Cinefantastique Online

Veteran CFQ journalist Lawrence French takes you deep into the dark and dreamy world of horror, fantasy, and science fiction films.

This weeks CFQ Ultra-Lounge podcast features a talk on Dick Smith getting his honorary Oscar for the groundbreaking work he did as one of the greatest  make-up artists in the history of the cinema.  Cinefantastique Magazine helped paved the way for this award, by devoting a retrospective cover story to Mr. Smith and his (then) [...]

This year marks Pixar Animation Studios 25th Anniversary, although the core group that went on to form Pixar actually dates back before 1986.  Cinefantastique was on the scene to celebrate Pixar’s  first major success, TOY STORY  in 1995, along with their early triumphs in computer graphics for effects work.  As CARS 2 is about to [...]

Master of Menace Vincent Price as the abominable villain in DR. PHIBES RISES AGAIN.
To celebrate the lasting legacy of  Vincent Price in his centennial year, here is a collection of  fond memories and  a few letters  from a selection of his many friends and co-workers.

CHRISTOPHER LEE

L to R: Christopher Lee, John Carradine, Peter [...]

In 1960 when Roger Corman cast Vincent Price in The House of Usher he never had any thoughts about  making a whole series of Poe films, but box-office success quickly changed his mind. As a result, between 1960 and 1965, Corman and Vincent Price went on to make eight films together, which most people [...]

While Universal’s planned version of AT THE MOUNTAINS OF MADNESS was being put on hold, I began looking as some of the dates when Lovecraft came up with his classic terror stories.  I was rather startled to see that Lovecraft’s work was mostly done in close harmony with the classic era of Hollywood horror in the twenties [...]

In the history of Cinefantastique Magazine,  Sir Cristopher Lee has appeared on our cover three times, surpassed only by Ray Harryhausen.   Interestingly enough, all three of the CFQ covers on Lee (Dracula,  The Man With The Golden Gun and The Wicker Man), were also the movies that were given the most play in the [...]

That criminal mastermind of a film programmer, Eddie Muller is presenting 24 films a second…  or rather 24 films in ten days,  for the ninth annual edition of  NOIR CITY taking place at San Francisco’s historic movie palace, the Castro Theatre, from  Friday, January 21 through Sunday, January 30.  This year’s festival features several Noir [...]

Seventeen years ago on October 25 1993 at the age of 82, Vincent Price met the end of his adventure on Earth. To commemorate his passing, several Facebook groups are having a “Vincent Price Day” including Rick Squire’s The Vincent Price Exhibit. As is well-known, Mr. Price was a life-long devotee of all the arts and often defended the motion-picture as a great art form before it was fashionable to do so in the fifties and early sixties. In an homage Price wrote in 1986 for Forrest J. Ackerman, he offers a splendid tribute not only to “4 E” but also to the many fright films that will forever be associated with the name of Vincent Leonard Price. Read it below the fold.

Image Entertainment’s new 14-DVD set of 67 episodes of THRILLER is quite a marvelous treat, and it fits in perfectly with Cinefantastique’s celebration of  movies released in that seminal year for terror, 1960.
Among the impressive authors who wrote episodes for THRILLER were Robert Bloch, Richard Matheson, Charles Beaumont, Donald S. Sandford and Barre Lyndon.  The [...]

Watch the Video of the BFI and BAFTA special achievement award presented to RAY HARRYHAUSEN on the occasion of the master animator’s 90th birthday. This fabulous 42 minute minute video includes comments from James Cameron, Steven Spielberg, Guillermo Del Toro, Nick Park Frank Darabont, John Landis, and more.

As I’ve suggested for the last two years, limiting the Academy Award for “Best Visual Effects” to only three nominees seems quite unfair, since all the other categories (except make-up) have five nominees. Given the overwhelming number of films that feature superlative effects work these days, it has become increasingly obvious that this is a change that has been long overdue.

Probably the biggest challenge for Pixar in making TOY STORY 3 was turning the third film into more than just a rehash of ideas from the first two stories. But having a central core of well-loved toy characters who were already familiar to audiences from the first two movies, freed the Pixar story team [...]

Christopher Lee as Saruman the White in LORD OF THE RINGS
In Tim Burton’s ALICE IN WONDERLAND  Christopher Lee has a brief one line “cameo” as the voice of  the dragon-like Jabberwock, so it was interesting to note that Lee himself  has recently suggested  he might play the voice of Smaug, the dragon,  in the upcoming [...]