Mario Dominick — Exploring the Underground: The Mainstream Viewer’s
Mario Dominick has been reviewing & charting the horror underground on various off & on-line publications for a few years now, so he’s the perfect writer to cover this subject. And through-out the book you really feel his passion for the underground film horror scene. The book took six years for him to write and complete, and truly it’s a must have for any fan of the genre.
In all the book takes in 21 chapters, and each of these start off with a short introduction about the film makers work before going into lengthy & in-depth interviews, discussing how the film makers first got into underground horror, their various films & how their films are produced, etc. Dotted through-out the book are black & white film stills, film artwork, on set pictures, etc. Mario really has given the most impressive & detail looks at the underground horror genre I can think of.
Featured in the book we have the likes of : Fred Vogel of TOETAG( of the infamous August Underground Trilogy, and others). Ron DeCaro of For the Better of Mankind Productions( of the great & disturbing Brightside Trilogy films). Michael Todd Schneider of MagGot Films( who most famously appeared as the deranged brother on August Undergrounds Mordum- but has produced a whole host of his own films). Andrey Iskanov( often surreal yet brutal Russian director of such films as Philosophy of a Knife & nails), and many others.
On the whole this is a very impressive work covering a whole host of underground horror fare. If I was to criticize one thing it would be the books title, as I think really you need to have some interest already in the modern underground horror film genre before picking this up, because really it doesn’t review or critic the films themselves, but instead is more of a collection of interviews. But this is just a minor quibble, and should not put you off!-if you are familiar or interested in any of the film makers in from the underground horror genre.
The first pressing of the book came in an edition of just 100 copies, and I got my copy direct from the author- at one point the book was on sale at Toe Tag’s internet store, but it no longer seems to be there….so you might have to do some hunting for this book, but if you’re a fan of the modern underground horror film genre, it really is worth your time & effort.