31 days of Horror 2012 day 11

April Fool's Day
1986
Triple Feature Paramount DVD

Even though I am a huge fan of slasher films,and really love the ones made in the 80s,I never saw April Fool's Day until a few years ago. After seeing a fun interview with the director in "Falling to Pieces" I knew I had to see this film. Well then I was in town and found a dvd set that had "Tales from the Darkside the movie","Stephen King's Graveyard Shift" and "April Fool's Day". It was only 10 bucks so I grabbed it.

Muffy,played by the mega cute Deborah Foreman,invites a bunch of her friends from college to visit her on an island her family owns. So the film starts off with the friends waiting on the ferry to take them to the island. And we get to meet and learn a little about each of them. The only people I knew from  the group was Amy "Friday the 13th part II" Steel and Thomas "Freaks and Geeks" Wilson. It is April 1st so we see plenty of pranks. Once they get to the island it seems that Muffy has set up all kinds of pranks all over the house they will be staying in. But something more sinister is happening. Someone is killing the friends. And at the end we get a twist that I bet ,unless someone has clued you in,no one would have guessed.

It seems this is a film that among slasher fans is either loved or hated. Most of the people that hate it,seem to hate it cause of the ending. I love the movie. The acting is better than most slasher films. With Steel,Foreman and Wilson being the standouts. And the FX work is well done. April Fool's Day gets a B.

31 days of Horror 2012 Extra 07

The Mammoth Book of Zombies Comics
Edited by David Kendall

Reprinting 18 different zombie comics in black and white,this book is a nice collection of a wide variety of zombie fiction. There is stories written by Steve Niles,Jon Arye,Buddy Scalera,M.Swank,Darko Macan,Oleg Kozyrev,Mark Bloodworth,Stuart Kerr and many other writers. Overall the artwork is pretty good with some stories having amazing artwork.

The real stand outs are "Necrotic:Dead Flesh on a Living Body","Dead Eyes Open","Might of the Living Dead" and a great adaptation of the Robert E. Howard horror classic "Pigeons from Hell". Necrotic is a fun story about an archaeologist that has his friend mummify him when he dies. He comes back to life about 60 years later and tries to live a normal life,but quickly realizes that isn't gonna happen. Dead Eyes Open is a fairly long story about zombies that don't crave human flesh and behave like living humans. Lots of twists and turns in the story that keep it interesting. Might of the living dead is a short comedy piece that helps offset all the grimness and darkness in the other stories. Then there is Pigeons from Hell.I had read the Robert E Howard story many years ago in a collection of short horror fiction. But had forgotten most of it. This adaptation is amazing. The artwork helps capture the mood of the story. If you are into comics and horror this a nice collection to get. The cover price is right at 18 bucks but it is easy to find a used copy for less than half of that. The Mammoth Book of Zombie Comics gets an B+.