{"id":15866,"date":"2015-10-08T01:00:49","date_gmt":"2015-10-08T05:00:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/?p=15866"},"modified":"2015-10-08T02:30:24","modified_gmt":"2015-10-08T06:30:24","slug":"scream-greats-vol-1-tom-savini-master-of-horror-effects-1986","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/2015\/10\/08\/scream-greats-vol-1-tom-savini-master-of-horror-effects-1986\/","title":{"rendered":"Scream Greats, Vol. 1: Tom Savini, Master of Horror Effects (1986)"},"content":{"rendered":"

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For folks that want to learn everything and anything about Tom Savini, \u201cScream Greats\u201d is the cr\u00e8me de la cr\u00e8me of horror documentaries. Savini-philes will love the anecdotes and insight pulled from \u201cScream Greats,\u201d all the while savoring much of what the man and his company have produced for American horror cinema, from guts, gore, and basic prosthetics. \u201cScream Greats\u201d is infamous for me, mainly because it\u2019s one of those documentaries that revels in zombie cinema made famous by Savini. And anyone who knows me knows I was absolutely petrified of zombies for most of my childhood.<\/p>\n

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So this movie often went unseen in my yearly Halloween playlist. Watching it now, it definitely spotlights some of Savini\u2019s best gore and zombie effects front and center, discussing \u201cDawn of the Dead,\u201d and \u201cDay of the Dead,\u201d in great length. \u201cDay\u201d gets the most focus mainly because it garners the best stories, and has the most realistic special effects ever depicted in a horror movie. Savini explains that he used actual medical text books about the human body and researched stuff like scars, open wounds and the like, to help create the effects for \u201cDay of the Dead.\u201d This helped in his engineering of the brutal death scenes of the soldiers in the finale, and the famous zombie brain sequence.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s also a hilarious tale about how a mishap with a fridge helped turn the Rhodes gut munching finale in to a literally gut turning experience for the entire cast. The film has its definite charms here and there, with a lot of coverage on Savini\u2019s most disturbing effects, as well as a look at what inspired Savini to become a make up artist. In one of the better moments he demonstrates squibs with his wife pretending to shoot her with a shotgun. I also really enjoyed the interviews with the crew, including then assistant Gregory Nicotero, who was at the time, a fresh faced young man constantly tortured by Savini. Savini\u2019s props and effects are genius, and he discusses a lot of the mechanics and methods for staging some of the best sequences from films like \u201cManiac,\u201d \u201cThe Prowler,\u201d and \u201cMartin.\u201d<\/p>\n

Fangoria leaves no stone unturned here, exploring zombie make up, fake torsos, and discusses Savini\u2019s penchant for putting himself in danger quite often. Savini is a perfectly affable and charming guy who loves what he does here, and discusses what drives him, as well as what petrifies him. It\u2019s bugs. The man hates bugs. \u201cScream Greats\u201d is one of the best horror documentaries ever made, and one of the top filmmaking docs ever created, and it\u2019s a must for horror buffs of all kind. For folks that appreciate old fashioned make up and effects, this will definitely be up your alley. You may even be inspired to watch it two or three more times to pick up the knowledge Savini imparts here.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

For folks that want to learn everything and anything about Tom Savini, \u201cScream Greats\u201d is the cr\u00e8me de la cr\u00e8me of horror documentaries. Savini-philes will love the anecdotes and insight pulled from \u201cScream Greats,\u201d all the while savoring much of what the man and his company have produced for American horror cinema, from guts, gore, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,12],"tags":[292,359,472,477,501,885,1272,1111],"class_list":["post-15866","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-halloween-horror-month","category-movie-reviews","tag-documentary","tag-filmmaking","tag-hollywood","tag-horror","tag-indie-film","tag-s","tag-special-effects","tag-tom-savini"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15866","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15866"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15866\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15868,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15866\/revisions\/15868"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15866"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15866"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15866"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}