Nathan Schiff is a Long Island, New York filmmaker best known for low-budget horror features he shot in Super 8mm while in his teens. Image Entertainment, a leading DVD distributor, held these films in such high regard that they restored and released the films on DVD releases in 2004.
Born in Forest Hills, New York, Schiff grew up in Baldwin Harbor, Long Island where he began making films at the age of 11. Between the ages of 11 and 16, he made over 20 short films. At age 16, he began filming his first feature, Weasels Rip My Flesh (1979), made on a $400 budget. The storyline follows a detective (John Smihula) investigating deaths caused by a giant mutated weasel. The weasel is captured by a mad scientist (Fred Borges) who plans to conquer the Earth with a monster army created by using the creature's regenerative blood (actually a mix of Karo syrup, cranberry sauce and ketchup).
In Long Island Cannibal Massacre (1980), power lawnmowers and chainsaws spew guts and gore across the suburban landscape as cannibal lepers lurk. They Don't Cut the Grass Anymore (1985) follows two psycho hillbilly gardeners who slice up yuppies instead of cutting the grass. When these three films were released on DVD, film director Wes Craven commented, "Schiff knows Long Island the way Dante knew Hell".
Schiff's fourth feature, Vermilion Eyes [1] (1991), was not made available on DVD. The plot concerns the odyssey of a self-destructive man (John Smihula) through a dreamscape of prophetic nightmares where the border between fantasy and reality has blurred. Critic Ray Young reviewed, "Unique and personal, it grieves over the loss of innocence, as if tapped directly from the id. Vermilion Eyes makes no concessions to anyone or any genre and works out of bruised, frazzled emotion. The poetic, whirling, free style of its imagery is remarkably close in spirit to James Joyce".
Schiff later returned to filmmaking with the horror short Abracadaver! (2008), made for British producer David McGillivray. Promoted as "a gruesome tale of magic and mutilation," the film was part of McGillivray's Worst Fears series. [2]
Long Island Cannibal Massacre and Weasels Rip My Flesh were selections of Cinefamily's 2008 Homemade Horror festival, and Schiff was flown to the West Coast as an invited guest of the Cinefamily film study group. The features were shown under the umbrella title The Super-8 Gorenography of Nathan Schiff! On November 29, 2008, Schiff introduced the two films from the stage of the Silent Movie Theatre in Los Angeles. LA Weekly reviewer Christoph Huber said:
In 2008, Abracadaver! won an award in the Best Horror Short category at the New York International Independent Film and Video Festival. [5]
The Texas Chain Saw Massacre is a 1974 American independent horror film produced, co-composed, and directed by Tobe Hooper, who co-wrote it with Kim Henkel. The film stars Marilyn Burns, Paul A. Partain, Edwin Neal, Jim Siedow, and Gunnar Hansen. The plot follows a group of friends who fall victim to a family of cannibals while on their way to visit an old homestead. The film was marketed as being based on true events to attract a wider audience and to act as a subtle commentary on the era's political climate. Although the character of Leatherface and minor story details were inspired by the crimes of murderer Ed Gein, its plot is largely fictional.
A slasher film is a subgenre of horror films involving a killer or a group of killers stalking and murdering a group of people, usually by use of bladed or sharp tools. Although the term "slasher" may occasionally be used informally as a generic term for any horror film involving murder, film analysts cite an established set of characteristics which set slasher films apart from other horror subgenres, such as monster movies, splatter films, supernatural and psychological horror films.
Video nasty is a colloquial term popularised by the National Viewers' and Listeners' Association (NVALA) in the United Kingdom to refer to a number of films, typically low-budget horror or exploitation films, distributed on video cassette that were criticised for their violent content by the press, social commentators, and various religious organisations in the early 1980s. These video releases were not brought before the British Board of Film Classification (BBFC) due to a loophole in film classification laws that allowed videos to bypass the review process. The resulting uncensored video releases led to public debate concerning the availability of these films to children due to the unregulated nature of the market.
Willard Tobe Hooper was an American filmmaker, best known for his work in the horror genre. The British Film Institute cited Hooper as one of the most influential horror filmmakers of all time.
Gunnar Milton Hansen was an American actor and author best known for playing the mentally impaired cannibal Leatherface in The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974).
Cannibal Holocaust is a 1980 Italian cannibal film directed by Ruggero Deodato and written by Gianfranco Clerici. It stars Robert Kerman as Harold Monroe, an anthropologist who leads a rescue team into the Amazon rainforest to locate a crew of filmmakers that have gone missing while filming a documentary on local cannibal tribes.
An exploitation film is a film that tries to succeed financially by exploiting current trends, niche genres, or lurid content. Exploitation films are generally low-quality "B movies", though some set trends, attract critical attention, become historically important, and even gain a cult following.
Marilyn Burns was an American actress. She was known for playing Sally Hardesty in Tobe Hooper's horror film The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974), which established her as a scream queen and a catalyst of the final girl trope. She was involved in two more films of its resulting franchise: a cameo in The Return of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1995) and a supporting role in Texas Chainsaw 3D (2013). In 2009, she was inducted into the Horror Hall of Fame at the Phoenix Film Festival.
Men's adventure is a genre of magazine that was published in the United States from the 1940s until the early 1970s. Catering to a male audience, these magazines featured pin-up girls and lurid tales of adventure that typically featured wartime feats of daring, exotic travel or conflict with wild animals. These magazines were also colloquially called "armpit slicks", "men's sweat magazines" or "the sweats", especially by people in the magazine publishing or distribution trades.
The Hills Have Eyes is a 1977 American horror film written, directed, and edited by Wes Craven and starring Susan Lanier, Michael Berryman and Dee Wallace. The film follows the Carters, a suburban family targeted by a family of cannibal savages after becoming stranded in the Nevada desert.
Slither is a 2006 science fiction comedy horror film written and directed by James Gunn in his directorial debut. Produced by Paul Brooks and Eric Newman, the film stars Nathan Fillion, Elizabeth Banks, Tania Saulnier, Gregg Henry, and Michael Rooker. The film is set in a small town in South Carolina that becomes invaded by a malevolent alien parasite.
The Return of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre is a 1995 American slasher black comedy film written, co-produced, and directed by Kim Henkel. It is the fourth installment in The Texas Chainsaw Massacre film series. The film stars Renée Zellweger, Matthew McConaughey, and Robert Jacks. The plot follows four teenagers who encounter Leatherface and his murderous family in backwoods Texas on the night of their prom. It features cameo appearances from Marilyn Burns, Paul A. Partain, and John Dugan, all stars of the original film.
The Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning is a 2006 American slasher film and a prequel to the 2003 film. The sixth installment in The Texas Chainsaw Massacre franchise, it was written by Sheldon Turner from a story by Turner and David J. Schow, directed by Jonathan Liebesman and co-produced by Kim Henkel and Tobe Hooper. The film's story takes place four years before its predecessor. It stars Jordana Brewster, Diora Baird, Taylor Handley, Matt Bomer and R. Lee Ermey.
The Texas Chainsaw Massacre is an American horror franchise created by Kim Henkel and Tobe Hooper. It consists of nine films, comics, a novel, and two video game adaptations. The franchise focuses on the cannibalistic spree killer Leatherface and his family, who terrorize unsuspecting visitors to their territories in the desolate Texas countryside, typically killing and subsequently cooking them.
Hillside Cannibals is a 2006 American horror film directed by Leigh Scott and produced by The Asylum. The film is a mockbuster of the film The Hills Have Eyes, another film released around the same month, but its plot also incorporates elements from other films, including Cannibal Holocaust, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and House of 1000 Corpses.
Twin brothers and filmmakers Mark Polonia and John Polonia founded Polonia Bros Entertainment and Cinegraphic Productions. Between them they have written, directed and produced over 40 feature films, often shot-on-video and mostly in the horror and science fiction genres, making them low-budget or even no-budget film cult icons.
Terror is a 1978 British supernatural horror slasher film written by David McGillivray and directed by Norman J. Warren. It stars John Nolan and Carolyn Courage as two cousins who fall victim to a curse that a witch placed on their ancestors.
The Mad Doctor of Blood Island is a 1969 Filipino horror film, co-directed by Eddie Romero and Gerardo de Leon, and starring John Ashley, Angelique Pettyjohn, Eddie Garcia and Ronald Remy.
Butcher Boys is a 2012 American horror cannibal film written and produced by Kim Henkel, who co-created 1974's The Texas Chain Saw Massacre with Tobe Hooper. The film was directed by Duane Graves and Justin Meeks. It was originally titled Boneboys.