Witchy Willey's Blog of Peculiar Interests

     As I have mentioned before, I watched many horror movies as a child.  Including the awful ones!  I was very young when my mother allowed me to rent a particular horror film, mostly because it wasn't R rated.  It was a sequel and I had not seen the first one, I just thought it looked like a cool horror flick.  A troll could be scene lurking behind a child on the cover and I was very excited to watch it.  We went home and I was finally able to watch it with my mother who told me she thought it was "really stupid" and that "we picked a really bad one this time..."  That film has since had a cult following due to how bad it was and there was even a documentary made about the film titled "Best Worst Movie".  In other words it's a film so bad that it's good.      The story begins in a family home.  Michael has always dreamed of being a farmer, and arranges a home exchange vacation in which he and his family will move into a house in the

      Samhain represents the progression of life and death and is the end of the harvest, calling the spirits and the changing characteristics of the God and Goddess.  Autumn colors are usually used as altar decorations to represent the dying of nature and life.  Many decorate with “Halloween” decorations to resemble death while they also may choose to add pictures of passed loved ones.      Some use suitable herbs which symbolize mortality on their altar to remember loved ones or shrines for family are also created.  Spiritual tools are often added to altars for Samhain such as scrying mirrors, Tarot cards or a pendulum.  I use my nearly one-hundred year old Ouija board due to my success in using it.      One October thirty-first, my husband, my mother and I went to my older sister’s place and we brought my Ouija board.  I brought candles and every planchette from each board I own.  We successfully communicated with all four of my grandparents and my aunt.      My grandmothe

     Along with the 90’s TV Series “Are You Afraid of the Dark” , my older sister and I loved another spooky 90’s show called “Goosebumps” , a Canadian horror anthology television series based on R. L. Stine's best-selling book series .  We owned several of the Goosebumps books and they certainly contributed to our fascination of all things spooky !      Alike the Are You Afraid of the Dark “The Tale of the Lonely Ghost” episode, we also had a favourite episode from the Goosebumps series.  We loved the episode so much that we convinced our mother to purchase the home video VHS release of the episode, and others thereafter.  However the first VHS was always our favourite to watch.  See below my review of the Goosebumps episode “The Haunted Mask” .       The Haunted Mask is a two-part horror television special that first aired on October 27, 1995, based on R. L. Stine's book of the same name.  It follows Carly Beth , a timid girl who buys a Halloween mask that wou

     I wasn’t going to do a review for this film originally.  However upon the release of my review of the 1973 film “The Exorcist”, along with a paranormal experience which happened to my teenage friends and I one evening, a fellow named Eugene William Elder shared a far more terrifying experience which happened to him while he watched the film “Paranormal Activity” .  I will start with my review of the film first.      " Found footage films" are a very interesting concept…  Many people dislike them because of the amateur shaky camera shots so many present while others love them because they seem believable as they are normally shot in home video styles.  However new directors of these films have become more creative in the ways the films are shot…  I’ll admit that they are a guilty pleasure of mine most of the time because most of them end in the same way, that being that the characters documenting die in the end.  However I find that the more I think less critically

     Some of the best memories of my childhood was watching spooky shows with my family.  My older sister and I especially shared a fascination with everything spooky.  Doing witchy stuff , dressing up like vampires , playing Bloody Mary and watching various shows about all of that wonderful fun.  One of our most cherishes shows to this day was a show we would always watch on YTV called “Are You Afraid of the Dark?”      It was always a real treat when our favourite episode aired on our favourite Canadian children’s TV Network, called “The Lonely Ghost” .  It has always been a bone chilling, most spooky favourite!      The show starts with the old campfire gang while David starts the show as he is about to tell the story to the rest of the "Midnight Society" .      The story is about Amanda Cameron , whose parents are studying carvings up north.  Amanda must stay with her Aunt Dottie and her snobby cousin Beth.      Beth wants nothing to do with

     One of the first films that scared me as a child was a crazy children’s horror fantasy film with Fred Savage as a lonely boy named Brian who meets the monster from under his bed named Maurice, played by Howie Mandel.  The film was advertised as a children’s film and had a PG rating, however due to the nature of hellish scenes in the monster dimension and adult humour that doesn’t always go right over children’s heads, many parents thought that the film should have been rated PG-13.  Still watching it today, I can see how it is still scaring children, however the humour may be a lot more tamer for today’s standards as many children watch show like Family Guy.  When Little Monsters was released in 1989, the show parents didn’t want us to watch was The Simpson’s, and the old episodes are really quite tame compared to Family Guy or even Little Monsters for that matter.      The film starts with lonely Brian, after moving away from friends, finding himself blamed for sev

     With the new season of The Exorcist launched, I found it an appropriate time to release my review of the first season.  When I first heard there was a series in relation to the original film, I was hopeful that viewers would get to see an extended version of the original Exorcist story .  However when I heard more about the family surrounding the first season, I was originally disappointed that it didn’t seem relative to the original characters of the 1973 film.  That is until viewers later learn a twist  in the story that connects the first season to the original film which then had me following the first season to the very end.  I wont spoil it for you...      Alike the original film, season 1 of The Exorcist is a propulsive psychological thriller following two very different priests tackling one family’s case of horrifying demonic possession .  Father Tomas Ortega is the new face of the Catholic Church : progressive, ambitious and compassionate.  He runs a small, b

      The very first music album which my parents bought for me was Alapalooza by Weird Al Yankovic .  Around this time my family and I would sing along to song on the radio like If I Had a Million Dollars by the Barenaked Ladies , whom I do not care for today.  My copy of Alapalooza was a retro cassette tape copy and I had lots of fun listening to it on my double cassette recorder.      Alapalooza was released on October 5, 1993 in the United States. Globally, some versions included a notice distinguishing it from the official Jurassic Park film soundtrack, as the two cover designs were similar. The Japanese edition contained a bonus track of Yankovic singing "Jurassic Park" in Japanese. A music video compilation for the album, entitled Alapalooza: the Videos, was released in February 1994 and contained four videos, only two of which ("Jurassic Park" and "Bedrock Anthem") were from Alapalooza.      Alapalooza contains seven original songs a