"The Horror Star" / FrightMare. loved it..

[ronnie21]

Ok, recall seeing the cool ad for it in the paper at 10 yearsold in May of 83. and wanted to see it. Didn't acourse till April of 84 when it hit the movie channell. and liked it alot. Even recorded it and showed it to all my friends. Yes, i like the characthers , Conrad was creepy. and liked the students. all unknowns. yes didnt know jeffrey combs yet. But i did met jeff at a convention in NJ and asked about this movie and belive it or not, he had very little memory of making this movie. surprised i think it was his first role. unless he really wanted to forget about it... Yeah frightmare suffers from the same thing humongous did, the lighting was poor... but it did have a creepy atmosphere..

[maybrick]

I also saw it back in the day on The Movie Channel. The live cremation scene freaked me out at the time and haunted me for years. I don't think that I ever knew the name of the film until I first hopped on the internet years later and did a search for it by asking people on message boards. When I finally got the name I bought a VHS tape off of ebay and was pleased to find that it still held up. I think the lighting is fine. What kind of copy do you have?

[ronnie21]

I've had a few copys from diffrent sources, i had the movie channel version , i bought the original Vestron VHS, and i got the dvd from troma (which is a crappy transfer...)
Yes, the cremation scene was disturbing. hella of a way to die. I read in an old fanogira. I think it was number 20. they claimed that the house they filmed the movie in, real murders took place there. i did some research about this but couldnt find anything on it. Iam taking it was before its 1981 filming.. They didnt state how long before the film was shot the murders took place..

[Erick H.]

Has there EVER been a decent DVD version of this film,any region ? I always seem to locate VHS transfers that are cropped and look awful .

[Hellbilly]

Early VHS fave, back then when our rental store was displaying the video boxes in big squeaky aluminum frames, and every box had a small red sticker on the upper right side with the rental number actually printed.
In order to check if the movie was available you had to write down the number on a piece of paper, and hand it over the counter. Ahhh the '80's, how I miss thee.
That said, I haven't seen Frightmare in ages. I should rewatch one of these days.

[startide]

Originally Posted by Hellbilly

In order to check if the movie was available you had to write down the number on a piece of paper, and hand it over the counter.

My local shop had a photocopied sleeve in an empty clamshell with a note saying this one was out. Of course this was 1985/86. There weren't that many videos to be rented at that stage. I wonder at what stage did they dispense with that idea?

I remember my mother nearly having heart failure when we told her what the overnight price of the video we had just rented was. The movie name escapes me now. Gremlins? Goonies? Never Ending Story? Something of that era.

Edit: It wasn't The Goonies, and that's how I remembered the clamshells! We wanted The Goonies, but that one was out. Must ask my brother. (And knowing him, he won't remember!)

[Hellbilly]

Originally Posted by startide

True story. They had a jar filled with small pencils and post-it sized cut papers on the counter so you could write down those numbers. Too complicate matters, you had to write down those numbers in a specific order, from most - to least wanted, unless you didn't care what was available on your list.
Either way, we would always circle the first 3-4 numbers (most wanted!) and hope for the best. Many times we ended up with least wanted titles from way down the list though

This was in 1982/83 and lasted a couple of years. In 1985/86 they got rid off the frames, pencils and papers and just put out vhs boxes. Whatever was sitting on the shelves was available for rent.

I still have one piece of paper with numbers in my wallet from back in the day. That video store is long gone, but I'm keeping that list for pure nostalgia.

[ronnie21]

i recall at captain video in 1983. you got free popcorn on your birthday if you were a member..

[maybrick]

Originally Posted by Hellbilly

True story. They had a jar filled with small pencils and post-it sized cut papers on the counter so you could write down those numbers. Too complicate matters, you had to write down those numbers in a specific order, from most - to least wanted, unless you didn't care what was available on your list.
Either way, we would always circle the first 3-4 numbers (most wanted!) and hope for the best. Many times we ended up with least wanted titles from way down the list though

This was in 1982/83 and lasted a couple of years. In 1985/86 they got rid off the frames, pencils and papers and just put out vhs boxes. Whatever was sitting on the shelves was available for rent.

I still have one piece of paper with numbers in my wallet from back in the day. That video store is long gone, but I'm keeping that list for pure nostalgia.

That place sounds like Netflix, only without the Net.

[startide]

Originally Posted by Hellbilly

True story.

More

The more details you give me the funnier it gets! It's the absurdity that gets me, and that's what triggered my memory of the clamshells. How about this instead: if it's not there, it's not available. Right?

What gets me though is that a couple of under 10 year olds were just allowed to go in and rent a movie. These days you need to sell your first born just to join up and be a member. I'm surprised they don't want a deposit as well as your rental fee! Especially in the digital era. Pulling out tape was so time consuming, now you can just deface or break the discs. Too easy!