Adios Texas – A Tribute
Regular readers may have noticed the recent lack of posts. The reason: I’ve spent the last several weeks moving cross-country with spouse and puppy in tow. After several days of ten hours behind the wheel, we finally arrived in Oregon early this week and have been recuperating ever since.
Now that I have landed in the cool, lush Pacific Northwest, I am reflecting upon four years as a Texas resident with mixed emotions. While I certainly detested the dominant conservative views of the state’s populace, I appreciated the brash Texas culture that combined so many influences. I come away from the state with a greater appreciation for western cloths, country music of the Townes Van Zandt variety, spicy foods, and the greatest contraction ever, “y’all.” The place rubbed off on me, and I know that I’ll think back fondly on the many friends I made, SXSW dayshows I attended, bars I frequented (Hole in the Wall!), and daytrips to float the Comal taken over the past four years.
I feel especially blessed to have been in Austin at a time in which horror fandom flourished. I doubt that this blog would exist had I not cultivated my interest in the genre through coursework in media studies, conversations with like-minded friends, and late night b-movies at the Alamo Drafthouse. Because of the Terror Thursday (now Terror Tuesday) series, I saw such gems as The Stepfather, The Hidden, and Silent Night, Deadly Night along with some duds that shall remain nameless. I even saw a few of the genre’s famous faces at special screenings, including Eli Roth, Herschell Gordon Lewis, and Joe Bob Briggs.
The Alamo Drafthouse sign. Image taken from toplessrobot.com.
Most exciting to me was seeing the production of such movies right before my eyes. The fall that I arrived in Texas, Quentin Tarantino and crew were filming Death Proof in a neighborhood adjacent to my own. I actually spotted Tarantino at Jo’s Coffee Stand while looking for apartments in Austin. I reacted by quickly walking past, calling my brother so I could tell someone, and then walking back to the coffee shop to get a closer look. Later, I saw the trailer park of stars and crew assembled on South Congress and witnessed some of the shooting of the film in Guero’s Taco Bar, an early favorite of mine as I became acquainted with the area. Jungle Julia billboards dotted major streets in South Austin, and my bus trips home from UT would often include a drive past shooting locations. The next Spring, I scored tickets to see the regional premiere of Grindhouse with some friends, and we all met up at one of the film’s prominent shooting locations, the Texas Chili Parlor, before the screening. There, we ran into a group of roller girls (The Putas del Fuego), decked out in evening wear with beauty pageant sashes. We learned at the screening that the ladies of the league were honored guests. Better company for such an event I cannot imagine.
A scene from Deathproof shot at the Texas Chili Parlor in Austin. Image taken from lifeofandres.files.wordpress.com
What I discovered the longer I lived in Texas was the way in which Grindhouse merely elaborated upon an established connection between the state of Texas and the horror genre. Only after moving to Texas did I discover one of the greatest modern horror films of all time, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre. That film’s director and co-writer, Tobe Hooper, taught at the University of Texas’s Radio-TV-Film Department, where I worked on my master’s. He shot the film outside of Austin, capitalizing upon the dry, central Texas terrain to give the film a desolate feel. Horror films continue to use this kind of setting to illicit the same feelings of isolation in viewers.
A still from the stirring final shot of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Image taken from dragonsheadinn.com.
So, while I may be thrilled to be back home in the Northwest, I will always reflect back upon my time in Texas as particularly formative. It may not have been New York in the fifties or San Franscisco in the sixties, but for me, Austin was the right cultural scene at the right time, and it made me into the horror fan that I am today.
Horror Remix at Alamo Houston
As a former resident of Austin, Texas, I regularly crave the horror-exhibition experience offered by the Alamo Drafthouse, a popular regional theater chain voted the best theater in the country. Like many up-and-coming local franchises, the Alamo offers a full restaurant menu for a true dinner-and-a-movie experience. I became familiar with this model while living in Oregon, as the theater pub phenomenon was in full swing there as well. Still, the Alamo sets itself apart by offering innovative programming that further enhances the theatrical experience, which includes its screening of horror films.
The Alamo Ritz on Sixth Street in downtown Austin, Texas. Image taken from Flickr.
Several years ago, for example, I made it out to a showing of Friday the 13th: 3-D. This third installment of the series capitalized on the popularity of 3-D films with many kills designed specifically to enhance such effects. The drafthouse showing was a one-night event, and it drew a rambunctious crowd of fans. While such fan enthusiasm was new to me at the time, I now know that it’s common at the Drafthouse. I’ve attended many other screenings with similar results. I saw a sneak preview for Hostel: Part 2 in which writer/director Eli Roth was tied up by some dominatrices and whipped. Lower profile events included the midnight Terror Thursday (now Terror Tuesdays at 10:00PM) screenings, which featured various rarely screened horror films. My favorites: Silent Night, Deadly Night, The Hidden, and the best slasher ever, The Stepfather! Such screenings became a staple of the summer between my first and second years of grad school, and I miss those late night treks to downtown Austin immensely. Below is a clip of host Zack Carlson introducing the final screening for Terror Thursday, Black Christmas:
Curious about the state of horror programing at the Alamo, I checked their site and discovered that the Alamo in Houston (operated by different owners than the Original Drafthouse in Austin) has a series called “Horror Remix.” The tagline “All Killer, No Filler,” sums up the concept: the curators trim the excess fat from bad horror films, leaving behind the juiciest half-hour of each title. Films are grouped together thematically, with such titles like “Dummy” (puppet horror), “Shopping” (slashers in malls), and “Death Rock” (no description necessary). Click on this link for the trailer for “Dummy,” which, to be quite frank, looks absolutely terrifying and hilarious to me. Also, here’s the promo for “Death Rock”:
I dig the fan revisionism at the heart of this series, and (shock) I love the way these various sub-genres get grouped together to demonstrate the similarities and differences within these categories. As a result, the screening becomes, on the one hand, a study of formula and genre. On the other hand, it demonstrates the ways in which genre films do not always obey convention, as these movies ultimately must be shaped to fit fan expectations. In essence, this is what I love about the Alamo: it honors film fandom unabashedly, recycling old and forgotten texts for new audiences in a theatrical settling. Sadly, such experiences are rare in this age of corporate theater chains.
Dark Room 