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Post by dem bones on Oct 8, 2018 18:10:49 GMT
A supernatural skating double bill.
Elia W. Peattie - On The Northern Ice: (The Shape of Fear, & Other Ghostly Tales, MacMillan, 1898). Ralph Hagadorn skates across the frozen river to attend his best friend's wedding. Echo Bay is also home to the girl he loves, Marie Beaujeu, though he has little hope of her accepting his proposal. As night falls Ralph is distracted by mystery skater who lures him from his intended route. On reaching his destination he learns of Marie's sudden death the previous day. It was her ghost steered him clear of the gaping fissure in the ice, saving his life.
Algernon Blackwood - The Glamour Of The Snow: (Pall Mall Magazine, Dec. 1911: Pan's Garden: A Volume of Nature Stories, MacMillan, 1912). Hibbert, holidaying at a resort on the slopes of the Swiss Alps, takes to visiting the ice rink after dark when his fellow tourists have long called it a day. One night he acquires a mystery skating partner; a slim young woman, freezing to the touch, who conceals her face behind a muffler. Hibbert longs to repeat the experience, but several nights pass without a glimpse of her.
On the night of the Hotel's costume ball, a heavy snow falls on the town. The streets are deserted, all save for the mystery woman who lures him out into the frozen darkness and further and further up the slope, away from the people, beyond the range of the church bells. Hibbert belatedly realises he's fallen under the spell of an Ice Spirit. It will take a skating feat bordering on the miraculous to save him.
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Post by dem bones on Oct 24, 2018 9:41:48 GMT
Ambrose Bierce - An Unfinished Race: ( San Francisco Examiner, 14 October 1888). Purportedly true account of the disappearance of a Leamington shoemaker in full view of witnesses on 3rd September 1873. James Burne Worson had struck a bet while drunk that he could run all the way to Coventry and back, a distance of around 40 miles. To see fair play done, three adjudicators followed close behind in a cart. "Suddenly - in the very middle of the roadway, not a dozen yards from them, and with their eyes full upon him - the man seemed to stumble, pitched headlong forward, uttered a terrible cry and vanished! He did not fall to the earth - he vanished before touching it. No trace of him was ever discovered."Read it HERERandy Miller - Porky Pig In The Mirror: (Stefan Dziemianowicz, Robert Weinberg, Martin H. Greenberg (eds.) - Horrors! 365 Scary Stories, 1998). Really nasty and, unfortunately, topical. When she finished as runner up at last year's Nationals, Coach Nelson predicted Olympic stardom. Twelve months on, bulimia notwithstanding, he's cursing her as a blimp. A thirteen-year-old has to make sacrifices if she wants to be a champion gymnast. Tim Waggoner - Skeptic: (Stefan Dziemianowicz, Robert Weinberg, Martin H. Greenberg (eds.) - Horrors! 365 Scary Stories, 1998). He's watching the Big Mike Martin versus The Raider pro-wrestling bout on TV, but his pal insists on ruining it. The "sport" is phoney, these guys are incredibly bad actors, "I don't think that people should act like something is real when it isn't, that's all," etc. Eventually they agree to pop down to the lake for a bite to eat ....
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Post by dem bones on Jan 12, 2019 10:08:23 GMT
Terminally gloomy baseball star 'Silent Smith' (aka, 'The Mortuary.') Artist uncredited, but it can only be Heitman C. Franklin Miller - The Ghost Of Silent Smith: ( Weird Tales, Feb. 1924). Here's a Story That Is Not Easily Forgotten. A comatose Andy Gregg is briefly possessed by the spirit of dead pitcher-in-black, 'Silent' Smith (the most miserable player in baseball history), to win 'Bears crucial play-off final versus the indomitable Leafs. Stanley G. Thompson - Sport For Ladies: ( Weird Tales, April 1924). A Grim Little Tale. A jailbreak by mismatched pair All American athlete Marshall Stollard and bone idle, backstabbing English weasel Ed 'Cockney' Cravens, both prisoners serving life sentences for murder. You can guess which is responsible for ultimately scuppering what should have been a great escape. Precious little 'Weird' about this one, minimal sport, but notable for a pro-Prohibition stance. Adam Meyer - The Edge: (Stefan Dziemianowicz, Martin H. Greenberg & Robert Weinberg [eds.], 100 Wicked Little Witch Stories, 1995). The Bobcats, a team of supposed has-beens, are topping their division while their opponents keep losing star players to mysterious "injuries." The new coach is clearly up to something, but what?
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Post by dem bones on Apr 24, 2019 7:09:49 GMT
Robert S. Carr - The Flying Halfback: ( Weird Tales, Sept. 1925). Chung Wo-lung accomplished a Spectacular Exit for Tommy Kee. A sane but evil scientist and a star footballer are rivals for the hand & Co. of innocent, beautiful beyond compare, Toy Sing. As Tommy Kee prepares for the big game, Chung Wo-lung gets busy perfecting his anti-gravity device. Ralph Barton (Told by Emil Raymond) - The Spirit Quarterback: ( Ghost Stories, Feb. 1927). Only a miracle could save Evandale from inglorious defeat at the gridiron. Then came - the Spirit Quarterback.Graham Masterton - J. R. E. Ponsford: ( 13 More Tales of Horror, 1994). Phantom cricketer uses bat to bust some public schoolboy skull.
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Post by dem bones on Aug 19, 2019 8:16:41 GMT
Humour me. Wal Paget E. B. Osborn - The Extra Back: The Strange Story of the Great Football Match at Pencombe: ( Pall Mall, March 1910). Pencombe, a mining town in South Wales. Welsh international Vincent Jenkins has captained the local rugby XV for a decade when "Death, the referee without a whistle, order(s) him out of his happy playing grounds." The Pencombe lads unanimously agree that, despite this tragedy, they will honour their forthcoming fixture versus Terawley as it's what Vince would have wanted. The match takes place on a miserably cold afternoon with Dicky Dyke, promising young ginger, standing in for the late captain. Dicky puts in a man of the match performance, but too many of his teammates are off their game and, come half time, Pencombe are staring humiliation in the face. When Dicky is cynically wiped out by the opposition's resident hatchet man, Vincent's ghost intervenes to inspire a miracle comeback.
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Post by dem bones on Sept 14, 2019 16:09:54 GMT
Charles E. Crombie G. A. Riddell & Bernard Darwin - Mephistopheles on the Links: ( The Strand, Aug. 1908). Routine nefarious-bargain-with-the-Devil misadventure set in the build up to the Open at Seaworth. Mephistopheles exploits John Lee's lust for glory to ensnare his soul. Also features Postlewaite the millionaire, "stricken down in his middle age with golfing insanity."
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Post by dem bones on Sept 23, 2019 20:02:46 GMT
Sport is supernatural: Armada Ghost Special: Philip Sidney Jennings - Run for Your Life: (Mary Danby [ed.], Armada Ghost 15, 1983). A fright from the scythe-swinging phantom toll-keeper prompts Danny's sprint to victory in the end of year cross country trials. Eve Gothard - Magic on the Field: (Mary Danby [ed.], Armada Ghost 11, 1979). Several years after his death, Phil Gaskell scores the winning goal in Fairfield Junior's dramatic second half comeback victory over perennial bogey team, St Kenelms. Charles Thornton - The Haunted River: (Mary Danby [ed.], Armada Ghost 6, 1976). I suppose fishing must count as a sport, otherwise there'd be no Subbuteo Angling (" ... reproduces all the thrills, hazards and rewards of real coarse fishing with true-to-life accuracy for the enjoyment of young and old.")
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Post by helrunar on Sept 23, 2019 20:27:19 GMT
Sport IS horror darling. You should have heard the sounds from this mob that gathered in the neighbor's back yard to watch and revel during the last big US football orgy a couple of weekends ago. Enough to wake the dead which frankly would have been more amusing.
cheers, H.
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Post by mcannon on Sept 23, 2019 22:20:41 GMT
Sport IS horror darling. You should have heard the sounds from this mob that gathered in the neighbor's back yard to watch and revel during the last big US football orgy a couple of weekends ago. Enough to wake the dead which frankly would have been more amusing. cheers, H. Hmmm - probably a good thing that you're not living next door to me during the current Rugby World Cup then, Helrunar! (Australia's first match was almost a horror story in itself....) Mark
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Post by helrunar on Sept 24, 2019 2:44:32 GMT
The gang that had gathered on the lawn next door for that game included a lot of women who kept performing this synchronized sort of cooing and yowling that was reminiscent of moments in the recent horror film Midsommar. It should have been fascinating from the point of view of ethnography. But it wasn't.
H.
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Post by Dr Strange on Sept 24, 2019 14:51:12 GMT
How was Midsommar, H? I haven't seen it yet, but definitely intend to.
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Post by helrunar on Sept 24, 2019 15:41:48 GMT
Hi Dr Strange,
It was very much a mixed bag for me. The photography, art direction, settings were all beautifully done. I did not care at all for the script but if I were to tell you specifics, there would be spoilers. The main thing is that only the protagonist is at all fully realized as a character, and she's typical of what we have seen a lot of in recent films and TV shows--a neurotic, traumatized, flailing American young woman of a certain age and outlook. In all fairness, Florence Pugh who is British brought great artistry and spot-on emotional dynamics to the role. I just did not care much for the character, particularly as the story developed.
Everyone else in it represents a cliche rather than a person. So, it was difficult to care much about the story. I also found some of the up-to-date graphic horror elements left me so numb that by halfway through, viewing it had receded completely into the realm of, yes, an ethnographic exercise.
The trailer had such beautiful imagery and so many of my friends were discussing it that I wanted to see it. I don't regret having spent the time on it but it is not a film I would ever want to waste time on again.
Best, H.
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Post by helrunar on Sept 24, 2019 15:44:55 GMT
An interesting footnote to the above. Lead actress Pugh and the director had diametrically opposed (180 degree opposition) views on what the character was feeling at the end, and what the ending itself signified. I found that fascinating in and of itself. After I saw it, I read some web articles and interviews to try to find out more about what the actors though about the movie and why people were touting it.
H.
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Post by dem bones on Oct 13, 2019 16:06:03 GMT
Two from Dennis Pepper's The New Young Oxford Book of Ghost Stories, (OUP, 1999) Paul Fisher Johnson Snookered Catherine Graham - Snookered: Three snooker loopy youths acquire a well-meaning hanger-on in the gawky form of Smithy, a social outcast with a big heart and a bent cue which belonged to his grandpa. Sometimes his encouragement can grate on the nerves, as is the case when our narrator, Alan, is struggling for form on the eve of the Youth Final. Angry with the world and hacked off at Smithy's criticism of his game, he throws the lad's treasured stick in the canal. Instantly regretted, of course, and it's not like he could have known Smithy would jump in after it .... And so to the afternoon of the final at the Civic Hall. Even in Death, Smithy is not done with touchline coaching. Robert Scott - The Opening Match : David and Peter strike a bond. Whichever of them dies first will return to let the other know if there is cricket in Heaven.
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Post by dem bones on Oct 22, 2019 12:08:43 GMT
Alan MacDonald - Baggy Shorts: (Wendy Cooling (ed.), Go For Goal, Dolphin 1997). Lowly youth team Ditchley Rovers scrape through to face perennial trophy winners Top Valley in the cup final at Wembley Park. An odds on defeat just got more odds on as goalie Flip is injured with no replacement in the squad. That's when the mystery boy shows up. Tall, built like a runner bean, comically attired in retro green roll-neck jumper, flat cap and baggy shorts. The Ditchley guys damn near laugh him back to Oxfam's. The kid - they never catch his name - insists he's an experienced keeper, really good, and it's not like they've anything better in their ranks. He comes on at half time, and sparks the inevitable dramatic comeback from 2-0 down, with narrator Joss Porter netting a last gasp winner. As Ditchley celebrate, the undisputed man of the match, quietly wanders off, never to be seen again .... until Porter Senior spots his likeness while sorting through a box of 1940's cigarette cards.
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