All Night Horror Madness 4!

Now in its fourth year, All Night Horror Madness! has all the menace of Damien and some of the swagger of Chucky. After Twitter leaked the night’s surprise opening film to be Oscar (1991), the toys are out the pram and organisers are pissed. So look out for something scarier than a Sly Stallone comedy. The first of five horror films, played back-to-back and cut with retro trailers.

Blows keep coming with Frank Henenlotter’s Brain Damage (1988). Student Brian’s lurrgy is worse than feared when he discovers his tummy bug to be an ancient parasite. The chipper, talking worm (called Elmer) bays Brian to feed his penchant for human brains. In return, his host gets a hit of the creature’s LSD-laced saliva – injected right into his 80s bonce. Cue a netherworld between the graveyard scene in Easy Rider and a Prince video. With retro effects and killer timing from Elmer (voiced by John Zacherle), Brain Damage is what TVs A.L.F would’ve been like if David Cronenberg had directed. Look out for a nice Basket Case (1982) cameo and fellatio scene that throws new light on ‘giving head’.

Wes Craven hit the nail on the head with A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984). Then thrust five knives through the face. Freddy Krueger is literally the stuff of nightmares. Mince-faced and sardonic, he rips you up in your sleep and lets you bleed out in real life. And before Adderall and Irn Bru 32, his co-ed prey didn’t stand a chance. Between all the butter-fingers blood and guts however, Craven shows a lightness of touch. He builds suspense around the murder mystery and creates a surreal, synth-filled dreamscape. He even gets teen angst and sex in there from the likes of Johnny Depp and Amanda Wyss.  A Nightmare… was the definitive horror film for a generation, and many still suffer night terrors with Freddy stalking school corridors, screeching blackboards and flicking through York notes.

Like a Berlusconi afterparty, the horror continues with Italian grindhouse classic The Nights of Terror (1981). A horny professor throws a swingers party. When a nearby archaeological dig knocks through into an ancient burial site, a curse is unleashed that resurrects the dead. Like Shameless’s Gallaghers gate-crashing a Kevin McCloud soirée, the zombies attack the prof’s villa, eating up the trendy socialites like brain parfait. Infamous for a son-on-mom scene (the former played by dwarf Peter Bark), The Nights of Terror is the Russ Meyer and George A. Romero collaboration that was never was.

More down to Earth pleasures come with The Return of the Living Dead (1985). A group of kids that ‘just wanna party’ choose the wrong night to gatecrash a cemetery. When a can of army engineered toxin is bumbled open by a biotech firm (that old chestnut), the dead reanimate and prove as hungry for ‘braaains’ as the kids are for 80s beats. The Return of the Living Dead is so 80s it hurts. Listen closely enough and you can almost hear Rodney Dangerfield bludgeoning a teen with a putter.

Get down to The Cameo for 11pm on Saturday 10 March for a horror all-nighter with three screenings from vintage 35mm prints and a free raffle. Just stay awake, or Freddy will pinch your popcorn.