Friday 18 December 2009

Cover Notes




Two for this evening.

I feel I've now moved into another level in my Giallo watching, and I don't necessarily mean in an upwards direction; this may be very unfair to these films, I haven't watched them yet, but this is my response to the covers from Shameless.

Now, I thank Shameless very much for making more Gialli available to the masses (although Italian dubbing would be a lovely addition), but compared to the mysterious and understated cover for the Blue Underground 2005 release of "Crystal Plumage" and the sumptuous Shriek Show version for "Woman in A Lizard's Skin" (I realise there are other complaints about the quality of the DVD), I can't help feeling that this has a negative effect on the perception on the product. Their cover for "Torso", which uses a still from the film, does not pave the way for the stylish delights therein, and is a bit of a spoiler. How much better is the sinister, atmospheric Anchor Bay 2000 cover, I have the recent Blue Underground release, which has an almost 60's poster look to it.

Consequently, I'm not expecting great things from these two - but, we shall wait and see.


Other favourites include:

The NoShame Sergio Martino collection (these guys do do some delightfully stylish for other genres too)
"The House with Laughing Windows" Image Entertainment 2003
The "Perversion Story" cover above from Severin 2007

These are intriguing and stylish covers that you want on your shelf. I like the way Shameless have used the yellow as a nod to the books, which is handy because you will instantly pick them out on your shelves BUT, I'm not keen on these cheapo covers. I know there are people enjoy this look, but I'd love to see Shameless up their game a bit. I love schlock n'sleaze with the best of them, but I don't feel these are good examples of that either.


Thursday 10 December 2009

Early Christmas present to Self



La Dolce Morte by Mikel J. Koven - Scarecrow Press (and I am checking them out right now)
I am So going to enjoy this.

The first two lines:
"This book has three aims. The first, obviously, is an explanation of the giallo, albeit from a rather synchromic, rather than diachronic, perspective..."
I'm thinking "Cor!!!" in the manner of Norman Wisdom! I am getting my dictionary out and settling down to it shortly. All this and the sound of carol singers echoing in the park! Mmmmmm.

Thursday 3 December 2009

Pronto! Pronto! a go! go!


We drove back with our latest t-shirts hot off the press from the wonderful guys at October Textiles. This time I managed to take some film of the process. We've still got to take some pics with our models but the t-shirts will be for sale online later today.
There's a bit more to add but I just wanted to put the pics and film up for now.