033 House On Haunted Hill
And we return to our regular scheduled broadcast. It’s a long overdue trip to the 1950s for William Castle’s “House On Haunted Hill”, where Vincent Price hands out handguns as party favours, a…
12 films, made outside the system · 12 with a known budget
These are the films the show has covered that were genuinely made independently: no major studio, no streamer, and not one of the established genre houses that had their own real infrastructure and wide theatrical distribution, like Hammer or the modern likes of A24 and Blumhouse. Some of these were shot for almost nothing by one or two people with a camera. Some are decades-old cult objects nobody expected to last. What they share is that somebody made them happen without a studio behind them.
What counts as "independent" here is a judgement call, not a fact the data gives us outright. It's set out, and can be argued with, in the site's own code.
$2.3M in today's money$200K at the time · source: $150,000–$200,000
And we return to our regular scheduled broadcast. It’s a long overdue trip to the 1950s for William Castle’s “House On Haunted Hill”, where Vincent Price hands out handguns as party favours, a…
$1.9M in today's money$169K at the time · source: £133,394
Last episode we watched “The Red Shoes”, considered by many to be the masterpiece of directors Powell and Pressburger, by contrast we now turn to the film that practically ended Michael Powell’s…
$1.2M in today's money$125K at the time · source: $114,000–$125,000
Episode 99 takes us to a small isolated farmhouse as the team experience George A Romero’s game changer “Night of the Living Dead”. A film which teaches us to always check the small print (or lack…
$1.4M in today's money$300K at the time · source: $300,000
We’re sticking with the work of Don Coscarelli, and going back to the classic that made his name; “Phantasm”. A film in which Angus Scrimm shows that, despite being older, he can still shoot his…
$1.4M in today's money$375K at the time · source: $375,000
If you go down to the woods today, you’re in for a big surprise, as you’ll find the WTH team sat there watching Sam Raimi’s classic “The Evil Dead”. A film which teaches you how to perform some…
$2.8M in today's money$900K at the time · source: $900,000-1.3 million
Heads up! Lee’s still in Canada, so Lady Jennifer, Chris and Adam sit down to watch Stuart Gordon’s first HP Lovecraft adaptation “Re-Animator”. A film in which we see a clear breach of…
$1.5M in today's money$750K at the time · source: $200,000–$750,000
In 2021, three podcasters went into a Zoom chat and were never seen again. The recordings of that meeting, believed lost, were recently recovered, and it became clear that they were talking about…
$1.4M in today's money$900K at the time · source: $900,000
We’re heading back to 2009 (or is it 1983?) for Ti West’s “The House of the Devil”. A film which gives us the do’s and don’t’s of babysitting: DO bring a friend along to ensure the employers…
$3.0M in today's money$1.9M at the time · source: €1.8 million
It’s the 2nd in our season of 5 Christmas Episodes, and this time we’re watching Jalmari Helander’s “Rare Exports”. Having opened their traditional Halloween crackers, the gang take the…
$1.1M in today's money$750K at the time · source: $750,000
This week, the gang check into the Yankee Pedlar Inn for Ti West’s hybrid of slacker comedy and haunted house chiller: “The Innkeepers”. A film which teaches us that lying to impress a woman…
$1.4M in today's money$1.0M at the time · source: <$1 million
It’s Adam’s birthday choice, so he’s wheeled out what he feels is an under appreciated blast of weirdness: Don Coscarelli’s “John Dies At The End”, adapted from the book by David Wong. A film in…
$2.2M in today's money$1.6M at the time · source: $1.6 million
It’s episode 69! And we don’t even laugh about it! We do, however, piss ourselves laughing at Taika Waititi & Jemaine Clement’s “What We Do In The Shadows” - possibly the best Vampire film (comedy…