Free Republic

Joe Bob Briggs, the iconic Horror alter-ego of film critic and comedian John Bloom and current host of The Last Drive-In, has become the target of accusations of homophobia, transphobia, and racism from members of the Horror community, with many of the allegations stemming from columns written by Briggs in which he defended free speech and questioned the benefit of the ever expanding ‘LGBT’ acronym.The discourse surrounding Briggs’ character began on May 14th, when Killing Brooke actor and producer Johnny Donaldson published a Medium article which asserted in its headline that “Horror has a Leadership Problem.”In his post, Donaldson claims...

JUPITER, Fla.—The plastic remote on my Sunbeam Electric Heated Fleece Blanket went haywire last night and made me oversleep, so I spent the day in my spaghetti-strap T-shirt and my favorite pair of wind pants from the Adidas outlet store out on Interstate 95 binge-watching the Death Wish series because I couldn’t remember which movie had the scene where Charles Bronson blows away Laurence Fishburne with a perfect American Sniper-style long-distance kill shot that goes through the giant boom box Laurence is holding on his shoulder and into the lowlife gangbanger’s skull. It turned out to be in Death Wish...

NEW YORK—If you study Method acting at one of the great New York studios that grew out of the Stanislavsky system, the first thing they teach you is that acting is not about speaking, it’s about reacting. “Always watch the actor who is not speaking,” the great Freddie Kareman used to tell his classes at Carnegie Hall. “If he’s engaged and focused and concentrated, that’s when you’ll see his craft.” Or as Martin Scorsese once told me, “Pay no attention to the words. We’ll change the words. We’re looking for what’s underneath the words.” The great thing about watching a...

NEW YORK—All over America IKEA futons are groaning with the restless insomnia of journalists—tossing, turning, cursing the impotence of their melatonin capsules—burdened with the future of the Republic. Long nights of torment, and then . . . Morning resolve! Before they’ve even microwaved their second Jimmy Dean Sausage Sandwich, they know that this will be the day of reckoning. They will fire up the Kia Sedona and take the long way to work, giving them more time to think about the epic 1,500 words that will make the difference between chaos and civilization. Yes, they tell their wives, It’s time...

"It's actually rather scholarly, or at least as scholarly as a book written about films like ILSA, SHE-WOLF OF THE SS can be." - reader review on Amazon.com. "... the result is a book that blends fascinating pop-culture history, first-rate film criticism, and learned commentary on the stunt-vomit in The Exorcist." - today's National Review. HORROR SHOWBrigg’s Disturbing. Profoundly Disturbing: Shocking Movies That Changed History!, by Joe Bob Briggs (Universe, 256 pp., $24.95) EDITOR'S NOTE: This review appears in the September 1, 2003, issue of National Review. The title is reassuringly lurid and the cover comfortingly nasty, but, on opening...