Fangoria Weekend of Horrors Report

Yesterday, for the first time, I ventured to the Fangoria Weekend of Horrors! After waking up early and making the drive to Los Angeles, I found myself at the Burbank Airport Marriott surrounded by like-minded people…all horror-loving freaks!

 Eli Roth Hostel II panel

My first order of business was to pop into the Hostel II panel with director Eli Roth and stars Bijou Phillips and Vera Jordanova. I was a bit early, so I got to catch the last part of Heather Langenkamp’s (the star of Nightmare on Elm Street) Q & A. She was very personable, friendly and open and still looked fantastic! Next was the Hostel II panel. Out came two buff, hulking men wearing leather aprons. One carried a wicked hammer and the other a long strand of chain. Both had surgical masks over their faces and both looked very menacing…and they are two of the torturers from the film! Eli Roth and his two leading ladies soon took their seats on stage and began answering questions from the audience. All three of them seemed very excited about the movie and happy to be at the convention. Roth encouraged all young filmmakers in the audience to never give up their dreams and not to let anything get in their way. He also told a funny story about sneaking into the Fangoria convention when he was still a struggling filmmaker and did hilarious, spot-on impressions of Quentin Tarantino and David Lynch. A sneak peek at Hostel II was also shown, which, along with Roth’s excitement, only made me more anxious to see Hostel II.

Me, Danny of Horror Fanatics and Michelle Fatale

After that I had time to traipse around, look at all the pretty merch, stop in to say hi to our friends at Mangled Angels and the Living Dead Girlz and have some lunch. After that it was to the bar to meet up with Heidi Martinuzzi of Pretty/Scary and Shannon Lark of Living Dead Girlz and the Viscera Film Festival. Then it was back to wandering the booths and picking up some cool souvenirs and freebies. There were lots of famous faces wandering about – gothic minstrel/author Voltaire, horror darling Debbie Rochon, Doug Bradley (Pinhead from Hellraiser fame), Rider Strong (of the upcoming Borderland), Tony Todd (of the upcoming Hatchet, of Candyman and The Devil’s Rejects fame), the cast of Rob Zombie’s Halloween including Danielle Harris, Giuseppe Andrews (from Cabin Fever), director Ryan Schifrin of Abominable  and tons more!

 Me and director Ryan Shifrin

After wandering a bit, I made my way to the next couple of panels, including a Horror Composers panel, a Hatchet panel and sneak peek and the Rob Zombie/Halloween panel. The Hatchet panel was by far the most entertaining, with writer/director Adam Green getting the audience pumped with his enthusiasm. The movie itself, set to be released September 7th, 2007, looks wicked awesome! The sneak peak shown to the audience was met with a roar of approval from the crowd and was a fantastically gruesome and bloody clip! Stars Kane Hodder, Tony Todd, Joel David Moore, Tamara Feldman and special FX creator John Carl Buechler joined Green on stage. This is one movie that I am wholeheartedly looking forward to and I hope it gets a great response from horror fans, because it looks like it aims to please!

 Me, WiL and Molly from Horror Yearbook

The Halloween panel was a bit of a let down, as Rob Zombie wasn’t as enthusiastic or responsive to the audience’s questions as Roth or Green were. Still, it was a thrill to see Zombie on stage along with cast members (left to right in photo below) Kristina Klebe, Hanna Hall, Danielle Harris, Scout Taylor-Compton, Sherri Moon Zombie and cutie Daeg Faerch (Rob Zombie on far right of photo). I think Faerch was the most excited to be there and definitely gave the best answers to fans’ questions.

 Rob Zombie's Halloween panel

After the remaining panels I headed back to the bar for some mingling…Met a fine bunch of people including Danny from Horror-Fanatics.com, the lovely Michelle Fatale, the director of Guardian of the Realm, Ted Smith, the director and writer for Closet Space, Mel House and Jason Stewart, Jolene from the Flesh Farm the wonderful Molly Celaschi and WiL from HorrorYearbook.com, the Dread Central guys and so many more! There are so many people I missed seeing and didn’t get a chance to talk to, like the Icons of Fright crew, who came all the way from the East Coast, “Flick Chick Staci” (or Staci Wilson) whom I spotted running around and lots of other familiar looking folks whom I didn’t have a chance to talk to. I’m glad I got to spend some quality time with the folks I did meet, though! And to anyone I missed, there’s always next year!

I ended the night knowing I had made some great new friends, I had attending my very first horror convention and I had spread the word just a little bit more about Fatally-Yours.com and our love for horror. It was a fun time and restored my faith that yes, there are horror fans out there just like me (they seem hard to come by where I live). This Weekend of Horrors was truly memorable and was an amazing and overwhelming experience, one that I look forward to repeating next year!