Twitch of the Death Nerve

Our dear friend Erica Schultz is back on the show — coincidentally right around Mother’s Day — to talk about her book, The Sweetest Taboo: An Unapologetic Guide To Child Kills In Film (which you can still buy through that link if you haven’t ordered it yet, though get on it because it’s selling like hot cakes). We talk about how the book came to be, what it was like to watch A THOUSAND movies where kids get killed on screen, the parameters of the book (no true crime!), and the ins and outs of self-publishing. We also forced Erica to help us come up with a collective list of our five favorite movies featuring child death, truly an impossible task. And at this point many of you know Erica and her work already, but you should also listen to her podcast, Unsung Horrors. As always, pretty please rate, review, and share. You can also find us on Apple and Spotify and please follow us on Instagram and drop us a line if you want to join our Discord. Also check out Essex Coffee Roasters (enter code CINEPUNX for 10% off). We can’t thank all of you enough for your support.

What force on earth could compel us to the suburbs of New Jersey and Staten Island to watch movies? Learn more by following us on Patreon to unlock this full episode and instantly access our entire back catalogue of bonus episodes, video essays, written essays, and several of Samm’s ongoing solo podcasts. Support Twitch of the Death Nerve and help us keep the show ad free and on the airwaves forever!

We’ve gotten a lot of requests to do an episode on the great Stalked By My Doctor series, starring the absolute king Eric Roberts, and we finally delivered. Lifetime Channel thriller enthusiast Rob Weychert joined Charles and Samm to talk about this wild trend in made for TV movies and we honestly had the best time. We discuss everything from historical origins for this subgenre, how these films should be seen as modern day exploitation movies, the ins and outs of stalking, the career of mastermind director Doug Campbell, and much more. There’s even a special surprise segment at the end engineered by Rob! Read Rob’s amazing blog post about how and why he created a bonkers game based on Lifetime Channel movies. As always, pretty please rate, review, and share. You can also find us on Apple and Spotify and please follow us on Instagram and drop us a line if you want to join our Discord. Also check out Essex Coffee Roasters (enter code CINEPUNX for 10% off). We can’t thank all of you enough for your support.

The latest Death Nerve is here, and it’s a real throwback! Acting as a spiritual successor to our Texas Psychorama episode from a couple years back, Death Nerve founding member and true dyed in the wool freakshow Jon Dzwonar is back with a fiendish 6 movie marathon! Unfortunately, Samm got stuck in the hospital visiting her catatonic friend Patrick, so she’s sitting this one out. Don’t worry, friends, Patrick still lives, and Samm will be back on Death Nerve next week. Also featured on this episode is Erica Shultz, host of the Unsung Horrors podcast and author of The Sweetest Taboo: An Unapologetic Guide to Child Kills in Film. She helps us work through an insane line up of mystery movies that include a hicksploitation film, a castrationsploitation Category-III flick, and a sleazy NY movie just to name a few! The episode is a fun and breezy walk down Cult Cinema Lane, hope y’all dig it! As always, pretty please rate, review, and share. You can also find us on Apple and Spotify and please follow us on Instagram and drop us a line if you want to join our Discord. Also check out Essex Coffee Roasters (enter code CINEPUNX for 10% off). We can’t thank all of you enough for your support.

In this episode, Samm gives an impassioned argument for why you should watch as many Kenji Misumi movies as possible and Charles dons a tinfoil hat to explore the connection between the death drive and ’00s disaster movies. What the hell does that mean? Learn more by following us on Patreon to unlock this full episode and instantly access our entire back catalogue of bonus episodes, video essays, written essays, and several of Samm’s ongoing solo podcasts. Support Twitch of the Death Nerve and help us keep the show ad free and on the airwaves forever!

How am I supposed to relate to a character who has CGI blood coursing through their veins? Find out the answer to this question for the ages by following us on Patreon to unlock this full episode and instantly access our entire back catalogue of bonus episodes, video essays, written essays, and several of Samm’s ongoing solo podcasts. Support Twitch of the Death Nerve and help us keep the show ad free and on the airwaves forever!

Dune has been one of Samm’s favorite books since childhood and Charles has become similarly obsessed (maybe even more so), so it was inevitable that we were going to do cover it at some point, because… the spice must flow. For this episode — which covers everything from Herbert’s first few books to David Lynch’s adaptation and the two Villeneuve films — we knew we had to get Mike White as our co-host. Most of you are already familiar with his work as the relentlessly prolific host of The Projection Booth, where he’s already done several Dune-related episodes, but he also contributed a commentary for the Arrow blu-ray of David Lynch’s Dune. This is a pretty wild discussion that covers a lot of ground, but it might help to go in with at least a basic knowledge of Dune’s plot and some of the key terms. As always, pretty please rate, review, and share. You can also find us on Apple and Spotify and please follow us on Instagram and drop us a line if you want to join our Discord. Also check out Essex Coffee Roasters (enter code CINEPUNX for 10% off). We can’t thank all of you enough for your support.

From the inception of Twitch of the Death Nerve, an episode on Pier Paolo Pasolini’s Salò, or the 120 Days of Sodom (1975) seemed inevitable. It’s a film that has had an incredible influence on Samm’s life, plus we got to see it on 35mm recently at a sold out screening in NYC. Luckily we found the perfect guest, Annie Rose Malamet, who shares Samm’s deep love of and admiration for the Marquis de Sade. Many of you are already familiar with Annie’s work, especially her wonderful podcast Girls, Guts & Giallo, but please follow her on Patreon if you aren’t already! If you’re unfamiliar with Salò, you might want to watch the film and come back to this episode, which doesn’t cover a lot of introductory material, but is a rich discussion that ranges from Italian fascism to WWII trauma, political violence in the ’70s, Pasolini’s sexuality and its potential impact as a queer film, how it remains relevant, and how its lessons can help us grapple with genocide unfolding in front of the world today. As always, pretty please rate, review, and share. You can also find us on Apple and Spotify and please follow us on Instagram and drop us a line if you want to join our Discord. Also check out Essex Coffee Roasters (enter code CINEPUNX for 10% off). We can’t thank all of you enough for your support.

Follow us on Patreon to unlock this full episode and instantly access our entire back catalogue of bonus episodes, video essays, written essays, and several of Samm’s ongoing solo podcasts. Support Twitch of the Death Nerve and help us keep the show ad free and on the airwaves forever!

For this episode, we’re diving in to the Hong Kong New Wave through the work of underrated auteur Patrick Tam. Dear Death Nerve friend Bobby Rodriguez joins to help break down the history of political turmoil in Hong Kong in the ’60s as it relates to the birth of the New Wave. We talk about its origins in television, how the Hong Kong New Wave is different from other arthouse movements, and how it reimagines popular and cult genre tropes. We also share our love for Tam’s Love Massacre (1981) and My Heart is That Eternal Rose (1989) and talk about his influence on Wong Kar-wai. Bobby was kind enough to share her extensive notes here — and she made us a Cantopop playlist of cover songs! As always, pretty please rate, review, and share. You can also find us on Apple and Spotify and please follow us on Instagram and drop us a line if you want to join our Discord. Also check out Essex Coffee Roasters (enter code CINEPUNX for 10% off). We can’t thank all of you enough for your support.

Follow us on Patreon to unlock this full episode and instantly access our entire back catalogue of bonus episodes, video essays, written essays, and several of Samm’s ongoing solo podcasts. Support Twitch of the Death Nerve and help us keep the show ad free and on the airwaves forever!

Happy New Year! Charles and Samm had a lot of fun talking through their respective favorite films of the year: this includes both their top 10 films watched for the first time, but a few runners up and a run through of some Letterboxd stats like top actors and top directors. As a result this episode is all over the place in terms of geography, genre, and decade (though we frequently return to Japan), but it was an incredible year of new-to-us movies. May 2024 be as rewarding! What were your favorite new films and first time watches from last year?

Follow us on Patreon to unlock this full episode and instantly access our entire back catalogue of bonus episodes, video essays, written essays, and several of Samm’s ongoing solo podcasts. Support Twitch of the Death Nerve and help us keep the show ad free and on the airwaves forever! And have a happy holidays!!!

Follow us on Patreon to unlock this full episode and instantly access our entire back catalogue of bonus episodes, video essays, written essays, and several of Samm’s ongoing solo podcasts. Support Twitch of the Death Nerve and help us keep the show ad free and on the airwaves forever!

We’ve been wanting to do a Death Nerve Q&A episode for awhile and we got so many great questions from social media, the Patreon, and our Discord. We got to talk about everything from rape revenge movies to dream blu-ray releases, favorite books, under-seen films of the 1940s, Stalked By My Doctor, why Samm dislikes New Hollywood, Stalked By My Doctor, and so much more. If you don’t hear your question answered in this episode, check out the upcoming bonus episode in the Patreon, which features part two of our discussion. And thanks again for all the genuinely thoughtful (and some very silly and fun) questions. As always, pretty please rate, review, and share. You can also find us on Apple and Spotify and please follow us on Instagram and drop us a line if you want to join our Discord. Also check out Essex Coffee Roasters (enter code CINEPUNX for 10% off). We can’t thank all of you enough for your support.

That’s another Halloween season and another Exhumed Films 24-hour Horrorthon in the books. This year’s Horrorthon was particularly delightful, because so many of our friends and listeners were in attendance. Harry, Dan, and Jesse from Exhumed Films had a packed lineup this year and we break it down, film by film, in the latest Death Nerve episode. Charles and I both got COVID at Horrorthon, which is why this episode is a little late — also fair warning because we sound pretty delirious in the episode, though I suppose that’s to be expected for every Horrorthon episode… This is also our 50th episode! We can’t thank all of you enough for your support. As always, pretty please rate, review, and share. You can also find us on Apple and Spotify and please follow us on Instagram and drop us a line if you want to join our Discord. Also check out Essex Coffee Roasters (enter code CINEPUNX for 10% off).

This Halloween, Charles and Samm dive into one of the best cozy horror subgenres — the slasher film. This episode breezes through 10 of our favorite underrated slasher movies, with some probably predictable choices and others that are more niche. We also talk about what exactly constitutes the slasher genre and how it intersects with and differs from other subgenres like the serial killer thriller, Hicksploitation, home invasion film, etc. And speaking of home invasions, keep an ear out for our first ever surprise guest on a Death Nerve episode. Happy Halloween and thanks as always for supporting the show. Pretty please rate, review, and share! You can also find us on Apple and Spotify and please follow us on Instagram. Also check out Essex Coffee Roasters (enter code CINEPUNX for 10% off).

Follow us on Patreon to unlock this full episode and instantly access our entire back catalogue of bonus episodes, video essays, written essays, and several of Samm’s ongoing solo podcasts. Support Twitch of the Death Nerve and help us keep the show ad free and on the airwaves forever!

The latest Twitch of the Death Nerve episode celebrates one of America’s greatest heroes — hardcore icon Jamie Gillis. Charles and Samm are joined by gentleman pervert Shawn Porter to discuss Jamie’s incredible career, the Golden Age of Porn, Radley Metzger, Water Power, Gerard Damiano, woods porn, quaaludes, kink, and so much more. Shawn runs the incredible body modification archive Sacred Debris, an important resource that document the history of tattooing, piercing, other body mods, and focuses on a lot of folks in the queer and leather communities, of which Shawn is also part. Really the perfect guest to celebrate Jamie Gillis. He even had some Jamie Gillis Appreciation Society shirts made for the occasion (in brown and yellow, naturally). And as Samm mentioned in the episode, friend of the show Lee Buford made a tote bag out of Jamie Gillis’s nasty business card, which Shawn and Samm both sport. They’re incredible. Thanks as always for supporting the show. Pretty please rate, review, and share! You can also find us on Apple and Spotify and please follow us on Instagram. Also check out Essex Coffee Roasters (enter code CINEPUNX for 10% off).

Every year in early summer for over a decade now, Exhumed Films holds their annual 35mm exploitation movie marathon, Exfest. We covered this event on the show last year and we’re back to talk about 12+ hours of exploitation cinema. To discuss this year’s marathon, which was held on June 10th at the Colonial Theater in Phoenixville, PA, Charles and Samm were joined by Ian Galloway, owner of beloved Philly record store Beautiful World. We recorded first thing the next morning, so we sound pretty deranged, but we had the time of our lives. This year might truly be the best Exfest lineup yet, and you’ll get to hear us talk about everything from Simon Yam and Black revolutionary cinema to Shaw Brothers, shooting up cocaine, Greek mythology, and of course PRIDE. Thanks as always for supporting the show. Pretty please rate, review, and share! You can also find us on Apple and Spotify and please follow us on Instagram. Also check out Essex Coffee Roasters (enter code CINEPUNX for 10% off).

Our latest episode is about shot-on-video (SOV) horror, as well as all things regional and very, very low budget. Divisive, underground, and often mind-melting, SOV horror movies exist in a world unto themselves and outside the bounds of good taste. Joining us to discuss a slew of no-budget oddities are Philly-based filmmakers Michael DiFrancesco and Brewce Longo. Mike D recently joined us on our sword and sorcery episode, and Brewce has been long time comrade and friend of the show. If you enjoy the episode, definitely check out our guests’ two recent SOV films: the satanic metalhead acidtrip Blood Sick Psychosis (2022), AND the upcoming necrophile splatterfest, A Corpse for Christmas, which will be released next month (just in time for Christmas in July). Look out for premiers in July in Philly, NYC, Pittsburgh, Baltimore, Chicago, NJ, and additional cities around the US. Find out those dates and more about the new movie on Instagram at @bloodsickproductions, buy their first movie here, and follow Michael on Instagram at @murkdeep. Thanks as always for supporting the show. Pretty please rate, review, and share! You can also find us on Apple and Spotify and please follow us on Instagram. Also check out Essex Coffee Roasters (enter code CINEPUNX for 10% off).

Usually these Patreon-only bonus Happy Hour episodes exist behind a paywall, but we decided to unlock this one to the general public because it’s just so much dang “fun.” Charles Smith III, who was the guest on our previous episode covering the ongoing WGA strike, hangs back for the Happy Hour to drink some cheap whiskey and discuss the tribulations of independent filmmaking, his work as a producer and professor, and what it was like to study under director Peter Medak in film school. But the real heart of the episode is rousing political discussion about work and hierarchies, not as an abstract concept, but as the lived reality of pretty much everyone. Though the discussion isn’t always strictly film related, this Happy Hour episode felt meaningful to us, so here it is unlocked and un-paywalled. If you like our show and want extra content, please for the love of god sign up to Samm Deighan’s Patreon! Not only will you get access to all of our bonus Happy Hours, but you’ll also be able to listen to Samm’s series on Jean-Luc Goddard, read tons of articles, and hear one off audio treats. We can’t possibly express just how much we appreciate all of our supporters on Patreon. It’s truly keeping the lights on and our extremely large cat fed. It also helps keep Death Nerve 100% ad-free. But to be honest, we could make negative money a month and we still wouldn’t run ads. Fuck that. Thanks as always for supporting the show. Pretty please rate, review, and share! You can also find us on Apple and Spotify and please follow us on Instagram. Also check out Essex Coffee Roasters (enter code CINEPUNX for 10% off).

For this episode, Charles and Samm are joined by our friend Charles Smith III, a local producer, director, film teacher, and proud union member. We discuss the ongoing writers strike, why it’s so important, what the core demands are, and larger issues related to strikes and class war within the entertainment industry. We briefly talk about a few films centered on strikes, because of course I had to bring up Gian Maria Volonté, and Mao has something of a cameo as well. You can find Charles Smith lecturing about film production at Rowan University, Drexel University, and Buck County Community College. He directed the Philly-shot superhero satire Zeroes, produced the gnarly horror film Neighbor, and is currently producing the nationally syndicated PBS kids’ show Albie’s Elevator. He’s also a member of the Producer’s Guild of America and loves setting off fireworks.

We’re baaaack with a really fun, somewhat raucous conversation with Jesse Nelson and Brian Izzi from Cauldron Films. Charles and Samm gush about their recent fancy pants edition of The City of the Living Dead, and chat with them about some of their other great releases like Contraband and American Rickshaw, what it’s like to run a boutique blu-ray label, genie movies, Italians in Florida, and other insanity. We also dip into Jesse’s background with Exhumed Films and his long-time, beloved movie retail site Diabolik DVD. Thanks as always for supporting the show. Pretty please rate, review, and share! You can also find us on Apple and Spotify and please follow us on Instagram. Check out Essex Coffee Roasters (enter code CINEPUNX for 10% off).

For the latest Twitch of the Death Nerve, Charles and Samm were joined by one of the best people on the planet, Michael DiFrancesco, to talk about one of the best subgenres on the planet, sword and sorcery movies. We set out on an epic journey from the origins of the subgenre in Greek myth, pulp literature, and Italian sword and sandal films, through to a discussion of our favorite ’80s sword and sorcery films. We talk about everything from Albert Pyun and Conan the Barbarian through to the GOAT, Conquest, to the insanity of She, and so many more. Michael is an encyclopedia of cult movie knowledge and is also a musician and filmmaker. You can find him on Instagram at @murkdeep. Check out his first film, the SOV acidfest Blood Sick Psychosis, and I’ll share news about the release of his upcoming necrophilia film, A Corpse for Christmas, as it becomes available. Thanks as always for supporting the show. Pretty please rate, review, and share! You can also find us on Apple and Spotify and please follow us on Instagram. Check out Essex Coffee Roasters (enter code CINEPUNX for 10% off).

For this episode, Charles and Samm were joined by dear friend Phil Jablon, an author, photographer, and researcher who first made a name for himself photographing and documenting historic movie theaters in Thailand. He also collects and sells Thai movie posters — enabling our growing addiction to them — and we talked to him about everything from life in Thailand, his journey exploring old theaters and preserving movie posters, to some of our favorite Thai films. You can find Phil (and lots of Thai posters) on Instagram at @thai_poster_bliss. His first book, Thailand’s Movie Theatres: Relics, Ruins and the Romance of Escape, is available online and I’ll be sure to link to pre-orders for his new book on Thai movie posters when that becomes available! As always, this will be live on the Cinepunx network as well as Apple and Spotify later in the week, so please like, rate, share, review, send us angry letters, your favorite human flesh recipes, etc. Thank you for all your support!

One of our favorite people, Robert Skvarla, is back on the show to discuss a particularly popular American conspiracy: the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. Charles and Samm ask Rob a million questions about the murky facts surrounding the murder and dive into a few JFK movies, namely: New Hollywood classic The Parallax View (1974), spaghetti western The Price of Power (1969), and French crime thriller I as in Icarus (1979). Enter our smoke filled room, as we discuss the best exploding head not in the Scanners franchise. Find Rob at @RobertSkvarla on Twitter and read his essay in Creem Magazine on the connection between the CIA, money laundering, and Creedence Clearwater. Thanks as always for supporting the show. Pretty please rate, review, and share! You can also find us on Apple and Spotify and please follow us on Instagram. Check out Essex Coffee Roasters (enter code CINEPUNX for 10% off).

We’re getting romantic in true Death Nerve fashion this Valentine’s Day — with a discussion of three juicy necrophilia films that run the gamut from gore fest to indie teen romance to Hong Kong thriller. Charles and Samm are joined by dear friend Angel, a New Jersey/Philadelphia based performer and model with an unusual penchant for all things macabre. In addition to loving Valentine’s Day and creating an upcoming zine on romantic necrophilia movies, they’re holding a similarly themed, virtual necrophilia marathon on February 18 at 10 am with Quality Violent Cinema. You can find Angel on Twitter as @Ossuary_Angel (where you can find their zine for sale), occasionally on Instagram as @Ossuary__Angel, and in the May 2022 issue of Hustler. Find Quality Violent Cinema on YouTube, Instagram, and Discord. Learn more about the upcoming necrophilia marathon here. Thanks as always for supporting the show. Pretty please rate, review, and share! You can also find us on Apple and Spotify and please follow us on Instagram. Check out Essex Coffee Roasters (enter code CINEPUNX for 10% off).

We’re diving into some of the Twitch crew’s favorite subjects with the latest Twitch of the Death Nerve episode: political resistance, folk horror, and Polish cinema. Historian and pal Matt Kowalski joined Charles and Samm for a lengthy discussion of Andrzej Żuławski’s The Devil (1972) and Marek Piestrak’s She-Wolf (1983). Both films are set during key historical periods in Polish history and make use of horror genre and especially folk horror tropes. We give a little historical primer and unpack how both directors use these themes to critique parallel events in communist Poland in the ’70s and ’80s. Also discussed: Marxism, Polish literary Romanticism, and the most beautiful mustache in the world. Thanks as always for supporting the show. Pretty please rate, review, and share! You can also find us on Apple and Spotify and please follow us on Instagram. Check out Essex Coffee Roasters (enter code CINEPUNX for 10% off).

We’re baaaaaaack! Charles and Samm took a much needed break in December to relax, regroup, and plan some exciting episodes for the next few months with more wonderful guests. And despite the title of this episode, we also spent a lot of time thinking about our favorite films of 2022; not necessarily new releases, but films that were new to us. So without further ado, here we are, complaining about year end lists and then presenting our own. Episode drinking game: take a shot every time Charles declares he’s not a mathematician. Take a sip of your drink every time Samm expresses disdain for Sight and Sound’s Best 100 Films list. We should be back on our regular schedule for 2023, so thank you all for your patience. I hope everyone had a lovely holiday season and 2023 is treating you well so far. Thanks as always for supporting the show. Pretty please rate, review, and share! You can also find us on Apple and Spotify and please follow us on Instagram. Check out Essex Coffee Roasters (enter code CINEPUNX for 10% off).

For the latest episode of Twitch of the Death Nerve, Charles and Samm are joined by dear friend Eric Bresler, who runs beloved local venue PhilaMOCA and the Philly chapter of the Psychotronic Film Club. We pick his brain about the visionary film, art, and music programming at PhilaMOCA, and the ins and outs of the Psychotronic Film Club. Eric has encyclopedic knowledge of Japanese film, music, and pop culture, so we also take a deep dive into Kazuhiko Hasegawa’s little seen The Man Who Stole the Sun (1979). The film stars pop icon Kenji Sawada as a science teacher who decides to build his own atomic bomb, go head to head with a gruff inspector (who amongst us wouldn’t try to get Bunta Sugawara’s attention in such a dramatic way?), and hold Japan ransom. We also talk about the Art Theater Guild produced films, Kenji’s career, depictions of Japanese masculinity and generational conflict, political violence, and Eric gives us a primer on Japanese rock music in the ’60s and ’70s. We also go into Hasegawa’s only other feature film, the harrowing Youth Killer (1976). Thanks as always for supporting the show. Pretty please rate, review, and share! You can also find us on Apple and Spotify and please follow us on Instagram. Check out Essex Coffee Roasters (enter code CINEPUNX for 10% off).

A lot of cult movie fans look forward to November, primarily because of the Vinegar Syndrome Black Friday sale — so what better time for Twitch of the Death Nerve to celebrate one of the best blu-ray and film restoration companies. Recently, Charles and Samm took a little vacation up to Connecticut, mostly to go to Vinegar Syndrome’s headquarters and the Archive, their retail store. While we were there, we had a chance to sit down with Justin Laliberty, Director of Operations for Vinegar Syndrome sister company OCN, and Brandon Upson, a long-time film restoration expert for Vinegar Syndrome. We cover a lot of topics: 10 years of Vinegar Syndrome and how the company has expanded, the behind-the-scenes of disc producing and film restoration, favorite movie releases, Waterpower, and much more. Thanks as always for supporting the show. Pretty please rate, review, and share! You can also find us on Apple and Spotify and please follow us on Instagram. Check out Essex Coffee Roasters (enter code CINEPUNX for 10% off).

Last year, Twitch of the Death Nerve had a great time covering Exhumed Films 24-hour Horrorthon, the best annual Philadelphia-area event. So here we are again, tired but still alive after a weekend of 15 movies (and trailers and cartoons) across about 26 hours. October 22nd was the 15th Horrorthon and a celebration of 25 years of Exhumed Films — basically Christmas for the cult cinema obsessed. People come from all over the country to attend and it’s almost always a sold-out event. Charles and Samm were joined by lovely friend Josh Christensen, a Philly actor and fellow movie nerd. He somehow agreed to record with us Sunday night, despite extreme sleep deprivation. We talk about everything from ’80s vampire movies to ’60s psychosexual thrillers, dream-sploitation, newer creature features, perverse Pre-Code terror, and much more. Can you believe this weekend we are doing another 24-hour marathon at home? Thanks as always for supporting the show. Pretty please rate, review, and share! You can also find us on Apple and Spotify and please follow us on Instagram. Check out Essex Coffee Roasters (enter code CINEPUNX for 10% off).

Happy Halloween friends! We are vibing so hard this season, between horror movie marathons and pumpkin carving and candy binges, Twitch of the Death Nerve is a little off schedule. So as a seasonal treat, we’ve decided to unlock one of our bonus “happy hour” episodes, which are usually Patreon exclusives. These are looser, more free wheeling discussions that touch on everything from pop culture and new releases, to our latest gripes. This episode is a somewhat chaotic celebration of everyone’s favorite season. It runs the gamut from Pumpkinhead to Harlan Ellison. We argue about recent theatrical releases, share our ritualistic Halloween viewings from childhood, and summon the ghost of Bud Dwyer. If you enjoy this episode and want more, go sign up over at Samm’s Patreon! These bonus episodes generally drop every two weeks, which means you’ll get one Twitch of the Death Nerve every week (when we aren’t making ourselves sick on Halloween candy). Thanks as always for supporting the show. Pretty please rate, review, and share! You can also find us on Apple and Spotify and please follow us on Instagram. Check out Essex Coffee Roasters (enter code CINEPUNX for 10% off).

Friends, it is OCTOBER. And the Twitch of the Death Nerve crew is here to party, mostly by discussing everyone’s favorite Italian gothic horror exploitation movie about torturing people in a castle, The Bloody Pit of Horror (1965). A group of models shooting material for a horror novel stumble across a castle owned by tortured actor Travis (Mickey Hargitay), who has become obsessed with the legend of a medieval torturer: the Crimson Executioner. In addition to discussing our shared love of this film, Charles, Jon, and Samm cover: the Italian gothic subgenre and how Bloody Pit marks the end of that phase, Mickey Hargitay’s demented Crimson Executioner, fumetti nero comics, the origins of torture porn, the Marquis de Sade, and more. Thanks as always for supporting the show. Pretty please rate, review, and share! You can also find us on Apple and Spotify and please follow us on Instagram. Check out Essex Coffee Roasters (enter code CINEPUNX for 10% off).

Twitch of the Death Nerve is back with the show’s single most requested episode: William Friedkin’s controversial queer serial killer masterpiece, Cruising (1980). Charles, Jon, and Samm have wanted to talk about this film before the podcast officially began and — out of sheer excitement — the episode is a doozy. Of course we dive elbow deep into Cruising, the various controversies surrounding it, and our abiding love for the film. But we also discuss queer leather culture, ’70s New York, William Friedkin’s career more generally, the “bag murders” case that inspired the film, and much more. We also attempt to answer the age old question: hips or lips? For those of you who have seen the film: after you listen to the episode, please comment and tell us what you think is going on in the film’s conclusion! Thanks as always for supporting the show. Pretty please rate, review, and share! You can also find us on Apple and Spotify and please follow us on Instagram. Send us your favorite mushroom recipes! Check out Essex Coffee Roasters (enter code CINEPUNX for 10% off).

It’s been almost exactly a year, but the time is finally nigh to return to one of our favorite topics here at Twitch of the Death Nerve: Hong Kong CAT-III films. In the latest episode, Charles, Jon, and Samm discuss Danny Lee and Billy Tang’s horror masterpiece, Dr. Lamb (1992), which has recently had a long overdue restoration and blu-ray release. The film stars Simon Yam as a disturbed young taxi driver (based on a real-life serial killer) who can’t resist slaughtering his female fares when it rains. Dr. Lamb is really one of the greatest CAT-III horror films, in part because of Simon Yam’s incredible performance. We discuss his iconic and quite varied career, focusing on some of his other key films like Twist (1995), which Danny Lee also directed. We talk about Lee’s work as a director and important related CAT-III films like Taxi Hunter (1993), but also dive into serial killer pathology. Thanks as always for supporting the show. Pretty please rate, review, and share! You can also find us on Apple and Spotify and please follow us on Instagram. Send us your favorite mushroom recipes! Check out Essex Coffee Roasters (enter code CINEPUNX for 10% off).

Are you yeti to party? We certainly are in the latest Twitch of the Death Nerve episode, which has a slightly different format: Charles and Samm are joined by Rob Skvarla, who is filling in for Jon this week. Some of you might remember Rob as Samm’s co-host on goth podcast Evil Eye. Rob is also a brilliant writer, researcher, and has a wild Twitter account where he discusses conspiracy theories, cryptids, the evils of the CIA, and so much more. We knew we had to get him on the show to talk about all those things. In this episode, we primarily focus on three bigfoot/sasquatch/yeti movies: the Findlays’ Shriek of the Mutilated, infamous dick-ripping Video Nasty Night of the Demon, and softcore romp The Beauties and the Beast. We also discuss cryptids and conspiracy theories more broadly, and briefly recount the glory of Suburban Sasquatch. Thanks as always for supporting the show. Pretty please rate, review, and share! You can also find us on Apple and Spotify and please follow us on Instagram. Send us your favorite mushroom recipes! Check out Essex Coffee Roasters (enter code CINEPUNX for 10% off).

The very first Twitch of the Death Nerve episode of 2022 was on a Godzilla movie, but we just had to include what you could call a kaiju-adjacent episode before the year was out. Charles, Jon, and Samm just love Ishirō Honda so much, which brings us to our latest discussion of Honda’s underrated and underseen Matango (1963). Though Honda is beloved for creating the Godzilla series and directing many of its best films, he also made other, eerier kinds of creature features. We talk about how much we love him, his career more broadly, as well as some of his horror films, before diving into Matango. This sweaty, hallucinogenic tale of unlikely vacation companions shipwrecked on a nightmarish island is the ultimate summer movie — though possibly your summer might not involve mutated mushrooms, hallucinogens so powerful they can transform your very DNA, and a creepy, alien environment on par with some of the best sci-fi horror cinema. Thanks as always for supporting the show. Pretty please rate, review, and share! You can also find us on Apple and Spotify and please follow us on Instagram. Send us your favorite mushroom recipes! Check out Essex Coffee Roasters (enter code CINEPUNX for 10% off).

The latest Twitch of the Death Nerve episode marks a number of occasions for Charles, Jon, and Samm: it’s the one-year anniversary of our podcast and it’s just a few days away from Samm and Mario Bava’s birthdays (both on July 31st). For this episode, we talk more broadly about Bava’s incredible career and do a deep dive on Bay of Blood (1971), the film with a thousand titles. This wildly influential post-giallo, proto-slasher is kind of an outlier in Bava’s career, so we contrast it with some of his other films and discuss how it varies from the giallo subgenre. We also spend a lot of time talking about how it’s a deliciously nasty example of a film where there are no protagonists and most of the characters are vicious killers. Join in our celebration of one of cinema’s greatest talents (and an obvious inspiration for our podcast…). Thanks as always for supporting the show. Pretty please rate, review, and share! You can also find us on Apple and Spotify and please follow us on Instagram. Check out Essex Coffee Roasters (enter code CINEPUNX for 10% off).

Twitch of the Death Nerve are back from a brief hiatus! For this episode, which just happened to be recorded on the 4th of July, Samm INSISTED on doing a deep dive into Billy Jack. We cover the many hours of cinema writer, director, and star Tom Laughlin devoted to the character over four films: The Born Losers (1967), Billy Jack (1971), The Trial of Billy Jack (1974), and Billy Jack Goes to Washington (1977). Charles and Jon may not love the series as much as Samm (it could be hard to compete), but we still manage to talk about everything from liberal vengeance to dirty hippies, progressive education, biker movies, the power of taking your shoes off to kick around some racists, shamanic vision quests, and so so so much more. Samm argues that these films remain topical, because Billy Jack is the hero America needs. Maybe a rattlesnake will awaken him from death to go slap some Supreme Court justices around with his hapkido-trained feet. Thanks as always for supporting the show. Pretty please rate, review, and share! You can also find us on Apple and Spotify and please follow us on Instagram. Check out Essex Coffee Roasters (enter code CINEPUNX for 10% off).

Thanks to the last episode dropping early and then COVID laying one of us low, Twitch of the Death Nerve has gotten slightly off schedule. To tide you over, we decided to unlock one of our bonus “happy hour” episodes, which are usually Patreon exclusives. These are looser, more free wheeling discussions that touch on everything from pop culture and new releases, to our latest gripes. For this particular episode, we’re over the moon to discuss one of our favorite directors, David Cronenberg. We talk about his career in general, touching on our favorite and least favorite of his films, and spend a lot of time gushing over Crimes of the Future. If you haven’t seen the film yet, there aren’t too many spoilers (cover your ears around the 40 minute mark). Jon and Charles try to steer the conversation towards Top Gun and Morbius, which is basically blasphemy during a Cronenberg episode. Samm steers this back on track with a brief foray into Cronenberg’s love affair with Viggo. For your consideration: If you enjoy this episode and want more, go sign up over at Samm’s Patreon! These bonus episodes generally drop every two weeks, which means you’ll get one Twitch of the Death Nerve every week (when we aren’t in bed with COVID). Thanks as always for supporting the show. Pretty please rate, review, and share! You can also find us on Apple and Spotify and please follow us on Instagram. Check out Essex Coffee Roasters (enter code CINEPUNX for 10% off).

After a two year hiatus (thank you COVID), Exhumed Films’ 12-hour exploitation movie marathon known as eX-fest — one of the best annual events in the Philadelphia area — made its grand return last weekend. Previously held at the now defunct International House in Philly, ex-fest part X moved to the Colonial Theater in Phoenixville, PA. In this episode, Charles, Jon, and Samm discuss the ins and outs of eX-fest and go over the lineup of 7 movies, which included a 70s heist hang out movie, a reactionary rape revenge film, as well as Hong Kong action, a low budget South African martial arts flick, and a gorgeously shot chanbara melodrama, among others. We also dip our toes into the bottomless well of our love for Hong Kong treasure Simon Yam. Thanks as always for supporting the show. Pretty please rate, review, and share! You can also find us on Apple and Spotify and please follow us on Instagram. Check out Essex Coffee Roasters (enter code CINEPUNX for 10% off).

On the last Twitch of the Death Nerve episode, we covered sociopathic teenagers bombing Hong Kong, so we decided to lighten things up this time around with a discussion of systemic racism, fighting back against white supremacy, and overthrowing the state. Charles, Jon, and Samm dive into the Black power classic, The Spook Who Sat by the Door (1973), and two radical related films, Top of the Heap (1972) and Melvin Van Peebles’ iconic Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song (1971). Our discussion includes the difference between these films and more traditional Blaxploitation, the legacy of the Black Panthers, the FBI’s flagrant racism, and the glory of boobytraps, among other things. Thanks as always for supporting the show. Pretty please rate, review, and share! You can also find us on Apple and Spotify and please follow us on Instagram. Check out Essex Coffee Roasters (enter code CINEPUNX for 10% off).

Charles, Jon, and Samm have really been on a tear lately discussing some brutal films with radical political themes. Theoretically, we should stop for a minute and do a “fun” episode, but the current state of the world is making this difficult. Between the formula shortage and abortion rights likely being overturned in the US to the barrage of tragic (and thoroughly preventable) mass shootings, it is impossible to think about fun. Thus for the latest episode of Twitch of the Death Nerve, we are basking in nihilism with Tsui Hark’s little seen 1980 film, Dangerous Encounter – 1st Kind (aka Dangerous Encounters of the First Kind). The film follows a sociopathic young woman who coerces three aimless teenagers into being her friends when she catches them bombing a movie theater. More bombings and Molotov cocktails ensue, as the foursome cross paths with — and steal money from — psychotic weapons dealers. We talk all about this incredible film, its fraught political context (bombings galore in HK), and the heavy censorship the film suffered. Thanks as always for supporting the show. Pretty please rate, review, and share! You can also find us on Apple and Spotify and please follow us on Instagram. Check out Essex Coffee Roasters (enter code CINEPUNX for 10% off).

We hope you’re hungry, because the new Twitch of the Death Nerve episode is a real feast for the senses. Charles, Jon, and Samm discuss one of the most notorious cult movie subgenres — Italian cannibal films — particularly focusing on Cannibal Ferox and Cannibal Holocaust. The questions we try to answer in this episode include: Who actually likes these films? (Spoiler: we do!) Which one is the real GOAT of the genre? Why is Giovanni Lombardo Radice so wonderful? Why is Umberto Lenzi so unappreciated? Who are the real cannibals? Thanks as always for supporting the show! Pretty please rate, review, and share! You can also find us on Apple and Spotify and please follow us on Instagram. Check out Essex Coffee Roasters (enter code CINEPUNX for 10% off).

Just in time for Walpurgisnacht, the latest Twitch of the Death Nerve is all about one of our favorite topics: witchcraft. In this episode, Charles, Jon, and Samm focus on the underrated British-American classic, City of the Dead (1960), better known to American audiences as Horror Hotel. In order to write a research paper, a young college student travels to an eerie New England town known for its history of witch burning. But she gets far more than she bargained for when it seems that witchcraft might be alive and well. We talk at length about City of the Dead’s incredible atmosphere and the uncanny valley of a British studio making a film set in America, Christopher Lee’s role in the film, its similarities with Psycho, and much more. We also have a long discussion about witchcraft and pagan traditions, other movies where witches/pagan traditions are depicted as real like The Wicker Man and Blood on Satan’s Claw, and connections between witches, Beltane (May 1st), and political resistance. Thanks as always for supporting the show! Pretty please rate, review, and share! You can also find us on Apple and Spotify and please follow us on Instagram. Check out Essex Coffee Roasters (enter code CINEPUNX for 10% off).

Since Twitch of the Death Nerve first became a possibility, we have been waiting for this glorious moment… OUR FIRST (but certainly not last) PINKY VIOLENCE EPISODE!!!! Sharpen your switchblades, rev your motorcycles, and get ready for an intense discussion of one of our favorite things in the entire world. This episode, Charles, Jon, and Samm dive into the Japanese pinky violence subgenre by way of one of its outliers, the nasty, nihilistic Zero Woman: Red Handcuffs (1974). We talk about girl gangs, anarchism, Japan in the 70s, defiant nudity, rape revenge films, exploitation cinema, and, of course, the divine trio of Meiko Kaji, Reiko Ike, and Miki Sugimoto. Thanks as always for supporting the show! Pretty please rate, review, and share! You can also find us on Apple and Spotify and please follow us on Instagram. Check out Essex Coffee Roasters (enter code CINEPUNX for 10% off).

Twitch of the Death Nerve really went off script for this latest episode, where Charles, Jon, and Samm discuss Mexican legend El Santo. One of the world’s greatest pop culture heroes, Santo made 50 films in addition to his celebrated wrestling career (and run of comic books, etc), so we decided to celebrate his life in a broader sense, rather than focusing on one particular film. We do share our mutual love of Santo and Blue Demon Vs. Dracula and the Wolf Man (1973), and if we have any particular focus to the episode, it’s the amazing horror films he made throughout his 20+ year span as a cult cinema star. We also decided to do something new with this episode and interview an expert — in this case, academic and historian David Wilt. Among other things, he’s a wealth of knowledge about Mexican pop culture. You might know his work with Mondo Macabro or CasaNegra, but he’s written a number of books including The Mexican Filmography, 1916-2001, as well as the comprehensive newsletter, Mexican Film Bulletin. I also love his YouTube channel, particularly his series of episodes on Mexican vampire films. Thanks as always for supporting the show! Pretty please rate, review, and share! You can also find us on Apple and Spotify and please follow us on Instagram. Check out Essex Coffee Roasters (enter code CINEPUNX for 10% off).

The latest episode of Twitch of the Death Nerve is devoted to French filmmaker Henri-Georges Clouzot and his masterpiece of suspense, Les diaboliques (1955). A landmark of crime and suspense cinema, it ushered in a new type of murder mystery. Charles, Jon, and Samm talk about their love for that film and so much more: Clouzot’s career, why Diabolique is so important and influential, the difference between the whodunnit and the whydunnit, the brilliant writing team of Boileau et Narcejac, related suspense films like Hitchcock’s Vertigo (1957), and the weird ’50s wave of mainstream movies about killing your spouse — among other things. Thanks as always for supporting the show! Pretty please rate, review, and share! You can also find us on Apple and Spotify and please follow us on Instagram. Check out Essex Coffee Roasters (enter code CINEPUNX for 10% off).