Gone With The Bride

The most romantic film ever made. A film set in a time of turmoil. A film with daring dialogue for the rime. That film is of course, The Bride of Frankenstein (1935). 

My poster is a parody of the classic Gone with the Wind poster.I used my own designs for horror's cutest couple, unless you've seen the film, in which case you know otherwise!

The Bride

You know those days when you wake up thinking... I feel like drawing The Bride of Frankenstein. So I did:

1

2

3

Inks

Pencils

I am not sure which is my favourite. Definitely either 2/3. The coloured version is not very thrilling. The others suit the quirkiness of the Bride better, I feel. I thought it would be fun to show the penciled and inked versions too.

FAVOURITE FILMS 9- Alien (1979)

DIRECTED BY: Ridley Scott
WRITTEN BY: Dan O'Bannon and Ronald Shusett
RELEASED: 1979

I'm sure it is no surprise to anyone that Alien is one of my favourite movies. The haunted house in space was written by Dan O'Bannon with the help of his friend Ronald Shusett. The writing  was postponed whilst O'Bannon went to work on Alejandro Jodorowsky's failed Dune adaptation in 1975. The screenwriters were stuck though. How does the Alien get on board the galactic mining rig? That was when Shusett came up with the idea that the Alien "screws" one of the crew and impregnates him. It was the birth (no pun) of one the scariest sci-fi moments of all time. If Jaws (1975) made everyone scared to go back into the water, then Alien made the audience shit-spooked of the dinner table. The scene with John "best actor ever" Hurt writhing in pain across the table, as the chestburster... bursts out of his chest, is the film's most famous scene and was hilariously parodied in Mel Brooks' Spaceballs (1987). 

I love the film. The gothic cathedral design of the Nostromo, the design of the creature (courtesy of H. R. Giger), Jerry Goldsmith's score and by god those opening titles! If you haven't seen it by now, then where the Martin Van Buren have you been! Go see it and watch the trailer too. 

My poster contains parts that stand out in my mind. 

• We have warrant officer Ellen Ripley (which introduced us to Sigourney Weaver), in the spacesuit.
• I placed MU/TH/UR, the ship's computer amongst the stars, because that's what it always reminded me off.
• We had to have the title and the most memorable tag-line of all time: In space no one can hear you scream. True story, when we did Space in Physics (circa Year 9), our teacher brought up this awesome quote and some know-it-all at the back complained that it was too cheesy. What an idiot!
• I had to include the egg from the poster, different to the one in the film, with the green glow emitting from it. 
• I also added the Alien. Where? Oh it's in there. Like in the film, the creature is hidden in the shadows.

I suppose I should talk about the other films.

Aliens (1986) I love. Its as good as the first one, buuuuuut I like the first film just a little more. I like the fact that Cameron didn't make a carbon copy of the first film. It' s an action film with some real scary moments, especially the scene where Ripley and Newt are locked in the Facehugger room. The reason it isn't on the list is because it didn't seem right putting two films of the same franchise on it. Let's say this spot goes to both. It should have stopped here.

Alien 3 (1992) was a decent film. I don't remember it being dreadful (they saved the best till last). However it did ruin the evolution of the Alien. It shouldn't be that it takes after whatever animal it impregnates. There was no indication of this in any of the other films. However, I liked the cinematography and idea of the prison planet. It managed to create an atmosphere similar to the original film. I never liked the Newt/ Hicks death, but -sigh- it's too late now. 

Alien Resurrection (1997) was awful, a truly terrible movie that just killed the the idea of any other good Alien films. It turned what was once a serious franchise into a comic book movie. I can't talk about it now- one day though!

Alien VS Predator (2004)... Oh go SO to hell!

Conquerer Worm

A design on the force mentioned in the Edgar Allen Poem (sorry, couldn't resist). The name first came to my attention after the Hellboy series of the same name. It was also used as the American title for the Vincent Price film Witchfinder General (1968, Michal Reeves), which was named Edgar Allen Poe's Conquerer Worm to cash in on Price's earlier success in Roger Corman's Poe series. It has nothing to do with Poe's work and is a great film on the Salem Witch Trials. You got me talking about Vincent Price.

So the design was influenced by the many creations from the Cthulhu Mythos. Something that was over the top, yet gross, yet fascinating, yet other worldly, yet beautify... well maybe not that far. The mouth was inspired by the Giger Alien, (if you're gonna steal, then steal from the best!) and the body was just me thinking what the Emperor of Worms be like, a wrinkly, grotesque mound body fat. I like the spindly little arms, too unnatural for a normal animal. 

Werewolf Head

A much better werewolf head. This is more of what I had in mind.

Wolf-Man

My werewolf is based on the more traditional werewolves that appeared in films such as:


Werewolf of London (1935)

The Wolf-Man (1941)

The Curse of the Werewolf (1961)

I have always preferred this style to the more wolf-like and it is simply because you still see the human in the face. Modern werewolves are too monstrous, trying to be tough and bullish. 

To me they just stop being scary. Above are examples from Van Helsing (2004. They just become a dragon for the hero to slay, instead of a supernatural transformation.

The original design is better because I can believe that this was once a human. Where in the werewolf mythos, does it say you become a huge monster. It doesn't, your body merely turns animalistic and that is why I prefer it. Plus I find seeing the human's eyes through the make-up sad and therefore more frightening. So there we are... my lecture on werewolves.

Again I find the feet gross, the way they are suspended like that.

Vampire Wolf

As mentioned before, Dracula can shape-shift into a wolf. Well I decided to design it so that it is a mix of wolf and bat. I think this gives it a demon dog look, much like the one in An American Werewolf in London.

The head is obviously based on a bat, but also the tail, which on a bat is membrane like, but on this design that would be useless. So I morphed that with a wolf's tail and VOILA! The bottom image is just to show that this is a flat faced wolf, still keeping the once human element and it is actually how I prefer my werewolves, but we'll move on to that later. The front legs, i think are out of proportion, but hopefully you get the idea. I think I wanted an Alpha-Male vibe to it, since it is Dracula.

It actually looks like Panthro!

Vampire Bat

I'm designing classic monster in the hope they will be useful for future films. First up we'll start with Vampires.

No, NO! Proper vampires. Ones that actually vant to suck your blood. Ones that shun from the day light. Ones that don't look at girls mysteriously, with a constipated face and begin a frustrating franchise of back and forthing and end with a vampire cesarian! Ones like... Christopher Lee, show 'em how to do it Chris--

-- My God he's awesome!


No these are vampiric beasts. In Bram Stoker's original novel of Dracula, the title Count could shape shift into a bat, a wolf and smoke. I probably won't draw the smoke, but below you can see the bat and wolf. I decided to make the bat more monstrous, but the size of a human. It just seems more threatening. Plus it's an interesting design. I'm pleased how this turned out. In fact this is a design I have been trying to crack for a couple of years. If I find the older version I'll post it. It turns out I just needed to make the face more bat-like. I tried to colour it, but because of the cross-hatching... well it didn't happen, but I imagine it to be like a dull, dusty brown. 

The last image is torn from Van Helsing's book on Vampires. I took a lot from bats, such as the hands for feet, which look very creepy, but are also reminiscent of ape feet, so it is not just bats that are present here. Where the wings bridge the outside wrist to the shoulder were based on actual bats. Using nature as an influence grounds the design. It makes the audience believe it and that is important.