The Amazon Guide

HereÂ’s a quiz for you. LetÂ’s say youÂ’re driving across the country on vacation, and your vehicle breaks down. You limp into a ramshackle country store and are greeted by Granny (Liz Little), the creepy old woman who owns the place. She invites you to stay for dinner, and, not wanting to be rude, you accept. Once you and your kin are seated and ready to eat, Granny introduces you to the other members of her family.

First off, thereÂ’s Brain (Jay Dugre). HeÂ’s an average-looking guy except for that huge sack which covers his enormously oversized cranium. Then thereÂ’s Plates (Warwick Davis), a midget who dresses all in white and looks (and acts) like a junior-sized psychopath. Oh, and he likes to throw plates at people. And finally, sitting in a darkened corner, is a man introduced as the Surgeon General (Kurt Carley). You canÂ’t make him out very well, but it sort of looks like heÂ’s wearing someoneÂ’s face over his own. IÂ’ll repeat that last part. HeÂ’s wearing someoneÂ’s face over his own.

Now for the quiz. At this point, would you:

(a) Be thinking to yourself how odd these people are and how youÂ’d better watch out.

(b) Excuse yourself to go to the bathroom, then run like hell.

(c) Laugh like an idiot at all their charming backwoods antics, then start asking the guy in the corner (thatÂ’s right, the one wearing someone elseÂ’s face) lots of annoying questions.

If you answered (a) or (b), then youÂ’d probably react like 99.9% of the population. But if you answered (c), well, you would be perfectly suited to be a member of the Rockwell family.

Thankfully, the mother, father, and younger brother of the Rockwell clan are dispatched very early on (in fact, during that ill-fated dinner mentioned above), leaving only teenage Tina (Karoline Brandt) to contend with the family of maniacs and fend off the romantic advances of Brain. Luckily for her, help arrives later on in the form of a gang of homicidal, geriatric bikers named The Ancient Ones (led, strangely, by old-school horror fanboy, Forrest J. Ackerman). And let me tell you something – nothing can beat the sight of an eighty-year-old biker ripping the head off of a man and being drenched in blood.

Skinned Deep is what IÂ’ve come to expect from el cheapo horror films. Bad script. Bad acting. Bad everything. The only thing that even passes for average are the special effects, and this makes sense once you realize that the director (Gabriel Bartalos) has long worked in that field. Now that heÂ’s got the directing bug out of his system, I hope heÂ’ll go back to the land of prosthetics and squibs and stay there.

The movie attempts to be funny at times, but the Bartalos script is absolutely devoid of anything approaching humor. It doesnÂ’t even have that so-bad-itÂ’s-good quality. ItÂ’s simply bad. Your local community theater could do better. For that matter, you could do better with a few thousand dollars.

And I would especially like to express my disdain at the filmmakers for ripping off shots from The Road Warrior. Maybe they considered it an homage. I consider it desperation and lack of creativity. ItÂ’s annoying when Tarantino does it, and itÂ’s even more annoying when someone of this ilk does it.

Skinned Deep had potential, but the whole project went horribly awry (probably from the moment that a printer spit out the script). YouÂ’ve been warned. View at your own peril. And, after reading this, if you still think you might rent this film, why donÂ’t you just put five dollars in an envelope and send it to me? I deserve it more than the people who made this film.

Cinema Threads – The Best Kept Secret on the Net

Forrest J Ackerman – Ackermansion tour

I need help on a book series can anyone help now?

I need someone to help give me a summary on a book called another fine myth and another book called myth conceptions and they are by robert asprin.

ah the hilarious mythAdventures series. your going to be cheating yourself out of a good book but eh! kids today

Robert Asprin talking about SCA

Many of Philip K. Dick’s stories have been made into films, including “Blade Runner” which was based on the novel “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?” and “Total Recall” which was based on the short story “We Can Remember It for You Wholesale.” Steven Spielberg’s 2002 adaptation of “The Minority Report,” starring Tom Cruise, was based on the short story written in 1956.

It’s been my experience that the book is usually better than the movie so after seeing the film I decided to read the original story which takes place in a future where mutant beings with precognitive abilities aid a pre-crime police force in apprehending criminals for crimes they would have committed in the future.

They’re then exiled or sent to detention camps. Murder has pretty much been eliminated. Of course the criminals complain that they haven’t done anything but this is brushed off on the grounds that they presumably deserve it. When Anderton, the top cop, is accused of murder he thinks there’s been a mistake or he’s been set up. He begins to wonder if there’s something wrong with punishing people for things they haven’t done yet. If he can’t discover who set him up he will fall victim to the system he helped create.

Some plot points are changed. For example the three precogs in the movie are portrayed peacefully but in the story they’ve been drugged and they’re forced to use their psychic abilities. But Spielberg kept the basic theme of the story and made it into a thrilling sci-fi adventure. It’s a great movie, the technical aspects are well-done, the special effects are out-standing and the acting is superb.

But I would definitely recommend reading the original story for Dick’s vision which was way ahead of its time and surprisingly up to date in spite of being over fifty years old. The edition I chose – THE MINORITY REPORT AND OTHER CLASSIC STORIES – contains eighteen stories in total. It’s not a best of collection, it’s actually volume four of his collected short stories and it spans the period between 1954 and 1964, but it’s a good representation and a must for serious collectors.

His work is imaginative, surreal and often downright strange. Dick writes about people rather than technology and science. His characters seem like ordinary people, but bizarre things happen to them. The complex plots take twists and turns and sometimes they seem like episodes of the Twilight Zone.

His future worlds are often dystopian societies characterized by misery, oppression and despair, where people lead dehumanized lives. Yet he often incorporates humor in his stories. Many of them involve precognition and themes of false reality. Others deal with the fine line between man and machine and ask – What is humanity?

This is a great edition for fans, collectors and those who enjoy short stories rather than novels. If you are only familiar with Philip K. Dick from the movies based on his work you owe it to yourself to pick up a copy.

A brief synopsis of each story follows.

AUTOFAC takes place in an apocalyptic world where robots (autofacs) work for the surviving humans. But when humanity discovers they can’t shut down the robots they are reduced to stealing supplies in order to live.

SERVICE CALL is a time travel story. A service man from the future visits the past to try and stop an invention that control’s people’s thoughts.

In CAPTIVE MARKET a woman travels through time to sell her goods to a colony of men building a ship to leave a radioactive Earth. When her customers tell her they’re leaving and won’t need any more merchandise she tries to keep them from going.

In THE MOLD OF YANCY a totalitarian society is being brain washed by broadcast messages from John Yancy, a composite man who doesn’t really exist.

In THE MINORITY REPORT three clairvoyant Precogs see alternate realities in the future and the PreCrime system uses the reports to arrest people before they commit a crime. The Police Commissioner sees a prediction that he will murder someone and he tries to find the minority report that will allow him to change the future.

In RECALL MECHANISM a man has a fear of heights and falling. He goes to a doctor who takes him back through repressed memories.

THE UNRECONSTRUCTED M, is an interesting story about a machine that can leave fake forensic clues and frame someone.

In EXPLORERS WE six astronauts who died on a mission to Mars land on Earth. The humans believe that they are clones or disguised aliens and must be killed.

In WAR GAME a toy is created that will infiltrate the minds of children.

IF THERE WERE NO BENNY CEMOLI, is a story based on the idea that whatever is in the New York Times is real.

NOVELTY ACT is about a dystopian future ruled by a woman who is wife and mother to the nation.

In WATERSPIDER many famous names are dropped when time travelers come back for Poul Anderson, because they need his help.

In WHAT THE DEAD MEN SAY there is a short amount of time in which the dead can be revived. Louis Sarapis cannot be brought back but his voice appears to be coming from outer space.

ORPHEUS WITH CLAY FEET is about Jesse Slade who lives in 2040 and travels back to 1956 to inspire the writing of his favorite sci-fi author. He discloses that he is a time traveler and the writer becomes cynical and never develops his full potential.

In THE DAYS OF PERKY PAT survivors of a nuclear war are obsessed with a doll and an escapist role playing game.

STAND-BY and WHAT’LL WE DO WITH RAGLAND PARK? are both about media in the future.

OH, TO BE A BLOBEL is about the Human – Blobel war. Espionage agents on both sides undergo physical changes and assume the form of the opposing species.

Publisher: Citadel (May 2002)

Paperback: 380 pages

ISBN: 978-0806523798

Price: $14.95

Gail Pruszkowski reviews for “Romantic Times BOOKreviews” magazine and her work has been published in the “Cup of Comfort” Anthologies.

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Swords and Sorcery