splatterjunkie

As some of you may know, we here at splatterjunkie.com like to celebrate a little holiday called October 4^th: Horror Independence Day—a day honoring independent horror filmmaking. Since we invented the holiday, we’re pretty much the only ones who celebrate it, so in the interest of spreading awareness, here’s a peek at what went down on the first-ever October 4^th celebration.

First of all, there are four October 4^th traditions: 1.) watching an indie horror movie, 2.) contributing a little cash to an independent filmmaker, 3.) the baking of a Shamble Pie, and 4.) the splatterworks display. We began the evening with an adventurous foray into baking as we created the first-ever Shamble Pie, which is basically any damn thing you want stuffed into a Filo crust.

To slightly modify Richard Nixon’s famous line: I am not a cook. I have never been a cook. I have no aspirations of being a cook in the future. The Shamble Pie emerged from the oven looking a bit like a crying slug, if you can imagine that. Biting into the thing, I was immediately relieved that it wasn’t as foul-tasting as its appearance would suggest. However, after finishing my slice, I realized that perhaps I had gone overboard with the cheese and suddenly felt the deadly onset of cheese overdose. I enjoy cheese, but my god, the flavor of it was so ferocious that it numbed my face, left me nauseous, and utterly ruined Gruyere for me, possibly forever. And so, I came to the conclusion that perhaps the baking of Shamble Pie is not the best of traditions after all, as I certainly don’t want people to associate violent disgust with October 4^th.

Fortunately, no one else was foolhardy enough to try eating the crying slug and so the other guests were spared my fate. Fortifying myself with strong drink, I rejoined the others in the living room where we were preparing to engage in the traditional watching of an indie horror movie. While we were at the Alamo City Comic Con (coverage on that soon) we were able to get ahold of a movie called Sanitarium, featuring direction from San Antonio local, Bryan Ortiz. Since we had purchased the movie directly from their booth, we considered that as our financial contribution to independent filmmaking, thereby fulfilling the donation tradition. I would tell you more about the movie, buy you’ll just have to wait for our review to come out 😉

After watching the movie and having ordered more palatable food, we went outside to enjoy the splatterworks spectacular. For those of you that don’t know, a splatterwork is simply a firework with a blood-pack wrapped around it; it’s our own bloody take on fireworks. I could tell you about our splatterworks display, but why not just watch the video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hnGCVkXdopU

And so, the first October 4^th celebration came to pass, a small and humble affair, but one that we hope will be carried on in the years to come, by ourselves and perhaps by others. We love October 4^th because we love indie horror, because it adds a little bit of awesome to the beginning of the month, and most of all because it gives people a reason to come together and bask in the glory of the macabre one more time per year. So if you love indie horror or just can’t wait for Halloween and want to start the party early, then please, join us in celebration next year when October 4^th comes creeping by again.