A recent discovery has brought to light a new chapter from the Tellurian Artifice. The pages tell of the truth behind the nature of God as we know Him, and introduce him as the creator of our physical gaol.
Please use this link to view the Tellurian Artifce.
New to the Strange Circle website, the Short Story “Going Under” is available in a variety of formats…
“Take for granted, the London Underground delves deeply underneath this ancient city. The forgotten past of countless humans lies there, waiting to be discovered. And discarded deities prowl the tunnels, searching for those who would serve them.”
Click here to jump to the Strange Circle Short Story Page.
RUNTIME: 85 minutes
FIRST RELEASED: 2006
This surprisingly intelligent film tells the tale of Melanie, a troubled teen recently released from a stint in rehab. In the meantime, her family has moved to a new town, and it is there that Mel is introduced to the local ghost story by her sister, Crystal. If you park your car on the train tracks, it will mysteriously be pushed off them to safety by the spirits of children.
The story is sufficiently complex to maintain the more cerebral of audiences, and has enough shocker-gore to keep the rest entertained as well. Add in Melanie’s dysfunctional family, including a deranged bitch mother, and creepy school councillor and there is enough in this film to make it work.
There is more to the ghost story than we first suspect, and Melanie starts seeing things she would rather not. These lead her to the even more horrible truth. Part schlock horror, part detective story, part serial killer movie and with a little bit of teen angst thrown in as well, it will appeal to a wide range of people.
CAST:
Leah Pipes plays the now drug free Melanie, leading the film from the outset. She gives a passable performance, though is nothing special. Likewise her sister, Crystal, played by Kristin Cavallari, who should really have stuck to reality TV.
Notable mention go to Ginger Gilmartin who plays the weirdo Mum of the family. At first you think she is giving a totally unbelievable performance, but something about it eventually works. you really do hate her by the end of the film, and [SPOILER!!!] it’s a real shame she is not killed off somehow after the way she treats her children.
The real surprise is Lou Diamond Phillips who you see really act for the first time in ages. He plays the vaguely inappropriate school councillor, Doug, in a role that is far more touchy-feely that his usual type-cast tough army guy. He does it well!
LINKS:
RUNTIME: 99 mins
THEMES: Curses, Demons
FIRST RELEASED: 27th May, 2009
This latest and most welcome offering from Sam Raimi has just about everything you could want: curses, possession, demons, ghosts, evil old gypsy crones and a large amount of disgusting gore. Great!
Christine Brown is a loans officer who has the misfortune to be on duty when an old woman, Sylvia Ganush, comes in to ask for an extension on her mortgage. Christine is trying to impress her boss, so refuses an extension. Let’s just say that this old gypsy is non too pleased.
Christine is cursed by the old woman, the focus of which is a button from her coat. A demon is going to come for Christine’s soul in three days and drag her down into hell unless she can do something about it. Raimi manages to take a rather hum-drum plot idea and turn it into something quite watchable. The special effects are superb, and the gore scenes are very gory. There are lots of things going into mouths, like blood, flies, eyeballs and even used embalming fluid. Nice!
CAST
Christine is played by Alison Lohman, who does a so-so job. She is slightly wooden at times, and you tend to you lose your sympathy for her quite quickly. (Although this may be the point.) Justin Long (Jeepers Creepers) is her boyfriend, looking all grown up now. He is actually a good actor. Who knew!
MOST GUT-WRENCHING SCENE
Corpse at a wake falls on top of you. You end up face to face with her liquified insides running out of her mouth and into yours!
OVERALL: 4/5
A surprisingly good film. Keeps you in suspense, shocks you and grosses you out, so what are you complaining about! The twist at the end is slightly predictable, but only if you have a long memory.
LINKS:
The second chapter of Bloodlines is released today.
You can access it from the Serial Fiction Page.
Don’t forget to sign up for the Dark Times RSS feed to keep abreast of when new chapters are released.
The mobile edition of the Strange Circle website is now up and running.
You can access most of the content from this site, including the fiction sections, and of course Dark Times! The site is an html site optimised for smaller screens. (Looks especially good on an iPhone!).
The link to the mobile site can be found on the front page of the main site, in the top-corner. Just click on the picture of the iPhone. Or simply click here!
RUNTIME: 115 mins
FIRST RELEASED: 26th January, 2008
THEMES: Vampires
Expect something really different from this very alternative Swedish vampire. In fact, thats probably a bit of a spoiler. It takes a while for you to realise what the premise of this film is, and little by little you are drawn into this reinterpretation of the mythos. It is a slow moving, beautiful, poignant and disturbing look into a world straddling the line between reality and horror.
Oscar is a frighteningly blond boy who is mercilessly bullied at school. He lives in a apartment block with his mother, and often spends hours alone in its snow courtyard. Eli appears one evening on the jungle-gym, and introduces herself as his neighbour. They forge an awkward friendship in which the truth about Eli is slowly revealed.
Along side this plot line, we have the strange older man who ids killing people and stringing them up for their blood. He is soon revealed to have some sort of relationship to Eli. And what will happen to the bullied Oscar under the influence of Eli.
The visuals in this film are stunning. Everywhere is white and bright, because of the snow, but this stark theme is brought into the classrooms of the school and the architecture of the town. The supernatural elements are filmed to great effect, with subtle special-effects that have you rewinding for a second look. the violence is disturbing in its brutality, and the gore is shocking in a similar way.
CAST
Kåre Hedebrant plays Oscar, a very strange looking boy who eventually annoys the hell out of you. Or maybe thats the point. He has a constantly running noise when he is crying, which is a lot, and this adds to the general unease while watching. He plays the eternal victim to perfection, then makes a believable character shift under Eli’s nocturnal influence.
Lina Leandersson, who plays Eli, is by far the more remarkable actor. She has a ageless and interesting face, and shifts from vacant girl to blood-thirsty monster with hardly a breath. Full marks to this young monster!
MOST GUT-WRENCHING SCENE
One of the final scenes, a massacre at the swimming pool. Totally eerie, and times to perfection!
OVERALL: 3/5
Not you usual Hollywood schlock. If you are not into subtitles or dubbing, don’t touch this with a barge-pole. But if you can open you mind to more relaxed serving of horror, then this is well worth it.
LINKS:
The first chapter of Bloodlines is released today. This is the first serial novel from Strange Circle, and each chapter will be published as it is finished. This is a bit of an experiment for the site, so we will see how things go!
The story is about a woman who is thrust in to the shadow world by an encounter with a serial killer. Once she has witnessed what he has done, she cannot ignore the hidden world around her.
This serialisation is written in blog format. You can access it from the Serial Fiction Page. Don’t forget to sign up for the Dark Times RSS feed to keep abreast of when new chapters are released.
RUNTIME: 116 mins
THEMES: Evil child, Family, Psycho-killer
Well, you can tell from the poster that this film has an evil kid in it, right? So you might be expecting a run-of-the-mill, cliched offering that leaves you begging her to kill everyone quickly and get it over with. Wrong!
It certainly starts off in a predictable enough fashion. Family with two kids, mother loses her third, so eventually they decide to adopt. They bring home Esther, an artistic (if not slightly spooky) Russian nine-year-old who proceeds to be the apple of her new father’s eye. Her mother, of course, beings to suspect something might be amiss.
The first third of the film build up the tension well. There in an almost overuse of the shock-moment to get the audience jumping (even before we have even clapped eyes on Esther for the first time). The story plateaus a little in the middle, and the Dad ends up being so dense about the proceedings that it does get slightly ridiculous.
But what an end! After I thought I new exactly what was going to happen, I found myself gripped by the finale, and not disappointed at all with the twist in the tale. The full scope of Esther’s rave-inspired artwork is revealed (black-light IS cool!) and with a beautiful smeared makeup ‘Baby Jane’ moment she fulfills her potential as an iconic villainess, and you really do want that bitch kid to die. Hooray!
CAST
Orphan has a top-notch cast who do not disappoint. Peter Sarsgaard (The Skeleton Key) plays the whiny husband to a tee, and Vera Farmiga is equally as annoying (in a good way) as recovering alcoholic, baby losing, bad mother Kate. Special mention must go to the two children of the family, especially Aryana Engineer who does a stunning job of playing the little deaf girl, Max. Of course, the star of the show is Isabelle Fuhrman who is evil incarnate at the insane Esther. Without giving too much away, her transformation at the end of the film is equally brilliant. After watching the film I had to double check to see just what year she was born (1997).
I have to recognise CCH Pounder, a perennial favourite of mine, who gives us a sterling ‘Nun-in-charge-of-the-Orphanage’ in this film. What a trooper!
MOST GUT-WRENCHING SCENE
A manual vice and a child’s arm. Self-mutilation to the extreme. Nice!
OVERALL: 4/5
Totally worth watching. Slow in the middle, but then grabs you and sticks its finger right down your throat. Cliched, but in a good way, almost using this as a way to draw you into the film, then surprising you at the end.
Released today, Crochet is a new addition to the Strange Circle Library.
The story follows the disturbing path of a serial killer as he selects a series of victims, seemingly as some sort of divine plan.
As always, this short story is available free, in many e-book formats, including eReader, Mobi-pocket, ePub and PDF.
You can download this story from the Short Fiction Page.
