Tag: Film

The year 2012 was a great one in many ways, be it movies, art, or events. Art-wise, I had some interviews go to print, most notably with an awesome piece written by fellow artist Ghoulish Gary Pullin for Rue Morgue Magazine. I just released a debut book that is a complete portfolio of all my work, titled In Vivid Red: Horror Art By Chris Kuchta. I also did some concept art for a few projects that can't yet be discussed in case they end up happening! My career flourished as I pushed myself to be on the ball as much as possible. It wasn't easy, but I hit a good twenty or so conventions to display and sell my work, which required busting serious ass to get a new painting ready for each show. I like to offer something new each time. It was hard and stressful in many ways, but totally worth it. I cannot stress enough that hard work ALWAYS pays off. Between all the travel and nights in my studio, teaching, and whatnot, free time was sparse. But when I had it, you can bet your ass I spent it watching movies!!

I enjoyed a lot of the films I caught last year, so I'll list off a few that really knocked it out of the park for me.

THE AVENGERS - What else is there to say besides HELL, YEAH! Everything about it was phenomenal. It was everything I expected to see and more. I liked all the individual Marvel films leading up to this epic battle of all battles, but this just blew me away.

PROMETHEUS - I personally thought Ridley Scott did a great job on this, even if the first half was a bit on the slow side. It was amazing to see in the theater.

THE CABIN IN THE WOODS - Possibly the best horror movie to come out in 2012. It was designed so perfectly. I loved the literal destruction of stereotypes and challenge for others to come up with something new. The creatures making havoc all over the damn place was unbelievably cool.

THE WOMAN IN BLACK - This was a great take on the story and didn't harm the memory of the original film in any way. The gothic scenery and costumes were spot on, and it was damn creepy!

THE DEAD - I thought this was great. It had an old school quality to it, which was probably the lack of CGI regarding the zombies. It reminded me of Fulci's stuff and it had that distinct bleak feel to it. Check it out!

THE RAID - This was just plain AWESOME. The martial arts are unbelievable. It's got a really simple plot, but it doesn't need any more than that, due to the unparalleled explosion of action! The cinematography should win awards. The cameraman literally injects pure kung fu right into your eye sockets!

EXIT HUMANITY - I really enjoyed this, especially for the inclusion of art within the film as used for telling the story. I did a blog post on this HERE.

THE DARK KNIGHT RISES - Just a stellar movie all around. Great way to finalize things.

THE HUMAN CENTIPEDE 2 - Oh, come on. This was so wild, you gotta love it!

V/H/S - Most of this was pretty good. I think it's the only found footage anthology that exists.

FATHER'S DAY - Oh, yeah! As wild as it gets. I love this stuff. It reminded me of Hobo With a Shotgun a lot.

DEAR GOD NO! - Another crazy exploitation horror movie that has to be seen to be believed! Most of the guys in this are not actors, but real bikers!

DEAD WEIGHT - A friend co-directed this Wisconsin-shot, independent film, and I seriously recommend it! It's about survival and the evil of man above all things. That even a zombie apocalypse can be the least of your worries sometimes.

SINISTER - Not extremely original, but it was simply done very well. Creepy!

TUCKER AND DALE - How hilarious was this? I caught this at a festival and was glad I did.

Those were the standouts! I also enjoyed The Moth Diaries, The Innkeepers, The Hole, Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter, and The Divide. Movies I REGRET watching are: Apollo 18, Red Riding Hood, Monster Brawl, The Devil Inside, Incubus, Underworld: Awakening, the new Resident Evil, and TCM3D royally sucked! These all really missed the mark on so many levels. I try to be pretty open-minded when it comes to movies, but these were just total messes.

2013 films I look forward to: Iron Man 3, Pacific Rim, Mama, Carrie, Lords of Salem, Star Trek, Wolverine, Frankenstein Created Bikers (Dear God No sequel!) and I, Frankenstein!

It's probably pretty obvious what a huge movie fan I am just by looking at my art. Besides for entertainment, movies are great sources of inspiration for me. I may even put a whole damn movie or all the characters in one painting! An example of this would be my BIG TROUBLE IN LITTLE CHINA piece!

The Thing alien scene

Legendary horror film director John Carpenter was in Chicago recently for Flashback Weekend Horror Con, and it got me thinking about doing a little post tribute. Well, a true tribute would take pages and pages! But, I've included a photo of a poster from my personal collection, as well as a painting that depicts the image that influenced my obsession with THE THING at a young age. It's one of my top ten favorite horror films!

When I was a kid, I saw The Thing on TV and one image stuck in my brain. It haunted me for years because I didn't know the name of the movie, and had no way of properly describing what I had seen to others. But, hell, I HAD to see this again! It was the coolest thing I'd ever seen on TV. I bet most people can name a few movies that had scenes which messed with their heads as kids. You spend years wondering what that movie was and relentlessly try to find it. We didn't have "Google" growing up! This painting here is that alien scene that stuck in my head!

Years ago, I was very fortunate to have had a conversation with John Carpenter. He's incredibly nice, and he even liked my piece a lot, noting how well I'd captured Kurt Russell. He said he'd always had a really hard time finding someone who could draw Kurt well, and that it's why he kept using Drew Struzan for poster art. Drew had Russell down to a science. Nope, Kurt is not easy to draw. Some faces are way harder to capture properly than others. It's weird. I didn't get to talk to Carpenter this time around, as I had a table across the street at Wizard World. But, it's great to see through fan photos and interviews that he was clearly having a blast at the convention. There's just nothing like the feeling of meeting one of your idols. Just like that alien scene, the feeling sticks with you.

Being on the road so often for conventions is amazing, but it usually means missing great

movies that people get to tell me was good. I was able to catch a viewing of Exit Humanity

and loved it, so I'd like to spread the word about it. There are a few familiar faces in the

cast, like Bill Moseley, Dee Wallace, and Brian Cox. It didn't have a big budget, but for a

Civil War zombie film, they really outdid themselves. The zombie makeup was great, and

the thing that REALLY stood out for me was the inclusion of animation! How often can

that not end up corny? Everyone behind this film clearly had a passion for it, so their talent

and drive really did it justice. I love that they did such a great job meshing live action with

animation, making it a standout in recent zombie films. It's nice to be inspired by a zombie

film in an age where they are more than a dime a dozen.

Official Trailer HERE.

Another zombie film that recently impressed me was The Dead. It has that bleak, hopeless

and pretty much apocalyptic feel as a classic Fulci flick.

Check out the trailer!

But back to Exit Humanity! I found out a little more about the artist behind the animation,

Snezhan Bodurov, and wanted to share this neat video of animated sequences he did for

the film. These are illustrations of stories told in Edward's journal.

Exit Humanity Animation from Snezhan Bodurov on Vimeo.