MONSTER OF THE FRENCH BROAD RIVER

French Broad RiverThe French Broad River near Asheville, NC is one of those rare rivers that are older than the mountains they pass through. Those mountains in the Appalachians were not created until North America collided with Africa 300 million years ago to form the enormous continent called Pangaea. The river is older than that.

The She-Monster of the French Broad River is said to be a life-form that goes back to those prehistoric times. She is the sole remaining member of whatever type of pre-human race existed in those times and as such is extraordinarily lonely. Continue reading →

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October 17, 2015 · 2:56 pm

ELEVEN MORE BAD MOVIE CLASSICS FOR HALLOWEEN

Return of Dr X

Return of Dr X

My month-long celebration of Halloween continues! Regular readers of Balladeer’s Blog are very familiar with my Bad Movie page where I examine plenty of under the radar movies that are hilariously awful. Previously I ran a list of the top Eleven Neglected Bad Movie Classics for Halloween. That was such a hit here is a list of eleven more neglected bombs. My Bad Movie page features full-length reviews of each of the movies I’m offering a synopsis of here.

THE RETURN OF DR X (1939) – The notorious film in which the legendary Humphrey Bogart played a zombified mad scientist named Dr Xavier who was brought back from the dead by another mad scientist named Dr Flegg. Much of the fun comes from Bogie’s unmistakable disdain for finding himself in the kind of stinker that Bela Lugosi often waded through. Bogie’s Dr X kills Continue reading →

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October 16, 2015 · 7:58 pm

THE SOUL GEM OF THE WHITE MOUNTAINS

Balladeer’s Blog presents another neglected American horror legend for Halloween Month.

THE SOUL GEM OF THE WHITE MOUNTAINS

HANDOUT - In Vorbereitung auf die Jubilaeumsfeierlichkeiten zu 150 Jahren Erstbegehung des Matterhorns, zeichnete der Schweizer Bergsportspezialist Mammut zusammen mit den Zermatter Bergfuehrern in einer Lichterkette die Route ueber den Hoernligrat nach am Mittwoch, 17. September 2014. (PHOTOPRESS/MAMMUT/Robert Boesch)

On the former peak of Mount Monroe in New Hampshire’s White Mountains there used to glow a large light as if from a gigantic ruby or carbuncle. The Native Americans claimed it was a huge stone that fell from the sky one night in the far-distant past. They called it the Soul Gem in their language and they believed it ate the souls of anyone who touched it.   

No one within living memory had survived an attempt to reach the Soul Gem. Over generations multiple expeditions were mounted but all ended in horror. Stories spread that the souls captured by the gem knew new lives as the living trees which at one time were said to grow there.    Continue reading →

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October 15, 2015 · 11:43 pm

THE MALEVOLENT SEAMSTRESS

Balladeer’s Blog presents another neglected American horror legend for Halloween Month.

THE MALEVOLENT SEAMSTRESS  

PlagueIn Boston in 1775, shortly after the Revolutionary War had broken out a mysterious old seamstress wandered into the rebel-held countryside. This woman always wore a mantel wrapped about her in such a way that most of her face was always obscured.

The gentle and apparently very aged woman would beg a night’s lodging in the homes she visited, offering to do any sewing work that needed done by way of paying her way. Many families were happy to take her up on that bartering offer.  Continue reading →

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October 14, 2015 · 11:19 pm

HORRORS OF BOON ISLAND

Balladeer’s Blog presents another neglected American horror legend for Halloween Month.

HORRORS OF BOON ISLAND

Boon IslandBoon Island is located off the southern coast of Maine. Though it is now famous for its lighthouse it used to be a deserted island with no plant or animal life upon it.

In the late 1740’s the ship Nottingham went down just off Boon Island. The survivors of the shipwreck swam to the narrow, deserted wasteland and, losing hope of rescue, eventually turned to cannibalism. Continue reading →

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October 14, 2015 · 9:57 pm

THREE BAD MOVIES FOR HALLOWEEN

Blood SongHalloween month continues here at Balladeer’s Blog! Links to previous lists of Halloween Turkeys are below.

Right now here’s a look at three more classically bad horror flicks for the season.

BLOOD SONG (1982) – Singer Frankie Avalon as a 1980’s- style slasher villain! The godfather’s Luca Brasi (Lenny Montana) as a co-star and co-producer! Who could possibly resist that? Frankie plays a homicidal maniac who escapes from an insane asylum with his beloved flute/recorder type thingee.

Turns out years earlier a girl played by Donna Wilkes – soon to star as Angel herself – got a blood transfusion from Psycho Frankie. In this movie’s logic-free universe that means that she has a mental link with our mad slasher. This link is causing him to track her down to kill her with the single-minded fury that Mike Myers showed toward Jaime Lee Curtis in the Halloween movies. Continue reading →

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October 14, 2015 · 2:34 am

THE DALTON CHANGELING

Balladeer’s Blog presents another neglected American horror legend in honor of Halloween Month.

THE DALTON CHANGELING

Dalton Changeling 2Anne Coleman was a feared witch in Lanesboro, MA in the 1780’s. She was suspected of causing storms that sank ships, bringing on diseases that killed cattle, making food go bad and other malevolent deeds.   

Eunice Dalton – a new mother – had told her husband Ezra and anyone else who would listen that she was certain that Anne Coleman had stolen their baby boy out of the crib and replaced it with a changeling. Ezra and others tried to assure her that the baby was her own but she continued regarding it with fear.

One day when Eunice was nursing the baby she shrieked with horror as she realized the baby had developed teeth and had bitten into her breast to suck out blood instead of milk. Ezra was convinced now that something was definitely wrong with the baby because of the sudden growth of teeth and the blood spilling down from his wife’s bitten breast. Continue reading →

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October 13, 2015 · 8:39 pm

NAKED FEAR: FIVE ODDBALL HORROR FILMS FOR HALLOWEEN

The Nude Vampire

The Nude Vampire

Balladeer’s Blog’s month-long celebration of Halloween continues with this look at five unusual movies with that certain seasonal feel.

5. THE NUDE VAMPIRE (1970) – France’s Jean Rollin is one of those love-them-or-hate-them directors. The snooty French often bashed his films for their devotion to style over all else. Don’t believe reviews which claim that his movies have no comprehensible storylines. Personally I find him more straightforward than Lynch or Jodorowsky. At any rate the central figure of this arthouse Euro-horror is indeed a beautiful female vampire in skimpy outfits and less.

Members of a Suicide Cult have taken to offering themselves up to a vampress who turns out to be science-spawned rather than supernatural. Throw in various allusions to evolution, morality and mortality for good measure. There’s plenty of eerie and macabre imagery to go with the subtext which not only addresses the previous concepts but also examines the way in which the older generation of any time period always considers the younger generation to be figurative “monsters” who will quite literally inherit the Earth.

I’m not sure if Anne Rice was influenced by Rollin’s films but Continue reading →

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