One cliche I have seen over and over and over again in film and TV is The Late Night Movie, Midnight Chiller Theater, or some such titled show that airs B-movies late at night. Now, I have lived in many areas in my time, but I've never seen anything like that. Have any of you? Perhaps it did exist at point, but has lost popularity. I guess Elvira counts, but she went away about seven years ago. BTW, around about '95 I saw this horrible show on NBC called Attack Of The Killer B Movies. It was hosted by Elvira and a bunch of annoying kids from Saturday morning teen comedies and it featured half-hour clips from classics like The Wasp Woman and The Tree People (Cut down? Blasphemy!), interrupted every so often by the hosts' lame MST3K knock-off riffing. If Midnight Movies were indeed aired I would be the happiest of men.
Apparently there really have been such late-nite film hosts; they still have cult followings. (For some reason, they all seem to hail from the midwest. I never had one myself.)
Nathan
Yea, we had quite a few different host in the 70's in upstate New York. At the time some of them seemed alittle hokey, but we loved them anyway.
I mention this once in a while, but for one season back in the '80s (I think), SNL alumnus Laraine Newman starred in The Canned Film Festival, which did Tor-Johnson-friendly skits around clips of the "Worst Movies Ever Made!" crammed into one hour. They hit Robot Monster, They Saved Hitler's Brain, Bride of the Monster, and other suckfests. I also remember that Dr. Pepple sponsored it, and the show featured Dr. Pepper's funky Godzilla parody-commercials.
If you do a Google search for "Zacherley's Horrible Horror"--I have to work fast here my computer's acting up--you won't be disappointed. It's a hoot.
OK. I rebooted.
Terry's Far Out Videos has "Zacherley's Horrible Horror" for sale/trade (http://www.geocities.com/Hollywood/Lot/5723/). Watch him do his semi-lame routines (he seems...not quite right) amidst the best collection of B-movie clips I've ever come across.
I recall that, for a while, one of my local stations carried Elvira's show. There is also Off Beat Cinema, on WKBW TV from Buffalo, with a group of beatniks hosting bad movies from a coffee house.
However, the one I remember most fondly was Not-So-Great Movies. This aired on City TV, a Toronto station that pioneered a lot of unconventional stuff that everybody is doing today. In the 80s, they showed this as a play on "Great Movies," the title under which they broudcast popular movies. Not-So-Great Movies started out as a Sunday afternoon thing, and included stuff like Plan 9, Creeping Terror, King Kong vs. Godzilla and stuff like that. When the Terminator came out, they showed Hercules in New York. NSGM also ran late at night for a while. No corny hosts or anything, just cheesy movies.
There is a book about the late night Horror Hosts! Andrews links can get you to a site that lists the Hosts, and boy, is it a doozy. One of the guys i work with has a book, and it gives chapters about Ghoulardi, Svengooli (old and new), Symour (Larry Vincent), Zackerly and Vampira, Dr. Madblood (Who looks a bit like Dr Freex, thank you very much)....oh,man, its a great list. In fact, the book is mentioned in the latest Videohound book, "Cult flicks and Trash picks". If you haven't at least read it....you do yourself a disservice.
There used to be an independent station in my area that played all kinds of great b-movies. It didn't have any horror hosts so far as I know-- I didn't stay up too late when the station was in existence-- but it worked some primo bad movies into the schedule. I caught War of the Gargantuas one afternoon, and Plan 9 from Outer Space at 3 am. I'm told they also played Glen Or Glenda?, Robot Monster, and several Troma films more than once. Unfortunately, it's since been bought out by PAX-- A network I absolutely LOATHE.
I have seen "USA Up All Night" that showed B movies such as "Sorority Babes in the SlimeBowl'O Ramma" and i remember a show on Comedy Centeral or something that showed the worst part of certian B movies I think it was called Tralerpark Theater Anyone else remember ???
Good God, I remember Off Beat Cinema! I used to live in Lockport (a Buffalo suburb), and I caught an episode at like 5 AM. They were showing some classic Stooges shorts. And I do remember a cool show on Sci-Fi (sounds like an oxymoron, I know) called Trailer Park, in which science fiction themes like cloning, invading aliens, etc. were explored through trailers from films. It came on after MST3K, making a solid block of good viewing on the otherwise dead Saturday night.
My absolute favourite wasn't even a real horror host, but rather a parody. Joe Flaherty's Count Floyd was hilarious on Monster Horror Chiller Theatre. Really enjoyed the 3-D "movies" with Dr. Tongue and Bruno. Wish it was a real show.
Ah, "USA Up All Night". Or T&A movies without the T&A. It's a winner of a formula. It's like watching DEAD ALIVE with all the gore cut out.
I've seen Mosquito on Up All Night a bunch of times. And they show one of my all-time favorite genres: Bad '80s comedies. They're all set in summer camps, frat houses, beach resorts and ski lodges, and they are so good, yet bad. Has anyone seen White Water Summer? Not a comedy, but it seems like one. Sean Astin and Eddie from Growing Pains and some other kids are taken on a camping trip by Kevin Bacon, who slowly goes mental and terrorizes them. And the other kids don't like Samwise, until they bond while p**sing.
I loved the episodes where Count Floyd had to introduce something blatantly not scary, like a Bergman film or a Dick Cavett episode. "Ooh, Dick Cavett, kids! He, uh... scares me... bluh."
"Tonight I'm going to suck! ...your blood!"
--Kount Krusty (the perfect Midnight Movie host, misreading his cue card)
The only horror host I've ever seen is Elvira and she hasn't been on around here since the 80s. My mother remembers Zacherley, but I never saw him. I think that was something that was more popular back in the 50-70s or so. Now, all the local shannels have been become network affiliates and they either show nothing late at night, or infomercials.
The only other movie host I've seen was Joe Bob Briggs who used to host a lot of SF/horror movies. He started out on The Movie Channel, where he could pretty much show whatever he wanted, and then he moved to TNT where everything had to be censored. They probably fired him because he kept mentioning how the breasts and some of the blood had to be cut out of the movie in order to show it on TNT.
Beyond that, I seem to recall a show on the weekends in the 70s called Chiller Theater. There was no host, but each show started with this cool claymation scene;
It showed a foggy void with a dead tree, a pool of blood and the word CHILLER spelled out in free standing letters. There were some weird sound effects and a voice would say "Chhhhiiiiiiiiillllller-er-er" while a hand came up out of the blood, picked up the letters and then sank back into the puddle. You can see a brief portion of this intro in Idle Hands when the star is flipping channels.
BTW, would anyone happen to have this on tape or know where I could download a copy? (the Chiller intro, not Idle Hands)
During the late seventies one of the UHF stations had a horror host--"Dr. Bela." He kinda scared me when I was a kid but now I realize he was playing it for laughs. Later on he totally quit being scary and would give lost pet announcements on the air.
We had movies shown on one of the independent stations on Saturday nights during the early 80s. They had some local guys as hosts who did comedy sketches during the breaks--they weren't really "horror movie hosts" per se, just comedy guys and the sketches weren't related to the movies at all.
Then the former independent station became a FOX affiliate, and there were no late night movies at all until a few months ago. One of the network stations has started something called "WORLD' S WORST MOVIES" on Saturday nights. I work then so I can seldom catch it, but I've taped it a few times. I don't agree on their definition of "world's worst"--they played Night of the Living Dead one night and I consider that far from a bad movie. They have annoying "pop-up" comments during the movie, but they're few and far between. The hosts attempt to do humor but aren't that funny and lack the charm of the horror hosts of my childhood. Still, I'm really glad to see horror movies on late night network TV, and at least they don't give them the MST3K treatment.
I can't remember why they fired Joe Bob from TNT--I think they just wanted to revamp their saturday night programming.
Joe Bob rocked. It was a tough choice between his show and MST3K most Saturday nights. I just wish a chennl would show B-flicks uninterrupted aqnd unedited. Showtime Beyond, which specializes in horror and sci-fi, could do something like that. AMC used to be good for unedited B, but now they have commercial breaks and edit out language and nudity.
Joe Bob is awesome!!! I was p**sed when Monster Vision got canned! Pretty much ruined my Saturday Nights(still haven't fully gotten over it). Last time I heard Joe Bob he was on the radio doing a Shiner Bock comercial! DAMN YOU TNT!!!
If anyone needs a Joe Bob fix, they can go to his website at http://www.joebobbriggs.com.
By the way, does anyone know if his "Dead in Concert" tape is worth getting? My local video store has a used copy for $5.
Joe bobb Briggs was the most original thing on TNT. Or as i call it, "The 24 hr Jaws Network". Joe Bobb refused to take the management too seriously, and if there is anything the High Sheriffs don't like, its being dissed. Bunch of pusilanimus poltroons. Ah well.......
Seen DEAD IN CONCERT....it's not terrible, but not nearly as good as any of his TV stuff.
Loved the one where he had to introduce "Georgie Girl," and didn't know quite what to say.
"Oooooo, this is a really scary movie with Lynn Redgrave...and she plays a... girl... who's....a little....chubby."
Then he tries to convince everyone that it's really scary to see Lynn Redgrave put on weight, then he just gives up completely.