Recent Updates and News for November, 2003

If you would like to receive an e-mail when there are new updates or news, e-mail me and I'll add you to my distribution list.
If you are currently on my news and updates list and wish to be removed, e-mail me and let me know.  I'll take you off my distribution list IMMEDIATELY!

Jim Siedow

1920 - 2003

November 22, 2003

I have just learned this morning that my friend, Jim Siedow, has passed away.  Please click HERE for more information.

To be honest, I'm still in shock and at a loss of words.  I'll write more about Jim later.

November 14, 2003

I have posted videos of the two-part story about the Texas Chainsaw Massacre that ran on the San Antonio television station, KSAT channel 12.  I was interviewed for both parts.  There are high and low res options for download.  Unfortunately, I could only make .wmv files of the videos which requires Microsoft Windows Media Player.  If someone would like to tell me how I can convert these files into some other more common formats like MPEG or MOV, I'd like to hear from them.  Go to the Media page and check them out.

Also, Gunnar Hansen has been very busy these days.  I just got an e-mail from him though.  He tells me that he has appeared in three films recently.  Murder Set Pieces, Chainsaw Sally and Swarm of the Snakehead.

November 7, 2003

The trip to Kingsland for the screening of TCM was great!  I got to meet some TCM fans that I had only known through e-mail.  People like Dane Sears and Robbie Sanders really made the trip worth while!  They also helped me recite the opening monologue to TCM because their film copy didn't have it.  Bob Burns was there giving the grand tour of the house.  Unfortunately, someone stole his original TCM lobby card right off the display table.  If anyone knows what happened to it, please return it to my address and I swear that NO questions will be asked.  You have my honest word.  If you send it to me, you don't even need to include a return address.  You can e-mail me annonymously for my address.

Originally, I had not been planning on attending the TCM 30th anniversary cast reunion in Ohio.  But a person, of whom I will not name, has very generously offered to pay for my wife and I to stay in a hotel for two nights there.  If anyone out there feels like being just as generous and helping us out with the cost of the airline tickets, it would be much appreciated.  My wife and I would very much like to go.

Speaking of money, the demands on my web site are now as such that I have had to move my site to yet another server.  Even though Time Warner was generous enough to sponsor and host my web site for free, I surpassed their monthly bandwidth limit and they dropped my site like a bad transmission.  Just in time for Halloween too!  Now, I'm on CoreNAP.  Although my site is running very smoothly on their server, it's not free.  So any donation to keep my site afloat would be greatly appreciated.

OK...  Enough of the begging!

Last month I mentioned that Noel Gross made a wonderful article about the TCM film locations and plugged my site endlessly in the Dallas Morning News.  Not only have I posted the articles to this site, but I have opened a new section of my web site simply called Media.  It's just a section of my site to archive the various media attention that my site has received.  I think of it as my own scrapbook.  I hope you enjoy it.

I found a GREAT write-up by Joe Bob Briggs and the making of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre.  It took me over an hour to read it.  Extremely informative.  Click HERE to read about it.  I have added it to the Links page.

Looks like someone has written a book about the Texas Chainsaw Massacre.  It's available from Titan Books, http://www.titanbooks.com.  It's called the Texas Chainsaw Massacre Companion by Stefan Jaworzyn.  Here's the press release about it:

'I believe that The Texas Chain Saw Massacre... is still the all-time  Œchampeenı when it comes to pure fright'  ­ Stephen King

This is the first ever, comprehensive guide to the most talked about horror movie of all time. Packed with exclusive interviews, scores of rare and unseen pictures, it includes a foreword from the chainsaw-wielding Leatherface himself, Gunnar Hansen!

In 1974, a low-budget, no-star horror movie was unleashed on the world, causing panic among the censors and provoking glee from its intended audience. The Texas Chain Saw Massacre is still as powerful today as when it was first seen almost thirty years ago.

Now, in this long-awaited companion to Tobe Hooperıs groundbreaking film, Stefan Jaworzyn gives us the inside story of one of the most successful, controversial and influential horror films ever made, as well as in-depth coverage of the three sequels, various documentaries and other movies also based on the life of serial killer Ed Gein.

³The Texas Chain Saw Massacre is still around. And itıs thriving.  It has entered the culture ­ itıs hard to pick up a chainsaw now without having it mean something menacing.² ­ Gunnar Hansen, from his foreword

€ A timeless cult classic in constant demand, the original film has enjoyed a UK cinema re-release and two DVD releases in the last three years alone.

€ The remake is in cinemas now!

€ There have also been Texas Chain Saw comics, a computer game, and even action figures!

€ The book also covers the three sequels: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2, starring Dennis Hopper, 1990ıs Leatherface: Texas Chainsaw Massacre III (still banned in the UK!) and the bizarre Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Next Generation, starring Renee Zellweger and Matthew McConaughey...

TITAN BOOKS
NOVEMBER 2003 UK - £16.99
DEC/JAN 2004 US - $19.95 US
PAPERBACK

AVAILABLE NOW TO PRE-ORDER ON AMAZON.COM

For further information, review copies, competitions and author interviews please contact:
Kate Jones - Press & Marketing Officer
kate.jones@titanemail.com
www.titanbooks.com
 

I'm very pleased to see that people have understood my web server situation and have volunteered to move their Fan Fotos from my site to their own web servers.  So go there to check them out!

More people have submitted more locations of where they're convinced the TCM actually happened.  Check out that ever-growing list HERE.