One of Halloween’s Rare Seasonal Songs
Though, unlike a Christmas carol, Screamin’ Jay Hawkins’ signature song is at home any time of year, “I Put a Spell on You” is a fitting fixture during this season of magic, mystery and things going bump in the night. Covered by many (both George Clinton and Queen Latifah have given it a fling), it is decidedly Hawkins’ original frantic recording that made the song a standard. His over-the-top, theatrical “witch doctor” stage performances of it hail from a different era – but even in its day the record itself seemed anachronistic, like something hailing from the time of “race records” or Jazz back when it was “Jass.”
Screamin’ Jay Hawkins
A short history of Mexican B movies, from monster movies to masked wrestlers, to the avant garde art cinema of Juan Lopez Moctezuma – collaborator of Alejandro Jodorowsky. Featured interviews with Ignacio Duran, David Wilt.
An installment from the BBC’s documentary series Mondo Macabro. Based on the book of the same name by Pete Tombs, the series focuses on cult cinema from around the world.
Director: Guillermo del Toro
A Gothic horror tale in the most orthodox sense, The Devil’s Backbone (El espinazo del diablo) is set in 1939, the final year of the Spanish Civil War. Written by del Toro, Antonio Trashorras and David Muñoz, it was independently produced by Pedro Almodóvar, and filmed in Madrid.
Del Toro considers this to be his most personal work.
Slavery, Cannibalism & Genocide: Controversial Themes in “The Shining”
An essay by British film historian Rob Ager.
You may also want to check out the 2013 documentary Room 237.
A subjective documentary that explores the numerous theories about the hidden meanings within Stanley Kubrick’s film The Shining (1980). The film may be over 30 years old, but it continues to inspire debate, speculation, and mystery. Five very different points of view are illuminated through voice overs, film clips, animation and dramatic reenactments. Together they’ll draw the audience into a new maze, one with endless detours and dead ends — many ways in, but no way out.
Dark Matters 
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